Don Addis Editorial Cartoons E-mail a letter to the editor

June 23, 2000

Editorials
The high price of skullduggery
During the 1998 campaign, Bankers Insurance Co. of St. Petersburg and its corporate siblings contributed $440,500 to the Florida Republican Party. No other source gave as much. But from then through March 30, the last reporting date, the Bankers group turned positively stingy, giving only $8,000 to the GOP and a smattering of cash to three local politicians.

Able medical examiner needed
Medical examiners are vital to the criminal justice system. They investigate suspicious deaths, help determine if crimes were committed and influence the outcome of trials. They should be competent medical professionals, managers and witnesses.

Tarnished police trust
Out-of-control police units damage the public's trust of officers who protect, abide by the law and respect our constitutional rights.

Letters
Court's ruling on school prayer is ridiculous
Re: Prayers given by students silenced, June 20.  

Perspective
Taking jobs, alienating customers
For weeks Americans have been told that the outsourcing of high-tech jobs is good for our economy. So said Greg Mankiw, chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers in a recent report signed by President Bush. So, too, writes Thomas Friedman of the New York Times in articles praising the rise of call centers in India used for everything from making airline reservations and reading medical X-ray films to providing tech support for American computer firms.

Philip Gailey: Democrats fall off campaign finance reform wagon
Well, what do you know. Soft money is back, and it's making hypocrites of all those Democrats who fervently championed the McCain-Feingold campaign reform law, not to mention those Republicans who objected to the law's restrictions on issue advocacy.

Bill Maxwell: Who is for the farm worker?
Florida Gov. Jeb Bush is touting legislation to improve the lives of Florida's 300,000-plus farm workers, who endure institutional and systemic injustices each day in our fields and groves and their personal lives.

Robyn E. Blumner: For some defendants, an American gulag
In Bernard Malamud's masterpiece The Fixer, inmate Yakov Bok was subjected to psychological torture in a Soviet gulag through the humiliations of constant shackling and repeated strip searches.