Discord Over the Concorde

To the Editors:

Granting of limited service to the Concorde SST [Jan. 19] would be akin to planting a small bomb in Times Square to see if its effect were boon or bane.

David Oldham

New York City

Not allowing the Concorde to land in the U.S. not only would prove detrimental to our relations with France and Britain but would show the world that the U.S., which has always been a leader in technological advancements, is hindering a major breakthrough.

Jim Skoulikas

Lowell, Mass.

We need the Concorde like we need skin cancer and further depletion of the world's oil reserves. Rejecting the Concorde would snub France, but so what? As for Britain, it might be the best thing we could do for it. Maybe we would force the British to face reality and pump money into more vital, potentially profit-making industries.

William R. Bufkins

Princeton, N.J.

America (as we all know) believes in "free" trade, but not so free that U.S. industry is outdone. So feeble excuses like destruction of the ozone layer are put forth, even when every chemist knows that the Concorde would have an infinitesimal effect on the ozone layer, which is already being so effectively destroyed by the hydrofluorides in spray cans.

Roderick Ryan

Melbourne, Australia

TIME neglected the vital matter of fuel reserves. British Airways admits that the plane's fuel reserves are so low as to impair "regularity [and] punctuality of operation, especially to New York and Washington," but says that "if, in order to improve regularity of direct service to New York, holding fuel is increased by 15 minutes," payload will have to be reduced by 26% to 43%.

Not surprisingly, the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization has warned that the Concorde will need priority on landing, put a substantial burden on the air-traffic control system, and may cause delays for other flights.

John F. Hellegers

Environmental Defense Fund

Washington, D.C.

You quoted Senator Goldwater: "If we lock out the Concorde, that will be further evidence that the U.S. is becoming a has-been power." Perhaps rejection of the Concorde would be evidence the U.S. is becoming a power interested in preserving its environment.

Lon Mitchell

San Diego

The Power Boys

I could not help comparing the [Jan. 19] approach to life of the "Power Boys" with that of Mother Teresa and the other "Living Saints" you presented a few weeks ago. If our best response to the problems of the world is "Devil take the hindmost," then the species does not deserve to survive--and it won't.

Peter Battis

Swampscott, Mass.

It is my fervent hope that when "Hustler" Ringer and "Power" Korda some day turn to a fellow human for aid, they are met only with a "power gaze."

Mark S. Herrick

Marlboro, Vt.

Rat-cage ethics!

Will Faas

Lewisburg, Pa.

If Author Robert Ringer considers himself to be a follower of Ayn Rand, I suggest he study her philosophy further. In The Fountainhead, Hero Howard Roark says of ruthless Newspaper Publisher Gail Wynand:

"I haven't mentioned to him the worst secondhander of all--the man who goes after power."

Judy White Feather

New York City

The P.LO.'s Peace

Relentlessly, the P.L.O. propaganda machine is blasting away, this time from the United Nations Security Council [Jan. 19], with its worn-out phrases about a "peaceful, secular, democratic state in Palestine where Moslem, Christian and Jew will live in harmony."

Whom are they fooling? The peace that is now overtaking Lebanon, which was such a state, will be the peace of the graveyard.

George Sauer

South Orange, N.J.

Palestine is not just a "problem" but a group of people who feel an identity. Israel should understand what it's like to be a people without a country.

Nancy Figgins Henderek

Houston

So Chou Goes

Your praise of Communist Chou En-lai [Jan. 19] was impressive. You should have been as kind to J.F.K.

Jerry Jacobs

Monroeville, Ind.

You would not have praised murderous criminals like Hitler or Stalin. Why do you praise Chou?

Murray I. Franck

New York City

Doctors and Patients

For a long time medical costs have been completely out of proportion to services rendered by physicians or to their interest in or compassion for patients.

The lack of support physicians are finding over high malpractice insurance costs [Jan. 19] is simply the patients' way of saying: "How do you like it when the shoe is on the other foot?"

Eugene J. Friedman

Boynton Beach, Fla.

Re malpractice: What is to prevent a dissatisfied parent from deciding that a teacher is the cause of his son's failure to graduate from high school and bringing suit for x thousands of dollars?

Eloise Kennedy

Sante Fe, N. Mex.

Our Sick Postal Service

Mr. Heiskell's letter [Jan. 19] is charitable in that it does not rub President Ford's nose in the most hopeless aspect of the Post Office situation: most of the 700,000 postal workers are forever protected by a no-layoff clause.

This guaranteed free ride through life is offensive to many of us in private industry whose jobs depend on the ability of our employers to compete effectively in the marketplace. Competition and the right to lay off. These two pills could help cure our sick Postal Service.

Howard Caine

New York City

When William Faulkner quit his job as a postal worker here so he wouldn't be at "the beck and call of every s.o.b. who's got two cents to buy a stamp," he didn't realize he was giving up a great financial future. As an assistant professor, I find it irritating that the barely literate persons who read my 9-c- penny postcards make more money than I do.

Ron F. Fister

Oxford, Miss.

Progress has reduced the importance of the printed word in America. So let the economic chips fall where they may.

William H. McClure

Cincinnati

Where There's Smoke, There's Ire

I am startled at your TIME Essay by Michael Demarest on "Smoking: Fighting Fire With Ire" [Jan. 12].

As the Surgeon General who issued the Advisory Committee Report on Smoking and Health on Jan. 11, 1964, I am proud that the report has stood the test of time in that the conclusions have been reconfirmed and extended by additional studies.

It is scientifically established that many persons can be made ill by exposure to intense smoke from others. In addition, a vast majority of the non-smokers find such exposure uncomfortable and unpleasant. It is much too serious a problem to have fun poked by a tongue-in-cheek essay.

Luther L. Terry

Surgeon General, Ret.

U.S. Public Health Service

Washington, D.C.

Michael Demarest, who plainly must be a smoker, completely misses the most crucial point in the nonsmokers' fight for the right to clean air.

I have no desire to contract lung cancer because of someone else's addiction.

Trudy E. Bell, Editor

Scientific American

New York City

Off the Beam

I was appalled to read in the article on lasers [Jan. 12] that in addition to repairing retinal detachments as a medical usage, lasers were also used to remove cataracts. I have spent a number of hours over the past several years explaining to patients that lasers are not used in the removal of cataracts. In fact, the presence of a cataract many times precludes using the laser in treatment of diseases of the back of the eye, since the laser beam will not penetrate a dense cataract.

Frank B. Thompson, M.D.

San Gabriel, Calif.

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