The Daily News Leader from Staunton, Virginia • 4

4 Staunton, Leader, Thursday. 27, 1973 WHAT A TANGLE SS system needs reform Today's health Lester I. Coleman, M.D. colleagues in an effort to tie up a relationship between a husband's occupation and the likelihood that his wife might develop cancer of the cervix of the womb. Cell studies by smears showed that women married to house painters, miners, and other laborers had a higher rate of cancer of the cervix than did the wives of clerical workers, artists, and professional men.

These are the findings, but as yet this remarkable relationship between a husband's activity and a wife's illness has not been satisfactorily explained. Gall bladder stones, especially those that interfere with the free flow of bile, have for years been treated surgically. Until recently, methods by which the stones could be dissolved have been tried with little or no success. A new approach to this problem seems to be more effective, and indicates that the treatment for stones may yet lie in the use of heparin. When patients were given large doses of heparin intravenously, many of the stones dissolved in about nine days.

Dr. H.C. Patterson, at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, reported these preliminary studies. It is hoped that this may also lead to methods of dissolving kidney stones. A new method is now being tried to pinpoint areas of the heart damaged by coronary artery disease.

Ultrasound, or ultrasonic vibrations, are being used to locate tiny areas of the heart that are damaged. Dr. Padmaker Lele and his co-workers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are utilizing these sound echoes, in conjunction with computers, to reveal information about the heart that escapes the Among the few things Congress got done before recessing for its between sessions recess was enactment of the bill to increase Social Security benefits again. This time it is for 11 per cent, in two stages beginning in 1974. The President is expected to sign the bill, which makes an election year gift to some 30 million SS beneficiaries.

Sooner or later, Congress will have to reform the SS law drastically. It never was actuarily sound. Taxation for it has become an additional income tax, with almost annual increases and no deductions. It requires employers to deduct it from everyone on their payrolls, and to match the deductions from their own gross earnings not from the net. The system has been changed radically since its creation by the SS Act enacted in 1935.

It was viewed then as a weapon aginst the depression, persuading elderly workers to retire, thus providing openings for young workers. It has become a "fiscal giant and is the second largest source of federal revenues larger than that from corporate income taxes and second only to individual income say specialists who have been making a study for Midwestern Industries, Inc. These studies have shown that SS beneficiaries who have retired since 1937 receive benefits roughly 10 times the amount contributed. It will be 1983 before anyone who will have contributed all his working life retires an aspect of the system which explains its great popularity with persons now retired or near retirement. Milton Friedman, an economist, of the.

University of Chicago, has developed the fact that persons in high income brackets will receive higher benefits relative to taxes paid than lower income earners. Dr. Friedman has also found that the self-employed pay a lower tax as a result of the system's working. Perhaps it would have been impossible to write a compulsory federal pension law without some 1 inequities. Some hold that the exemption of benefits from the income tax is an inequity, but the majority of beneficiaries is dependent on their SS checks and it would not be equitable to exempt them and not those who have additional income.

Advocates of SS reform say the following are some of the existing deficiencies: The rapidly increasing payroll tax which will amount to 12.1 per cent in 1978. The fact that this tax is regressive and takes a larger percentage from a poor or average worker's income than it does from a more affluent person. The system is unfair to those between 65 and 72 who continue to work. The system is grossly unfair to today's young people who will be paying high payroll taxes in order to pay for the benefits of persons who will be retiring over the next few decades. Young people have been put in the position of paying more than they will receive in benefits because the payroll tax was not geared to pay for obligations in the years 1937 to 1965.

Recent developments in the system also are having a harmful effect on industry. small businesses. The increasing payroll tax (which is, of course, an increasing cost of labor) has forced most businesses to pass on these higher costs to consumers in the form of higher prices, thereby adding to our already growing inflation. Industry is required to contribute to both social security and pension plans in most instances. Most fundamentally, the system has grown like Topsy without any real thought for the future.

Various ways to reform SS have been suggested, among them being a negative income tax. Economist Friedman holds that this single device would assure everyone a minimal income, alleviating need for the complicated and often wasteful social services. Another way: the government could pay off all of its existing SS obligations and require everyone to belong to a private pension plan. Profs. James Buchanan, VPI State U.

economist, and Colin Campbell, Dartmouth College economist, hold that the SS Administration is bankrupt, which is not surprising. Experts declared it contrary to actuarial principles when it was passed in 1935. Buchanan and Campbell urge that the national debt inherent in the system and its future operations be placed on a sound actuarial system. That the tax rates which would be required would be acceptable to legislators and future beneficiaries and employers is doubtful. Mandatory private pension systems may have more appeal and probably could be operated without politics which dictate increases in election years and would be a way to prevent inequities.

These Days, by Jeffrey Hart Rockefeller's career a paradox My husband and I read a recent newspaper article which said that people who drink alcohol have fewer heart attacks than those who don't He has recovered from one heart attack and now he thinks that alcohol will be his salvation. He already drinks far more than anyone I know. Isn't alcohol dangerous in other ways? Mrs.N.Y.,Pa. Dear Mrs. The study you refer to was released by the American Heart Association.

It is true that their preliminary research indicated fewer heart attacks among people who drank liquor than among those who were total abstainers. This report was not meant to give license to those who drink large quantities of alcohol, a license to continue, or to increase their consumption. The exact interpretation of these statistics is not completely clear, even to those scientists who made the observation. This will be forthcoming at a later date. Even if there is any validity to the preliminary study, it must be remembered that liver damage is one of the dangerous products of excessive drinking.

When the liver is damaged, blood that is dammed back creates pressure on the heart and lungs which can be extremely hazardous especially to one who has had a previous heart attack. Another important aspect of this study substantiated the fact that tobacco was strongly indicted as a cause of heart attacks. Three members of my family have deep furrows in the tongue. Does thes mean that we are more susceptible to developing cancer of the tongue than others? One member of our family had it Mr.J.E.,Ky. Dear Mr.

The condition you describe is known as "geographic tongue" because the appearance resembles markings on a relief map. Some hereditary -link is responsible. There is, however, no serious implication. Only on rare occasions is there any relationship between the appearance and vitamin or dietary deficiency. There is no need to fear that these deep ridges predispose you or your family to cancer, infection or any other local disorder.

From Manchester, England, comes an interesting sociological study. Three hundred thousand women were studied by Dr. John Wakefield and his Letter to the editor He's No 'Damn Fool' After the robbery of the Rockingham Bank of Grottoes I went into the woods and found the bag of money that had better than $5,000 dollars in it, which was taken in the robbery on Dec. 18, 1973. I have had so many people to tell me and call me on the phone and say that they thought I was crazy and they knowed it now, and a damned fool to give the money back to the bank.

If I am crazy and a damn fool, it just isn't enough of crazy and dam fools around here to be honest. I have a little money, if I get hungry and need a little money. I have some friends among which is the Rockingham Bank of Grottoes, and also, the Bank of New Hope, New Hope, Virginia. And my old buddy, Dr. G.

G. Tanner of Grottoes. L.E. (BILL) COLEMAN Sheriff Glenn M. Weatherholtz of Rockingham verifies the statement of Mr.

Coleman that he found the stolen money and returned it to the bank.) pleased conservatives by his stringent anti-drug legislation, and by his refusal to knuckle under to the insurrectionaries at Attica Prison. Also important is a shift in the Rockefeller rhetoric. It is not all that long since any Republican to the right of Rockefeller was in constant danger of being branded an extremist, a zealot, or a "dark" force completely outside the Republican One gathers that Rockefeller has found out where the mainstream actually is by counting the votes at the last three Republican conventions. Whatever the reason, however, he is now talking in the accents of the national Republican Rockefeller's liabilities, from a conservative Republican standpoint, remain, and may not be overcome. His veto of a bill restricting abortion is remembered by many.

His reputation as a big government, high tax politician evokes a sour response. Professionals sense a lack of for every Kissinger he has attracted, he has also found an Emmet Hughes. But for the first time in his long career Rockefeller has made himself a viable candidate for the nomination. Columnist Hart says that after 15 years Rockefeller may be on the threshold of The Big Prize. For the last 15 years, the career of Nelson Rockefeller has represented a paradox.

From the time of his upset victory over Averell Harriman in 1958, Rockefeller has completely mastered the political equations in New York, steamrollering all challengers: Frank D. O'Connor, Robert Morgenthau, Arthur Goldberg. He was a toughly practical governor, and he ran the state the way the Borgias ran Renaissance Florence. But the political equations of the national Republican Party entirely eluded him. There he was no Borgia, but rather King Constantine of Greece.

Incredibly, in three successive presidential years 1960, 1964, 1968 Rockefeller presented himself as an Eastern liberal; this, at a time when that brand of Republicanism was a shrinking force within the party. It remains a mystery why Richard Nixon could grasp the fact but Rockefeller could not that the center of Republican gravity was shifting south and west. Now, as 1973 draws to a close, Rockefeller like some terribly slow but tenacious student' seems at last to have grasped that fact. His reward: a growing acceptability among Republican conservatives; and, therefore, his best shot at the nomination. The reason is simple: conservatives constitute three-quarters of the delegates to Republican conventions these days.

As a matter of fact, there was much even in the Old Rockefeller possessing conservative appeal. Rockefeller has always been sound on foreign policy and on national defense. He recognizes the international responsibilities of the U.S. It is no accident that Henry Kissinger came out of the Rockefeller shop. And Rockefeller has always given a high priority to military strength.

On the welfare issue, Rockefeller has undergone a Road-to-Damascus style conversion. In 1968 he ran for the nomination as the advocate of a hugely expensive and comprehensive guaranteed income. Today, he says, he has come to realize the bureaucratic fat, the fraud, and the mismanagement in our welfare setup. He also says that Ronald Reagan knows more about welfare than anyone in the country, and he has launched a tough crackdown on abuses. The list lengthens.

Rockefeller Today in history Interesting opinion shifts PBW takes on all comers members and lists 1,209 stocks. Of the 1,209, only 135 are "primary" stocks. The rest are also carried on either the New York or American exchanges. If the SEC is upheld, and institutional investors are ordered out of the PBW, financial advisers say it would not mean the end of the exchange. But they say it would force it to trim its sail, perhaps signaling its return to its old role as an exclusively regional exchange.

order. It is now preparing to appeal to the Supreme Court, and at the same time trying to convince the institutions to do some public business. The PBW is the nation's oldest exchange. It was originally called the Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington Stock Exchange, but changed its name and its staid image after Elkins Wetherill took over as president in 1965. Today, the exchange has 444 By The Associated Press Today is Thursday, Dec.

27, the 361st day of 1973. There are four days left in the year. Today's highlight in history: On this date in 1949, Queen Juliana of the Netherlands signed an act granting sovereignty to Indonesia after nearly 350 years of Dutch rule. On this date: In 1571, the pioneer German astronomer, Johannes Kepler, was born in Wurttemberg. In 1822, the scientist known as the founder of preventive medicine, Louis was born in the French city of Dole.

In 1900, prohibitionist Carrie Nation staged her first raid on a saloon, smashing bottles at a bar in Wichita, Kan. In 1944, in World War II, an American tank column smashed across the German bulge in Belgium and relieved U.S. troops who had been under siege at Bastogne. In 1945, after World War II, the United States, Britain and the Soviet Union announced that they would govern Korea as joint trustees for five years, then grant independence. In 1966, a rally of 100,000 Red Guards in Peking denounced China's President Liu Shao-chi.

Ten years ago: Chancellor Ludwig Erhard of West Germany arrived in Houston for a meeting with President Lyndon Johnson at his Texas ranch. Five years ago: The Apollo 8 space capsule and its three astronauts made a safe landing in the Pacific after a flight that took them into orbit around the moon. One year ago: A week of the heaviest U.S. air raids of the Vietnam war left scores of targets in ruins in North Vietnam. States.

How we will clean up the environment, create job opportunities, raise human productivity and improve the individual's life quality unless we work hard and develop our natural resources, particularly those useful for the production of energy, is a complete mystery. It is interesting to note that most of those who take this airy view of life in the future have had the benefit of a college education. No sweeping generalization can be made, but all this raises the suspicion that a college education cannot be said to automatically bestow upon its possessor a high level of intelligence. Ambition and old-fashioned horse sense still count. Mirror of Your Mind yxm by JOHN CONWELL Can love 'cure' a pessimist? Some interesting shifts in public opinion concerning the things which make America great have shown up in a Louis Harris opinion poll.

Of those questioned, 90 per cent believe hard-working people have been most important in the past, but only 74 per cent believe hard work will be a major factor in America's future greatness. Around 88 per cent credit development of rich natural resources as vital to present U.S. strength, but only 65 per cent believe this will be as important in the future. Larger numbers of people place emphasis on equal opportunity for all the races to get ahead and on individual fulfillment and a higher quality of human life as major factors in building the future greatness of the United By staff members Follow The Leader Today's Thought And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full. IJohn 1:4.

God has revealed His person and providence to us in His Word not to darken our path with fear but to brighten our days with abounding joy. During a family visit on Christmas Day the tradition of "shanghaiing" was recalled. The dictionary fails to give the definition of shanghai as we are referring to it in this column. It defines shanghai as the kidnapping of sailors for crew duty on the China run, or to do something through force or underhanded methods, Oldtimers will remember the shanghai parades through downtown Staunton streets in the early part of this century. The par-' ticipants wore ragged clothing and masks some resembling Santa Claus.

Some wore black stockings pulled over their heads and faces, with holes cut for the eyes, nose and mouth. "Most anything went," recalled one person who remembered the parades. Short trousers were generally worn by the men. Shanghaiing is believed to have been most popular in Philadelphia in the early 1900s. By JIM CLARK Associated Press Writer PHILADELPHIA (AP)-Like an old-time circus wrestler, the PBW Stock Exchange is taking on all comers.

If it's not the New York Stock Exchange, then it's the Securities and Exchange Commission. Each year it grows, spewing out ideas designed to carve out a bigger share of the market, and maybe to embarrass the bigger exchanges on Wall Street, While the New York Stock Exchange was talking about raising brokerage fees, the PBW came up with a plan to lower fees to attract smaller investors. In January PBW will open an office in Miami, and is looking at Atlanta and Dallas as possible locations. And for some time it has been pushing a plan to get the regional stock exchanges to merge. For all of its ambition, however, the PBW still does only as much trading in a year as the NYSE does in a week.

And despite winning a number of battles, the PBW may be about to lose the war. In 1967, in a drastic break with tradition, the PBW began admitting financial institutions as members of the exchange. The idea was that an insurance company which traded tens of thousands of shares a year could avoid paying brokerage fees if it held its own seat on a stock exchange. Since a seat on the PBW cost only $4,000 and the institutions could save hundreds of thousands of commission dollars a year, the lure was obvious. But early this year the plan hit a snag.

The Securities and Exchange Commission adopted a rule forbidding the entry of institutions into the stock exchanges unless a certain amount of their business was public. Since then, PBW has been in court, trying to appeal the SEC In rural communities shangahi groups would organize and walk through the neighborhood during the Christmas and New Year's holidays. For those who had motor transportation, the routes were extended into other communities. "We would knock on the door and usually the person answering would invite us in," recalls one old shanghaier. "They would offer us candy and cookies and other Christmas goodies." In some cases, especially if the unexpected visit was late at night, the shanghaiers would get a cool reception maybe with the threat of a shotgun blast.

As the shangahi groups approached the homes, they would sing Christmas carols to help prepare for a friendly welcoming. Practices varied in the individual areas. Some reportedly rang bells on their shangahi trips. Shanghaiing, like serenading, has passed. Only the fond memories remain.

R.T.S. THE STAUNTON LEADER THE STAUNTON NEWS-LEADER Founded 1904 By Hierome L. Opie The Daily News 1890 The Morning Leader 1906 DIAL886 M66 E. Walton Opie, Chairman, Publisher and, Editor Hierome L. Opie President and General Manager Roy T.

Stephenson, Managing Editor Published afternoons, Monday through Friday and Sunday morning by The Leader Publishing (Box 59), 11-15 N. Central Staunton, Va 24401 Second class postage paid at Staunton, Va. National representative Bortinelli Gallagher, 12 E. 41 New York Member The Associated Press, Audit Bureau of Circulations, Virginia Press Association, American Newspaper Publishers Association, Southern Newspaper Publishers Association Rates by carrier delivery service and motor route week Rates by mail payable in advance Inside Virginia one year, six months, three months, $4.25. Outside Virginia one year, six months, three months, $5.00.

YES and no. Say a pessimist is so sure that with his luck he will never fall in love. It happens, and everyone thinks he is cured of looking on the dark side of life. But, he says, "that was the good news," as he admits he was wrong to think he would never be fortunate enough to fall in love. Now, to keep his membership in the pessimists' club, the pessimist will say, "Let me give you the bad news.

My love won't last more than a 100 years or so." Does discipline scare a parent? YES; and many times more than it scares a child. Indeed some parents are so wracked by self-torture, as they debate with themselves over whether or not to discipline Junior, it is enough to make them lean toward permissiveness. Yet parents have a relatively easy rule of thumb to guide them: let them be strict disciplinarians when the child needs them to be firm; and they can be loving and permissive all the rest of the time. Today's Laugh How busy is not so important as why busy. The bee is praised; the mosquito is swatted..