The News and Observer from Raleigh, North Carolina • 6

GA The News Observer Raleigh NC Wednesday Jan 6 1993 Editorial nifila ilews Et observer 1 advise and enjoin those who direct the paper in the tomorrows never to advocate any cause for personal profit or preferment 1 would wish it always to be the tocsin" and to devote Itself to the policies of egoality and justice to the underprivileged If the paper should at any time be the voice of self-interest or become the spokesman of privilege or selfishness it would be untrue to its history --JOSERILIS DANIELS Editor and Publisher 1894-1948 The News Observer IRAK AliDWItO 14 1300Le Cures and complications ki 1 1 1ww i AtIftiet5eq4 pf Gel5htxxoitt 0 14400 Ouv 144 4 I 11 10 11111 'f I'14 t1141111 1 i 49 flio 1111 i APOIr It1g A 0 KT) dAll il 3 1 a (Y 0 1 4 I Z17 "11' 111A --1-'171 A 0 110 Or1351S it gpOroom Kratf '1' fo I Aft -v- 47 S'APO 1-'-- 1T'0'4 514-4 i 4 If011 4 ---1'tfi 1 144 fg10101-41 0'''-'21 -r i NI 14110 xvrtie Ge15 ova poor woh ouv The idea behind a new rule requiring North Carolina's pharmacists to provide more detailed drug information to patients and to keep more information about those patients is well-meaning But the mess it's likely to create isn't worth it The rule pushes pharmacists too close to a line separating their responsibilities from those of doctors It will undoubtedly cause hang-ups and snafus at smaller-staffed pharmacies that handle a full load of customers now And it substitutes a layer of regulation for individual responsibility Now in effect the rule is an outgrowth of a federal law that requires counseling when prescriptions are filled for Medicaid patients North Carolina's state Board of Pharmacy after public hearings expanded the rule to apply to everyone not just those covered by the federal-state health plan for poor people Pharmacists now will have to tell customers about dosages and side effects They will have to keep records of a customer's allergies other drugs he takes and diagnoses One local pharmacist described the effect of the rule: "It's going to be kind of like going to the doctor It's not going to be like a hamburger joint anymore" Going to the pharmacy shouldn't be like going to a hamburger joint But it shouldn't be like going to the doctor either Responsible physicians already cover dosages allergies etc with their patients and keep track of what medicine patients take They also talk about side effects And many of them view that rightly as their business They after all know their patients' medical histories far better than the pharmacist If it doesn't get WASHINGTON 1992 is dead and gone but it should not be forgotten any time soon It was called the year of various things but what it really was was the year of the shameless A stretch of time that gave us Robert Packwood trashing victims of his senatorial pawing and then kind of apologizing is typical So soon after the disgraceful Anita Hill episode will the Senate seat him? Unless one of those new women senators rises up and protests it probably will The Senate has always been shameless So has Madonna this year peddling a fake sex book that costs $50 Madonna is Madonna but couldn't the publishers have said no? "Nobody's responsible" was the motto of the year just closed do your own thing Just look at the Chicago couple who left their two children ages 9 and 4 home alone while they went off to Acapulco What about the 17-year-old thug who killed a contemporary on an escalator at Union Station here in Washington apparently for saying "hi" to the shooter's girlfriend? Odious individual acts were reflected on the grand scale by nations Remember how the Germans were never going to do it again? Remember how they told us that Nazism had been uprooted destroyed root and branch? Pan now to the violent anti-foreign demonstrations in Heidelberg Cologne and Berlin and see the skinheads beating the defenseless Is it Kristallnacht all over again so soon? Or are they just kidding trying to scare the world out of its wits? In pursuit of more melancholy evidence that we are not making any progress as a human race let us travel to Bosnia where cruelty is king There is a thick ethnic brew Serbians Bosnians Croats Christians Muslims old grievances are kept alive as in Northern Fake loth owes only the people imf 16q3 we're doomed teenage Mafia ask themselves only one question "What's in it for me?" Their clan leaders and warlords don't seem much better There has been much discussion about whether we have the right or the obligation to disarm Somalia's gun-toters Caution said for weeks that we mustn't while UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali said we must But when George Bush announced he was on his way the babble abruptly ceased Thg Marines suddenly began going door to door and demanding the residents turn over all firearms Let's hope they take careful notes so they can repeat the exercise here Washington desperately needs disarmament The District got some cold comfort which is the only kind '92 gave out It seems we have reduced the number of killings this year Only 450 people were killed By contrast 489 went down in 1991 Not to worry we're still the homicide capital of the world We hope our new president will notice These events are reported But across the world in Indonesia a silent slaughter continues The people of East Timor who wish to be independent are being exterminated by Indonesians They recently jailed the East Timorese resistance leader Xanana Gusmao He is held incommunicado Interrogations with torture and disappearances continue Nobody except Amnesty International the human rights group pays much notice 1992 took away our illusions about civilization and the gradual improvement in human behavior And just for spite at the end of the year it snatched away the most charming creature in Washington Ling-Ling the panda Thanks for everything Universal Press Syndicate reduction produced strong conservation efforts The Depression caused abandonment of much cropland and by the 1950s pine had invaded the land Timberland increased from the 1920s until the 1970s then diminished So don't be comforted that we have more trees than our grandparents trees in the 1920s were abnormally few DOUG PHELPS New Bern Time to plant trees I think there will be no more trees when my children have their children Everywhere I look trees are being cut down I wish that people would stop cutting down trees and start planting more trees This planet is going to be destroyed by man not by animals And if they start a colony on Mars they will destroy it too MAGGIE LINAK 3rd Grade West Lake Elementary School Raleigh The Far Side "Uh-oh Looks like the usual airplane food" 444 1 a 1 I i 1 400:1 111 11110114 1111114 i -') What's to happen for example if a pharmacist and a physician disagree on dosage? Is the patient simply going to be caught in the middle while they fight it out on the phone? The new rule also would seem to take away a patient's and a customer's privacy Why should an individual have to answer personal medical questions in the pharmacy having already answered those same questions in the doctor's office? Yes some doctors are better than others at explaining things And some pharmacies don't offer enough information about the drugs they dispense But many already provide detailed information about side effects to customers on printouts that come with prescriptions That comes under the category of customer service and any business that pays attention to good service has a leg up on the competition Such services are best offered voluntarily The problem with the new rule isn't just about long lines at the drugstore as people are delayed while others are counseled It's about the rights of patients the responsibilities of doctors the duties of pharmacists And it creates unnecessary confusion and suspicion among all three Good Morning The last time Peter Paul and Mary who'll sing at the Clinton inauguration performed at such an event Puff the Magic Dragon lived by the sea Now he's probably in a subdivision of condos that would hold them to a tighter standard than that to which they're accustomed A News Observer analysis of campaign finance records shows the senator-elect enjoyed the largesse of business political action committees That's not surprising since incumbent Sen Terry Sanford was perceived by some in the business community as being pro-labor While standing for workers shouldn't rule out standing for healthy businesses there are powerful business interests who believe that politicians must stand on one side or the other That's their problem It shouldn't be Faircloth's Though he turned his campaign and himself over to the folks at Jesse Helms' National Congressional Club for purposes of getting elected Fair-cloth ought to be realistic enough to know that his victory wasn't a mandate to sell out to special interests If anything the congressional statewide and local races in 1992 nationally and in North Carolina showed voters to be more concerned with the well-being of ordinary people Lauch Faircloth the man not the candidate understands those people and knows how to talk to them with good sense with humor and with an understanding of their concerns He must invite and encourage them to talk to him too And when he votes it is their voices he must hear clean bill ing supposedly focused on issues involving cities was an unnecessary trip for him and an unnecessary expense for the city By paying the money Campbell also sharpens his commitment to straightforward by-the-book government an absolute must for anyone who's going to be watchdogging state agencies as auditor Campbell will it's hoped hold other state officials to the same standards he has now followed himself The People's Forum better than this Ireland For the Serbian forces the Visigoths seem to be the role models There is training in mass executions there are orders for mass rape The West has no idea what to do Europe can only wring its hands The ideal of European unity of continent-wide diplomacy of concerted action is slowly sinking in a sea of blood hunger and heartbreak In Somalia mankind has returned to its natural state People kill starve and terrorize their fellow humans in a totally uninhibited manner George Bush sent in the Marines and they have comported themselves in a commendable way They have taken pity on the children they feed them and try to comfort them We are very proud of them The only people on the ground who seem grateful for their presence however are the relief workers from many nations They look sunburned worn harried They are trying to save people from starvation while other Somalis do everything in their power to stop them They were there before the Marines came they'll be there after they have gone Medals should be struck for them To see just how far '92 went in bringing out the worst in the world you need only watch on television the "technicals" the armed thugs who hold up reporters who pass into their territory working to bring Somalia's plight to the planet's attention The technicals Somalia's Why the public reprimand after proper authorizations and signatures condoned the trip and the spending of the necessary funds? Why was the trip approved? It would have saved a column or two in the paper as well as juvenile behavior from those who felt it worthwhile to elaborate on this past event This trip was on the calendar so it was no secret In my experiences with public and private industry trips of this sort are very routine and do not always merit the classification of absolute necessity but the officials all go anyway and do not receive such public criticism and their character is not accosted as Campbell's was In other words whoever knew the trip was in progress and waited until he returned to stir up this article "Apologize!" A congratulatory note to recognize his newly elected position as state auditor would have been more appropriate SUE DEVRE Garner When trees were few A People's Forum letter from the NC Forestry Association said that the Lake James area's pristine wilderness "appearance" is courtesy of forestry management and that same management gives us more trees today than our grandparents had 70 years ago It would be a mistake to generalize that forestry always creates a wilderness appearance Consider Time magazine's Essay of Dec 28 which said "Even as we consume and alter we erect stage sets to mask the loss Many Americans today mistake as wilderness the ersatz version to which they have been accustomed Where once there were forests now there are tree farms transmogrified by science into monocultural stands of uniform height and genetic stock In a word a crop" Also why is 70 years ago often used to compare with today? "North Carolina's Fourth Forest" by NC Forest Resources reports that by the 1920s agricultural clearing had peaked and most of the old-growth timber had been logged Public anxiety over the extensiveforest 3 4 442 4 Mary t- McCrory o' Rt 1 4 2 Lauch Faircloth rode to victory in his US Senate campaign against Terry Sanford on a carpet carried by contributions from business interests Faircloth who took office yesterday believes his contributors came around because he's an advocate of "a businesslike approach to running government" But contributors don't kick in just because of their philosophical kinship They expect the object of their monetary affections will vote the way they like and will answer the phone when they call Faircloth's mission as a senator however means he'll have to keep the lines open to all not just to business interests that are first and foremost strongly anti-labor Not just to agricultural interests who want him to fight against needed environmental legislation Lauch Faircloth Campbell gets a Ralph Campbell can take office as state auditor in the bright sunshine now that he's blown away a small cloud resulting from a questionable trip to New Orleans He has reimbursed the city of Raleigh for $1215 in expenses incurred for a meeting of the National League of Cities in November Campbell was wise not to make a belabored point of trying to justify the trip He simply couldn't He had announced his resignation from the City Council and the league meet The News ici Observer "The Old Reliable" e'f i' fP i -t-'': 1-: 55: 14" 1'6 f' 'i 7 0 1 gi it i': 1 1 i' i'-'' ''N- i Libraries need support "Computer wizards supplanting book lovers at library desk" (Dec 28) was an interesting article It was the sort of story people like to read in newspapers about libraries Unfortunately it did not address some of the unpleasant issues facing libraries because of computers and the publishing industry Not addressed these issues will result in monetary and electronic impediments to information for the general public scholars and students Information is not free It never has been nor will it ever be Access to information costs money too Libraries have traditionally absorbed these costs Unfortunately these costs have risen dramatically The subscription rates of scholarly journals have been rising at more than 10 percent every year for at least the past six years It is not uncommon for these journal subscriptions to cost hundreds of dollars apiece More and more electronic information is not owned by the library it is leased When a library drops an electronic subscription the library must give back the information Consequently the public should support concepts like The National Research and Education Network (NREN) It represents federal legislation exploring the development of a national information infrastructure Also support libraries with human and capital resources Support their need for additional staff computers and information Would you go to a surgeon who didn't have a scalpel? How can you expect librarians to do their job without the necessary tools? ERIC LEASE MORGAN Systems Librarian NC State University Raleigh Campbell's trip OK'd As I read the articles relating Raleigh City Councilman Ralph Campbell's recent trip to New Orleans I wondered why you just did not take him to a chamber room and spank him It would have been less humiliating to the councilman Publisher FRANK DANIELS JR 829-4695 Executive Editor FRANK DANIELS HI 829-4685 Managing Editor MARION GREGORY 829-4770 Associate Editor STEVEN FORD 829-4512 General Manager FRED CRISP 829-4651 Business Manager ROBERT WORONOFF JR 829-4659 Sales and Marketing Director D(K HENDERSON 829-4652 Circulation Director JEFF BURCHAM 829-4718 Advertising Director JIM McCLURE 829-4617 Production Director DANNY COLLINS 829-4782 Classified Advertising Director DURWOOD CANADAY 829-4585 1-.