ArticleIP_3862.txt

   
   
      
         
            

            
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               Illiteracy 
               Test
            

            "Who Cares if Johnny Can't
Read?" by Larissa MacFarquhar is a truly stupid article, whose only point
is that there is a big difference between basic reading and highbrow reading.
But this is not a crucial distinction for people concerned about literacy in
this country. There has been a palpable decline in literacy in America over the
last 30 years. Even the average university student both knows less and, by
common-sense measures, is less intelligent than his or her predecessors. And
even if IQ has not declined on a mass scale (and I suspect that it has), there
is a point at which lack of curiosity and sheer ignorance are indistinguishable
from a deficiency of intelligence. This article was a good example of
supposedly skeptical and revisionist garbage.

            
               --Harvey
Scodel
            

            
               Lying
Illiterates
            

            "Who Cares if Johnny Can't
Read?" by Larissa MacFarquhar is so off base that it is difficult to fathom
that she really believes what she is saying. I am the president of the Literacy
Council of Garland County, Ark., and I know that the functional illiteracy rate
in our state is 52 percent.

            Her data
is obviously faulty. It is nonsense to ask an illiterate person if he's reading
a book. Of course he's going to say "yes." The last thing an illiterate person
wants to advertise is the fact that he can't read. Our culture is filled with
ways to help people hide their illiteracy. Restaurants like Shoney's and
Denny's feature pictures of their entrees on the menu so those who can't read
can still order their meal. And people know who wrote Huckleberry Finn
and other books because they have learned from television and the movies.

            
               --Ann W.
Schmidt
            

            
               Lay Off
the Lama
            

            Thanks to
David Plotz for giving me the link to the Dalai Lama's Web site in his
"Assessment," "The Ambassador From Shangri-La." But other than that, it was a
complete and utter waste of my time. Plotz thinks the Dalai Lama is merely
cashing in on the West's romance with Eastern spirituality. The Dalai Lama is
the only world religious leader who acts the way many feel a world religious
leader should--speaking inclusively to people about his faith instead of trying
to ban women from the priesthood and gays and lesbians from humanity in
general. Maybe he is a feel-good optimist or maybe the answers are really
simpler than our unnecessarily complex world would like to believe, but either
way, the Dalai Lama is one of the few people in the world whom I can
legitimately not feel cynical about. And David Plotz has dismally failed to
change my mind.

            
               --Al
Cotton
            

            
               Uncle Sam
the Mooch
            

            Jodie T. Allen's article
"I Like the
IRS" is based on an extremely dangerous and faulty premise: All income
belongs to the government, and the portion we are allowed to keep is some sort
of present. The flaw is best expressed when she refers to last week as
"windfall week." As we all know, the money in a tax refund is money that the
taxpayer earned and was kept by the government for up to a year without
interest. Windfall? Incredible.

            Allen's comments about "tax
shelters" are similarly puzzling. Can she possibly mean that we should pay more
in taxes than the law requires? She then goes on to extol the virtues of our
beloved IRS, distracting us from the actual percentage of our income that is
being taken.

            As for her
discussion of the graduated tax and the flat-tax proposal, she blithely opines
that taxing higher-income individuals is OK because the dollars are "less
precious," but she knows that we are talking about percentages of their total
income, not a fixed amount. I think Slate's articles are usually insightful,
the authors informed, and the viewpoints balanced, but Allen's article
possesses none of these virtues.

            -- Charles
Van Cleef
            

            
               Amen to
the IRS
            

            I agree with Jodie T.
Allen's argument in "I Like the IRS." The present tax system is pretty fair, and is
certainly more democratic than a flat tax. The system of exemptions and
deductions, although perhaps a little complicated, really means that one's tax
obligations are custom tailored to one's specific circumstances. Paradoxically,
the more we try to simplify the code, and the more "one size fits all" we try
to make it, the less conforming to our individual needs the system becomes.

            The problem is, we are
always trying to have it both ways. We want all the breaks, and we want a
simple system. The two approaches, unfortunately, are mutually exclusive. If we
go to a flat tax and then people find out that they're paying more than others
they perceive as less deserving, they are going to scream like stuck pigs. If
people are unhappy now--thanks to contentious, self-serving news writers who
are more bent on garnering attention through controversy than they are through
enlightenment--they are going to be miserable when they realize what they have
done to themselves.

            My only
complaint with the IRS is that they seem to be lagging in the computer area, a
problem I attribute to the politicization of the IRS's top management. We get a
new top person with each administration, and then it's a whole new
ballgame--again and again. The heads of the IRS ought to be like the heads of
the FBI or the chairmen of the Fed, above party, serving terms that transcend
incoming and outgoing administrations.

            

               --Collingwood Harris
            

            
               Taxing
Ambition
            

            I beg to differ with Jodie T.
Allen's "I Like
the IRS." As a 24-year-old college graduate, recently married, I was one of
those 25 percent that you spoke of who didn't get money back. But even if I
had, this should not be viewed as a source of income or bonus. How about the
fact that the government has held that money over the course of the year,
preventing you from collecting interest or circulating it throughout the
economy. There is no positive outlook in having the government hold on to your
money so you can get a bonus check at the end of the year.

            Moreover, your definition of
rich is concerning. You feel that you can judge who values a dollar more based
on community standards. However, we live in America, a country that was built
on individualism. Taxes do not empower the individual, they empower the
government and sucker people by taking their extra income to fund
government-program flops.

            What
continues to baffle me about progressive taxing is why people care so much what
Steve Forbes, Bill Gates, or I pay in taxes. We should trust the businessmen
who turn $1 into $10 and make our economy stronger, improve our overall
standard of living, and even provide jobs. These are the people that drive our
economy. The more money you take out of their hands the more money you take out
of the economy. Our current method only penalizes people for making more money.
We have turned monetary success into a crime. It is no wonder our society is
floundering around and the current generation is called Generation X.

            
               --Tony
Stanich
            

            
               Put
Dworkin's Argument out of Its Misery
            

            In the "Dialogue" on
assisted
suicide, Ronald Dworkin holds that neither a woman aborting "her" fetus nor
a "terminally ill patient killing himself" involves either "important interests
of other people" or an action "horribly against the actor's own interests." I
disagree.

            The definition of humanity
is not intrinsically questionable. For some, it is clear: From conception until
death, human life is sacred. Dworkin reduces the ontological status of the
fetus to an issue of ownership by calling it "her" fetus, using an assumption
central to the validation of the master-slave relationship. He implies that
killing is justified when it releases a willing victim from pain, a maxim that
could lead to a justification of slaying the innocent to avoid any other
painful social or personal dilemma.

            Dworkin
wishes to replace the moral teleology of law with obeisance to cultural
prejudices, informing us that unjust acts may be countenanced when popular
ideology asserts them to be "personal" and hence putatively free of legal
restraint. But the better part of Western thought has always affirmed that the
principles of law are ineluctably related to the principles of good.

            -- Steven
A. Long
            

            
               Teacher's
Pet
            

            I want to thank you for
bringing the insights of Steven
E. Landsburg and Paul
Krugman to Slate readers. I'm a high-school economics teacher; their
perspectives have enriched my understanding and challenged my students. They
have made all of us really think, which should be the highest motive of an
economist. Clearly, you have chosen two of the best.

            I especially appreciate
Professor Landsburg's accessibility. I have been able to carry on an e-mail
dialogue with him regarding his ideas expressed in Slate and his book, The
Armchair Economist . Through me, my students have participated in this
dialogue. They think that's exciting, and so do I.

            By
providing this service, Slate has demonstrably increased my effectiveness in
the classroom by engaging my students in a conversation with two leading
economists. So I thank you and your Microsoft sponsors and ask that you
continue the good work.

            -- Gary
Nelson
            

            
               Address
your e-mail to the editors to [email protected].