tangents

news & views

by sal mcintire

HOMOSEXUALITY MORE IMMORAL

THAN HETEROSEXUALITY?

The question was:

"The Civil Service Commission has information indicating that you are a homosexual. Do you wish to comment on this matter?"

The answer was:

"No. I do not believe the question is pertinent insofar as my job performance is concerned."

This happened 4-27-62 at a hearing that is part of the fight by Bruce C. Scott, of Route One, Springfield, Va., against being fired for homosexuality from his government job as personnel expert. As reported in Washington, D. C.'s The Evening Star, Mr. Scott states he knows his suit will place him in the spotlight, but he filed the suit "to make himself a kind of symbol that will force the government to conduct a study on homosexuality and its relation to work production.'

Mr. Scott maintains that his sex life, like his religion, is his private affair, and that the finding that homosexual conduct is "immoral in nature" is arbitrary and capricious.

David Carliner, attorney of the ACLU who is sponsoring the case, says he expects to take the case clear to the US Supreme Court.

INCOME TAX EXEMPTION FOR NO BABIES:

Columnist Hoppe of SF Chronicle puts in his suggestions on how to slow the frightening cancer-like exploding world's population. It is, he says, a matter of incentives. Presently, all incentives are stacked in favor of having babies. The mother gets "love, sympathy, and a new wardrobe" and the father gets a "$600 tax exemption, hearty congratulations and perhaps even a small raise." And what does the couple get who tries to save the world from the population explosion? "Nothing!"

In these days, says Mr. Hoppe, this is neither fair nor even rational. It should be the other way around

there should be an incentive for non-production-a "Non-Baby Bonus" (to be administered, naturally. by Dept. of Agriculture-because it has had "vast experience in the field of rewarding non-production!") And there might even be a "stiff tax penalty for each new dependent."

Mr. Hoppe puts forward his suggestion rather tongue in cheek, but he is talking about a basic irrationality of today. Why should bringing another baby into today's