BY HARRY RING
Leave home without it - Last year, 1.4 million U.S. people
filed for personal bankruptcy, triple the number of 12 years
ago. A large number were credit-card users, the fastest growing
category of debtors.
To visit Yugoslavia? - By a two-thirds majority, the U.S. Senate voted down a proposal to bar the Pentagon from leasing - at $50 million a year - six luxury business jets to haul around military commanders. The military inventory already includes 100 executive jets, but a solon dismissed them as "old dumbos."
Not to hurry - Nine people, including the pilot, died in the recent Little Rock, Arkansas, plane crash. The pilot had been working more than 13 hours. The Federal Aviation Administration, responsible for air safety, declared its intention to enforce the regulation requiring that pilots get at least eight hours uninterrupted rest in each 24 hour period. The regulation was issued in 1985.
To sum it up - A New York Times headline advised: "For good health, it helps to be rich and important." The article added: "More than genes, more than diet, social class predicts longevity."
Take that - England's South West Water company admitted that for a month in 1997, it provided 100,000 customers drinking water unfit for human consumption. A stern magistrate's court fined the company about $15,000.
Gotta make a buck - A group of California prosecutors are suing the Rite Aid drug chain for selling contraceptives and baby formula well beyond their expiration date. Like a pack of condoms purchased last month with a "sell by" date of March 1995.
`Be your own boss' - A survey found that England's 46,000 mom n' pop groceries are open, on average 117 hours a week. That's nearly 17 hours a day, seven days a week.
Who could believe that? - "Zealous police in Turkey tapped the phones of top military and government officials, including the prime minister. Among the revelations: some of the most wanted criminals have regular, easy access to top military and government officials" - European news item.