The well-paved road--A survey of 350 large companies found that the average pay increase for chief executives last year was limited to 6.9 percent, the smallest in more than a decade, leaving them, on average, to get by on $7 million a year.

Nobody else wants them?--Michael Eisner, top dog at the Walt Disney empire, announced he was buying $10 million in company shares on the open market to underline his confidence in its bright future.

We couldn’t help but worry--What if Eisner’s $10 million was flushed down the pipe? Even for a big- time operator, it’s still a lot of bread. But on reading the New Yorker, we turned over and went back to sleep: the magazine reports that from 1996 to 2001, Eisner was paid a rough average of $145 million a year

No castration program?--The Bush administration has been offering federal funds to states for "sex education" programs, strictly limiting such programs to "abstinence." In Louisiana, which got with the program, the state supreme court knocked it down as a violation of separation of church and state. The program has been using tax dollars to distribute bibles, organize prayer rallies outside abortion clinics, etc.

Read it, retch, and rebel--"Internal documents show two drug companies knew a pharmacist was diluting cancer [chemotherapy] drugs as long as three years before his arrest." According to patients’ attorneys, "Eli Lily dismissed the allegations [and] Bristol Meyers did not respond to requests for comments."--Washington Post.

Mr. Big Nose outsources--A while back Attorney General John Ashcroft announced plans to recruit millions of volunteers to ferret out "terrorists" among their neighbors. One opponent of the anti-liberties scheme signed up to get an idea of how it works. He enlisted on the appropriate web site and was promptly welcomed aboard by the Justice Department.

After waiting a month for how-to advice, he called the department and asked what to do with a tip. He was given a supposed FBI number which, he was advised, had been set up by the agency to handle tips. At that number, a receptionist explained, it was the TV program, "America’s Most Wanted." She said they had been asked by the FBI to take incoming terrorist tips.

One saves you ten, nice, no?--Only a shyster lawyer or an elderly billionaire would comprehend. Recently a couple of keen-eyed ambulance chasers found a loophole in a 1913 law exempting "widows and orphans" from taxes on inherited insurance. The wealthy are using the loophole to sidestep gift taxes in passing on their inheritances.

Your attention, please--A while back we reported--perhaps not wisely--that we were hip deep in clippings sent in by readers. Now things are back to normal--a steady flow of clippings sufficient to keep the column going. So do your part to keep the supply at "enough plus." Send items to Great Society, c/o Pathfinder Books, 4229 S. Central Ave., Los Angeles, CA. 90011.  
 
 
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