■ John Paul II’s book tour will be less extensive than Colin Powell’s, and rightly so: he is only the Vicar of Christ.
■ Do people, and the businesses they form, have a presumptive right to the money they earn? Or do they get to keep some portion of it only as a favor from the Federal Government? That’s the question at issue in a dispute over the meaning of the term “corporate welfare”—and astonishingly enough, the usually sound conservative Rep. Bill Archer (R., Tex.) is on the wrong side of it. The chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee wants to eliminate about sixty business tax preferences over the next seven years to help balance the budget. But to end a tax break without reducing tax rates amounts to a tax increase—which, political junkies might recall, Republicans are supposed to be against. If Congress really wants to attack “corporate welfare,” it should abolish the Export-Import Bank, agribusiness subsidies, and tariffs. Giving other people’s money to select businesses is welfare; letting them keep more of their own is not.
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