Fat Cats

PHILADELPHIA -- Now that it's over, let's hear it for the casting director. The Republican variety show featured more women and minorities in the acts than in the delegations. If America actually looked like the convention stage, every dot-com would be run by a woman or Hispanic. By the time Dick Cheney and George Bush made their appearances, it was something of a shock to see that the headliners were two middle-aged white guys. But, hey, that's entertainment. Even more bewildering were the cameo appearances of working-class folks and the utter disappearance of Grand Old Plutocrats.

YOU KNOW you're from Baltimore if you still call it the Civic Center. And you know you're from Baltimore if you always thought it was a stupid idea to put a stage in it. (Bad design, waste of seating space. "They shoulda tore this place down the day they built it!") And now you know you're from Baltimore if you cringe at the prospect of spending more taxpayer millions to build a new downtown arena, but you can't bring yourself to say it's a terrible idea. Can you?National Basketball Association?

Parris N. Glendening has been Maryland's governor for less than a year and the September 1998 primary is still some 33 months away. But the Democrat from Prince George's County is already back on the fund-raising circuit.Some say he never left it.For months now, Mr. Glendening and his supporters have been quietly but steadily stockpiling money for a race that is unlikely to begin in earnest for at least two years.The governor has held a series of five relatively small but pricey-up to $1 000-a ticket-fund-raisers around the state this fall that, by themselves, brought in around $250,000.

WASHINGTON -- Of all the bad ideas in the Republican budget proposals -- and there are plenty -- the least defensible may be their plan to kill the public financing of presidential election campaigns.The system was put in place 20 years ago as a response to Watergate and the abuses that had developed in the financing of campaigns -- most particularly the influence enjoyed by a few fat cats who financed candidates with multimillion-dollar contributions.Now, in the name of deficit reduction, the Republicans intend to scuttle the system -- and open the door once again to another generation of influence-seekers.

Candidate Bill Clinton promised to come to Washington and cleanse the campaign finance stables, first by ending political reliance on "big money interests," especially un-regulated "soft money" -- donations to a party, which are not limited, in contrast to contributions to candidates, which are. Last month, though, President Clinton sat down with 2,000 representatives of big money interests and soft money contributors who paid $3.5 million to eat tenderloin and...

For a state that doesn't seem to have enough money to make ends meet, Maryland is about to take a peculiar step.Legislative leaders and the governor have agreed to let a 1 percent income surtax on the wealthy lapse -- a move that will cost $40 million in revenue and help put more money in the pockets of Maryland's richest citizens.Ninety-nine percent of the citizens in this state won't get a penny back from this move. Only the affluent will benefit.But the lucky 20,000 filers with adjusted gross incomes above $150,000 ($100,000 for single filers)

Don't count Mickey out. He has the best name recognitio from the fat cats. Judge Ginsburg is the first New Yorker on the court in a long time, but not a militant New Yorker. The U.N. is shooting up civilians in Mogadishu, which is better than the U.S. doing it.

Many Democratic members of Congress want to raise the present income-tax campaign fund checkoff from $1 to $5, then raid the Treasury to the tune of some $180 million every two years to subsidize candidates for the House and the Senate. The stated goal of this is to keep special interests from buying influence on officeholders with campaign contributions. In return for the subsidy, candidates would be limited in accepting private contributions. Thus, fat cats and political action committees would be thwarted.

Across the country, health care experts are searching for ways to cut the cost of hospital care for thousands of patients too ill to go home. Integrated Health Services Inc. of Hunt Valley offers a solution: a few weeks in one of its "minihospitals," conveniently located at nursing homes in 21 cities.At about $550 a day, a bed with hospital-quality nurses in one of Integrated's properties is expensive, but still 30 to 60 percent cheaper than a hospital bed. That's the cornerstone of co-founder Robert N. Elkins' business strategy: Without spending on costly construction, he has strung together a nationwide chain of nursing homes, adding minihospitals to meet demand.

Once upon a time Bill Clinton went to a much-ballyhooed fund raising event in Beverly Hills. Rich and famous Hollywood entertainers raised and contributed over a million dollars to the Clinton campaign. A couple of days before, George Bush went to a $2,500-a-person brunch at Bob Hope's estate for the more conservative members of the Hollywood crowd.Those were just the more visible of presidential campaign fund raising activities this season. President Bush and Governor Clinton have been glad-handing fat cats from coast to coast.