In Fact...

NATION NOTES

A proposed 14.2 percent postage increase for periodicals was swept aside by the Postal Rate Commission in a recommendation issued on November 13. The five-member presidentially appointed commission approved increases that average just under 10 percent. In our view that's just about 10 percent too much, given that the Postal Service is--the Internet notwithstanding--the circulatory system of our democracy. The Nation was among the witnesses cited in the commission's 1,000-page opinion who warned about the potentially destructive impact of the proposed rate hikes on journals of opinion.We were pleased that the commission recognized these magazines as a category worthy of separate consideration, but next time we hope to persuade them that it's as wrong to tax ideas through postal-rate increases as it was to tax tea in colonial times.
Katha Pollitt is not writing a column this week; she will be back in two weeks.

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