RUST COMMENTARY: HAPPY HOLIDAYS IN A LAND OF FREEDOM

Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah to all of our associates, friends and their families. However you celebrate this blessed time in the year, remember to give thanks that we live in a country which allows us the freedom to worship in the manner that we choose. Have a blessed holiday. -- Gary and Wendy

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A few of the "Thoughts on the Business of Life" selected by the editors of Forbes as the best quotes for 1997 ...

There is no joy surpassing that which springs from consciousness of work well done, whether that work be driving an engine or managing a railroad, sweeping a bank floor or filling its presidential chair, selling a bill of goods or directing a vast sales force, operating a machine at the bench or running a great factory. No theater, no movie show, no picnic, no vacation can yield the same satisfying pleasure as is derived from putting forth in honest work the best that is in us. -- B.C. Forbes

When one teaches, two learn. -- Robert Half

Age is mind over matter.

If you don't mind, it doesn't matter. -- Satchel Paige

There are several good protections against temptations, but the surest is cowardice. -- Mark Twain

When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left but could say, "I used everything you gave me." -- Erma Bombeck

The Eiffel Tower is the Empire State Building after taxes. -- Anonymous

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Christmas would not be Christmas without the Toybox and Christmas for the Elderly programs. Many thanks to the Salvation Army, Jaycees and Cape Girardeau County Health Department for making the holidays a little brighter for so many. Thank you, Kim McDowell, for helping put it all together here at the Missourian.

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Running Scared: In a 1993 Gallup poll, 74 percent of those surveyed opposed spending public money on private schools. By 1997, opinion was nearly split on the issue.

With such writing on the blackboard, the teachers' unions have reached deep into their pockets to fight the specter of competition. The National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers contributed nearly $5 million to political candidates in the 1996 election cycle. A striking 98 percent of that money went to Democrats. It is little wonder that President Clinton has threatened to veto any [school] voucher plan for the District of Columbia. -- The Economist

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Population Implosion: During the most affluent moment in history, so many young people say they can't afford to have two children. People well into their sixties look vainly for grandchildren. Adoption, already excruciatingly difficult, may well become more so. Will the rest of the country look like Manhattan, which has the country's largest concentration of people living alone (48 percent) except for a former leper colony in Hawaii? -- Ben Wattenberg, American Enterprise Institute, New York Times Magazine

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JANET RENO ... She saved her job. And lost her reputation.

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Japan Doesn't Get It -- Yet: Japan should take a cue from Ronald Reagan. Substantial tax cuts, deregulation and sound money turned malaise-ridden, moribund America back into an international powerhouse, setting the course for us to become the globe's only superpower. We are today still reaping the rich harvest of the Reagan legacy.

Note: Japan announced a tax cut Dec. 16, and the stock market rose.

IRS' Mammoth Matrimony Tax: Next year Republicans should repeal the tax code's so-called marriage penalty. U.S. Reps. David McIntosh (R-Ind.) and Jerry Weller (R-Ill.) have proposed legislation to do just that.

The current code punishes working couples who tie the knot. Their now-joint incomes kick them into higher tax brackets, and their exemptions are reduced. McIntosh cites an example of a man and woman each making $30,500 a year. Unmarried, the couple owe a federal income tax bill of $7,184. If the two are married, the exaction rises to $8,563 -- a penalty of almost $1,400. This is destructively absurd at a time when even Washington pays lip service to "promoting family values." Let Bill Clinton explain why we can't afford to stop financially punishing people who go to the altar. What the GOP will discover if it repeals this penalty is that Clinton will do what he often does in such situations -- reverse himself. -- Steve Forbes

~Gary Rust is president of Rust Communications, which owns the Southeast Missourian and other newspapers.