Annals of Democracy by Ronnie Dugger. ANNALS OF DEMOCRACY about voting by computer. Since 1964 different kinds of computer-based voting systems have been installed nationwide. This year 55% of all votes will be counted electronically. Recently computerized vote-counting has engendered controversy. Are these systems vulnerable to fraud? Is the most widely used computerized system...

Television Comment by Mark Hertsgaard. Ronald Reagan has been strangely absent from the nation's t television screens this fall even as a Presidential campaign created in his image has swirled all around him. The President's handiwork is evident not only in how Vice-President George Bush and Govenor Michael Dukakis have run their campaigns but...

The Talk of the Town Playground Person by Adam Gopnik. Talk story about Iona Opie, the children's play expert and co-author(along with her late husband Peter) of "The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren," published in 1959 & still a classic of anthropology. She is 65 years old, lives in Hampshire, England, and this was her first trip to...

The Theatre JUST SAY WHAT? by Mimi Kramer.

Around City Hall AROUND CITY HALL LAST INNINGS by Andy Logan. In the middle of last month, Richard Bond, the political director of Vice-President Bush's Presidential campaign, concluded that there was a chance the Republicans could carry New York State, previously written off to the Dukakis forces. Bush was endorsed at a PBA rally in Queens 2 days after 2...

The Talk of the Town 101 Club by Mark Singer. Talk story about the 101 Club of New York. Bill Schifrin the 101 Club's walking "Who's Who," introduces writer to various members at their monthly meeting held at the Werner Baer Restaurant, on Central Avenue in Cedarhurst, Long Island. The 101 Club's official creed is to share and exchange business...

Musical Events by Andrew Porter.

A Reporter at Large THE RELIGION OF THE PAST III-SMOKE by V. S. Naipaul. Lengthy mention in REPORTER AT LARGE about the Old South. Writer tells about meeting James Applewhite. He was from an old tobacco family in eastern North Carolina. He was 52. He was a teacher at Duke University in Durham-the university founded and endowed by a tobacco fortune. He was...

Fiction Close by Lucia Nevai. Story about a woman, Jorie, who learns of her brother's death from AIDS while in Vancouver, Canada. She is a counsellor to families whose children have attempted suicide, but she still feels unable to cope with the emotions from her brother's death. He had not told anyone that he had...

Fiction He Didn't Go to Canada by Garrison Keillor. Story about Sen. Dan Quayle and the controversy about his service in the Indiana National Guard rather than in Vietnam that became known after he was chosen to run for Vice-President on the Republican ticket. Story is told in the first person, but Quayle's name is not mentioned. The...

Poetry The Orphan, 1917 by Maria Flook. She took the short route to her place of work...

Poetry A Case of Netsuke by Mary Jo Salter. Wise, size of peach pit, nut...