http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/uniontrib/sat/news/news_1n17value.html
White House may put less value on seniors, disabled By Dana Wilkie COPLEY NEWS SERVICE May 17, 2003
WASHINGTON - After senior citizens raised a ruckus, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christie Whitman said last week that her agency's rule makers would stop calculating the lives of the elderly as less valuable than those of younger people. But if the White House has its way, future regulations could be based on similar calculations that not only place less value on the lives of seniors, but also on the lives of the disabled and the sick. A document prepared by John Graham, President Bush's "regulatory czar," urges all federal agencies to weigh the cost of new regulations against how many years they might add to people's lives - a calculation that tends to give less weight to older people with fewer years ahead of them. Critics insist that Graham also wants agencies to give less weight to people with a questionable "quality of life," presumably those who are disabled or ill. -- Marta Russell Los Angeles, CA http://www.disweb.org