Stamping on PoliticiansThe people in the professional...

Stamping on Politicians

The people in the professional campaign business are sounding the alarm about imminent increases in U. S. Postal Service rates. The 25-cent postal stamp, they note, is about to give way to the 30-cent stamp.

That means that bulk mail, the lifeline of political campaigns, will also increase 20% to 25%. Worse still, warns political consultant Below, Tobe & Associates in a recent letter to campaign managers, the increase might go into effect before the November elections.

And by the way, adds a brochure from the Marina del Rey-based firm, clients may have noticed that some of its fees also went up in January.

Helping to Cut the Fat

You’d think Fox Inc.’s Barry Diller has enough on his mind, with his hybrid network-studio caught in the middle of a regulatory shootout between big broadcasters and program producers.

But the CEO still found time to worry about dietary indiscretions on the Fox lot.

At Diller’s behest, the company has revised its commissary menu. Every dish, from chicken consomme to classic club sandwich, now has a calorie count. Low-cal foods start on the menu’s left, and the numbers rise as you move to the right.

“If you order from the wrong side, well, maybe you won’t be around after a few years,” a Fox executive warned recently.

$7 Million to Plug Leak

As chairman and chief executive of Pasadena-based Parsons Corp., a large engineering and construction firm, William E. Leonhard has gotten a close-up look at the engineering brain drain: College students are being lured to more glamorous and lucrative professions, making campus recruiting more difficult for his firm of 8,500 engineers, he said.

As a 1936 electrical engineering graduate from Penn State, Leonhard has put $7 million where his mouth is.

Leonhard and his wife, Wyllis, have given Penn State a $4-million life insurance policy to endow the Leonhard Center for Engineering Education, which eventually will support dozens of teaching interns each year. In addition, two charitable trusts will provide about $3 million in income to the university after the Leonhards die.

Although Penn State won’t get the $7 million until after its benefactors’ deaths, the institution can use the promise of the funds to get grants from other sources, a spokesman said.

“I’ve engaged a food taster here,” the 74-year-old Leonhard quipped.

Leonhard has made smaller donations--if you can call $1 million or so small--to other institutions, including USC, UCLA, Pepperdine and Caltech.