One of the first stories Dave Davies had done at the Philadelphia Daily News had tumed out to be a front-page exclusive on a proposal by Mayor Goode for an unearned income tax, a story that the Inquirer had missed. Davies had finished his research and written the lead: "Faced with the likelihood that city council will reject his proposed increase in the city wage tax, Mayor Goode yesterday sent council a proposal that would impose a tax on interest from bank accounts and other kinds of so-called unearned income." But his editor had turned thumbs-down. "This is a good lead for the Inquirer," he said, "but it won't work here. You've got to personalize it."

So Davies tried again. He wrote: "For years Philadelphians have been complaining about the wage tax. Now Mayor Goode wants to tax their unearned income." Again, he showed it to his editor, who this time rewrote it himself: "Mayor Goode has his eye on the interest from your savings account to balance the city budget. And the eamings from your money market fund. And the dividends from your stocks. And the profit you make when you sell your house. He even wants to get his hands on your winnings from the crap tables in Atlantic City, if you're so lucky."

The "pumping up" was something Davies sometimes had a problem with. To make it hard-hitting, he thought, you may have to make it unfair. The new lead had been technically accurate, he knew. But it had taken the complicated budget situation and simplified it, making it sound as if the problem was that Wilson Goode had his greedy eye on your pocketbook. Davies recognized that when a newspaper must sell itself each day as an impulse buy on the newsstand, that kind of writing was necessary, just as serial murders were always going to make page one and push out city budget stories. But he didn't have to like it.

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