The Press: Lid on the Sewer

Four recent libel suits did not faze Confidential magazine (TIME. July 11) and caused no change in its up-from-the sewer journalistic formula of sex and sin. But in Washington last month, Postmaster General Arthur Summerfield threw a scare into the magazine that rattled every skeleton in its closet; he barred Confidential from the mails after a "number of complaints." Post Office officials objected to among other things, a racy description of a stripteaser's gyrations and a "questionable cheesecake photograph of Hollywood Starlet Terry Moore. Hereafter each issue of Confidential must be cleared by the Post Office before it will be accepted...