mathml fonts in Firefox under Debian Linux 4.0 (etch)

Under Debian Linux 4.0 (etch):

1.  The default Mozilla browser is a Debian clone of firefox called
    "iceweasel", apparently created due to DFSG concerns, that does
    the usual thing by default with MathML when MathML fonts are not
    installed BUT regresses badly when the standard Linux (truetype)
    directions are followed -- with incorrect glyphs for characters
    inside MathML.  I don't know how to resolve this.

2.  As a work around, I downloaded the Linux binary build of firefox
    from the standard site.  However, it failed to run because of
    load-time version expectations inside libstdc++.so.5.

    My diagnosis: Debian 4.0 provides libstdc++.so.6 in /usr/lib
    with a symlink libstdc++.so.5 -> libstdc++.so.6.  There are
    version expectations in the firefox binary and also in the
    accompanying libxpcom libraries that are not satisfied with
    the so.5 -> so.6 symlink.  Things seem to become OK when I
    grabbed a real copy of libstdc++.so.5 and placed it parallel
    to the firefox binary and the other firefox-provided runtime
    libs.

                                    -- Bill