Banner Graphic, Volume 12, Number 94, Greencastle, Putnam County, 29 December 1981 — Page 6

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The Putnam County Banner-Graphic, December 29,1981

opinion

LARRY GIBBS Publisher

Letters to the Editor Action in one of three areas key to bargaining: SPCTA

To the Editor: As president of the South Putnam Classroom Teachers' Association, I am very concerned about the attitude of our school board in teacher negotiations. They want everyone to act as if it really does not matter that we are the only school corporation in the county without a settlement. As the year comes to a close, the teachers of South Putnam have worked four months without a contract. This cannot continue indefinately without repercussions. Almost one-third of the teachers reported on a survey that they were prepared for job action if necessary. How many will feel this way six months from now without a settlement? The morale of the teachers will get lower for each month with no settlement. Why does the school board seem not to care? There are three key items in the contract negotiations. First, salary increase offers could be used for settlement, but not 1 per cent. Second, bin-

Allison Home attributes successes to community

To the Editor: The trustees, staff and children of the Mary Allison Children’s Home, Inc. would like to take this opportunity to extend warm wishes for a happy holiday season to the people of Putnam County. We are proud to announced that the Allison Home currently is at 90 per cent capacity. We could not have succeeded without the support of the entire community. A very special thanks to all the individuals, groups, and organizations who have helped to “pull us through”

'Candle in the window 1 1 It's a wise man who knows when to use a symbol instead of sword

By TOM WICKER c. 1981 N.Y. Times NEW YORK Critics are deriding President Reagan’s “candle in the window” for the Polish people, much as last year they mocked President Carter for refusing to light the White House Christmas tree after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. But it’s a wise man who knows when to use a symbol instead of a sword. The critics say Reagan hasn’t done enough to punish the Polish government for imposing martial law, or to force its relaxation, and that what he did do was too little and too soft a mere “candle in the window.” That’s what they said about Carter, too until his grain embargo and Olympics boycott began to step on American as well as Soviet toes. In fact, Reagan like Carter before him is doing just about all he can do, and all

Strange coalition forming to fight abolition of U. S. energy dept.

By JUDITH MILLER c. 1981 N'.Y. Times WASHINGTON - At first glance, President Reagan’s recent decision to abolish the Department of Energy seemed simple political fare: the fulfillment of another campaign promise. Guerrilla warfare directed at preventing the dismantlement of the four-year-old agency had begun more than a week before the formal announcement Dec. 17, however, and before long what appeared to have been a fairly straightforward decision was being denounced by key members of Congress. By day’s end, several legislators predicted that the proposal stood little better than a 50-50 chance of approval. Opposition has crossed not only party but ideological lines. Sen. John Tower, RTexas, the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, urged Reagan in a letter to reconsider parts of the plan. Sen. Henry M. Jackson, D-Wash., the ranking minority member on the Energy and Natural Resources committee, called it a “tragedy.” House Speaker Thomas P. O’Neill Jr., D-Mass., called the move “purely political” and “absolutely the wrong thing to do.” Even James B. Edwards, secretary of the nearly defunct department, implied at a news conference the night before the announcement that dropping the dismantlement initiative might not be a bad idea. What issue or force has united this

ERIC BERNSEE Managing Editor

ding arbitration is a very important item needed in the settlement. Binding arbitration is a method of settlement of any grievances over the contract. Third, representation fee could be implemented into the contract as an item for reaching any settlement. The teachers are quite aware that they cannot have everything. Therefore, the Association would like to see movement in just one of these three areas by the school board. In return, we would attempt to reach a settlement. If the school board refuses to move, then they will be responsible for causing any negative attitudes in the school. Parents of the students and other taxpayers should call the school board members and attend the board meetings to support movement by the school board to reach a settlement. William G. Gardner president, South Putnam C.T.A.

the rough times of our greatest need. We look forward to continuing our services for children in need for many years to come. Again, thanks to all our friends, old and new. Joe Ferguson, president Ken Eitel Jr., vice-president Value Williams, secretary Jerry Calbert Marilyn Hoover Sandra Gretter, administrator Beverly and Barney Jones, houseparents

he should do, in a situation not likely to be helped by saber-rattling or cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face. As with so many cases with which a president must deal, no “quick fix” is available. Most importantly, Reagan has done nothing to cause or encourage a general uprising of the Polish people. At best, violent resistance would be violently put down by internal military forces so far more loyal to the government than many expected. At worst, the bloody job would be done by invading Soviet or Warsaw Pact forces. In neither case could the United States do anything much to help short of going to war, probably without allies. On the other hand, Gen.' Jaruzelski’s moderate Christmas Eve speech, combined with the passive resistance of Solidarity leaders and the influence of the Roman Catholic Church, keeps alive the

politically disparate group of nay-sayers? For each of the players, the answer is different. But their individual public explanations and hidden agendas are the

Begin the terrorist U .S. helping Israeli leader 'make facts' that will, predictably, make war

By GARRY WILLS Universal Press Syndicate When Menachem Begin helped direct the 1948 raid on a non-combatant Arab village, Deir Yassin, it was not an act of war , it was simple terrorism. Arabs were being told to run, or they would be slaughtered, as the 240 civilians of Deir Yassin were. Many Jews were rightly shocked by Begin’s act, and 28 American Jews - including Albert Einstein, Hannah Arendt and Sidney Hook - wrote an open letter to The New York Times protesting his visit to America that year. David Ben-Gurion observed: ‘‘l have no doubt that Begin hates Hitler, but that hatred does not prove that he is unlike him.” BEGIN RECALLED his glory days of blowing up the King David Hotel in his public attack on America, in which he likened the Reagan administration to the British occupiers he conquered: “What did you want to do? To hit us in the pocketbook? In 1946 an English general

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slim hope that some relaxation of martial law may be worked out. The general’s apparent willingness to retain some Solidarity reforms, while perhaps a trap for Solidarity leaders, suggests that the best American tactic is to work for gradual resumption of political rule. And surely Reagan is tactically correct to begin with limited punitive steps against the Polish government, while reserving the possibility of stronger action, including sanctions against the Soviet Union itself some of which may be announced Tuesday. Firing off all his political and economic guns at once no doubt would appeal to the hard-nosed, but if the broadside failed to move either Warsaw or Moscow, where would Reagan then turn? Maintaining food shipments to the Polish people, for example, is not only the humanitarian thing to do; when coupled with the threat to cut off food shipments

stuff of which’coalitions in bureaucratic fights are made. And, as political veterans will attest, bureaucratic struggles are often Washington’s fiercest as well as most

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MENACHEM BEGIN A reckless course named Barker lived in this house. Now I live here. When we fought him, you called us terrorists, and we continued to fight. After we attacked his headquarters in the

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unless they actually reach the mass of the people, it also dangles a sword over Jaruzelski’s head Food aid. of course, cuts two ways. A reasonably well-fed Polish people might be more inclined to accept the general’s rule. But a starving people also might be more likely to rebel, precipitating the violent conflict Washington seeks to avoid. And food shipments are more than a symbol of solidarity with the aspirations of the Polish people. Similarly, it makes sense to go slowly on sanctions against the Soviet Union, particularly since no very effective ones are at hand, and the European allies are not eager to participate. And remember that it was Ronald Reagan who canceled Jimmy Carter’s embargo on grain shipments to the Soviets, not least because of political pressure from the farm states. How could he now impose a new one?

arcane contests. Some Democrats saw the president’s decision as an opportunity to inflict a rare political defeat in Congress, which must

King David Hotel, Barker said, ‘This race will be affected only when we hit it in its pocketbook.’” In that same recent statement, Begin attacked the immorality of America’s war in Vietnam (which Israel supported) and the anti-Semitism in the United States Senate. BEGIN WAS RIGHT to recall his gory time as a terrorist. He was an international criminal then, and he is one now. Only his more recent crimes make the earlier ones look like peanuts. Now he has jets and rockets to kill civilians with. His course of crime is an escalating one, and American disapproval obviously has no deterrent effect at all. Begin has taken Reagan’s measure, and each pat on the wrist brings us the back of his hand. He raided Iraq; we said “tsk tsk.” He shrugged, and bombed Beirut. We said “naughty naughty,” and he annexed the Golan Heights. Now that we have worked up the nerve to say “rude fellow,” what new crime will he find?

And anyway, what power Reagan does have to punish the Russians economically and politically may be more effective as a threat than as a fact, particularly in gaining a measure of Soviet cooperation toward a rollback of martial law in Poland. To avoid the appearance of knuckling under to Washington, wouldn’t Moscow be less likely to cooperate after sanctions than before? By the same reasoning, it would be folly to break off the theater nuclear missile talks going on in Geneva, or to postpone the strategic arms talks to begin next year. Leonid Brezhnev’s various statements have made it clear that he w'ants such negotiations at least as much as Washington does. So the threat of ending these talks sometime in the future might well persuade Brezhnev at some point to call off Jaruzelski; doing so now would be more likely to cause him to react

approve abolition of the department. Some, such as Jackson, have argued that abolition of the Energy Department would send a message overseas that the nation was weakening its commitment to energy independence. Environmentalists warn that the proposal will inevitably result in a further downgrading of research into alternative energy sources. Perhaps the fiercest opponents, however, are the self-proclaimed protectors of the department’s largest sector the almost $5 billion nuclear weapons production program. Under the Reagan proposal, the nuclear weapons complex is scheduled to be transferred to a new, semi-autonomous agency within the Commerce Department. The weapons complex employs 54,000 people and includes the national laboratories, nuclear weapon production facilities, assembly plants and weapons test sites. Malcolm Baldrige, the secretary of commerce, told reporters there were “20 reasons" he should inherit the bulk of the agency, including scientific and managerial training gleaned from his oversight of the National Bureau of Standards. Many in Congress disagree, however. One Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, who asked not to be identified, argued that “national security” considerations dictated against the transfer. First, he noted, the secretary of com-

I agree with Begin that there should be no vassal relationship between America and Israel. It is astonishing that Israel, which deals with repressive regimes in Africa and Latin America, has assumed the right to tell us we cannot even talk to the PLO. IT IS DISGRACEFUL that another country wants to tell us to whom we can sell surveillance craft. It is criminal that it can take our money and weapons for use in an attack on civilians and in assaults on international law, and tell us to shut up if we disagree with this use. Israel has alienated world opinion; it has struck deep fear of its bellicosity in responsible leaders everywhere (as the editor of a Japanese newspaper assured me). It sees nothing dangerous in this, but persists in its reckless and almost irrational course. If any other leader had done what Begin has, we would be treating him as another Moammar Khadafy. Why do we submit to Begin’s brutality? For us to be implicated in his further crimes will serve neither our honor nor our interest. SOME EXCUSE BEGIN by saying that the Holocaust has convinced him that no one can be trusted, that Jews must do everything themselves. That attitude, no matter how arrived at, is crazy. Rather than breeding pride in Jews, it would reduce them to the mentality of trapped dogs, biting any hand that comes near them. Security comes from international stability, which such an attitude undermines. Others say that Begin has to seize the Golan to placate, pre-emptively, those who will resist his surrendering of the Sinai in April. But that presumes he will keep his agreement in April - a big assumption, given the way he has kept the agreement on autonomy for the West Bank. His settlement policy there is daily undermining any chance for autonomy - and the Golan seizure is a death knell for that promise. There is no difference in principle between annexation of the Golan and of the West Bank. Who says A must say B. Rather than strengthening his hand against extremists, Begin has given them exactly what they want - a precedent. Settlers on the West Bank will predictably ask why their land should be treated as any different from that of the Golan Heights. BEGIN IS “making facts,” that will, predictably, make war. And we are helping him do it. It is time for our vassalage to end.

in anger. Besides, it’s obviously possible that Poland will remain a bone of contention between East and West, even a flashpoint for war ; and events there provide sad new r evidence of the political rigidity and psychic insecurity of the Soviet system. All that makes it more, not less, in the American interest to seek useful and verifiable nuclear arms agreements. That Reagan understands this is implicit in his restrained action so far, and in his stated intention still to meet Brezhnev at the summit sometime next year. More action is undoubtedly forthcoming, but that candle in the window is good evidence that this president, despite his own ideological views and the urgings of his most strident backers, has learned that no American government can shape events to its liking, or force other great nations to accept its will.

merce, like many of his predecessors, has little technical background or training, carefully ignoring the fact that the present secretary of energy’s background is dentistry. Second, the $5 billion budget of the weapons program is larger than the department’s budget and the temptation to raid the weapons programs when cutbacks are made might become irresistable. While senators describe the struggle in terms of national security, their colleagues in the House more readily discuss an even more pressing consideration: congressional jurisdiction over the weapons program’s budget. “I tried to explain the problem to the White House,” said an exasperated Rep. Samuel S. Stratton, chairman of the armed services subcommittee that oversees the weapons program budget. “But half of them were out of the country, and the rest just didn’t understand." “The White House thinks they can write existing jurisdiction into law," he said. “But they can’t. Those committees will say, as long as we’re shifting the boxes, let’s ensure that the warmongers and the nuclear nuts no longer oversee these programs.” A final consideration is what some Administration officials describe as the “hidden agenda" of Edwards, who has said that he is longing to return to the “beaches of South Carolina." White House aides, however, report that privately, Edwards resisted the dismantlement of his agency.