Indianapolis Recorder, Indianapolis, Marion County, 13 July 1996 — Page 2

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THE INDIANAPOLIS RECORDER

SATURDAY, JULY 13,1996

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EDITORIALS

A salute to Indiana Black Expo As one of the oldest continually operated AfricanAmerican businesses in the state of Indiana we congratulate the board, staff and volunteers of Indiana Black Expo. This year’s theme, which celebrates business and industry, is of special significance to us as we celebrate the beginning of our second century of publishing The Indianapolis Recorder. We are proud of the fact that we have seen our alumni go on to write for numerous publications and that former staff writer William Raspberry has won a Pulitzer prize. Newspaper publishing is a rather unique business in that there are not many people in the AfricanAmerican community who have the opportunity to work in such enterprises. But, there are other larger, successful businesses which are run by African Americans and there are a number of highly successful African Americans working in large corporations in Indianapolis. As we help sponsor another year of Black Expo, we salute all of these special individuals for their achievements in business and for their contributions to the community. We thank them on behalf of our readers for all of the jobs that have been created and for all of the many contributions African-American business people have made to the city of Indianapolis. Courting disaster A number of health care providers are reporting a terrible slowdown in payments for Medicaid patients. This is causing a tremendous strain on some hospitals and clinics, as they are forced to carry what has become millions of dollars in past due claims — which have not been paid by the state Medicaid office. This means that some health care providers are on the verge of a serious financial crisis that threatens to close down some clinics and seriously curtail health care services for the poor — and everyone else — in a kind of domino effect. Large hospitals can survive the wait for reimbursements, which total millions of dollars, but smaller clinics which provide services to low-income people, have already started to suffer reductions. It took many years for the city to develop a credible system of low cost health care centers in poor and low-income areas. It appears that this slowdown in payments for service from our state government can undo years of work and service by dedicated health care providers, if something is not done soon. Our well known struggle with infant mortality, for example, can be sabotaged by continued bureaucratic delays. Many of the prevention programs which rely on Medicaid reimbursements will be halted or slowed if the state does not figure out how to pay its bills. Apparently the money is there, since we’ve been told there is a budget surplus. If the money is there then why is the state of Indiana reluctant to pay its bill for health care services needed by the poor? Perhaps we should not be surprised, since the state only executes poor people for capitol offenses as we have noted in other editorials. We are wondering if we are not seeing a pattern. Perhaps we have found another way to institute the “poor laws” that the English were so fond of in years gone by. It may not be a crime to be poor in Indiana, but we seem to be able to punish people for being poor. Wr will wind up paying more for services to the poor if we neglect the health care system, which was designed to serve the poor. We are courting disaster.

9 Will Clinton administration become sleazebatts?

It was President Johnson on the phone, talking about a man he hoped I would hire at the U.S. Information Agency: “When you gel his files you’ll see that he had a little VD during World War II. But, hell, most real men have had a little VD.” LBJ, like many others of the Vietnam War era, had a lively and sometimes mean fascination with the contents of the FBI personnel files. With the cooperation of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, he often abused those files by looking for dirt

on those who opposed that war. What Johnson did was only half-scandalous compared with what Hoover himself did. He kept his private files on American presidents, congressmen and other prominent citizens, and was known to use them to blackmail or extort favors. Hoover spilled forth raw bilge from his investigative files during what the FBI finally admitted were 25 separate campaigns to destroy Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. And now comes this disquieting, disgraceful business of

the Clinton White House demanding and getting hundreds of FBI files about Republican staffers of the White House. We are going to have to endure congressional hearings, an investigation by independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr and endless campaign rhetoric about this weird business because the Clinton people look guilty of some sinister behavior. The president looked foolish trying to dismiss the current caper as a “bureaucratic snafu.” I can’t understand why the Clinton administration has not

tried to do the right thing by at least giving Americans some preemptive facts. For example: 1. Who is the highest-ranking White House official, or member of Mr. Ointon’s re-election team, who approved or knew of the request to the FBI for the files? 2. What was that official’s rationale for this request? 3. Did the FBI question the propriety of sending the White House so many sensitive files, given the previous woes of the FBI because of improper uses of the files? 4. Who in the FBI actually approved delivery of the files? 5. Who in the White House, including secretaries and aides, had access to these files? 6. From which files wds information taken, to whom was such information disseminated, and to what use was it put? It seems to me this is the least the White House can give voluntarily, sparing the country a wait to see what probers and investigators can drag out of those we now know to have been involved. Not to voluntarily issue such information leaves the Clinton administration looking like a bunch of two-bit sleazeballs who will violate laws of privacy and everything else if it gives them a political advantage. It cloaks the Clinton White House in world class arrogance if, when caught in a romp through the files, it says, “Okay, let’s see you figure out what we were doing and then f convince voters that we’re guilty of something.” Even a banana republic deserves better leadership than that!

Church fires: What are they telling us?

Church fires are horrible assaults on families and communities. It is critical that we sift through the ashes and determine the real culprits behind the burnings. The culprits is ignorance, programmed by sensational political rhetoric and others who spew misinformation from high places that heightens and meanspiritedness. The culprit is the society that tolerates irrational fears and creates the angry white male. The culprit is the society that breeds the grounds fro repulsive acts like church burnings, business like the Redneck Shop, and hoisting a Confederate flag atop of the South Carolina State House dome. In South Carolina, two men convicted of burning the Mt. Zion AME were Ku Klux Klansmen But ate they the real culprits? Wage stagnation, along with massive layoffs, and an uncertain economy has fueled a backlash from the economic “victims” The backlash has resulted in a malicious attack against anything and anybody perceived to be responsible for their condition. In Charlotte, N.C., Urban league president Madine H. Fails sees evidence that whites perceive that... “Blacks and other minorities have somehow taken away white people’s privileges and rights. Blaming Black people for the economic ills of their country is like being the white man who dropped out of school in the eight grade, but who beat up a Black man with a Ph.D. because the Black man was driving a better car. What kind of logic is that? “It's the same kind of logic that results in the burning of churches. Implicit in that kind of anger is the

belief somehow that white people inherently deserve more than Black people no matter what.” The truth of white male fear has been exposed — it appears that their power structure, stealthily maintained fqr virtually over 400 years in these United States has been shaken. In South Carolina alone, 36 houses of worship have been burned since 1991. the congregations of 21 of those churches are predominantly

Black. These violent acts of arson have taken a toll on our entire community. Injustice anywhere is a threat of justice everywhere. “Today a Black church, tomorrow a synagogue, or a Muslim mosque,” says Laura Keeling, president of the Trident Urban League on Charleston, S.C. “We have to fight this crime in our community because of the threat it poses for the well-being of us all." Urban League affiliates throughout America and specifically those in communities that have been affected by the church burnings — Charlotte, Memphis, Portland, Birmingham, Charleston — vigorously support race relations and anti-hate/anti-crime initiatives. We must call on those who are

still on the sidelines to join us and others to defeat this great evil. Martin Niemoller, the German theologian once said. “Alfthat is required for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.” We cannot do nothing. We must defeat the efforts of those who try to use America’s economic worries to manipulate and further polarize people. Those worries must be properly addressed through candid dialogue and education. That is why we again call on the administration and Congress to enact the National Urban League’s proposal to implement a coordinated, targeted and accountable investment strategy that includes infrastructure rebuilding programs that would train, employ and prepare for the jobs being created by a changing economy.