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Page 4..The Portland Observer...May 6, 1992 Blazers and the Suns: THE Playoff Series More on Replacing Congress with Contract Help BY PROF. MCKINLEY BURT Bush's political campaigns. One reader set up a schedule o f priorities fo r the assignments to the contract operators. First things first, he said (money honey), noting that as the Knight-R idder News Service said a week ago, “ The Bush administration appears to be D EL A Y IN G M OVES TO S H U T D O W N L A R G E F A IL IN G BANKS U N T IL AFTER N O V E M B E R ’ S E LE C TIO N for p o liti cal reasons.” The director o f the Con gressional Budget O ffice said, “ The delay could drive up costs o f bank failures by tens o f b illion s o f dollars.” This was detailed to sleepy congress men s till trying to balance their own checkbooks. Now, hundreds o f b illion s, not “ tens" is more like the amount poor taxpayers are going to have to pick up. W illia m Kistner, an associate w ith the Center fo r Investigative Reporting in San Francisco, puts the matter where even an eighth grader can understand it when he described the savings and loan debacle in the Forum Section o f the Sunday Oregonian. Our congressmen who have been demonstrated not to be able to count, bought early estimates o f “ less than 50 b illio n ” in that case as w ell. Together, the ante can w ell be a T R IL L IO N D O L L A R S ! Another point that came up among our readership (and it frequently does) is the matter o f the huge A M E R IC A N AR M S SHIPMENTS to foreign coun tries. C N N reports that the Pentagon alone shipped more than 1 b illio n dol- I was hardly senous not too long ago when 1 suggested that we dispense w ith Congress, elections and the like, and JU ST C O N T R A C T O U T TH E W H O L E BU SINESS previously per form ed by our elected o fficia ls.” But I love the way readers responded. Several cooperating callers sug gested that the technique be applied to state, county and m unicipal bodies— even port districts and other groups o f elected o ffic ia ls exercising governance in the infrastructure. One party said that w hat she thought was so neat about the idea was that the successful bidder on any project could be forced to put up a P E R FO R M A N C E B O N D -D o or die pardner! Devise and implement the laws and procedures necessary to slop the drug tra ffic o r else you are bankrupt, sucker; not on the public payroll fo r life . T w o items in particular seem to have caught the readers’ s attention as we listed the areas where our national legislative body (or state) has failed to act in a serious way.Surprisethat George Bush as a congressman “ voted for re peat o f federal mandatory sentencing fo r a m inim um possession o f drugs.” And that the venerable old American arms manufacturing company, C olt (the six-shooter, not the beer,) was a prime m anufacturer o f the deadly “ street w iper” A - 15 assault rifle. That com pany is a large contributor to the N a tional R ifle Association o f which Presi dent Bush is a life-tim e member and to lars w orth o f weapons PER M O N T H in 1991. Now this, o f course, does not include the direct sales by the manufac turers who supply our defense estab lishm en t-w h o you may have thought to be prim arily in the businessof A m e ri can defense. Nor does this “ figure o f death” include the transhipment to oth ers o f weapons ostensibly destined for use by our allies (to k ill somebody or another). The adm inistration has been ac cusing Saudi Arabia and Israel, in par ticular, for this type o f transgression as though they had no preknowledge in this deadly game o f musical chairs. W ho dies each tim e the music stops? Israel, o f course, has its own extensive weapons industry and foreign arms sales represent a considerable portion o f its Gross National Product. A lot o f A m e ri can (and European) blacks are terribly unhappy yet about the Associated Press report several years ago that Israel had supplied South A fric a w ith T H O U SANDS OF SHOTGUNS FOR “ DE- FENSE” PURPOSES. Against who, the black majority? Certainly, immediate legislation to correct the insanities we have cited should keep our contract legislators quite busy . I ’ m w ell aware that some o f you had some rather caustic comments on our CEOs and other industrialists- and there has got to be a way to replace “ junk bond happy” businessmen who create no jobs, no futures and no hope. W e’ ll get around to dealing w ith those characters, too. BY BILL BARBER Fans have one overriding advan tage. They can look ahead to the next p la y o ff series. By contrast, players have to look exclusively at the team that stands in front o f them. They sim ply do not have that luxury. The point being, that it really does not matter who wins in the S eattle-U tah tilt. A lm ostevery- one agrees that the hottest series in the Western Conference is the one being played out between the Portland T ra il Blazers and the Phoenix Suns this week. Whoever comes out on top can realisti cally expect an easier series against the w inn erofthe S o nics-Jazz match up. Il there was ever a “ must have” series for the Blazers, this is it. What is it going to take fo r the Blazers to w in this match-up? Are you looking fo r a 100%, “ Bet the farm and I aint ly in g ” guarantee? In a word ... Defense. Clyde D rexler said “ They play w ell, but I do think we can play better. Our defense has not been as good against them as we would have lik e d ... but I think our defense w ill be much better.” The key is to keep Phoenix from getting to the century mark. That is an N B A p la yo ff fact. I f you average out the scores o f all the 30 games played in the N B A playoffs leading up to Tues days game, you w ill find that the losing teams have only scored 98.7 points. The exact figure is 17 o f 30 losing teams. The Suns have never won when Portland kept Phoenix under 100 points. Never. W e ll, we have got the easy part done ... T alking about it. Portland T ra il Blazer coach R ick Adelman has his w ork cut out for him. No other team in the N B A has beaten the Blazers in the regular season over the last tw o years. The Suns h it over 50% (.508) from the fie ld which was better than any other team in the league did against the Blazers. Phoenix runs a three-man weave. In addition, the pick- and -roll they incorporate into their m otion offense has given Portland a lot to prepare for. The high- scoring team is as good at the jum p shots and three- pointers as they are at the fast break. 11 that description sounds fam iliar, you probably got the point. It sounds like Portland w ill be playing a m irror-im age o f itself. Portland has an intim idating ad vantage on the boards, and you can tell that the Suns are very aware o f it. “ Portland does an unbelievable job on the boards,” said Sun Kevin Johnson. “ We know what they can do, and they know what we can do. There are no excuses during the playoffs. We have to take away their rebounds. 1 like our bench. We have tw o all-stars coming o ff the bench.” Portland has been using a seven-man rotation lately. Robinson and Ainge were able to bring in 14 and 19 points respectively to the last L A contest. Neither o f the two have had a great deal o f success against Phoenix during the regular season. Nonetheless, you can throw that out the w indow now that the playoffs are here. Robinson and Ainge have done what was neces sary to w in whenever they were called on. Back to the subject o f the Suns bench; i f a team has tw o should-be - starters sitting down at the start o f the game, the totals are bound to look lop sided in the box scores. Alaa Ab- delnaby scored a point a minute fo r the five minutes he put in during clean-up time. M an-for-man the Blazers should have the edge in bench when they are called on. Any way you cut it, i f that person you know who has the Blazer- Suns pla yoff tickets, s till owes you a favor, this would be an excellent tim e to call it in. This series is bound to be one people talk about fo r a long time. Considering the distractions o f the Lakers-Blazers series it is amazing that the team was able to keep its focus. Sports did not seem to be very im p or tant when balanced against what was going on outside the building. Sports writers are supposed to w rite about sports, and nothing else. The same goes for the players. Alas, we’re human. When the verdict was announced, it reminded us o f the story o f the man whose w ife came home early to find him w ith another woman. She was justifiably enraged. The husband looked at his wife and said the same thing the defense attorney must have said to the ju ry ... “ Who are you going to believe? Me or your eyes? The players didn't forget about the problems in L A , but they had to play through the pain in their hearts every b it as painful as the pains in their bodies. The best thing about being a sports reporter is getting to know the players as people. 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