PAGE
HERALD AND NEWS, Klamath Falls, Oregon
Tuesday, July 16, 1963
EPSON IN WASHINGTON . . .
Asks Strict Auditing
Of Spending By House
Who'd You Ever Lick?"
dit&iiaL (paqjL
Businessmen And Politics
Looking for some businessmen to fill
cabinet posts, William Scranton, Pennsyl
vania's new Republican governor, ran into
a disturbing situation.
Most of those he contacted were either
on the verge of retiring and wanted to take
life easy or were in their early forties a
prime competitive period of business life
and had no desire to enter government. When
he finally got about 22 businessmen who
seemed possible cabinet members, Scranton
was shocked to discover that 11 had not voted
in the primary, eight had not voted in the
general election and six had not voted for
president in 1960.
Said Scranton recently: "It seems to me
that the American business community in
considering the future of the free enterprise
system might profitably investigate the polit
ical and governmental awareness of its own
members.
Dormant Threat
(St. Louis Globe Democrat)
Lying in a pigeonhole in the House Ways
and Means Committee is a political time
bomb set for election year 1964. It is John
Kennedy's pitch to the millions known as
"senior citizens." . , .
The Kennedy program is built on a foun
dation of a reconstructed King-Anderson bill,
which was defeated last year. The new ver
sion would cost $5,000,000,000 in the first
five years and be financed under Social Se
curity. :' Americans, generous by nature, might
go along with using tax money to help des
titutes unable to care for themselves. But a
good look at the measure will show that "med
icare" Is not that, but a socialistic hoax.
First, the bill ignores the four out of five
cases that could be treated at home, since
it makes no provision for doctors' visits. Here
is a blanket invitation for every aging man or
woman to go right down and check into the
hospital as soon as the leg or back starts
acting up.
It tempts the young American to put his
responsibility for his elders on the state.
: This would mean hospitals inundated
with patients and freeloaders, as well as over
worked hospital staffs. More funds, more
hospitals would be needed. And there would
be the costly mountains of paperwork, normal
outgrowth of the massive Federal bureaucra
cy required to administer any such Federal
plan.
The answer offered by the President is
far too drastic. It is like using a flamethrower
to rid the house of termites. True, there are
people over 65 without hospital insurance who
cannot take care of themselves. But they are
a minority.
In 1952, some 26 per cent of those 65
and over had hospital insurance; now it is 52
per cent and the figure is growing. In 1952,
some 61 per cent of those under 65 years of
age had the health insurance; today the fi
gure is 77 per cent. . . .
Many states are moving to adopt the
Kerr-Mills proposal which provides wide medi
cal aid to those who need it and can't reason
ably pay.
Why should every American be subjected
to a socialistic solution to a problem which is
already solving itself?
Why, indeed, do its sponsors refuse to
allow participation in the plan by privata in
surance firms? . . .
The only answer can be the American
government is trying to convince us that
without Federal intervention Americans
would not provide for their future but would
squander their substance foolishly. Thus more
and more is taken from a man's paycheck and
less and less does he spend himself.
The Higher, The Funnier
(The Christian Science Monitor)
Rep. Wilbur Mills, chairman of the House
Ways and Means Committee, has introduced a
bill to levy social security taxes on personal
earnings up to $5,400 a year instead of the
present ceiling of $4,800. Efforts of Kennedy
administration spokesmen to relate this to
their proposal for hospital care for the aged
are slightly amusing.
The chairman's bill, they pretend, will
improve the outlook for adding their propo
sition to social security. They are whistling to
keep up their courage. It will have the op
posite effect if its significance is at all under
stood. The hospital care or "medicare" bill could
benefit only if the increase recommended
by Mr. Mills were to be used to help finance
hospital care for the aged. But the revenue
from it is already more than earmarked.
The trustees of the social security trust
fund reported a few months ago an indicated
long-range income deficiency for the fund
of about 3 per cent. This situation is due in
part to the addition a few years ago of pay
ments for disability besides the original old
age insurance. The Mills bill proposes to cover
only half of the 3 per cent deficiency, leav
ing a prospect that the trust fund will run
into the red even without "medicare."
Is this an argument for adding hospital
care for the aged to the cost of social security?
The social security payroll tax now is 7V4 per
cent on employe and employer together,
scheduled to rise to 9V4 per cent in 1968.
The "medicare" system would add at least one
fourth of one per cent at the outset, probably
a great deal more in the long run.
HOLMES ALEXANDER . .
Latin America Prelude
By HOLMES ALEXANDER
WASHINGTON, D. C. If Con
gress ever "goes home," this re
porter hopes to mkc a tour of
Latin America. While he's there,
of eourse, and when lie returns,
he'll be omniscient on Latino af
fairs. Meanwhile, what's wrong with
some becoming Ignorance? So,
as a welcome respite from the race
issue, he rocs around Washing
ton and tries to find out from
resident experts what the hassle
down there is all aixiut. He sorts
the anecdotes from his notebook:
"See!" says a Communist in
Guatemala City as an air-conditioned
car plies between the air
conditioned office and tlie air
conditioned apartment w hich house
American officials, "they don't
even breath Hie same air that wo
do."
"No, I'm 'batching' It," says a
German traveling salesman in
Central America. "The Adenauer
chancellory won't let my wife out
of the country till she perfects
her Spanish. I work for a private
diescl oil firm, but my government
has the idea that every German
in Latin America, man, woman
and child, is a representative of
the Federal Republic."
"I,et'! got down to business
right away," snys the American
salesman to tlie Chilean execu
tive, who has been bred to enjoy
long, pleasant conversations and
slow-growing friendships. "I've
got to catch that three o'clock
plane."
"Why waste my time?" snaps
an American official of the Alli
ance For Progress to a vice pres
ident of a U. S. manufacturing
firm which may Invest some of
its own money in Latin Ameri
ca. "You've Rot to come in here
with a specific plan before c can
talk."
"You ask if we have democracy
here." says a Nicaraguan oflicial
in answer to an American news
man. "Well, you have one kind of
democracy in Massachusetts and
another in Mississippi: one kind in
California and another in Ala
bama. Yes, we have our kind."
"Thero are as many kinds of
Communism as thero are of dem
ocracy," says a young Dominican
construction engineer. "All the
Latin American leaders were
Marxists in their voutii. Any suc
cessful govemm.'nt in 1-atin
America has got to be at least
socialist."
The reporter doing a cram
course on Latin American af
fairs remembers such succinct,
hearl-of-thc-matter statements. It
is the same when he turns to
reading "I-was-therc" reorts. A
"Saturday Evening Post" article
makes him suddenly understand
why Latinos react with hatred
toward neon signs advertising
American made goods, even
though the Gringo firms bring
money and creature comforts to
the "other" Americans. Those bla
tant commercials offend the La
tino's "virilidad" his man
hood. How vivid a revelation!
Tlic cramming reporter asks a
Latin friend for some other word
that is crucial to our success in
Latin America, and the friend
says "simpatia" sympathy.
But that, of course, is an inborn
quality. It cannot tic suddenly
acquired, much less alfected.
"No." lie is told. "In Latin
America we still think of Mr.
Kennedy as trying to build him
self into a beloved ex-President.
Always the image never the
action."
Well, you don't become an cx
ort on Liit in America hy inter
viewing and reading in Washing
ton. There is no substitute for
spent shoo leather. Hut you begin
to gauge tlie dimensions of your
your un ignorance by the di
mensions of the problem. You
can lie a little less impatient with
the statesmen who still haven't
checked all the answers, ironed
out all the wrinkles, stamod out
all the Communists, ruked in one
hundred cents fur every dollar
expended there.
You haven't found anybody yet
who knows how we're going to
"win" in Latin America, or any
body who Isn't positively certain
that we cannot aflord to lose.
, I ft
IN WASHINGTON
Goldwater's Real Record
By RALPH de TOLEDA.NO
A new and systematic campaign
to tar and feather the "draft
Goldwater" movement is in the
making. The means being used
are these:
Senator Goldwater's only chance
to win the nomination and be
elected comes from his strength
in the South. If the Republican
Party seeks to take the South
ern vote away from the Demo
crats, the GOP will have to be
come "lily white." In fact, Mr.
Goldwater is turning the GOP
into the "white man's party."
Those who propose these argu
ments are very careful to tlis-'
claim any malign intent. They
have not yet really tried to pin
tlie anti-Negro label on Mr. Gold
water. But the insistence that he
is converting tlie "party of Lin
coln" into a Dixiecrat grouping
can only lead to false and vicious
assumptions.
Barry Goldwater is not anti
Negro and the Southerners who
support him are for tlie most part
citizens who are far more in
terested in tlie economic problems
created by the New Frontier and
tlie steady decline of American
power abroad. I am not author
ized to speak for Senator Gold
water, but I do have his record
on civil rights and it is one that
any American would be proud of.
This is not hyperbole. The men
and women of the South with
whom I have spoken do not wish
to persecute the Negro. They
agree that Negro rights should be
respected. But they do not want
the federal government holding a
pistol to their heads. Nor do they
want to see the civil rights issue
destroy the constitutional fabric o!
tlie nation. Long before the Su
preme Court decision, many
Southerners were working to raise
tlie Negro standard of living and
to open doors to the colored
people. Interestingly, the Supreme
Court's 1954 school decision did
more to set back Negro-white re
lations in tlie South than any sin
gle event since tlie Reconstruc
tion. Senator Goldwater has long be
lieved in voluntary action and
cooperation rather than bayonets
and court orders. He believes in
this even though the Negro vote
in Arizona is negligible 13,400 in .
a population of almost 1.3 mil
lion. When he got out of tlie Air
Force in 1946. Mr. Goldwater took
a reduction in rank in order to
organize the Arizona Air National
Guard. As executive officer, he
established the first integrated
National Guard of the postwar
era. He did not do it to win votes
STRICTLY
PERSONAL
By SYDNEY J. HARRIS
"To do tlie opposite," re
marked a German wit two cen
turies ago, "is also a form of imi
tation." 1 was reminded of this com
ment at a college recently, when
1 was approached by an angry
young student writer with a sheaf
of manuscripts. He asked me to
look through and evaluate h i s
work.
As kindly as possible, I tried
to point out to him tliat every
thing he sliowed me was written
in (lie spirit of contradiction.
And contradiction, which seems
to be independence, is always a
form of subservience.
He was puzzled by this seem
ing paradox. Yet it is absolutely
true that the writer or thinker
whose aim is to be "unlike oth
ers" is really getting his cue
from tliem: He lets popularity
decide which attitude he will take
and to be always against tlie
popular is as much an enslave
ment as to be always with tlie
Hpular.
Aristotle said that both the
master and the slave are tied
to different ends of the same
chain mid so it is with t h e
Almanac
Ry lulled Press International
Today is Tuesday, July 16, tlie
197th day of 1963 with 168 to
follow.
The moon is approaching its
new phase.
The morning stars arc Jupiter
and Saturn.
The evening star is Mats.
On this day in history:
In l?.K), Congress eslablislicd
the District of Columbia on the
Potomac.
chronic contradictor: Mass taste
determines what he will be
against, and he cannot be ori
ginal because he is only react
ing to other people. What lie mis
takes for his "independence" is
really a great dependence on so
ciety. Somewhere in his fine book of
rcllcctions, published more than
30 years ago, "Life and the Stu
dent," Charles Horton Cooley
observes "It is the mark of a
rarely stable mind that antagon
ism cannot drive it to extremes."
The angry young writer, an
tagonized by what he conceives
as the stupidity or hypocrisy or
apathy of the social order around
him, is driven to the extreme of
contradicting everything, of dis
agreeing with all w hich makes
his position as ridiculous as lli.it
of tlie most placid conformist.
Any philosophy based on a nega
tive, on being tlie opposite, has
given up its essential freedom.
Real changes are effected in
society not by tltc eontradictors
and opposers, but by those who
arc able to synthesize what is
best out of the old and the new.
A revolution that simply turns
over tlie past is doomed to make
tlie same terrible mistakes, only
in an upside - down position,
i And what was uniquely remark
able about the American Revolu
tion was its willingness to re
tain the positive aspects of Eng
lish common law and merely
modify tlie traditions it broke
with politically.)
Mo.-t of us define ourselves by
what we arc against tlie banker
no less than tlie beatnik. And
thus we are, in a way. the cap
tives of our antagonists. Only
great men arc truly free, for
they alone define themselves hy
eternal standards, and not hy
social ones.
or to irritate his neighbors. He
neither won nor lost votes from
it.
As a member of the Phoenix
City Council, Mr. Goldwater took
the lead in bringing about the
desegregation of the restaurant at
the municipal airport. He was
also able to help desegregate Ari
zona theaters. He and his fellow
Phoenicians did not exercise com
pulsion. They were acting with a
states' rights framework to do
what they felt had to be done.
The Goldwater department
stores have practiced no discrim
ination in hiring as far back as
any company official can remem
berwhich is about 26 years. All
employes eat in the same cafe
teria whether they are wliitc, Ne
gro, or Indian (also the target of
discrimination in the Southwest).
Senator Goldwater's sincerity is
being assailed because he refused
to implement integration by force.
Criticism is mounting because he
will not vote to end Senate debate
if tlie "public accommodations"
bill comes up. But like many Sen
ators, both Democratic and Re
publican, Northern and Southern,
he feels that using the "interstate
commerce clause" of the Consti
tution as a device to open pub
lic accommodations to the Negro
is a dangerous precedent which
can allow the federal government
to interfere in every activity of
every citizen right down to the
shoeshine boy Cloture remains
the only way to prevent passage
of a measure whose implications
can live to plague us particu
larly since the Fourteenth Amend
ment offers abundant groundwork.
I suspect, though I have no
way of knowing, that if Senator
Goldwater were pressed to the
wall, he might justify his posi
tion on current civil rights meas
ures by noting that all the free
dom in the world will avail us
naught if the country is pulverized
by a bomb as a result of faulty
foreign policies.
In any case, the proponents of
civil rights can argue with Sena
tor Goldwater's way of solving
the problem. But they cannot ac
cuse him of being indifferent to it
or in any way anti-Negro. The
implication that he is, now being
carefully nurtured, can backfire
badlv.
By PETER EDSON
Washington Correspondent
Newspaper Enterprise Assn.
WASHINGTON (NEAI-A pro
posal by Rep. Oliver P. Bolton,
R-Ohio, to let U.S. Comptroller
General Joseph Campbell and the
General Accounting Office which
he heads audit the accounts of
ail House committees and Archi
tect of the Capitol J. George
Stewart is something new in
Washington.
No one has ever had the cour
age to suggest that before. But
in view of all this year's agitation
for congressional reform and re
organization, it has possibilities.
There has been a lot of crab
bing at Congress this session for
loose handling of the taxpayers'
money. First it was for little
. things like spending half a mil
lion dollars of the Treasury's for
eign funds on expense accounts
for overseas junkets. Then it got
into big money to finish the $70
million third House office build
ing, complete with swimming
pool.
A plan to build a two-deck un
derground garage for the con
gressmen at a cost of $8 million
has been sidetracked, but it will
be back.
It was all this tomfoolery which
gave young Bolton his idea for
having a closer check of con
gressional spending. The General
Accounting Office is, of course,
the watchdog of Congress.
Last year Campbell sent Con
gress over 800 audits after in
vestigating charges of waste and
inefficiency in agencies of the
executive branch of government.
This resulted in savings of over
$160 million.
Incidentally, this is almost as
much as it costs to run Congress
$140 million for the House and
$28 million for the Senate in the
new fiscal year that began July
1. This is an increase of $22 mil
lion over last year.
On request, GAO in the past
has audited some of the rou
tine housekeeping accounts of the
Capitol the restaurants, barber
shops, custodial and police serv
ices. These reports have been
sent to the clerk of the House
or tlie Secretary of the Senate.
But they have never been made
public. And congressional com
mittee financial reports have been
approved only by chairmen.
To get all this out in the open,
Bolton went to the General Ac
counting Office for help. GAO's
general counsel Robert F. Keller
gave informal guidance on how
to proceed in drafting the bill,
without taking any position on its
merits or demerits.
The bill has now been referred
to House Government Operations
Committee under Chairman Wil
liam L. Dawson, D-Ill. i
On request from this commit
tee, says Campbell, GAO will re
view how tlie legislation would
operate and its costs.
Preliminary estimates are that
an audit of House committees
and Capitol architect's office ac
counts would require the full-time
services of only one or two
auditors. The cost would be $10,-
000 to $15,000 a year, plus the
cost of printing public reports,
which would be several thousand
more.
Bolton's bill would grant to the
comptroller general "the right
and privilege to audit all public
accounts of the House of Rep
resentatives, as well as all ex
penditures of the Capitol archi
tect." The Senate is excluded from
this bill because one house of Con
gress never legislates on the oth
er. But the assumption is that if
House accounts are put under
General Accounting Office audit,
the Senate would follow suit.
"Enactment of this bill," Bol
ton believes, "would grant to the
entire press corps facts which are
now held confidential. An open
accounting would help re
establish public trust and confi
dence in Congress."
Bolton also has under study a
proposal to establish a congres
sional Committee gn Ethics. It
would be patterned after the
American Bar Association Com
mittee on Ethics which has done
much to raise standards of the
legal profession.
WASHINGTON REPORT . . .
Foreign-Aid Program
Is Three-Ring Circus
By FULTON LEWIS JR.
Midway through the campaign
that was to carry him up Penn
sylvania Avenue to the White
House, Jolui Fitzgerald Kennedy
aimed some of his most bitter
salvos not at Richard Nixon but
big-city slums, instead.
To be sure, Nixon was the
scapegoat. He had voted against
urban renewal. He had opposed
in 1949 the National Housing Act
and in 1952 had sponsored an
amendment to end public housing
in Los Angeles.
Slums, declared candidate Ken
nedy, were the shame of the na
tion. Forty million Americans, he
continued, were forced to live in
sub-standard housing. There was
the financial cost of slums:
crime, delinquency and disease.
And the "social cost: For mil
lions of children, the slums are
an asphalt jungle, a mockery of
the American way of life."
He pledged an end to all of
this. He proposed a five-point, 10
year plan that would turn slums
into parks and punks into gentle
men. Soon after his election, the Pres
ident asked for and got increased
appropriations for urban renewal.
A press release, dated June 25,
explains one of the more ingeni
ous programs of the Urban Re
newal Administration:
A $900,000 attempt to turn the
deserted marshlands of southeast
New Jersey into a sta'e park and
BERRY'S WORLD
"Tber gatt tb tongrtuioiul watchdog commitltc'.'
"wild bird refuge." The area is
represented in Congress by Rep.
Milton Glenn (R.), who is unable
to fathom how or why it can
qualify for federal funds under
the urban renewal program.
There are no residents in tlie
"urban" area Washington wants
to "renew." There is nothing but
sandhills, and Indiana grass and
sea gulls, according to Rep.
Glenn.
The gift of Federal money is
deplored by municipal officers of
Ocean City, N.J., as the funds
will be used to acquire private
property, taking tax ratables from
the city.
There is no need for a Stale
Park, says the Congressman, w ho
points to 14 seashore resorts in
the immediate vicinity. Their ex
istence, he continues, is now
threatened by a State Park-financed
by federal funds that no
body, save some faceless bureau
crats, seems to want.
As for the "wild bird refuge,"
Rep. Glenn says it is a flagrant
misuse of the taxpayer's dough:
"Personally, I have nothing"
against birds. Yct-at the risk of '
being accused of discriminating
against our feathered fricnds-l
maintain that when our federal
government starts using urban re
newal money to develop bird ref
uses at a lime when American
citizens are living in slum condi
tions, such muddled governmental
thinking is strictly for the birds."
Ever wonder why the Adminis
tration needs more than $4 bil
lion to run its foreign aid shop?
Consider tlie following, uncovered
by Delaware Sen. John J. Wil
liams. 1. Washington buys from a Brit
ish firm 47 pieces of radar equip
ment at a total cost of $2,156,679.
2. Washington then discovers it
has no need for tlie stuff and asks
tlie British firm, Cossor Radar
Electronics, Ltd., to buy it back.
3. After considerable haggling,
the British agree to purchase the
goods as surplus for $114,500.
4. Cossor Radar promptly turns
around and sells the equipment
which is still in its original pack
ing crates to the Portuguese gov
ernment. 3. The Portuguese, using IS
foreign aid funds, pay the Brit
ish $493,500. The equipment ' is
then shipped to Portugal at US
expense marked "Free Issue."
Republicans will make an all
out effort to capture the Senate
seat of Democrat Edmund Mus
kie. one-time boy-wonder of Maine
politics. Likely GOP candidate is
seven-term Congressman Clifford
Mclntire.
-TVs "",