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About Herald and news. (Klamath Falls, Or.) 1942-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 26, 1963)
PAGE A HERALD AND NEW 8, Klunjlh Fails, Oregon Ihursdiy, December 26, 196 IN WASHINGTON Johnson Should First Cut Waste a Commendable Project Junior Chambers of Commerce, includ ing Klamath Falls', do a lot of worthwhile things in a community. The lighting contest our boys are staging at the moment will bring a lot of Christmas atmosphere to the city. It's an event from which both the par ticipants and the viewers get a good deal of enjoyment. The Jaycees at Portsmouth, Ohio, rate a kudo, for a project they undertook this Christmas season. They managed to get clearance to extend an invitation to a Rus sian family to visit the United States and especially Portsmouth. The family attended Paying The Piper's It seemed too good to be true, some months ago, when we learned that Washing ton's new cultural center, once it had ac cepted a site owned by the Government, would be financed entirely by voluntary contributions. And it was too good to be true. Now the Congress is being asked to au thorize $15.5 million in Federal grants to the project. Originally, the idea was that anyone who wanted to foster culture in Washington could contribute to the center. Now, as lax money will be used, it means that everyone will be required to contribute, whether he has the slightest interest in culture or Wash ington. There isn't any question that Washing ton could use an opera house, a symphony Jiall and another theater. Opera used to play at the Capitol Theater, a gaudy movie palace, but the wreckers got it. The local symphony orchestra now plays in enormous Constitu tion Hall, which was not designed for the purpose. All legitimate theaters but one have vanished. Democracy ; By rillL NEWSOM .. I'PI Foreign News Analyst In Seoul, South Korea, lints of tattered, hungry men form for a morning; handout o( food from a Catholic missionary re lief kitchen. Factories stand halt com pleted. In the last year Lhc price of ' rice has doubled. Rents and 1 .consumer poods prices have i risen steadily. II is estimated Mhat about one-fourth of the ! -country's labor (uric is uncm : ployed. This Is some measure of the economic crisis lacing the new Third Itepublic of Korea which came into being on Dee. 17 when Clou. Park Chung lief, leader of Korea's ruling mili tary junta, switched hats and became the nation's freely elect ed president. The junta had ruled South Ko rea for a little more than two and a half years and the eco nomic problems it passed along to the new Third Tiepuhlic were being inlierited by the same men who helped create IJiem. Park ran as the candidate o the junta backed Democratic Republican party, and he was accompanied into his new otlice by many another military man who hastily shucked his army uniform to campaign as a civil ian. Honest And Orderly " But there was an important difference. Even Park's politi cal oponenls agreed that Ko rea's elections had been the most orderly and honest In Ko rean history, and, politically, a good start had been made to ward democracy. Economically, the future must depend on whether Park and his associates have learned from past mistakes. For the last two years Korea : has been on a spending spree. U. S. aid money Intended to produce goods for export went instead into a government owned television station and im ported television receivers, Into jovernment-bullt automobtla assembly plant and into lipstick, stocking and other factories a chamber of commerce function, had the chance to shop at a supermarket and take in several typical American affairs. "We are delighted to be in your great country and we feel lucky wc were chosen to come here," the father of the family said through an interpreter. The Portsmouth Jaycees were looking for a suitable "Peace on Earth" project. They found it in some "men of good will" from Russia. Letting the people from the U.S.S.R. see us in action seems to be the best way to build understanding between the two nations. There isn't even any question that the people who go to the new cultural center will need parking space, for which $11,000, 000 is to be spent a figure that works out to about three times the worth of the av erage car parked in each space. The question is, should all taxpayers everywhere be taxed for entertainment fa cilities for Washingtonians? Residents of New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Detroit and other cities support theaters, opera houses and symphony halls through ticket purchas es and philanthropy. Washington, our wealthiest city in terms of personal income, certainly could do the same. The residents probably would be hap pier, in the long run, if they did. If the Government is a major sponsor, they may expect Congressmen to be the most vocif erous critics and fill the pages of the Con gressional Record with their personal ideas as to cultural or non-cultural values of the performers. He who pays the piper calls the tune. Faces Crisis producing luxury goods strictly for the home market. The result has been nidation and a serious depletion of Ko rea's foreign exchange. This has been in spile of the fact that in the last 10 years. U. S. economic and military aid to South Korea has totaled more than $1 billion. U. S. current aid is running at around $163 million annually. Mow To Mend Despite U. S. insistence on economic reforms and the pros pect of a decline in U. S. spend ing and despite many promises, the Korean government has been slow to mend its ways. There have been other sources of irritation between the two governments. BERRY'S WORLD j "I hen a big turprist for you, (olkt . , . In Commondtr-in-Chitt closed my fcase.'" Rent In Korea One such came, when the Ko rean government secretly nego lialcd to purchase more than $0 million worth o Australian food plains. The United Stales held I li.it Korea suflcred from no such grain shortage. Another arose over the late President Kennedy's failure to congratulate General Park on his election to (he presidency. But there remains hope. Tile (act that Park now heads a strong government has led to predictions that Korea and .la pan may be able soon to settle their long dispute and bury the ill-feeling left by 33 years of Japanese occupation. U. S. offi cials long have been convinced that cooperation between the two is essential to a healthy Korea. By Ralph de Toledana One congressman has already saved the taxpayer $33 million in the procurement of a com plex of electronic systems and lie has shown that the Pentagon wasted $83 million on the same purchase. This is something that President Johnson should ponder as he moves to cut 73. 000 people from the Defense De partment's civilian payroll and to shut down 30 instal lations. The President's "economy" efforts may or may not weak en this country's defenses. That is something for Congress U in vestigate. But the elimination of waste in procurement will not cut out jobs or slow indus trial wheels. If Mr. Johnson wishes to reduce the Defense budget, he should call on the General Accounting Otlice to give him the facts and figures it has amasssed on this waste and then call Defense Secreta ry Robert MeNamara to task for allowing and defending it. The nature and extent of this waste have been discussed in WILLIAM S. WHITE . . . New Appointment Welcomed By Latins W ASI 1 1 NGTON The re is ela tion among Americans with per sonal knowledge of Latin reali ties at President Johnson's ap pointment of Thomas Mann to pull together and singly In head our somewhat contused and overlapping programs deal ing with Latin America. That Mann is the man for the job is the view of an extra ordinary range of Latin buffs. It is a range including Senate liberals. Senate moderates. Sen ate conservatives and practical American businessmen with long experience in the coun tries lying to the south of us. The liberals are happy be cause Mann, who grew up along the Texas-Mexican border and knows lhc Latin mind as well as he knows his own, has a long record of active and ellcctive interest in the economic and social progress of Latin Amer ica. Maximum Bv DOKRIS FLEESON WASHINGTON Maximum exposure of Gov. William Scran Ion of Pennsylvania in news and picture magazines and on television has been firmly scheduled. This is the word from the country's communica tions center. New York, to its political capital, Washington. It suggests that the Eastern kingmakers of the Republican party believe that Presi dent Johnson can be beaten next ear in the big states by a Kennedy I v k from the Ken nedy generation. Prior to Dal las this group had entertained little hope ol defeating Presi dent Kennedy, and many in it had been willing to give I h e right wing its fling with Sen. Goldwalcr. WASHINGTON REPORTS By Ft ETON LEW IS JR. WASHINGTON Sen. Tom Dodd, militant foe of commu nism, is under police guard 24 hours a day. His life has lccn threatened. The Connecticut Democrat re ceived the. first of four threat ening letters a fortnight ago. The anonymous notes were to! lowed up by a call to radio station WT1C o( Hartford. Conn. An unknown caller vowed he would finish off the Senator. District of Columbia detectives have been assigned to Dodd s off ice and his Washington home. The Senator, a mild-mannered individual, maintains he does not know why someone would want to kill him: 'T don't want to make a big thing of this. And I don't know why ainone is mad at me. It's jiist on of those things." Police surmise lliat a fanatic left winger has made the threats against lvdd. Congress' number one expert on t h e Communist threat. Dodd lias run tlte Sen.ite Internal Securi ty Subcommittee and has di rected the group's twcer in vestigation into the Fair riay tor Cuba Committee. The Fair Play group. Dodd this space with some frequen cy. But Rep Earl Wilson 'R Ind.i keeps uncovering new examples. He is resnsible for the lipurcs I mentioned above. Mr. Wilson has fought a single handed battle to force the Pen tagon to procure its hardware by competitive bidding (which the law requires i and to do away with sole - source buying at inflated prices. For two years, he has been studying Hie pile o( documents involved in one transaction a complex of radio systems including the AN-VRC 12 a n d the AN-PRC 23 walkie - talkie. As a result of forcing the Pen tagon to open the AN-VRC 12 contract (or competitive bids. Mr. Wilson saved the taxpayer $10 million. Some $33 million had already been waslcd in ovcrpavmenl to the sole-source manufacturer. The AN-PRC 23 walkie-talkie and another sys . lem in the three-way complex have already cost $50 million more than was necessary be cause of sole - source procure Business is relieved because Mann like his chief, President Johnson, who has always been a favorite of Mexican - Ameri can voters in this country has never conlused an authentically liberal approach to Latin Amer ica with any notion that legiti mate American interests should not be fully protected. This in cludes American properly inter ests. For illustration, any fur ther confiscation of American property in Latin America will surely not be looked upon kind ly by Ihe new Washington head of Latin-American affairs. A peculiar ability to get along with Latins, meanwhile never forgetting that he represents the United Slates, Mann has many times shown, most re cently as American Ambassa dor to Mexico. The regime there is leftist though anti-Communist, and Mann is a poliUcal moder ate w-ith a strong and open at Exposure President Johnson is 55. His political roots go back to the New Deal, and he has been powerfully in the public eye for 10 years. Scranton, 4l, quietly slipped into Washington in lO.Vt as special assistant to the Sec retary of State and served one term in the House before be ing drafted for the Republican nomination for governor in 1SS2. Governor Scranton has resist ed pressure on him to enter Ihe New Hampshire primary. He has argued that he has work to do with his own legislature and cannot give the New Hamp shire voter the handshaking at tention to which he has become accustomed. Like Senator Gold water, he is indeed more mod est about his chances than his supporters and rather inclined Anti-Communist Solon's Life Threatened revealed, was heavily infiltrated by Communist operatios. Lee Harvey Oswald, accused as sassin e( President Kennedy, was once arrested for passing out Fair Play leaflets in New Orleans. Dodd is not tiie only Congress man to receive death threats in recent weeks. -Mail reaching Sen. Jolin Tower was so abusie that he was forced to move his family out of town. Rep. Bruce Alger, tiie Republican who rep resents Dallas, received such ominous letters that he had to take extraordinary measures to protect members of his office staff. Government emplejes forced to buy $100-a-p'a(e ticket tn Democratic f:d-raisms affairs will be interested in the com ment of Sen. George .McGovern. The South Dakota Democrat says that federal employes "ought to regard it as a privi lege" to contribute. The issue was raised by Sen. Frank Carlson, who took the Senate lloor to protest ticket hauking by repiesentatixes of the Democratic National Com mittee. Carlson, ranking Repub ment. Competitive bidding will bring down the cost by $23 mil lion. The Army communications complex involved in this pro curement deal are but one of many in which sole - sourcing costs the taxpayer billions of dollars every year. At the Pentagon, it is often said that though the bill may be higher when the sole - source method is used, there are real advan tages. Speed of delivery and familiarity with the product are the two most often cited. Pro curement officials insist lli.it they make out much beUer with the companies they know. The case of the AN-VRC 12 proves just the opposite. The low bidder, when competition was permitted, was tiie high ly experienced Mugnavox com pany. Representative Wilson says it is "making the radio on schedule, is making a profit, and would like to have more business at the same price." He adds: "As a matter of fact, it delivered the pre-production tachment to democratic capital ism. Nevertheless, he fared not ably well with President Lopez Mateo, who considers him one of the best Ambassadors ever to serve in Mexico City. And this is the reason: The Latins like all other peoples, but perhaps even a little more so than most respect honest power honestly and fairly used. They do not want from us mere reformist - minded spokesmen awash with vague good will but unable to perform. They want sympathetic spokesmen. of course, but, most of all, spokesmen able to talk candid ly of the candid purposes of the United States Government from a personal closeness to the head of that government, the President. As much as any thing else, they want at all times to know just where they stand with Washington. All over Latin America they Scheduled to wait and see. The New Hampshire question mark thus remains Richard Nixon. Nixon urged a recent caller to return Jan. 10, as there might be news then. A Rockefeller backer had no trou ble identifying the date as Ihe one when filing opens for the New Hampshire primary. It would seem a little unusual for two New York Republicans living in the same apartment house to run against each other in the New Hampshire primary, but there is no law against it. It is also unusual for a major party to rely upon building up a Presidential candidate for an election less than 11 months away, but this is. of course, the age of instantaneous communi cations. Nor must it be forgot lican on the Senate Post Office and Civil Service Committee, said "career employes must be protected from political harass ment" Carlson referred to a story in the Washington Star by Joseph Young, who has covered the government for many years. Young said civil servants had received two communications from the Democratic National Committee in which tickets to a $10O-a-pIate dinner were ped dled. One of the letters was signed by Democratic National Chairman John Bailey. Employes who make as little as W.fiTS a year were among those asktd to purchase tickets. Democratic ofticials deny that any employe is pressured to buy a ticket. Career employes feel differently. Y'oung said: 'They fear that unless they purchase the $100 tickets their dunces for advancement in their careers are apt to be jeopardised. Furthermore, they fear it puLs them in an unten able position whenever there might be a chance of rational political administrations. "They point out that one of the first thiees a new political administration does Vn taking otlice is to scan the list ( con model a month ahead of sched ule." It is. moreover, not unusual for the low bidder to be the previous sole source manufac turer. In the case of the AN PRC 23, the producer cut his price in half and won the bid when he was faced with com petition which couid have taken the contract from him. But the waste or worse is not only in the procurement of military hardware. The Navy Purchasing Office has been going to the well with astonish ing frequency in what seems like a mad rush to ' stockpile" supplies and of:ice equipment. In 12, for example, it needed four electric stapling machines. These are available for a max imum of $24 from the Feder al Supply Schedule. But t h e NPO went to a favored whole saler and paid him $44.75 each. Then the NPO bought 24 not four) machines at this in flated price, with no known rea son for wanting the additional 20. And there were, at the time. call Mann "sympatico" not meaning that ho is a crooningly sentimental friend but meaning that he is a practical friend al ways ready to help but never ready for a moment to let dow n his own country. They know he is sympathetic to their prob lems; but they also know he is no Yankee apple polisher. President Johnson, in fact, hesitated a bit over this selec tion. This was not out of the smallest doubt of Mann's capa cities. It was because this, his first major appointment, neces sarily would involve a m a n from the President's native state. If domestic politics had been a point, Mann would not have been the choice. The Pres ident went ahead in the con viction thai the problem of as sisting Latin America to come through the twin curses of left wing and right-wing extremism, fed by poverty and disorder, is For Gov. ten that the big states effective ly blocked serious consideration of Lyndon Johnson for Presi dent at the 1060 national con vention. The old misgivings will be muted at Ihe first national Dem ocratic gathering since Dallas. It is a meeting of the national committee here Jan. 4. No doubt one and all will profess to be very, very happy with the 11154 prospect, but it will be rather on the order of Congres sional pretense thai the Presi dential Succession Act is serv ing the country well at this point. President Johnson does n o t have an automatic hook into the new generation The Catholics will not vote solidly for him, as they tended to do for their first tributors to the opposite politi cal party, to see if federal em ployes are on the list. This could and has led tn recrimi nations against employes." The West German Ministry of Interior has denied a request for entry permits from a group of Hungarian "folk singers." The reason: The "singers" were actually Communist Party organizers. A guest on the Presidential plane when Lyndon Johnson f'.ew to New York for Herbert Lehman's funeral was Joseph L. Rauh. leader in the Ameri cans for Democratic Action. Rauh has been a violent critic of the President. In r.i5fi. as ADA national chairman. Rauh accused Johnson of dragging Ihe Democratic Party to its "lowest point in 25 years." In 1957. Rauh said Johnson had sold out the Democratic Party on civil rights, a charge he repeated through low) when he led Ihe fight against LBJ for vice president. Now Rauh u sajd to know he needs Johnson. And Johnson, never popular with the Demo cratic Party's left wing, is said to know he needs Rauh. 15 electric staplers sitting tn the NPO warehouse, never used. The NPO, what's more, had an overstock of 3 000 staple remov. ers, half a million sheets of car bon paper, 3.838 ballpoint pens. 4.6(18 ballpoint refills, and five miles of Scotch tape to name hut a few Items. According to Mr. Wilson, the NPO issues a new eraser every three days to each of its inn employes. In a $33 billion budget, this supplying in order to give a friend the business may seem like small potatoes. But multi ply it by the great number of offices, agencies, and bureaus al the Pentagon and the figure becomes significant. Secretary MeNamara is con sidered an excellent executive. Did he permit these kinds of practices when he was presi dent of the Ford Motor Com pany? This is the question President Johnson should ask him when next they discuss Ihnse 75.000 civilians who are petting their pink slips just be fore Christmas. exceeded in gravity only by Ihe problem of keeping peace in a nuclear world. But to say that few public officials have ever entered high tasks with more wide and gen erous backing is not by any means to loll the whole tale. All is not now well; everybody will not now live happily ever afterward. No informed person can doubt that the road ahead w ill be very long and rocky. No informed person can sup pose, cither, that even the most gifted director here of Lalin American affairs can do in one year, or two, or five, all that must be done. Given great good fortune we may now be at the beginning of a phase of possible solutions for a huge area be deviled by Castroism on the left, right-wing dictatorship on the right and. often, public apa thy in the middle. That is the best that can be said. Scranton President, but will return to some degree to Republican alle giance. The party is in disorder in key states. The new President also will he expected to produce much more from Congress than was President Kennedy. It has giv en little ground so far. "Presi dent" Harry Byrd of Virginia is doing about what he planned anyway with the tax bill, and so is "President" Howard Smith of Virginia with civil rights. One of the higcest Johnson tasks will be to convince his old collcacues that he is in ear nest when he adopts the Kenne dy program and enlarges it. As that condition appears, it will be high drama to watch him cope. Al manac By I'nited Press International today is Thursday, Dec. 2fi, ' the 360th day of 19tv) with five td follow. The moon is approaching its full phase. The eveninc stars aie Jupiter, Saturn and Venus. On this day in history: In 177fi. Gcor;e Washington' army captured l.ono Hessians at the Battle of Trenton adar inflicting a major defeat on the British. In li5. the first patent for a coffee percolator was awarded to James Nason of Franklin, Mass. In 10:7. the federal govern ment took over tiie operation of ail L' S. railroads for the du ration of tiie World War I. In TOI. for the first time, a British prime minister ad dressed a joint session of Con cress. Winston Churchill dis cussed the war in Europe. A thought for the day Ihr British statesman Winston Churchill said. "Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without results." o o
