PEROT: BACK DOOR MAN Pg. 9

A JOURNAL OF FREE VOICES JULY 24, 1992 • $1.50 Remaking the Democrats

MICHAEL ALEXANDER DIALOGUE

No Peace in Middle East mise failed. Skaff, who maintains a Houston THE TEXAS residence and is a Democratic National I am a longtime subscriber and reader of Committee member from Texas, said the The Texas Observer and have always been Arab-American Democrats believed they impressed with the accuracy of your report- abided with the substance of the agreement. JOURNALs OF rverREE VOICES ing. I must, however, take exception to the We will serve no group or party but will hew hard to article entitled "Peace Talks Falter" in the the truth as we find it and the right as we see it. We are On Perot's Myth dedicated to. the whole truth, to human values above all June 19 1992, issue. The article was not only interests, to the rights of human-kind as the foundation inaccurate, but it was also unfairly slanted. James Cullen's piece on Perot ("Henry of democracy: we will take orders front none but our own As chairman of Texans for Justice and Ross Perot: Hit or Myth," TO 6/5/92) is by conscience, and never will we overlook or misrepresent Freedom, an organization supporting the far the best of the current round. I've xerox- the truth to serve the interests of the powedid or cater ed it liberally and passed it around. There is to the ignoble in the human spirit. U.S.-Israel relationship, I negotiated an Writers are responsible for their own work, but not agreement on platform language with Chair- a kind of Perot sickness in Dallas, and appar- for anything they have not themselves written, and in pub- man Bob Slagle of the Texas Democratic ently everywhere, waiting for Jesus, Rapture, lishing them we do not necessarily imply that we agree Party and Ruth Ann Skaff (of Memphis, Final Solution, Purity, etc. Essentially a very with them, because this is a journal of free voices. Tenn., not Houston as you report), represent- .outrageous moment in history. Keep up the SINCE 1954 ing the Arab-American community. The lan- deconstruction; the myth has a lot of technol- guage we agreed upon with regard to the ogy and dinero this time. Publisher: Ronnie Dugger Middle East was almost word for word the Rod Davis, Dallas Editor: Louis Dubose language Texans for Justice and Freedom Associate Editor: James Cullen Layout and Design: Diana Paciocco, Peter Szymczak drafted. We never discussed inclusion or Copy Editor: Roxanne Bogucka exclusion of language expressing the special No Cake Walk Mexico City Correspondent: Barbara Belejack relationship between the U.S. and Israel, as Ann Richards', Gib Lewis', and Bob Editorial Interns: Jubilee Barton, Jay Brida, Paula you mistakenly report. George, Lorri J. Legge, Kate McConnico Bullock's recent message to Texas public Contributing Writers: Bill Adler, Betty Brink, Warren The agreements we reached contained a schools, in which they reneged on promised Burnett, Jo Clifton, Terry FitzPatrick, Gregg Franzwa, certain code of conduct. After several viola- school funding, taught students across the James Harrington, Bill Helmer, Ellen Hosmer, Steven tions of the agreement by Arab-American state a whole new meaning to "The Turn of Kellman, Michael King, Deborah Lutterbeck, Tom delegates, Chairman Slagle declared that the McClellan, Bryce Milligan, Greg Moses, Debbie Nathan, the Screw." Great lesson, gang. Gary Pomerantz, Lawrence Walsh. - Arab-American delegates had breached the Carol Countryman, Athens Editorial Advisory Board: David Anderson, Austin; agreement and that the agreement was null Frances Barton, Austin; Elroy Bode, El Paso; Chandler and void. Since there was no agreement on P.S.: Coming soon: Bake Sale and Car Davidson, Houston; Dave Denison, Cambridge, Mass; platform language, the Platform Committee, Bob Eckhardt, Washington, D.C.; Sissy Farenthold, Wash (proceeds to pay for public education). Houston; Ruperto Garcia, Austin; John Kenneth Galbraith, in its wisdom, and not as retribution for the Cambridge, Mass.; Lawrence Goodwyn, Durham, N.C.; breach, adopted platform language which George Hendrick, Urbana, Ill.; Molly Ivins, Austin; Larry mirrored previous platform language recog- Persistence Rewarded L. King, Washington, D.C.; Maury Maverick, Jr., San nizing the special relationship between the Just a few comments regarding your paper. Antonio; Willie Morris, Oxford, Miss.; Kaye Northcott, Austin; James Presley, Texarkana; Susan Reid, Austin; United States and Israel, the only democracy First, I do appreciate your renewal letters Tor- Geoffrey Rips, Austin; A.R. (Babe) Schwartz, Galveston; in the Middle East. The platform also added mat. Second, I feel it is essential to have your Fred Schmidt, Fredericksburg. the language earlier agreed upon with the paper this year what with a Native Son possi- Arab-American delegates. The Arab- bly being a presidential candidate. Third, I Poetry Consultant: Thomas B. Whitbread American delegates attempted to offer a wish you had Molly [Ivins] as a more fre- Contributing Photographers: Bill Albrecht, Vic Hin- minority report of the Platform Committee quent contributor. terlang, Alan Pogue. Contributing Artists: Michael Alexander, Eric Avery, on the floor of the convention and that report I had wanted to see your publication for Tom Ballenger, Richard Bartholomew, Jeff Danziger, was voted down by 2 to 1 according to several years, but never was able to track it Beth Epstein, Dan Hubig, Pat Johnson, Kevin Kreneck, Democratic Party officials. down. Finally, our youngest daughter, who is Michael Krone, Carlos Lowry, Ben Sargent, Dan Your Associate Editor, James Cullen, a Business Librarian at the University of Thibodeau, Gail Woods, Matt Wuerker. apparently decided not to interview members Missouri (Columbia), gave me the original of Texans for Justice and Freedom or Chair- subscription and I have enjoyed having it. Managing Publisher: Cliff Olofson Lee Gray, Aledo, Ill. Subscription Manager: Stefan Wanstrom man Slagle. Had he done so, he would have Executive Assistant: Gail Woods learned that the "factual scenario" he re- Special Projects Director: Bill Simmons ceived from the briefing party was incorrect. P.S.: I wish we, in Illinois, had a similar Development Consultant: Fiances Barton Finally, we agree with Ms. Skaff that the check on our state government. Democratic Party should continue to work SUBSCRIPTIONS: One year $27. two years $48, three years $69. Full-time students $15 per year. Back issues $3 prepaid. Airmail. foreign. group, and with Arab-Americans. Our primary goal, bulk rates on request. Microfilm editions available from University Microfilms Intl.. 300 N. Zeeb Road. Ann Arbor. MI 48106. Any current subscriber who however, is to elect Bill Clinton to the finds the price a burden should say so at renewal time: no one need forgo White House and not to engage in the reading the Observer simply because of the cost. unpleasantness attendant with the breach Write THE TEXAS OBSERVER (ISSN 0040-4519/USPS 541300), entire contents copyrighted. 01992. ispublished biweekly except for a three-week interval of an agreement. between issues in January and July (25 issues per year) by the Texas Observer Marc R. Stanley, Chairman, Dialogue. Publishing Co.. 307 West 7th Street. Austin. Texas 78701. Telephone: (512) 477-0746. Second-class postage paid at Austin. Texas. Texans for Justice and Freedom, Austin POSTMASTER: Send address changes to THE TEXAS OBSERVER. 307 West 7th Street. Austin. Texas 78701. 307 West 7th Street, A Member of the Editor's Note: Cullen attended the Platform Association of Committee hearing at which the alleged Austin, Texas 78701 Alternative Newsweeklies breach of the agreement was discussed and observed as attempts to preserve the compro-

2 • JULY 24, 1992 T HE TEXAS EDITORIALS server VOLUME 84, No. 14 Deja Voodoo Economics FEATURES Remaking the Democrats By Dave Denison ONE OF THE DEMOCRATIC Con- Public Citizen's Congress Watch director 5 N vention speakers I listened to mentioned Michael Waldman wrote in the June 29 issue GOP Dry Run it. Ross Perot alluded to it once, telling a talk- of The New Republic. Waldman explained that By Kate McConnico 7 show host that one of the largest banks in failing financial firms often nose-dive into the country (read: Citicorp) is insolvent. But "insolvency spirals," gambling on riskier loans Almost Elvis other than Ross' moment of candor, no one is and paying extra-high interest rates to attract By Allan Freedman 8 discussing one of the most important issues new customers. Having seen the effect of the of this election year. Only if you read and S&L policy of forbearance, financial advisers Perot: Backdoor Man listen, paying careful attention to writers now agree that it is better to take control of a By James Cullen 9 and thinkers like William Greider, Lawrence bank as soon as it becomes insolvent. Waldman Goodwyn, Tom Ferguson, Jim Hightower, and points to the one-year delay in last year's Pampa and Woody Guthrie Tom Schlesinger of the Campaign for takeover of the Bank of New England, which By Richard Hughes • 15 Financial Democracy, will you begin to have increased bailout costs to $2.5 billion. some idea of what's waiting for you after Though prompt and fiscally responsive action DEPARTMENTS the election. by the Bush Administration now could help turn 3 Henry B. Gonzalez knows. The San the tide and save billions in taxpayer dollars, Editorials Antonio congressman has known for a long don't count on it. "When regulators seize a bank, Las Americas time, probably even before June 22, 1990, it means bad headlines, consumer jitters, and when, obviously concerned about the odd economic dislocation," Waldman wrote. Not Quiet Election in 0-J By Jack McNamara arithmetic by which the FDIC guarantees bank the sort of thing that George Bush has much 12 deposits, he questioned then-Comptroller of stomach for. 13 Currency Robert Clarke at a hearing in The Financial Democracy Campaign, which Journal Houston. Gonzalez asked Clarke how the. Hightower chairs, has followed the adminis- Books & the Culture FDIC could insure so much with so little. The tration's response to the hidden banking crisis The FBI Takes Aim comptroller replied that the insurance fund and what they reveal is truly disturbing. Bush Movie review by Steven G. Kellman was adequate, that Gonzalez's question pre- Administration banking policy includes: 19 supposed the collapse of a lot of banks, and • Summoning hundreds of field regulators Reading Rainbow that even assuming the worst a whole lot of to the National Bank•nd Thrift Examiners' Book review by Geoffrey Rips 21 real estate (presumably to be sold off as the Conference in Baltimore for "guidance" on Resolution Trust Corporation is now selling the treatment of commercial loans. After the Afterword S&L properties) stood between the FDIC meeting, Comptroller General Charles Bowsher Expose Yourself to Politics insurance fund and a taxpayer-funded bailout. called the message delivered to the examiners By David Schultz 23 The FDIC insurance fund, in other words, was in Baltimore "potentially dangerous to the main- in good shape. That was two years ago. Two tenance of a safe and sound banking system." Political Intelligence 24 years later, on June 2, the Federal Deposit (December 16, 1991) Insurance Fund reported its first loss ever: $7 • Loosening capital requirements (a move Cover art by Michael Alexander billion last year. frighteningly reminiscent of the policies that What you haven't been told is that next year bought us the $500 billion S&L collapse) by • The Fed votes to delay full implementa- the banking system is going to begin to col- removing limits on how much "noncumulative tion of limits on bank loans to insiders. (April lapse, much like the S&Ls did four years ago. perpetual preferred stock" banks can count as' 22, 1992.) And you're going to be billed for the bailout. their core capital. (January 12, 1992) • Congressional Budget Office Director Actually, you already have been billed. If you • Federal bank regulators announce that banks Robert Reischauer reports that the FDIC dra- believe the $70 billion "loan" that the FDIC will no longer be required to disclose risky, matically slowed the pace at which it closed already wheedled out of Congress to stanch the highly leveraged transactions on their books. failed banks in the first half of the 1992 fiscal flow of bankers' red ink will ever be repaid, (January 21, 1992) year, despite Congressional authorization of a then you probably still believe the Sandinistas • President Bush announces a 90-day freeze $70 billion taxpayer-guaranteed loan to quick- are on their way to Harlingen and that Bill on new regulations and orders a costly review ly shut down insolvent banks, and thus reduce Clinton never inhaled. of existing bank rules. (January 28, 1992) the loss to the Bank Insurance Fund. That "Just like 1988," former Texas Ag • The Federal Reserve proposes that credit amount represents more than one-third of the Commissioner Jim Hightower wrote in a July cards and mortgage-servicing rights be count-. $215 billion the federal government spends 3 broadside to newspaper editors, "when the ed as core capital for banks. This creates the on all discretionary domestic programs. (April Reagan Administration downplayed the impor- illusion of secure capital where there is none: 1, 1992) tance of the S&L mess and kept it out of the The money certainly won't be there if credit • Disregarding recommendations of FDIC press and the presidential campaign, this card holders — now shopping in a competi- chair Michael Taylor that the premiums banks year's banking bomb is being obscured by the tive market — are lured away by other banks pay to the insurance fund be substantially White House." Hightower is not entirely alone or if mortgage holders refinance loans at other increased, the five-member FDIC Board voted in trying to make banking a campaign issue. institutions. (February 26, 1992.) for a very modest increase to take effect Janu- "If the S&L debacle taught us any lesson, it • Regulators consider accounting changes ary 1, 1993. (May 12, 1992) is this: delay in the takeover of an ailing bank that would permit banks to count tax-loss car- It's unlikely that we will hear much about often adds substantially to the ultimate cost," ryforwards as "capital." (March 10, 1992) this from the Clinton-Gore camp, either. And

THE TEXAS OBSERVER • 3

that's too bad. By ignoring the problem, not Bush-Quayle campaign in northern California This is Texas today. A state full of only is the Democratic ticket failing to level in 1988, was recently nominated to serve as Sunbelt boosters, strident anti-union- with the voters, it is missing a political oppor- comptroller of the currency? Waldman also observed that among the bank ists, oil and as companies, nuclear tunity. The President's behavior is informed by his fear of the public's learning how bad things lobbyists pressuring the FDIC Board to keep weapons and power plants, political have really gotten in the past 12 years and his insurance premium increases minimal was hucksters, underpaid workers and toxic understanding that while banks might be going Thomas "Lud" Ashley, a former Bush class- wastes, to mention a few. broke, bankers still have abundant money to mate and Skull and Bones brother from Yale contribute to political campaigns. who recently shook the money tree and raised Clinton has no patronage here and the $250,000 in "undisclosed contributions" for the President does. And the President is using defense fund of S&L poster boy Neil Bush. that patronage in return for contributions from Though there's no political patronage for bankers. Timothy Ryan, "is the administration's Clinton and Gore to hand out here, they can't point man working with bank regulators," win this fight by staying out of if it. What will It"> Tif I according to the Waldman article. Ryan, the they have to say if they win and take office V ' appointed director of the Treasury Department's just in time to pick up a $28.7 billion tab for the P Al 4,W., tAI' I? Office of Thrift Supervision, is a career politi- 200 banking failures the FDIC has predicted for 0046' 41 ...... 1 °'. „ - "It i --:-- - cal operative. "Ryan began his career in poli- 1992? And that might be just the beginning, tics working for CREEP in 1972, and has particularly if the big banks, like Citicorp — AR 4V- ■jA, A ,,;:‘ ar .,.., worked in every Republican presidential cam- declared "technically insolvent" by Michigan "e paign since then — including this one," a Congressman John Dingell last August and

., gal congressional aide told Waldman. by Ross Perot last month.— go under. R... , I) 4 ., ....ir '" Waldman describes Ryan as the leader in the April's secret will inevitably become the Le toy Q. - ' administration's fight with FDIC chair William December surprise. So the Democratic ticket 44C, I - Irtb r Taylor over a substantial increase in the pre- either drags this issue out into the summer sun- mium rates banks and thrifts pay into their insur- light anduses it to define what the Reagan-Bush- ance funds. Ryan's success in holding premiums Quayle administration is all about, or — and RIA down, which will mean that taxpayers rather here's the real risk — calculates that the bank- rilLF/ rr than banks pay for the bailout, is the sort of polit- ing community will read the polls and start cov- BUT ical patronage that will result in big campaign ering its bets by writing big checks to the DO NOT -.-, giving by bankers. Ryan also announced the Democratic ticket. , "The administration in this political year has DESPAIR! recent bank deregulation pleasures that came out of Vice President Dan Quayle's Council on caved in to the special interests," Banking

,...,,,.,, THE TEXAS Competitiveness. And if all of this is not "pro- Committee Chair Gonzalez said of a recent foundly political," as Hightower characterizes Treasury Department ruling. If Clinton and Gore it, how else to explain Ryan's actions, or the remain silent on banking, you can bet they're 1 fact that James Gilleran, who chaired the caving in, too. — L.D TO SUBSCRIBE: Choices on Abortion

Name nne shoe dropped, and the U.S. Supreme Supreme Court could reinstate the 1898 Texas Court left the other shoe dangling when statute — moot since the 1973 Roe v. Wade it upheld most of the Pennsylvania law restrict- decision — that provides five-year prison terms ing abortions, including the 24-hour waiting for doctors or others who perform abortions. Address period, parental consent for minors and an With uncertain legislative support to repeal the informed consent rule. Spin Control in old law, the Texas Abortion Rights Action Washington declared that the decision, which League is focusing on electing sympathetic stopped short of reversing Roe v. Wade, took judges on state appeals courts, including City the heat off anti-abortion President Bush in this Democrats Oscar Mauzy and Rose Spector election year, particularly since polls suggest on the Texas Supreme Court and Morris the public supports abortion rights with some Overstreet on the Court of Criminal Appeals. restrictions. But aging Justice Harry Blackmun In Washington, one day after the Supreme State left no doubt that the 5-4 decision could go Court decision, the House Judiciary Committee the other way and outlaw all abortions within approved the Freedom of Choice Act that would a few years if Bush is re-elected. "Four justices protect abortion rights. "Congress has the power anxiously await the single vote necessary to — indeed the responsibility — to fill the con- Zip extinguish the light," Blackmun wrote in the stitutional void left by the court," Chairman opinion, adding: "I am 83 years old ... I can- Jack Brooks, D-Beaumont, said. Pro-choicers in Congress do not have enough votes to over- ❑ $27 enclosed for a one-year not remain on this Court forever." subscription. In Austin, Bill Price, president of the anti- ride Bush's expected veto, but they hope it will abortion Texans United for Life, promised a energize voters who support legal abortions. ❑ Bill me for $27. push to restrict abortions in Texas next year. Lt. The Texas Department of Health reported Gov. Bob Bullock has said he would block any 92,000 abprtions were performed in Texas dur- such bill in the Senate and there is little incen- ing 1991, compared with an estimated 316,000 307 West 7th, tive for new House leadership to promote live births. Sixty-nine percent of abortions were Austin, TX 78701 such a divisive bill; if it gets as far as Gov. obtained by single women and nearly one in Ann Richards, she would veto it. But the five were obtained by teenagers. —J.C.

4 • JULY 24, 1992 Remaking the Democrats

BY DAVE DENISON

New York City HE FIRST DAY of the convention was a sweltering day in the city, one of T those days that soaks the full back of the shirt, not just a splotch along the midspine. I had a vague headache from negotiating a half- day's worth of transportation from Boston to Long Island to Penn Station and, for no par- ticular reason, I felt myself to be in a hurry. I got to the credentials headquarters in the hotel across from Madison Square Garden in late afternoon, made my way through the line, and set out to find my way around. Not yet having discovered the side entrance reserved for media at the Garden, I waited in a crush of delegates as a slow-moving line fil- tered through the two metal detectors set up in the front entrance. Just ahead of delegate Tom Hayden of California, I made it through and went inside. The important thing was, I had my Bell South media lounge pin and if I could find the lounge it would mean free and unlim- ited grazing privileges. The information desk directed me to go to the top of the Paramount Theater. I started riding escalators. Signs pointed to news bureaus in every direction, but no media lounge. I got to the seventh level and started down a winding corridor. The air condition- ing was chilling the wet back of my shirt. I was evidently in the Garden, not the theater. I turned into a staircase and started down. At the next floor level, and the next, the door was locked. NO ENTRY. PROCEED TO NEXT LEVEL. Further down I went. PROCEED TO NEXT LEVEL. It occurred to me I was the only one using these stairs. Halfway down, a discarded red-and-blue placard rested among the dusty pipes. It said: "Mario Cuomo for President." I wondered if there would be many of those on the convention floor a few nights hence, and why this one had been abandoned. Had someone just now given up after months of hope against the odds? All the way at the bottom I found a door that opened. I peeked out and saw people waiting in line in front of metal detectors. I had come too far to wait in line again, so I slowly began to trudge back up. Proceed to next level. Proceed to next level. Mario for President. Proceed to next level.

hen I got to the media lounge it was crawl- PATRICIA MOORE Wing with journalists. Piles of roast beef Ann Richards and Bill Clinton and turkey sandwiches on buns were disap- pearing and being replaced just as quickly. Free vision monitors brought us the C-Span view of about the reasons Texans took such a strong beer and drinks were flowing. The many tele- the convention's opening rituals. interest in armadillos, which to him seemed to As I loaded a plate, I spotted Andrew Kopkind be dirty little varmints. The cover of our of the Nation coming over. I had last seen Observer that month happened to depict a dead Dave Denison, a former Observer editor, is a him in Atlanta in 1988, when he was going about armadillo in the middle of the road, a pictorial freelance writer living in Cambridge, Mass. with Alexander Cockburn, who grilled me then warning that went unheeded by the Democratic

THE TEXAS OBSERVER • 5 candidate that year (and the rest is history). standing, would be forced to respond to. If tell it, are the most important bloc of voters in I was glad to see Kopkind, not just because you further imagined an energized social the nation. The loyal Democrats were assumed he is garrulous and funny but because the piece movement that was specifically geared toward to be reliable. Those wavering Southern white he had written with Cockburn just before the seizing control of the Democratic Party, a males, independent-minded suburbanites and convention that now brought us together pressed movement that truly had the numbers behind it, urban white ethnics who fell for Reagan were the very question that ought to have been how could the party rebuff it? But then, if you seen to be the key to victory. weighing on the mind of•every thinking jour- can imagine all that, you can just as easily imag- How to impress them? Stand up to Jesse nalist and delegate in the hall: Is the Democratic ine such a movement creating its own party and Jackson, for starters. This had already been Party a lost cause? Writing when just about launching out on its own terms. achieved by Clinton's public chastisement everyone was still assuming there would be a Either way, it ought not to be a law of of Sister Souljah, the black rap artist, at three-way race for the Presidency, Kopkind and American politics that the Republican Party, as Jackson's Rainbow Coalition dinner. Second, Cockburn asked: Why not a fourth candidate? the party that speaks for the wealthy minority, join the Republicans in elevating welfare as "Has there ever been a more propitious time for the fundamentalist minority and the racist minor- a symbolic issue and assert that too many poor a candidate of the left, with the task of win- people are on the dole as a way of life. Third, ning not the 50 percent necessary in a two- cast the campaign as a crusade for the mid- way race but the 25 to 30 percent needed in each dle class. state in a four-way contest?" The writers sug- This is a campaign strategy that was for- gested it might not be too late for Jesse Jackson Is the party so far mulated in the laboratory of the Democratic to break off and run as an independent. Leadership Council several years ago, when Another article in the same issue of the Nation from its ideals of the great mass of the electorate was still pre- made the case for the building of a third party, sumed to be in sympathy with the presumptions a recurring dream of leftists who feel abused by organizing and ele- of Reaganism. Democratic liberalism, it was the Democratic Party, and one that is getting vating the working decided, could no longer win the approval of serious consideration again by feminists, labor the majority. So a cautious, chastened and remnants of the progressive crowd that class and the disne- Democratic Party would have to reposition itself hoped to build the Citizens Party in the 1980s. franchised that it as a "moderate" party. By the end of convention week, of course, This has won almost universal approbation the theoretical mathematics had all been jum- ought to be aban- from the mainstream press. Real, live "Reagan bled by Perot's sudden withdrawal. Jesse Democrats" were sought out by reporters. Two Jackson had stayed on board the Democratic doned to the party forty-something voters in suburban Philadelphia oceanliner; Mario Cuomo was there too. Both loyalists, corporate were quoted in the Philadelphia Inquirer giv- of them had at last agreed to swab the deck ing a tentative O.K. to Clinton: "I believe in for Captain Clinton. There would be no third funders and overedu- helping them," one said about people on wel- choice and no fourth choice. Bush vs. Clinton; cated elites? fare. "But they should do something back. They take it or leave it. shouldn't just sit there and wait for the check." Despite all that — or maybe because of that Clinton struck this voter as "a conservative — the question continues to nag: Is the ity, should have a claim as a majority party. The Democrat that's not going to give everything Democratic Party in such an "advanced stage sheer numbers favor a party that speaks for a away." Suddenly, Clinton was said to be 30 of decay," as the Nation put it, that it can no coalition of people in the lower and middle points ahead of Bush in public opinion polls. longer fulfill its original purpose— that being income range, who favor liberty from govern- According to the papers, Clinton is not as lib- to counterbalance the power of the moneyed ment intrusion but benefits from governmental eral as the usual Democrat — he's in favor of interests and the wealthy few? Is the party, in activism and who haven't given up hope that the death penalty, he says government isn't the fact, so far from its ideals of organizing and ele- the races can get along. answer to every problem, he's not a bleeding vating the working class and the disenfranchised Sheer numbers don't mean a thing, of course, heart for the poor... This is the level of debate that it ought to be abandoned to the dwindling as long as citizens remain unorganized, alien- the campaign will be waged on in the coming core of party loyalists, corporate funders and ated, unregistered to vote and without hope that months. overeducated elites who so ardently yearn to politics can be meaningful. And that is where At the same time, there's a new element of speak for the "forgotten middle class"? Or is we are in 1992. The high theory, the "What- anger and rebellion among the voters that the this a defeatism that we cannot afford? Ifs," and the democratic idealism can make a DLC strategy hadn't counted on. This allows I put the question to Kopkind. Given the near journalist feel silly at times. The arguments take Clinton to inject a tinge of populism into the impossibility of succeeding with a third party, us up and down a closed staircase, the stenciled message. He took pains at the convention to why is it not at least somewhat more realistic lettering on the doors advising us to try anoth- show himself as a regular bubba, a man who for progressives to work for the transformation er level, the old populist dreams resting on dusty had risen above family difficulty and wasn't of the Democratic Party? Is it not easier to pipes, like a placard advertising a candidate who part of the East Coast elite. And for a campaign take over an existing enterprise, with all its is not even in the running. slogan, he settled on "Putting People First." machinery assembled, than to build some- (This seemed to especially capture the imagi- thing from the ground up? Kopkind's answer rro the next level, then. The newspapers nation of USA Today, which probably can be was that it is not necessarily so. The Democratic and commentators of July would have us expected soon to trumpet poll results showing Party, he said, is so tightly controlled by view the Clinton-Gore ticket as a great wis- "Large Majority of Us Favor Putting People Washington lawyers, corporate fatcats, and the ing-up of the Democratic Party. Ross Perot him- First.") party insiders that it is simply not available to self, for all his disdain of the media, must It would have been interesting to conduct a other owners. Any attempts to limit or remove have bought the media line; his stated reason poll of the assembled delegates as to what the present controlling interests would be for getting out of the campaign was that the Clinton might mean by "people first." Clinton doomed to fail. So why waste the effort? Democrats had revitalized themselves. himself never delineates exactly what order The argument can go around and around, as By the end of convention week Clinton's peo- he intends to upend. One Clinton delegate I it has, in fact, for more than 100 years. If you ple were reported to be pleased with the way interviewed suggested he might mean. putting are willing to imagine a mass movement, such things had gone. Their strategy was taking shape. American interests ahead of those of foreign- as the populist movement of the 1890s or the The road to making the Democrats a majority ers. Hmmm... But that would be Pat labor movement of the 1930s or the civil rights party was opening up to them. The way they Buchanan's slogan: "America First." Others movement of the 1960s, you can imagine an would do it would be by winning back the thought he meant putting human needs ahead uprising the Democratic Party, fatcats notwith- Reagan Democrats who, to hear the pollsters of military weaponry in the government's bud-

6 • JULY 24, 1992 get. (I didn't ask, but I assumed that the smat- the something-for-nothing ethic of the last Clinton's plan puts people first — George tering of animal liberationists in the crowd would decade and putting people first for a change." Bush's plan puts wealthy people first." take issue with the anthrocentricity of putting Does that imply putting people before prof- People first, yes. But compared to what? people first.) The Democratic platform says, its? Tom Harkin, speaking from the podium Could it be that Clinton wanted to suggest "We need to rebuild America by abandoning Tuesday night, put it this way: "Governor putting people ahead of corporate interests GOP Dry Run in Houston

BY KATE MCCONNICO Houston said "there is no question about the Bush seeding and only 6 percent to aggressive law enforcement (weeding). "Social rehabilitation C4 all it a dress rehersal for the party con- Administration's commitment to programs k.. ventions. Many of the same speakers were which will help rebuild urban infrastructure." is not an effective substitute for law enforce- in the lineup at the 60th Annual National Yet he also pitched the capital gains tax, ment," said Tim Shea, one of the Justice Conference of Mayors this past month in vigilant policing of poor areas, the need for Department officials sent by the government Houston and there was a certain rhetorical reduced government spending on welfare pro- to gain pre-election support for this program. optimism designed to swell the heart of grams, and Bush's line-item veto. Kemp used More aggressive policing of selected com- even the most cynical (or sleepy) listener. supply-side logic when he said that elimi- munities (usually black, Hispanic and Asian All of the convention's keynote speake nating the capital gains tax for urban investors communities) angers residents, who see it -- Housing and Urban Development Secretary (not to mention cutting it to 15 percent for as just another governmental excuse to single Jack Kemp and Drug Czar Bob Martinez from suburban investors) would "dramatically out and militarize their communities. Some the Bush Administration and Arkansas Gov. increase the rewards for entrepreneurs and mayors are also dissatisfied with the top-heavy Bill Clinton, New Jersey Sen. Bill Bradley, investors who put capital at risk to create new federal bureaucracy that controls "Weed former California Gov. Jerry Brown and businesses and new jobs." This is the "Urban and Seed" and the difficulty they have fit- Rainbow Coalition founder Jesse Jackson Enterprise Zones" proposal that Michael ting the program to their own cities needs. on the Democratic side — spoke of hope; Kinsley of the New Republic calls "a bribe to Earlier in the conference Mayor Norman the hope they had for America and the hope the rich." There seemed to be a contradic- Rice of Seattle asked a Justice Department they had for their own agendas. tion in Kemp's support of reduced taxation of deputy why more money needs to be spent on Republicans promoted the Bush existing wealth as an incentive program for weeding out crime (billions already goes to Administration's programs and Democrats black entrepreneurs — generally a group with this effort at the local, state and federal lev- asked why their proposals had been ignored lower levels of existing wealth. Cutting the els), when it is the seed programs that address for 12 years. As the speeches droned on, may- capital gains tax to zero in the cities and to 15 the source of crime: poor education, lack of ors in the antechambers worked out the real percent in all other areas, as the Administration job skills, run-down neighborhoods, etc. "If details of programs on crime, schooling, health proposes, would increase the incentive only you just go in to weed people might view it care, AIDS education and treatment, drug pre- for established large corporations, such as as simply another stepped-up law enforcement vention and treatment, waste disposal, trans- Wal-Mart or Circuit City, to flock to the inner program," Rice stated. portation and even earthquake preparedness. cities, and perhaps decrease the creation of The Seattle mayor, who has won awards The Republicans, mainly Kemp, Martinez mom-and-pop businesses than might actual- for achievements in the areas of urban youth and a few Bush appointees on drugs, crime ly empower disadvantaged Americans. After programs, also said many mayors had prob- and AIDS, faced the daunting task of con- Kemp's speech, one mayor sitting next to this lems with the implied derision and racist over- vincing the nation's mayors and the press that writer mumbled, "What is he talking about?" tones of the title, "Weed and Seed." Inner-city Republicans were not the cause of the col- After DEA Director Bob Martinez's speech, residents are not weeds, to be thinned out by lapse of urban America, but that they were the which proposed militant policing and long cops, nor are the areas themselves desolate solution. That solution came in the form of prison terms over rehabilitation and educa- weed patches, he said. This year, the num- "Weed and Seed" programs and "Urban tion, another mayor said, "Is this the Mayoral ber of cities participating in "Weed and Enterprise Zones"; two pro-business initia- Convention or the National Convention?" Seed" should increase to 16 and the budget to tives we'll hear more about when the GOP Both Kemp and Martinez endorsed the U.S. $500 million, $290 million in new (federal) convention gets underway on August 17 in Justice Department's "Weed and Seed" pro- monies and $210 million in old money bor- gram, a federally dictated two-step program the Astrodome. rowed from existing social services. based on "weeding" out drug dealers and users Not everyone at the mayors' conference So it probably was in George Bush's best in an area, and then "seeding" that communi- was buying, though. Every urban program interest to have avoided even giving a "half ty with treatment centers, neighborhood presented by the "envoys" of the Bush hour for the representatives of urban Administration, as Jerry Brown called them, watch programs, job training programs, and other anti-drug efforts. The most commonly America," as Boston Mayor Raymond Flynn whether it dealt with crime, transportation, said in criticism of the President's absence. health care, AIDS education, schooling or pol- heard criticism leveled at "Weed and Seed" is that the government spends considerably Bradley, Clinton, Brown and Jackson were lution, seemed designed to benefit the sub- so well received here that a Bush speech might urbs as much or more than the inner cities. more time and money on the weeding — aggressive law enforcement, including indef- have flopped as badly as did drug czar Kemp. Martinez and Deputy Attorney General Martinez's. While the times seem conser- George Terwilliger discussed social reform inite pre-trial detention and heavy policing of schools — than on seeding. Currently "Weed vative, the mayors gathered in Houston didn't as a sort of "insurance" against events like the seem to find many solutions in the Bush Los Angeles riots and crime that might spill and Seed" exists in three U.S. cities and only Administration's proposals. Republican over into affluent neighborhoods. 18 percent of its budget is going towards seed- Kemp, who referred to himself as "a radi- ing. On paper, the government promises that speakers at least will be better appreciated in cal, bleeding-heart, progressive conservative," 94 percent of the money will go toward the Astrodome next month. C.

THE TEXAS OBSERVER • 7 but was just too shy to say so? Somehow, at this multi-million-dollar convention, bankrolled by corporate largesse, it didn't seem likely. The Wall Street Journal noted recently that even Almost Elvis as Clinton campaigns on the claim he will smite Washington's corporate lobbyists, the lobby- ists themselves don't take it seriously, espe- BY ALLAN FREEDMAN cially since many of them are serving as advisers to Clinton's campaign. One need only think New York City of the $3 million deficit the Clinton campaign am not an old hand or a seasoned polit- was running before the convention to see the ical observer. I do not remember John fix Clinton is in when it comes to corporate fund- I F. Kennedy's inauguration or his assas- ing. A revealing article in the National Journal sination. Nor can I recall Lyndon B. noted that from the money standpoint, the addi- Johnson's historic "We shall overcome" tion of Al Gore to the ticket is a boon. Nathan address to Congress. These are events viewed Landow, the Maryland funder who backed Gore from afar, from the cool perspective provided for President in 1988, reported that "the enthu- by documentaries and feature films like siasm of people with cash has been dramatic." Oliver Stone's JFK. I have come into adult- This is a fortunate turn of events, given the grum- hood in the age of AIDS, crack and Ronald bling among some fatcats about supposedly Reagan. And the only real hope for posi- abrasive treatment by Clinton's fundraisers. tive change that I have experienced has PATRICIA MOORE Giving advice on the proper way to treat "peo- passed briefly, like the news in 1988 that ple with cash" an unnamed "major party donor" Democratic candidate Michael Dukakis was faithful adherents to the Democratic religion. told the National Journal, "Sometimes you have 17 points up in the polls and that perhaps At home, the television provides focus on to be aggressive, but you always must be Reagan ism would come to an end. It was the speaker. In the hall, it is the crowd you respectful. You must have humility." (There are at least a glimpse of something better than feel, and the connection of the speaker to anatomically descriptive expressions that four more years of Republican rule. it. Standing on the convention floor for convey this same idea.) So I should be experiencing one of those Clinton's 55-minute address, as I did, you Jerry Brown, like an embarrassing drunk rare (and cherished) moments of political feel the press of flesh against you. You are uncle, kept trying to talk about the influence optimism. After all, as I write it is two days part of an emotional whole — 6,000 indi- of money to the Clinton campaign and to the after the conclusion of the Democratic viduals united to one end, to witness the for- convention. Nobody was much in the mood to National Convention and Bill Clinton is 24 mal introduction of the man who would be listen to it. While I mingled with the Texas del- points up in the polls. In contrast, Dukakis' the next President of the United States. egation, I asked a few Clinton supporters to 1988 post-convention bounce was just 9 To be fair, Clinton's address was not comment on Brown's frequent assertion that points. Yet Clinton has left me colder one of his best moments. He had remarked the party must "cut that umbilical cord to the than even Dukakis did. He's like an old girl- to an aide that he was more nervous than corrupt money." Clay Sands, a real estate bro- friend you run into on the street, years after expected; his voice was raspy and he lost his ker from Houston, said, "he's assuming that the thrill is gone. You know the scene. She sense of rhythm a few times. Yet at least I `big money' is corrupt money, which I don't looks great, she seems pretty much the same had felt something more than ennui when think is the case." Clinton would be likely to as always, but you keep wondering why Mario Cuomo delivered his tub-thumping favor campaign finance reform were he to win you feel nothing for her. nomination speech. Cuomo had made the the Presidency, Sands said, but "the-reality is My dislike for Clinton is not primarily ide- connection between the emotional and the now, in 1992, you have to raise that kind of ological, mind you. Dukakis, Mondale and intellectual. In contrast, Clinton's sense of money to be competitive." Congres'sman Carter were no balls of progressive fire, propriety has caused him to forget the polit- John Bryant of Dallas, also a delegate for either. On the big issues, the issues that mat- ical value of sincerity. He is so confounded Clinton, dismissed Brown's crusade, even ter, Clinton would be a vast improvement by the need to please the public that he though he himself has long supported cam- over Bush. Clinton's pro-choice, for one. does not know how to get down and be funky. paign finance reform. The problem with Brown He'd probably make some good appoint- As I observed the Clinton. speech, I felt is that he has no credibility, said Bryant, con- ments. And he would get rid of the Quayle like a Jew at a Christian worship service; I tinuing: "I've got a very progressive voting Competitiveness Council, freeing the fed- could sense the fervor of the moment but record. I want to say, where has Jerry Brown eral bureaucracy to promulgate some rules as an unconverted soul I could not truly been all these years? I think the guy is a total- and regulations that benefit the majority of feel it. Clinton filled me with the same sense ly dishonest, no-good, lyin' demagogue, and Americans instead of a select few. Sure he of deprivation I feel when I walk into a Wal- you can write that in your paper." is a raging centrist. But as John Bryant, the Mart. Oh, that horrible sameness. What the The four lonely Brown delegates in the liberal congressman from Dallas put it, Democrats need is a boisterous Baptist. What 232-member Texas delegation naturally had a "What's the difference between Dukakis and they have in Bill Clinton is a Baptist with a more skeptical view of the powers-that-be who Clinton in terms of their views?" Hell, I voted Methodist soul. Bill Clinton is not Elvis. are in control of the Democratic Party. "What for Dukakis. He's Fabian. we have now is an incumbent party that is No, my distaste for Clinton is inspired But Clinton might be exactly what certainly beholden to big business because of by his lack of what I'll call Democratic America wants. In an age in which this coun- the campaign finances they have to come up

Spirituality. The Democratic National . try is increasingly defined by the suburban with," said Robert Jones of Austin. But they, Convention is, if nothing else, a grand strip mall and Plano defines the Texas too, seemed to grant that there's not much revival meeting, a service held for the most political soul more closely than does Clinton can do about it as a candidate. "I'm cer- Terlingua, here is a candidate who is as bland tain that Clinton, if he's elected, will not veto as America itself. Yet for me, Bill Clinton is the campaign reform act," said Brown delegate Allan Freedman is a former Observer editor a reminder that I am still on a personal search Bonnie Moore of Austin. "Any Republican will and is a freelance writer living in for leadership, for the John Kennedy of my veto it." Washington, D.C. generation. Continued on pg. 20

8 • JULY 24, 1992 Back Door Man

BY JAMES CULLEN Austin ENRY ROSS PEROT knows well the use of back doors. H Perot, a former IBM salesman, par- layed a part-time job with Texas Blue Cross- Blue Shield in the early 1960s into Electronic Data Systems. When he sold EDS to General Motors for $2.4 billion in 1984, he hoped to pre- serve the sense of individual initiative at EDS 0 as well as shake up GM's old-fashioned man- agerial style. After two years of listening to 0 Perot's criticism, GM paid another $700 mil- lion to get him to clear out. Perot, protective of his reputation as a principled crusader, told reporters he would place the money in escrow for GM managers to reclaim if they came to their senses, but Todd Mason, a Perot unau- thorized biographer and Fort Worth Star- Telegram writer, noted that the escrow account never existed. On Larry King's radio show on Feb. 20 Perot opened the door to a popular draft for President. He said he would run if a grassroots effort put his name on the ballots of all 50 states. In five months a cotps composed mainly of volunteers had qualified Perot for ballots in 24 states; they had turned in petitions in seven others and they • appeared well on their way to qualifying in all 50 states when Perot backed off July 16. The Dallas billionaire had entered the 1 Presidential race with the image of a can-do businessman who could turn the country's eco- I • • • • nomic problems around. The public embraced 1 11 1 I • • him as a potential knight in shining armor and 11 his standing in polls soared. But his star had fallen in recent weeks as news coverage turned Ii critical, volunteers in the field bristled at attempts to unify the 50 state petition drives into a Presidential campaign and Perot refused to listen to the big-name campaign pros he had hired with much fanfare a few weeks earlier. When he authorized the petition drives to place him on the general election ballot and he promised to spend $100 million of his own money to finance the campaign, the Democrats were in disarray and President George Bush appeared to have a clear shot at four more years in the White House. Perot focused attention on jobs, the struggling economy and the nation- , al debt, topics on which the Bush administra- tion was vulnerable. While Perot exchanged file with the Republican administration, the MICHAEL ALEXANDER Democrats regrouped. Meanwhile, the news media changed the tone yet hit full stride. Perot generally dismissed the crest of his Democratic nomination for President, of its reporting on Perot from respectful to revi- criticism; sometimes he accused critics of lying surging into first place even as Perot plunged sionist. Journalists began dredging up episodes or he cast doubt on their motives; he also in popularity. His gut check showed no fire in from his past, exploring how he made his for- blamed some of the shift in coverage on GOP the belly, so Perot, the billionaire Dallas busi- tune off government welfare programs, his pen- dirty tricks. But Perot found that running for nessman, made a business decision: Cut his loss- chant for spying and his nonchalant attitude President was not much fun and he had four es at $10 million. toward the Constitution; he was called a liar, more months until the election. The independent campaign was encounter- a hypocrite, a fascist, and the pundits had not Recent national polls showed Clinton, on the ing some rough weather when Perot and his top

THE TEXAS OBSERVER • 9 H' 4M11 ligrE0117 I WomPek WlitiT IT WoW-17 Cosr ro zEcoME KING or itiowAVA f'+'

MATT WUERKER advisers sat down July 7 in Dallas behind closed not appoint homosexuals to high-level Cabinet with inner-city residents in Los Angeles. doors with 100 leaders from business, profes- positions because the controversy would dis- "He's very good on race," said Jesse Jackson, sions and other walks of life to develop policies tract from the job. Perot moderated his position who has a relationship with Perot dating back that would pass muster on Sunday morning talk with a statement saying he has always prohib- to Jackson's 1985 trip to Beirut in an attempt shows. Perot brought in heavyweight names ited discrimination in his businesses and, if elect- to secure the release of hostage CIA bureau from both major parties, including Paul Nitze, ed President, would make appointments on chief William Buckley. Perot paid for the trip the former arms negotiator; Willie Nelson, individual merit and "any discrimination based and the two have remained in touch. the country singer and family farm activist; on gender, race, religion or sexual orientation But minorities and women have a right to be Calvin 0. Butts III, a Harlem pastor and civil will not be tolerated," although he deferred a skeptical of Perot. EDS had a poor record of rights advocate; John Hill, former Texas decision on whether gays should be allowed promoting minorities and women when he was Supreme Court justice; Hollywood producer in the military. He also said he would intensi- in charge. In 1986, when General Motors bought Martin Jurow; and Nobel Prize-winning med- fy AIDS research. He told TV Guide, "Have I him out, only about 1.5 percent of the compa- ical researchers Michael S. Brown and Joseph ever had homosexuals working for me? Yes. ny's managers and supervisors were black or L. Goldstein of Dallas. His top circle of advis- They were bright, they were 'talented, they were Hispanic. EDS finally produced an affirmative ers included Richard Fisher, a financier and able.... I have said again and again that what action plan at the federal government's insis- chairman of the Dallas Council on Foreign people do in their private lives is their own busi- tence two years after Perot's departure; last year Relations, on foreign policy; Ed Rollins, the ness." Perot also was quoted in a lengthy pro- the figure for minority managers and supervi- former Reagan campaign adviser, on strategy; file by Austin writer Lawrence Wright in the sors at EDS was nearly 10 percent. EDS also John P. White (a former Jimmy Carter aide, but New York Times Magazine on June 28 saying has increased the proportion of female super- not the former Texas ag commissioner and he has never known a homosexual. visors from 5 percent under Perot to 31 percent Democratic national chairman), who was On race, Perot was thought to be well-mean- today, an EDS spokesman said. developing Perot's platform on the federal bud- ing, if clumsy and paternalistic, as shown in his The turbulence increased as Perot on July 13 get and the national economy; Thomas Barr, a performance at the NAACP convention July 11 dismissed adman Hal Riney, who had produced New York City lawyer, on crime, civil rights in Nashville, where he drew catcalls when he Ronald Reagan's "Morning in America" ads in and other legal issues; Marilyn Berger, a for- referred to "you people" and "your people." 1984 and had proposed image-building "soft mer journalist, on the Middle East; and Morton Perot's work in education demonstrated a com- and fuzzy" ads for Perot. Then Rollins — Meyerson, a longtime Perot associate, and Marti mitment to educating poor and minority chil- who brought Riney into the campaign — quit Meyerson, his daughter, on women's issues, dren as well as the white middle class; he is on July 15. Hamilton Jordan, former strate- abortion and gay and lesbian issues. passionate about rebuilding an industrial base gist for Jimmy Carter, also was said to be Perot got in trouble with gays in late June that provides good jobs to be filled by people frustrated with Perot's unwillingness to take when he told ABC's Barbara Walters he would of all classes and ethnicities; and he has met advice. Nitze distanced himself after he learned

10 • JULY 24, 1992 that Perot proposed to shift American foreign On the day Perot withdrew, one of his clos- incentives for start-up businesses. The plan, policy attention from Europe to Asia. est advisers, Morton Meyerson, told the Star- to be implemented over 12 years, also proposed Bill Clinton was the beneficiary of the Perot- Telegram Perot would take his name off the cuts in Social Security benefits or higher taxes Bush firefight. As Americans learned more ballots. The following day, Perot was wheel- for wealthy recipients and a cap on deductible about Perot and Clinton was able to recast his ing into the role of power broker in interviews interest on mortgage loans of $200,000 or more, own image, the Arkansas Governor moved into with Larry King and Barbara Walters, saying which would affect upper-income groups. a virtual dead heat with the President while Perot he would leave to his grassroots organizers The Mexican stock market welcomed the lost standing, dropping as much as 18 points the decision of whether to keep his name on news that Perot — potentially the biggest obsta- over the past months in a recent Washington the ballot as a way to keep pressure on cle to a free trade treaty between the United Post/ABC News poll, to 20 percent support. Presidential and Congressional candidates. States, Mexico and Canada — had dropped out In the afterglow of his Democratic nomination, "We can provide the swing vote to determine of the race. The Bolsa de Valores had lost more Clinton opened a lead of more than 20 points who gets into the House and Senate, and we than 17 percent of its value in June as Perot's over Bush in the polls. can provide the swing vote to who gets to be fortunes rose, but the Mexico City market surged However, Perot remained stout in Texas. A the next President of the United States," he said 3 percent on news of his withdrawal. Both statewide poll conducted July 5-9 for the July 17 on CNN's "Larry King Live." Perot George Bush and Bill Clinton support removal Houston Post and KHOU-TV in Houston seemed to keep his options open for a possi- of most trade barriers among the three North showed 34 percent of Texans supported Perot, ble return to the race if the Democrats and American nations. 27 percent supported Bush and 22 percent Republicans fail to come around to the Perotista Perot also had tentatively approved a foreign backed Clinton. way of thinking, but asked if he was keeping policy platform that called for using the National The three-way race might have given the the door open, he said told Walters: "I don't see Security Council to address internal threats. Democrats their best shot at carrying Texas, a possibility unless I thought it was good for Perot's foreign policy adviser, Richard Fisher, since Democrats believed their base vote, the country." told the Dallas Morning News the redirection estimated at 40 percent, could constitute a win- In 1968, George Wallace bolted the of the White House agency, which now deals ning plurality. With Perot out of the race, Democratic Party and mounted a third-party almost exclusively with foreign policy and was Bush is expected to regain the lead in Texas, candidacy that gained 18.9 percent of the Texas central to the Iran-Contra scandal, would have but the Clinton-Gore ticket should be well- vote. In 1980, former Republican congressman given Perot "a vehicle that was totally at the placed to make a pitch for disaffected Perot sup- John Anderson got 2.47 percent of the Texas President's discretion to use," to break the porters. Indeed, a Dallas Morning News poll of vote as an independent for President. In both Washington gridlock. Perot backers in the Dallas area showed 40 per- cases, the campaigns were based on the per- Michael Ventura, writing.in the June 26 L.A. cent moving toward Clinton, while 28 per- sonality of the candidate and had little lasting Weekly, explored Perot's stance on issues, as cent favored Bush. impact. Perot appeared to recognize this when far as they could be determined from his record he appealed for his supporters to turn their and/or his statements during the campaign. magine the surprise of Perot's staffers, who efforts toward influencing congressional Ventura concluded: "On issues of crime and I had been working to rally the troops amid campaigns. civil liberties, he's to the right of Bush; on edu- the rumors of dissension, when they heard the Tony Mazzochi, an Oil, Chemical and cation and the equalization of education funds, morning of July 16 that Ross was calling it quits. Atomic Workers International Union official, he's to the left of Clinton; on cutting the defense Announcing his withdrawal, Perot argued that said the groundswell of support for Perot's budget, he and Clinton share the same position; the Democratic Party, which appeared crippled abortive independent campaign proved that his economics program and abortion stance is in February, had revitalized itself and he no there is a large mass of people disaffected with solidly Democratic; his attitude toward gays longer had a chance of winning the election out- the established political parties. Mazzochi is and privacy is stolidly Republican; and his acces- right; he did not want to throw the election helping to organize Labor Party Advocates to sibility, his risk-taking technological ideas, and into the House of Representatives, which push the established parties to address worker the fact that he's running at all is the most would start a partisan fight. concerns, but he added, "It must be created from radical stance for a serious presidential candi- Still, Perot's supporters did not expect him the bottom up.... Both [Jesse] Jackson and Perot date in the 20th century." to give up this easily and some clung to the hope demonstrate the rise and fall of third movements Then Perot blinked. When the going got that he would reconsider. "I was very disap- [based upon an individual]." rough, Ross got going — out the back door. pointed because I thought Mr. Perot would stay Austin businessman John Opincar, a Perot "Ross has left the building," his supporters for the fight, being the Southern person that volunteer who had become alarmed that Perot were told. he is," said Sam Williams, director of Perot's was becoming insulated from the people who Perhaps Perot can salvage a role in the cam- Austin phone bank. "Maybe a deal was made placed him on the Texas ballot, had announced paign. Anybody with $3 billion still has a place — I don't know," said the 75-year-old former plans to create a separate Grassroots Continuum in the American political process. Maybe he can Yellow Dog Democrat. to carry on the Perot campaign independent become the Jesse Jackson of the middle class. "It would be disruptive for us to continue," of the Dallas organization. After Perot's pull- But by the end of the weekend Perot reported- • said Perot, who had left himself that escape out, Opincar said the group will continue as a ly was backpedalling even on his promises to clause in February when he authorized the peti- clearinghouse for volunteers to work in and out help finance the reform movement. He has tion drive, but many of his supporters thought of politics. Meanwhile, other "official" state reneged on commitments before, and he makes that disruption of the political status quo was coordinators discussed the possibility of reform- it harder for. other potential leaders to gain the the point; they wanted to shake up the politi- ing the petition organization as a permanent trust needed to build alternative political cal establishment. His abrupt retreat left quite government reform movement. movements. a few feeling betrayed. "We've been Peroted," Regardless of whether Perot decides to take an Illinois campaign worker told the Fort lthough Perot took himself out of the his name off the ballot, a third party will be list- Worth Star-Telegram, as he coined a verb for A..race before he released his economic ed on the Texas ballot and at least 29 other state offering hope and then backing out. recovery plan, it reportedly would have called ballots. The anti-government Libertarians are One of the thousands Of Perot supporters for widespread financial pain. It called for bal- fielding Andre Marrou, a former Alaska state left in the lurch was Mike Ruppert, 41, who told ancing the budgetin five years by raising taxes representative, for President; Nancy Lord, a the Dallas Morning News he recently had quit on alcohol, cigarettes and gasoline, imposing physician/lawyer, for Vice President; and more as a narcotics detective with the Los Angeles steeper defense cuts, eliminating special tax than 80 candidates for federal, state and coun- Police Department to help investigate connec- favors, cutting domestic programs across the ty offices. And other progressive movements, tions between drugs, Nicaraguan Contras and board by 10 percent and then slicing another such as the Texas Populist Alliance, Labor Party the U.S. government. Maybe Perot can still 5 percent from administrative costs through Advocates and the populist/left New Party, will put him to use. more selective cuts. It proposed tax breaks and continue organizing at the grassroots.

THE TEXAS OBSERVER • 11 LAS AMERICAS Election Day in 0--J

BY JACK D. MCNAMARA Ojinaga, Chihuahua, Mexico negotiations of the proposed North American completely dominated the police and judicial his agricultural community of 60,000, Free Trade Agreement. system in Ojinaga. located across the Rio Grande from As predicted, PAN won the July 12 Chihuahua In his letter, Ortega asked the president to T Presidio and known locally as "O-J," was state gubernatorial elections. PRI is out of office intervene to protect him, his family and fellow quiet on election day on July 12. It's not ordi- in Chihuahua and in the border city of Ojinaga journalists Lupe Leyva and Rene Cardona. In narily so peaceful. Since the middle 1980s the for the first time since the party was founded, the weeks after the alleged threat, the editors streets of Ojinaga have been rocked by pitched and in October Francisco Barrio Terrazas will and staffers of the three-paper joint venture piled gun battles between warring tribes of "narco- become Governor of Chihuahua and Jose Isaac into a boxy 20-year-old Ford LTD and drove 90 traficantes," and mangled bodies occasional- Uribe Alanis will become Mayor of Ojinaga. miles in 100-degree heat to Pecos, Texas, to ly float down the river. In April 1987 the Uribe has said there will be no problems in have their 20-odd page weekly tabloid print- principal Ojinaga druglord, Pablo Acosta, the changing of the guard. President Salinas, ed. With only 10 percent of the publication ded- died when Mexican authorities (with the col- Uribe said, has acted quickly and forcefully to icated to paid ad space, the conjunto newspaper laboration of the U.S. government) staged a heli- ensure a smooth transition. hammered the opposition in the weeks lead- copter assault on his house in the Mexican village PAN's victory, in part, is a result of the efforts ing up to the election. of Santa Elena, near Big Bend National Park. of a few brave and aggressive Mexican jour- The panista editors and their publications sup- But Acosta's death didn't calm the streets of nalists. Armando Ortega Mata, 39, arrived in port free enterprise and economic development. Ojinaga, and now the violence that has been Ojinaga in March 1987 and began publishing Ortega complains that Ojinaga is a "ghost town" associated with the fight among surviving drug a weekly tabloid newspaper, ;Prensa Libre! and candidate Jose Uribe calls for a new era traffickers threatens to spill over into the In the period leading up to the July 12 elec- of progress and development for Ojinaga as a region's electoral political feuds. tion, ;Prensa Libre! was combined with two "Port of Mexico." Panistas point bitterly to In 1986, state elections here were followed other PAN weeklies, /Contacto! , edited by the failure of PRI officials to attract any by bitter PAN (National Action Party) protests Guadalupe Leyva Navarrete and El Regional, maquiladoras in recent years. Armando Ortega alleging theft of the election by PRI (Institutional edited by Rene Cardona Bejarano. is Secretary and Jose Uribe President of the Revolutionary Party), the party which has ruled On the evening of June 18, as the first dead- Economic Development Committee of Ojinaga, Mexico since 1929. Angry campesinos (farm- line approached for the conjunto (combined) "working to promote the creation of jobs in ers) used sit-down strikes and tractors to block weeklies, Ortega claims he was confronted in Ojinaga" according to a yellow pages ad in bridges in both Ojinaga and Juarez, contending his newspaper office by Eleazar "Malaquias" the telephone directory published by Ortega. that the conservative National Action Party, a Flores Marquez, a prominent PRI politician and Though there is real bitterness between the growing force in the north of Mexico, had been businessman, whom Ortega accuses of drug PRI and PAN factions in Ojinaga, the local robbed in election. dealing. Armed and accompanied by two fed- panistas are not critical of President Salinas. In the intervening six years, local political eral judicial police, according to Ortega, Flores Behind Ortega's desk is a huge portrait of the dissidents have complained that border cor- unsuccessfully attempted to force Ortega into a president, the symbol and leader of the nation- ruption was no longer only serving the tradi- red automobile. al PRI. The lines here are clearly drawn There tional political purposes of nepotism and graft. In a 1,500-word statement sent by fax to are only two parties in the political fight in They charge that the PRI-dominated govern- Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari Chihuahua; only a few posters remind voters of ment has become a handmaiden to organized three days after Ortega alleges he was threat- the existence of Cuauhtemoc Cardenas' pop- criminals, particularly drug dealers. They also ened, Ortega quoted Flores: "Ya deje de estar ulist/left PRD (Party of Revolutionary allege that Colombian cocaine cartels have chingando a mis amigos," (Quit fucking my Democracy) and there are no signs of the seized control of large parts of the Mexican gov- friends). Ortega wrote that Flores was attempt- numerous smaller political parties of the left. ernment in the border areas, concentrating on ing to discourage publication of the panista joint The attention of regional press and interna- Ojinaga, in an effort to control more land weeklies, iContacto! , El Regional, and /Prensa tional queries may have had a calming effect adjacent to the north-south drug highways. Libre! (Ojinaga newspapers are ferociously par- on Ojinaga. At mid-afternoon on election day Rumors abound of ranches adjoining the Rio tisan and no one here even attempts the sort of neither uniforms nor guns were visible in the Grande being "bought up" by drug interests. objectivity affected by U.S. newspapers. The downtown square. Small boys mugged for the Some American publications sensed a change PRI weekly publication is El Fronterizo.) photographers and four worried looking cam- in the prevailing political winds and predicted Mayor-elect Jose Uribe said Ortega's public paign workers sat in the red, green and white PRI a PAN victory (see "Border Boredom and Beer," stand in the face of the alleged threats increased headquarters across the street from the public TO 6/19/92). The speculation was that the public support for PAN. Uribe describes Ortega plaza, on Trasvina and Retes. Would PRI win? PRI government would allow a PAN victory as a man of "conscience." "Of course," responded a campaign worker. in Chihuahua as a signal that Mexican President Beyond Ojinaga, regional Mexican news- Three blocks. down Trasvina, on another cor- Carlos Salinas de Gortari is prepared to accept papers picked up the story and published arti- ner, the blue and white PAN headquarters was democratic reforms. Those reforms will pre- cles about the intimidation alleged by Ortega. busier, although accommodations were more sumably reassure the U.S. and thus facilitate Monterrey's El Norte sent a reporter to Ojinaga modest. Francisco Javier and Manuel Tercero and on June 22 published a story complete with predicted-victory for PAN but their grim looks a picture of Ortega's three-page appeal to the suggested they were not too confident. Jack McNamara is publisher of the Nimby News president. Clearly legible in the photograph of In the end, PAN claimed 4,756 votes to PRI's in Alpine. the letter is Ortega's charge that the narcos have Continued on next page

12 • JULY 24, 1992 JOURNAL

and when somebody wanted to know where (they're for it) obediently raising their hands Randall's Takes It they could pick up a copy we could tell them for some tinkering with the constitution, and at Randall's." went to lavish receptions to celebrate the re- Personal Onstead did not reply to requests for an inter- election of regional directors, most of whom view. ran unopposed." AUSTIN Randall's is willing to pay a price for its Tucker, a former regional director from. St. When Houston-based Randall's Management moral standards. Advertisements for Randall's Louis, Missouri, campaigned for a switch from Corp. recently announced it had agreed to buy 45 grocery stores in the Houston area note that the current delegate system to a one member- Dallas-based Cullum Cos., Randall's spokes- they do not sell alcoholic beverages, which one vote system of electing top officers. A sim- men said no changes were planned at the 79 costs them an estimated $50 million in rev- ilar process resulted in reformist Ron Carey's Tom Thumb-Page groceries, Simon David enues annually, the Morning News reported. upset win in the Teamsters earlier this year. A Gourmet Food Stores and Drug Plus discount Whether it can afford to write off the patron- Detroit Free Press poll of 150 Detroit-area mem- drug stores in the Dallas, Fort Worth and age of persons sympathetic to gay and lesbian bers found 92 percent in favor of the referen- Austin areas. But Randall's has a reputation concerns — as well as those disturbed by dum-style vote and 21 locals submitted at its Houston grocery chain of upholding its apparent censorship of the public prints — resolutions endorsing the change, but the own moral standards, which has been a cause remains to be seen. — J.C. Constitution Committee recommended keep- for concern as it expands its holdings. ing the status quo. The referendum issue ended Critics complain that Randall's censored one up with the support of approximately 10 per- free newspaper because of its "sleazy" content, cent of the delegates. while allowing another tabloid to discrimi- Tucker said many delegates were sym- nate against homosexuals in its advertising. pathetic to the reform movement, but reluc- Randall's previously was acclitsed of being UAW Flattens Reform tantly voted with the International biased against gays when butcher Steven leadership because they feared the loss of Little was fired in 1985, allegedly over con- AUSTIN International support as tough contract talks cerns about AIDS. Little sued but settled out of With the motto, "If it ain't broke, don't fix approach. court and has since died, the Dallas Morning it," United Auto Workers delegates in San Reg McGhee, a UAW spokesman in Detroit, News reported. The grocery chain's presi- Diego, California, beat down a reform move- said Tucker was not allowed on the conven- dent, Randall Onstead, recently told a gay rights ment at the union's convention this past month. tion floor because he chose not to run as a del- group he is not homophobic and said the com- But the opposition leader promised to keep pres- egate from his Local, but Tucker's supporters pany employs many gays and lesbians. sure on the UAW leadership as auto workers were allowed to raise their issues, and all were This past spring Randall's stopped the face continued efforts to bust their unions or rejected by large margins. "It's clear that the Houston Press, a weekly alternative newspa- to relocate manufacturing plants outside the membership endorsed the stands that the per, from being distributed at the stores. The United States. national administration has taken," McGhee Press said its distributor was told one of the rea- "We still have a revolution to provoke out said. He also denied there was any intimida- sons was that the publication publishes personal there somewhere," said Jerry Tucker, the tion of delegates. ads for gays and lesbians as well as for het- challenger from the New Directions opposition Carroll Butler, president of UAW Local 848 erosexuals. Randall's officials said the Press movement, after he got support from approxi- in Grand Prairie, said he entered the conven- was pulled because it was behind on pay- mately 5 percent of the 2,000 delegates to the tion a supporter of New Directions, but he won- ments for space and did not maintain the racks, convention. "Our supporters were too few, ders if the reform movement has lost its steam. which the Press denies. but they were still well-spoken and we stood Butler said he did not see harassment or intim- Queer Nation, a gay activist group, protest- our ground," Tucker said, putting the best idation of reformers. The incumbents "didn't ed that the Montrose-area Randall's should face on the reform movement's worst show- need to," he said. "The rank and file seems to drop Greensheet, a free tabloid whose personal ing since its organization in 1986. be satisfied with the leadership," he said. ads are limited to requests for the opposite sex. Membership in the auto workers' union has At Local 276 in Arlington, President Dave Randall's has refused, claiming that protests dropped from 1.5 million members in 1979 to should be aimed at the publisher. Queer Nation 862,000 in 1991, and it represents 68 percent of also complained that a transsexual was harassed U.S. auto workers, down from 86 percent in in a restroom of the chain's Montrose location. 1978, according to Labor Notes, a Detroit-based Continued from previous page Onstead reportedly told the gay group his magazine of the union movement. It also report- view of the Press as containing "sleazy" edi- ed that in the keynote speech at the convention, 3,029 in the Ojinaga district. The village of torial content was a factor in his decision to UAW President Owen Bieber failed to mention Manuel Benavides and the town of Coyame remove the paper. The Press, in an editorial, General Motors' plan to close 21 plants and voted PRI but PAN took all Ojinaga offices. accused Randall's of hypocrisy in barring the eliminate 54,000 UAW jobs. Of the union's Four blocks down Allende street, behind a Press, which is distributed free, while the gro- April retreat at Caterpillar, Bieber called it a blue facade advertising "Novedades del cery store continues to sell sensational tabloids "change of tactics," not a "surrender." Desierto" (an earlier Ortega publication), Ortega plus the city's two major daily newspapers, both "It's safe to assume that the Big Three were said that the President's office tells him the threat of which carry personal ads, and romance nov- encouraged by Caterpillar's success and will he reported has been referred to Mexican pros- els containing steamy and suggestive language. take a hard line in bargaining next year. But ecutors. And Malaquias Flores reportedly has John A. Wilburn, editor of the Press, said there was no way for delegates to debate been arrested by federal police, charged with he regrets Randall's decision to bar the news- how to meet the expected assault," wrote Jane carrying an illegal gun. But not everyone has paper mainly because it was a convenient out- Slaughter in the July issue of Labor Notes. got the message. On iPrensa Libre!' s answer- let. It accounted for about 5 percent of the "Instead delegates desultorily discussed ing machine on election day a husky, gravelly paper's distribution, he said, but, "The best thing apple-pie resolutions ranging from free trade voice threatened, "You are going to die very about being in Randall's is they're all over town (they're against it) to national health care soon, understand? Tu pendejo, hijo de puta!"❑

THE TEXAS OBSERVER • 13

Purdue, whose GM plant avoided a shutdown has learned its lesson." McGhee said the UAW is not "on the skids," in February, said auto workers are not satisfied, Tucker is not so sure, and while the pres- despite the loss of hundreds of thousands of but they have more faith in the leadership sure is off the GM plant in Arlington, he said jobs, but it is hopeful that a Democratic admin- than they did in 1986, when he was among all American auto workers should be concerned istration under Bill Clinton will reverse 12 years the organizers of New Directions in an attempt about the movement of jobs outside the coun- of havoc which the Reagan and Bush admin- to elect Tucker as regional director. Since then, try. "They've been conditioned to look out for istrations have wreaked upon American indus- Purdue said, the leadership has become more themselves on a plant-by-plant basis and the try and the union movement. responsiye to the membership and many orig- members know that the GM plan involves shift- While the UAW executive board — along inal reformers have become disenchanted ing plants to Mexico ... but to allow these cor- with other AFL-CIO affiliates — has endorsed with the movement. "These are critical times porations — particularly the auto makers — Clinton, Tucker said they may have a prob- and these are no times to be divided. It's dan- to move with this kind of reckless abandon is lem getting the membership to vote for a can- gerous," he said, adding, "I think International dangerous to everyone." didate who supports free trade with Mexico. "I'm not sure they'll necessarily go for Perot, but I think a lot of members are fed up with the process," he said before Perot quit the race. UAW members were more likely to vote for Perot because of his opposition to free trade with Mexico than his past criticism of GM, Tucker said. "The UAW members at GM are awfully fear- ful; they don't know whether they want to bash PEOPLE GM or hug GM," he said. "Some workers Make a world of difference ! feel if they don't rock the boat, they might be We're proud of our employees and their contributions to your overlooked and be allowed to stay in place." Tucker said he will continue to monitor the success and ours. Call us for quality printing, binding, mailing International's performance. The reformers' and data processing services. Get to know the people at Futura. best opportunity may come in three years, when Bieber and several other top officials are P.O. Box 17427 Austin, TX 78760-7427 forced to retire. Otherwise, the heir-apparent to the presidency is Steve Yokich, a vice presi- FUTURA 389-1500 dent who heads the union's GM division. COMMUNICATIONS, INC. '"-J.0 •

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14 • JULY 24, 1992 Been Good to Know You: A Panhandle Town Comes to Terms with a Native Son

BY RICHARD B. HUGHES

Pampa OODY GUTHRIE AND I arrived in Pampa the same year, 1929. He was W 17. I was brand new. We never met. What astonishes me now is that I never heard anything about Pampa's most celebrated citi- zen until I was in college and never associated him with our Panhandle home town until many years later. As far as I can remember, Woody Guthrie was as unknown to my high school friends, class of 1948, as to me; none of us collected his records or sang his songs. And a 1975 graduate of Pampa High School who now lives in Houston recalls her classmates' spec- ulation about Woody Guthrie: "Had a man of such talent actually gone to our schools and roamed our streets?" When she later read that he had, she wondered, as many of us do, why the world-renowned balladeer of the down-and- out who had spent eight formative years in Pampa was treated like a loony uncle best kept out of the family photo album. I went home to Pampa to find out, talked to some of Guthrie's 1929-1931 classmates at Pampa High School, and came back to Austin with a portrait of the ultimate outsider, as social- ly clumsy as Charlie Chaplin's Little Tramp and as out of place in the classroom as Huckleberry Finn: "Not a leader ... No one you'd remember." "Never had a date, as far as I know." "He didn't seem to take life seriously, and certain- ly didn't take much interest in school ... A sort of drifter." One woman said her mother, complaining that "there was plenty of soap and water" could never tolerate Guthrie's body odor. Some of Guthrie's Pampa High classmates, now in Guthrie's sketches from the backs of blank checks their seventies, suggested that Guthrie's trou- Woody Guthrie would do it his own way. bound together a brotherhood who felt a simi- bles began at home. They remembered that his The most memorable lyrics of Guthrie's lar agony. mother had died in a Norman, Oklahoma, Pampa years, "So Long, It's Been Good to And it could be that for Woody Guthrie, mental hospital, and that his father managed an Know You," were a response to the Great Dust Pampa was a hell for another reason: the entrap- across-the-tracks flophouse where a roughneck Storm of April 14, 1935. Some Pampans ment of marriage. Several interviewees told me could rent a cot for a quarter a night and a girl believed the end of the world was upon them that Guthrie was not a good husband to Mary for a couple of dollars. and there was just time for final goodbyes. Jennings, the woman he married in 1933. After four disastrous semesters Woody For Woody, his drafty shack full of choking Mary's brother, Matt Jennings, who was also dropped out of high school, where he'd spent dust, Pampa was beginning to seem less like Woody's best friend in Pampa, was more much of his class time drawing cartoons and home and more like hell. If Pampa was hell forthright. Woody was "the least adapted to mar- caricatures. Joe Klein, in his excellent biogra- for him, it nevertheless prepared him for later riage of anyone who ever took the vow." Guth- phy, Woody Guthrie, a Life, tells how Woody success in California and New York. In Pampa, rie just never seemed to understand that a educated himself. At the Pampa Public Library, he found his calling — as poet-lyricist — and family requires a steady income. He worked spo- the high school dropout devoured books on psy- his tools — his voice and his guitar. In Pampa, radically and sometimes never made it home chology, religion and Eastern philosophy. He he learned that he could win audiences not only with the money he made. Worse, he would with- found a spiritual mentor in the Lebanese poet with songs but with clowning and patter and out explanation take off to hitchhike or ride Kahlil Gibran. In education, as in all things, boyish charm; he was developing skills that the rails, only to return as mysteriously as he would later gain him a reputation as a humorist had left. and down-home philosopher. In Pampa, he felt Nearly all Pampans suffered from dust and Richard B. Hughes is professor of history at the pain of the Dust Bowl and the Great poverty in the 1930s, although the town was St. Edward's University in Austin. Depression, the sources of the many songs that never the unrelieved wasteland depicted in

THE TEXAS OBSERVER • 15 the 1976 movie made from Guthrie's autobi- ships created by drought. Their spirit was reborn Guthrie further leftward. Joe Klein captures ography, Bound for Glory. But for Woody and in the displaced Okies, Arkies and Texans Woody's exuberance: "The idea that the gov- Mary, the "Hard Times" he later sang about during the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl. ernment was building all these massive dams were especially hard. Erma Lee Kennedy Their villains were the faceless rich men in was especially thrilling. It was what social- Barber, then about eight years old, befriended Eastern boardrooms who drove them from their ism would be like when it came to the United the Guthrie's first child, Gwendolyn Gail, when mortgaged farms. John Steinbeck immortalized States." From this experience Guthrie wrote Gwendloyn was two. Barber remembers her them in The Grapes of Wrath, and Woody more than two dozen songs, among them two concern that the Guthries' tiny house held only Guthrie retold Steinbeck's story of angry of his greatest, "Roll On, Columbia," which one bed, a cook stove and a shelf which ran impotence in "Tom Joad." celebrates the New Deal project, and "Pastures along one side of the room. At Christmas they Woody's lyrics (usually, his tunes were of Plenty," which celebrates the nobility of had no tree. borrowed) were most powerful when he wrote migrant laborers. Both were political statements. "That was dreadful to me. I begged my par- from direct experience, when his innards moved So. was "This Land Is Your Land," written ents to let me have fifteen cents to buy my friend the keys of his typewriter. He had seen his fam- in early 1940 in response to "God Bless a tree. My dad made a wooden stand and the lit- ily collapse from poverty and disease in Okemah America." To Guthrie, Irving Berlin's immense- tle girl and I put tinsel on the branch- ly popular anthem was, as Joe Klein es. The tree turned out to be a joy to puts it, "just another of those songs both of us," Barber said. that told people not to worry, that But for every Pampan who remem- God was in the driver's seat." bers Woody's failings as husband and Berlin's family had experienced father, there is another still under injustice in the Czarist Russia they the spell of the singer's boyish charm. had fled when he was two; for Berlin Fern Dulaney recalls: "Woody would and many Jews who had escaped the visit us fairly often. Everyone laughed pogroms of Europe, America at the when they were with him. He would turn of the century was the promised ride the freight train within two miles land. Guthrie, by contrast, had expe- of our house and come down the rienced injustice in America; he did lane singing and playing his guitar. not want to calm nerves but to pro- He helped Dad with the plowing, and voke change, to remind his coun- one day Dad saw Woody just really trymen that their land belonged to making tracks to catch the tractor. the many and not the few. It is often, Woody said he was seeing if it would and correctly, said that many of go by itself. I think they had to do Woody Guthrie's songs are light, some fencing after that episode." singable and fun. But in many of Did time and fame change Woody them there is a powerful undercur- Guthrie? His two-week visit to Pampa rent of rage. in 1946 gives us an answer: yes and Tired of his rambling ways, Mary, no. In the seven years after leaving the wife from Pampa, divorced Pampa, Guthrie had blossomed. Guthrie. In 1945 he married "Charismatic" is the word John Gikas Marjorie Greenblatt Mazia and often used to describe Guthrie, who found new friends among the East bummed an extra bedroom in Gikas' Coast left circles. The marriage was bachelor pad over the Main Street Bar. an unlikely union of a farm-belt pop- Charlie Chaplin's Little Tramp had ulist and a beautiful New York become a man of the world. "He dancer in the Martha Graham could sing anything. He had been Company, whose Jewish parents around and could also talk about were intellectually sophisticated anything. He said things in an origi- socialists. Although the marriage nal way. He got everybody's atten- was tempestuous, Marjorie was the tion," Gikas said. love of Guthrie's life. She was the In other ways, Woody had not changed. He "in the Oklahoma hills where [he] was born." mother of Cathy, Arlo, Joady and Nora, as well still looked like a drifter. He didn't have any He had eaten dust in Pampa until he said, "So as the protector of the Guthrie legacy and the money, just a sack of clothes and a guitar. For long, it's been good to know you" to the Texas creator of an organization whose aim is to money, he sang at the joints every night, never Panhandle in 1937. free the world of Huntington's chorea, the hered- saving anything for tomorrow. In California he found that his songs could itary disease of the central nervous system which Could a boy schooled in Pampa have become not only entertain but could also open peo- killed Woody, his mother and two daughters a communist? Pampans I interviewed had little ple's eyes to injustice. Guthrie's songs also by Mary. specific information about Guthrie's politics, warned that some of the promises of the The second marriage, like the first, did but several were uneasy that his political American Dream were false — the promise, not produce financial stability. Where money beliefs were as unacceptable as his personal for example, that an Okie start a new life in was concerned, Woody Guthrie was a pop- behavior. In his middle years, Guthrie called California without money, or "Do Re Mi." His ulist monk determined to save his soul from himself a socialist, but denied membership in friendship with Will Geer, later the Grandpa of the corruption of wealth; never mind the wife the Communist Party, U.S.A. He did, howev- the TV series "The Waltons," brought him in and kids. If humankind is divided into "two er, write a column for the Daily Worker and contact with migrant fruit pickers and members bunches of people, the ones that are rich and looked at Stalinism with a sunny naivete. But of labor unions, some, like him, refugees from the ones that are poor, the ones that do the pinning political labels on Woody Guthrie is the Dust Bowl. These were the people. Against work and the ones that get the money," he risky business. He thought with his guts and them, in Woody Guthrie's simple dualism, stood knew which side he was on. On the verge of "populist," as used by the farmers of the South the exploiting rich. success as a CBS performer, Guthrie fled. and West in the 1880s and 1890s, seems the best New experience brought new songs. A month Later escapees from the poverty of the rural description of him. These populists screamed on the payroll of the federal government, as the South, such as Loretta Lynn and Dolly Parton, that the financiers and railroaders of the East New Deal built huge dams on the Columbia accepted fame and fortune as their due. But were taking advantage of the economic hard- River in Washington and Oregon, moved Woody ran from the American Dream as hard

16 • JULY 24, 1992 as the rest of us chase it. He was determined Woody Guthrie Street. "Should there be?" two birthday, has passed, but the town leaders (per- not to be rich. He was determined not to Pampans were recently asked. One replied with haps sensing commercial possibilities) have have the money or the values of middle class an emphatic "Oh yes!" Another said just as scheduled an all-day bash on October 3, the respectability. That repudiation of middle class emphatically, "Why, he was just a tramp!" anniversary of Guthrie's death. Woody's sis- values is, I suggest, why Pampans are ambiva- Official Pampa long resisted efforts to welcome ter, Mary Jo, will speak and local officials lent about their most famous citizen. The the old prodigal to the town of his youth. But have voted to designate Highway 60, which Pampa, Texas, in which I grew up in the this year a small band of conspirators began runs through six Panhandle counties and skirts 1930s and 1940s was as middle class as a Frank to plan a welcome-home party for Woody the city limits of Pampa, as "The Woody Capra movie. Its dominant values (never, of Guthrie. They argued in a language that Guthrie Memorial Highway." And in Pampa's course, perfectly observed) were hard work, Pampans can understand, that deep love for the Central Park, a giant cast iron sculpture of the honesty in business, donation of time and powerless is the most prized of Biblical virtues musical staff and notes of the first two vers- money to worthy causes, fidelity to one's and that Woody Guthrie may be alone in his- es of "This Land ..." will never let Panhandle spouse and care of one's family, love of God tory in writing a thousand songs for them. schoolchildren forget that Woody Guthrie and country, and beating the Amarillo Golden July 14, which would have been his 80th was once a Pampa boy. ❑ Sandies in football. These values were pro- claimed at church services, women's circles, service clubs, scout meetings and school assemblies. Education was important, and some excellent public school teachers prepared Subscriptions to and back issues of students not only to attend regional colleges but also the prestigious colleges on the coasts. At one time in the early 1950s, there were four The Texas Observer are available. Pampa High graduates at Yale. Woody Guthrie smelled bad. He flunked out Fill in the gaps in your collection — or even out that short leg of high school. He rode the rails with hoboes. onyour table — for only $3 for each back issue you need. He wrote a ballad that turned the gangster, Pretty Boy Floyd, into Robin Hood. He cheated on his We still have plenty of copies of the following issues: wives. He neglected his children. He talked like a Red. He mocked the American Dream of rags •Henry Ross Perot: Hit or Myth (June 5, 1992) to riches. He was an affront to a community reluctant to allow the artist to live by a separate •Molly Ivins guest-editor issue (Feb. 14, 1992) standard. • Double issue on David Duke (Jan. 17 & 31, 1992) By the late 1950s, Woody Guthrie had become for some Americans a tragic hero, a •JFK issue (Dec. 27, 1992) and others. legend who had earned a place in history by his To inquire, call 512/477-0746 or write: talents and his suffering. His period of great productivity — he wrote perhaps a thousand Texas Observer Back Issues songs — was over. It had lasted no more than 307 W. 7th St. 16 years, from about 1937, when he left Pampa, Austin, Texas 78701 to about 1953, when'Huntington's chorea put him permanently in the hospital. He spent near- ly all of his last 14 years there, from 1953 rob, THE TEXAS until his death in 1967. It was the protest singers of the 1960s who canonized Guthrie, seeing him as their fore- runner and mentor. Bob Dylan is but the best 1111PI known of the musicians who went as pilgrims server to Guthrie's bedside. The old populist became their model and inspiration. They were moved by his courage as a wretched disease robbed TO SUBSCRIBE: him of his talents before it robbed him of his life. They loved the old lyrics which roasted the Establishment. They counted his bohemian Name lifestyle as virtue and not vice. And most of all, they envied him for being something they were not, an authentic man of the people. Pete Address Seeger had gone to Harvard. Joan Baez's father was a college professor of physics. Bob City Dylan suffered neither hunger nor the Dust Bowl in Hibbing, Minnesota, although he would have given his soul to have had a history to match State that of his hero, Woody Guthrie. The singers of the '60s were like the gener- Zip ation of politicians who, after Lincoln, longed to convert their birthplaces into log cabins. ❑ $27 enclosed for a one-year subscription. 1 Okemah, Oklahoma, was Woody's log cabin. ❑ Bill me for $27. Pampa, Texas was his rail-splitting youth. How ❑ $3 for each back issue. Please indicate dates fortunate were Abe and Woody to be so unfor- tunate. Pampa has a street named for Randy Matson, a local son who won a gold medal in the shot put in the 1968 Olympics. There is no

THE TEXAS OBSERVER • 17 A public service message from the American Income Life Insurance Co. — Waco, Texas — Bernard Rapoport, Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer. (Advertisement) LESSONS OF THE '30s By David Boren and Harris Wofford

In the wake of the Los Angeles violence, there are some pay able men and women to sit idle. America's inner-city poor signs that our political leaders may be willing to stop play- do not want to be viewed as a danger, as the enemy, but rather ing the politics of fixing blame and start fixing problems. as a resource, as talent ready to make a difference. It's time to put into place policies that work instead of wast- We have been joined by a diverse group of Democratic ing time and money on those that don't. and Republican senators in proposing a new program that While more resources will have to be invested, the solu- would provide work opportunities for those on welfare and tion is clearly not as simple as increased funding for exist- the unemployed by bringing back the WPA and CCC in ing welfare and job training programs. Enterprise zones modern versions. and home ownership programs have their place, but they are Under this new "Community WPA" (CWPA) program, all not enough by themselves. What is most needed is a welfare recipients, with the exception of mothers with very change in thinking and a new approach that looks at what has young children and those enrolled in education and training worked in the past. programs, would be required to take an available job in a If we are going to solve the urban crisis in this country, sponsored project if they cannot find jobs elsewhere. Many we need to work out way out of it — literally. In the 1930s, young men not counted in official unemployment figures are America addressed an economic and social crisis with a falling through the cracks in the current system because they straightforward, action-oriented approach: The Works never held a job entitling them to unemployment compen- Progress Administration and Civilian Conservation Corps. sation or received AFDC benefits. They, too, would be eligi- What worked for FDR was work — not the dole, not wel- ble to participate. fare, but work, both in the WPA and the CCC. In addition to the CWPA, there would be two youth pro- During the eight years the WPA was in existence in the grams that would provide work opportunities to high school late '30s and early '40s, 8 million WPA workers built more students and young adults in exchange for educational benefits. than 650,000 miles of roads, highways and sidewalks, 125,000 A new "Youth Community Corps" would enable students from public buildings (including 39,000 schools), 124,000 bridges, seventh to 12th grade to work up to 250 hours per year in 8,000 parks and 18,000 playgrounds. The wrote hundreds of demanding community service projects. The second youth books and created countless artistic works. They served more division, the "National Youth Community Corps," would than 1 billion meals to hungry schoolchildren and sewed more create camps or dormitory units for young people to work on than 382 million garments for those in need. All of this required such projects as reforestation, auxiliary police service and in investment of about $90 billion in today's terms. park or low-income housing reconstruction. Those still in By comparison, what has our welfare system created in the school would participate in the summers, and those out of past eight years? At a cost of over $900 billion spent on all school would work year-round. public assistance, we have managed to produce little more Many people out of the work force today lack the skills than subsistence-level payments to an increasingly hopeless and training of those who went to work for the WPA and CCC and alienated segment of American society. By simply in the Depression years. There will therefore be an even greater handing people checks, the system robs them of a sense of need for supervisors who can help train workers on the job. being part of the communities where they live and of any moti- The Army ran the CCC in the 1930s. Now is a good oppor- vation to achieve. There is nothing worse for a person's tunity for many of the talented people being forced into self-esteem than to have no reason to get out of bed in the early retirement from the military because of changes in the morning and no useful work to perform. world to take up this leadership role again. In addition, as A young high school dropout involved in Philadelphia's Sen. John Warner said recently, military facilities that are slat- Youth Service Corps understood that with productive work ed for closing have already been paid for by the taxpayers he not only helped his community, he also helped himself: and should be put to use: "I got tired of people coming to do good against me, trying "Why not fill those empty bunks and dormitory barracks to help me all the time. This corps asked me to do the help- with young people who need a chance to work and whose ing. Now I'm making a difference." talents are needed to rebuild America?" We now understand that personal responsibility and self America worked its way out of a crisis in the 1930s. If we esteem can't simply be taught; they have to be earned. It is get to work, we can do it again today. a scandal that we sit by while another generation of inner-city young people drops out of school and onto the streets, into David Boren is a Democratic senator from Oklahoma. joblessness, drugs and the dependence systems of welfare Harris Wofford is a Democratic senator from Pennsylvania. and prison. A society with children who need care, roads that This essay first appeared in The Washington Post of May 21, need repair and bridges that need building cannot afford to 1992.

18 • JULY 24, 1992 BOOKS & THE CULTURE The FBI Takes Aim

BY STEVEN G. KELLMAN

INCIDENT AT OGLALA Directed by Michael Apted 66 liked the whole idea of letting people involved at the time tell the story," John Trudell, one of those people, said in a telephone interview. "I liked letting the audience make up its own mind." Incident at Oglala is a cinematic inquest into what happened on June 26, 1975 at the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. Narrated by Robert Redford, who also served as executive producer, the film examines a shoot-out between two FBI agents and mem- bers of the American Indian Movement that resulted in the deaths of both federal officers and one AIM man. Incident at Oglala proceeds chronologically, from the occupation of Wounded Knee, South Dakota in February 1973 to the present, the 16th year of Leonard Peltier's lifetime incarceration for the murder of the FBI agents at Oglala, on Pine Ridge. It weaves brief statements by people involved — witnesses, lawyers and law officers — into its exposition. The FBI refused to cooperate, though three prosecutors did agree to face the camera. One maintains: "YoU don't sim- ply retry cases simply because people aren't satisfied with the result that the jury came up with." Yet when an audience makes up its own mind about the story, it is likely to conclude John Trudell that Peltier deserves a new trial, if not exon- eration. Home to 10,000 Lakota at the time of the to slip across the border to Canada. However, man who calls himself "Mr. X" tells the cam- shootings, Pine Ridge had the highest rate of Darrelle Butler and Bob Robideau were appre- era that he, and not Leonard Peltier, killed homicide of any area in the United States. hended and placed on trial for the deaths of the two agents. "This story is true," says Peltier "It was a war zone," declares AIM leader FBI agents Jack Coler and Ron Williams. from prison about Mr. X's account, "but I won't Dennis Banks. The combat was between When a Cedar Rapids, Iowa, jury acquitted testify against him." Deprived of freedom and "full bloods" and "mixed bloods" — desig- them, federal authorities pressured Canada virtually all hope, Peltier explains his stoicism: nations defined less by genealogy than atti- to extradite Peltier. After their defeat in "I've got my dignity." tudes toward indigenous traditions. With the Cedar Rapids, prosecutors made sure that their In a telephone conversation from California, aid of his GOON (Guardians Of the Oglala case, before a very different kind of judge, Trudell is coy about whether he knows the iden- Nation) Squad, mixed-blood Richard Wilson, in a Fargo courtroom, would be much stronger. tity of Mr. X. "I didn't see him putting his mask president of the tribal council, conducted what Peltier was convicted, and sentenced to two on," he says, indignant that a substitute should Trudell describes as "a reign of terror" against consecutive life terms, on the basis ofques- have to be produced in order to free Peltier. local full bloods and the members of AIM who tionable evidence: the red-and-white van he "There are integrities involved here. We're came to Pine Ridge to protect them. More than was driving was not quite the same as the being asked to provide someone to take 60 murders remain unsolved. The violence red pickup observed at the scene of the crime; Leonard's place. Either they have the evidence of June 26, 1975, occurred within a context of rifle casings alleged to connect Peltier to the to fairly convict Leonard, or they don't. To me, corruption, collusion and despair. shootings could not have come from the what is most important is the fact that the gov- Despite a massive manhunt, Leonard Peltier, murder weapon; and, most blatantly, Myrtle ernment manufactured evidence. They didn't one of those present at the shoot-out, managed Poor Bear's testimony that she was Peltier's alter evidence; they made it up." girl friend and had seen him shoot the agents Incident at Oglala is one of two recent films was inaccurate on both counts. made by English director Michael Apted that Steven G. Kellman is a professor of compara- The most dramatic moment in Incident at focus on murder at an Indian reservation. tive literature living in San Antonio. Oglala occurs toward the end, when a masked The other, Thunderheart, is a fictional varia-

THE TEXAS OBSERVER • 19 tion on the same story, starring Val Kilmer Continued from pg. 8 the argument. And the argument that captivates as an FBI agent who denies his own Indian her- him — and his audience — is that Reagan itage until faced with homicidal hostility toward he Clinton strategy does not call for a Republicanism was a disaster. that heritage by his senior case officer — played T genuine campaign against the entrenched Cuomo recounted in a memorable passage by Sam Shepard — and a seedy tribal chief. economic interests that hold such sway over in his nominating speech for Clinton that in the Though the documentary was made before it, both parties. Therefore, Clinton cannot be 1980s, "governors and mayors had gone to Thunderheart was released first, had a brief presumed to be seriously interested in the dete- Washington to plead for help for education, for commercial run in Texas last spring, and is still rioration of American democracy. (He may also job training, for health care, for roads and being screened in some second-run theaters. be underestimating a key element of why so bridges. 'Sorry, there is none,' said the President. John Trudell appears in both. A musician who many working-class former Democrats believe `We're broke. We have the will but not the wal- has worked with Jackson Browne and per- the party no longer speaks for them.) Neither let.' Then Americans discovered that wealthy formed in Austin and San Antonio last March, the party's platform nor Clinton's acceptance bankers — educated in the most exquisite forms he also composed the score, a fusion of rock speech included more than cursory references of conservative Republican banking — through and Indian traditions, for each. to removing the influence of organized money their incompetence and thievery and the gov- "They both tell truths," he replies when asked from the electoral and legislative system. ernment's neglect had stolen or squandered which version he prefers. "I don't have any Clinton's concerns are programmatic. "These everything in sight! We heard no moralizing interest in films that keep placing us back are not just commitments from my lips," he said about values then from our Republican leaders. 100 or 200 years ago: the noble losing red man. in his speech. "They are the work of my life." Instead, ,nirabile dictu — all of a sudden — the I am interested in films that portray contem- If you look at the Clinton campaign on this heavens opened, and out of the blue, billions of porary realities." level, you can talk yourself into supporting it. dollars appeared." What is the contemporary reality on Pine There was a glimpse of the campaign at its most That's an argument for new priorities. But Ridge, 17 years after the fatal incident at progressive at a forum on Wednesday of con- it's made with a sense of out-rage, a feel for jus- Oglala? Richard Wilson died in 1990, and, vention week put on by the Campaign for New tice, and a demand for fairness. Clinton is a mite claims Trudell, tribal governments are no Priorities. Derek Shearer, the California activist short on these qualities. And it's probably longer as much of a prbblem as the U.S. who is serving as an economic advisor to because the Reagan era led him to more ambiva- Department of the Interior. "The form of Clinton, extolled his man's national econom- lent conclusions than those drawn by the oppression has changed," he explains, citing ic strategy. "This is the most comprehensive, Governor of New York. The argument that "massive, massive poverty" and an 80 percent progressive economic plan put forward by a Clinton has been making since he launched his unemployment rate. candidate for President, certainly in my life- race is with his own party. He's interested in Raised on the Santee Sioux reservation in time, perhaps in this century," he testified. showing voters he's learned from Ronald Nebraska, Trudell was national spokesman for The Campaign for New Priorities is an Reagan. Of course, Bush wants to stake the AIM when he came to Oglala at the time of the attempt to bring government policy into line same claim. The irony is, it's turned out to be notorious incident that is recounted on film. with post-Cold War reality. Included on the a year when voters are suddenly looking for In 1979, he burned an American flag in front panel with Shearer were Bob Borosage, a Jesse someone who can explain what the hell is going of FBI headquarters in order to protest its per- Jackson advisor; Jeff Faux of the Economic wrong here. And who seems to have a righteous secution of Peltier. Less than 24 hours later, Policy Institute; Senator Harris Wofford of sense of indignation about it. in a case that the FBI refused to investigate Pennsylvania; AFSCME president Gerald and that remains classified an "accident," McEntee; and none other than former CIA direc- Trudell's house burned down, killing his wife, tor William Colby. Conversion to a peace- y the last day of the convention, I found a children and mother-in-law. time economy was the dominant concern. "The B new level on which to understand the Trudell no longer works for the American world has turned upside down; we now must upcoming Presidential race and Bill Clinton's Indian Movement. "AIM served its purpose. show that we can turn our priorities right side role in it. His long and somewhat tedious accep- That form was not practical for me anymore. up," said Wofford. tance speech was what anyone who has fol- I wanted to be able to operate more freely." He If Clinton is not bold enough to speak the lowed him would have expected. It was safe continues to voice his commitment to justice truth about the distortion of politics and the rather than bold. Policy oriented, not passion- for the American Indian, but he insists that: gross imbalance of power in America, his ate. He is clearly a politician who will not get "There is no political solution to the prob- next best hope may well be to hammer away out ahead of the people. "People first," he seems lems we are confronting." In fact, if politics, on the new priorities theme. The Republicans to be saying. "Let the politicians follow." at least since Machiavelli, has been defined by will hit him time and again with their favorite Clinton would never have been a trustbuster adversarial attempts to advance social goals, epithet: "tax and spend." What he must get in an earlier age of American politics. He is Trudell demands an end to politics. "Politics across to the voting public is that the pattern a Grover Cleveland Democrat, ready to assume is based on competitiveness, while we need of taxing and spending the Republicans have the mantle of a business-oriented party, ready cooperativeness. The dominant forms of polit- set for the past 12 years is the real problem. to strike a deal with power. He is made of Wasteful and corrupt throughout the 1980s, it opportunism, not principle. It's a repulsive ical structure are alien to our culture." ❑ is now not even remotely connected to the real- sight at times, such as when he is using exe- ity of the 1990s. Why does Bush insist in his cutions in Arkansas to impress the Reagan current budget that we must spend $5.5 bil- Democrats. But at the same time there is some- lion on Star Wars? Spend the money instead in thing fundamentally and essentially democratic ANDERSON & COMPANY ways that can directly help the economy: on about this kind of leadership. The reason is COFFEE?, education, on infrastructure and on developing this: In the event that power was coming from TEA SPICES competitive technologies. organized citizens, Clinton would bend as eas- TWO JEFFERSON SOUARE Clinton knows these issues frontwards and ily as he would to organized money. Though AUSTIN, TEXAS 78731 backwards. The trouble is, he can't talk about we would like Bill Clinton to fulminate against 512 4453-1533 them convincingly. He is so full of new poli- the plutocrats, it isn't really his fault that Send me your list. cy ideas that he conveys no sense of the fun- American democracy is lackluster and given Name damental argument for them. This is why he over to concentrated economic power. It still suffers in comparison with Mario Cuomo isn't within his power to reactivate citizen Street — not just because Cuomo is a better orator but democracy, either. The most we can reason- City Zip because Cuomo reasons with the public, trying ably demand is that he not stand in the way to get us to realize what's wrong with should we ever get a democratic movement

Reaganism. Cuomo has a perfect sense for rolling. ❑

20 • JULY 24, 1992

Reading Rainbow

BY GEOFF RIPS

OUR FAMILIES, OUR FRIENDS, to more books by minority writers and writ- ter way is there to understand and teach about OUR WORLD: An Annotated Guide ers from other countries, mainstream children's the oral tradition in African-American culture to Significant Multicultural Books for literature still contains distortions. These include than to be a part of it?" they ask. Children and Teenagers an overemphasis on rural life in books about Austin's Oralia Garza de Cortes has pro- Edited by Lyn Miller-Lachmann highly urbanized foreign countries, such as vided the guide with two chapters — one on R. R. Bowker, New Providence, Mexico, Great Britain and most African and Hispanic-American literature and another on New Jersey, 1992 Asian countries, and a reliance on folktales, par- Mexican and Caribbean literature. In her intro- 688 pp., $39.95. ticularly concerning Africa, to the exclusion of duction, Garza de Cortes traces the evolution current fiction and nonfiction. of published Hispanic children's literature from T HAS TAKEN almost a century, but the There was a brief flowering of multicultur- a few assimilationist works in the 1960s and melting-pot image of America, born in al children's literature in mainstream U.S. pub- '70s to recent books about the immigrant I the late 19th century, is finally giving lishing following the civil rights gains of the experience as well as such bilingual works as way to a better understanding of ourselves as 1960s, first by African-American writers, fol- Inez Maury's My Mother and I Are Growing a multicultural, pluralistic society. Nowhere is lowed by Hispanic and Native American writ- Strong/Mi Mama y yo nos hacemos fuertes about this understanding more important, than in our ers. But the 1980s saw a precipitous decline changes in a family when the father goes to public schools, in which Hispanic, African in minority publication in this country, not so prison. She laments, however, the continued American and Asian American students make much because of a new conservatism but •dearth of good young adult books. up increasingly larger portions of the student because the Great Society program funds that Among the books she cites is the recent bodies of urban America. While many teach- purchased a large proportion of the minority lit- Family Pictures/Cuadros de familia by Texas ers, librarians and administrators recognize the erature for schools and libraries were cut off. native Carmen Lomas Garza and Harriet need for a multicultural curriculum, they are Mainstream publishers quickly lost interest in Rohmer, calling it "a landmark in the devel- given few resources to draw upon. , publishing these authors. Small presses stepped opment of Mexican-American children's lit- Now there are no more excuses. Our Families, into the breach. Some, such as Children's Book erary history." Our Friends, Our World begins to fill that void. Press of San Francisco, have thrived by sup- Our Families... is user friendly, with chap- Edited by a librarian at Siena College and writ- plying the growing demand for multicultural ters subdivided by grade level, each entry ten by teachers, educational consultants, chil- literature, as well as for trade books to replace thoughtful and well-written. So get the word dren's book authors and librarians — including textbooks and basal readers, as more schools out: Every school and library should stock the children's librarian at Austin's Terrazas pub- embrace a whole-language curriculum. one of these guides in order to begin stocking lic library — this volume provides critical assess- Our Families... provides a series of sever- the books analyzed. An important resource to ments of about 1,000 books published in English al-hundred-word critical assessments of fiction help our children understand their world is now (or in bilingual editions) between 1970 and 1990. and non-fiction, discussing accuracy, literary at our fingertips. ❑ The object is to provide teachers, librarians and quality, authentic depiction and whether the parents with a guide to current children's lit- work helps build self-respect, emphasizes pos- erature in order to provide our children with itive values and provides hope, direction or a an understanding of the diversity and complexity broader knowledge of the world. While most of their school, their city and the world. works included in the volume are there to be 4'410 44111'11'"‘– Sea Consequently, this is not simply a recom- brought to the attention of a wider audience •• Horse mended reading list. Each chapter provides a of teachers, parents and librarians, a number of • cultural or regional focus, beginning with a gen- currently widely-read children's books are also • Inn eral discussion of the body of children's liter- included so that they can be analyzed using the • ature under consideration, its strengths and same criteria used for lesser-known works. Kitchenettes-Cable TV Obr Pool weaknesses. The volume includes chapters on As an example, the chapter providing anal- eg o African-American, Hispanic-American, Asian- ysis of 128 works of African-American chil- beside the Gulf of Mexico Ear American and Native American children's lit- dren's literature, criticizes the fairly popular Go on Mustang Island erature, as well as chapters devoted to the Free or Die: A Story About Harriet Tubman by $ ,e Available for private parties wirl. literature of regions and countries of the world. Jeri Ferris by citing the sentence, "But Harriet Oil% The books included in the guide are those was different from most slaves — she wondered al Unique European Charm 10 1 in which the content or a significant theme gives why such things [slavery] should be." The three ) & Atmosphere 0, insight into a culture different from that por- librarians responsible for this chapter of the i Special Low Spring & Summer Rates % trayed in mainstream U. S. work. As the edi- guide write: "Harriet Tubman was not [empha- Pets Welcome f•Ak- tor, Lyn Miller-Lachmann, explains in an sis theirs] different from 'most slaves' in this Cr informative introduction, the guide is meant respect and to state that she was implies that 1423 11th Street flo, to combat stereotypes and distortions, partic- the others were too content or too stupid to ques- ularly in children's literature published before tion their wretched place in society." They rec- V' Port Aransas, TX 78373 '$ and during the 1960s. While the last 30 years ommend instead Ann McGovern's Wanted call (512) 749-5221 of children's book publishing has seen a shift Dead or Alive: The Story of Harriet Tubman as the "best Tubman biography for this age." for Reservations ,.,,f In another entry they recommend Julius , Lester's adaptation of The Tales of Uncle ...,4c.,,,,„,,,,,,.. V Geoff Rips is a former editor of the Texas Remus, saying Lester has reworked Joel Chandler Observer. Harris' "difficult and offensive prose. What bet-

THE TEXAS OBSERVER • 21 In another case, a Travis County jury ruled ty of these pages has been marred by the stain Political Intelligence that an Austin police officer was acting within of immorality." American-Statesman publish- Continued from pg. 24 the law when he stopped and searched a black er Roger Kintzel said he approved the "dreariest" and "biggest windbags," which may man at Robert Mueller Municipal Airport last announcement because "we have decided not explain why his plodding, but groundbreaking, fall as part of the war on drugs. LeWayne Kelly to discriminate on the basis of sexual orienta- investigation of the Bush administration's aid filed a civil lawsuit against the city after he was tion." Local radio stations reported being to Iraq was long ignored by the D.C. elite. stopped by Officer John Sisson, who testified besieged with calls; one station estimated that Kelly appeared nervous, was walking quick- that 70 percent of callers were opposed to the V IRE LAURELS. Former Observer edi- ly and was carrying two beepers when he marriage. Kintzel's office told the Observer tor and contributing writer Brett Campbell, who arrived at the airport Oct. 18 to pick up a that only only one complaint was received (from recently moved to San Antonio, received an friend. Kelly's briefcase was searched and his a woman whose announcement was below award for outstanding investigative reporting pant legs were "patted down" by Sasson. Civil the female couple). Reached for comment from Investigative Reporters and Editors, a libertarians argue that use of "drug courier pro- before leaving for a honeymoon, Strandtman nationwide support organization for inves- files" results in harassment of minorities, who said, "It wasn't our intention to make a gay tigative journalists, for an article on the Texas face seizure of cash or other assets which law- rights statement ... [But] now, because of , welfare system, "Out of Touch: Why Texas' men believe may have resulted from drug this coverage, there is an opportunity for peo- Welfare System Doesn't Work," which origi- traffic (See "Presumed Guilty," TO 11/29/91). ple to be educated..." nally appeared in the summer 1991 issue of Kelly was assessed court costs, but his attor- Southern Exposure. An expanded version ney, Jim Harrington, said he is considering fil- V SAN ANTONIO Congressman Henry appeared in the Sept. 6, 1991, Observer. ing -another class-action suit centering on B. Gonzalez was quoted in the Washington allegations of discrimination. Spectator, wondering why we are still occu- V HOT SHOTS. A shooting spree in a pying Panama: "I think the American people Fort Worth appeals court that left two lawyers V DEAD ON ARRIVAL. That was the ought to know that we still have two-thirds of dead and two judges and another lawyer injured report on the Rio Earth Summit by the Lone the troops in Panama that we had at the height has started yet another debate on whether gun Star Chapter of the Sierra Club, which blast- of the invasion, and that we are governing control could have prevented the tragedy. ed President Bush for gutting environmental Panama. ...The people we have put in power Last year, Texas became the first state to safeguards at home and failing to support the in Panama are all bankers; they were bankers report that gun deaths outnumbered traffic-relat- summit's initiatives abroad. "The truth is that were enmeshed in the illicit drug trade." ed deaths. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control that George Bush has as much claim to being reported that shootings are the third leading the 'environmental president' as Clayton V GOOD BANKERS? Maybe it's not cause of accidental deaths among children Williams has to being a rape counselor," said an oxymoron after all. In Austin, seven small and that teen-aged Southerners face the great- Ken Kramer, director of the chapter. Scott banks have pooled their resources to create a est risk. Houston City Council in April enact- Royder, the Sierra Club's state conservation .financial co-op to share the risk of lending to ed an ordinance that makes it a Class C director, noted that Texas ranks with California, low-income borrowers. The seven banks, misdemeanor to leave a gun where a person Hawaii and Florida at the top of the list of states according to the Austin American-Statesman, younger than 18 can get it, but it faces a likely with the most threatened and endangered will try to provide services similar what is avail- legal challenge from the National Rifle species. One-third of native fish species are able through a community lending program Association, which is trying to head off any threatened or endangered, duck populations offered by NationsBank in collaboration with movement to limit ownership of firearms. Texas are down 40 percent and out of 89 natural com- the NAACP. Five similar bank projects will get law has no registration or licensing of firearms, munities, 17 are in danger of becoming extinct. underway soon in Sunbelt states. Nationwide but it bans weapons in schools, polling places, Texas has lost 50 percent of its coastal wet- lending statistics establish that minorities in government offices, racetracks and places were lands, 63 percent of its bottomland hardwood most urban areas are rejected for loans at a rate alcohol is served. Tarrant County bought 32 forests (Texas' version of tropical rainforests) far greater than are whites. Texas NAACP walk-through metal detectors after two previ- and 90 percent of South Texas' brush habitat President Gary Bledsoe told the American- ous fatal courthouse shootings in the past six has been converted to other uses, chiefly Statesman he now perceives a higher sensi- years, but they were in storage awaiting judges' agriculture. In addition, only one million of six tivity among mortgage lenders. The bankers' requests for installation on the morning of million acres of long-leaf pine habitat remains change of behavior, according to Ken Pool of July 1 when George Lott, a former lawyer from and half of Texas coastal waters are closed to the National Council for Urban Economic Arlington, started firing a 9mm semiautomat- shellfish harvest due to pollution. But the Bush Development in Washington, is probably ic pistol at the 2nd Court of Appeals hearing. administration signals the green light for clear- motivated by the Community Reinvestment Lott reportedly emptied the 15-cartridge clip in cutting forests and allows polluting indus- Act, which, among other things, requires the courtroom, reloaded and pursued a fleeing tries to increase toxic emissions, bypassing more fair lending practices in inner cities. lawyer down a hallway. The suspect, who report- environmental regulations. edly was frustrated over his divorce and child- V MONEY TROUBLE. The state's abuse allegations against him, surrendered that V WHAT BEGAN as two column inch- schools were warned not to expect the money afternoon at WFAA-TV in Dallas after dis- es of text and a photo on the Austin. American- that was promised to them in 1991 in a letter cussing the shooting with news anchor Tracy Statesman's wedding page quickly became a from the Governor, the Lieutenant Governor Rowlett for a half-hour. controversy over the morality of homosexual and the House Speaker, although Lt. Gov. Bob marriage. Sara Strandtman and Karen Bullock later predicted that public schools would V COURTHOUSE FOLLOW UPS. A Umminger, who were married at a Unitarian get at least $650 million from economic growth Smith County grand jury decided not to indict a Church in Austin, announced their union with in the next biennium. State District Judge Scott Kilgore police officer who shot and killed a a paid notice in the Austin newspaper's Sunday McCown of Austin said he will shut down pub- bedridden black woman during a botched drug wedding page and quickly found themselves lic schools if lawmakers fail to come up with raid in January. The shooting of 84-year-old Annie and the American-Statesman under attack from an equitable school funding plan by next June. Ray Dixon as Officer Frank Baggett Jr. burst into the fundamentalist Christian right. Jack State Rep. Jim Rudd, D-Brownfield, chair- her room (see "Dividing Line: Police vs. Blacks Chambers, host of a Christian talk show, in man of the House Appropriations Committee in East Texas," TO 6/19/92) was the third death something less than an act of Christian com- and a leading candidate for House Speaker, involving law enforcement in Smith County with- passion, attacked the announcement as "an insult recently told the Greater Stan Antonio Chamber in two months and sparked a rally at the court- to the momentous, happy occasion of the of Commerce the Legislature will face a rev- house on Feb. 10. An inquest in June deadlocked other married couples whose accounts of their enue shortfall of $4 billion to $6 billion when 4-2 over whether the shooting was accidental. weddings are portrayed on this page. The puri- it convenes next January. ❑

22 • JULY 24, 1992 AFTERWORD Expose Yourself to Politics

BY DAVID SCHULTZ

EX AND POLITICS. On the pretense of ter than Dukakis among those who had zero, examining the moral character of public one, or three partners, while Dukakis bested S figures, America is obsessed with the pri- Bush among those with two or four partners. vate sexual behavior of its politicians. Clearly the former governor of Massachusetts Perhaps this preoccupation first started with was the choice of voters with even numbers of rumors about J.F.K and Marilyn Monroe. sexual partners. Explaining why this is so will Perhaps it started with Jimmy Carter lusting be the responsibility of political scientists in his heart in the pages Of Playboy back in who do voting studies, and of the Democratic 1976, or with Gary Hart, Donna Rice and the Party as it tries to understand who its base good ship Monkey Business in 1988. Regardless constituency is. of when it started, newspaper reporters, the Now if we consider those highly sexually supermarket tabloids and evening news anchors active (more than three times per week!), 63 now seem obsessed with finding who our politi- percent voted for Bush while a mere 31.5 per- cians are sleeping with and how many times cent voted for Dukakis, and we are left won- they did it. dering how these people had time to vote, let There is Bill Clinton and Gennifer Flowers, alone fill out an NORC survey of more than 500 Bob Kerrey and Debra Winger, and, let us not questions. forget, Jerry Brown and Linda Ronstadt. To What might all this data suggest to candidates many, this sleeping around is political taboo, who contemplate running for office? First, absti- but among my cruder male friends, sleeping nence and voting seem to go hand in hand. with any of these women is certainly a vote in Candidates might wish to direct their message the candidates' favor. toward celibates. Additionally the dirty-movie While the media and the public has pro- voting bloc also deserves targeting (Bush nounced the private behavior of candidates to does Dallas?), yet commercials directed to them be of public importance, no one has asked about might not be suitable for viewing during fam- the character or private sexual behavior of the ily viewing hours. American voter. Maybe candidates should con- GAIL WOODS Beyond specific candidate appeal, smut and sider the private actions of voters prior to ask- sex seem to be distracting voters and some steps ing for their vote. how these numbers are related and whether sex- need to be taken: Recent data from the National Opinion ual materials provide an outlet for political • To prevent voters from being distracted Research Center (NORC) offer interesting impulses. One also wonders if (or for whom) by dirty movies on election day, all adult tidbits that might illuminate connections Justice Clarence Thomas voted in 1988. movie theaters and video rentals should be between the voting and sexual behavior of Does all this suggest that viewing smut is a closed. This proposal is similar to the laws Americans. Perhaps it is this information that threat to political parties and elections? NORC that once kept bars closed on election day. politicians should consider when they are out data show that 43.5 percent of those who con- • Or, voting booths might be relocated to adult campaigning. sider themselves Democrats have recently seen movie theaters and VCR rentals. Better yet, vot- For example, of those who voted in 1988, 58 a dirty movie, while 45 percent of Democrats ing booths could be placed in private movie percent claim they saw an X-rated movie in the also see pornography as an outlet for bottled- stalls in the porno-movie theaters. The pro- previous year. For those who did not see such up impulses. Possibly the inability of Democrats ceedings from the peep shows could be part of a movie in the previous year, 69 percent voted to win the White House can be deduced from the public financing for presidential elections. in 1988. A difference of 11 percent between these facts. But don't fret: 41.4 percent of those Overall, voter registration laws should be relaxed those viewing and those not viewing a dirty who associate themselves with the Republican to make it easier for the sexually active to movie suggests interesting questions about what Party have recently seen a dirty movie and 43 vote. some people were doing on election day in 1988 percent of the Republicans polled see pornog- • Sex education should be removed from high and how viewing smut relates to low voter raphy as an outlet. Moreover, among those who school health and science classes and placed turnout. consider themselves members of the Grand Old instead in civics and social studies departments. Surprisingly, among the dirty-movie crowd, Party, 40 percent have had three sexual partners • Encouraging abstinence and telling students 57.5 percent voted for George Bush, while a in the last year. Sex preoccupies voters in to just say no could be given a patriotic theme mere 41 percent supported Michael Dukakis. both parties. — "No to sex means yes to democracy." Also, of those who voted for Bush, 59 percent Another interesting statistic in the NORC data Given what the NORC data suggest, cleans- thought sexual materials provided an outlet for is that among those who said that they had no ing the moral character of Americans might just bottled-up impulses; among those supporting sexual partners in the last year, 74.3 percent be what is needed to vitalize American democ- Dukakis, a mere 39 percent. One wonders voted in 1988. Of those with one sexual part- racy. After all, how can we expect good can- ner, 68.8 percent voted; with two or more didates to ask for our vote if we ourselves are partners, a mere 55 percent voted. Clearly those so flawed in character. David Schultz is a professor of political science who were more sexually active had better things Perhaps Jimmy Carter was right: A nation at Trinity University in San Antonio. to do on election ,day.' Bush generally did bet- deserves leaders as good as its people. ❑

THE TEXAS OBSERVER • 23 Postmaster: If undeliverable, send Form 3579 to The Texas Observer, P.O. Box 49019, Austin, Texas 78765

POLITICAL INTELLIGENCE

✓ RUNOFF WRANGLING. Ben Flowers has sued to stop the GOP operative Sadberry, a black lawyer, after learning he had Reyes won the right to a July 28 rematch from appropriating her story. Brown's political voted in the Republican primary. with Gene Green for the Democratic nomi- action committee will get half the $4.99 fee per nation for a new congressional seat in Houston call, which will allow it to buy more advertis- ✓ LETHAL PRISONS. Court - ordered after a state judge found more than 300 people ing. The Bush campaign distanced itself from execution has taken its place among the lead- who voted in the March 10 Republican primary Brown's effort and Bush condemned the ad; he ing causes of death in the state prison system, cast illegal crossover votes in the April 14 also disavowed connections with the 1988 ads, with eight lethal injections administered dur- Democratic runoff, which Green won by 180 also produced by Brown, which focused on a ing the first six months of 1992. A review of votes; the 14th Court of Appeals upheld the black convict who raped a white woman while death reports of persons in the custody of the new election. Reyes immediately attacked on a. furlough program during the tenure of criminal justice system, collected by the Green for a mid-campaign conversion from Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis, the Attorney General's office, showed 75 deaths pro-life to pro-choice on the abortion issue. Democratic presidential nominee. And GOP in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, In the Hill Country, Jeff Wentworth pro- "opposition research" goes on (see "Perot- Institutional Division, during the past six posed running his wife, Karla, for the Texas Scope," TO 7/4/92). months. Heart and circulatory problems caused Senate after the 4th Court of Appeals in San 21 deaths, AIDS and HIV-related diseases Antonio upheld Republican Party Chairman ✓ PECKING PICKS. Ann Richards final- caused at least nine deaths, cancer was diag- Fred Meyer's ruling that Wentworth, a San ly found an acceptable black woman to sit on nosed in nine cases, pneumonia in four cases Antonio state representative, is ineligible for a Houston appeals court, but the governor's and sepsis in three cases. Other causes with two the Senate since he took per-diem pay as a image was tarnished by repeated miscues in the apiece were tuberculosis, stroke and hangings, member of the State University System Board search. Richards got clearance from Sen. Don while 15 deaths had other causes. of Regents in 1987-88. Wentworth quit the Henderson, R-Houston, to appoint Gaynelle board to run for state representative, but the Griffin Jones, a black federal prosecutor, to the ✓ SUBLETHAL BUZZ. "Killer" bees regent's term does not expire until next 1st Court of Appeals, making her the first black chased a 76-year-old San Antonio man and February, making him constitutionally ineli- to serve on either of the two Houston-based stung him about 250 times. James E. Port Jr. gible to run for any legislative seat until then. appeals courts. But that was only after a series was doing yardwork on the city's northeast side If the ruling stands, GOP officials from the nine of botched attempts, starting with Richards' when the "Africanized" bees attacked him. counties in the district will name a new nom- reported choice of Michael Charlton, a white He ran inside his house and his family helped inee — probably primary runner-up Alan lawyer, before clearing it with Sen. Rodney get the bees off of him. He was treated and Schoolcraft, state rep from Universal City. Ellis, a black Democrat. Ellis headed off the released from a local hospital, as was a 34-year- nomination, insisting that the all-white court, old man who was helping Port clear brush ✓ GOP PHONE SEX. The Republican which includes four male judges and four female and was stung 10 times. Meanwhile, the Texas freelancer who tied Willie Horton to the judges, should have a minority justice. Richards Structural Pest Control Board allowed emer- Democratic presidential campaign in 1988 then chose Vanessa Gilmore, a black woman gency response workers and beekeepers to has unveiled the latest attack ad on Bill Clinton, recommended by Ellis, only to discover that remove or kill the pests without a license, as featuring Gennifer Flowers' alleged affair with she lived in the district of Sen. John Whitmire, long as there is an imminent threat or a bee- the Arkansas Governor. After polls showed a white Democrat who asked for a more sea- keeper is not compensated and does not use Clinton had benefitted from the feud between soned politician to face Adele Hedges, a white chemicals or mechanical killers. A recent change President Bush and Ross Perot, the Associated lawyer selected by GOP officials to run in in state law had required the licenses. Press reported that Bush's re-election team asked November. The Houston Press noted that the Republican leaders to step up attacks on the Richards crew had infuriated local Democratic ✓ BELTWAY INSIDERS. Phil Gramm Democratic challenger. A week later, Floyd senators a year ago by failing to consult with was listed among the "showhorses" in the U.S. Brown, who heads an independent group pro- them on the appointment of Alice Oliver-Parrott Senate in Washingtonian magazine's rankings moting Bush's campaign, released the ad to the same court. After the Democratic rebuffs of the Best and Worst of Congress. In the House, which urges viewers to call a telephone service of her choices, Richards went hunting for a Charles Wilson, D-Lufkin, was "no altar "to hear Flowers' tapes of their intimate con- judge in the district of Henderson, a Republican, boy"; Charles Stenholm, D-Stamford, was versations," the Washington Post reported. who told the Houston Chronicle the governor's "worst party loyalist"; and Henry B. Gonzalez, Clinton has denied Flowers' allegations, which office earlier had send him Anthony Sadberry's D-San Antonio, was listed among both the were first reported in a supermarket tabloid, and name for the appeals bench but dropped Continued on pg. 22

24 • JULY 24, 1992