Denton Record-Chronicle (Denton, Tex.), Vol. 76, No. 293, Ed. 1 Tuesday, July 10, 1979 Page: 4 of 16
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” Page 44 DENTON RECORD-CHRONICLE Tuesday. July 18. 1979
viewpoint
this: President Cartea and his inner -
s • . circle are seated in a rustic lodge deep
Y Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be . i inside the well-guarded confines of -
Carter has his back to the wall
By JAMES GERSTENZANG
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - Picture
A s
en
limited without being lost
Thomas Jefferson
Gag of grand jury
confuses the public
It is pretty difficult for the
taxpayers and voters of Denton
County to make a judgment on
the actions of Judge Bob
Scofield and the Denton County
.Grand Jury when no one can
talk about the subject-of their
battle.
The district judge, apparently
aware of what the grand jury
, was about to say in its report,
ordered the grand jury mem-
bers not to make a report and
not to talk about it for the rest of
their lives. There are a lot of
possibilities The judge could
have had a runaway grand jury
venturing far from its legal
bounds. Or he could have been
trying to muzzle the grand jury
in the legitimate pursuit of its
civic duty
As we said, it ’s difficult for the
average citizen to know without
any information to go on.
Whether the judge over-
stepped his legal powers
remains to be seen Obviously,
he thinks not. Some lawyers in
town think otherwise What the
appellate courts will say
remains to be seen — if there is
an appeal, if an appeal is
possible legally and if the courts
do rule
There ought to have been
some other way to handle the
situation If he is right, Judge
* Scofield could not have hurt
himself more politically than he
did with his seemingly high-
handed approach Perhaps he
should have admonished the
grand jury that it was out-of-
bounds, warned the members
not to do so and then let them
have their say. Their report has
no legal effect anyway.
If he is wrong, then he has
diminished the rights of the
grand jury to report and the
people to have the benefit of
Camp David.
They have heard from the nation's ■
prominent business and labor leaders,
a civil rights leader and college
presidents Now they are trying to
revitalize Carter’s domestic program
and tackle the energy issue
One’ trusted aide outlines a
proposal Others chime in until finally
the president speaks
"No. None of those ideas is big
enough to get me out of here "
That, in a sense, may be what is
happening at Camp David, tf we look
behind the vague reports emerging
from the -mountaintop compound
guarded by Marines and electronic
fences.
Carter has been there seven days ;
He spoke first with aides who have
been with him since he was Georgia
governor nearly 10 years ago Then he
talked with a wider circle, a who’s f
who of. 1970s America.
The decisions that will flow from the
meetings. Carter’s press secretary
a
a
wo
dis
act
vol
• ev
Ko
S’
their findings
Saying that other grand jury
reports were innocuous was an
insult to the hard-working grand
juries of the past. Better to have
said their reports would not
have been legal had someone
called their hand, if such is the
case
The net result of all this has
been mass confusion on the part
of the average citizen. It has
generated a plethora of rumors,
not all of which can be true and
probably not most of them
Whatever the grand jury found
probably could not have been
any more damaging than the
rumors.
It is hoped the matter can be
resolved in such a way as to
a
says, "will have a profound effect on
the nature of our society " for years to
come.
Carter is not simply reworking his
canceled energy speech. White House
aides and other participants in the
meetings have made clear
Vice President Walter F Mondale
indicated Carter is considering -a
synthetic fuels program of
monumental proportions,
What is actually happening at Camp
David remains pretty much of a
guessing game This is by Carter's
design — he likes to hold his cards
close to his vest until a decision is
made.
“If I were guessing,” said a
Washington insider Carter consults
from time to time, “some dramatic
things may come out of this."
Unstated but understood in a con-
versation with this source was the
. . ... 1 * president's standing in public opinion ------.
clear up the confusion, let in: polls: Each day seems to bring a not to expect any spanking new options" to be worked out by staff
nocent persons off the book and report of a new drop., and one poll programs from Carter when he finally members, said one person familiar
free future grand juries to do released over the weekend offered comes down from the mountain. - with the Carter approach “But that
their duty.— evidence that his support at home Th If nothing else, the-eenduct of the hasn't worked too well for him on
or
%4
the South is eroding
"Carter is a .middle-of-the-road
decision maker until pushed to the
wall, and then he does some dramatic
things," said the observer, who
requested anonymity
But others have cautioned reporters
president’s meetings at Camp David energy " -
— the second such soul-searching for According to press secretary Jody
the administration in 15 months — Powell, who has been at Camp David
reflects a change in the way Carter since Thursday, the president con-
does business ferred over the weekend with groups
"He usually doesn’t get involved in that included the president of the
debates down below, waiting for National Audubon Society, an in-
ternational petroleum consultant, the "
chairman of the Tennessee Valley
Authority and the president of the
plumbers union. - ’ - ’
By
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President pockets most of expense allowance
By JACK ANDERSON
Syndicated Columnist
WASHINGTON - Jimmy Carterit
promised the voters he would ferret
out government waste and improper
use of the taxpayers' money But in
his search for misused funds, our
millionaire chief executive failed to
look in the handiest hiding place of all
- — his own pocket
During his first two years in office.
the parsimonious president spent only
, one-seventh of his $50,000 annual
furniture as a deduction, but the :
Internal Revenue Service disallowed
The. unusual thing about Carter's
expense money is how little of it he
manages to use each year The pur-
pose of the *50.000 allowance was to
spare presidents from having to pay
unofficial costs of the presidency out
of their own pockets. Former
President Herbert Hoover estimated ,
that "the minimum cost to the
president is somewhere between
$25,000 and *35.000 a year of con-
The American public might be
forgiven for expecting Carter to
set -an example for the
. bureaucratic spenders he cam*
paigned against.
Anderson
expense allowance. But instead of
turning the two-year total of *85.727
left over back to the Treasury, Carter fashion as it should be conducted."
simply put the money in his personal That was 30 years ago, when it cost a
mere three cents to mail a first class
ducting the White House in such a
bank account.
There's nothing illegal about a
president pocketing unused expense
money Indeed, the practice has been
sanctified by tradition in the 30 years
of presidential walking-around
money Carter’s predecessors in the
White House didn’t turn their leftover
allowance back, either
In fact, Richard Nixon, with his
usual flair for imaginative income-tax
calculations, tried to stretch the
taxable expense allowance by
claiming depreciation on White House
scrupulously returns the unspent
portion of his modest *10,000
allowance in 1977 he turned back
*4,934: last year he gave the Treasury
*5.180
While the $85,727 unspent
letter. presidential allowance is peanuts in a
Yet we have learned, with the help government that treats a million
dollars as small change, the
of Jesse Sterns of the Sterns News
Service, that President Carter spent
just $1,108.52 of his $50,000 allowance
in 1977, and $13,165 last year. In fact,
IRS may disallow 112,111 of the 1978
“business expenses,” which went for
expected nor required." Lipshutz
said, adding that neither he nor Carter
even considered such a step. He also
suggested we read the legislative
history of the bill to get a better un-
derstanding of its purpose
Maybe Lipshutz would benefit from
his own suggestion. If there’s one
thing the congressional debate of 1949
makes clear, it is that there was
serious concern over the possibility
American .public might be forgiven
for expecting Carter, the born-again
crusader for truth, beauty and
economy, to set an example for the
bureaucratic spenders, he cam- “The real rub," said the Senate’s
staff ’parties and receptions. (The
remaining $1,054 was spent for meals,
gifts and miscellaneous' expenses ) president's counsel, why Carter
paigned against ’ „ resident moralist, Wayne Morse, then
We asked Robert Lipshutz, the 3 a Republican, of Oregon, “is that this
entire expense proposal is but a
In contrast to Numero Uno, Vice didn't [eturn his leftover expense
President Walter Mondale money to the Treasury. “It’s neither
Americans could learn a lesson
from Britain’s Maggie Thatcher
Harvey t
By PAUL HARVEY
Syndicated Columnist
Britain’s problems are similar
enough to ours so that Maggie
Thatcher may teach us a thing or
two about what to do — or not to do.
The previous Labor government
recognized most of the problems but
proved powerless to correct them
Maybe the Iron Lady can
Why did socialism fail so
miserably in Britain? Over the past
five years that country’s industrial
production increased only 3.5 per-
cent - while production in Germany
and France was increasing 30
percent.
This past winter the British people
suffered the usual problems of snow
and cold plus a cacophony of
problems which they created for
themselves - strikes by hospital
workers and garbage collectors and
others -_
And with labor continuing-to
demand more without producing
more Britain's cost of living in-
creased last year altogether as fast
as our own.
Simplistically, the difference
between capitalism and socialism is
this: Socialists want the poor to have
more by slicing the pie into more
equal portions. Capitalists want
everybody to have more by baking a
bigger pie.
In Britain under James Callaghan
the government reached the
- practical limits for redistributing
the pie
People of talent deserted the
country — fled to Canada, Australia
not. '
But Mrs. Thatcher with one eye in
the rear-view mirror is not likely to
make the same mistakes
- She will cut taxes at both the high
and the low ends of the scale thus to
encourage worker efficiency
She will resist printing more
money. The Heath government of
the early Seventies could not resist
doing that, hoping to bring inflation
under control
The British government under
Thatcher will unload its awful
burdens of public housing and
nationalized industries — assuming
there are buyers.
Labor unions will be required to
hold secret-ballot elections.
or the United States.
Meanwhile, poor people found
themselves with an equal portion of
the pie — but paying more for it.
Along comes this no-nonsense
lady, campaigning on a platform
that would reduce labor- union
power, reduce government spen-
ding
Now what"'
The Toties in the early Seventies
tried to repeal socialism and could
reducing labor anarchy.
Work stoppages have meant less
take-home pay. 5
Tax cuts will mean more take-
home' pay.
These are the objectives Between
where Britain is and where Britain
needs to go is "work, sweat and
sacrifice..."
It will take a female Churchill to
Sell that
Los Angeles Times Syndicate
president's salary another *50.000 and
call it an expense account. It is an
immoral principle."
At one point, another Republican
senator. Eugene Millikin of Colorado,
who sought to overcome this objection
by requiring a president to certify that
the money was actually used for
expenses, was asked what would
happen to any unused portion of the
. *50,000
“I understand we are making an
allowance of expense money," said
Millikin "If it is not spent, I imagine,
in an appropriating period, it
probably goes back into the general
fund, and we would have to reap-
,propriate it." No one challenged this
explanation.
Several members of Congress
spotted the same sneak attack on the
Treasury that Morse had. They noted
that if the, *50,000 were made tax-
that a president would simply use the exempt, as originally proposed, it
*50.000 as additional salary. —- would be worth up to $200,000. Coupled
with the salary raise in the same bill
— from *75.000 to *100.000 - it would
mean that the president was being
voted a salary of about *300,000 a
year
“This bill is a fraud," declared Rep
Ralph Church, R-Ul. "It is designed to
. lead the people to believe that the
increase in compensation is nominal,
whereas in fact, the increase is very,
very substantial."
Two years later, the tax-exempt
status of the expense allowance was
removed. But unless one believes that
Congress was deliberately trying to
deceive the public by calling a salary
raise an expense allowance, the
"intent" that is so important to
Lipshutz' seems to argue in favor of
giving back any unused funds. The
president's attorney evidently thinks
Congress was trying to pull a fast one
and give the president a back-door
pay raise:
In the absence of explicit legislation
requiring the return of unused ex-
pense money, only a president's
personal moral code can dictate what
he does with the surplus, Jimmy
Carter’s code tells him: Take the
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subterfuge for hiding the real intent of
the bill, namely to increase the
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Footnote: The late Nelson
Rockefeller, the richest vice president
in the, nation's history, never gave
back a dime of his expense money
United Feature Syndicate
A toast to Califano in China:
HEW power creates Chairman Jo
finished His health agreement.
Buchwald
which he signed with Dr Qian
Xinzhong. minister of public health
in the People's Republic, twas a
landmark document, in which we
promised -not to supply- them with
saccharin and Darvon, if they
promised not to send us Asian flu
We arrived in Beijing — a party of
health, education, and welfare
By ART BUCHWALD
Syndicated Columnist experts, and a handful of press — to
I went to China with our beloved ' a tumultuous reception
and revered Secretary of HEW
-•Joseph Califano, who is referred to
by his staff as Chairman Jo. Before
the taxpayer gets too excited, I want
to make it perfectly clear that I paid
my own way including air fare,
hotels and all meals, except for
banquets given in honor of Chair-
man Jo, which the Chinese tax-
payers picked up, though I'm not
sure they were told about it.
When the history of normalization
between the United States and
China is written, three American
names will be engraved in the Sino-
American Hall of Fame — President
Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger and
Joseph Califano, not necessarily in
that order. What Nixon and
Kissinger started. Califano
Co
high-ranking American official is
that you get to meet high-ranking
Chinese officials. 5----
At a banquet in- Beijing, a high-
level Chinese administrator asked
me quietly what Secretary Califano
REALLY did
“The secretary is the most
powerful man in America. He can
make you take a swine-flu shot, bus
your child to school, hold up your
Social Security check, stop you from
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Our beloved secretary not only smoking in a public place, and
signed a health treaty with the
Chinese but also an agreement to
discuss an education treaty.
Therefore, we were entertained by
. health officials, education officials,
welfare officials and deputy
directors, vice-premiers, ministers
and Bob Hope.
This required a great deal of
toasts and speeches. Every half-
hour a Chinese deputy vice-minister
would pledge eternal friendship
between the People's Republic of
China and the United States, and
Califano in turn would pledge the
eternal friendship of the American
people for China Then we’d go off to
’see another brain operation
The best part of traveling with a
decide wherther or not you need an.
abortion.
“You could call him the American
Mao Tse-tung But instead of a little
red book, the people wave HEW
regulations at him when they parade
. in front of his building to show how
much they love him.”
The Chinese official said, "He's
that powerful'’"
"Powerful isn’t the word," I told !
him. “If you wanted to build the
Great Wall in the United States you
would first have to prove to
Secretary Califano that you would
hire as many women as men to drag
up the stones of he would refuse to
fund it," - ,
Los Angeles Times Syndicate
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Denton Record-Chronicle (Denton, Tex.), Vol. 76, No. 293, Ed. 1 Tuesday, July 10, 1979, newspaper, July 10, 1979; Denton, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1703647/m1/4/: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Denton Public Library.