Polk County Enterprise (Livingston, Tex.), Vol. 101, No. 89, Ed. 1 Thursday, November 3, 1983 Page: 4 of 48
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PAGE 4A-THE POLK COUNTY ENTERPRISE, THURSDAY NOVEMBER $, 1163
Editorial
Hard fall
Jack Anderson
On the face of it, the conviction on bribery
charges of former Japanese Prime Minister
Kakuei Tanaka should hardly matter much to
Americans. After all, Tanaka resigned the prime
ministership nine years ago, although he remains
a powerful member of the Japanese parliament.
His current disgrace for taking up to $2 million in
bribes from the Lockheed Corp. a decade ago
should not unseat Japan’s ruling Liberal
Democratic Party or discredit its support for a
close partnership with the United States. ,
And yet, Tanaka’s conviction is more than just
the biggest political story of the year in Japan. It
could be the cause of political turmoil that may
well weaken the government of Prime Minister
Yashurio Nakasone. Nakasone, Japans’ most
overtly pro-American leader in more than 20
years, is almost a protege of Kakuei Tanaka.
Whatever diminishes Tanaka’s immense power in
the Diet (Japan’s parliament) diminishes as well
his ability to support Nakasone.
That is important because Nakasone has taken
some controversial positions in an effort to
strengthen Tokyo’s ties with Washington. Heeding
Washington’s appeals for higher defense spending
and lower trade barriers are not especially
popular moves in Japan. But Prime Minister
Nakasone has pushed through such policies with
the help of the largest single voting lbock in the
Diet - the 119 Liberal Democratic Party members
who follow Tanaka’s lead.
After his conviction, Tanaka once again pro-
claimed his innocence and vowed to fight on in the
courts until he wins. The appeal process would
take years. In the meantime, Tanaka may be able
to resist calls for his resignation from the Diet. He
may also be successful in delaying imposition of
the four-year jail sentence recently meted out to
him.
But even if Tanaka manages all this, he still
cannot hope to retain the power he wields today.
And if he is forced to resign, or if he goes to jail,
his bloc in the Diet will likely melt away. To
Prime Minister Nakasone, and to American
policymakers in Washington, the fall of Tanaka
could have decidedly unpleasant repercussions.
T-Wheeler
No one asked
By Alan Miller
Here we go again. Seems like every
time another shoot-em-up happens in
the world we have to grab the World
Almanac to find out who we’re mad at
this time.
Grenada? It’s a little bitty island in
the Caribbean, south and east of Cuba.
Just off the Venezuelan coast of South
America.
About twice as big as Washington,
D.C., about 100,000 people. Grenada has
a medical school, of all things. About
100 American students are enroUed.
Grenada also has under construction
a 10,000 foot airport runway on the
southern Up of the island, being built by
Cubans with some Russian advisors
along to help.
We understand that several other
small countries in the Caribbean area
are concerned that Grenada is building
an airport supposedly to serve as a
staging area for the Russians and
Cubans, has a standing army of some
3,000 soldiers, and in a bloody coup a lit-
tle bit ago assassinated the Premier
and several cabinet members.
This posed a dilemma for the United
States. We have a treaty with the
Eastern Caribbean countries that we
will come help if they are in trouble.
They asked for our assistance, and
marines’ Army Rangers and
paratroopers, with some help from
Jamaica and others went ashore to
secure the place, and stick around until
elections are held to form a more
democratic government than the one
that existed after the military takeover.
And politically things have come a lit-
tle unstuck. Some countries around the
world are screaming it’s an invasion to
“supress human rights.” We guess it is
if you mean the right of any govern-
ment to eliminate the existing one by
any means including murder. If
“human rights” is killing one another
indiscriminately, endangering civilians
and nationals from other countries we
suppose Mr. Reagan was wrong in call-
ing in the troops.
On the other hand, if we are really
concerned about Russian and Cuban in-
tentions on our doorstep, maybe we
should draw a line somewhere in the
Caribbean and tell them in no uncertain
terms that they should quit messing in
an area that expresses our vital in-
terests, including our clear and
unhindered access to the sea lanes that
utilize the Panama Canal.
Personally we doubt very much if the
coup in Grenada had anything to do
with the price ot nutmeg, bananas and
cocoa (their principal exports).
Our guess would be that the Marxist
faction that ran the country was con-
sidered a little too bland for the Soviet
backed military that overthrew it.
The fact that the Cuban” workers” on
the airstrip just happened to be an arm-
ed engineer battalion of the Cuban ar-
my could hardly be considered usual.
And a four star Russian general in
charge of his country’s advisors would
appear a little rank-heavy under the ac-
cepted responsibility of military
echelons.
Our government says we went in at
the request of other nations in the area,
and will only stay until the present
chaos is stilled, and those are our
primary aims.
There is a lot of furor from around the
world accusing us of starting another
Afghanistan, gunboat diplomacy and
all the other rhetoric you would expect
when a superpower exerts its influence
in its own interests. )
The amazing thing is that the
Afghanistan, Ethiopias, and Angolas
seem for the most part to go unnoticed.
It’s only when Uncle Sam gets perturb-
ed that the United Nations and the
Soviet hloc turn their public relation
guns loose and give us what for.
There probably could be something
said for the way we Americans
perceive ourselves. We know that
democracy works, however imperfect-
ly. We rely on the ballot box to correct
any mistakes we might have made in
the last election. We wonder why more
than half the voting population stays
home on election day. But stumble
around as we do occasionally, the
wheels have kept turning for more than
200 years, and we can’t understand why
the military dictatorships and left-
leaning nations fail to understand there
is a better way to live together har-
moniously.
So we will be accused of picking on
the little guys, propping up the banana
republics, and messing in someone
else’s business. And Russia and Cuba
will keep trying to subvert govern-
ments where and when they can just to
make our job a little more difficult.
It just seems kind of sad that all
anyone has to yell to make the rest of
the world upset at the United States is
“you’re violating their human rights.”
The Poles and Hungarians have a
good answer to that question, but
nobody has asked.
Treatment for Marines delayed
WASHINUTON-The bombing of the
U.S. Marine compound in Lebanon last
week was tragic enough, but now we
have learned that a political decision
was made not to helicopter the wounded
to nearby Israeli hospitals. Instead,
they were flown all the way to U.S.
military hospitals in West Germany.
As a result, treatment of the wounded
was delayed by as much as 14 hours. At
least two Marines died on the way.
Here are the disturbing details:
Shortly after the bombing, Israeli
Defense Minister Moshe Arens placed
an urgent call to Washington. He spoke
to Secretary of State George Shultz and
Secretary of Defense Caspar
Weinberger.
©83 Daytona Beach Momitw Journal
01983 Copley New, Service
*
Arens expressed his distress over the
massacre and offered immediate ac-
cess to Israeli hospitals for the wound-
ed. These hospitals are among the best
in the world, and they were less than an
hour away by helicopter.
But the decision was made in
Washington that the United States
should not be seen as cooperating too
closely with Israel. So the offer was re-
jected.
But the decision was made in
Washington that the United States
should not be seen as cooperating too
closely with Israel. So the offer was re-
jected.
The first available plane was a
British Royal Air Force transport,
which left Beirut with the most serious
cases eight hours after the bombing.
U.S. medical evacuation planes picked
up the rest of the wounded.
Who made the decision to bypass the
Israeli hospitals? Our sources say it
was Defense Secretary Weinberger.
There is circumstantial evidence,
meanwhile, which suggests that Ira-
nian terrorists may have been responsi-
ble for the Beirut bombing. Ayatollah
Khomeini has hundreds of Tehran-
trained terrorists scattered throughout
the Moslem world. In Lebanon, they are
holed up in the mountains around
Baalbek, northwest of Beirut.
The CIA believes that Khomeini’s ter-
rorists were behind the bombing of the
V
liiP
IN—
“I wasn’t able to start World War III, but I did manage to get the
Moral Majority’s computer to invite Ted Kennedy to give a speech.”
American Embassy in Beirut last
April. The method used in that incident
was identical to the one used to destroy
the U.S. Marine compound: A fanatic
driving a truckload of explosives blew
himself up along with his victims.
BUGGING THE MOB: Fifteen
members of organized crime families
throughout the Midwest were recently
indicted for allegedly skimming profits
from Las Vegas casinos. It was the
Justice Department’s biggest score
against the mob in recent years.
Never in the history of the war
against organized crime has the FBI
used more court-approved “black bag”
jobs to obtain incriminating evidence.
FBI operatives broke into motels, law
firms, automobiles, restaurants and
private homes in order to plant legal
electronic listening devices.
The bureau’s bugs picked up more
than just evidence of casino rip-offs.
They also gave the justice department
its first hint that the mob was conspir-
ing to bribe former Sen. Howard Can-
non, D.-Nev.
UNDER THE DOME: Congress* is
considering another appropriations
bill, as usual, some members have re-
quested money for their special in-
terests. One senator wants to give the
State Department funds to produce
maps showing several Soviet states as
independent nations. Another wants
$250,000 for a fishwashing project.
Another wants $2.5 million to finance
exchange projects with West German
politicians.
- The Senate Judiciary Committee
recently assembled a package of 19
“non-controversial” amendments to
the criminal code, one of which would
make congressmen subject to the same
conflict-of-interest statutes as other
federal employees in their dealings
with foreign governments. An aide to
Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., initially
voiced an objection to the amendment,
but the senator himself decided not to
oppose it after several calls from our of-
fice.
—Letters to the editor-
‘There is enough heroism to go around for all
To the editor:
The Smithsonian News Service arti-
cle on Soviet air power printed in your
Aug. 14 edition did not say that the
Soviet (not Russian!) air force was the
“world’s foremost air power as of 1945”
as Mr. Bob Goodman stated in his letter
of Sept. 29 to you. The article stated that
“By the end of World War II, the
Soviets had amassed the largest tac-
tical air force in the world.” This is an
historically true statement. Where the
United States produced enormous
quantities of bombers, both medium
and long range, fighters, transport air-
craft, etc., the Soviets manufactured
large numbers of tactical aircraft only.
For example, they produced around
33,000 fighters in the Yak series and
over 36,000 shturmoviks.
Despite these numbers, there were
weaknesses in 1945. With the advent of
the nuclear age, the Soviet Air Force
had only a handful of long-range
bombers (less than 100) and they could
not match the advanced American
bombers such as the B-29. Moreover,
the Soviet Air Force was really behind
in jet development.
The question of Lend-Lease aid is
always considered when dealing with
the Soviet war effort between 1941 and
1945. Soviet historians tend to ignore or
Veterans support amendments
To the editor:
Two constitutional amendments of in-
terest to all veterans and their families
and the friends of the veterans’
organizations will be voted on by Texas
voters on Tuesday, Nov. 8.
Propositions No. 7 and No. 8 have
been endorsed by the Veterans of
Foreign Wars (VFW) of the U.S. and
the American Legion, Livingston,
Department of Texas.
Proposition No. 7, if approved, will
enable Texas veterans "to borrow up to
$20,000 to apply toward the purchase of
a home. v
:. L ' '
Proposition No. 8 is an amendment
that authorizes political subdivisions to
exempt veterans’ organizations from
ad valorem taxation on their property.
State Commander Emmett A. Stelzer
of the VFW urged all friends of,
families of and members of all
veterans’ organizations and their aux-
iliaries to “get out the vote” on Nov. 8,
especially “for" approval of Amend-
ments No. 7 and No. 8.
B.D. Clowers
Dist. 19 Youth Activities Chairman
215 Easy St
, Livingston
downplay the significance of American
Lend-Lease aid. This is not only a
distortion of history, but an insult to the
brave men, for example, who
weathered the Artie and German
bombers to deliver Lend-Lease supplies
to Murmansk - to name only one of the
three points of entry.
Americans, by contrast, have a
tendency to exaggerate the role of
Lend-Lease, as if the Soviets did
nothing to equip their armed forces.
This position is equally false, especially
in view of the thousands of tanks and
aircraft the Soviets produced between
1941 and 1945. During the war, the
Soviets manufactured around 135,000
aircraft. Lend-Lease shipments
numbered around 14,000 aircraft,
around 11 percent of the total Soviet in-
ventory. The Soviets did an excellent
job equipping their own armed forces.
Lend-Lease, to set the record
straight, made a significant contribu-
tion, but not necessarily the decisive
contribution. Food, raw materials (e.g.
aluminum and oil) and transport
(trucks and C-47s) were very helpful.
Sometimes Soviet photographs of the
war reveal the presence of Lend-Lease
aid, always a reminder that America
was indeed enormously successful in
fighting a two-front war and at the
same time equipping its allies with
crucial equipment and supplies.
History books should not attempt to
“glorify” any system, as Mr. Goodman
suggests, whether it should be
American or Soviet, but to tell the story
as accurately as our historical sources
allow. My book, Red Phoenix, made use
of American, German, British and most
important, Soviet sources to tell the
story. All accounts were studied
critically. In the end, there is enough
heroism to go around for all, the United
States and the Soviet Union.
Dr. Von Hardesty
Associate Curator of Aeronautics
Smithsonian Institution
Washington, D.C.
Jets disturbing quiet life'
To the editor:
We, who have chosen to live the quiet
life in the country, are now experienc-
ing almost daily the jarring sound of
jets that fly extremely low and break
the sound barrier. v
This doesn’t happen in the city. Why
does it happen to us? Is there an avia-
tion group who will respond to our com-
plaints? Perhaps an investigation
should be launched to find out if laws
are being broken. If not - then laws
should be written against the unnec-
cessary disturbance of the peace in our
area. 1
May M. Munn
P.O.Box 760
Onalaska
(Our area lies along one of the
military training routes used
periodically by pilots out of Bergstrom
Air Force Base near Austin. Included
as part of the training is flying low in
order to take photographs and avoid
radar detection, according to a major
at that base. Breaking of the sound bar-
rier is not included in the exercise. The
Air Force tries to confine its routes to
less populated areas. Any specific com-
plaints should be addressed to the base.
-ed.)
)
Blind leading
blind is "sad"
To the editor:
The mideast problem is caused by
false ministers disseminating false pro-
phecy and polluted bread from the
pulpits.
They do not understand that God’s
mantle upon old testament “Israel,”
(which means “Power with God) fell
upon Christ and His church instead of
falling on antichrist people.
The blind are leading the blind, and
that is sad, sad.
Sis ter.Mildred Baskin
Route 1 Box 440
Livings too
POLK COUNTY
ENTERPRISE
<
ALVIN HOLLEY, PUBLISHER
Entered as Second-Class Matter at the Post Off ice at Livingston, Texas
77351 under the Act of Congress of March 3, 1897.
EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT
Barbara White, Editor s f
Grace Hobnan, Family Editor
Beatrice HaQ, Special Correspondor*
Van Thomas, Sports E*1'.*
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Don Hendrix, Special Sections Editor
Linda Father, Darkroom Technician
Paul Fortney, Reporter
PRODUCTION DEPARTMENT
Pressroom Personnel
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Composition Personnel
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CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT
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ADVERTISING DEPARTMENT
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Linda Jacobs, Carrolyn Vaughn,
Kathy Jordan, Mary Jo Watson, Patty Hankard
BOOKKEEPING DEPARTMENT
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- Diane Holley
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of county. $155# per year, out of state. Published semi-weekly, Sunday
and Thursday at 501 Tyler 8t. In Livingston, Texas by the Polk County
Publishing Co.
Any erroneous reflection upon the character, standing or reputation of
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Opinions expressed to editorials are those of the Enterprise.
Postmaster: Flense send farm mt to P.O.B« 1271, Uvtogston, Texas
7WL
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White, Barbara. Polk County Enterprise (Livingston, Tex.), Vol. 101, No. 89, Ed. 1 Thursday, November 3, 1983, newspaper, November 3, 1983; Livingston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth788974/m1/4/?q=+%22Amarillo%22+%22streets%22: accessed June 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Livingston Municipal Library.