OCR Text |
Show Page The National Enterprise, June 22, 1977 twenty-si- x The Prince Column 1 Open Account by Chuck Akerlow BY John Prince Carters energy plan guns and butter? During the Vietnam buildup President Johnson told the American people it was possible to have guns and butter. What he meant was that the nation could fight a war in Asia without any sacrifice at home in our standard of -- by low sulphur coal cannot be built. Make sense? No. But then, any similarity tween rationality and politics is purely coincidental. be- living. It was a popular political idea on paper but it proved wrong in the end. The guns and butter philosophy gave us a mediocre and overly cautious war policy in Asia while producing great friction and a sluggish economy at home. Sometimes a choice has to be made whether between guns and butter or clean air d and power plants. coal-fire- t Senator Jake Garn pointed to the hypocrisy in Washington last week when he compared actions with rhetoric. On the one hand President Carter is calling for new energy sources and the expanded use of coal. On the other hand the Congress toughens the clean air standards in certain areas which means that power plants fired low-sulph- ur Garn has a point. The government hasnt yet set its It has several priorities. for Amerit wishes priorities ica but it has failed to come to grips with the fact that not all of those priorities can be implemented at the same time. There are many points in the development of an energy program where environmental goals will cond flict. Strip mining, construction power plants, the of nuclear reactors are but a few. coal-fire- The reason I propose this approach is that the production of alternative sources of energy takes great time years. And in a volatile world where the U.S. is heavily dependent upon foreign oil, time is of the essence in the development of new energy sources. Since this is the case we must put aside those environmental concerns of an aesthetic nature or which are not related to immediate health hazards for people in order to move forward on the energy production front. Concurrently steps should be taken to increase technology to solve those problems in the environment created by new energy source expansion. It seems clear to me that the production of sources of energy should take the first Due care to the priority. environment should be planning for but should not be the overriding concern. Technology is capable of solving problems related to environmental hazards. If this is done our energy program will move forward at a pace necessary to make America energy independent by 1982. If it is not done, America could well be dragging on the debate over energy policy until it falls over, having run out of gas. Playboy on the airplane but decided to take it with me at the last minute just to test the system. Everyone knows you cant take Playboy magazine into the Soviet Union so I was fully expecting it to be confiscated by the customs agent. It wasnt and I was astounded. As a matter of fact, they didnt even look in our suitcases. Now I didnt really want to get the same type of treatment that Mr. Toth of the Los Angeles Times has received but I did expect to get at least a mild search. In a way I felt short changed. Like going to Africa and never seeing a rhinoceros or Uganda and not being asked to carry Idi Amin for a few miles. Certain places are known for certain things and if you cant see paranioa in the Soviet Union you might just as well go to Idaho. So there my wife and I were a few years ago, walking right into a hotel in Russia holding things in our arms that we supposedly couldnt hold in our arms in Moscow. We left Playboy and other capitalist reading material in our room and went out to dinner. Restaurant choices arent hard over there because one soon learns foreigners can only eat in certain places. Intourist is the government agency that deals with outsiders and the game plan seems to be that of giving the traveler the impression of visiting the Soviet Union without actually letting him talk to the natives. Its all so subtle that its easy to overlook what is really happening. At dinner, the tourist will often find himself seated near Russians but there is no effort on their part to make verbal contact. THE NATIONAL Now I realize that most of them do not speak our language, but we also know that a good deal of English is taught in the schools. Wouldnt you think that someone would want to practice on some real live Americans? Someone, Im convinced, has got the word out that tourists are an evil to be tolerated but not the kind of social contacts one wants to be seen with. For some reason our guide in Moscow stands out in my memory. Every morning she would ask us what we wanted to see. We told her that we had a simple request but that we were sure she couldnt pull it off. We wanted, we told her, to see inside a typical Russian home. No problem we were told, Do you have any friends in Moscow you can visit? Natually we didnt know anyone. We told her that she was our best friend and wondered if it would be possible to visit her place. Not possible, we were told, Does she plan on waking up? my roommate is asleep. And so it went. A day later, we were driving along and we saw some unfinished apartments. When we asked if we could see them, she told us there was no road leading to the building! Well, none of this was really important but it might give you some feeling of the country. Tourists are indeed an evil to be tolerated. foreign currency. They bring in There is plenty to admire in the Soviet Union but Im afraid that the loss of 20 million people in World War II combined with a stifling bureaucracy has left them the least enjoyable people in the world to visit. GAS dUZZlf As I said, my wife and I left Playboy and other magazines in our room when we went to dinner. They were gone when we got back. I'm sure Mr. Toth is glad to be home in Los Angeles. |