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Show 'A tun done can enslave man. " philosopher (1909-- 1 A Summe Weil, French OQOOOQ 94.1). The Daily Herald 6 if Thursday, August 18, 1994 inton mixes politics, eligion at meetings By RON FOURNIER Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON - He's (if scorn from the religious the target right, gal- vanizing an angry political mass with his support of gay rights, abortion and sex education cursed and mocked because of ''character issues. " So it may surprise some that President Clinton has quietly reached out to religious leaders and theologians, looking for inspiration during troubled times. Every two or three months, a small group of 10 to 15 meets in a quiet corner of the White House, usually for breakfast. The participants come from a variety of denominations, from across the country, from the left and (he right. Their discussions are inforand frank. mal, The topic: The role of religion in public life. "Sometimes I think the environment m which we operate is entirely too ecular," Clinton said, welcoming his guests to an August 1993 breakfast. "The fact that we have freedom of religion doesn't mean we need to try to have freedom FROM religion." The most recent gathering took place last week, as the crime bill lurched to the brink in the House and debate on health care reform slow ed in the Senate. The group, ranging from conservative Catholic scholar Michael Novak to the liberal Edmund L. Browning, presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church lit the United States, privately shared eggs and conversation w ith Clinton for more than an hour . Martin Many, a University of Chicago professor considered a leading expert on American religious history , culled the president "a very biblically informed thinker." "You can always tell if somebody is duking it up for the clergy or if they grew up with it." he said. "No doubt that this fellow is steeped in it." His voice hoarse and hushed, Clinton spoke briefly about his desire to bring unity to a country he sees as too often divided. "There are all sorts of fissures in the American public on most domestic policy issues." one of the participants quoted Clinton as saying He asked for advice. James Dav ison Hunter, a University of Virginia professor and author of "Culture Wars," brought to the table the viewpoint of his txxtk that the extreme left and extreme right in religion and politics act to exclude more moderate voices from public debate. "To hold an opposite view, one has to be either crazy or evil." Hunter said later. Clinton seemed to express similar sentiments before the August 1993 meeting: "If people of faith treat issues about which they disagree as nothing more than a cause for a screaming match, then we also trivialize religion in our country." Taking the notion one step further, Clinton often calls for a more reasoned debate in the political arena. "Sometimes I think the commandment we most like to overlook in this city is 'Thou shall not bear false witness,'" he said at the National Prayer Breakfast in February 1993. The group reminded Clinton this month that he sometimes drags down the level of discourse. They mentioned his lashing out at Jerry Falwell and the religious right, with one participant telling Clinton, "Don't go out of your w ay to alienate this group. " The trouble is, he already has. Many Americans see a disconnect between Clinton's faith and his political and personal actions. "His views on abortion, gay rights, family values, plus his own womanizing ... convince us that he is not committed to what we believe," Falwell said. Richard John Neuhaus, president of the Institute on Religion and Public Life, said abortion foes, particularly, find it hard to accept Clinton's plea for more inclusive debate. "If he believes that is the case, then why has he thrown every ounce of presidential power into supporting abortion?" said the Catholic priest, w ho has not attended the meetings. Clinton, a Southern Baptist who carries a family Bible to church nearly every week, turns to religion for inspiration and revitalization. The August 1993 breakfast came immediately after an introspective summer vacation, with the suicide of close friend and aide Vincent Foster fresh on his mind. Arkansas, friends said Clinton joined Immanuel Baptist Church to help come to grips with his 1980 gubernatorial election defeat. Critics said he was drawn solely to the church's televised services. Since he became president, Clinton has attended a Methodist church near the White House almost every Sunday. His wife In is a lifelong Methodist. Like presidents and politicians before him, Clinton recognizes the political benefits of public displays of faith. Just last Sunday, he promoted his crime bill from the pulpit of a Maryland church, comparing his work to a religious ministry. "Pray for me," he said, pleading for divine intervention on a political matter. "Pray for members of Letters Health care simple makes so much sense. Editor: As the health care reform debute heats up. we are hearing more and more .ligament on the issue. Usually presented witn some tragic anecdote, these reports one-side- d seem to indicate that any opposition to the particular position being argued is down... and brands the person right disagreeing us belonging to a "special inter- est." The issue of health reform is incredibly complex, but in reality a few basic causes can be found at the root of most of the problems. The time has come to tell the real story about the health care "crisis" in this country. It will sound simple enough, but I'm amazed how often this truth is lost in the muddled, dogmatic positioning taking place all around us. First of all: The real problem w ith health care is cost, not access. If there were no cost problem, there would eventually be no access problem. Sound obvious? think about it. If costs were under control, a way could ultimately be found to pay for everyone. True "universal coverage" would result. Under many current "reform" proposals, ci 'sts would only cont inue to rise So where does the cost problem come from? At the most basic level, it stems from the fact that individuals are Mally removed Iroin financial consequences of their healthcare decisions. With third-part- y pa.vment mechanisms and uninformed consumers, no economic checks and balances exist. The solution is simple: Individuals must be better educated, and nxre accountable for health-tardecisions. That is why the idea of medical savings accounts (w hich would give consumers the incentive to nuke efficient choices in their medical care, while still protecting them against financial hardship) e The second part of the cost problem arises from the failure of our society's medical ethics to keep up with rapidly advancing technology. We allow medical science to do even thing it can. regardless of the cost. Time was, "everything" was quite limited. But now, with the explosion of advancements in medical technology (created in large part by U.S. private industry research), there is often literally no limit to what can be done, and how much can be scenario is spent, even when the best-cas- e much less than ideal. We cannot afford to continue with unlimited spending. But who decides where to draw the line? I hope it isn't the government. There are no "villains" in health care. health insurance Even the industry onlv introduced the "medical underwriting" when employers w ith healthy employees demanded a lower-price- d product, in spite of skyrocketing medical costs. 1 am not aware of a single insurance company that does not support extensive insurance reform to "level the plaving field." What they oppose is a massive new federal entitlement program with untried methtxis Ever)' segment of health care delivery, from hospitals to physicians to insurers, simply responds to the realities of the health care environment, in order to survive. much-maligne- d What is needed now is rM necessarily health insurance for everyone, (by itself that would offer no long term solutions), nor a massive overhaul of the financing mechanism that leaves the run causes untouched. We need to address the disease, not the svniptoms. Michael Bush Sandy "Look . . . the Cubans are racing the Haitians!" ' "' " "' "" " ' "1 "" -. .ii ii .i .MI.III. ,., . I,.,,. i. ...I,.,, - Ml! I Golfers sometimes wander out of bounds And so it seems that after all these years as America's second most beloved golfer after Amie, of course Jack Nicklaus has wandered off the fairway and stepped into something that sticks to his shoe. Following in the tradition of such sports Baxter legends as Howard Cosell, who once called a black football player "that little monkey," and Al Campanis, who confided to Ted Koppel in front of perhaps 20 million listeners that in his opinion, blacks didn't have "all the necessities" to manbaseball team, Mr. age a major-leagu- e Nicklaus last month told a reporter for the Vancouver (British Columbia) Province that the lack of black golfers in America was not due to racism. Nicklaus said that blacks "have different muscles that react in different ways." He also said he didn't think that if he had refused to play at clubs that barred minorities back in the '60s and 70s and '80s that it would have helped more minorities find their w ay onto golf courses. "I don't buy that," he said. Now, before rushing to judgment, you should consider the possibility that there are a few things at work here, none of which, of course, is Jack Nicklaus' brain. First, Mr. Nicklaus is a product of a sheltered segment of our culture. He grew up in country clubs, and country clubs do not reflect society as most of us know it. They are, for the most part, protected from all those homeless and hungry and tired and sick folks whom the Statue of Liberty welcomes into the country. Second, according to his friends, Nicklaus has been a friend of civil rights at least he has donated time and money to minority golf programs. And the third thing to keep in mind is that beyond golf, Nicklaus, like most of his fellow professionals on the PGA tour, has very little interest in the universe. Yes, I know he designs courses, but I'm Syndicated Columnist not sure that makes him a Renaissance man. At any rate, given Mr. Nicklaus' narrow experience, and his view of the world from the 18th fairway, it is not surprising that he might believe that blacks have dif ferent muscle groups than whites. Or that their muscle groups react differently than whites' to the peculiar physics of a golf swing and there is nothing in as physics peculiar as a golf swing, except perhaps the cast of a fly rod. Here I am, after all, a man who was not brought up in a protected environment, certainly not in a country club, and my guess is that there is a difference in the musculature of blacks and w hites too. And I do not think that holding this opinion makes me a racist. It may make me ignorant of human physiology, but I can probably name more bones than you can having broken most and it has never occurred to me of mine that whatever the physical differences between the races are, that they reflect anything other than the differences themselves. It is not, as the politically correct argument goes, an easy step from believing blacks are naturally faster or better jump ers to believing that blacks are naturally less intelligent. And even if such an argument were valid, it has nothing to do with the plain fact that physical differences do exist between one race and another. Which is to say that Jack Nicklaus is entitled to his theory of racial musculature, and that he should be free to express it without seeing his words splashed all over the sports pages with the suggestion that they make him a racist. He may be politically incorrect, but that is a different sort of crime from racism, and the two things ought not to be confused. It is one thing to say that blacks are physiologically different from whites; it is another thing to say that refusing to play at clubs where minorities were not allowed wouldn't have opened more doors for biacks. If Nicklaus and Palmer and Sam Snead and Gary Player and the other great players had refused to play at clubs that barred blacks, it might have very well opened some doors earlier. On the other hand, it could have closed some doors to Nicklaus himself, and I would remind you again that we are not talking today about Lincoln or Gandhi or Martin Luther King, we are talking about a man whose contribution to the planet is his ability to hit a small, dimpled ball. There is nothing wrong with that, but there is no accompanying implication of greatness. Jack Nicklaus was close to a perfect golfer, perhaps the best who ever lived. The idea that he is much more than that, however, grows out of a culture that insists on making role models of its athletes. And like most athletes, Nicklaus collapses when handed the weight. That doesn't mean he's let us down, it only means that we expected too much. Boxing, politics have a lot in common By CLAUDE LEWIS Knight-Ridde- r Newspapers politics and professional great deal in common. Both can be sweaty, grimy, ruthless and brutal sports in which participants operate on the premise that victory is all that counts. It seldom matters to boxers and politicians High-leve- l boxing hav e a how the battle is waged, so long as the opponent suffers defeat. Both sports are performed in public arenas, but as nearly everybody is aware, some of the biggest deals affecting these savage activities are carried out in either dimly lit bars or the darkest corners. Boxing's most hated promoter, Don King, is a neophyte when his antics are compared to manipulations of professional politicians. Fight promoters and politicians use guile and gall to victimize the public. They lie w hen they insist they work for their constituencies, when obviously they are hopelessly addicted to the need to perpetuate and expand their own power and authority. King now faces charges of fraud, and in both parties many politicians should meet a similar fate. It is nothing short of fraud when people doubt the need for a new crime measure, simply because they lack the imagination to design a fair and effective solution. People are not sent to Washington to deal only in political expediency. It is their duty to come up with iegislation that satisfies the needs of the American people. Obviously, what is needed at the local level and in Washington is a clear sense of urgency and a willingness among politi cians to find solutions to the emergencies we face. There is a desperate need to sharply reduce crime and curb the numbers of Americans being killed and brutalized on a daily basis. There should be some things on the national agenda that are beyond politics. When children are being gunned down, when women are being seriously abused, and when our elderly quake at the crimes perpetrated in their communities, the time for problem-solvinnot speeches, has arrived. Delay, circumvention and defeat profit no one. They only ensure that the carnage and inadequate health care for .ntllions g, endure. Politicians sound precisely like fight managers when they tell the public we're w inning this battle or turning the corner on that one. They say, "Things aren't really w ill so bad." Some of those fighters must ask themselves, "If we're winning, why am I hurting and being bruised and bloodied while you stand there without a single stain on your white shirt?" The answer is simple: Politicians and managers seldom suffer the punches or the pain. They often are divorced from the terrible realities that millions suffer. When politicians insist that the need for health care reform is not real, they are out of touch with the masses of forgotten Americans. Members of Congress don't lack for health care. They do:i't live in unsafe neighborhoods. They don't lack the means to protect themselves or their families, How can the need for health care reform not be real when at the outset 37 million to 40 million Americans are w ithout ade- -' quate coverage? What recently has developed around the crime bill and health care reform has put the smell of blood in the nostrils of President Clinton's opponents. While Clinton may have suffered a political defeat on the crime bill, it is the public that is being ' in traumatized. The procedural defeat of the crime bill has serious implications for health care reform. But if members of Congress think the president is vulnerable and he is they will fight to destroy health care reform to make him take on the cast of a loser. In the end, the opponents of Clinton's efforts will be the losers. When it becomes clear that we have made little or no progress in these two areas, the public will turn on Congress and ultimately place the blame where it belongs. The boxing analogy holds true when politicians think the only thing that counts is defeating a president or the other party. Too many believe it doesn't matter whether victory arrives via a crisp knockout, a series of punches and counterpunches, or by an unmerciful beating that leaves their opponents bloodied and hanging on the ropes. Greedy fight promoter worry only about the size of purses and the next event. Ambitious politicians worry only about creating failure on the part of their opponents, by any means necessary. Many of them have forgotten that the crime bill and health care reform will affect the lives of millions. 'it . |