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Show dDcliind the Jteacttine& Republicans who have been waging a frontal attack on the President's domestic policies believe be-lieve they can now strike best at his foreign policies by attacking the men around the President rather than the President himself. him-self. This is one of the reasons behind be-hind the recent Republican criticism criti-cism of State Deartment Policy Planner Walt Whitman Rostow. Critics say his celebrated re-evaluation re-evaluation of U. S. foreign policy pol-icy puts too much wishful faith in Soviet "good intentions" a la Teheran and Yalta and would pave the way for unilateral disarmament dis-armament and eventual Cold War defeat. While Rostow and the President Presi-dent are at pains to deny these charges, there is no indication that Republicans are either sincerely sin-cerely convinced or are planning to ease up on their attacks on the men around the President, whom they consider the real villains vil-lains of the New Frontier. It is a little difficult for the GOP to attack "President Kennedy's Ken-nedy's Republicans" in many Cabinet and sub-Cabinet posts. The President's own personal popularity and sacred bipartisan-ism bipartisan-ism of foreign policy leave Republicans Re-publicans frustrated in attacking foreign policy differences unless a major foreign policy blunder occurs. However, the men around the President and especially those in the second echelons of the New Frontier who enjoy no such immunity im-munity or popularity except Republicans Re-publicans to step up their attacks and are now seeking White House guidelines on handling them without adding fuel to the partisan fires. Advisor Historian Arthur K. Schlessinger Jr. has already felt the sting or partisan abuse. U.N. Ambassador Adlai Stevenson is a prime target of GOP foreign policy pol-icy critics. Republicans and conservative Democrats alike are seeking liberal lib-eral Chester Bowles' scalp, be- ences with the Kennedy Administration Admin-istration feel he was won public sympathy for his quiet toil on the massive complexities of his job. It is the State Department specialists spe-cialists and Brain Trusters the GOP is gunning for now. Rusk, an old hand at fielding foreign policy politicking since his State Department service under un-der Truman during the McCarthy Era, has managed to be personally person-ally inoffensive, politically agile and does not hesitate to let aides shoulder both responsibility and criticism. Republicans are also hamstrung ham-strung in the criticism of Rusk's policies because of his service with New York Gov. Rockefeller Rocke-feller as head of the Rockefeller Foundation before picked for the State by JFK. Republicans, especially 1964 Hopeful Rockefeller, cannot attack at-tack Rusk's foreign policy views since they largely reflect Gov. Rockefeller's own thinking. This j is why Kennedy was politically shrewd in picking Rusk. I The GOP is also hard put to attack Treasury Secretary Robt. Dillon (a Republican) for his fiscal views. Defense Secretary McNamara for his military policies poli-cies since he came from the presidency of the pro-Republican Ford Motor Co., and Kennedy Administration trade policies can not be logically attacked by the GOP since they were formulated by Republican Banker Howard Petersen, the President's Trade Advisor. The Republicans are determined deter-mined not to hold off their fire and, while unable to blast away at the "Kennedy Republicans," they are stepping up their fire on Cabinet and Sub-Cabinet underlings under-lings in the same way the late Senator McCarthy aimed barbs at lesser aides. This is one of the reasons behind be-hind the President's recent warning warn-ing to career State Department employees to "Get out of the kitchen if they can't stand the (political) heat." It's going to be lieving that they can drive him from his new post as WhiteHouse Advisor on under-developed nations na-tions in the same way he was hounded out of his job as Under Secretary of State. The slightest upset in our delicately deli-cately balanced African policy will be laid only too quickly to liberal Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Men-nen Men-nen Williams, with partisan glee. Liberal Averell Harriman will be held personally and politically political-ly accountable as Assistant Secretary Sec-retary of State for Far Eastern Affairs for anything serious happening hap-pening to our foreign policies in Asia and the Pacific and especially espe-cially if Harriman's personally-arranged personally-arranged Laos truce collapses. The GOP is only too anxious to step up its attacks on Richard Goodwin, Assistant Secretary of State for Latin American Affairs and the country key Cuban strategist. strat-egist. Many members of the President's own party would like to see Childe Richard go. No frontal attacks are planned! on the President himself because of his high personal popularity, the widespread feeling that he has the ultimate answers in for-i eign policy and that "politics stop at the water's edge" when the chips are down, as it did even , after the Cuban invasion fiasco. 1 Curiously, Secretary of State Dean Rusk continues to remain ramarkably free of widespread criticism for several reasons. Republicans drafting party strategy on foreign policy differ- stepped up as the 1962 political campaign begins the day after election day this November. Agriculture, Secretary Freeman Free-man and especially his aides are already under fire to resign since the Billie Sol Estes farm subsidy scandal. The GOP has been trying try-ing to turn labor criticism of Labor Secretary Goldberg into an anti-Goldberg drive. Com-mrece Com-mrece Secretary Hodges is under fire for "unimaginative" handling han-dling of the nation's business problems and for inviting foreign for-eign firms to operate in economically economi-cally distressed areas of the U.S. Health, Education and Welfare Secretary Ribicoff has long been charged with playing politics in his cabinet post. It's the. lesser lights in the sub Cabinet posts the GOP is now gunning for, believing Cabinet heads and eventually the President Presi-dent would become vulnerable if their power to protect subordinates subordi-nates is removed. It remains to be seen whether any heads will really roll as the GOP beefs us its legal investigative investi-gative arm to probe every nook and cranny of the New Frontier. The GOP's stepped up "anti-administration" "anti-administration" campaign is now sparing the President himself in the same way Democrats were wary of tangling with Eisenhower's Eisen-hower's popular appeal, but the JFK lower echelons are( "under the gun." Are you working on the solution solu-tion or are you part of the problem? ! |