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Show 3 '"Better by far you should forget and smile Than that you should remember and be sad." Christina Rosetti, British poet (1830-187- - Monday Ooioioiis 4) Dec. 10, 1990 ! nsebDe Oeirmraans ago, when the Berlin Wall had been breached and Germany's future-, was uncertain, a great deal of Gpfjgern was expressed around the globe about the prospects of a united, more ptjwgrful Germany. The parliamentary ejfiions held recently to choose a new alWSerman government should allay most of those fears. In the first free balloting throughout Germany since November 1932, the voters reaffirmed the sensible political middle. Chancellor Helmut Kohl's Christian Democratic Union was given a solid mandate to build on the policies that led to swift reunification. Significantly, the voters in the east entiifsed Kohl's vision in about the same ratio- - as the electorate in the west. And Kohl's vision is one of a united Germany fh'Titiy moored to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the European CoViimunity. '.The Social Democrats, who once were expected to fare especially well among eas,' German voters, had their worst showing in a decade. The Social Democrats did poorly in the east because of a general disaffection with the left and bepause they were less enthusiastic about reunification than Kohl's Christian Damocrats. Extremists of both the left and the right also were rejected by the voters. Germany's newest party, the Republicans, have generated headlines for their sympathies and em- far-rig- ht ; neo-Na- zi Herald comment phasis on recapturing lands lost during World War II. A year ago, the Republicans were viewed by many as the embodiment of Germans' worst instincts. Now, however, they are little more than a footnote in German politics, falling far short of the 5 percent support needed to qualify for seats in the Bundestag. militantly Similarly, the environmental Greens took a beating. Once seen as a symbol of Germany's drift toward neutrality, the Greens failed to reach the 5 percent threshold in the west. Consequently, the seven slots they will have in the new, parliament will be held exclusively by east Germans, leaving the principal leaders of the party out in the cold. Even the old east German communists, who have changed their name to the Party of Democratic Socialism, gained more seats (14) than the Greens. Barely a year after the Berlin Wall was toppled, Germans have voted for a united nation tied economically and militarily to the Western democracies. The fears that German unity would wrack the Continent with renewed conflict suddenly seem overanti-nuclea- r, 656-se- at -- f To all the servicemen on patrol, sh you all success in your goal. Hire's a little humor, here's a little fun, Cell's change places with the government, arid put them on the run. I'm a mother, a grandmother and a great, That puts my immediate family about eight. TBat doesn't count the or the stepchildren for sure, That brings into my family many, many more. rNow this puts me a little past the age of in-la- Jsixty-fiv- e, gracious, and sakes alive. came from a family of kids twelve plus Gbydness 1 1 one I Andwith all those brothers and sisters, boy did we have fun. Now that's my history, so I'll put it out of the way, I just want to let you know how grateful we (are .of you today. For defending the freedom of us and others, I I bet you'd rather be back home, if you had i your druthers. Fori you I know this is a hardship, that's for I si ire. life is disrupted as you go off to war. Our prayers and our best wishes go to you fr? pi this land, As you struggle and fight that ever blowing sand. jjSutwhat I'd really like to see when they sartd you over there, in your place go the Congress, senators to do their sliare. jiflithe president 3jS they would realize what things are all As-yo- ' i ! j i J J ' ; ' ! i I trees. We sold them in our driveway in less than two hours. This soon became a famiy business which grew each year. During these years, I have tried to provide people with the type of tree they like and the price they can afford. I have traveled thousands of miles and spent thousands of dollars to make a convenient working operation and above all else to please the customer. Just what do people expect? When a tree is cut, it is no longer alive. It is dying and the amount of time it takes differs a little with each tree. To make matters worse, the trees are put into warm houses near stoves and heat vents. We used to do most of our business after the 10th of December, but now we must be ready the day after Thanksgiving or lose our business to someone else. Please don't expect a Christmas tree to stay fresh from Thanksgiving to New Years. The trees are put up too early! Fresh cut flowers purchased from a florist, are not returned to them when they wilt, and the florest is not to blame. I feel very responsible to the people I do business with. I want the best product for them and do not like to see them disappointed. As a result of the worry and concern on my part, I am seriously considering going out of business next year. Merlin Phillips Phillips Family Tree Farm Payson wood-burni- Revolution rules Jumping the gun ( PkSS Nice try, plutonium weapons-grad- e saaaamr & If I understand the situation correctly, At BSKf381 ... Iraqi war: U.S. would be on its own Editor: These are some of the reasons why our country is in big trouble and could be MCfwj they would cut down on their nonsense destroyed. Communist rules for revolution, May 1919. liiieip us oui. now see ana couia inis (A) corrupt the young, get them away from your imagination religion and get them interested in sex. (by a laueh we all could have, maybe two sex education) (B) get control of all means of publicity and thereby: of three. 1. Get peoples minds off their government IH put aside, These fun and jokes just thank you all, as I say with pride. by focusing their attention on athletics, sexy May God be with you and keep you in His books and plays. (It's working, to gain a one world government.) care, 2. Divide the people into hostile groups by this I That you will all soon be home want to share. constantly harping on controversial matters of no importance. Well, what more can I say 3. Always preach true democracy, but I'm Elaine Robbins seize power as fast and as ruthlessly as From the little town of Salem, Utah, USA And the zip as you can see possible. (Congress is doing this.) 4. By encouraging government extrava;? gance, destroy its credit, produce fear of inflation with rising prices and general discontent (by Congress). Cause the registration of all firearms on some pretext, with Editor: view to confiscating them and leaving the In 1976 I took my family to a tree farm to a helpless (innocent people who are population We tree. it cift'a fresh Christmas brought for gun control, unknowingly are hoiye, decorated it and within a few days fighting the goal.) community helping I to went floor. off on the fell all the ;needles Bob Bormann a "relatives' ranch and cut 50 pinyon pine Provo I 4 "" HAH! 30 pounds of rt, blown. 70 'Editor: "I'd like a bike, a Bart Simpson ad Letters Poetic gratitude r JUL f ju1 jrmi V (J HIM Y J OUT one of the reasons we're gearing up for war with Iraq is that we're trying to create some sort of new "world order." This seems to mean that we're trying to create a kinder and gentler world and, if Saddam Hussein interferes with this kindness and gentleness, we'll stomp the hell out of him. And if I understand the situation correctly, much or most of the world agrees with what we're doing. That conclusion can be drawn from the support we've received from the United Nations, which represents most of the world's population. If you pause and think about that, it's pretty impressive, since the world is a pretty big place and a lot of people live in it. The most current estimate is that the world's population is 5.3 billion. (If you like to look at zeroes, that's 5,300,000,000.) So as Americans, we can feel proud that more than 5 billion people have said, through their U.N. representatives, that they're on our side. And Saddam should feel nervous with that many people thinking he's a low-lif- e character. Of course, many millions of thtr. are little kids who don't know what's going on. And there are probably millions more who are drunk or hung over or watching game shows and don't care one way or another. But even if you want to adjust it down by a billion or so, we do appear to have considerable support. If that's the case, though, it's puzzling that so few of the world's 5.3 billion people have joined us in the Arabian desert. It isn't easy to get exact figures because the Pentagon keeps pretending that everything is a military secret. But most estimates are that there are about 80,000 military and support people over realize. And that's true. About 15 or 20 different countries have sent personnel, which sounds impressive. You would imagine that Saddam would say: "Holy camel, there are troops from 15 or 20 countries out there. Quick, hand me the white flag." Mike Royko TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES there with us. Eighty thousand people would be an impressive turnout for a football or baseball game. And they would make up the small city. population of a livable-size- d But as a percentage of the world's population, they're not much more than a drop in the swimming pool. If my pocket calculator is correct, those 80.000 troops and support personnel represent something like .000015 percent of the world's population. What is that? One or something? I don't know. Maybe some bright math major can help me out. I do know that it isn't exactly a frenzied turnout. Many rock concerts have drawn bigger crowds. And some of the rock concert-goer- s were probably more inclined toward violence than our desert allies. That, of course, is why some of the critics of President Bush's war plans have been saying that the rest of the world isn't doing much more than offering to hold our coat while we brawl with Iraq. And they're asking why, if Saddam is such a threat to world peace and the world's economy, the rest of the world isn't frothing at the lips and just itching to pluck out his eyes. Some of Bush's defenders respond that there are more countries represented in the desert or at sea than most people th However, it becomes less impressive when you look at what some of these countries have sent. There are small-tow- n American Legion posts that provide bigger marching units for parades. Norway sent a Coast Guard cutter, which, would be handy if any icebergs drift into the desert. Denmark also sent a small ship, which is OK, but our troops would probably have preferred a few thousand cases of cold Heinekens. Saudi Arabia has a few thousand of its' own troops on the front lines. That might not seem like many, considering that it was Saudi Arabia that yelped for us to come and protect it after Saddam invaded Kuwait. You might think that Saudi men, young and old and by the tens of thousands, would be enlisting to protect their own country. But we have to understand that they have a tradition of disliking menial jobs. They prefer to use their oil money to hire what we, in this country, call "domestic help." Just as some rich to protect Americans hire and businesses, the Saudis have to fight for their oil hired our wells and polo ponies. All of this might bother some of Bush's critics. But we can look at it another way. If we really want a kinder, gentler, less combative world, this could be an encouraging sign. If there's a war and 9y.999 percent of the rest of the world doesn't bother to show up for it, that means there are a lot of kind and peaceful people out there. Or if they aren't kind and peaceful, at least they're not stupid. then-home- rent-a-co- s rent-an-ar- Diet pills more harmful than FDA admits WASHINGTON The latest dope on diet pills is that they may be more dangerous than the Food and Drug Administration has admitted. It wouldn't be the first time the FDA erred on the side of recklessness. Nor would it be the first time that dieters had been disappointed by the promise of quick and easy results. A report prepared for Congress by a U.S. Public Health Service physician says that the appetite suppresdiet pills is sant in many ineffective for most people and can be a health hazard, especially to young people obsessed with thin figures. The report, by Dr Paul Raford, raises the possibility of consumer fraud and questions whether the ingredient phenylpropanolamine hydrochloride, or PPA should be sold over the counter. The news means that the FDA has some explaining to do. Last month, the FDA had a chance to ban PPA from uses but decided not to. Several other nonprescription diet ingredients were prohibited from being sold without prescription, but the FDA declined to put PPA on that list, saying it needed more time to study it. The FDA also allowed PPA to stay in cough and cold remedies. Raford's study is not so timid. Our associate Scott Sleek obtained an advance copy of the report. PPA, which acts as an appetite suppressant in diet pills, has been linked to heart damage, strokes, seizures and other medical problems, Raford told Congress. PPA is a cousin of methamphe-tamine- s, commonly known as "speed" or "uppers." Raford's report says research on PPA that, "if furthur verified shows potential for massive consumer fraud at best, and at worst could explain the disturbing and increasing incidence of medical malaffect. The findings will fuel an ongoing debate over the safety of diet pills. Rep. Ron has been spearheading a Wyden, congressional investigation into the diet only under doctor's supervision. PACKING Preparations for a war in the Persian Gulf have included some odd procurement orders. But not all of the purchases went through the big defense contractors. The troops attached to Ft. Stewart, Ga., called the local before embarking for the Gulf and bought 5,500 containers of foot powder, skin lotion and suntan oil, 2,400 cans of insect repellent and 174,000 gallons of bottled water. As bad luck would have it, none of the items were a blue-bgspecial. After a lengthy court battle in New York City, the poor lost. The Supreme Court let stand a New York ban on people begging in the subway system. Begging is also illegal in the Washington, D.C., subway system, and the trend against tolerating panhandlers is spreading to smaller cities too. This is another case of people asking the court to solve the little unpleasantries of life that we don't want to deal with ourselves. Such convenience always sacrifices the rights of individuals. No one likes to be panhandled, but the solution is not to call the police and have the panhandler locked up. The solution is to say no. Sure, some panhandlers get aggressive and threatening when they are turned down. But there are already laws against accosting someone else. It is proper to call the police if someone threatens you. But the United States should not be a country where you call the police when a poor person asks you for a handLAST-MINUT- E Jack 'Self Anderson & Dale Van Atta UNITED FEATURE SYNDICATE last-minu- te ht industry. And the Federal Trade Commission is investigating claims of the companies that peddle diet pills. An FDA spokesman told us the agency will review the new research. Jessica McDonald put a face on the problem when she recently testified before a congressional subcommittee about her long battle with eating disorders and diets. A college junior from Washington, D.C., and a dance student, McDonald said she started taking diet pills at cge 12. She wanted to lose weight fast, and at one point was popping up to 20 pills at a time. She never saw a doctor or a nutritionist. Raford says the misuse of diet products containing PPA is widespread, especially among people under 30. He said adverse reactions are more common from PPA in diet pills than from PPA in cold and cough remedies. And he said products with PPA result in more reports of adverse reactions than any other leading medicine. Some people compound the risk by "double dosing," using caffeine drinks while taking diet or cold pills. There are studies that have been kinder to PPA, but congressional investigators say those studies are flawed because they are unpublished, had no peer review, involved small numbers of subjects, did not follow up on their findings and violated research protocols. Most developed nations have banned PPA as a diet aid, and its critics in the United States say that it should be used er MINI-EDITORI- - out. Letters policy The Daily Herald welcomes letters to the editor. Address letters to Letters to the Editor, PO Box 717, Provo, UT 84603. Letters must be signed and include the writer's full name, address and a daytime phone number for verification. Letters should be typed, double spaced, and less than 400 words in length. |