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Show Sunday, February WASHINGTON (AP) - 14, 1993 THE HERALD, Provo, Utah, - Page w, IPs finis for a few words Four ' vviuvilIUI SJJIlrU' " dor that began his term, President . Clinton delivers a more crucial in- augural message Wednesday night, launching the economic program central to his administration and perhaps to his political fu- ture. If has been a month of trial balloons and intermittent tribulations, over social issues as major as gays in the military and as unlikely as the rules on tax payments for Cabinet baby sitters and housekeepers. Clinton has had to back away from some campaign commitments, and may well have to explain away another one, a tax cut Americans who for middle-clas- s may instead have to pay more for some of the things they buy . But those early problems and missteps will fade when the Clinton economic plan is presented to a nationally televised joint session of Congress. The tough steps he vows in order to simultaneously promote economic growth and deficit cuts 'will draw protests and stir controversy, but on a central, not side issues. : n The laggard economy was, after all, a major factor behind the change in White House command. It is the problem Clinton said attention. would get his laser-lik- e "We must do what no generation has had to do before," Clinton said in his inaugural address. "We must invest more in our own people, in their jobs, and in their future, and at the same time cut our massive s AP Columnist debt." translate that easily into specific proposals for legislation. So the Clinton plan wasn't ready that soon. It won't be approved dency. Only one of his three White that swiftly. And neither will make House predecessors won a second any difference so long as the presiterm. And Ronald Reagan was the dent and the Democratic Congress only one who began with a clear, agree on a program, get it done and specific economic plan and got it make it work. through Congress. Part of that effort is the sales job Clinton had said as. a candidate launched with his national Clinton that his proposals to stimulate the call-i- n town meeting, televised economy, create jobs and promote investment for growth would be from suburban Detroit. He promised fair, shared sacrifice, a pledge ready on Day One of his presidency, on congressional desks the symbolized by his emphasis on morning after the inauguration to raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans while cutting payrolls open an explosive 100 days of acand perks in the government. tion. That way, even with taxes that But campaign promises do not Now he must say how. It is a vital keynote to his presi- affect middle America, like an energy tax, the administration can point to sharper increases at the top. There also may be some fine print involved. Clinton vowed as a candidate that he wouldn't raise middle-clas- s taxes to pay for new programs he wants, but he never said never. And it is going to take more than upper income or corporate tax increases to start cutting budget deficits. Clinton started toning the message a week in advance. When a woman questioner at his TV town meeting worried that he might renege on his pledge against wm taxes, he con- ' didn't pass, and probably came too raising middle-clas- s firmed her suspicion. "I wish I late to help him politically. He could tell you that I won't ask you never dispelled the Democratic to pay any more," he said. charge that he had no real domestic On the deficit, too, Clinton had agenda. to temper his campaign pledge of a By contrast, Reagan sought and 50 percent cut within four years. got the giant tax cut he'd promised But targets and numbers will count in the 1980 campaign, won sharp, less than progress, and Clinton will if temporary, cuts in domestic earn credit for that with any signifbudgets, rode out an early term icant curbs on the budget deficits slump, and rolled to a second term that soared under his predecessors. on a surging economy. A year ago, it was George Bush The last Democratic president, who went before Congress with an Jimmy Carter, never managed to economic revival plan, but his put his stamp on an economic promodest package of tax breaks, and gram. He wound up promising an business incentives did nothing to economic revitalization plan in the second term he couldn't w in. spark his campaign. mmen I H oWaVNewtJrtfcis Clinton's HIV ruling is an outrage By RICHARD ESTRADA ' Dallas Morning News The United States faces many problems today, but is a shortage I tf AIDS victims really one of them? "That's exactly what the Clinton White Hfuse was saying when it recently directed the Department of flealth and Human Services to whittle down to one the number of diseases that traditionally have oeen ciieu as a- reason Cior exciuu- J 1 I ing immigrants. Only tuberculosis remains on the list. -- ;: But here's the kicker: President .Clinton has made his decision not .' because those diseases formerly on , .the list are no longer a public . ,- - . health menace, but because he feels obligated to accommodate the AIDS and homosexual lobby of the .Democratic Party, which holds the ban on immigrants to HIV-positi- ve be, "discriminatory." - ' tn otner words, sexually transmitted diseases such as syphillis J nau .10 De aroppea rrom me exciua-J -' able list specifically so that the im- -' 'migration ban on HIV could be '"logically" justified. A hunger strike by 274 Haitians ; at Guantanamo Naval Base in - Cuba most of them HIV positive also is said to be a factor in the timing of his decision. I l 1 1 1 , ' ; Those doctors who calmly as-'su- re the American people that immigrants "pose no threat" base their view on the ar- -: gument that these diseases are not airborne communicable, which is evidently true, and on the assumpimmition that no grant will ever lie to a sexual part HIV-positi- HIV-positiv- e ner or commit rape or otherwise expose another human being to his or her infectious medical condition which may or may not be true. Mercifully, medical experts at the American Medical Association oppose changing the policy. What is too seldom noted is that tuberculosis is curable while AIDS isn't. So, where's the logic in banning TB but not the AIDS virus? One more thing: Even though the "scientific medical community" knows full well whose services will be in demand as the numbers of AIDS patients increases in the United States, they ignore the question of who actually will pay when immigrants den cases of AIDS velop and turn to publicly funded medical assistance. And herein lies a key question: Is it not logical to assume that individuals many will seek to immigrate to the United States for the overriding purpose of receiving publicly funded treatment? Won't citizen AIDS victims be able to rely on fewer resources as the number of imported AIDS cases grows, as it surely will? Why on earth do the politicians and the "medical experts" they cite fail to take this into acHIV-positi- ve full-blow- HIV-positi- ve count? Because for them, the entire world is their oyster. For them, the idea of a sovereign nation wherein the interests of the majority of the citizenry of that nation are to be protected is quaint and outdated. narcissism of speThe cial interest groups and their and political chamis order of the day. So the pions illogical are some of their deci one-wor- ld sions that when citizens rise up to question their costly and dangerous agenda, they instantly are accused of "discrimination and racism," in an attempt to invoke cloture on debate. Sadly, aside from raising the odds of infection simply by increasing the number of HIV carriers in our society, the forget that the world beyond U.S. borders does not pay U.S. taxes, which are in turn used to pay for generous U.S. social services. Leave it to the liberal media to obfuscate rather than clarify the issue. A Feb. 9 New York Times article on the HIV decision irresponsibly focused on the term "visitors" and completely overlooked the fact that exceptions already have been made for those visitors who carry the AIDS virus. The real issue is permanent resettlement to the United States. The Times article also gave awfully short shrift to U.S. Rep. Marge who heroically Roukema, is fighting the administration's irrational decision. libAs a modern eral who has never held a real job in the real world and whose adult livelihood has rested almost entirely on the generosity of the public purse, perhaps nothing else should have been expected from Clinton. Still, there are millions of Americans who took him at his word when he used words like "moderate" and "centrist" in the 1992 campaign, and he has let them down. OOT? WELL, GET HUA A CHANCE ID CURE HM VET I HE CHECKED one-world-- M. Mi ft li , Ol M. s a A 1 M Jm m a M iil I I k Kr .i. ..f & it, m 9 w. w w t. u. ',... v m BACK IN MERE.' HAVEN'T HAD VA.. a - I2 & t 7 J., special-intere- I 9) st Klaus service-pr- oviding Richard Estrada is an associate editorial page editor o f The Dallas Morning News. Service program may have budget problems Dallas Morning News When President Clinton outlines his economic programto Con-- gress, he'll probably include a plug for his national service program. It's an issue Clinton once said "I feel very passionate about" and one that he seldom fails to mention among his principal presidential foals. But it's also an issue that was always destined to be subordinated to the president's No. 1 goal of -' selling uic iuuium ccuiiiiuj in vi'. der. ; : fact, national service has emerged as something of a symbol of the difference between cam-- : paign rhetoric and the reality of In in an of austerity. age ' governing But it's not going to disappear. '' "This has been something that's. ' " been close to Bill Clinton for a jdng, long time," said Eli Segal, w ho has been assigned to turn the concept into reality. In his campaign. Clinton set hich coals for national service. " "I want to establish a system of national service for all voluntary Americans, nc xio uv 1991 speeches setting forth three ' his basic goals. "In a Clinton ad- ' :.n u0!1 nut fnrth. Hrv- . muimiiiiiuii, v pu .v.. ' mestic GI bill that will say ... we ' want you to go to college, we'll to pay for it ... but you've got give 21 kUIIlCUlllI vJ J return." ' aid college That idea of getting : t j in return ior national seiviuc uicw an especially warm response trom younger audiences. Clinton also talked of using it to replace the loan programs tnai now ncip inimuii . ' students. ' 'But national "The highest number of Peace Corps (volunteers) in any one year was 16,000," he said. "Any numover existing programs. that Bill Clinton is talking bers rein came a Another estimate will start at a higher number about the Commission month last by port than the Peace Corps. ' ' on National and Community ServWhile he doesn't expect the new ice, a federal agency created in and 1990 to encourage support program to displace the college community-servic- e programs loan program, he expects to maintain the link with education that around the country. in his campaign. Noting that some local programs Clinton outlined are "We unassuming there will be estimated it costs $20,000 to sort of some esbenefit, it a derwrite single participant, timated that a national program whether the kid does it ahead of with 100,000 participants could be time, before college, and gets the equivalent of a scholarship to go to started for less than $2 billion. But even that seems like a lot in college or does something afterward and then gets released from the current budgetary environment. And Segal, a businessman his or her loan obligation," he said. and longtime friend of Clinton's, accommodated have Ironically, Segal occupies a corappears to ner of the Old Executive Office himself to the reality he faces. r, "We have to deal with the fact Building used by Gregg the who ran of "Points that there will be cost attached to this, and the budget office doesn't Light" program that George Bush used to recognize local voluntary necessarily recognize any cost savservice programs. this anecdotal which are to ings, But Bush viewed service as an point more than anything else," he individual's said. "This will not be a major obligation of citizenbe to undertaken without any in the least at ship, beginprogram, reward. tangible ning." Clinton sees a more direct traBut having started four small in which young Americans deoff with businesses, he is comfortable can the college get something concrete that. Before program in return for performing useto "we've he said, got prove aid grow, ful services in their community. it can work." Will Marshall, president of the Despite recent emphasis on its both Segal and Marshall rea Institute and limits, Progressive Policy convinced main of the president's servnational of advocate longtime commitment. apice, agreed with the Clinton "is determined to bring proach. a serious test to see what is about "We're creating something best the we need and test to from scratch, approach to voluntary national service," Marshall said. the capacity of communities to abSegal said he remains "cautsorb and put to work large numbers of volunteers," he said. "We iously optimistic." "The reason that I agreed to do th drawing power need o this was because it was so imporamong students." Segal also noted that the impact tant to him," he said. "I think that of the Peace Corps John F. Ken- the country is ready for this." nedy's 1960s precursor of Clinwent far ton's service concept bevond its numbers. mated that a program with 800,000 participants would cost $5 billion By CARL P. LEUBSDORF ' A19 service is expe- nsive. A 1988 study by the Democratic Leadership Council, of which Clinton later was chairman, esti post-servi- ce mm Peters-meye- go-slo- w OMR SUPPLIES: YOUR GIFT FROM DRAKKARNOIR Now, Drakkar Noir has a gift for you: Power Supplies. This collection of Drakkar Noir 1 Kau de Toilette, 1.25 oz. fragrance and grooming essentials includes oz. rich-latheri- Shave Foam, 1 oz. soothing Your gift alcohol-fre- e After Shave Balm, and 1 oz. Deodorant Stick. with any Drakkar Noir purchase of 29.50 or more. Fragrances !Z3 CM I |