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Show Trm ftjf jfKyn DESERET NEWS, SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH WEEKEND Of NOVEMBER 3, 1973 fa 4- - cj We stand for the Constitution of the United States with its three departments of government, each fully independent in its own field. Rationing: Another reason to back mass transit Unless a relentless chain of events is reversed, gasoline rationing across the nation appears imminent. That prospect has some immediate repercussions for Utah, which is currently assessing the K ftf o1ayp vIV va Miuik utwu v macc mu hanRit climb in gasoline prices is forcing commuters to take another look at bus service. If the commuting public finds buses clean, fast, on time, convenient, and reasonably priced, the transit service Should giVw rapidly. Ui'w'au i; aoALWu Front. Voters in several Weber and Davis County communities wid cast ballots next week for or against annexation Utah Transit Authority. With projected extension cf routes and improvement of service, Wasatch Front counties shculd be in good shape to keep up with demand, provided planned improvements are earned out expeditiously. Certainly the area must not be caught unprepared if gas rationing suddenly increases the number of persons looking for a convenient way to work. to the Gas rationing isnt the only reason for pressing for mass transit, of course. But it is one more powerful argument. If, or when, gas rationing comes, mass transit will assume growing importance directly related to severity of the rationing. For that reason, its only prudent that transit officials begin thinking seriously All this argues strongly for a favorable vote Tuesday toward annexation into the Utah Transit Authority system. Even without rationing, the arguments are solid for retammg and improving a mass transit system. not only about extending UTA to new communities, but also about improving bus service where its already being provided. The handwriting or. the wall seems clear. Distribution of petroleum fuels came under government regulation this week for the first time since World War II. Shortages of aircraft fuel are forcing termination of more than 160 daily flights across the U.S. Gasoline prices are going up one to three cents a gallon Congress and the administration are actively considering a standby system of direct rationing to the consumer. Utah also is making preparations. Governor Rampton this week named a state fuel coordinating officer, and made provision for office space for a federal officer on fuels. Even without rationing, Gas rationing Mass transit provides a valuable service for the very young and the very old, who must depend on buses for most of their transportation. just around Buses also are important in combating the twin problems of congestion and pollution. One bus, for example, can do the work of up to 50 passenger cars with only a fraction of the congestion, pollution, and gas consumption. One study shows that buses get to the gallon, while cars get only 32. the corner? vote Tuesday for the mass transit system is a vote for developing public transportation along logical lines to meet the challenges of the 70s. A the steady A worthwhile delay property appraisal, , As a result of that death, the Deseret News urged the states elementary By streamlining procedures, the county can condense its land acquisition procedure from the present one to two years to a matter of weeks. At the present rate of land inflation, that improvement translates into thousands of dollars that can be saved through greater efficiency. schools to install some safer material than asphalt to help cushion the falls. Response of Salt Lake area schools has been gratifying. Many schools have either installed or are testing such materials as rubberized asphalt, outdoor carpet, rubber foam carpet, sand, and rubber matting. long-wearin- g, Sound like a tall order? Perhaps. But necessity is still the mother of invention, and certainly the need is there. The trend is ir. the right direction. But there are still too many Utah elementary schools with asphalted playgrounds and dangetous playground equipment. Surely one death is enough to spur any school district ini action before the same fate occurs to another school child. Painted into a corner The congressman Defense Department official appeared before a House subcommittee recently to ask for some budget transfers, secreincluding $3,000 to paint the defense tarys office. A committee member from Georgia said he had visited that office recently -and it didnt much need by mistake painting. The Defense Department guy said there was some chipped paint that the opportunity perhaps you did not have or chance to see. A Chairman , Senate interior Committee departments. these is completely satisall a great improvement are factory, they over hard asphalt. So the field is still open for some inventive genius to come up with a material that is resilient, in price, can reasonable adequately protect against falls, cant be dragged away or vandalized, and is clean and safe. An editorial from The Cleveland Plain Dealer Henry M. Jackson Certainly in land buying, the knowledge of these individuals is far superior to that of only one or two individuals or While none of Granite District's Willard Davidson ponders playground safety problem. pated a week ago." any problems that may arise. Make playgrounds safer This fall a boy suffered fall a from playin fatal head injuries an elementary school in ground bars at District. Granite said well, he wasnt there on a paint inspection job. He sent a staff member out for additional information, which was that the job could be done for $885. So the subcommittee said harrumph, and how did the Defense Department ever come up with an estimate tf $3,000? The Departments representative checked again and agreed that he had been wrong. The actual estimate was $3,957. Surely we can draw from this a lesson about defense expenditures. New hope for Middle East settlement By Norman Cousins L. A. Times Syndicate There are good reasons for Prcsdent Nixon s confidence in the prospects for peace in the Middle East. It would be undiplomatic tor him to elaborate, but the reasons are nonetheless significant. The President believes that Egypt and Syna, at long last, have given up the illusory and dangerous notion that Israel can be eliminated as a soverign state. For more than Arab leada quarter-centurers have been seized by the idea that if only they could combine their military strengths, they could throw Israel into the sea. The war of 17 served only to intensify this six-da- y conviction. The humiliaUon of that defeat convinced the Arab leaders that-thecould make their military superiority count if they could keep their anUaircraft defenses operaUonal and if they could open up their tacUcs in tank warfare. They also determined to give their tank personnel better training. All these resolutions were in t evidence m the Arab surprise attack of early October. The strategy almost worked. If the attack didnt take the Isralis completely by surprise, it at least succeeded in throwing Israel onto the defensive. For the first 36 hours of the war, Egypt and Syna genuinely thought they were on the way toward overwhelming victory. What they didnt realize was that their initial success also earned with it the potentialities of ditwo-fron- saster. The strategy of the Israelis, it is apparent in retrospect, was to lure Egyuan tanks in large numbers into the Sinai Peninsula, only retaining enough foree to keep tnem ena but undertaking gaged, bypassing action that would give them a military position on the west bank. This strategy had two objectives. First, to cut off the supply line for the Egyptian forces on the east bank; second, to mount a against Cairo direct threat itself. This strategy came close to producing sir even greater military victory for the Israeli" than they scored in 1967. Having routed the Syrians on the cast, the Israelis isolated the main Egyptian tank force in the Sinai Peninsula and prepared themselves for a direct attack on Egypt. When the U.N. call came for a cease-fir- therefore, the Is- raelis were hardly enthusiastic about stopping the war at that point. But the United States, on which the Israelis were mainly dependent for military equipment, used its full weight to press f r cessation. The United States was able to persuade the Israelis that they were now in a position to achieve their basic aim full recognition of the respect for their existence as a sovereign and independent nation by the Arab states. As the price for its withdrawal from Syria and Egypt, the Israelis could demand full recognition. Chile starts cleanup Given these circumstances, President Nixon is confident that the chances for a structured and lasting peace in the Middle East are better than at any time since the creation of Israel. He feels that the separate rcles of the Middle East are finally m proper relationship and balance. And he is confident that Arab recognition of Israel, for long the precondition peace, is now more than merely likely. The resourceful and effective initiatives of the United States In the current Middle East crisis have been ob scured by the political crisis over the Watergate investigation. But the historical reality is that recent U.S. foreign policy has had a constructive consistency which has improved the potentialities for world peace. Some may say that the credit belongs not to Richard Nixon but to Henry Kissinger In the Watergate scandals, the point was made that Richard Nixon had to take responsibility for the actions of his subordinates. That point is correct. In ail fairness, the same principle should hold in the field of foreign policy. cf Marxist mess By John Parker Copley News Service Chiles next battle wont be SANTIAGO, Chile fought with guns. It will be waged silently with computers and the pencils of half a dozen economic advisors. Their task will be to reconstruct a country, operating, functioning and solvent, out ot total financial and economic chaos tne Marxists produced. Figures dont mean much when quoted against a b3e of unrealistic foreign exchange rates, and in a small country such as Chile, even the astronomic amounts involved wouldnt mean much to anybody living in one of the worlds economic giants such as the United States. burden there was to have been met, as usual, by printing more money. The main task of the economic team today is, first, to produce a quick growth factor m private and nationalized industry, in agriculture and most of all, in mining. When Allende was toppled Sept. 11, the copper mines were producing less than three years ago. The first move was to set a realistic foreign exchange rate and abolish the existing multiple, politically inspired rates. Thus there is now only one commercial rate for import-expotrade, 280 escudos to the dollar. It was raised from the former 25 escudos, at which nobody could export with profit, and therefore didnt. But simple facts have meaning. For instance, the decline and general decay in food production In this country mean that the entire income from a depleted copper industry, the economic backbone of the economy, will have to be spent on food imports. Thats about $730 million. In 1970, when the Marxists came, food from abroad was cost- This will inevitably bring price increases, for there is hardly a product in Chile not affected by the cost of imports, d ing about $170 million. While She Marxists were quietly negotiating in Europe to sell the countrys gold reserves to the highest bidder, and while the late President Salvador Allende was, as has now been discovered, working himself a percentage deal on government purchases, the almost 500 industries and banks the Marxists took over In their 33 months in power were losing money to an extent almost equal to the entire national budget As inflation soared wages were Increased by the same percentage. In Octoocr all workers would have received a pay boost of almost 400 percent. Since the government was the greatest employer, the rt g g A fairly wide pnee freedom policy has been established, with control only over monopoly items which are, in fact, very few. There are signs of public confidence in the program of the economists. Ir, the stock market, for instance, indus trial shares which haven't been worth the paper they are printed on. are fast recovering their true vplue. The black market dollar, which stood at 3,200 escudos early in September, when the official rate was 25 escudos, has dis- and the only channel for appeared completely, noncommercial, touast private transactions is the dollar, at 850 escudos. Also, there is honesty There are no more cases like that of a departed Marxist chief, who made a quiet $4 million out of nationally assemble black-marketin- automobiles I I I I I j ; j i i jU-J- A. A. crisis is much worse than all of us antici- or to ignore expert county advice. The new guidelines, adopted in the form of an ordinance by the county commission, involve pertinent county officials in land transactions early in the dealings. Thus the expertise of the commissioners, county attorney, auditor, finance department and land negotiators is tapped for Tiie other day Salt Lake County purchased a parcel of land for a county park 18.6 acres for some $25,000 more than it would have cost if the original deal had been consummated some two months ago. Much of the reason the deal fell through was because of claims and counter-claim- s on whether or not too was much money being paid for the land. On its face, that sounds like a wasteful loss for the county. But out of the whole questioning of methods of land purchasing has come a new set of guidelines which may well save the county many times over what it has lost on this one transaction. As this page noted last September regarding county purchases, it is ridiculous for government officials to negotiate land acquisitions without even obtaining a "The fuel i |