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Show yif The Public Forum Tribune Headers Opinions activists and Another Carter? economic constituencies Nixon-For- The taught fish flapping on the deck is a simile that occurred to me after I read your editorial "Turn About of Defense Spending Could Polish Reagan Image (Sept. 1). Your comment that sizable reductions in military spending will be a sensible adjustment to reality attributes to your editorial a feature common with all historical accounts of presidential economic thought in economic crises of the past two decades in America. These accounts picture administrations and presidents shifting policy almost randomly from one expedient to the next as some situation changed or some nostrum worked too slowly. In successive efforts to placate and to keep placated, as many as possible of the various 1 Forum Ktilo Public Forum letters must be submitted exclusively to The Tribune and bear writers full name, signature and address. Names must be printed on political letters but may be withheld for good reasons on others. Writers are limited to one letter every 10 days. Preference will be given to short, typewritten (double spaced) letters permitting use of the writer's true name. All letters are subject to condensation. Mail to the Public Forum, The Salt Lake Tribune, Box 867, Salt Lake City, Ctah. 84110. economic constituencies, and without any clearly formulated economic line of its own, the Carter administration eventually lost all credibility. The question now arises of how much we can expect of a Reagan administration on the credibility front? The center of gravity of the administration position among various political-ecconstituencies has obviously shifted to the political right but what of its its Brownian movement, so to variability over time of the various constituenspeak cies. The administration has virtually jettisoned two and pro-labOther constituencies might have remained in place. Can President Reagan keep the peace among different constituencies on compromise terms, which, whether we like them or not, economic actors can take as essentially given in framing pricing, bargaining, investment, employment, and output decisions over the Reagan presidential term? Or will Ronald Reagan go down in economic history as a more conservative but equally unreliable version of Jimmy Carter? Squabbling has already broken out disguised as purely political friction over political loaves and fishes between long-teronomic pro-refor- I '? :'1 m fe I i v 1 j : J $Jl & pro-Reag- The Way If Was Here are the briefs of The Salt Lake Tribune from 100, 50 and 25 years ago: Sept. 10, 1881 The first week of the new school year of the Salt Lake Collegiate Institute has passed and the prospect is that - this fine institution of learning will have a more prosperous and pleasant year than ever before. The school is doing great service in connection with others here, in affording a medium of instruction to the youth of the city, which it is impossible they could receive in the way provided by the public want of system. There is no public school system, and we welcome the sectarian schools, as filling the great educational want here. Sept. 10, 1931 One convict was killed, two others were wounded with buckshot and two prison guards were beaten into unconsciousness in a brief but spectacular uprising in the Utah State Penitentiary early Wednesday morning. As an aftermath of the attempted breaH, two of the ringleaders in the riot, who are serving life terms for murder, may face a firing squad. Sept. 10, 1956 Eligible citizens who dont cast a ballot in Tuesdays primary election are not pulling their weight in the never ending struggle to preserve democracy. The hundreds of polling places around the state, tailorcJ to fit the needs of the modern 7 a.m. working family, will be open 12 hours to 7 p.m. In some areas, civic organizations will provide transportation to and from the polls for persons otherwise unable to make the trip. it is Each year and each election-timbecoming harder and harder to be an inactive member of democracy, but regardless of the efforts and pleas from officials of all political parties, a substantial number of voters will choose to stay at home, hoping that their neighbors will see fit to vote as they might have. e, John Berbers holdovers. Of the d (2) (1 anti interest rates. (3) anti-tax- ; the holdovers dominate (1) the activists. (2) within. (3) the more willing to press for tax cuts without expenditure reductions under the twin banners of the three-yea- r Kemp Roth income tax slashing program and of the Laffer curve. e conGiven consensus on cessions to the constituency, we cannot expect any more than two of the constituencies (1, 2, 3) to be satisfied simultaneously, short of a more drastic, immediate or thorough going attack on other constituencies, and pro-- . namely, reform via sharply reduced funding for their programs and enforcement of their legislation. Such gutting seems unlikely to meet with either public or congressional approval: in short it would be bad politics. Compromises, of course, are always possible. But the infinite variety of compromises remains the problem. To what extent and how in frequently will the terms be revised response to movements in price, employment, productivity, GNP, or the politicasl polls? What I personally expect in the Reagan administration, as indeed in any other, is a series of pragmatic, expedient and mutually inconsistent compromises between and among the various pressure groups pulling and hauling this way and that. If I have to summarize my current guess as to what one might expect of President Reagan, it will be a "Jimmy Carter of the Right. (high-nomina- l) higher-expenditur- pro-lab- AMARESH DAS Department of Economics University of Utah Should Fight The air traffic controllers have received minimal support from the general public. I find this disconcerting, if not downright alarming. In a nation as industrialized as ours, and given the intricacies of our complex labor network, it would be disastrous to the everyday working person for our unions to be weakened in any respect. The people are playing right into Mr. Reagans hands. Judging from the presidents stance on the PATCO issue it would be safe to say that he is out to bust the union system (or change them drastically at the very least). I am convinced Reagans choice to use PATCO as a precedent-settin- g example was deliberate and not happenstance. Reagan is aware that PATCO is one of the more elite unions and that support for their action would come slower than if the striking union was one more familiar to workaday society. Reagan's true reasons for reacting to PATCO in the manner in which he has are quite t liferent from the reasons he has given us. His anger ostensibly stems from the "illegality of public workers to strike. This, however, is not the case. In order for Mr. Reagan to fulfill his fleeting dream of corralling inflation in short order, he must first be able to gain a direct handle on controlling wages on the labor scene. In return for their support, candidate Reagan made some hefty promises to the air controllers last fall ; some of those promises are one and the same with concessions PATCO is asking for. If the White House treats a union that was openly allied and committed to him early on so harshly, you can imagine how other unions, ones that never endorsed the Reagan platform, might be treated by the administration in the future. If Mr. Reagan is allowed to establish this precedent-witthe PATCO situation, it will set the stage for more repression in the organized labor movement. Labor unions have had their excesses, but what they have achieved historically for the everyday man (and woman) far outweighs the bad points. Another pathetic reality is that the affiliated unions across the nation have offered PATCO little if any support. Unions like the International Machinists and Aerospace Workers, who could literally shut down all air traffic, have abstained from any strong commitment to PATCO. They are encumbered by restrictive laws prohibiting support of any illegal strike. In an era when more and more jobs are considered public in nature, the day is not so far off when the majority of American workers will be prohibited to strike. Perhaps the American union system could learn a lesson from their laboring counterparts in Poland. Indeed, if the labor movement in Poland had not defied government there, they would not be at the point they are at today in their labor history. If PATCO and their affiliated unions choose to fight, the battle will no doubt be a long and hard one; you can bet your bottom dollar that the Reagan administration will fight them tooth and nail to the end. Without a fight, however, surrender will follow shortly, with defeat the final reality. American Solidarity is the key. BERNARD J. SARKISSIAN Power Shifting to State Capitals New York Times Service i FRANKFORT, Ky. This cozy state capital in the limestone hills of northern Kentucky is providing an early indication of the kind of change that may take place in government and polities when federal authority is returned to the states under the new federalism policies of President Reagan. A r trial run in which Kentucky tixik over an urban grant program has shown that the shift of authority from Washington is likely to add a nev dimension to state government and politics, according to the authorities here. In the allocation of the money, public attention has shifted from the Washington bureaucracy to the governors office, they say, and this is likely to lie an issue in future political campaigns. The trial run also indicated that the states must hire more people to administer the federal programs and that the shift is not likely to put an end to the red tape and bureaucratic practices that have damaged many federal programs. It is still an open question whether the states can administer the programs without fraud and abuse. one-yea- Along with Wisconsin, Kentucky got a head start in the new federalism, which begins next month when grant programs are to be delegated to the states. The program that was shifted here contains development block grants for cities and counties of under 50,000 population. It is one of those cash programs that Kentucky, a state of small, deteriorating communities that are trying to rehabilitate themselves, loves best And now that state control is assured by law, excitement and enthusiasm are sweeping through the corridors of the government buildings here. "Ixx-a- l officials are having to find where Frankfort is on the map and how to get here. said Andrew Martin, commissioner of the Department of Community and Regional Development. "In the past all they had to know was how to find the closest airport that could get them to Washington." So far. the department has been aide to insulate the program from Kentuckys customarily raw patronage politics. But those familiar with the shift in authority agree that it IHirten.ds some significant changes for the state When the takeover is complete, grants will no longer be announced from Washington by members of Congress, a practice that has been jealously guarded by senators and representatives as a way of demonstrating their influence in behalf of constituents, whether or not they had any influence on the grants. The announcements will be made from by the governor or his assistants. And because communities have to compete for the grants, the governor can be held responsible by both the winners and losers. Administration of the program is likely to be an issue in the future gubernatorial campaigns, according to officials here. Frankfort "This is a very important change for said Martin, whose department Kentucky, New York Times Service At the start of a. new academic year, the public schools continue to face fewer pupils and fewer dollars, and a carping public. Criticism of the schools is Is there any- hope for the public rampant. schools? has become a standard question. The answer, to judge from emerging trends, is a qualified yes. The schools are doing better but they are getting less support today because of yesterdays poor performance. Public perceptions usually lag behind reality. Although public school enrollment is about e live million below its high 10 years ago, a system with about 40 million pupils hardly looks like an enterprise nearing extinction. Much has been made of the flight from the public schools and the growth of nonpublic education, but those observations are misleading. Almost 90 percent of the school-ag- e IMipulation continues to attend public schools. The Roman Catholic school system, the second-larges- t sector, has experienced an enrollment decline comparable to that of the public schools: it stands at 3.1 million, down from 4.3 million a decade ago. but its enrollment is stabilizing. Other religious schools show similar trends, of stable or slightly increased enrollments. Hie independent schools, constitutioning a sector usually without religious alfiliations except, sometimes, those of origin, are stabl ;. They do not seek to grow and have held steady at a total of alxmt 320. 000. all-tim- high-prestig- e This leaves only the Christian or fundamento as fast- growing or mushrooming institutions riding the crest of the religiously fundamentalist and politically conservative wave. Yet these schools, which are reported to be opening at a rate of three a day. are small, averaging only 60 students. Their growth is estimated by the National Center of Educational Statistics to have amounted to only a total of 120.000 pupils over the past two years, and they seem to be somewhat ephemeral, with experts forecasting of the newly estabd that only about lished ones will survive. one-thir- Such figures mean that without a dramatic for example, the possible political change impact of tuition tax credits for nonpublic school enrollments the future of elementary and secondary education in America remains inextricably linked with the future of the public schools. There is growing evidence that the public schools, though not, perhaps, better than ever, are better than many people think and considerably better than they were a decade ago. Critics who still ask regularly why Johnny can't read, write or figure not only betray their ye irs by apparently ignoring .Johnny's sister but ignore as well the improvements in both climate and achievement that have taken place in the past two years, j Heading scores have improving, even in Ix-e- r Gov John Y. Brown, who made millions as a promoter of Kentucky fried chicken and now contends that Kentucky is "the state that's run like a business." was eager to take on the responsibility. In the Carter administration, the Depart ment of Housing and Urban Development decided to run some experiments on state administration of block grants for smaM communities. Brown, a Democrat, called on Carter at the White House to ask that Kentucky tx allowed to run demonstration projects in taking over administration of the program Kentucky and Wisconsin were selected from a number of applicants The development attracted little attention at tiie time because the idea of the federal government's surrendering the program to the states while continuing to finance it seemed ixilitically unrealistic. Congress did so earlier this summer, however, in the course of consolidating a variety of health, education, urban and other programs under broad grants to he administered by the states. Kentucky and Wisconsin, with a years experience in administering the small communities program, suddenly became the focus of attention by other states. Under the small communities program, states can take it over if they wish, and the Council of State Community Affairs Agency in Washington expects about 40 states to do so by next month. (Copyright) ( Hard times at the Pentagon, Part One: Taking up a collection to luy another cannonball. h talist schools, usually referred began administering tile program for the fiscal year that Itegan in Octolx-- 1980. I Jack W. Gcrnumd, Jules Witcover 4 j Mad Bomber - Scrooge Tag Is No Joke Chicago Tribune WASHINGTON During the presidential campaign a year ago Ronald Reagan used to joke about his reputation as a combination of Ebenezer Scrooge and the Mad Bomber. The candidates political advisers never thought that was terribly funny. But they did recognize it was a deft way of dealing frontally with a very genuine concern. As it turned out, those fears about Reagan that he might be insensitive to the plight of the poor at home and blusteringly aggressive were never totally dissolved in the abroad electorate. For example, the survey made of voters leaving the polling places on Election Day by ABC News continued to show that about d believed Reagan "might get us into war as president. one-thir- That kind of concern is politically pertinent right now because President Reagan is facing over the next few weeks just the kind of decisions that will determine whether that perception of him continues to thrive. And that, in turn, can have a significant effect on his own fortunes and those of the Republican Party over the next three years. Indeed, the juxtaposition of issues confronting the president right now seems to offer an unusually clear opportunity for gauging his priorities and inclinations. On the one hand, he must decide just how far to go in limiting his increase in defense spending; on the other, he must evolve some rational position in financing the Social Security system. By the estimate of most political professionals, there is no issue as sensitive for Ronald Reagan as Social Security. One reason, of course, is that he is a prisoner of his own history on the question. Although candidate Reagan managed to muddy that history during the. 1981) campaign, it is true that as far back as 1964 he, like Barry Goldwater, was musing aloud about making To the Social Security system "voluntary. those who rely on benefits or plan to do so. that sounds very threatening indeed. In 1976, running against Gerald Ford for the Republican presidential nomination, Reagan was incautious enough to advance a plan for returning enough social service functions to the states to raise questions about how Social Security would fare under his stewardship. That probably cost him the New Hampshire primary he lost by a whisker because the state has a substantial population of the elderly. And it surely contributed to the scope of tiie defeat he suffered in Florida shortly thereafter. Although he managed to deal with those fears effectively last year, both in the Florida primary and the general election, they were quickly revived last spring when the White House advanced a plan under which, among other things, the benefits for those retiring early would be sharply reduced and the minimum benefit abandoned altogether. The political fallout was immediate and obvious. In polling in at least two special elections for Congress, political professionals found Reagan had opened a can of worms. And the flustered offered by the explanation that these proposals were more Republicans the product of staff than of the President tion involving 450.000 students from 26 counwas never very convincing. Thats himself tries. what they always say when a president gets The United States, which entered the competinto a jam. ition in 1974, had become in 1977 the first Now. largely because of this history. Reagan Western team to take first place over the is in a position in which his decisions on Social traditional winners, the Soviet Union and Security are likely to be weighed against those Hungary. on such things as the MX missile, and tint Skeptics are justified in saying that one , inevitably will be awkward. victory does not make an educational millenIn fact, of course, there isnt any real nium, and only uncritical boosters of the public connection between the financing of the schools would claim that a winning American retirement system and weapons. Barring some mathematics team obscures the serious deradical change in philosophy to provide ficiencies that still plague many schools. financing of Social Security from general revenues, dollars saved on missiles cannot he What is worth noting, however, is the trend of to a trust fund program. applied to automaabandon schools across the country That, however, is not a distinction that many tic promotion from grade to grade. There is a of the voters are likely to understand or new emphasis on finding ways to insure many of Reagan's critics among the Demomastery of a specific skill before moving on to crats likely to emphasize. In politics, what the next more advanced one. After an era of matters is most often how things look rather stress on students rights, the need for an than how things are. orderly school atmosphere is again generally acknowledged. None of this suggests, of course, that the President should make these decisions solely of another year, The schools, at the start on the basis of their political content. Both seem to deserve more credit than they often issues are serious and complex. But it also get. The continuing popular perception of the would be naive in the extreme to suggest that public schools as a failed institution may polities is not a factor in any major presidential constitute a political threat. Withdrawal of decision. be school the when may public supixirt, just And in this ease Ronald Reagan cannot turning the corner toward better quality, could or that reputation as ignore his own history wipe out recent gains and turn fears of the a combination of Ebenezer Scrooge and the system's ultimate failure into a Mad Bomber." prophecy. i (Copyright (Copyright Troubled American Schools Show More Improvement YORK j r I Frt(l M. Htrhinger NEW f" the big cities where they had sunk lowest. The National Association of Elementary School Principlals reports that, contrary to public perception, children in the early grades are reading better than a decade ago, with substantial gains by disadvantaged youngsters. Scott Thomson, executive secretary of the National Association of Secondary School Principlals, says: A renewed emphasis on writing has improved important communications skills among high school seniors. The class of 1981 is far more computer literate than were any of its predecessors. Also, more girls are graduating with three or four years of science and math than in earlier classes." A report published two months ago by the General Accounting Office in Washington, shows that the efforts put into Project Head Start for disadvantaged preschool children have begun to pay off in improved achievements and attitudes. A program known as Cities in the Schools, initiated in 1974 with the aim of involving public and private youth service agencies, as well as corporations, in the problems of public education, is now operating in Atlanta, Houston, Indianapolis. New York, Oakland, Calif., and Washington. Although the public still perceives the public schools as the staging area for mathematical illiteracy, an American team of eight public high school students won the 1981 International Mathematical Olympiad, a two-da.competi- v |