| Show Tte Salt Lake Tribume COMMENTARY House Secrecy Vote Panders to THI WASTENGTON POST -- WASHLNG'rON — The House of Representatives last week took a small step that will likely lead to several very big changes in the character of the American la The only people who government seemed to understand what it means were the members of the Congressional Black Caucus Most of them voted no when the House decided to make public the names of members as they sign petitions to force immediate floor votes on pending bills By doing so the House greatly increased the likelihood that the Constitution will be amended t) require a balanced budget to enhance presidential control over spending decisions and to limit the tenure of its own members — three major conservative goals The 394-4- 0 vote for the change in a procedure that had gone unchallenged for generations was a testament to the shifting locus of political power in this nation A measure that was :argely ignored in the "establishment press" was hosts and adopted by the radio by their favorite ally Ross Perot and bulled through to passage in remarkably talk-sho- Hosts Jeopardizes Black Reps TA-Sho- w hod time It wu late in May just four months until ago when Rep Jim Inhofe vow a rather unpublicized junior member of the minority party began a move against what he calls the "dictatorial" control of the House agenda by its Democratic leaden Inhofe like other Republicans and somc conservative Democrats objected to the way the speaker of the House and some key committee chairmen used their authority to delay or prevent floor votes on measures they opposed The issue is an old one and the House long ago provided a safety valve against arbitrary interference with the wishes of ifs members It allows a majority of the Horse — 218 people — to obtain a floor vote on any measure by signing a "discharge petition" removing the bill from the jurisdiction of the committee considering it and bringing it up for a floor vote Discharge petitions are rarely used — and even more rarely succeed In the 58 years the current procedure has been in effect only 31 discharge petitions have received the needed 218 signatures And only two of those produced bills that became law w David Broder (ir:) 1-- - t non-signe- rs 0 That is what he did in August and then be turned the hosts loose on the laggards quickly building the pressure that produced last week's overwhelming 10-- 1 margin in the House A few members of the House tried to argue that something of value was being but they were ignored or away swept Rep Jim Oberstar complained that the move would "give the agenda of thc House over to the hosts and computerized mass mailing companies that serve the lobbies downtown" But in the end the tide was so strong that Oberstar voted with Inhofe It was left mainly to academic political scientists in a committee hearing that had none of the public impact of the talk shows to make the case that the orchestrated public pressure that now will focus on those who balk at signing discharge petitions can have dangerous effects talk-sho- One reason for the rarity of success was the secrecy surrounding the petition signers Until the 218th signature was achieved the names of the signers were kept secret from the public Thus there was no effective way for pressure to be brought on those who balked at signing It was this secrecy which Inhofe and his allies convinced the hosts was wrong Congress is a favorite target of the radio commandos and Inhofe had little trouble persuading them that it was rank hypocrisy for members to pretend they supported such measures as the balanced-budget amendment the line-iteveto and term limits while refusing to sign discharge petitions that would bring them to a vote Inhofe filed a bill to end the secrecy talk-sho- w m talk-sho- The 14 L : ‘ i7: -- 0 '1 1 ql 6 lio 0 1fil 440 -7- i lie t -I) Reform (i II! 1 mil (0 ''' C t' '11 °et"--61"- 1 1114'4 II:Atil t4 -- ' tAr rw- rnci: 4' k Ote C -1 5 : '') 1 si la) ip It - - 11 - ) '4''' n ---- : rOST- - el 4 14c-011 'Violent America Must End Its Gun Lwany CHICAGO TRIBUNE SERVICE CHICAGO — - : the foreign tourist murders in Florida They are an infinitesimal part of the senseless homicides in America every year It wasn't President Clinton's calling for gun control as essential to holding health care costs down and reminding us "One of the reasons Amerinn health care is so expensive is that our hospitals and our emergency rooms are full of people who are cut up and shot" - a The cost of patching up the of violence is only a small part of what's driving public fears of crime What hit home and should ' prompt persistent outrage is a fact in a Chicago Tribune article last week about the 51st child un der age 15 to be killed in the Chicago area this year: More children have been shot in the Chicago area since January than all the people of all ages gunned down in England during 1991 What kind of people are we? Why do we tolerate such deadly violence? People in other industrialized countries don't live with such a frightening level of violence Handgun Control Inc says that in 1990 handguns killed 22 people in Great Britain 87 in Ja pan 10 in Australia 68 in Cana da 13 in Sweden — and 10567 in the United States What kind of people are we? Ninety percent of all murderers of young people ages 15 to 24 in the industrialized world live in the United States according to a report just issued by UNICEF the United Nations agency There -are 153 homicides per 100000 young people armunlly in this age group in the Urited States corn vie-tun- - 11 1 11 convince legislators they have more to fear at the polls from outraged and frightened citizens than from and gun lobbyists Legislators don't lack for proposals to enact But members of Congress have let gun lobbyists scare them out of voting for even the relatively mild "- - It wasn't so much Joan Beck c--:- well-connect- well-pai- d A pared with 04 in Japan 07 in France 09 in Britain 19 in Italy and 31 in Canada Homicide is the 10th leading killer of all Americans the second largest cause of death among year-old- s Have we grown so numb so callous that such numbers no longer enrage us or move us to insist on change? What kind of people are we? Dr David Satcher the new head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has made it a point to stress that violence is a leading cause of lost life in this country He told The New York Times "If it's not a public health problem why are all those people dying from it?" So what can we do besides letting our eyes glaze over at the daily news reports of more killings and reminding ourselves not to walk alone after dark to stay away from certain areas not to stop if our car is bumped in traffic to get more locks to fence es in behind our fears? Several things are obvious Because violence in this society is inseparable from guns we will have to t art disarming ourselves Inow-selv- dustrialized countries where people don't kill each other in e numbers have strict gtm laws We need them American-styl- handgun control legislation known as the Brady bill but its supporters are still pushing it e meaA package of sures introduced last week under the sponsorship of Sen Joseph Biden would stiffen penalties for drive-b- y shootings and other violent crimes Several other bills in Congress are intended to prohibit young people from owning assault weapons and penalize people who give children access to guns We need more innovative ideas too For example Sen Daniel has Patrick Moynihan picked up on earlier proposals that it would be quicker and easier to ban — or at least sharply limit access to — bullets than to make an effective dent in the 200 million guns in which America is now awash Moynihan has introduced bills that would levy a 1000 percent tax on ammunition and outlaw some kinds of it completely We can disarm our society We must We can come to see guns as as polluting and violence as unacceptable as drunk driving The alternative is an escalating level of fear and an admission that all the scary ugly headlines in European papers about our murderous nation really are the truth about us anti-crim- D-D- el D-N- Y anti-soci- al k 1 Law : Forum ' Not Their Business Where to Write (Forum Sept 9) that meaningful reform of the 1872 Mining Law is long overdue Outdated as its name suggests (President Grant and the 42nd Congress hoped its enactment would hasten the settlement of the West) the law permits multinational mining companies to reap huge profits from their operations on public lands and leave taxpayers to clean up the mess Several mining reform bills have been introduced this year in Congress however only passage of the Rahall bill (HR 322) will stop the plunder of public lands described by Mr MacAllister For example only the Rahall bill will end the "patenting" process by which mining and real estate interests may now acquire public lands at a fraction of their market value And only the Rahall bill will give federal land managers the discretion to modify or deny proposals to mine on public lands if the economic or environmental costs of the operation are too high KIRK BADDLEY Salt Lake City 4 When submitting letter i to the Public Forum please include your full name signature address and daytime telephone numbers Information other than your name will be kept confidential Preference is given to original letters of 300 words or less that are typewritten and permit publication of the writer's true name (Names may be withheld for good reason) All letters are subject to editing Mail to Public Forum The Salt Lake Tribune double-- spaced PO Box 867 Salt Lake City Utah 84110 OMM Don't Cry for Coyotes Wharton's Tom article (The Salt Lake Tribune Sept 16) de- This experience involved the parking fees being charged to those who must visit this particular office including anyone acting on behalf of a recipient I had to pay $1 in parking fees which in turn had to bP reimbursed to me by the state Most people who come to this office have fixed incomes and are recipients of Social Security To ask that they pay $1 or $2 while waiting in the Social Security office is taking advantage of the poor That's a lot of money to someone who lives on $439 a month I am sure that a parking system could be developed that would give validations to those who must go to the downtown Social Security office The parking in this office should be comparable to any other office for instancc the Murray Social Security office where parking is free scribing his outrage and that of the Utah Wilderness Association's Gary MacFarlane at the subsidizing of predator control activities on public land rellly broke my heart Unfortunately Msrs Wha ton and MacFarlane suffer from e pree selective righteousness ator control and other subsidies received by ranchers are mere chickenfeed compared to the subsidies received by us rem eationists particularly those of us who use wilderness In the Fall 1993 issue oi Range magazine noted environmental writer Alston Chase (Playing God in Yellowstone) presents some interesting figures concerning subsidies for using public lands According to Mr Chase "Nationwide federal recreation user fees cover just 3 percent of costs The public subsidy per wilderness visit per day is between $14 and $25" In 1991 the Forest Service alone lost $340 million subsidizing recreation To add insult to injury most of the costs now incurred for predator control are unnecessary and are the result of environmental extremists' demands During the 22 years that I was involved directly or indirectly with predator control programs on Indian reservations I concluded that we could get all the predator control we needed by using the poison 1080 every other year at a cost of about 5 percent of what other control procedures cost By grossly misleading the public and the president about 1080 however the ecoquacks were able to get 1080 banned Another point that cries out to be made is that controlling coyotes and cougars often does about as much to benefit deer and antelope population as it does to benefit domestic livestock BOBBI M SCHUTZ Salt Lake City West Valley City Parking Fee Unfair As a case manager for the Division of Services for People with Disabilities I am writing to expose an example of flagrant exploitation of those who are elderly disadvantaged or have disabilities On Sept 2 I had a disturbing experience while advocating for a client of mine at the Social Security Office in the American Towers building in downtown Salt Lake City for the is a tolaulios-'Chicago Tribune Jowl-Bee- That means voters will have to Aiming— I agree with Mark MacAllister ------ -"' A if 2 II I 11 1 VI igire I L i t-- ' 4 le ' t Palk w Tribune Readers' Opinions 111 Ilin 1 1 141 ' 1 :11 w des-title- d - ! The House may become more responsive but only at the cost of its deliberativeness The detailed scrutiny by COMdates which has been the House's pride and joy will more often be omitted in the rush to bring issues to a vote Instant majorities will have less need to compromise with assenting views Inhofe's next goal is to use the new procedure to force a floor vote on term limits for members of Congress That prospect is one reason that most of the members of the Congressional Black Caucus were among the 40 who voted against Inhofe last week African Americans have finally begun to gain some leverage in the national government by achieving the seniority that gives them the chairmanships of key House committees and subcommittees They see term limits as a threat to that tenuous grip on power and they are right Once again blacks who played by the rules are finding that as soon as they gain power the rules are changed Make no mistake: This fight was not just about secrecy it was about power Blacks in Congress could see that even if their white colleagues chose to listen 'to the talk shows and look the other way: surrounding the signature process and then filed a discharge petition to bring that bill to a vote As a prod to bggards be warned that be would — with the help of The Walt Street Journal editorial page — neatly bypass the secrecy requirement by giving the newspaper the names of all - t A17 Sunday October 3 1993 111- tion governing issues totally outside of their constituency and affect the of citizens'in other states? Federal legislators are able to champion laws that cause significant change in land-us- e patterns in states they do not represent where they have no local expertise and are not subject to local voter repercussions As an example legislation entitled "The Utah BLM Wilderness Act of 1993" (HR 1500) has been introduced by Maurice Hinchey a Democrat from New York This bill will specifically act on the status of lands in Utah It that Rep Hinchey knows more about what our state needs than our own elected officials Legislation affecting a single state without obvious interstate implications should be introduced only by representatives and senators from the specific state not someone geographically and emotionally removed ROBERT W SCHAFER Salt Lake City well-bein- g Foresight vs Hystena The recent rise in gang activity and youth violence is a causefor concern and needs to be addressed But I deeply doubt that a few young thugs with bandanas and zip guns are going to bring two centuries of representative democ:acy to its knees Before we act in fear panic or haste Ids look at this policy proposal before us Will we abridge the right of:a peaceful public assembly to allow the police to deny access to a public event based on age dress 'Or race? Will we infringe on the right to keep and bear arms to embrace waiting periods background checks and the like absent of any suspicion of criminal behavior? Will we allow the police to search persons or property without cause based on deportment or ethnic background? We are dealing with deeper Issues and values than are first apparent I ask that all of us — citizens community leaders elected and appointed officials and the media — stop take a deep breath and pause for a long moment of reflection Think about what we stand to gain and what we stand to lose Let's sit down identify and work toward solving the problem rather than treating a lew symptoms however visible they might be scorr E G ED GOMER Salt Lake ' aty 7): Teens Aren't Sold on Madonna Instead They're LOti ANGELES -- - ration Or are they? Something is stirring in the land among young people It may be described as a sexual counterrevolution It is a growing belief among teens that they have been exploited by adults who treat Touthful sexuality as a commodity to be ittrchandised for profit The Southern Baptist Convention the nation's largest Protestant denomination has cleated a campaign called "True s Love Waits" in which pledge in front of their parents and each other to remain chaste until marriage signing a card that they carry with them Those who have already had a sexual experience can take the pledge and remain pure from now on Since the program began at the start of TIMES SYNDICATE Adults seem to hbae thrown in the towel on teen sex They don't think they can compete with Madonna who has opened a new show in London that is full of predictably high levels of sex They think they are no match for Janet Jack Eon whose latest album says Rolling Stone magazine is preoccupied with carnal knowledge In response to such shcts to the groin area the government gives us the new surgeon general Dr Joycelyn Elders whose plan is to toss condoms to schoolchildren Madonna who entertainer Steve Allen writes has "scrawled graffiti on the national dialogue" and Janet Jackson whose preoccupation with sex suggests she was deprived of healthy affection as a child sum to be role models many American teens turn to for guidance and inspi HOUSTON teen-ager- summer other denominations have joined Some church leaders were skepti m! ( I— — 11 Cal Thomas ': s ' cal that teens would make such a pledge and sign the card but the responses have been encouraging so far Adam Allen of Howton's First Baptist Church expressed the view of many teens who have signed up: "Kids are taught they're juEt animals and they're going to have sex — just use a condom I'm willing to stand by God" Churches throughout the country are reporting not a trickle but a flood of young people eager to take the simple Fifteen-year-ol- d IVIalcing Chastity Pledge'1 pledge which says "Believing that true love waits I make a commitment to God myself my family those I date my future mate and my future children to be sexually pure until the day I enter a covenant marriage relationship" Some churches say it is not unusual for anywhere between 100 and 300 teenagers to sign the pledge At a summer camp in Oklahoma more than 13500 teens committed to the program One of them was Traci Bixler a freshman this fall at Oklahoma State University who says she does not have a boyfriend but she has already written a sealed letter to her future husband telling him she loves him enough to wait Some teens say that in a youth culture that wants to be different remaining a virgin is now regarded among many as "awesome" Jennifer Sleep of lIouston comments "It gives you Sixteen-year-ol- d a good reputation" Eighteen-year-olRick Bedient of Houston says he used to come to schbol on Monday morning and brag about his weekend sexual exploits "Since I accepted Christ as my savior" he says "I happily took the pledge Sex is something Coad made to say 'I love you' If you have :gel with everybody you can't say I've saved this one thing to say 'I love you' " Too many adults especially those positions of leadership have given up on s and resigned them to addition to their glands Organizers of the "True Love Waits" campaign hope to display 500000 pledge cards next July 294t a celebration in Washington DC p These are flames that could be fannOt into bonfires in which virginity add purity would become the "in" thing and the donnas and Janet Jacksons of the cultuxe would quickly fade into oblivion d teen-ager- 0 4- - 1 ) How is it that members of CAgress both in the House and Set-at- e are able to introduce legisla- M 4 AILA11- -3 adiLmdLed ooa 1""""1-"1"4-4"- Amtdolta11 dal Od Adi Aocmmam&atlkoftd'01 |
