Show COMMENTARY The Salt Lake Tribune If President Can't Consider THE WASHINGTON POST WASHINGTON — The puzzlement created by President Clinton's seeming retreat last week from key parts of his national health plan is less mysterious if you remember one fact Bill Clinton was a governor for 12 years He has been presi- dent for only 18 months When he rejoins the governors as he did last Tuesday flying into Boston for the final session of the summer meeting of the National Governors' Association (NGA) Clinton reverts to form And it gets him into trouble in Washington — which says more about Washington than it does about Bill Clinton This is not the first time it has happened Last January when the health care debate was just beginning the governors came to Washington for their winter meeting Clinton held a closed-doo- r session with them at the White House Governors of both parties said the president had said that like them he was opposed to the price controls in his plan and had included them only to satisfy the Congressional Budget Office They also reported that he had said he was not wedded to the mandatory purchasing alliances in the plan two-ho- pLAst4NN 41) 110 ld part-tim- n Oar OP I -- ( Ill' t t HoMELE56 Li A ttifi 1:1$ 5 CHICAGO TRIBUNE CAti-rAVPC9- 0 Cou-V7- 6 Ipor Liqcotigt5 14Er 14:44:14 II '7171111 ill p0' r 141 01— volf-f- ittikotti l Ittili Ittat 1 No cortAcze 1 0-A-tfer 114frt 14 semi-annu- - - I NO MEDICAL RSURAW CE I ut4ceaEct3C41:1-E-- 0 qa "FAMILY VALOS checks Shalala contrasts this scheme with traditional "workfare" in which a recipient keeps on getting a welfare check while the government tries to "sanction" her take the check away — if she doesn't "work it off" As Shalala notes it is ''time consuming difficult and bureaucratic to sanction someone" That is because the Supreme Court requires fairly elaborate procedures (including a hearing with lawyers) before even part of a welfare check can be taken away The Clinton plan supposedly avoids this mess "If you don't work" says Shalala "you don't get paid" Alas not quite Rather in Clinton's plan what happens when a recipient reaches the time limit is roughly this: She gets a WORK assignment and her but not necessarily check is reduced eliminated — in anticipation of the wages she will earn If she doesn't show up for her WORK job her supervisor notifies the welfare department which calls her in for yes "sanctioning" Perversely (depending on how much her check has been reduced) she may actually benefit from the "sanction" which initially is only a loss of 50 percent of her former full welfare check Not until her third refusal to work does she face the possibility of losing the entire check Doesn't all this sound well a bit difficult and bu "time-consumi- near-unanimo- reaucratic"? There is another catch In any jobs program wages must be kept low to preserve the incentive for workers to look for private-secto- r jobs But the fine print of Clinton's plan requires that WORK workers be paid the same wage as others doing "the same type of work" Does Clinton want to put welfare recipients to work at useful visible tasks like cleaning up parks? If so under this provision he'll have to pay them a lot more than many could earn in the private sector Clinton officials admit that they won't be able to place recipients in jobs that unionized municipal workers are already doing Unfortunately those are the most useful jobs It's worth remembering that when unions went on strike against Roosevelt's Works Progress Administration over a similar "prevailing wage" issue in 1939 Roosevelt broke the strike Try to imagine Clinton doing that Still the details of Clinton's welfare plan are not nearly as grim as they might be The plan has many small loopholes but no black holes Even n clauses are not as cripthe as those in the national serice pling law Congress passed last year The Clinton welfare bill is a more serious attempt to grapple with the welfare problem than anything any previous president has proposed I resolve to be less cynical about Clinton in the future Except when he says "There is no reason for cynicism" public-se- rvice pro-unio- SERVICE CHICAGO — Now that OJ Simpson has his own hot line I thought about phoning in a suggestion for assuring him a fair trial That's a major concern — finding an impartial jury that hasn't been swayed by the incredible media barrage the many leaks phony stories and constant TV jabber There is also talk about the possibility that some true believers in the American concept of free enterprise might be tempted to lie about their views in order to get on a jury and sell their stories to the supermarket tabloids And there is fear that some jurors might ignore the evidence and vote according to their racial persuasion football passions or secret belief that a wife should be faithful obedient and beaten regularly The obvious solution to this problem is a change of venue which means moving the trial from Los Angeles to another part of the state where the jurors might or be more But the Simpson case has been so heavily publicized that nowhere in California or the entire United States could you be sure of finding 12 people who have not been influenced to some degree So that raises the possibility of moving the trial out of this country to a civilized foreign country where nobody has seen CNN or heard of Simpson and 12 totally fair people can be found That isn't easy but there is such a place It is a peaceful little country isolated in a distant mountain valley Unfortunately I can't name it because its UN representative told me: "If you quote me by name the president of my country will have my head chopped off He's a shy kind of guy" But could OJ get a fair trial in your country? "Sure We don't have TV or radio but everybody goes to school and studies the great Eastern and Western philosophers and Shakespeare and we all speak at least a dozen languages in case a tourist ever shows up We have no racial prejudice because every newborn child is tattooed with stripes that are yellow red black and white That way they don't have to goof around painting themselves in preopen-minde- I period of crippling partisanship and had outgrown it before Clinton came along In the NGA meetings Clinton learned that seeking consensus did not mean making only small plans The idea of national education goals — a truly radical notion in a country committed to local control of schools — came from the governors and finally was ratified by the president and Congress It led to agreement on something even more radical nationally defined competency standards and tests Clinton arrived in the NGA leadership in time to carry that project to fruition and he learned from it that consensus methods work His instinct is to approach health care the same way But in a Washington here partisanship prevails where House leaders are struggling to line up every available Democratic vote in anticipation of Republican expected opposition Clinton's nostalgic evocation of the spirit of gubernatorial accommodation sounded suspiciously like an untimely retreat As one senior congressional Democrat told me scornfully "He's got to learn he's president not governor" Too bad there's such a difference 4 ittliklis -- Ptkett ' 141° 'f" IPIL t ks -i '-- Il I'l 1:L1A4 147 INEMPLOYMENtr 5ENERT-- used all those years as a governor As he said at the beginning of his Boston speech "It was as governor that I learned and lived the idea that the purpose of public life is actually to get people together to solve problems not to posture for the next election with rhetoric" That sounds like a cliche but it is in fact a description of gubernatorial behavior In their individual states some governors on some occasions play hardball partisan politics But when the governors come together for their NGA meetings both partisanship and posturing are frowned upon In an organization like NGA the favored style of discussion — which Clinton quickly mastered — is to define common goals and then indicate flexibility on the means for reaching them The style was established well before Clinton's time by governors like Dan Evans of Washington Cal Rampton of Utah Bob Ray of Iowa Cecil Andrus of Idaho and other moderates of both parties who understood that only by seeking consensus among governors of differing views could states exert real influence in Washington The NGA had passed through a Last Thing OJ 's Attorneys Want Is Fair Trial by Impartial Judge 1 )) 491 iliteV1 p two-yea- Taken together the comments certainand ly sounded like a Clinton climb-dowthey were so interpreted in Washington Critics of his proposal and those on Capitol Hill trying to negotiate a compromise expressed delight at signs of presidential "flexibility" Those who wanted at least as big and bold a program as Clinton had proposed — if not more — bellowed in rage at what they regarded as a sellout Within hours the White House was denying any change in its stance What few of them seemed to understand was that Clinton was not being cute or clever or devious he wasn't even sending signals He was simply sliding easily back into the mode of discussion he had 400 At4 NO FP THE NEW REPUBLIC 0 tia - By Mickey Kaus 12-ste- ers' health insurance I CAM Why don't more Americans appreciate Bill Clinton? Because of Cynicism the enemy within The president sounded the alarm upon his return from the Normandy battlefield declaring that "those people did not die so the American people could indulge themselves in the luxury of cynicism" Clinton says he "is seriously dealing with crime with welfare reform with health care" but that voters don't believe it because of "negative" press reports I confess I am a member of the press and I am a cynic when it comes rehato Clinton Should I seek bilitation? Or is cynicism justified? In search of an answer I have subjected myself to a painful diagnostic test: I have read Clinton's entire welfare reform plan After health care this is his most significant domestic initiative Does it (as he claims) "seriously deal" with the problem or is it (as cynics suspect) riddled with loopholes to protect entrenched Washington lobbies? Welfare reform offers a particularly good test because Clinton has issued a clear promise against which his plan can be measured He has declared that after two years on the dole "anyone who can work must work — in the private sector if possible in a temporary subsidized job if necessary" Two years and go to work? Yeah sure There must be a catch somewhere Sure enough the sections of the Clinton bill that describe his time limit feature more than a few escape hatchr clock doesn't start es The ticking it turns out until age 18 (so an who has a child unmarried is guaranteed four years on the dole) The clock doesn't tick for any month in e It which a recipient works doesn't tick if a recipient gets a note from a doctor On top of all this states can excuse up to 10 percent of the caseload for "good cause" (eg "serious emotional instability") Another 10 percent can get "extensions" to pursue various educational opportunities You'd have to be an unusual welfare mother to miss all these loopholes Still as welfare loopholes go Clinton's reare pretty modest Most long-tercipients will eventually "hit the wall" What happens then? To hear Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala tell it what happens is simple: "If the time limit is reached welfare ends and people are expected to work" They will be offered day care and private or public jobs in a new program called WORK After that they will get paychecks "for hours worked" not welfare eqpt- LLIKEMPLOYtt) NO David Broder - - n Not as Grim As It Could Be s e Welfare Reform Consensus Washin on's Warped Health-Car- e Within hours White House officials were trying to erase the message saying the president merely meant that he was "willing to explore" alternatives if anyone had them But today the mandatory alliances are gone and price controls are in doubt It was instant replay in Boston last week — except this time the session was public and happened while the House and Senate were nearing a vote on health care Lawmakers have been searching every sentence the president utters for clues to what he will sign and what he will veto When Clinton said that as a practical matter his bottom-linrequirement of universal coverage meant that "somewhere in the ballpark of 95 (percent) or upwards" should have health insurance it certainly sounded like a signal for compromise At another point he said that delibis a phased-iwhat "we all want erate effort to get toward universal coverage" In another comment the president said "There may be some way other than an employer mandate to do this" implying that he was ready to consider alternatives to the requirement in his plan that every business pay for its work A21 Sunday July 24 1994 d empty-heade- d school" This sounded perfect However I checked with some legal authorities and they said there is no legal precedent for moving a trial to a foreign country "Even if it was legal" one authority said "the networks have the final say and they would veto the idea if it was a country where their anchors could not get first-claroom service" "Too bad" the tiny country's representative said "it would have broken the monotony and put us on the map" Then the most obvious solution came to me And I wondered why Simpson's lawyers hadn't thought of it first A bench trial Which means there is no ss - i Mike Ito)ko 1 jury A judge hears all the testimony and evidence and he alone would decide on Simpson's guilt or innocence With a judge you have someone who knows the law He knows what evidence is or is not admissible He knows what flippant remarks by lawyers or witnesses should be ignored Having been trained in the law he would probably be mare resistant to racial or emotional pleadings It would also cost the taxpayers less money since the judge has to be there anyway but a dozen jurors wouldn't have to be paid $20 a day each or whatever sum they toss around in California And it is legally permissible All Simpson's lawyers have to do is waive a jury and ask for a bench trial and if the prosecutors agree that would be that I was about to dial Simpson's hot line and suggest a bench trial when it occurred to me that I should get the views of a few legal experts A call to Dan Polsby a criminal law professor at Northwestern University brought this response: "You want to know why if he's convinced that he won't get a fair trial why the hell not ask for a bench trial? "I'll tell you why If he ever got a bench trial on the current evidence they would have to send him to the death chamber "They don't want a bench trial because they don't want a fair trial A bench trial is only good if you're not guilty" And that with a few variations was the reaction of most legal experts You ask for a jury trial only if the evidence is really nasty With 12 ordinary people judging you there is always the chance that one of them might like the twinkle in your eye or the way your jaw muscles ripple and will hold out for acquittal regardless of how damning the evidence might be All it takes is one holdout and you have a draw Then the prosecution must drag all the witnesses back and do the whole thing over again But a judge is more likely to ignore Media reports rightly believing that most media creatures are boobs And while he might believe in his heart that a guy is guilty if the evidence isn't there he must abide by it In other words you have a better chance for a fair trial with one middle-ageguy in black robes who was trained in the law than with 12 strangers who might all be a bit daft So I didn't call Simpson's hot line Nct that it mattered I'm told it was overloaded and crashed because of the great volume of calls from ardent fans There's your jury d Government Increasingly Encroaches on Church Rather Than Other Way Around LOS ANGELES TIMES SYNDICATE When the issue of separation between church and state is raised it is usually in the context of controlling the extent to which the church is permitted to influence the state and the laws by which we live - - - In Pompano Beach Fla an attorney is poised to seize the building Sunday morning offerings and other assets of a church in a case that should alarm consti tutional scholars and others concerned about the excessive reach of government and its increasing hostility to religious people who believe their faith compels them to apply that faith in the public arena The facts are these New Covenant Church a conservative Presbyterian body sold some of its land a decade ago to a doctor who subsequently opened an abortion clinic Members of the church who believe abortion is immoral and the against God's will began picketing clinic The ruling body of the church (known as a Session) made it clear that the decisicn to picket was not officially sane t) tioned by the church and the demonstrators were acting on their own The pastor George Callahan allowed Operation Rescue to rent the building for one night to hold a rally Some of those who attended the rally including Rev Callahan conducted a sit-i- at the abortion clinic on March 31 1989 The abortion clinic assisted by the local chapter of the National Organization for Women filed suit alleging that the defendants conspired to illegally blockade the clinic in violation of the patients' supposed constitutional right to an abortion to financially bankrupt the abortion clinic and to physically intimidate and harass employees and patients The court returned a judgment of $1 against the defendants But the NOW attorneys sued the church under the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act — RICO — and won a judgment for $234000 in attorneys fees The clinic's lawyer agreed to settle for $200000 but the church did not have that much cash on hand So last week the lawyer began the process of seizing the church building r n In ' Cal Thomas and not representing his church — decide to exercise what they regard as their moral obligation and their constitutional right to peaceably assemble and to petition their government for a redress of grievances s In the various protests and demonstrations that have characterized the r movecivil rights movement the ment and numerous other often civilly disobedient protesters have found sustenance and a home in Catholic and Baptist churches Had RICO been in effect durs and protests of ing the boycotts the civil rights era black Baptist Catholic and African Methodist Episcopal churches all over America could have been seized by angry white businessmen upset over the economic damage caused to their businesses by blacks who boycotted or blockaded because of segregation Remember the Berrigan brothers two Catholic priests who protested the Vietnam War and nuclear weapons and have been involved in environmental concerns' And there was Rev William Sloane Coffin chaplain at Yale and an sit-in- ow anti-wa- and its other assets including Sunday morning offerings The judge agreed to delay the forfeiture of the church property if the church would find $210000 (including interest should the judgment be upheld) and place it in an escrow account while it appeals his ruling Rev Callahan called several churches around the country and they lent him the money Even those who favor "a woman's right to choose" an abortion should be seriously concerned about a case that allows the state to confiscate the property of a church because a few members and the pastor — acting as an individual citizen ‘ sit-in- i encourager of draft-car- d burning and draft evasion by young men Protests boycotts of the Dow Chemical Company for making napalm dropped on Vietnam With RICO on the books in those years the assets and buildings of Yale University might have been seized by lawyers seeking to shut down legitimate and constitutionally protected expression This growing trend to single out ahortion and those who protest it because of religious convictions for special persecution and prosecution should disturb civil libertarians and those whose voices supported the deeply held convictions of Vietnam and civil rights demonstrators What goes around comes around and if the government can order the seizure of a church simply because one uses the building for a rally that leads to a protest the government doesn't like where is the end of this? If church-stat- e separation means anycut to the other way when it ought thing the state invades the church and declares there is no king but Caesar 4 |