opinion
Slouch By Jim Earle
“Falconry does have its inconveniences.”
Geography problem
for State Department
by Art Buchwald
Why do American secretaries of state
have so much trouble with the White
House? It’s nothing more than a question
of geography. In the good old days the
State Department was located in the Ex
ecutive Office Building, which is right
next to the White House and considered
part of it now. All the secretary would
have to do is cross an alley and walk into
the Oval Office.
But then someone in the White
House, years ago, got a brainstorm. If
they could move the secretary of state
down to a swamp called Foggy Bottom,
he’d think twice about bugging the Presi
dent over some silly matter concerning
foreign affairs.
The White House used the excuse that
it needed the Executive Office Building
to house its own staff. To add insult to
injury, they built a new State Department
that was the ugliest piece of architecture
in Washington. But it served its purpose
because it kept the secretary of state from
easy accessibility to the boss.
Although State is only about 15 blocks
away from the White House, the secret
ary might as well be stationed in Para-
guay.
This is what happens to all secretaries
of state since they moved out of the EOB:
The President sees his White House
staff every day.
“Top of the morning to you, sir,” they
say to him.
Now it goes without saying that a per
son who says “Top of the morning” to the
President every day is going to have more
input than a Cabinet officer who has to
taxi over to the White House twice a
week.
No President spends all his time just
signing bills, and making speeches at
prayer breakfasts. Who does he chew the
fat with? His White House staff, of
course. He isn’t going to call up the sec
retary of state and say: “Hey, come over
and have a beer.”
Even if he wanted to, the White House
staff members, jealous of their turf, are
not going to let an outsider like a secret
ary of state become part of the inner
circle.
Not only is the secretary kept away
from the President for bull sessions, but
the staff goes to great lengths to see that
he doesn’t get to see the President too
often when it involves affairs of state.
The first rule is that a secretary of state
must always call the President before he
comes over.
The conversation could go like this:
“This is the secretary of state. I have to
see the President of the United States.”
“I’m sorry, sir. The President is in an
important meeting with Charlton Hes
ton. Can anybody else help you?”
“No, I have to talk to the President
about China.”
“Haven’t you already talked to him ab
out China?”
“I have to talk to him again.”
“He has a terribly busy schedule. We
could fit you in a week from next Thurs
day for 10 minutes.”
“It’s urgent.”
“We can’t move it up any sooner. But if
we have a cancellation we’ll call you
back.”
After the White House aide hangs up
he turns to another White House aide
and says, “Can you imagine the gall of the
man? He thinks he can just call up, and
see the President on 48 hours’ notice.
What kind of administration does he
think we’re running?”
“They’re all alike,” the other aide says.
“They believe just because we let them sit
in on Cabinet meetings, they can have
access to the President any time they want
to. If there is one thing I hate, it’s a pushy
secretary of state.”
And that’s how it’s been ever since the
State Department moved to Foggy Bot
tom. And thus it will always be until the
secretary of state gets an office back at
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, so he can see
the President every day and say as the
lowliest White House staffer does now:
“Top of the morning to you, sir.”
The Battalion
USPS 045 360
Member of
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City Editor Bernie Fette
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Cartoonist Scott McCuliar
Photographers David Fisher, Peter Rocha,
John Ryan,
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77843.
July 14,
July: A crazy month in D.C.
W
by Ira R. Allen
United Press International
WASHINGTON — The political “silly
season,” a phrase coined by some pundit
long ago to describe candidates’ publicity
gimmicks, is generally thought to start a
few weeks before the first primary and to
continue through election day every two
years.
But close observers of headline pat
terns know that the “silly season” is not
some vague mataphor — it arrives on
schedule once a year and lasts precisely
31 days.
It is July — a month so hot and humid
in Washington that statues sweat and
lethargic pigeons slide right off.
No sooner do the lightning bugs and
mosquitoes rise up from the capital’s pri
mordial swamp than lawmakers and top
government policymakers flee to Dela
ware beaches or California mountain-
tops.
The top investigative reporters loll on
Martha’s Vineyard, and the regular
order of official business stops. It’s too
early for politicians to be campaigning;
the voters don’t start paying attention un
til Labor Day, if at all.
In July, there’s no such thing as a slow
news day. It’s a slow news month.
That is why for the past six years with
out fail, relatively minor events or revela
tions become full-blown scandals, domi
nating the headlines until Congress or
the president does something truly con
troversial.
So every renent July has seen the
Washington media, usually consisting of
those reporters who have to work when
everyone else is on vacation, embarked
on a feeding frenzy nipping for the latest
juicy tidbit.
This July, for example, the only story
in town — breaking as soon as Congress
left on a two-week vacation — is the alle
gations that lawmakers engaged in
homosexual acts with pages and may
have used, boight or sold cocaine.
While potentially more substantial
than other scandals, there has yet to be
any solid evidence of widespread vice on
Capitol Hill, and a growing suspicion that
whatever is proved will implicate only a
few members.
In 1981, the July scandal was the firing
of CIA covert operations chief Max
Hugel for his past deeds in an alleged
stock swindle, and calls for the firing of
CIA Director William Casey, whose
failed to fully disclose his huge financial
holdings.
It was also in July 1981 that an interna
tional scandal flared when President
Reagan slept through the shooting down
of two Libyan jets.
In 1980, President Carter’s perennial
ly embarrassing brother, Billy, was re
quired to register as a foreign agent and
to testify before a Senate committee ab
out alleged influence peddling in Libya,
he
where J ulys are no more pleasai
they are in Washington.
In 1979, President Carter hi®
ated a crisis by retreating incomi
do to Camp David and then prom
the existence of a “national malais
will do that to you.
Carter, it might be added, c lai
the August doldrums as well wliei
United P
NEW C
he final
revealed that he had beenattadi tionsbetwe
Rr and dooi
lluding tin
■I’m in
trouble.”
I A spokt
lonal Trai
laims to a
ut was big
bunny on a Georgia pond.
In 1978, it was Carter’s drug
Dr. Peter Bourne, who scandalize!
line writers by having written a
prescription for an aide and ettij
having to resign
And July 1977 marked the beg Board said
of the fall of Carter’s budgetadvis ^unaware
“I’m proud of you" Lance.
Obviously, there are mant
minor scandals that occupyidlen
— witness the Libyan hit squad
December and the recent investia
President Reagan’s new dry loo!
And there is plenty of legitim Pa A ” Bni'
tory being made — in other mot | H e saic
So it gives one pause, in the yea Irevent sor
month for pausing, to wondenii r '
happened to July. Perhaps its
great events — the birth of Juliu
the American and French rev
the Battle of Gettysburg andtl
landing, which occurred thesamt
l ed Kennedy’s fateful encouniei
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holdups bui
The Average takes over life
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Editor:
Seeking to protect our campus from
the pervasive and omnipresent maladies
that permeate our present day society, I
have appointed myself (surreptitiously,
of course) TAMU’s epidemiologist. As
such, I have to be privy to and wary of the
ominous rumblings that threaten the
mental and emotional integrity of our
student body.
It is therefore my duty to report an
insidious disease that has gripped our
campus by its jugular vein and en
dangered our very survival. Incanta
tions, supplications and entreaties have
failed to dent its impermeable armor. Its
voracious appetite knows no boundaries,
as it seeks adherents at any hour of the
day or night. Many people are only dimly
aware of its deleterious side effects, as it
strikes all sizes and ages indiscriminately.
The guise under which it seeks anonym
ity, however, has made itself known to me
and even at the risk of my life, I will
reveal its nom de querie — The Average.
This hideous term has affected (and
continues to affect) every sphere of our
lives. For instance: class grades are stated
in terms of the average; course grades
are meted out according to the normal
(the euphemistic term for average) distri
bution curve; students, on the average,
should finish college in four years; one
ought to toss aside his/her altruistic aims
and ideologies in quest of the pragmatic
dollar; and the granddaddy of all the
prevarications associated with the term
“the average* 1 : one must fall in love to the
tune of Henry Mancini’s platitudinous
songs accompanied by the dithyrambs of
Lothario, all of course before the senes
cent age of 30.
The malicious side effects of this term
usually leaves its victims writhing in phy
sical and psychological pain aided and
abetted by guilt, censure and an implac
able superego, its power and control is
imperceptibly burgeoning, with no fore
seeable end in sight. We can, however,
stop “the averages” flow to the sea if we
keep in mind (and practice) the following
tenets:
1) Define the word average as the
“amalgamation of individualities.” Note,
I said individualities, not exceptionali
ties.
2) Just like one has a biological circa
dian rhythm, I propose that one also has
a mental, emotional, social and intellec
tual circadian rhythm, different from
and unique to every person constituting
the human race. Listen to yours and re
spect its dictates rather than pillorying it
to societal norms.
3) Differentiate between the average’s
insatiable quest for rote knowledge with
out comprehension; glibness and deft
ness over comprehensiveness and in
sight; and logic purging intuitiveness. Co
with your intuition; seek knowledi
the exhilarating flush that resultsfi |
discovery beknownst to you
only. Become a belletrist rather ill
pedantic.
4) Let your heart back intoyowB
sions, as its atruims flow with tliesp*
IS
t
your soul, making you unlike any®
individual in the world. Heeditsarf
dons and accept its soothing I
Now I realize the resiliency and« m
ity with which the average will s« B
maintain and/or increase its beacH
into your life. I only ask that youte -a
- ■
real you come forth instead of subji L
ing your finely honed, idiosyncrad S
some idolatrous worship of thes«l
approved and dictated average.,Hi P
ness and placidness will be youtv P
companions and quite frankly ff
could ask for better guardian anjf ■
Marc M 4
Graduate sin ^
Educational Psych’ ^
by Brickn< j
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