Slouch By Jim Earle mn~ ArtLt^ -** £Ai-i-e “Actually my political position is to the left of Reagan; to the right of Carter; oblique with Connally; behind Anderson; adjacent to Baker and above Stassen. “ Opinion The NCAA: a paper tiger? The National Collegiate Athletic Association it seems has very little interest in enforcing its admirable regulations. When asked recently if the NCAA was aware that half of the schools in the Southwest Conference had special admission requirements for athletes, a spokesman replied, “No one has complained to us about that matter.” Vice president Clements? Lord help us all. In a day when Bill Clements can be considered, however remotely, for the GOP vice presiden tial nomination, we are in trouble. Both Ronald Reagan and George Bush are scheduled to campaign throughout the state next week, wooing support for the May 3 primary. And, since Clements is still the biggest big-wig the Republicans we have in this state (which says something about the condition of the Texas GOP), they will pay him courtesy calls. And there is talk that one of the subjects they will discuss is giving the governor a shot at the running-mate spot. Let’s hope it’s just talk. Anyone who’s lived in this state since Clements took over the Governor’s Mansion knows about Big Bill. Here is a man who suggested that deep-sea diving could be used as a birth control measure for pregnant women. Here is a man who told us that the Mexican oil spill wasn’t all that bad. Here is a man who said the hostages in Iran are “expend able.” Bill Clements has proved again and again that he is as stupid as he is obnoxious. And the whole idea of putting this cretin within a heartbeat of the presidency is equally as stupid and obnoxious. the small society by Brickman i-SN'T AMY- I flZEFEfZ - THAT'« TH£ 3-13 ,(y7^y*—u- The Battalion U S P S 045 360 LETTERS POLICY MEMBER Lfttrr. to (JW nfaor mot mod 300 word, omd . 1”** or, mdiotl to brtmt cot to tKuLmtcOt or Uw i Umgrr Th, Joun>«l«n. edOarwl nofl mrrro tlw nfkt to rdo me*, Utter, mol Editor Roy Bragg dot, mot tmomtee to pmhitd, Utter toe*. Utter moo, Associate Editor Keith Taylor W mecmrd dww the oddrtu of t*w wetter omd bet • News Editor Rusty Cawley momber for eertfumtorn Aut News Editor Karen Comelison JSr Copy Editor • ■ DilWd Su»e f-r'-- Trm, T7M3 Sports Editor Mike Bumchter Keprrwmed mohnrwSh by NatfcmJ v»*»r Focus Editor Rhonda Watters (Mas Screen, be.. N«-« Tori C«y. ch»rae> mod Lot Viewpoint Pa|je Editor Tim Sager A Tin City Editor Louie Arthur TV Vruhnn n pubWd Momby throwsb Fridoy from Campus Editor Diane Blake V^trwVT iVoo^ May nc«pi ibnaa rwo rod bobbv staff Writers Nano Andersen. * * T^. Bn.oh^.Aoyoliquo Cooelnd. ... _ „ _ Laura Cortez, Merit Edwards. Carol Hancock. Kathleen McElroy. f.1 lOtnt OO rwfmmt KMrrx, TV Botuinn Room 216 Debbie Nelson. Richard Oliver, %md HcOmmid ■ ■■>*■». Colnpr Sotuo Toai 77M3 Steve Sisoey. Becky Swanson. liaMod Pptm liMprBotnaol ■ nrtabd r«rVrt»«ly to (V And> " llliams oor far rr^codoctwr. cd & oowt dctparcVn cwdHori to a. Chief Photographer Lynn Blanco Ra4*i C* rryrabmoo <>t<>«rapoeTa ^ CunnjuJ Strve dark Opinioru rxprested in The Battalion are thorn of the editor or of the writer of the article and are not necexaarily thote of the Unicernty Administration or the Board of Regents The Battalion u a non profit, self- supporting enterprise operated by students as a unnernty and community newspaper Editorial policy is determined by the editor Viewpoint The Battalion Texas A&M University Thursday April 24, 1980 Value added tax is no panacea for America’s troubled econom By WILLIAM KEEGAN International Writers Service LONDON — Americans considering the idea of a value added tax might learn some thing from the British experience. Try it, by all means, but don’t fool yourself that it will solve all your problems. The value added tax, or VAT, was intro duced here in Britian in the early 1970s. It has been widely used elsewhere in Europe for years, and, its partisans claimed, it would perform wonders. As its name implies, VAT consists of levying a tax on the value added to goods and services at each stage of production and ditribution. In other words, when a partial ly finished item is sold, the tax is paid on its entire value at that point, with the seller receiving credit for all the taxes paid at earlier stages of production. In the end, the consumer pays the full tax — which in a sense makes VAT similar to a sales tax. American advocates of VAT, such as Rep. Al Ullman of Oregon, contend that is will permit cuts in income and social secur ity taxes by providing the revenue lost through those cuts. Moreover, he sub mits, it will encourage investment, pro ductivity, exports and price stability by shifting the tax burden from income to consumption. Many of the same arguments were ad vanced here a decade ago by champions of VAT. Since then, the tax has proven to be neither a disaster nor a panacea. Above all, it has not contributed to a dramatic improvement of Britain’s ailing economy, mention its complex system of charges and rebates, VAT is essentially a form of nation al sales tax on consumer expenditures. Un like the old purchase tax it replaced, which set levies of up to 33 percent on luxuries, VAT features a standard rate of 15 percent. Compared to the former system, too, VAT encompasses a broader range, since it includes the services sector. At the same time, though, it omits large areas of con sumption. For instance, items like food and chil dren’s clothing are exempted. Otherwise, the new tax would have been extremely regressive, hitting the poorest households the hardest. Altogether, in fact, VAT affects only about half of total consumer spending. Many of its vaunted virtues have failed to materialize. It has not, for example, dam pened consumption and spurred invest ment. Nor does the fact that it is levied on imports but not exports made any tangible difference in Britian’s foreign trade. In addition, VAT is expensive to admi nister because of its complicated structure. It also facilitates fraud, since professionals and craftsmen are tempted to compete for lients by quoting fees without tax. Despite thee reservations, however, VAT has an enormous advantage that was not originally emphasized in the debate over the subject years ago. It is useful to governments in the present economic con text because the tax is proportional and therefore its yields rise automatically with inflation. This is preferable to fixed taxes, such as those imposed here on ci ea r« tobacco, which are actually d value as living costs soar. Tbe- agonizes every year over wheth such taxes and thereby sendther index up. Here in Britain between 1969a government revenues gained • indirect taxes fell by nearly in! Partly to redress the balance Pn ter Margaret Thatcher’s Consent ernment raised VAT from 8 pen*! percent when it presented iMn , last June. That jump had a devasting eW prices, boosting them by almost4,, and aggravting Britain’s already st" flation problem. The increase B meanwhile achieved relatively littif it accounts for only about one* British tax revenues. The lesson for Americans who cm plate a U.S. version of VAT oue clear. It will not create miracles y that matter, will any fiscal remedv Mlifm-GWyMPTtm The devil Carfer is really threatening tp tighten the screws on us. AH th Th Soph Tucker’s economic primer By DICK WEST United Press International WASHINGTON — Economists are pre dicting that the recession they were pre dicting last year will arrive later this year, if it hasn’t already started or isn’t delayed again. The coinciding of these forecasts with the new census reminds us that for a large seg ment of the population the prospective re cession amounts to facing the unknown. Our economy has been on the upswing so long that millions of Americans have never known anything else. Understand ably, they are more apprehensive than those who have been through previous downturns. You can see their anxieties re flected in the popularity of such books as "HowTo Prosper During The Coming Bad Years.” As it happens, I was never able to pros per even during the good years. I am, however, one of the few people alive today who is old enough to remember what it was like during the Great Depression. There fore, my counsel and guidance are in con stant demand. In the gloaming recently, I was a-sitting’ and a-rockin’ out on the veranda when Ber tie and Fancy Clanker, a young couple who lives down the street, stopped by. “Is it true you are one of the survivors of the Great Depression?” Bertie asked shyly. “Yew dem tootin’,” I cackled, slapping my knee. (When you reach my age, you start drop ping letters off the end of words and replac ing them with apostrophes. This helps save your breath for more important things, like breathin’. (You also tend to cackle a lot. That gives you a cover for slapping your knee to keep the circulation going.) The Clankers asked if they might sit at my feet for a while and drink in any wisdom I might impart on how to cope with the coming hard times. I gathered up a mouthful for apostrophes and said, “The best thing to do is put your life savin’s into mattresses.” Fancy Clanker pulled a note pad out of her purse. “Are mattresses safer than banks when times are hard?” “Not necessarily,” I replied, “but they pay better interest.” Fancy erased something shel down. “What is the main difference recession and inflation? Bertie i “Durin’ inflation, you have i can’t buy things because prices > high. Durin’ recessions, the Pjj cfl j down but you have no money^ 1 Bertie gave a thoughtful nod I I’m getting the feel of it, he sad It’s a pity the Clankers and or" couples never knew Sophia Tu Last of the Red Hot Mommas. ■> 1 say before she cooled off mat !, poor and I’ve been rich, and, rich is better.” If Miss Tucker were probably would be chairman w | dent’s Council of Economic A TTERS U. S Constitution not based on the Bible Editor: I would like to respond to the speech made April 21 by Mr. Ron Tewson. He expounded that the Constitution was writ ten with the Bible as a text, and that our founders meant for the government they were creating to be Christian. Therefore, our present society is breaking up because we have thrown the Bible and its principles out These statements are very broad gener alizations. That the U.S. government was framed using the Bible as a text is simply not true. The majority of the men who contributed to the Constitution were not Christian. Benjamin Franklin was a Deist. So was Thomas Jefferson. George W'ashington was Anglican, but did not admit any particular creed. Deism was the reigning philosophy of the times, and held that reason was the road to God. and was skeptical of religion. The political philosophers that influ enced the writing of the Constitution were a product of the Enlightenment, of which Christians were a minority. John Locke was Christian, Voltaire was atheist, and Mon tesquieu had to answer to charges of reli gious unorthodoxy for his Spirit of the Laws, on which our Constitution is based. As a conclusion, the speaker mentioned several times “one nation under God,” im plying that this was a major concept written into the Constitution. These words come from the U.S. Pledge of Allegiance, and the phrase “under God" was not added until 1954 Sbisa strikes again! wouldn’t lose so much to waste I close only by saying that Mr. Tewson and his sponsors should he extremely embarrassed by his presentation, which claimed to be “intellectually and academic ally honest. ” Please. Mr. Tewson. whenev er you speak again , do not do such a sloppy- job of representing my Lord. Beverly A. Dowdy Editor: I am writing in response to Mr. Dennis M. McGuimes’s April 16 memo to all Northgate students. Mr. McGuime sent this memo to explain why he re-arranged the tables and deprived us of desserts in that illustrious dining hall. Mr. McGuime has attempted to turn all Northgate dorms against Davis-Gary as a scapegoat for this action. Mr McGuime, I really don’t care how the tables are arranged. As for the de sserts, I thank you. vruuiuil l 1U3C -- ,t--j telling us that compared to we eat well. I don t go to an) and I still don t eat well. $500 per semester for rancid ^ can anyone screw up catsup'/^| tuce and a variety of devast*®* _ chicken. On top of that I spend ^ Vninrlr^H mnrf* to keep hundred more to keep min in business. So you go ahead and keep P*£ excellent service. It shouldn Yo«! since there’s no competition and keep closing up at£30*^ t~wn mom rlnrms will DU , You tell us that you try to provide your customers with the best service possible on your limited budget. Is that why you raise the price of the board plan each semester and blame it on us wasting "food.” You don’t seem to understand. If you made something edible for a change, you “meals” of yours next year. But L* that! 1 refose to give you money for any longer. Furthermore.‘j place blame on a fellow o° " brought on only by the upon them by poor service, lousy food. Bfin