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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (June 3, 1981)
Viewpoint The Battalion Texas A&M University Wednesday June 3, 1981 Slouch By Jim Earle ‘I think I liked it better when registration was less personal. Making deals better than starting fights By DAVID S. BRODER WASHINGTON —The negotiations be tween Dan Rostenkowski, the Democratic chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, and Donald Regan, the stock broker-magnate turned Reagan administra tion Treasury secretary, on the shape and size of the new tax bill are really a meeting of two worlds. Regan has a deserved reputa tion as an executive as tough as those bulls he made famous in his Merrill Lynch TV ads. But tough on Wall Street is one thing, and tough in the 32nd Ward, on Chicago’s northwest side, where Danny Rostenkows ki learned politics as a youngster in Richard J. Daley’s machine, is something else. Daley practiced a politics that was dis armingly simple. He kept it simple because a great many of his lieutenants did not have first-class intellects. Daley taught his peo ple a few basic rules and showed that, by applying them consistently, you could amass great power. Understanding a couple of those rules will help you understand what Dan Rostenkowski is about, as he meets his first major challenge as Ways and Means chairman. One rule is: Don’t give up your base. When he was in his 20s, Rostenkowski in herited the 32nd Ward committeeman’s job from his father, who had held it for 20 years. He still has it. He went on the public payroll at 24, when he was elected to the Illinois House of Representatives. He has not been off' the payroll since. From the state House to the state Senate to the Con gress in 1958 — and all the time holding down the committeeman’s job that gives him control of city hall and county building patronage and lets him keep an eye on any ambitious upstarts at home. The second rule for that kind of politician is: Don’t overreach yourself. Rostenkowski made that mistake once, in 1970, and the scars are still there. The story is one he tells himself. It seemed like a safe bet, his back ing the late Hale Boggs of Louisiana in a tough contest for majority leader of the House in return for Boggs’ promise to appoint Rostenkowski as whip or deputy leader. Boggs won, but when he tried to keep his promise, he was overruled by House Speaker Carl Albert, still simmering over an incident at the 1968 Democratic conven tion when Rostenkowski — acting under Warped Blue collars could be next fad By DICK WEST United Press International WASHINGTON — Harvard Business Review, a rural-tinged publication if ever there was one, raises the specter that the blue collar is going the way of the horse collar. In case you don’t know what way the horse collar went, read on. “The only horse collars you see nowadays hang on old rusty pegs in barns,” the magazine says. “Some probably reside in museums in the West; the rest, unused, have been thrown away. Because horses no longer do farm work, farmers don’t need horse collars. ” Maybe farmers no longer need horse collars, but sports writers do. It would be very difficult to describe scoreless innings in baseball games without saying the teams were “horse-collared. ” Even so, there is no doubt that horse collars have fallen into widespread disuse. Two encyclopedias and an unabridged dic tionary I consulted had no listings for horse col lars. Horse latitudes, yes. Likewise entries for horse,mackerel, horsenettle, horseradish, horseflies, horseweed, horsetail and even horsefathers. But of horse collars, these reference works tell us nothing. Unless you happened to read the magazine article mentioned above, you prob ably are not aware of the importance of horse collars in the onward and upward march of agri culture. It was the invention of the iiorsc collar, the magazine tells us, that made possible the rise of the horse as “a primary energy source on the farm. “Prior to that time, farmers had tried putting an oxen’s yoke on horses, but it didn’t work because it blocked the major blood vessels, choking the horses,” it says. Very well. Then came the invention of the tractor, which pretty well did in work horses. In 1910, around the time the first farm tractor appeared, there were 26 million horses on American farms. After that, the number started “dropping faster than tractors could come off the assembly lines.” Widows and orphans who had inventfi life savings in horse collars were, ofe wiped out. And now Harvard Businessi( suggests a similar fate is about to befalllltj boys who moved oft the farm and I tractor factories. orders from Lyndon Johnson and Daley — wrested the gabel from Albert’s hand and did what Albert was unable to do, gavel down the anti-war, anti-LBJ, anti-Daley demonstrators. With Albert, Rostenkowski mistakenly underestimated the desire for revenge. And while his eye was on the whip’s job, he neglected to protect his base. He was blind- sided by Tiger Teague of Texas, who ousted him from the leadership job he had pre viously snared as chairman of the House Democratic caucus. Had the deal with Boggs gone through, Rostenkowski and not Tip O Neill would in all likelihood be Speaker of the House to day. It took Rostenkowski 10 years to recov er from that mistake — and if you know anything about him, about the 32nd Ward, and the Chicago machine, you know that whatever happens, he is not going to let Ronald Reagan show him up in his first test as Ways and Means chairman. That does not mean Rostenkowski has to win over Reagan. It just means Reagan can’t whip Rosty in public, humiliate him, roll over him. It means, in all likelihood, that if Reagan wants to deal, he will find in Ros tenkowski an old-fashioned politician who knows how to deal. In preparing for that moment, Rostenk owski has followed his two rules. He has protected his base. He had O’Neill give him a 23-12 Democratic majority on Ways and Means — almost literally beyond Reagan’s reach. He put forward a one-year tax-cut bill as an alternative to Reagan’s three-year plan. But that was just a bargaining chip for the negotiations now under way. As this is written, the outcome of those negotiations is uncertain. There is still a lot to be tied down. But Rostenkowski is not likely to push his luck as he did in 1970 by trying to grab more than can be had. He has met Reagan and he has been impressed with him as a political foe, impressed in a way that he never pre tended to be by Jimmy Carter. “He’s a warm guy — and he’s smart,’’ he said of Reagan after that first meeting. He also siad, T promise I won’t surprise you, Mr. President.’ Others may argue economic theory or fight about where we are on the Laffer curve. Dan Rostenkowski’s 29 years as a legislator tell him he’s better off making a deal. As they say in Chicago, “Why fight? There’s enough for everybody here.” For th Lefever. Senate have trouble ut the MSC stratic ughoi 1 Stude By JUAN J. WALTE United Press International WASHINGTON — Ernest Lefever’s warn ings that “the Russians are coming” is not everybody s view of the world in the early 1980s, particularly not of most Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Com mittee. But if the panel rejects Lefever as Presi dent Reagan’s top human rights official it won’t be mainly because of his strongly held conviction that the Soviets are the worst rights violators and greatest threat to peace. After all, the policy views expressed by Lefever to the committee follow generally those of his two superiors —- Reagan and Secretary of State Alexander Haig. So, why all the commotion surrounding his nomination? To be sure, the strong opposition to, and just as strong support for, Lefever by more than a score of congressmen, private citizens and groups was centered on his view of “quiet diplomacy for authoritarian (most friendly) regimes as against public condemnation of totalitarian (mostly com munist) regimes. But those witnesses don’t vote for confir mation. Senators do and it was clear after two days of hearings that an alleged conflict of interest rather than ideology is what will decide Lefever’s fate in the Senate. That involves Lefever’s Washington- based Ethics and Public Policy Center, the Nestle Corp. and — almost as a sideline — the controversy about the use of breastfeed ing substitute infant formula in the Third World. Lefever was questioned at length about a $25,000 contribution from Nestle to his center and his center’s reprint of an article which sided with the view of infant formula manufacturers — of which Nestle is the largest. that he received a mailing list fo’L Washington lawyer (Thomas Ward),* Ifo k et he described as an occasional cunsulBil the for Nestle.” ■The fh classe jee or ie sumi Mom He denied any connections between the Nestle contribution and the center’s article. But he failed to convince key Democrats and the confirmation hearings will be reopened this week to address only this fchers ■' Tuesd; Briefly, in September 1980, Lefever’s center reprinted a Fortune magazine arti cle about “The Corporation Haters” on the anti-Nestle boycott because of the use of infant formula. But Lefever may have touchedai when he compared contributions to lit ter to political contributions. Justli politics,” he said, “senators and otb ceive contributions from many source shing, r He stressed that even if Nestle" erct given us none, ora million dollars,1* have proceeded and written mysifflor, hi querit article (in the Wall Street jot felling, because I happen to helieve the is P ss pan important.” “Anybody who knows me at allb that I am not in any way for sale or rent told Sen. Christopher Dodd, DConn ing a lengthy and heated exchange. Lefever acknowledged that in March and August 1980, his center received $25,000 in contributions from Nestle and I Ie challenged the committeetopn» evidence of an alleged conflict of intfl None was presented at the May 181# but by issuing a challenge he may' sparked the follow-up sessions thisi# By Scott McCullar AND NOW THE. HOUR NEWS. THE CITY OF C. STATION'S HIGHWAY DEPT. ANNOUNCED TODAY THE RE-PAVING OF WELLBORN ROAD IS FINALLY UNDER WAY. wellborn road in the PAST HAS BF.E/V KNOWN FOR ITS PCCR DRIVING CONDITIONS, SO THIS WAS WELCOME. NEWS TC MOTOR i STS. HOWEVER, THERE WAS SOME UNFORTUNATE NEWS CONNECTED WITH A.V/YOU A/CE ME NT... THEY'RE GOING TO RE'PAVE IT WITH PRARIE FILM... THE V v VV'-WA,V' rvM'WM^v'Y'T > • Y I ' The Battalion V S P S 045 :h»o MEMBER Texas Press Association Southwest jourtuilism Congres LETTERS POLICY Editor ; . . . . Angelique Copeland City Editor janeG. Brust Photo Editor Greg Gammon Sports Editor Ritchie Priddy Focus Editor Cathy Saatholl News Editors Marilyn Faulkenberry, Greg Gammon, Venita McCellon StaffWriters Bernie Fette, Kathy O’Connell, Denise Richter, Cartoonist Scott McCullar Letters to the Editor should not cXcml 300 length, and are subject to being cut if they are UlP editorial stall'reserves the right to edit lettersfunl|U length, hut will make every effort to maintain ihrai intent. Each letter must also he signed, shawlin'#' and phone number of the writer. Columns and guest editorials are also weknmi 1 not subject to the same length constraints T Addr CSS all inquiries and correspondence to: Edita Battalion. 210 Herd McDonald, Texas A&M laiu' College Station, LX 77813. EDITORIAL POLICY The Hiittulion is a non-profit, self-supporting newspaper operated as a community service to Texas A&.\l Vni\ ersity and Bryan - College Station. Opinions expressed in The Bat talion are those of the editor or the author, and do not necessarily represent the opinions of Texas A6t\l Universi ty administrators or faculty members, or of the Board of Regents. The Battalion also serves as a laboratory newspaper lor students in reporting, editing and photography classes within the Department of Communications. Questions or comments concerning any editorial..matter should he directed to the editor. The Battalion is published Tuesday, VVcdni'Sil# Thursday during Texas A&M s summer semesters subscriptions are $Ui.75 per semester, $33.25|X‘r« year and $35 per full year. Advertising rates funiid*' 1 request. Our address: The Battalion, 210 Heed McDonal ing, Texas A&M University, College Station. TV v United Press International is entitled exdnsiu'lit use for reproduction of all news dispatches imlilrtb I