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The Battalion
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By Jim Earle
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'Now is the time!
IThe upcoming trial
lof Harrison Williams
By STEVE GERSTEL
United Press International
? WASHINGTON — At high noon on the
third of December, the Senate is going to
put Sen. Harrison Williams in the dock. It’s
going to be ugly.
Most senators, without question, must
fervently wish that something would hap
pen to spare them the ordeal of putting
^Williams on trial.
Yet, there appears to be nothing that can
-* allow them to avert this extremely onerous
assignment.
Senate Republican leader Howard Baker
t': seems committed to go ahead even though
it means the extension of a session that has
already run much longer than he had
hoped.
'
- And Williams appears intent on fighting
to the finish, showing no signs of exiting
with grace.
Pete Williams is far from the first to go on
trial before his colleagues — charged with
misdeeds and tarnishing the Senate.
Yet, in some ways that will have no bear
ing on the outcome, Williams’ case is diffe
rent from others in recent times.
First off, the recommendation of the
Ethics Committee is that the New Jersey
a veteran of 23 years in the
£ Democrat
^ Senate — be expelled. That is the ultimate
> punishment of the Senate.
S. No senator has been expelled since the
Civil War, assuring Williams a sordid foot-
* note in history.
The Senate censured Sen. Thomas
. Dodd, D-Conn., and condemned Sen.
^ Herman Tahnadge, D-Ga., but no one
% sought to kick them out.
£ Dodd was found guilty of mingling per-
^ sonal funds with campaign contributions, a
£ practice frowned on by clean-hand politi-
Talmadge had his wrist slapped for a biz- over.
zare series of financial transactions, includ
ing stuffing money into his overcoat
pockets.
Even in those two cases, the stigma of
Senate punishment was so great that both
their political careers were ruined. Neither
could win re-election.
The charge is more grievous against Wil
liams — conspiracy to obtain money for a
titanium mine in which he would acquire an
interest. He was caught in the ABSCAM
web.
The evidence, much of it on videotape,
was good enough so that a jury found him
guilty. The Senate needs even less proof to
hang him — and cares naught whether he
was a victim of FBI entrapment.
If the proceedings appear to be a Senate
vendetta against an unpopular colleague,
the impression is wrong.
Williams, a recovered alcoholic, is gener
ally known as an unspectacular sort who is
(or was) quite popular with his peers.
Little known to the general public, de
spite his many years in the Senate, he never
crashed the limelight — either by choice or
fate.
Williams was a down-the-line Democra
tic liberal. Like others of that genre, he was
a vote for the Great Society programs and
the advancement of civil rights, if he was in
labor’s pocket, so were the others of like
thinking.
In contrast, Dodd and Tahnadge were
loners with few friends in the Senate.
If the Senate had been of a mind to pun
ish for punishment’s sake, Tahnadge and
Dodd were better candidates.
With the start of the trial rapidly
approaching, Williams has little choice left.
He could resign, sparing himself and the
Senate the agony. Or, he can go the route.
Either way, it strongly appears that Wil
liams’ long career in the Senate is all but
The Battalion
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MEMBER
Texas Press Association
Southwest Journalism Congress
Editor Angelique Copeland
Managing Editor Marcy Boyce
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Graphic Artist Richard DeLeon Jr.
Photographers Rose Delano
Daniel Sanders, Colin Valentine, Greg Watermann
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Address all inquiries and correspondence to: Editor, The
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Second class postage paid at College Station, TX 77843.
November 25, llijj
The senator from Hocus-Pocus
By DICK WEST
United Press International
WASHINGTON — Ever found yourself
wishing you could instant-replay a conver
sation to take advantage of the clever re
marks you thought of too late?
You can if you are a U.S. senator.
Senators, operating ex post facto, occa
sionally polish previously uttered remarks
so they appear in print as bon mots that
flowed trippingly from the tongue.
Better yet, a senator also can unsay
something.
Should he decide a previously uttered
remark was better left unspoken, he can
recall the utterance and have it appear he
never said it.
These miraculous powers of speech, not
granted to ordinary mortals, are bestowed
on our lawgivers by the Congressional Re
cord, official transcript of House and Senate
proceedings.
On a given day last week, for example,
journalists auditing the school prayer de
bate could have sworn they heard the Sen.
Ernest Hollings, D-S.C., address Sen. Ho
ward Metzenbaum as “the senator from
B’nai B’rith.’’
They further were under the impression
that Metzenbaum, who actually comes
from Ohio, characterized Hollings’ geog
raphical reference as “bad taste,” whereup
on the senator from South Carolina apolo
gized, explaining it was “only in fun.”
But in the printed version of the debate
captured for posterity by the Congressional
Record, there was no mention of Hollings
and Metzenbaum speaking in this manner.
These utterances were treated exactly as
though they had been wasted on thin, de
sert air. Did our ears deceive us? Was there
present in the Senate the same “sinister
force” that erased 18 minutes of the Water
gate tapes?
None of the above.
The explanation can be found near the
end of the legislative day when Senate Re
publican leader Howard Baker obtained
unanimous consent to have the aforemen
tioned utterances “deleted from the re
cord.”
Even after surgery, however, therein
still plenty of meat for the archives.
Among the senatorial utterances lt|
were preserved in perpetuity was
official notification to the Senate thatSa
Alfonse D Amato’s 19-year-old <
Lisa had set a new world’s record “fortin
spent in a shower.”
Miss D’Amato, according to Bal
stayed in the shower “121 hoursandli
nute nonstop.”
“I want to extend the Senate’scongn
lations to Lisa and her local water autl
ity,” Baker said.
The tribute is now enshrined in hist
and will remain a part of Senate busir
down through the ages, or longafterson
one has showered 121 and 2 minutes
As the father of daughter whoalsomou
polized the bathroom, I can apprecil
D’Amato’s role in the accomplishment I
if Baker had referred to the senator
New York as “the senator from Jacuzzi,
might have no record of the feat.
It s your turn
Editor:
This letter is in reply to the absolutely
false accusations by Gerald Brock in his
letter to the editor published Tuesday in
reference to the International Students
Association Program “U.S. Policy and
Central America.”
One life is enough
First of all, the “Unified Revolutionary
Front” (DRU) did not have a representative
on the program panel. This individual was
representing the “Democratic Revolution
ary Front” (FDR) which is the opposition
front created in El Salvador.
Editor:
Ags, when you go to awe at the immense
bonfire, please stand back a safe distance.
The bonfire can collapse faster than a crowd
can move and does so without warning. We
are fortunate that nobody has been trapped
beneath the flaming logs so far. Please keep
the bonfire death toll at a minimum.
have one of the top Engineering Scha
the nation. To top that off, all Texas/ 1
Medical students who took the Mei
exam this year before entering internj
passed every section; this has never 1
done by any university. After all,
you call an Aggie two years after gni(|
tion? BOSS.
One life lost for burning Aggie spirit is
already too many.
As for the incident in the press boil
the question of objectivity, whynotql
tion the lack of objectivity in thisTCUl
cle. Is this what TCU calls objectivej|
nalism.
It is evident from Mr. Brock’s letter, that
when Dr. Melville discussed the various
ways in which human rights are being
violated in countries like Guatemala and El
Salvador. Mr. Brock believed this consti
tuted Marxist-Lenninist propaganda. The
only propaganda in the program were anti
communist pamphlets arbitrarily distri
buted, without consent of the local presen
ter. The program was intended to bring to
the audience the different perspectives re
lated to the conflict in Central America.
That was clearly accomplished.
Glen Gardner ‘84
Different is OK
The fact that Mr. Brock did not like the
opinions expressed by some of the panel
members, does not mean that they pro
vided mininformation. Misinformation is to
say that certain people are Marxist-
Lenninsts in an attempt to hide the fact that
they are concerned with the violence and
the profound socio-economical problems
facing these countries.
Editor:
This weekend visiting the TCU campus
we came across an article in the TCU stu
dent newspaper entitled “Aggies are a diffe
rent sort.” Paragraph after paragraph the
Horn Frogs cut down the Aggies and our
tradition-oriented school. Aggies aren’t
weird, we are just a step above the rest. We
think they have the wrong word for Aggies,
we’re not “stupid, ” we’re just one of a kind.
How can they even call us stupid when we
And what about Rev? There isasfl
chance of Reveille attacking as thereii
getting a wart from a Horn Frog.
As for our “buzzheads,” sorry F
there is no comparison to your cheerleaij
and our yell leaders. Who else canstai
the sidelines and have as much controlo 1
30 thousand people as TAMU Yell Leal
do?
Without A&M’s traditions and
backgroung A&M would be just anotij
SWC school. We have no desire to 1
anyone else. Yes, Aggies are of a dil
sort, but of a BETTER sort.
the
small society
It is true that some students did not agree
with what some of the speakers had to say;
this was very clearly demonstrated by in
sulting, threatening and pushing people
around once the meeting was over. This
only shows you their lack of education and
respect of other people’s feelings.
X PohVT ^AT
A^Y/W£"'
OttLY CALO£l&'
I was very sad to see this happen, mainly
because now I can understand how bad the
situation really is down there.
Eduardo Valdivia
Village Green
T1
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span
dark
216
Accusations about program untrui
Holly Vril
Sally Si
by Briclcmon
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