Page 2/The Battalion/Friday, March 28, 1986
Opinion
U.S. wants Marcos despite overt house hunting f
Former Philip- —
pines President Fer
dinand Marcos still
is searching for a
home after being ■
shot down by Panama.
Scott
Sutherland
Guest Columnist
Now the Aquino government wants it
back.
As one administration official put it,
Marcos had all the right credentials for
residency in Panama — a hefty bank
account. What’s the beef? Why would a
country that had no qualms about pro
viding a home for the famous Shah of
Iran balk at Marcos?
It’s possible that Panama, while being
pressured on the one hand to take the
deposed kleptocrat also may have been
pressured to refuse him. The Reagan
administration’s speaking with a forked
tongue was justified. With more and
more evidence of Marcos’ thievery pour
ing in everyday, the Reagan administra
tion had good reason to keep Marcos
here.
The Panamanians cited public unrest
at the suggestion of bringing Marcos as
their major reason for not accepting the
“world’s political garbage.” But when the
deposed Shah was running from the
bloodthirsty followers of the Ayatollah,
Panama didn’t even flinch at the thought
of the public unrest that might ensue.
Nor did they mind playing the role of
trash receptacle.
Philippines Senator Jovito R. Salonga,
the sell-proclaimed Marcos buster, has
already discovered that Marcos stole mil
lions from the Filipino government.
Marcos allegedly used some of the loot to
garner real estate, homes, boats, busines
ses, rare books, paintings, flowers and
thousands of shoes for Imelda.
Apparently, a great deal of the booty
came from bribes or kickbacks that Mar
cos forced from American companies
wanting to do business in the Philip
pines. But the' majority of the dough
came directly from the Philippines
t reasury.
Unfortunately for the Philippines,
when they let Marcos go they may have
let him go for good. At the time of the
revolution, Aquino just wanted to get rid
of the creep and avoid violence. But the
evidence of pilferage is increasing every
day and Aquino would like to have him
back. But the Philippines have a limited
amount of extradition treaties. They
don’t even have one with the United
States, much less Panama. If he stays in
this country, Aquino can always rely on
the possibility of the Reagan administra
tion surrendering Marcos. Panama
might not be as willing.
In addition to stealing the Philippines
funds, Salonga charges that Marcos stole
millions, maybe billions of dollars in U.S.
aid.
This hoodwinkery was discovered af
ter Salonga reviewed only 20 percent of
the evidence against the former ruler. If
the remaining evidence, believed to be
lying in Swiss vaults, proves as damaging,
Marcos will be in real trouble. It appears
now that Salonga will have access to that
evidence now that Swiss officials have
announced a willingness to cooperate.
And as if allegations of theft and fraud
weren’t enough, reports of mass graves
are surfacing. Should those graves turn
out to be Filled with former enemies of
Marcos, then he may find himself in
front of a judge pronto.
Marcos swiped his cash from U.S.
bankers, businesses and taxpayers. And
it was legislators who provided the funds
that Marcos stole. No doubt as the results
of inquiries come rolling in, American
voters will get restless. Voters will want
someone to be held responsible. If there
is no Marcos to berate and parade across
television screens, then attention may
focus on congressmen.
For Reagan and other Republicans,
this would not be a good thing. Especially
since the Republicans in the Senate will
be facing a run for their lives in 1986.
Better to have Marcos close at hand just
in case.
The chances that Marcos might end
up in court aren’t the long shot they once
seemed. Although attorneys acknow
ledge that Iran’s effort to recoup die
Shah’s losses fizzled, they admit that
court obstacles can be overcome if the
United States government takes the
right posture. Besides, American courts
might be inclined to be more amiable to
the friendly Aquino government than
they were to the radical Ayatollah
regime.
For now it seems the administration is
keeping its options open. The Reagan
administration wouldn’t be comfortable
asking a country to take Marcos and then
two weeks later having to ask for him
back. It would greatly impugn any coun
tries dignity if first it had to look like a
pawn for acquiescing and accepting
Just how long Marcos will be ableJ
avoid a day in court is hard to say. Bu[l s j°l )
becomes ever clearer that the admin® , 1 "
l?ek,l
It
ames ever
n ation overtly will keep up appearanct
by searching f or a home for Marcos.Sel^y
retly they may like him just wherehe*^
sipping Mai Tai’s on U.S. soil.
ti
fedru
id lo
Alice
Scott Sutherland is a senior journalism "\\\
major and assistant city editor for Illpt
Battalion.
Administration’s anti-porn effort epic hypocrisy
Be h oId the
most recent issue
of P e n t ho u se
Magazine and a
gamey one it is.
There is a partially
clad wench on the
cover, a story ab
out “North Caroli
na’s Holy War on
Sex,” something
about Sikh terror
A'e di
I Just
led I
letarc
llsiiv
lean
Richard
Cohen
ists being trained in the United States
and, in this magazine so dirty that it has
been condemned by the government’s
commission on pornography, a book ex
cerpt written by, of all people, William F.
Buckley Jr.
Yes, William F. Buckley. The conser
vative- columnist. The novelist. The host
of “Fil ing Line.” T he editor of The Na
tional Review and, along with his wife,
Fat, a c lose friend of Nancy and Ronald
Reagan and a frequent visitor to the
While House. That William F. Buckley.
And, yes, that Penthouse. The same
magazine cited on page 9 of the draft
report prepared by the Attorney Gener
al’s Commission on Pornography — the
part dealing with soft-core pornogra
phy. In the draft, the commission states
that 7-Eleven stores “are the leading re
tailers of soft-core porn magazines in
America” and “the single most impor
tant outlet” for Penthouse. “Profits made
by 7-Eleven on porn run into the mil
lions.” In case you don’t get the commis
sion’s drift, Penthouse is porn.
But is it? The truth is that I don’t
know. I know it is what we used to call
dirty because, to paraphrase Justice Pot
ter Stewart, I know dirty when I see it —
and I see it all over this particular issue of
Penthouse. The letters are pornog
raphic, the photos of naked woman are
lewd and the cartoons are just plain
dumb. Yet there is also fiction by Buckley
— an excerpt from his latest novel.
Whatever it is, it is not pornographic and
neither, for that matter, was Buckley’s
July 1984, Penthouse piece on Jesse
Jackson — although, truth be known.
I’m just guessing there. I never read it.
It takes Buckley in his role as fellow
traveler of porn (a Pornko) to point up
both the absurdity of the Reagan admi
nistration’s anti-porn effort and, if I may
be so bold, its epic hypocrisy. Not only is
the president’s pal-cum-intellectual-
mentor writing for a magazine his offi
cial censors consider pornographic, but
so for that matter does his son. Young
Ron now toils for Playboy. Like me and
Saul Bellow, he is a writer.
Censors, though, are totally without
subtlety. They don’t realize that the pres
ident is not serious about pornography,
otherwise, as day follows night, he would
banish Buckley and his son from the
White House — or make them both wear
bags over their heads. Instead, the cen
sors take both the president and Ed
Meese at their w'ord. They have made up
their minds about Penthouse, Playboy
and similar magazines. They have
already defined pornography as “a se
rious national problem” and have been
up to their ears in smut trying to do
something about it. They would dearly
love to censor. Only the Constitution
stands in their way. Darn!
But others have already been moved
to action. In Washington, for instance,
the two largest drug store chains have
stopped selling Playboy, Penthouse and
similar magazines. The result of all this
misplaced moral piety is that you now
can not buy either Bill Buckley or Ron
Reagan in many a Washington drug-
stox e. T hat might not seem too serious a
blow. But if the present rules were in
effect in September 1983, you would
have had a difficult time finding the
Playboy interview with members of the
Nicaraguan junta — the same interview
the president cited in his recent televi
sion speech to the nation. The same
holds true for Jimmy Carter’s famous
lust-in-my-heart interview.
To all this, the president and his min
ions turn away — saying nothingonil
half of the free flow of ideas. Meanwf
in Washington, the yahoos of the riiij ^
prove once again that the First Araenj j(j
ment has no key on a drugstore caj
register. I he administration thumpsi ^ * r -
family values and seeks, with a comm ^
sion, to prove that pornography IJ*'
damaging. Maybe. But what is inarg p
ably damaging is c ensorship — evi k
clumsy attempts at it. That’s been prot^ ^
time and time again.
If I were William F. Buckley, filt| b
rich and world renowed, I’d be damn! y
il l would let my writ ing appear in fed
ouse. Instead, I might sit down and pen! k
letter to my friend the presidenilj^
show him what happens when the got I■
ernment sics the dogs of censorship« ^
the public’s right to know: To read Ml ^
liam F. Buckley, you have togotoadiit
bookstore.
Richard Cohen is a columnist for tkt
Washington Post Writers Group.
Mail Call
Texas before God?
EDITOR:
In the following rhetoric, I do not wish to make a “mountain out of a
molt- hill.” I simply wish to raise a question that I have been pondering. I
re alize that behind every argument is someone’s ignorance; therefore, the
point I am trying to make may seem ignorant or even ridiculous to some —
oh well.
On April 21, Texas A&M w ill take a day off to celebrate the Texas
Sesquicentennial. However, classes will not be cancelled to celebrate Good
I T iday. Therefore it could appear to some, that in the eyes of the higher-ups
at this University, Texas is more important than God.
( iouldn’t this be taking “state pride” just a bit too far?
Brad Weir
Class of 'SB
“Understanding Households and Farming Systems,” indicates that poor
approaches by international donor projects have contirbuted to the pi'oblem
of, l ather than the solution to, hunger in Africa. The famines that plague
Africa regularly hardly existed before European colonial interference.
Colonialists were responsible, for destroying Af rican rural culture and
nomadic lifestyles in favor of developing cash crop economies. Today Africa
finds itself increasingly dependent on foreign aid for its very survival. And
for this, the blacks owe us a cultural debt?
John Wendt
Graduate Student
Soil and Crop Sciences
Best of 'Police Beof
Tooting our own horns
EDITOR:
When I first read Carl Kreiger’s letter in Monday’s Battalion, I thought
that be was engaged in satirical writing, but on a second reading, I believe
that he was actually serious. Krieger implies that the rights of multinational
corporations are more important than the civil rights of black South
Af r icans. He goes on to state that black a takeover in South Africa would
result in total chaos, and that blacks are incapable of inventing so much as a
written language. He concludes that blacks in fact “. . . owe the white
minority a huge cultural debt and should at least have the courtesy to wait
for the abolition of apartheid.”
As a white who lived and worked in Africa for a year, I want to state that
the author of this letter is, among other things, grossly misinformed.
Africans indeed have their own written languages. His assumption that
South Africa would plunge into absolute chaos is ludicrous. Zimbabwe,
formerlv the nation of Rhodesia, underwent successful transition from white
minority rule to black majority rule.
Neither South African blacks nor blacks anywhere owe the white man a
“huge cultural debt.” Jane Jacqz, in her review of Dr. Joyce Moock’s book,
EDITOR:
With all the negative letters being written to The Battalion, I feel it is
time for me to speak out in support of Texas A&M’s fine newspaper.
I particularly enjoy the continuing adventure of “Police Beat.” What
student can keep a straight face while reading “Police Beat’s” immortal
classics?
Glassies such as:
• That footloose yet hardened criminal himself, the “nude man in
Hensel Park.”
• The wretched resident of Schuhmacher Hall who has “been scheduled
for termination.”
• The dastardly incident in which three male hoodlums, devoid of
clothing, teri orized the MSG, even “knocking over checkcashing signs.”
• “Police Beat” is truly a highpoint of my day and so is your newspaper.
Carry on!
Paul Hatley
Letters to the Editor should not exceed 300 words in length. The editorial staff reserves the right to
edit letters for style and length but will make every effort to maintain the author’s intent. Each letter
must be signed and must include the address and telephone number of the writer.
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Scott Sutherland c
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