Arizona Republic du lieu suivant : Phoenix, Arizona • Page 30

ffllEDITlOflS A30 SATURDAY, DECEMBER 13, Published since 1946 by: Phoenix Newspapers, Inc. 120 E. VanBuren Phoenix, Ariz. 85004 The Arizona Republic Founded in 1890 PAT MURPHY Publisher WM.R.HOGAN Vice PresidentGeneral Manager EUGENE C. PULLIAH 1889-1975 Publisher, 1946-1975 PHIL SUNKEL Editor of the Editorial Paget CONRAD KLOH Director ot Sales EUGENE S.

PULLIAM President ALAN MOYER Managing Editor BILL SHOVER I Director of Community Services Where The Spirit Of The Lord Is, There Is Liberty II Corinthians 3: 1 7 EDITORIALS IKtNG HOLIDAY A Gathering Storm LETTERS Reagan: Web History Erring Editor. Editor: Aid To flavajos Editor Two recent articles in the Republic concerning Navajo Indians cause a person to wonder what the relationship is between the tribal council and the general population on the reservation. In one case, it was proposed by the council that the tribe spend thousands to celebrate the change in leadership. In the other instance, an effort by a non-Indian group to aid needy Indians on the reservation was publicized. It would appear that there is plenty of income to provide adequate aid to all Navajos.

If there is a legitimate need, most people would be glad to contribute. Anyone who has driven from Flagstaff to Page this time of year through that inhospitable territory would sympathize with any person living there who was hungry and cold. MARVIN A. PRINGLE Phoenix Luther King Jr. Day.

Babbitt then opted to add one extra state holiday at an estimated cost of $2.5 million in lost productivity. An attorney general's opinion said it was an illegal declaration, but nobody has tested it in court. If we correctly interpret the words of Ron Bellus, Mecham's press secretary, not even pressure from President Reagan will change the mind of the new administration. And now the key argument in favor of rescission seems to be the question of illegality, and an immaterial fear that "the governor will be sued." Why not let the courts decide? While the issue was being adjudicated, legislation could be readied for immediate passage should the courts knock down Babbitt's executive order. Two options have surfaced.

Tucson Republican Sen. Greg Lunn plans to re-introduce his unsuccessful bill of last session that parallels the federal system. Tucson GOP Rep. Jim Green proposes a public referendum to select the third Sunday in January, a tactic that saves state funds and avoids an embarrassing confrontation between GOP majority legislators and the Mecham administration. Lunn's bill is the better plan, yet Mecham mysteriously has failed to say if a legislative solution is acceptable.

The furthest he has commented is that perhaps the public should vote on the issue. Green's proposal is flawed. Far too often state lawmakers duck the tough decisions they are paid to make. The Mecham administration is engaged in self-delusion if it believes the King holiday is an issue blown out of proportion. The longer it remains intransigent, the darker the clouds will become.

THE ill-advised insistence of Evan Mecham to rescind a holiday honoring slain civil rights leader Martin 'Luther King and his failure to outline precisely what he could support legislatively, are sowing the seeds of divisiveness in Arizona. Black community leaders have played a role in that division by describing Mecham as a man with "a racist mentality," a groundless accusa-t tiori that serves only to exacerbate the building 'tension. Mecham has dug himself a hole politically in I vowing to follow through on his oft-repeated rescission promise when he assumes office next I month. The national media will take notice, as will civil rights groups. The King Federal Holiday Commission chaired by King's widow, Coretta Scott King has passed a condemning resolution noting that only 11 states have no holiday in honor of King.

National Republican figures, such as New York Jack Kemp, are urging Mecham to reconsider. Protest rallies are expected to peak on Jan. 19, King's birthday. Yet despite the gathering storm, Mecham refuses to budge. Early in this unfortunate saga, Mecham seemed to base much of his argument on the belief that only two presidents deserve days in their honor: George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.

The implication was that King, who preached brotherhood and equality for all races and was instrumental in reversing centuries of racial discrimination, was undeserving. Secondarily, Mecham made note of the manner in which outgoing Gov. Bruce Babbitt decreed the King holiday. To be sure, there was a tinge of politics associated with Babbitt's national political aspirations. The Legislature had, days earlier, failed by one vote to enact a law that would conform Arizona to the federal system of a President's Day and a Martin It's been written that Nero fiddled while Rome burned, and that Nixon met his Waterloo at Watergate.

Now that President Ronald Reagan is sweating it out because of the Iran deal, claiming he knew nothing about it, I find it hard to untangle the web he weaves to deceive us. With all the negative coverage and hullabaloo being generated by the latest presidential boo-boo, I think it's highly appropriate to label it "blabbergate." JOHN R. HARRIS Tucson Editor: I am not a student of history but, in regard to the Reagan predicament, history has another lesson to tell of a presidency damaged by political friendship and misplaced trust. Specifically, I mean the Woodrow Wilson-Col. Edward House relationship.

Wilson acted as his own secretary of State, distrusted Congress and delegated authority to Col. House by whom he (Wilson) was completely captivated. As a result, in the pre-armistice and early Treaty of Versailles negotiations, Col. House was allowed to create rather than follow policy. This led to serious tactical errors, and Wilson was forced to disavow some of the actions of his chief negotiator.

I think President Reagan should, like Wilson, take the tiger by the tail and disavow the political friendships which have led him already too far down the garden Nothing is sacred in Washington, D.C., and nothing is a secret. So why all this holier-than-thou attitude of the Democrats? It's time for everyone to start worrying about this country and stop tearing it apart for the sake of parties and egos. The hostages were warned to leave. The blame should be on them, and not on the president and the United States. It is time people started using their own minds, instead of being led like sheep to the slaughter.

MARGARET L.JENK Scottsdale Editor: The intent was good, but the operation was very poorly handled. Now Dan Rather, Sam Donaldson and many others are putting all the emphasis on the poor handling and none on the plan, which was to bring Iran back into the fold, end the silly continuing Iran-Iraq war and return the hostages. They have killed this plan. If there was ever a tempest in a teapot, it was Watergate. Richard Nixon became "Dirty Dick" because he made the mistake of trying to cover up the silly, inept, illegal entry into a political headquarters by some underlings in his party.

I am sure that history will show that Nixon was a capable president (it has already started), just as the opinion of Harry Truman has changed. The media have made many mistakes in their judgment of people just read statements regarding Abraham Lincoln before 1 he was assassinated. WILLARD L. ERICKSON Phoenix Big Ben Is Off Editor: According to an article in the Republic, Londoners have noticed that Big Ben has been skipping a note while pealing out its melodious ding-dong. A rod had snapped on the bell that plays the note in the sequence of sharp, sharp, and C.

The way to really get the attention of the Londoners would be to use the sequence listed. There would be no in the above sequence. It should be a B. It is interesting to learn that the clock chimes are pitched in the key of E. I can now check our wall clock to see if it matches Big Ben.

RUSSTHORSON Mesa SPENDING path of irresponsibility. J. M. RICHARD Sun City How Much Goes For Defense? Press Should Just Report The Hews Editor: and discuss the shortcomings of our Publisher Pat Murphy's column on the media fairness issue is typical of the thinking of the press. He extolls the virtue of adversaries, each able to speak his point of view, and how wonderful this is under our First Amendment.

In his example, the only thing he Kennedy was president. The Soviet Union spends 14 percent of its GNP on defense. When one considers the Soviets' GNP is approximately half that of the United States, the Russian defense burden is almost four times as great as ours. The average American believes that 45 percent of the defense budget $100 billion goes to waste and fraud, an incredible figure when one considers that more than 50 percent of the defense budget goes for fixed personnel, maintenance and operation costs. And what of nuclear forces? What part of the defense budget goes for these weapons of mass destruction? Perhaps 25 percent, 50 percent, more? Actually, less than 5 percent of defense spending goes toward our nuclear deterrent Over the last 20 years, defense spending as a percent of both the GNP and the federal budget has declined.

In constant 1987 dollars it has remained virtually unchanged since 1965, while steadily rising nondefense governmental spending has been primarily responsible for the escalation in the federal deficit failed to mention was that in the confrontation between the president and an impertinent Sam Donaldson, was that the Fourth Estate has the right to pick and choose what they feel should be reported. The president does not have this luxury and often has his THE average American doesn't have the foggiest idea of how much money the federal government spends each year on defense. According to an appendix based on a survey of public attitudes in the report of the President Reagan's blue-ribbon commission on defense management, the average citizen thinks the 4 government spends twice as much as it actually does on defense. A majority of Americans believes the government spends 46 percent of the federal budget on defense. The actual figure for 1985, a year of real growth in defense spending, was 26 percent.

One must go back to the mid-1950s to find a 'year in which defense spending approached half of the federal budget In 1985, defense spending equalled 6.7 'percent of the gross national product The portion of the federal budget spent on social welfare programs totals 10.8 percent of the GNP, up from 4.8 percent when John F. national elected leaders. The president does not have access to this daily barrage of outgoing news to the people. It is an unfair game when you strike out at an opponent, knowing full well he cannot retaliate. It is also cowardly.

Free speech triumphs, as Murphy 6ays, but only for the free press. In the latest controversy, it is not the president who has lost credibility, it is the press and especially the TV commentators-who can find nothing but fault in our government, and especially in the executive office. In its zeal, the press has become a divisive element in our society, disturbing the harmony. Report the news, and let us judge for ourselves. We do not need Sam Donaldson, John Chancellor, the snide remarks from Washington Week In Review and others.

EARL HANSEN Sun City West The Harvey Girls Editor: I would like to correct some misinformation in Peter Rose's article in Travel, Nov. 30. First, the Harvey Girls were never couriers. The couriers of the Southwest Indian Petours of the Fred Har-veySante Fe combination were guides chosen from universities, etc. Also, they never wore the Harvey Girls black-and-white uniform but were, instead, attired in Indian-influenced jackets and skirts with campaign-type hats and Indian jewelry.

Also, Fred Harvey himself had been dead many years when the Detours were started. I know. I wrote the carefully researched book The Southwest Indian Detours. DIANE THOMAS Phoenix points de-emphasized or obscured. Reporters, at their leisure, can shift through information and tapes of interviews, and select what suits them.

Their judgement is a form of personal censorship. They print or broadcast according to their perspective of an issue. The press also controls the na tions communications system, and can editorialize, analyze, criticize Fly Fishermen Live For The Beauty And The Challenge Richard Lessner Editorial Writer The Arizona Republic for the hydroelectric power the dam produces. This makes fishing here interesting at the least, and at times positively dangerous. I'm a fly fisherman out of conviction and passion.

What is the appeal of fly fishing? Many things. The grace and rhythm of casting a fly line; the knowledge of trout, stream and aquatic insect biology that is required; the satisfaction of deceiving with one's own handiwork a creature highly adapted by millions of years of natural selection; the intimacy with nature; the elegant literature and hoary tradition of the pursuit; the sense of snobbery and elitism the fly-fishing fraternity boasts over other forms of angling; the comradery and solitariness; and the fact that trout have the sense to live in only the most beautiful of places. ters of Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, and the intimate mountain creeks of Arizona's Mogollon Rim. Back in the 1960s, when Glen Canyon Dam was completed, a tailrace fishery was created in the Grand Canyon. The once warm and muddy Colorado was now clear and cold with the water coming out of the 600-foot depths of Lake Powell.

The constant year-round temperature and abundance of a small fresh water shrimp combined to produce a remarkable trout habitat. Despite management problems, the Colorado River at Lees Ferry and throughout the Grand Canyon is today one of the premier big-trout fisheries in the nation. The level of the river fluctuates as the water flow through Glen Canyon is increased or decreased by a computer in Denver according to the demand fury and brute strength, the tired and yielding fish comes into the teardrop-shaped landing net. Gently supporting the fish's weight in the palm of my hand, I slip the barbless hook out of its jaw. For a moment I admire the three-pound Kamloops Rainbow trout's flaming and heavily spotted flanks, then I lower it into the water, holding it in the current until it has revived, smiling privately as it darts back into the arms of the river with an urgent thrust of its tail.

I've fly fished for trout all over the West: In the Guadalupe River of Texas; the Chama of northern New Mexico; the Conejos of southern Colorado. I've caught California Golden trout, the riverine jewels of the High Sierras and yearling salmon in British Columbia. I've fished the legendary wa hook dressed with a bit of rabbit fur, thread and copper wire. The fly is my own creation, something I've fashioned with my own hands at my fly-tying bench. The leaden waters swallow the fly as it is swept downstream.

The end of the bright yellow fly line hesitates for an instant, just the slighest pause in the normal drift of the line. I lift the rod and the line comes taut, heavy with an unseen weight. A silver and red torpedo rockets out of the water, scattering drops like brilliant diamonds in the sun now breaking over the rim of the canyon. Into the heavy current the fish flees, running frantically for deep water, testing tackle and skill. Suddenly in the air again, strong head shaking, trying desperately to throw the hook.

After 10 minutes of alternating ing slowly awakens, the temperature steadily drops. Ice accumulates in the guides of my 9-foot graphite fly rod and I have to dip it into the 47-degree river water to free it of the tiny glaciers. Standing hip-deep in the frigid and treacherously swift water of the Colorado River, trying to maintain a precarious balance on moss-covered rocks resemble nothing so much as greased cannon balls on a dark and bitterly cold winter morning might seem to verge on insanity for many people, but there are few places I rather be, few things I'd rather be doing. I'm a fly fisherman. Fighting the Colorado's unrelenting current, I cast the fly up and slightly across stream.

At the end of the silken strand of delicately tapered monofilament leader is a Lees Ferry, Ariz. The golden line of the sun creeps slowly down the vermillion-colored canyon walls, while the depths of the gorge remain shrouded in a mantle of cold gray. A flight of Canada geese wing overhead in echelon formation. Morning mist rises off the river and swirls around the salt cedars lining the shore. Dawn on the Colorado River.

The sun warms the upper atmo-, sphere, driving the colder air downward toward the ground. As morn- I.