Statesman Journal from Salem, Oregon • Page 7

Statesman-Journal, Salem, Tuesday, January 20, 1987, 7A Opinion ephardt, Hemp will declare Tho Associated Press Legislature considers vetoes Life resembles vintage films Rep. Richard Gephardt of Missouri will announce Feb. 23 that he will seek the 1988 Democratic presidential nomination, an aide said Monday. Gephardt will officially launch his presidential What the Legislature resembles St. Louis area district, has been an all-but-announced presidential candidate for months.

He formed a presidential exploratory committee in November, launched an effort to qualify for federal matching money, and has been building a campaign organization. Rep. Jack Kemp will declare his candidacy for the 1988 Republican presidential nomination April 6, according to his spokesman. Spokesman John Buckley said Kemp, long considered a probable candidate, will formally open his campaign on that day with press conferences in Washington, in his district in Buffalo, N.Y., and in New Hampshire and Iowa, where GOP convention delegates will be chosen early next year. Kemp, a former football quarterback with the Buffalo Bills, was first elected to Congress in 1970 from a district composed of five rural and suburban counties in western New York.

Richard Gephardt Jack Kemp Commentary Ron Blankenbaker campaign at St. Louis' Union Station, where President Harry S. Truman, celebrating his 1948 victory against Republican Thomas Dewey, was photographed holding up a newspaper with a headline that was wrong. Gephardt, 45, serving his sixth term representing a Nation if they sustain the vetoes, Campbell has a hefty rejoiner. He points out that House and Senate Democrats, by agreeing to bring up just nine of 32 bills vetoed by Atiyeh, have already killed two-thirds of the vetoed legislation without putting it to a vote.

There are two ways the Republicans could address the veto question. One would be the substantive way, weighing each bill on its merits and voting it up or down. If this occurs, it's likely that more than just nine vetoed bills will be considered because the Republicans have as much right as the Democrats to decide which bills to consider. The other option for the House GOP is to take a procedural path in which all 29 members would vote no on the entire slate of vetoed bills. Sources say this is the more likely path because it allows them to deal flatly with the veto question without being trapped into subjective considerations about voting against bills that some of them voted in favor of in 1985.

Whatever the outcome, when the veto question comes up later this week it's a safe guess that both sides will act like the Claude Raines character and try to "round up the usual suspects." Ron Blankenbaker Is a Statesman-Journal writer. His column appears live days a week. most, at times, is an old movie. Like Monday, when the House Democrats accused the House Republicans of playing political games if they chose to block the override of Gov. Vic Atiyeh's vetoes.

I mean, really! Politicians playing politics. Tisk, tisk. It was like a scene out of the 1940s classic, Casablanca, the one in which the Vichy police inspector, played by Claude Raines, walks into Humphrey Bogart's casino and, as he collects his winnings, says: "I'm shocked. Shocked to find there's gambling going on here." What the Democrats are doing is some not-so-shocking politicking of their own. They're trying to make sure their GOP colleagues are painted very much into a comer, the kind in which the paint won't be dry until the 1988 election rolls around.

Democratic Majority Leader Shirley Gold of Portland said that if the Republicans blocked the vetoes they would be running up the cost of the session because the same bills would have to be re-introduced and passed again. No one's exactly sure just what the Republicans are going to do with the vetoes, which can be overridden by a two-thirds vote by both legislative chambers. Supposedly, they'll make a decision in a closed caucus scheduled for noon today. But the suspicion has been that the Republicans, who have 29 of the 60 House votes, will sustain the vetoes. That's because of earlier strong talk by assistant Republican leader Randy Miller of Lake Oswego.

He said that the GOP might retaliate against the majority Democrats for not dealing fairly on the adoption of House rules. Actually, when' it came down to action the Democrats didn't have enough votes among themselves to be as unfair as some of their members would have liked in adopting the rules. Thus, Minority Leader Larry Campbell says that the rules are not a real issue. What is, the Eugene Republican maintains, is a request by former governor Vic Atiyeh, Atiyeh's last request before departing the Capitol, Campbell says, was that his fellow Republicans sustain his vetoes. As for a claim by Gold that the Republicans will be denying people important legislation already passed A 1rr AP photo Commuter traffic backs up on the Lonq Island Expressway in New York City on Monday, despite the federal holiday.

A strike against the Long Island Rail Road, a commuter line, is blamed for the heavy traffic. Traffic is expected to be worse today when federal employees return to work from holiday. MWtOXJLDljQttllllM ommrnm WORRIED SICK ABOUT HWOFlHfc San Francisco station will take condom ads SAN FRANCISCO (AP) Officials at a San Francisco television station say they will accept commercials for condoms. The three major television networks and some leading magazines have refused similar advertising. Officials at KRON-TV announced plans last week to accept such advertising for a trial period.

The officials said the station would require the advertisers to make a matching donation to research into AIDS, acquired immune deficiency syndrome. Public health officials, including the U.S. surgeon general, have cited condoms as the best way to prevent the spread of the disease, barring abstinence. NBC, ABC and CBS and several leading magazines have turned down condom ads recently. They have cited longstanding policies against contraceptive advertising because such ads may offend portions of their audiences.

Soviet woman arrives in U.S. for treatment WASHINGTON (AP) Soviet dissident Inna Meiman arrived from Moscow on Monday to begin cancer treatment. She said, "I've been tortured for three years" by the refusal of Soviet authorities to let her go sooner. She left behind her ill husband, Naum Meiman, 75, a mathematician and human rights activist who has been denied permission to leave the Soviet Union. "It was such anguish for me to leave alone that I can't talk about it," she said after arriving at Washington Dulles International Airport.

Meiman, 54, planned to enter Georgetown University Hospital for evaluation and treatment of cancer, Jerry Strober, spokesman IET UNION! Morgan Hill and was measured at 4.3 on the Richter scale, according to researchers at the University of California Seismographic Stations at Berkeley. CIA Director Casey still in stable condition WASHINGTON (AP) CIA Director William Casey remains in for the National Conference on Soviet Jewry, said. Texas prisons make room for new convicts HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) -The Texas prison system began accepting new convicts Monday. Weekend paroles, which pushed the inmate population number below a mandated ceiling designed to avoid overcrowding, provided the openings for inmates. The prison system closed its doors to new arrivals Friday after the inmate count exceeded a cap mandated by state law.

The statute was passed in 1983 after a federal judge ordered officials to take steps to reduce overcrowding in the state's penitentiaries. Minor quake shakes San Francisco area MORGAN HILL, Calif. (AP) -A minor earthquake hit the southern San Francisco Bay area Monday. The temblor caused no damage or injury, officials said. The temblor was centered near stable condition recovering from brain surgery, Georgetown University Hospital officials said Monday.

A hospital spokeswoman said there has been no change in Casey con- W. -dition since a William Casey statement issued last week reported he was in stable condition, but experiencing speech difficulties and weakness on his right side. Casey, 73, is undergoing radiation therapy for cancer that doctors found when they removed a tumor from his brain on Dec. 18. Letters sions have been made to protect our rights, even at the very costly expense of possibly allowing a heinous offender to go free.

James H. Casey Dallas TOE WE REPLAC, SHEWS thaw jus mm la af i -L 1 Mrs. Goldschmidt I was not aware Mrs. Goldschmidt was elected to office along with her husband. In a state where the economy has already hit an all-time low, I resent his request to hire her a half-time secretary at a rate of $940 a month.

If he is really wanting to help the economy, let her do her own work, as many of us do. Influence is a great thing if used in the right way. He is using it to benefit his own home. Doris F. Griffin Salem 'Amerika' I just read that the film "Ameri-ka" is going to be shown on TV in February.

I was shocked and horrified that my country could be so hateful as to allow the making and showing of such a hate-filled picture. What are we trying to do? Start World War III? Destroy the world? The greatest sadness in life is the lack of knowledge of the majority of American people. Our president always calls the Soviet Union the "Evil Empire." Yet no Soviet soldier has ever set foot on American soil, nor have they killed American citizens. If we really care about the love that Jesus spoke of, we should write our congressman and senators asking them to stop this vicious picture. Gladys Schubert Stayton 00 become their bosses is offensive.

I believe the writer of that piece of trash owes both men and women an apology. Jerry Medlock Salem Paper's punch Salem is a political town; Oregon's seat of government. Political columnist Ron Blankenbaker serves the same function as Jack Anderson does for Washington, D.C. His column shines more light into smoke-filled rooms and dark corners than all the reporters assigned to cover the Legislature. They can't replace Ron's experience.

I must say, it's not at all comforting to learn that much of the Statesman-Journal's legislative reporting is going to come from a consortium of reporters and the wire services. Such common-denominator reporting can be had in the broadcast media! The Statesman-Journal has become limp editorially and scarcely interesting to read. Gone is the seasoned, perhaps more sage, wisdom of Charles Sprague, Wes Sullivan, Bill Bebout or Jim Welch. Is it Gannett's intent to turn the Statesman-Journal into a Reader's Digest newspaper a la USA TODAY? Mary Eyre Salem Military justice I read the letter from Mike Pon-gracz, of Salem, concerning military justice, and the rights of Adm. Poindexter and Col.

North under the Fifth Amendment. The writer said President Reagan should solve this problem of silence by bringing them before a military tribunal and issuing to them a direct order to furnish the answers to those questions. We do not need Inquisition-style tactics to get to the bottom of this. The authors of our Constitution felt that not learning the answers would be far better than resorting to the use of those tactics. The most probable reason Reagan has not convened a military tribunal is because he knows full well the very legal response, under provisions of Article 31 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, he would receive.

This is America. Whether in a civilian or military court, provi- the governor Now we have the governor we have needed for a long time. We can't expect him to be a magician. Our beautiful state is mostly phased out for the working people. I watched the beautiful inauguration with pride, as I have lived in this beautiful state for 75 years.

Now we the people and the Legislature must get behind our governor. We know he can do it put our state back on the map. M. Brenenstahl Salem And so it begins The governor's son holds court in his father's office, and his daughter will attend a school of her choice. The governor's ball will be in Portland, and the governor wants more than 7 million tax dollars for Portland's convention center.

I breathlessly await the next three years and 364 days! Mary Lo Stoudenmeyer Salem Logic and hell Logic does not teach that if there is a heaven there must be a hell. Logic inquires, rather, if God is love, why would He permit the vast majority of mankind to be eternally tormented? The answer is simple He doesn't. Perhaps no Christian doctrine incites greater passions than this one. How relieved many would be to know the truth about the Bible hell the hidden state, not eternal torture. We believe it to be a common failing of the present and all times for people to believe certain doctrines because others did so, in whom they had confidence.

Many doctrinal errors have in ignorance been promulgated by sincere individuals. Ron Miller Salem 'Piece of trash' The editorial "Women inch forward" was not an inch forward for women, but an attempt at prying men back. The premise that all 'Women who get pregnant are super-capable employees, and all males dolts who don't and would A happen to commercial and residential glass replacement. Mirrors, too. Your commercial-residential needs receive the same superior service that made us famous in auto glass replacement.

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Many people know we're the greatest thing to ever happen to auto glass. And they're quite right. But what they dont know is that we're also the greatest thing to ever Salem: 371-1777 About letters Trie Statesman-Journal welcomes letters Irom readers Letters to the editor must give the writers address and must be signed. They must include street address or post office box number (not for publication, but lor verification). Copies ot letters to other individuals or publications will not be published.

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