Hartford Courant from Hartford, Connecticut • Page 35

CI 2 Friday, July 10, 1W2 1 RAYMOND A. JANSEN Publisher MICHAEL E. WALLER Editor JOHN J. ZAKARIAN Editorial Page Editor DAVID S. BARRETT, Managing Editor HENRY McNULTY, Associate Editor Established 1764 THE OLDEST CONTINUOUSLY PUBLISHED NEWSPAPER IN AMERICA I it itiuieoiiMuiift Mr.

Clinton's insider pick if it fg It WWW Hlt A he choice of Sen. Albert Gore Jr. of Tennessee to round out the Democratic ticket was a matter of risky but potentially fruitful planning on the part of Gov. Bill Clinton of Arkansas, the party's presumed presidential nominee. Mr.

Gore is a key part of the Democrats' Southern strategy an attempt to pick off Southern and border states that, with the exception of 1976, have been the heart of the Republican base since Richard M. Nixon won in 1968. This strategy may be especially effective in a three-way race. If the Democrats' Arkansas-Tennessee axis can erode some of President Bush's strength in Dixie and do well in traditionally Democratic states, while Ross Perot denies the incumbent a major prize such as Texas, there could be a new occupant in the White House come January. Mr.

Gore, 44, is an attractive choice for other reasons: The Democrats can field a "new generation" team Mr. Clinton is 43 while Mr. Bush and Mr. Perot are in their 60s. The younger team should be able to appeal to many in the huge baby-boom generation and to younger voters.

The senator is also a leading environmentalist, an expert on national security issues lending "toughness" to the ticket. And, as a moderate, Mr. Gore fits with Mr. Clinton's aim of steering the Democratic Par ty closer to the middle of the road. His wife, Tipper Gore, who has campaigned against obscenity and violence in rock-music lyrics, can be expected to be a front-line soldier in the battle over which party can best represent "family values." The risky part? The Democrats seem not to have a Northern strategy.

Although Mr. Gore went to Harvard and Mr. Clinton graduated from Yale Law School and was a Rhodes scholar, this might appear to be a corn-pone ticket to New Englanders and Rust Belt Democrats used to seeing at least one Northern nominee. But regional balance may well be a requirement of the past. More worrisome is Mr.

Gore's insider status in a year when outsiders are supposed to have an advantage and professional politicians are being scorned by many. Capable and popular, the Tennessee senator is nonetheless a politician through and through. He is part of a family political dynasty that came to power in Tennessee in 1938. He was born and raised in Washington, D.C., while his father served in the House and Senate. The younger Gore first ran for Congress when he was only 28 and has held office ever since.

Long experience in Washington is his baggage. The Democrats have to hope that his undeniable strengths can overcome it. Marriage and domestic violence Cuban exiles need to calm down I almost missed the news story on the new marriage-license surcharge, in which several people objected to the connection made between domestic violence and marriage June 27, "Marriage surcharge I was in New Hampshire providing support to my younger sister whose father-in-law had just shot and killed his wife of more than 35 years. Each day in this country, between four and 10 women are punched, smothered, choked, stabbed or shot to death by their partners or ex-partners. Of the 10 Connecticut women killed by an intimate partner in 1991, four were murdered by their spouses.

Last year, almost 30 percent of the 21,520 family violence incidents resulting in arrest in this state not 108 incidents, as the article reported involved spouses or ex-spouses. National studies indicate that domestic violence is a problem in 25 percent to 50 percent of all marriages. In one in eight marriages, serious injury will be inflicted. One in seven women will be raped by her husband. As uncomfortable as it may be to acknowledge, domestic violence and sexual assault are pervasive and serious, affecting all of us.

State funding for rape-crisis and domestic-violence programs is woefully inadequate in the face of current and increasing demands for the critical services these programs provide. Expanded funding will allow us to provide services and support to more women, men and children victimized by physical and sexual abuse. It will also mean that we can continue to enhance essential violence-prevention work providing information to young people designed to support the development of nonviolent, non-coercive relationships. If the Connecticut Town Clerks Association feels compelled to point out to those purchasing marriage licenses that part of the fee will support domestic-violence and rape-crisis programs, maybe it can go the extra step and help us distribute information about nonviolent conflict resolution to those embarking on married life together. By thinking constructively and working together, as the Legislature did when it passed the five bills that make up the 1992 Violence Against Women Initiative, we can help create more workplaces, campuses and homes in which all members feel valued, supported and safe.

Anne Menard Executive Director Connecticut CoaUtion Against Domestic Violence Hartford Starting a new life I came to America from Moscow five months ago. I. am so thankful to this country for the way it admits refugees from Russia. The U.S. government gave us free medical insurance.

Jewish Family Services of Greater Hartford gave us money to live, helped us look for jobs and helped with many other problems we had. The program for old and disabled people impressed me most of all. The Russian people, who worked hard through their whole lives for their native country and earned nothing, receive help from the United States. I am independent here. I have a lot of challenging opportunities.

Certainly, my family does have some problems, but they are not as severe as in the former Soviet Consider the last episode. Over the weekend a group of four men three Cuban-Americans and a former Black Panther who had spent 11 years in prison in Cuba took a speedboat into Cuban waters and tried to pick up two friends who were to meet them on a raft. They got lost; then the boat ran aground. They managed to head back out to sea, but the boat broke down. They contacted the U.S.

Coast Guard by radio. The Americans sensibly told them they had no permission to enter Cuban waters to rescue them. But after Tony Bryant, the former Black Panther, pleaded with them, they came and rescued the would-be rescuers. That the fiasco ended without an international incident was pure luck. Imagine for a minute what would have happened if the Coast Guard vessel had been fired on even sunk by a Cuban one.

The Cubans would have been within their rights. U.S. administrations are loath to antagonize the rabidly anti-communist Cuban exile community. That's probably why no one has had the nerve to tell them to cool it. But the Coast Guard should not feel obliged to rescue the foolhardy souls who set out on such misguided missions of mercy.

The government should make it clear that these compulsive commandos are on their own. dome wealthy person could do America a very big favor by paying for a course in transcendental meditation for the Cuban exile community. Some of these folks need to find their centers. For too long their quixotic fantasies of recapturing the motherland have been encouraged by various U.S. covert agencies, and they seem to be the only group left in the world that hasn't yet got the news that the Cold War is over.

The old men of China still cling to their Marxist-Leninist ways, but they're no help to Cuba's Fidel Castro, the last left-wing dictator in the Western Hemisphere. Without the support of the Soviet Union, it's all Mr. Castro can do to feed his increasingly disgruntled people. The Berlin Wall fell, in the end, not by force of arms but of ideas. The famous 90 miles of turquoise water separating the United States from one of its last ideological enemies will be breached the same way.

Every time a bunch of "commandos" tries to pull off some harebrained raid, whether trying to march on Havana or smuggle out a few relatives, it only helps fuel Mr. Castro's propaganda machine. See those silly lackeys of the evil Yanquis? Who do they think they are, the Keystone Contras? A war on poverty could quell urban violence Team USA slam dunks its way Barbara T. Roessner really missed the mark with her "Squirt guns don't kill people real ones do" column, June 17). While I agree with her that banning the Super Soaker is an absurd attempt to reduce inner-city violence, she is naive to think that adding more gun legislation will affect the crime rate.

One has only to look to nearby New York City, home of the toughest gun-control laws in the country, to see that gun control does not equal crime control. The real cause of violence in the inner cities of America is poverty. When the best that America offers its citizens is service-oriented jobs that pay $7.50 an hour, how can we expect the nuclear family to survive? Not everyone wants to or can afford to go to college. Should that make them sentenced to a life of minimum-wage labor? If this country does not regain its manufacturing base by rejecting the New World order, the North American Free Trade Agreement and the relocation of manufacturing jobs to Mexico the standard of living in America will continue to decline. 1 he U.S.

Olympic basketball "dream" team, composed of the sport's biggest stars, inspires enormous pride but leaves at least a few rooters with a bruised sense of fair play. As hyped, this team, with Magic Johnson, Larry Bird and Michael Jordan, may well be the best ever assembled. It may be too good. The team tore through the recent Tournament of the Americas, the qualifying competition for the Olympics in Barcelona, defeating opponents by an average of nearly 52 points. In horse racing, that would be like winning the Kentucky Derby by 20 lengths not much of a contest but an awe-inspiring performance by the winner.

America seems to be getting over its obsession to yell "We're No. 1." The Persian Gulf war and capitalism's "victory" over communism two other mismatches did a lot to restore this country's much-desired status as the best, the most powerful, the most influential. (The French cultural minister's hysterical warnings about the profusion of American pop culture boost the national ego, too.) But just as generals are said to fight the last war when preparing for a new one, so this collection of National Basketball Association All-Stars seems to be looking for an opponent that no longer exists. In the past, the Soviet Union beat us at our own game by putting what amounted to a group of professionals on the court. The United States finally has permission to play its pros not a bad idea, the best in every sport competing in the Olympics but the Soviet team, like the Soviet Union, no longer exists.

Sure, some teams will be thrilled just to have their pictures taken with the U. S. juggernaut. And others will be content knowing that the best they can hope for is a silver medal. The challenge now for the U.

S. team is not winning, but doing so graciously. The Soviet bullies are gone. Team USA shouldn't take their place. John Overmyer Special to The Courant Until all Americans can work for an honest wage, feed their families and afford the basics in life, the inner cities will be violent.

Rather than ransack the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, let's declare war on poverty in this country. Besides, both black and white patriots may need their guns after November. David M. Glueck Middlefield Union. I am happy that my son will grow up in America.

I know, in this country, he will have a future. Nataly L. Zaslavsky West Hartford Restitution for crime Sentencing a person who embezzled more than $73,000 to three years in jail at a cost of an additional $60,000 raises questions about our judicial system news story, June 13, "Ex-state worker gets three years for Why pay for three years of room, board and medical care by incarcerating the defendant in an already crowded prison? I am glad a substantial part of the embezzled funds was recovered, and that she must repay the balance during the five years of probation after her prison term. I believe a better investment of state money, rather than spending it on her imprisonment and care for her children, would be to help her find a job, provide close supervision and require her to repay all of the embezzled money plus interest and pay a substantial fine and court costs. If no job is located for her promptly, she should be assigned to meaningful community service in which her considerable talents could be used to benefit society.

Perhaps the state needs a committee to create punishment options available to judges that could deter crime, reduce the need for costly prisons, make punishments fit the crime and require financial retribution that can reimburse society for costs resulting from the crime. William A. Kennedy Coventry Correction A July 1 news story carried a headline, in early editions, that used the phrase "Pro-abortion rally." That headline, which later was changed to "Abortion-rights rally," was criticized by Adria F. Klotz in a letter to the editor July 9. The wrong headline, and a wrong date, were added to Klotz's letter by an editor.

The news story itself did not use the phrase Return Megan Marie to her family Route 154? No, Route 9A I was sickened when I read about Judge John T. Downey's order to remove Megan Marie from her loving and responsible foster parents, Cindy and Jerry La-Flamme, so she could be returned to the teenage birth mother who abandoned her news story, July 2, "Foster parents forced to surrender Our lawmakers and jurists say they seek to uphold individual rights, yet Downey demonstrates contempt for the child's right to be brought up in a stable family environment by a couple who have shown her love and security. This decision will eliminate any apprehensions of mothers who abandon their newborns in malls, fast-food restaurants and Dump-sters. The system cannot allow this decision to stand while bemoaning the decay of the family. Isn't it time to employ some common sense and decency in our courts? Lisa S.

Murphy Glastonbury Famous among New England stories are the directions given to tourists lost on a back road: "Go about a mile up this way and take a turn where the old Smith place used to be." In OUR TOWNS Haddam 8C Neighbors highway was built, was an old friend. Route 154 is somebody's idea of making maps neater. In 1986, businesses on 9A complained that the new route number would discourage people from leaving the highway. The A designation was a tip that the road ran parallel to the highway and was a way to see scenery and visit some town centers. In fact, a comparison of traffic flow in the Higganum section in 1983 before the route number was changed and in 1989, after the switch, showed a 10 percent increase, which is normal growth considering population and development trends.

There is no way to know if traffic would have been heavier if the route number had not been changed. A public hearing would test the strength of the sentimental choice and of those favoring 154. If the switch is made and more tourists do leave Route 9, it would mean more inquiries about directions. In Maine, the legendary reply is a bemused "you can't get there from here." At least in Haddam they could say "just stay right on 9A." Haddam, the advice might be to take Route 9A but follow signs that say Route 154. It has been six years since the state, ostensibly to make distinctions clearer to travelers, changed the signs on 9A to 154.

But locals still call it 9A. So many people prefer the 9A designation that the Haddam division of the Middlesex Chamber of Commerce asked the state to change it back. The state should. The road's path parallel to the main highway Route 9 would be clearer to outsiders without hurting local communities. Roads develop personalities for regular users.

Route 9 which waRoute 9 before the four-lane Whowesre The Courant's opinions on issues and people are expressed only on thjs page, and only in the column under the heading, editorials. Those participating in the formulation and writing of the newspaper's institutional positions are: Publisher Raymond A. Jansen, Editor Michael E. Waller, Editorial Page Editor John J. Zakarian, Deputy Editorial Page Editor Robert K.

Schrepf, Deputy Editor for Commentary Op-ed Elissa Papirno, Town Editorials Editor George Graves, Editorial Writers Robert F. Murphy, Peter B. Pach, Daryl Perch, David H. Rhinelander and Susanna Rodell, Op-ed Page Editor Bill Williams, Letters Editor Andre Barnett and Columnist Don Noel 5- i.