European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - September 07, 1977, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 12 the stars and stripes wednesday september 7,1977 hey Mam i Aba they Mlot Semp Art exp of Tacky James Reston intercity it s time that . Got its priorities in order president Carter spent last week end with some distressing Homework the latest labor department figures 6.9 Mil lion americans out of work 7.1 per cent Overall 14.5 for Blacks As High As an month since world War ii and 40.4 for hands. Very few times has there been this much disparity Between White and Black unemployment  figures have startled the Carter administration but maybe this is not Al bad. The president has been so Preo Ccu teen age Blacks As compared to 14.7 per pied with human rights abroad that recent for teen age Whites. Also in his Reading file a prediction by his own officials that the growth of eco nomic output would decline from 7 per cent in the first six months of 1977 to 5 per cent in the last six months also a recommendation by Jack Watson of the White House 3taff for a new selective attack on the Urban problems in nine cities and various other suggestions about How to handle his meeting with the aggrieved members of the congressional Black caucus. There is a brighter Side that president Carter can and no doubt will emphasize the Economy has perked up since the 1973 75 recession and added 6 million new jobs so that now Over 90 million americans Are employed the largest work Force in our history. Also the number of americans living below the government s poverty level has dropped from 22 per cent to 11.5 per cent in the last eight years but while Over 40 per cent of Black families now earn $10,000 a year or More Over 30 per cent of Black families Are still below the poverty line. The blackout looting in new York and the alarming incidence of crime in the Black ghettos underscores these figures. Commissioner Julius Shiskin of the Bureau of labor statistics said of the latest unemployment figures if the pre sent trend persists Many More months i think Well have a real problem on our William f. Buckley or. Carfer May yes Surprise us during the first period the excite ment was Over the question where would Jimmy Carter go nobody knew and few people resented their ignorance. Rather they Felt that if they were in the dark this was testimony to or. Carter s versatility to his comprehensive concern Over myriad problems and his political Good sense which kept him from assigning priority to a single constituency with sundering con sequences. Thus had it been during the primaries and after that during the Campaign. One week however reluctantly he would endorse the Humphrey Hawkins Bill which was drafted in the kingdom of of for the purpose of giving a Jolt to americans who mainline on Liberal ideology about unemployment. The next week he would meet in new York with great ministers of economic Power Henry Ford types and assure them of his Fidelity to the private sector. Always there was the general impression that Jimmy Carter Felt deeply about a few things. The first his religious Faith an other his belief that government had grown too Large still another that human rights about the world should receive efficacious attention from any chief executive of the United states. Then he was inaugurated and people sat around waiting. We Are still waiting. Among those who wait Are those who Are a dissatisfied Humphrey Hawkins is As Likely to been acted As the amendment to abolish the income tax b those who Are relieved or. Carter recedes As a Prophet of Utopia and c those who Are disillusioned. It is concerning the latter that i write. And do so this time around Princi Pally As a reporter rather than a believer. Or. Carter May yet Surprise us. But Here is a midyear reckoning by his critics 1. They Are saying Carter s foreign policy is the wildest act of improvisation in recent american history. He has no doctrine. It can t be said of him that he is strictly an America firster in the sense of organizing strategic arrangements around fundamental american goals. If that were so he would not be worrying about such things As human rights in Chile the repatriation of the palestinians one Man one vote in Rhodesia. Nor is there Evi Dence that he has Laid out a shrewd human rights schematic the purpose of which is to concert Universal sentiment for human rights with the idea of evolving something of a liberation St american strategy that would bedevil the great transgressors and subvert their strength. He has criticized the soviet Union Al though with diminishing emphasis. But he has left China untouched. This is on the order of criticizing crime in new York City but refusing comment on the son of  the roustabout ing of Andrew Young does not help. It simply does not persuade serious moralists that the Best interests of the United states Are served by declaring our blood brotherhood with the various dictators of the Caribbean and Africa while putting on White gloves of disdain when addressing the leaders of Rhodesia Chile or Argentina. 2. They Are saying in Domestic mat ters Carter has emerged As the friendliest enemy of big government in history. He has acquiesced not Only in preserving Power for the Federal bureaucracy he has made membership in it something of a Gold mine. There Are men in the Whitehouse in their twenties earning More than the opinions expressed in the columns and cartoons on this Page represent those of the authors and Are in no Way to be considered As representing the views of the stars and stripes or the United states government. $50,000 per year. That is spoils in the great tradition. The Energy program is in the word of Milton Friedman a fiasco. The veto of the by left people shaky if Only be cause or. Carter was reported to have said of it that it was the most difficult Deci Sion he Ever had to make. If it was that difficult that suggests there were great arguments in favor of the by. Where these purity of the nation is concerned it is both conservative and Correct to be prudent. 3. And the critics Are saying in the matter of laying Down a new philosophical groundwork for american government the answer is he has t done it and there Are no signs to suggest he is about to do so. If there is a mystique there he has not vouchsafed us its magic nor drawn from it to cast a spell. Tomorrow perhaps. There is no alternative to waiting to see. C Washington Star of anyone care to p1scoss the of Nama treat has Given the impression that he has neglected the human rights at Home he has been so concerned with the Middle East that he has seemed to Short change the Middle West so diverted by arms control Neutron bombs cruise missiles the Panama canal and being fair to Bert the free Lancer that he has t covered Home  watching a new president trying to grapple with All these Devilish problems can in fairness be too dogmatic or critical but even Jimmy Carter s friends Are now saying that maybe he has his priorities put of order and that clarity and even foreign policy begin at Home. George f. Kennan former . Ambas Sador to the soviet Union and head of the state department s policy planning staff one of the most experienced and certainly one of the most articulate foreign serv ice officers of the last 40 years has just written a very Wise Book the Cloud of danger that deals with precisely this question of  policy he insists like a great Many other things begins at Home. One of the first requirements of Clear thinking about our part of the world is the recognition that we cannot be More to others than we Are to  Kennan Points to our stubborn refusal to conserve fuel despite the appeals of the president to the appalling waste of the military Industrial defense establishment to the disintegration of our cities with their alarming rates of unemployment and crime to our declining educational Stan Dards to the corruption of press radio and television based on commercial advertising and to the shameful phenomenon of the wildfire spread of  Kennan s thesis is therefore that we Are trying to do too much abroad and doing too Little at Home. He thinks that there Are severe limits on what we May expect to accomplish in the Way of influencing the course of world events that we will be Lucky enough if we succeed in protecting the Security of our own people As Well As those few foreign Peoples who Are reason ably aware of their own stake in the endur Ance and prospering of the United states. In Kennan s View this Means the reduction of external commitments to the indispensable minimum by which he Means the preservation of the political Independence and military Security of the Western hemisphere of Western Europe Japan and As he says with the single Reserva Tion that it should not involve the dispatch of american armed forces of Israel. Kennan emphasizes and this is what president Carter is now having to face that the correction of our own problems at Home will necessitate a diversion of both attention and resources from foreign policy to Domestic concerns. In conclusion he says we must Correct ourselves before we worry too much about correcting others. We should in other words approach the problems of foreign policy with a relative humility bearing in mind that our resources Are finite and that we Are faced with certain urgent and difficult but limited tasks the successful accomplishment of which is essential to world Security and to our  we cannot for this reason afford to dissipate our attention our energies and our resources on those dreams of world betterment that Pursuit of global involvement and authority and that Moralis tic posturing which Are so congenial to the american political temperament and to the rhetoric of our Public  c new York times