European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - January 31, 1981, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 12 the stars and stripes january 1981 it Rush me i have 10 find the head John Kifner loss of hostages weapon has Iran in muddle for the islamic Republican party of the hard Days of Power May be just the release of the 52 the weapon the religious traditionalists used Lor 14 months to solidify their May Mark a turning Point in the course of the attention and political Battles will now focus on the difficult issues of running Iran the War with the faltering second and More the settlement May prove a setback to islamic Republican leaders having made the hostage Issue a test of revolutionary in May find themselves attacked by even their own partisans for having compromised with the great the islamic Republican party is less a formal political organization than the embodiment of a shared idea that the Politi Cal and religious traditions of shiite islam Are a key not Only to revolution but to the perfect to a islamic republicans have the attributes of a political their clubhouses Are the mosques in every Village and City neighbourhood their picnics and Rubbe Chicken the religious processions and ceremonies that Mark the islamic year their Ward the Friday prayer there is even a sort of patronage system in institutions that have emerged parallel to the such As the revolutionary guards and the construction which figuratively is a holy War to rebuild the but the party is not a disciplined National capable of delivering voters or clearly formulating Given the fact that Iran political tradition has been one of absolute dictatorship leavened Only by corruption and the Lack of sophisticated political institutions is not sur one of the major failures of the liberals surrounding president Abolhassan who has been unable to translate his landslide election into real is that they have not established a political the islamic Republican party Structure is so vague that it is often unclear whether leading individuals actually belong to it or merely generally subscribe to its the party operates through a series of commis Sions in and As is so often the it is not Clear where the religious political organization ends and government institutions for one the office of the cultural is supposed to supervise the islamic nation of the University but it has spent much of its time attacking meaning much of the political infighting is carried on through the party the islamic which carries fulminating editorials with titles like colonialism and liberalism part the openness of the debate is unprecedented in and the liberals answer with their own the islamic published by and the Organ of former provisional prime minister Mahdi the Eminence behind the islamic re pub George Mair Laicans is Ayatollah Mohammed a grave voiced i fighter who also holds the position of chief Justice of the supreme once an official of the ministry of education under the he later held a favored Job in ministering to the religious needs of iranians if he came to the revolution he soon became important he was Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini operative in Tehran when the Shah was overthrown and super Vised the arrangements for the ayatollahs return from 15 years of the parliament is run by another key speaker Howato Heslam Hashemi jailed and tortured under the he injects the debates with doses of sarcasm when the legislators All but a handful turbaned mullahs become car ried away with the sound of their own which is another influential figure is Howato Heslam Mousavi who was a religious adviser to the militants who seized the embassy and is now Khomeini representative on the supreme defense Council running the War with several other men were prominent in the hostage notably prime min ister Mohammad Ali Rajai and executive affairs minister Behzad the two were jail mates under the imprisoned for belonging to guerrilla Rajai is a unprepossessing Man who was once in charge of discipline at a boys school and whose occasional utterances have proved baffling even by persian Nabavi was the key negotiator on the hostages and appears to be in charge of most of the governments Day today it is difficult to discern precisely the Par Tys position on such specifics As International finance or in the thrust is to reverse the Shah policy of westernization and modernization and to attempt to make Iran even at the Cost of International c new York times the Case against bargaining plea bargaining is the name of a Legal gimmick that puts some innocent peo ple in jail and lets criminals out too the gimmick works like this someone is arrested and charged with a but the prosecutor is afraid he cannot convict on the evidence he he makes a Deal to drop the serious charge if the suspect pleads guilty to a lesser the excuses for this practice Are that it keeps the courts from becoming More Over crowded and it quickly and economically jails i dont buy if the prosecutor has evidence to convict someone of a serious the suspect should be tried for that those convicted of serious crimes would thus receive stiffer which would keep them off the streets longer it would reduce crimes against citizens and would Cut Down the number of times the habitual Felon is recycled through the court this would mean fewer trials and less a worse result of plea bargaining is the jailing of innocent there Are cases where a actually innocent of any has pleaded guilty to a lesser charge because of fear that he might be convicted by mistake of a More serious crime and put in the state pen for a two year study of the effects of ban Ning plea bargaining was just completed in the study was done by the Alaska judicial Council using a Grant from the Justice it demonstrated that Banning plea bar gaining did not overcrowd the courts even though More cases went to the court system sped up to handle the study also found that the sentences handed Down were much More severe than before the in drug convictions in Par the sentences were dramatically More severe following the ban on plea bar this is an important and meaningful and judicial systems around the country ought to learn from it and ban plea c los Angeles times