European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - March 13, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 10 commits the stars and stripes thursday March 13, 1986 William Safire there should be no Compromise on Aid of contras the voice of defeatism in the United states says that no amount of support for anti communist guerrillas in Nicaragua will Ever oust the sandinista dictatorship. Up to now such defeatism has dominated our policy. Because president Reagan last year was unwilling to expend political popularity in a divisive fight Congress was Able to limit Aid to the contras to bandages while Moscow was providing its puppet regime with gunships. As a result the apostles of defeat arc saying with self fulfilling accuracy Sec the contras Are losing and no mass Appeal can be generated behind a losing cause therefore let s not throw Good Money after bad. Because defeatism is leading to defeat the defeatists arc triumphant. Now Reagan proposes to get serious about stemming the tide of communism in Central America. He wants $100 million in Aid about the sum paid annually during the Carter administration to the sandinista for appease men most of which is the kind that helps win wars. To do this he has to absent himself from fuzzy popu arism to make the Choice Clear. Our representatives in Congress will have to decide which Side they want to help win either our imperfect but ready to fight allies or the soviet Union s Western hemispheric distributors of aggression. Helping our allies requires doing something doing nothing helps the soviet client. That puts the Choice starkly but in Basic decisions simplicity is not simplistic. We support a War or we Force a surrender. Defeatists have reacted to this Choice with a Campaign of self victimization. A new York times editorial holds that the president seems to equate disagreement with  Abc s John Chancellor says that some unnamed people Are suggesting that opponents of Aid to the contras Are  the accommodation St line is to accuse the administration of stifling dissent of raw mccarthyism. In the bluntness of presidential aide Pat Buchanan defeatists have found their Long lost Agnew they wrap themselves in the martyrdom that makes dissent Deli Cious bewail imagined accusations of treason and characterize As horrid polarization the democratic business of Choice. This studied anti super patriotism is an effective Politi Cal device. In time some nuts and kooks will cooperate by hollering in american or "20 years of treason which will be grist for the anti Contra propaganda Mill. Let us remember that it is not in american to be mistaken not disloyal to choose the course of appease ment or no involvement not unpatriotic to decide against helping Central americans resist communist takeover. On the other hand the inclination to moralize about James Kilpatrick select committee selective morality abuses overseas while determinedly ignoring a mounting danger on our Border is not necessarily a badge of Honor right Wing Stooge for Somoza thugs assails courageous dissenters As dishonourable ". Under assault from the self victimize is the Reagan White House will be tempted to Settle for half the Money requested or support that is limited to half bandages and half Small arms. That sort of solomonic Compromise would be a bigger mistake than outright surrender. Better to say up front what is needed to help the contras win then Call for a vote up or Down with accountability unmistakable. The usual Compromise resulting in a policy of hand to Mouth armed annoyance would be met with scorn in Managua and would signal the rebel leaders that we consider them pawns rather than players. Latent support crystallizes when the possibility of Vic tory is real unless we open up that possibility with pow Erful armaments we guarantee failure. The defeat would be blamed on Reagan s unregenerate hawkish ass and defeatists would again be hailing the accuracy of their prediction. Here s what to do set a deadline for a cease fire with amnesty followed by All party monitored elections in Nicaragua this june As the anti sandinista in Side and outside that country have called for. Call that deadline the Compromise that Congress demands when the communists do not oblige let Reagan toss his Cap Over the Wall of sandinista resistance to free elections. No slow starvation of the contras no piecemeal involvement of the United states no sure defeat brought about by the debilitating demoralizing dribbling of Aid by Loyal patriotic 100 percent american defeatists. Instead let us have a fair test of whether enough arms and training delivered in time will enable anti communists to turn out the corrupt and repressive Ortega re Gime. C new York times news service / 2 years of Leoc harassment of Sears finally ended one of the most sordid Chap ters in the recent history of the bureaucracy came to an end in Chicago a few weeks ago. More than 12 years after the govern ment s harassment of Sears Roebuck began . District judge John a. Nord Berg at last put an end to it. The government s conduct in this affair has not one single redeeming Fea Ture. In the summer of 1973, the equal employment Opportunity commission through its zealous National program division decided to pick on Sears. The giant retailing corporation 380,000 employees 920 retail stores 3,100 other facilities had a superlative reputation for fair employment practices. Sears had been in the Vanguard of american companies seeking to end discrimination by sex or race. At the very time the Leoc staff was working up its charges Sears had ordered half of its positions in com Mission sales to be filled by women and minorities. None of this mattered to the staff. It plunged enthusiastically into a vendetta against Sears and in 1977 it persuaded the commission to file a decision that Sears had engaged in discriminatory practices. Such decisions at this stage in the Leoc process Are supposed to be kept in tight Confidence while Concilia Tion talks Are held. Curiously copies of the decision somehow were leaked to the National organization for women and the Washington Post. As courts later would hold there was no serious Effort at conciliation. The Leoc summarily demanded that Sears be prepared to pay a Large sum of Money $600 million was casually mentioned and submit to a five year surveillance of its hiring and promotion records. Sears said no and this greatly offended the Leoc. In 1979 the commission filed suit. The Leoc did not file just one suit. It filed five suits one in Chicago alleging 42 claims of discrimination by sex and others in Atlanta new York Memphis tenn., and Montgomery ala., alleging discrimination by race. Sears was ready to go to trial at once. The Leoc stalled. One by one the four racial suits were dismissed. The 42 claims in the Chicago suit dwindled finally to Only two. These two charges were 1 that Sears had discriminated against women in hiring and promoting persons who sell on com Mission and 2 that some women executives were not paid salaries equal to the salaries of men in comparable positions. In an Effort to prove its charges the Leoc conducted what a spokesman called the most massive investigation in its history. One consultant s contract bore a Price tag of More than $2 million. A team of statisticians under the direction of Bernard Siskin put thousands of Job records into a computer. The statisticians undertook multiple regression analyses multivariate Cross classification analyses and every other kind of analysis. They threw into the computer a Host of Varia Bles factors and groupings. They calculated by fragmentation Bias and by proxy  they put in everything but common sense for the statisticians assumed for purposes of their analysis that men and women Are exactly alike that All per sons who applied for jobs in sales at Sears were applying for All jobs in com Mission sales in All 55 retail product divisions. That is they assumed that All applicants male and female alike were equally interested in Selling furnaces draperies Auto tires and Home furnish Ings. Judge Nordberg viewed these assumptions As nonsense. He remarked that or. Siskin was an expert analyst of statistics but he did t know much about the world of Sears Roebuck. The court concluded that the statistics had virtually no persuasive  they were egregiously flawed. The Leoc s experts had turned a Blind Eye to Reali  indeed the experts deliberately made false assumptions that undermined the Validity of their  the Leoc had nothing but statistical Evi Dence it never called a single human being to testify to a personal experience of discrimination and the court found the statistical conclusions unbelievable. End of Case. Judgment for Sears. It is inconceivable that the Leoc will squander More of the taxpayers Money on an Appeal. What is indeed conceivable almost certain is that Sears will move to recover the millions of dollars it has had to spend on this stupid and unwarranted vendetta. And Sears probably will collect. 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