European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - September 22, 1988, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 10 the stars and stripes columns Flora Lewis election not Likely to alter . Foreign policy Princeton n j. European officials East As Well As West Are unusually related Aboul american elections this year. They Don l feel they have a big stake in the outcome not because .decisions Are any less vital to them now Adays but because they Don l expect much change whoever wins. Despite the candidates efforts to Sharpen their profiles foreign policy is not a major Issue in the Broad  s one reason vice president George Bush keeps harping on experience rather than on anything substantive Al though in comes a fait oddly from Ronald Reagan s running mate in 1980. They made no Point fit then. In any Case it s misleading. Bush hashed a lot of foreign exposure but that s not at All the same As grappling with decisions. People who were at la , when hews ambassador there saw an energetic Back slapping lobbyist which is a Parton the Job but say he did t seem Well informed on . Plans nor did he try loin fluence hem. Foreign diplomats who watched him in peking say he had no grasp of what was going on. And a Washington Post inquiry on the impression remade at the Cia reported people who worked with him there saying that whenever look a stand or made a recommendation when controversies arose. It is True that with the exception perhaps of latin America . Opinion and circumstances have set the Likely course of foreign policy for some years ahead. There will be negotiations wit the soviet Union and with America s run cars continued troubles in comes from leaving issues open so that fights Between the stale and defense de part cols for example went on until events imposed the Choice. The rth Erkey Thep soviets and a democratic president i Likely to establish better working relations with  the foreigners Overlook two important Points that influence policy one. Is presidential style not Only in present pie whom the president names to carry ing issues to the Public and in personal out the policy. Reagan put an a Prece encounters with other leaders but also in dented number of political appointees in facing decisions. A Large part of policy ambassadorial and ranking departmental trouble in the Reagan administration jobs Many without government or for the Middle East attempts to contain and if possible resolve regional conflicts. The options for Washington arc narrow on these issues. There is no question of isolationism or dramatic new initiatives. A Republican president who Lake scare to assuage hard liner might have an easier time getting new arms Contro treaties ratified although the realty hard ones will fight any agreements with the eign experience. Trie foreign service suf to a for so Winto. Signals bring an incisive fresh approach re Paproth Nave made dreadful Gaff Michael Dukakis s big foreign policy speech last week was evidently Oas cd on ideas articulated by Graham Allison jr.,Dean of the Kennedy school at Harvard. Critics hinted thai that smacked of plagiarism but it s nonsense. Of course a president has to rely on advisers and i matters that he choose knowledgeable and sound ones not just Slick Media consultants. If Allison is an example of where Dukakis looks he was a Good one. It would be interesting to know who advised Bush to use the line of at tack blaming Dukakis for failing to at tribute All the changes in the soviet Union and the communist world to the Reagan administration. Dukakis Haien Dorset current Reagan policy on dealing with Mikhail Gorbachev while Bush seems to be backers away a bit to please he Ultra right. But of course Dukakis is right in analysing Moscow s extraordinary shifts As the result primarily of soviet internal problems and Wise to show he under stands the limits of . Influence. The facts Are thai Gorbachev s attempts at transformation Are the cumulative result of two generations of general Success in the West and undeniable failure in the East. Even czechoslovak officials the hard liners of Fth Easl now concede tha Central planning does t work and the problem is How to Reform in without get Ting into worse trouble. Dukakis is right in pointing out that the defense budget can no longer be in creased. It is soft on defense to try to solve All questions by throwing Money at them. Now the difficult choices evade during the Reagan buildup will have to be made. Naturally foreigners Don t see anything serious in a debate about pledging allegiance to the Flag and counting diplomatic handshakes. Naw tort Sliwin it san act James Kilpatrick president s appointees will shape Constitution. A. A Mirum nut tic us Nyrl Nnami finer Nae Emels whose names Are widely  let us look ahead if you please to High noon on Jan. 20. As the clock strikes either George Bush or Michael Dukakis will hold up his right hand. The most awesome Power of their Sci a Colial office will devolve upon one of them. That is the Power to nominate Federal judges. Ii is a Power Seldom discussed but it matters More than All the rest. In the end Congress will decide upon taxes and appropriations. Congress will Deal with civil rights National defense and acid rain. Through us run Homo do c Alekse station Power of the purse Congress will shape the course of to  expectations. Foreign affairs when that clock Sunkes m january the High court live directions. President Dukakis would nominate justices of Liberal convictions. Bush s nominees would read the Constitution in one Way Dukakis nominee sin quite another. This is the Way the system has worked since George Washington packed the firs court with federalists. Presidents want judges who Are cast More or less in their own philosophical , Many justices have not stayed lied to their presumed ideology Harry Blackmun provides a notable example but most of the time judges have lived up Jive Jauntia but Congress cannot dictate the Choice of nominee for the Federal Bench. The Senate May reject a Nomi Nee but that is the extent of its Power. President Bush or Percsi Donl Dukakis will keep sending up names until the Senate consents. On these confirmations will de Pend the shape of the Constitution Well into the a Cal Century. It is a truism As Charles Evans Hughes observe Long ago Hal ours is a gov Emmen under the con Lilu lion but the Constitution is what the judges say its More to the Point the Constitution at any Given time is what a majority of the . Supreme court says it  nine justices Are not robots reacting to the pressed buttons of precedent they Are Ordinary mortals possessed of extraordinary Power and like other Ordinary mortals they have minds of their own. This is the Crux of the matter. President bus would nominate justices whose minds go in conserva 1.-, v a a. V we nac three justices More than 80 years old Wil Liam Brennan Thurgood Marshall and Blackmun. By general recognition they Are the most Liberal Julic a. On such issues As capital punishment and affirmative Clion they consistently hang together. During the last term the Brennan Marshall Blackmun bloc won is of he 34 cases that were decided either 5-4 or 5-3. The conservative regulars William Rehnquist Sandra Dayo Connor and Antonin Scalia won 19 of the split decisions. It is a reasonable Assumption that the three liberals will step Down during the term of the next president. There is much Ulk that Justice Byron White 71. Also will hang up his judicial Robe. President Bush or presi Dent Dukakis will have momentous opportunities Loshaje the Constitution to his will. Let us suppose to be supposing that Dukakis gels in. Lei us further suppose thai he picks three re placements e s Are widely mentioned. I place of Brennan he nominates professor Laurence h. Tribe of Harvard in place of Blackmun he choose judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg. In place of Marshall he names judge Harry t. Edwards. Docs that Prospect Rouse terror in the conservative breast it should. Tribe is the direct opposite of Robert Bork whose nomination was rejected last year. In Wassail of Bork that he was a super conservative far to the right of mainstream jurisprudence. Tribe is equally super Liberal a Man of Brilliant gifts a prolific writer an energetic and ambitious fellow whose pres ence on the court would Oul Brennan Brennan. And tribe is Only 46 Yean old. Ginsburg and Edwards both sit on the court of appeals for the District of Columbia. There they regularly oppose such conservatives As judge James  is s5, Edwards 47. If they sat on the supreme court to the age of their predecessors they would reshaping the Constitution Well after 2000. Suppose Bush wins. We could anticipate such nominees As sen. Orrin Hatch. 54, of Utah judge j. Harvie Wilkinson 43, of Virginia judge Patrick , 49, of Texas and James a. Baker 58, former Secretary of the Treasury. If Ihu � to the clock strikes the Bush nominees would join Rehnquist o Connor Scalia and presumably Kennedy informing a court of consistently conservative jurisprudence. This is what mailers most As the Campaign moves inexorably toward that High noon to come. Ian Luuri