European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - February 5, 1989, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 10 the stars and stripes columns Tom Wicker Bush takes key Steps to improve environment forget All that family hoopla the pork rinds nonsense and the Good old boy image making. Reserve judgment on the savings account fee fiasco. All that s Par for the course for any new president. On two major fronts however the Bush administration really has asserted itself As an improvement on its predecessor. What postwar Secretary of stale before James a. Baker Ever chose to make his first significant pronouncement not on soviet american relations or arms control or nato but on the global environment As if that were not enough to prove the administration s environmental intentions William k. Reilly the new head of the Epa followed with a Promise of legis lation to curb acid rain. These developments May prove More significant though they gained lesser headlines than the Retreat by John Tower the Secretary of defense designate from the overblown Reagan Conception of Star wars or space based defense against nuclear missiles. It s True that Only former president Reagan and his most sycophantic followers any longer believed in his original pipe dream of making missiles impotent and obsolete too Many technical obstacles some seeming insurmountable had been shown to stand in the Way of such an impenetrable missile shield. These obstacles had not persuaded Reagan or his relentless Secretary of defense Caspar Weinberg or to Compromise on their demands for funds for the so called strategic defense initiative or to modify their insistence on it in arms control negotiations with the soviet Union though it was Clear that in prac Tice ski research was moving More toward Point de sense for . Nuclear installations than toward the Overall shield Reagan had envisioned. Tower once an ardent supporter of ski conceded in his confirmation hearings that such a shield was not a practical Prospect thus signalling a far More re strained missile defense policy for the Bush administration. This should make possible substantial reductions in the Pentagon budget and May signal greater emphasis on More practical measures to improve nuclear deter rence Mobile missiles for example. Just As important a More restrained defense re search program makes Likely a More flexible . Bar gaining position in arms control talks with the soviet Union. The Prospect of a full scale . Effort to develop a space based defense which the soviets regard not Only As destabilizing to Mutual deterrence but also As a potential offensive threat has been perhaps the great est obstacle to a strategic arms reduction treaty. It also led to the Reagan administration s one sided Effort sharply disputed by the soviets and by Many americans to reinterpret the abm treaty to permit Star wars testing and development. George will restraint on Star wars had been More or less expected to follow Reagan s departure. During his presidential Campaign moreover Bush proclaimed himself an environmentalist improved his prospects in Cali fornia by promising to curtail offshore Oil drilling and blasted his opponent for Boston Harbor pollution. Still the immediacy with which two of Bush s Prin Cipal appointees moved to associate the new administration with both global and Domestic environmental concerns was unexpected but Welcome. The Reagan administration had Given no sign of any interest whatever in the greenhouse effect the threat of rising temperatures worldwide because of excessive discharges of Carbon dioxide and other gases into the atmosphere which could cause rising sea lev Els and disastrous changes in climate. Baker told an International conference on this prob Lem that the world could not defer action until All uncertainties about the greenhouse effect were cleared up. Time will not make the problem go away he asserted. Indeed not and Here again effective action will involve Steps useful for More than controlling climate change a reduction for example in Fossil fuel con sumption. As for acid rain the Reagan administration finally conceded the problem but avoided doing anything about it by calling for More study. In contrast Reilly said the Bush administration Al ready was developing legislation to reduce acid precipitation caused by Coal burning Power plants and other Industrial sources. This is a complicated political problem because the emissions arise in some states while the pollution Falls in others and the remedy in Many cases will be costly. What action will follow these bold promises remains to be seen and first indications were that the United states had no Strong proposals ready to follow up Baker s greenhouse speech. Nevertheless he and Reilly have committed the new administration As did Tower on strategic defense and those Are Long Steps up from the Rea Gan years. C new York times democrats on their Way to losing 92 election democrats have almost completed their quadrennial exercise of Licking their wounds and looking backward and Are feeling hopeful. Hopefulness is As a wit said the feeling that the feeling you have is not permanent. Democrats Are ready to turn briskly to the business of losing the 1992 election and some of them believe that the coming election of Ronald Brown As party chairman will be a big step in that direction. There Are moments and this is one when people who know better make themselves believe that party chair men Are hugely important in presidential politics. Brown is part of the democrats problem but his principal significance is As a symptom. Brown who is Black was Deputy manager of Ted Kennedy s 1980 insurgency against incumbent demo cratic president Jimmy Carter. In 1988, from late in the primaries through the convention Brown was the Organ izing Force in something almost impervious to organizing Force Jesse Jackson s Campaign. Brown joined Jackson at the urging of Many democrats who thought he could modulate Jackson. Because of that urging on of Brown the party can hardly round on him now and say that his association with Jackson disqualifies him from being party chairman. That would be unfair and democrats value fairness above All other things. Some democrats Comfort themselves with the thought that Brown is just the person to stand up to  but a fight with Jackson one of several fights democrats desperately need can hardly be waged by the party chairman. And anyway there is nothing about Brown a Kennedy Jackson Liberal that indicates he is inclined to fight. True Brown does want to reverse a Rule change that Jackson does not want reversed. Brown wants to restore to members of the democratic National committee their stature As convention delegates. That is not Surpris ing those Are the people about to elect Brown. But Brown shows no sign of wanting to undo what he helped win on Jackson s behalf at the Atlanta convention. There As concessions to Jackson the party made rules changes that to oversimplify just a bit re quire almost pure proportional representation. Under such a system a candidate who wins say 7 percent of the vote in a state primary gets seven percent of the delegates. The real problem with Brown is not the Way he looks to others not his color but the Way he looks at the country. He is a lawyer lobbyist for Washington s archetypal lawyer lobbyist firm the one with the dickensian name of Patton Boggs & blow. Its offices Are on m Street. On a Clear Day Brown can see All the Way to k Street where other lawyer lobbyists play. That is a perfect neighbourhood to play in if you want to forget How to think about voters As real flesh and blood individuals and to learn to think Only of groups. The theory there is that everyone is a member of a group every group has an organization and every organization has a Leader who has an office on k Street. Or m Street. A news Story on Brown contains this delicious Pas Sage actually or. Brown is More Eastern establish ment than extremist. He has a Telephone in his car " of Well then everything is Fine. But who is he calling of course Brown is no  what is wrong with him is what makes him perfect As democratic party chairman perfectly representative that is of party activists. It is that he describes the party As the last Best Hope in this country for dealing with issues of race sex religion and  perhaps the party is that. It is hard to know because it is hard to know precisely what is the Issue of sex or what constitutes dealing with ethnicity. Brown s list of vital issues reads like the Spring semester seminar curriculum in a College sociology department. Marvellously when listing the issues that democrats can Deal with Brown omitted the two issues that matter most to most voters peace and Prosperity. He can Check that by calling a voter on his car phone. From m Street it will be a Long distance Call. C Washington Post