European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - February 20, 1989, Darmstadt, Hesse Page 10 columns the stars and stripes Haynes Johnson classification often used to hide mistakes whatever happens to Oliver North he seems destined to haunt the Reagan Bush years like the unwelcome presence of Banquo s ghost. And whatever Hap pens to novelist Salman Rushdie his Case like that of North represents something of far More fundamental significance than the Fate of any individual involved. First about North yesterday s hero and today criminal defendant from the beginning of his tangled Legal Case there has been a Central irony. The Iran Contra affair was at its Core an attempt to subvert the democratic processes of the United was a Case in which the opera Tion of a Shadow government functioning in secret and beyond accountability of the Normal Legal political process was indisputably documented. The govern ment knew Best. Operating secretly it ran roughshod Over Laws and sought to avoid accountability. North by his sworn congressional testimony lied and destroyed classified information All in the belief that he was serving the higher purposes of the United states As established by his superiors first among them the president. The irony is that the very system North attempted to circumvent now is his greatest bulwark. It is reassuring to see evidence that the Legal system in the form of the trial judge and the lawyers defending him is operating so zealously to ensure that North s rights Are protected and that his trial is scrupulously fair. It is not As reassuring to witness once again the government s claims that his trial might result in damage to the National Security interests of the United states. In the last 40 years perhaps no More difficult Issue has faced the american Legal system than distinguish ing Between legitimate Security interests that the government insists must be kept secret and the right of the Public to know what its government is doing. Too often the problem is not Security but the use of secrecy to hide information that would be Embarrass ing or damaging to officials involved. In that respect former solicitor general Erwin gris Wold offered timely testimony last week. Griswold had the task of arguing the Nixon administration s Case against publication of the top secret Pentagon papers on grounds that their release would damage National Security interests. In the 17 years since those papers were published Griswold noted in the Washington Post i have never seen any Trace of a threat to the National Security from the publication. Indeed i have never even seen it suggested that there was such an actual threat. It quickly becomes apparent to any person who has considerable experience with classified material that there is massive Over classification and that the principal concern of the classifiers is not with National Security but rather with governmental Embar George will uror from never iislltilfnnphn.? a a is or a Ras sment of one sort or about the Case of Rushdie who Iran s Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini said should be executed along with those who helped publish or distribute his novel because Many moslem believe it is blasphemous Here is a classic Case that goes to the heart of the american system. By threatening physical violence the Ayatollah and others Are trying to pressure Viking Penguin inc. Into not publishing the american edition of Rushdie s Book the satanic they Don t like what s in it. Rushdie s scheduled . Tour has been cancelled for fear of violence. The classic and timeless response to All such censors and Book burners was Given 43 years ago by a great american Book editor Maxwell Perkins of Scribner s. I do not think that you understand the fundamental american principles of Freedom he wrote someone objecting to publication of a controversial Book. Under our theory the Rule is by the considered Public opinion of the people and this depends upon a free press. A free press furnishes the channels for information. The information appears then in magazines newspapers and books. Some of what appears May even be deliberately misleading. But when it has All appeared there is the material from which an adult Public May form its opinion and that opinion incur theory rules. When we published i chose Freedom we foresaw that we would meet violent criticism and opposition. But it is a publisher s function to furnish the Means for informing the Public on matters of Contro Versy. We should therefore have betrayed our profession at the Cardinal Point of its ethics if we had refrained because of fear of complications or Case closed. C Washington Post Jerry Brown ready of tangibility be democrats in an Odd metamorphosis a butter Fly has become a Moth. Jerry Brown the metaphysician has become a Mechanic. In the 1970s, he was alternatively and sometimes simultaneously delphic and Daffy. Now he aspires to be master of the mundane As chairman of California democratic party. Why spend lots of time and Money win Ning an office hitherto considered suited for a cipher one reason is a new California Law that requires its political parties to supplant the few powerful elected officials As the Pri Mary conduits of Campaign funds. And Brown believes that computers and telemarketing and other things can make the demo cratic party potent again. Like Many democrats Brown is reluctant to attribute Republican successes to Republican ideas. The successes must come Many democrats think from Clever machines. A Century ago says Brown parties were potent because they had patronage to dispense they were backed by virulently partisan newspapers their ticket making Powers were not limited by direct primaries and voting often was done not by marking secret ballots but by sub mitting a ticket printed by one party or the other. Furthermore politics was the most pervasive form of popular entertainment. In recent decades the withering away of the parties influence has been hastened by the use individual politicians make of modern Media to communicate directly with constituents. California the quintessential Media state is an unlikely Laboratory for experimenting with party building techniques. But the stakes Are enormous in a state that in 1992 will have 53 electoral votes 19 percent of the total needed to win the White House. Suppose the party building that Brown has in mind makes even a two percentage Point difference in democratic strength. California has 26,000 precincts. In 1948, Truman carried califor Nia by 17,000 votes. Since then Only Johnson carried the state for the democrats. The democrats shrinking Edge in registration is now wafer thin. And it never has meant As much As it should have. Between 1895 and the election of Jerry Brown s father in 1958, Only one Democrat was elected governor and he was beaten at the next election by Earl Warren. Brown says California has seven million registered democrats and the party has seven employees two of them receptionists. Dukakis did better in California than any Democrat since Johnson because sen. Aaan Cranston a master of labor intensive shoe leather retail politics got $3 million from the National party for organizational spend ing. Brown believes that the democrats hour is arriving because we Are entering an activist phase of government for three reasons. First the Prosperity of the 1980s has produced a tight labor Market and focused attention on the education system s failure to equip workers for the changing Economy. Second the growing conviction that health is a right is producing a demand for government provi Sion of More coverage. Third the daily headlines acid rain greenhouse effect thinning Ozone layer Are producing a surge of environmental concerns. Brown May be wrong. There is Prece Dent. Reading the transcript of Brown s appearance on meet the press in octo Ber 1975, 10 months into his first term As governor is like falling through a crack in time. It is Rich in quaint rhetoric about the need for More austere life because we Are reaching the outer limit of our economic today there Are 29 million More jobs and the Gross National product is 50 percent larger than in 1975. Some democrats remembering such rhetoric and the Mediterranean fruit flies he hesitated to Spray them and former chief Justice Rose Bird he appointed he consider Brown a one Man political but there is something unattractive about much of the disparagement of Brown. It is a reflex against the unpredictable an uneasiness with any personality spicier than Cream of wheat a Philistine anger at someone who seems to court ridicule and does not seem to care when he receives it. He risked it when after losing his . Senate race in 1982, he wandered the world to mexi co studying Spanish Japan studying buddhism and India three weeks wit Mother Teresa. Brown who campaigned for president without a speech writer Speaks his own mind because he has one. His re entry makes politics More interesting and will for some time. He has been elected governor twice has run for president twice and once for the Senate and is just 50. He vows to use the party machinery to tangibility be there he goes again being puckish just to annoy the staid politics. He subscribes As liberals often do to the mistaken notion that participation is Low because people Are Contentment is a better explanation but if Brown s program of Tan Gib litigation makes a two percent differ ence he May have the last laugh. C Washington Post
