European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - May 19, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                . Apple  s political soft soap Selling like hotcakes if \ of m . A it v i a a i it 5 in Quot. A i. I a tee meant a u try v. I Pirl .  a Ltd a a it a. Irtz a it tame a a a a r r is. A hard 5 a is a r m i a i a. Jorv Narg c a. Has moved toward . By .-r.> or. Promise Pov a or. Oha  had Noam oed . T  soar. 0 h a administration or   a r a search for a Borgst by Lith. The democrats  he has in effect to red. With  leaders in a search for a legislative he fake \ he fat / Tafess Don t watch we a wok Tow May ups j1.   s or. A b b or. Both a so. The president has softened policy statements by sensor colleagues. Repudiating John h sur uru. His ref of staff on the Prospect of a tax r. Crease and attorney general doric thoth ugh on or ii nights. Simm had tried to reassure re Policar. Tenser Stives by declaring that if democrats tend to put tax increases on the table m budget talks that it was a or prerogative to say  and i emphasize no. Up popped Martin Fitzwater. The White to ave press Secretary. To say on has Boss s behalf. Quot i disavow Ever remark that does t represent the president. To Amburgh had  to reassure business leaders and others who fear hiring quotas by publicly advocating a veto of a civil nights Bill that he said would introduce quotas by the baht door. Black leaders were angry. So Bush called in leaders of Black groups whom he has been courting for months made reassuring noises and told White House lawyers to work things out. Some see an old game being played Here with Bush As the Good cop being set up by aides As the bad cops. George will att in cease a of cd taa7 others think that Sununu and Thornburgh got out of line and were reprimanded As a consequence. In one sense h does not really matter. Bruch Ever interpretation is Correct. Bush ended up in a position that enables him to present himself As the reasonable Man. At the same time he can do a Linie useful work in broadening his popularity and steadying the Economy in time for his 1 992 re election Campaign. From the Start of his presidency. Bush has taken a non confrontational approach. Seeking to reassure As Many Peop a As possible without committing him Selt to any particular course of action. When the crunch comes his instinct is to split the difference As he has done on environmental questions such As the clean air act. He tends to avoid drawn out struggles in which he has Little Chance of prevailing. A number of major issues seem to be ripening forcing Bush to Cope with several at once. The absence due to the illness of Lee Atwater Bush main political strategist May be responsible for some clumsiness of execution lately. But the president has continued to apply what one Friend Calls Quot his own patented Brand of political soft  Only when cornered this Friend Sas. Does Bush like to take hard edged positions and to attack those who Challenge him. Thus he developed his no new taxes strategy to Salvage his Campaign when it was in trouble in new Hampshire Early in 1988. The ultimate pragmatist. Bush is now prepared to dump that strategy. His aides say largely because any other course might bring on a recession and threaten his chances of being re elected. All this is very different from the w a Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan handled things. One might say to paraphrase Michael s. Dukakis that for Bush governing is ail about Compromise not ideology. He risks being accused of standing for nothing except winning another term. It  however very much in the tradition of other presidents such As Gerald r Ford and in the Early part of his tenure Lyndon b. Johnson. Johnson used to say Quot come let us reason together a As he built a massive consensus behind his great society programs a consensus so Broad that he won one of the great electoral victories in american histor. In 1964. But As he discovered later that approach is extraordinarily difficult to sustain Over the Long haul. In. Be Yerx Rte is activist demands endanger intellectual ideals i r f d t it i do n ref it o n a Ltd a r 1 a t ask a. A. 4_ c 1 _ 3. _ or a 1. Robert Clark Dean of Harvard a Law school says the school is try ing a to achieve greater diversity a docs that mean Hing conservatives hardly. At Harvard the diversity that counts concerns biological not intellectual differences. Derrick Bell a tenured professor at the Law school says he will go on unpaid leave until a Black woman becomes a tenured professor. The school s 60 tenured professors include five White women and three Black men Belles act is another of the Quot diversity demands that drive today a academic spoils system. Hispanics asians homosexuals the handicapped a All Are heard from. Jesse Jackson has of course been heard from saying that Blacks Are insulted by a the Gross insult conveyed by the idea that a there is no african american woman qualified for appointment to Harvard Law  actually no one is saying that. However Jackson is saying that prevailing standards of qualification Are  a we cannot define who is qualified in the most narrow vertical academic terms. Most people in the world Are yellow Brown Black poor non Christian. Therefore need you ask the ugly truth is in the adjective  i he planted axiom is that a meritocracy is racist. But the rationales for racially based hiring Are racist and insulting to Blacks and subversive of the idea of a University. One rationale is that Harvard a Black students need Black role models. Now Black students at Harvard Are demonstrably privileged Well launched on upward mobility. The last thing they or any Black youths need is a role Model whose hiring communicates the message that they Are participants in a group entitle ment to professional advancement. This entitlement mentality causes Blacks to cultivate the attitudes of victims triggers in Whites the instinct of condescension and leads both to discount Black achievements. Such hiring cause a a entitled Blacks to regard even benevolent institutions As enemies because victim Hood seems to be for privileged a victims a an in assuage ble grievance. Hence the protests and sit ins at Harvard a Lagoon of liberalism w Here in the last 10 years almost half the new Law faculty hired have been women or minorities. Within the a Roe Model rationale for racial hiring lurks a degrading postulate Black youths Are disadvantaged unless taught by Blacks because Blacks Are supposed to have derivative identities derived from membership in a victimized group. This postulate leads to the second racist rationale for racial hiring. It is intimated when Beu stresses that the a a philosophies of Black academics Are shaped by a life experiences unknown to Whites. The corollary postulate not merely intimated but proclaimed is that such philosophies Are self ratifying and impervious to criticism from non Blacks. This theory of racially distinctive and automatically validated scholarship is a particularly Slipshod and patently political exercise in the a sociology of  it argues a no merely asserts a that All Black scholars have had a a experiences that give them unique a a perspectives that Whites Are not qualified to question. Thus race is an intellectual credential. Bell says a race can create As legitimate a presumption As a judicial clerkship in filling a teaching position regarding civil rights Law. This is intellectual gerrymandering caning out for Blacks an exemption from Competition. It is an academic set aside program a construction Industry mistake comes to Campus where race confers an entire to scholarly authority about judicial review jurisdiction and other jurisprudential questions. The set asides proliferate for a the women s voice  a the Gay perspective a etc., in literature history Etc one Charm of this theory for its proponents is that they can be highly paid professors without forfeiting the coveted lucrative status of victims it rests on racial stereotyping a reactionary Means for Liberal ends. Black scholars represent a a the Black experience in this a a progressive version of segregation Blacks Are supposed to be a indeed Are told to be a homogenized and conscripted into intellectual conformity apart from the mainstream of american culture. In a Scalpel like dissection of these intellectual errors Randall Kennedy writing in the Harvard Law renew notes that some Blacks such As Bell Are asserting a proprietary claim Over the study of race relations and other matters. This is says Kennedy subversive of the Ideal of a cosmopolitan intellectual Community in which intellectual Merit is an a achieved  Kennedy says that by exaggerating White racism and making ideas and scholarly craftsmanship subordinate to racial status Bell and others threaten cultural fluidity intellectual Freedom and individual  Kennedy was urged by the supposed guardians of civil liberties not to publish his 74 pages of temperate arguments against the Balkan izing of the academic mind. It is discouraging that in the current militarized climate of academic discourse it is journalistic ally necessary to note Here that Kennedy a professor at Harv Ard Law school is Black. A Cwashington Post writers group