European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - July 10, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 10 the stars and stripes tuesday july 10,1990flora Lewis m a amp Flonly soviet hard liners Haven to heard message Moscow a. Waves of speeches Roll by reduced by the translator s Monotone to a lulling sea song. Its hard to stay attentive. The Central committee propaganda wheel who is Reading out extracts remarkably precise and objective at that looked up and said Quot of dear in be mixed up my papers. It does no to matter the speakers Point was that we have to overcome the crisis of socialism Quot and he went on to the next speech a woman Delegate who works in a Candy factory complained that Quot they gave 15 billion rubles to International health care and we spent 5 billion on health care at Home last year so you can see we re doing it All  there Are Calls for discipline demands to strengthen the parly paeans to Quot the Noble idea of socialism Quot innuendos about who lost East Europe who lost Germany who is stripping the soviet Union of Security and there is the general who says 84.6 percent of officers polled in Kharkov want the party out of the army that com Mur ism is just a Utopia not realistic anyway so the party should change its name to something about social democracy. Foreign minister Eduard Shevardnadze in an impassioned speech warned that there la be nothing left to defend anyway if the country keeps spending a Quarter of its output on defense. President Mikhail s. Gorbachev comments that the hard line talk in Congress does no to represent the country which most people outside the Kremlin take for granted. There Are no surprises after All nothing new at the 28th Congress of the soviet communist party no doubt More argument than in the Days when everything was a sacred secret with any Peep of disagreement carefully muffled. But now that its spread out in Public the real Surprise seeps through Only gradual Ltd it is recognition of the overwhelming futility of All these years All these convictions. It is becoming so undeniable that its hardly painful anymore to the onetime believers. Once in a while someone mentions the tragedies in a kind of respectful Leon Daniel cow Aunkist party 261h. Congress. Way a head bowed before the enormity of millions of deaths torture broken lives that cannot be grasped and cannot be denied. But everybody knows now. The revelations no longer astonish because it is obvious that there was to limit to the lies that could be told. Details Are for those who like history. Even the line that it was All Stalin a fault the aberration of a Peculiar monster has worn away. It is simply the past that was and now what people have to be reminded How Long ago they were allowed to notice the futility. Its a very Short time. The outspoken paper Moscow news made its ironic Point with a series of quotes from the 27th party Congress a in 1986, the year after Gorbachev a arrival in Power a the platform for his Reform program. Quot the main thing that will ensure us a Success is the creativity of the masses maximal use of the tremendous potential and advantages of the socialist system Quot Gorbachev said four years ago widely seen As hopelessly obsolete now. The Congress came and went a with the same mentality a the paper noted proudly adopting a new program that proclaimed Quot the experience of the . And other socialist countries convincingly demonstrates the indisputable socioeconomic political ideological and moral advantages of the new society As a stage in Mankind a Progress that is Superior to capitalism and provides answers to questions that the Bourgeois system is incapable of  the Congress Quot took care to preserve the essential reason for All our misfortunes that is totalitarianism. It was meant to have a a human face and to be inspired with new ideas but it was totalitarianism All the same a the paper says now. An article about collective farms Speaks of Quot the agricultural gulag Quot and Calls it Quot a colonial state within the state Quot that a always Means  but there was plenty of warning it notes. It quotes Lenin Quot for no revolution has Ever been effected without coercion and the proletariat has a right to exercise coercion in order to hold its own at All  the obvious conclusions Are drawn. And so the last claims the last pc lenses of justification for so much suffering so much sacrifice Are drained away. That is the quiet news from the party Congress even As the apparatchiks posture and pose. People have killed and imposed terror since civilization but Only occasionally have they swallowed the idea that its the Way to a better society for All. What a crazy idea. Whatever the party says people Here have caught on. Everybody should. C new York times Snyder flawed but did enormous Good for homeless Mitch Snyder de Facto Leader of americans homeless hordes staged the ultimate Media event when he hanged himself. For sheer drama Snyder a suicide upstaged the 51-Day hunger strike which almost killed him in 1984, that fast forced president Ronald Reagan to turn Over the vacant Federal building on Capitol Hill that became Snyder a 1,400-bed shelter for the homeless. Snyder 46, evidently hanged himself in his room at the shelter after becoming despondent Over his broken Romance with Carol Fen Nelly who had fought at his Side for 14 years on behalf of the homeless. Quot Mitch always said Good things happen with rain Quot Fennelly told reporters thursday As she fought Back tears while standing in a Shower outside the shelter. Quot he was w Rong  the tragic hero of a real life drama Snyder was near death from self imposed starvation when Reagan finally agreed to his demands giving him the greatest v Iet o by o f h i s a ree r. Quot asked by a reporter if it had been Worth it Snyder whispered weakly Quot of  gaunt and bearded he basked in the lunch til. To some of his supporters he appeared Christ like. But like All mortals Snyder was flawed Sandra Boodman who covered Snyder a Campaign for the homeless for the Washington Post wrote a the tried to cultivate the lean ascetic look of an Early Christian Martyr but battled a weight problem and secretly hoarded Candy in his room when he Wasny to  bom poor in the new York Borough of Brooklyn Mitchell Darryl Snyder rejected Success As a Madison Avenue consultant and did some hard time for car theft. He took up roman catholicism and Radical causes in prison. After his release Snyder came to Washington where he was arrested in 1973 for climbing the White House Fence to protest the Vietnam War. Snyder who Well understood the uses of publicity would not have been surprised to know that mayor Marion Barry and Jesse Jackson rushed to the shelter when they heard of his suicide. Barry on trial for dope and perjury charges in a nearby building waded into the crowd outside the shelter kissing women and signing one woman St Shirl. Quot we had our Dilleree Ces a the mayor said Quot but he put the homeless Issue on the National map Quot t Jackson who aspires to the presidency of the United states was More eloquent a in Many ways Mitch lived in the Shadow of death and he Learned to face death rather fearlessly Quot the Baptist preacher said. I first interviewed Snyder a decade ago and in the years that followed i used the same words others did to describe him a words such As Quot charismatic Quot Quot visionary and  but i also quoted those who denounced Snyder As a Power hungry publicity grabbing egotist whose hunger strikes were nothing More than political blackmail. In fact Snyder was a flawed but decent Man who did enormous Good for the homeless. As for his tragic death Jackson said it Best a ultimately he died on his own terms on his own  us United press International 1 he opinions expressed in the columns and cartoons on this Page represent those of the authors and Are in no Way to be considered As representing the views of the stars and stripes or the United states government