European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - July 24, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 10 columns the stars and stripes tuesday july 24,1990a.m. Rosenthal War Aid to Neil Kinlock Leader of the British labor party came to new York delivered a serious speech before an important audience raised an Issue critical to the future of Freedom id the soviet Union a and then got the answer wrong. Wrong a politically historically economically and humanly wrong. He is in considerable company. Kinlock defined the Issue just Fine. He told the Council on foreign relations that Mikhail Gorbachev a insistence that soviet changes be within the context of the communist party was not insincere. Gorbachev he went on not Only believes now in the soviet communist party As the vehicle for change but would stick to that belief even under a a a pluralist political society. Right on. So far. Gorbachev a brilliance and adaptability have made the West forget that it was through the communist party that he attained Power not despite it. A up to now he has a a reformed the part by moving some of its Power from his left hand As party chief to his right hand As head of the government in which the communists remain the Only party. But during the recent party Congress Gorbachev said the party should keep its role in most important parts of soviet life. That party commissar system of total involvement and domination is How the soviet party created its Power under Lenin and Stalin. It is How the communists have kept Power Ever since. So Kin Nock a Point about Gorbachev a belief in the party was important. Then Kinlock uttered the sentences that May win him As much lasting Fame As his wife achieved with her Happy prediction that the sandinista would win the nicaraguan election. He said that although the soviet communist party is Quot in Many ways deficient and unacceptable to him the. Quot pragmatic fact is that the a Structure of that party can provide a mechanism for historic change in conditions where there Are few other coherent Means of establishing and pursuing new  i do not know How Kinlock will do Walter r. Mears balanced while it makes a Handy slogan in a Campaign year the balanced budget amendment  have put a Dent in the deficit any time soon if Ever. Curbing deficits will require Tough politically painful decisions on spending and taxes item by item. By contrast there a no political Downside to a vote in favor of amending the Constitution in the name of balanced Federal budgets. So a House majority voted for the amendment falling just seven Short of the two thirds margin it takes to when he again runs against Margaret Thatcher. But if he were running now in the former captive nations he would get the workers vote a about one and a half percent of it. That is roughly the number of working people who have lived under a communist party and still believe it is a Structure for anything but disaster. Eastern europeans believed the communist party could move in Only one acceptable new direction a out of town. That is Why they fought their revolutions remember and because Gorbachev did not truly Reform the party Boris Yeltsin and the mayors of Moscow and Leningrad walked out on him and the party. Hatred of the party that brought the gulag and similar innovations is Why muscovites demonstrate in the streets. It is Why the growing democratic movement believes that Only real democracy is a Way of a pursuing new direct a coherent  it is Why Kinlock sounded As if he were talking about another world not that part of the world that has lived under communism. Earlier this month leaders of soviet groups that support democracy and the rights of Independence movements met in Czechoslovakia. They issued the a Prague declaration a warning that if the soviet Union did not cast the party off it would be swallowed in the abyss of civil War. They pleaded with the West not to Overlook the democratic movements by changeling Aid to Gorbachev. The strange obtuse by supportive Western attitude toward perpetuation of communist party Rule is so widespread that it is unfair to pick just on Kinlock. All right lets also pick on the Bush administration the High Riding Ger Man government president Mitterrand of France even Thatcher a and All others so Giddy with admiration for Gorbachev a ability to run the communist party that they clean forget what the party is. It is the creator and administrator of soviet Tyran perhaps one Day the adaptable Gorba by Chev can be persuaded that the party is really Over. Perhaps one Day he will Lead his followers out which would bring the destruction of the party. Possible but Only if the West stops encouraging Nis Hope that the party can continue to Rule. Whatever the West does or does not do the terrible possibility is that civil War May come to the soviet Union a a communism a last gift. But if Western Aid encourages Gorbachev a Hope that the party of soviet horror can be the party of the soviet future it will make that War far More Likely perhaps inevitable. C new York Tima a Symbol not reality approve a proposed change in the Constitution. A Day later the House overwhelmingly approved a Bill to require that government revenues Ana expenditures be equal beginning in the next budget year. That too is political symbolism because it probably wont pass the Senate and  be enforced even if it became Law. But it gave House members another Opportunity to record votes in favor of balanced budgets after the constitutional amendment was turned Down. Measures like those have been argued for years sometimes approved then forgotten or waived a nearly 400 times in a decade in the Case of a measure that was supposed to curb spending. The Only restraint that counts is the one that has the heat on now the Grain Rudman budget control Law that will Force drastic automatic spending cuts in the Middle of the fall Campaign unless Congress and the White House come to terms on Sharp reductions in the projected deficit now forecast at a swollen $168.8 billion. That Law too has been eased and probably will be again As part of any 1990 settlement. The problem is that deficits Are made up of hundreds of decisions not one judgment that can be reversed with a single stroke. No constitutional amendment is going to balance the budget any More than a constitutional amendment stopped people from drinking liquor. Habits persist no matter what is written into the Constitution and deficits have been habitual the pattern in 50 of the past 58 years the Rule in 20 of the past 21. Every spending program has a constituency of interests and individuals a voters a who Benefit while the Cost is spread among All the taxpayers or added to the National debt. The congressman who votes for spending targeted at his constituents can and does follow up with speeches denouncing deficits. Eight years ago Ronald Reagan pushed a balanced budget amendment As an antidote to his own administrations budget which forecast a record deficit. Reagan and now president Bush have been seeking approval Ever since although neither has sent Congress a balanced budget. In 1982, the Senate controlled by republicans approved the amendment 69 to 31. The House turned it Down 46 votes Short of the required two thirds majority. The Senate came w within a vote of reviving the balanced budget amendment in 1986, narrowly rejecting a democratic version. That measure is up again but House rejection forecloses congressional approval of an amendment this year. Were one to be approved it would go to the states for ratification. The near miss in the House this time reflects the frustration the dilemma and the political discomfort of deficits that have swollen the National debt to $3.1 trillion and counting. The version the House rejected would have required presidents to propose balanced budgets each year with Congress and the administration then agreeing on anticipated revenues and spending no More unless three fifths of the members of each House vote to do so that certainly would make deficit votes More difficult. But it comes with variables loopholes and no enforcement terms. And it orders an outcome not a solution. One opponent rep. Jack Brooks a Texas chairman of the judiciary committee said it would mean no More than a bumper sticker. While they argued about the Impact of an amendment sponsors and opponents agreed in their set piece debate that Congress lacks the political will and the courage to Cope with the deficit. An advocate said the Only people who would have been Hurt by a balanced budget amendment including a provision making it More difficult to impose new taxes would be thousands of lobbyists who want taxes raised so they can get More Money appropriated for the interests they represent. But lobbyists done to vote on taxes or on appropriations.  Congress do that. Editor s note a Walter r. Mears vice president and columnist for the associated Presa has reported on Washington and National politics for Mora than 25 years