European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - November 28, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 10 a the stars and stripes wednesday november 28,1990 column Jim Fain nation should t tolerate a racist Campaign Jesse Helms eleventh hour resort to open racism in his North Carolina Senate Campaign May have provided republicans the Tooi they be been seeking to keep Reagan democrats on Board in 1992. William Bennett made that Clear at his first meeting with reporters As president Bush a Choice for next gop chairman. The former drug Czar commended As a perfectly legitimate Helms to and showing White hands crumpling a rejection slip for a Job that went to someone of a minority race presumably because of civil rights Laws. Head love to debate democrats on the subject he said Ronald Reagan wooed and won two traditional democratic bastions a White southerners and Blue Collar Northern ethnics a with subtly racist electioneering augmented by patriotic religious and ant tax appeals. He used code words like Quot welfare Queens a but his meaning was Clear. Bush a reversal on taxes and the collapse of the soviet Empire let most of the air out of that gop balloon. Nor did it help when he battled democratic efforts to shift Back to the Rich some of the tax Burden Reagan had transferred to the Middle class under the Guise of rescuing social Security. Bush had managed to hold the Reagan coalition together in 1988, largely through a spurious no new taxes pledge and cynical manipulation of racial and crime fears. Lacking Reagan a personal Appeal he relied on to symbolism to get the message across in such ploys As Willie Horton and Flag factories. But now with the Economy souring and Middle incomes Static some working class americans have begun to wonder what they re doing in a party consecrated to the interests of the Rich and powerful. That raises for gop tacticians their scariest Nightmare the Prospect of the electorate voting along income lines. The obvious antidote is to drive a wedge Between Middle class and poor. In this country that task is simplified As Richard Nixon deduced in his Southern strategy by the palpable fact of race. Since democrats from Franklin Roosevelt a time have been the movers and shakers on civil rights republicans have a natural Edge in exploiting White resentments. As Long As an expanding Economy provided enough goodies to share their payoff was confined to the South. But when the pie started shrinking White Middle class antagonism toward programs aimed at improving the lot of the Urban Black underclass spread throughout the nation. Now though its Clear that Blacks on the Bottom rung will never recover from 200 years of discrimination without some tilt in their favor any Job or promotion preferment is bitterly resented. President Bush recently vetoed a civil rights Bill that included modest affirmative action a a move gov. Douglas Wilder of Virginia press gently termed a a Bush Helms Axis to embrace a the new extremism of exploiting racism for political  ultimately it will be Bush Scall whether to unleash pit Bull Bennett amp co. To do so would violate his personal beliefs and innate decency. But he proved in 1988 he prefers winning to scruples. A racist Campaign is entirely possible and would weaken the increasingly fragile social fabric of the nation. The warning of an earlier Republican president remains As True As when Lincoln spoke it a a House divided against itself cannot  Cox news service James j. Kilpatric Rowan s autobiography has the write stuff Charleston . A Carl Rowan a autobiography came in the mail the other Day. It is a cracking Good Book destined for Best seller ranking and it tells a Story that would have enchanted the late Harry Golden. Golden you May recall was the editor publisher and sole proprietor of the Carolina israelite. He delighted in tales of Success that could happen a Only in  Carl Rowan a life provides an inspiring example of what Harry Golden wrote about. It is impossible Carl remarks for americans under the age of 50 to understand the world into which he was bom in 1925. This was the world of Mcminnville tenn., a a brutally racist Community a but no More racist perhaps than the whole of the segregated South at that time. Carl and his family knew the kind of poverty that is thankfully rare today. In their rat infested House a we had not a single clock or  no electricity. No running water. No Telephone. No radio. A toilet paper was a luxury we did not know when second hand newspapers were Good enough for our  the Rowan children survived on Navy Beans Black eyed peas chitterling and a Hoo very a  they Learned to rub their mattress buttons with kerosene the better to kill the bedbugs. Carl stole lumps of Coal to keep their tiny House warm. Out of the Milieu emerged a Black boy who would go on to become a naval officer a Brilliant reporter and a member of the foreign service during the Kennedy administration. Under Lyndon Johnson he became ambassador to Finland then director of the . Information Agency. He had a chair at Cabinet meetings. He moved easily Between leaders of the Black Community and top people in the White Power Structure when he left government it was to become one of the most successful columnists in the pundit business. At every step along the Way Carl challenged the old ways of racial segregation. He has titled his life Story a breaking barriers a and break them he did a at Public restaurants private clubs and bastions of government tradition. Nominated for membership in Washington a exclusive Cosmos club he was rejected by the racist membership committee of that Day Carl took the decision with devastating Grace a it is my understanding that this is Washington a club of intellectuals. If it is the intellectual judgment of the committee that i do not Merit membership i can do no More than note this judgment and wish the club  Carlos Story is Rich in anecdotal material. He travelled around the world with Johnson and survived the experience with his sense of humor intact. He provides the Best Brief summation of Johnson a mercurial character that i have seen anywhere a Lyndon Baines Johnson was egocentric domineering imperious mean insecure compone unfaithful crude. He was generous Brave a fighter for the Little Guy Loyal to friends and causes a and damned  in other vignettes he perfectly captures the fuzziness of Adlai Stevenson with whom he served at the United nations a the was one of the most indecisive men i have Ever met in High  he recalls sen. Hubert Humphrey and Secretary of state Dean Rusk. In a bitter chapter he assails the evil character of if ire Jor Edgar Hoover and he pulls together the circumstantial evidence suggesting that Hoover set up Martin Luther King or. For assassination. Unlike most autobiographies which have the formal feeling of a studio portrait Carlos Book is shirt sleeve stuff. Some Public figures write with pens that have been dipped in Library paste. Carl dips his pen in etching acid. It is not a pretty picture of Washington a mayor Marion Bariy that emerges. Carlos Pool Cue assaults sometimes carry him away. He charges flatly that Richard Nixon a a ordered the watergate burglary. This is nonsense. Nixon covered up stonewalled hunkered Down and lied about watergate but the cockamamie break in was the brainchild of Gordon Liddy and a spineless John Mitchell. Carlos judgment of Ronald Reagan also strikes me As unfair. Most of the blame he assigns to Reagan was abundantly shared by Congress a for example the reduction in funds for Public education a and whatever May be said about Reagan a character there is not a racist Bone in Reagan a body. A breaking barriers comes from Little Brown. In the sometimes Stuffy world of High level memoirs it is a keen and cutting Breeze. As Harry Golden used to say enjoy Universal press Syndicate