European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - May 20, 1991, Darmstadt, Hesse Monday May 20, 1991 the stars and stripes a Page 13 Walter r. Mears commentary Quayle looks for boost Relief in asian trip Dan Quayle is heading overseas this week to realms where vice presidents Are taken seriously. It is his 13th foreign trip As vice president and this one will be a respite from the wisecracks and qualms that pushed the Quayle Factor up the political Agenda after president Bush was hospitalized with an irregular heartbeat. At Home most vice presidential assignments Are As secondary As the Job description. When there is important work it does t draw much attention because it has to be conducted in a supporting role abroad a visiting american vice president stars in the main event. Its not quite presidential treatment but its not far Short. Quayle a latest trip takes him to Japan Singapore and Indonesia. He is to return to Washington on Friday. There a another foreign assignment coming next month june 2 to 7 in Eastern Europe. When that pne is completed he will have visited 36 countries during his 2vi years As vice president. Foreign travel including but not limited to the funeral duty Bush used to joke about when he was vice president have become an increasingly important part of the Job in the past 40 years. The emphasis dates from Richard m. Nixon a two terms he travelled to 54 countries. His Moscow a Kitchen debate with Nikita s. Khrushchev in 1959 was a political Bonus at Home. Quayle could use a boost like that. The uproar Over his role now and on the 1992 Republican ticket has subsided now that Bush a heart irregularity has been diagnosed controlled and is under treatment. But the clamor previewed a political argument that is guaranteed a rerun when the 1992 Campaign begins. Bush has said Quayle will again be on his ticket. A. A a a a a i think its an Issue regardless of what we say or done to say about him a sen. George j. Mitchell the democratic Leader said in a television interview. A a it a obvious the american people have deep concerns about it and i think its an appropriate consideration. A democrats looking for Bush a vulnerabilities certainly will make it one. But Quayle also has had democratic defend ers notably speaker of the House Thomas s. Foley. A a. I done to have the slightest concern about vice president Quayle a ability to carry on the duties of his office which in elude any possible action of Transfer of authority under the 25th amendment a Foley said. A i wish everybody would just Lay off Dan Quayle a added sen. Patrick Leahy Dot. A a. At some Point it goes Way beyond Bush said Quayle has been taking a bum rap while doing a first class Job and told of a Chat with his vice president a a. I said a look keep your head up. You re talking to a Guy that went through something like this for about eight years maybe not quite As a a. And it is unfair and it is piling on and it is beneath the critics to do that at this Lime i think a he said. That shared experience is one of the reasons Bush will resist any change in his ticket. In the Early phases of the 1988 presidential Campaign Bush was derided As a wimp and a Lap dog. Looking Back after his election he said some of the hits he took As vice president had been As bad and had braced him for personal slaps. Quayle said All. He can do is plow ahead with his vice presidential assignments no matter what the critics say. A this is not a High profile office nor does this office give you the ability to change perceptions dramatically a he said in an interview today. He meets with Bush every morning when they Are both in town. He a worked at overhauling space policy and tailoring it to a tight buc get. His Council on . Competitiveness has revived an administration in which the Benefit of Environ mental and other regulations have to be weighed against the Cost and some have been scrapped As a result. Quayle a has had More Impact on foreign and Domestic policy than any vice president including George Bush in my lifetime a says Secretary of transportation Samuel k. Skinner his Friend and sometime golfing companion. But that does no to Register in the Public opinion polls which show narrow majorities think he should be replaced in 1992 and doubt his qualifications to take Over As president. And there a no setup in the wisecracks that go with the image. Late night comic Jay Leno says Quayle was standing close by All through Bush s illness in Case there was need of a heart transplant. A the associated press a Tom Wicker House shows Backbone by axing space station three cheers for the House appropriations subcommittee which got its Back up and voted to scuttle nasal a grandiose space station program. That will save $2 billion immediately and $118 billion or More Over the next three decades. President Bush sent out his heir apparent vice president Dan Quayle to declare the. Fund cutoff a totally unacceptable to the administration. White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater promised a fight to restore the 52 billion appropriation. They might yet prevail since Congress is not in the habit of rejecting glamorous technology or expensive hardware and since the space station a though repeatedly scaled Down a already has absorbed about $4 billion of taxpayers Money. But there Are numerous Good reasons for Congress to follow the subcommittees belated Lead and Bury this particular Money guzzling monster once and for All. First and Foremost As chairman Bob Traxler d-mich., pointed out a we simply can no longer afford huge new projects with huge Price tags while trying to maintain services that the american people in fact the $2 billion this administration proposed to spend next year on a space station Many scientists believe is ill conceived was Cut specifically to provide funds in the same appropriations Bill for the increased costs of veterans medical benefits environmental programs and housing together with other Nasa programs. From a larger perspective what sense does it make to pour $2 billion into a dubious space project when libraries Are being closed schools do not have sufficient funds cities Are scraping to fight crime and provide Basic services highways Bridges and sewer systems Are crumbling and the sidewalks Are crowded with the sleeping bodies of the homeless the space station moreover has begun to look like either a Gigantic Boondoggle or a truncated Boondoggle. President Reagan originally proposed an $8 billion project a manned of course a that would now be Well on the Way to completion to serve As a scientific observation platform Laboratory and staging area for space leaps to other planets. In seven years of reluctant congressional approval costs and delays have multiplied while the space station itself has been reduced so drastically in scale that Many space experts believe it inadequate to its planned purpose. . Thompson of Nasa responded to that when he said the Agency would continue to fight for a a tomorrow a aside from the question whether this aspect of tomorrows technology is More important than today a human needs Congress has before it a horrid example of the consequences of reaching too quickly for tomorrow. Star wars that is a another of president Reagan a lurid dreams. A general accounting office official has just testified that Overly optimistic budget requests poor planning and pressures to deploy unproven technologies have resulted in at least s3 billion Down the Drain. Over All the Pentagon has very Little to show in usable weaponry and not much in other results for the $24 Bill Jpn Star wars program. The wasted $3 billion went into projects a like missile tracking satellites a that ultimately were abandoned or curtailed. Besides All that its High time that Congress began to resist the lure of headline grabbing High technology projects that soak up billions upon billions of taxpayers Money needed for More mundane purposes a like feeding educating housing and providing an environment relatively free of crime and a pollution Tor american citizens or furnishing medical care for the millions who done to now have it and pay for it if they did. A Quarter Century ago Congress did reject a High tech High Cost hardware program a the supersonic transport which private manufacturers would not or could not put up the resources to develop. All these years later its hard to see How that decision damaged the National interest a and the limited Success of the French British concorde seems to support that conclusion. The subcommittee that killed the space station a if it stays dead a put up s100 million instead for a feasibility study of two smaller orbiting laboratories. From Here on Earth that seems a More realistic search for tomorrows technology. ,. The now York time s a
