European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - June 10, 1991, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Monday june 10, 1991 the stars and stripes a Page 13 commentary William f. Buckley  s tears were genuine not synthetic i very much fear that the joke makers will very quickly make sport 6f president Bush a performance before the Southern baptists on thursday. It is considered High sport to make fun of a Man who Breaks into tears especially if he is a politician. It is generally assumed and not without reason that the performance is synthetic. One should begin any reflection on Bush evidencing tears when he spoke of praying in january before pulling the final lever on War that he is not a Huey Long who could cry on the shortest notice. La is somewhere recorded that reciting a speech written for him by one of his entourage which speech he had not even read Over before delivering it Long reached a line in. Which he thought the Trace of a tear theatrically appropriate. He engineered that tear without any difficulty and later on casually commented on his proficiency in these dramaturgical matters George Bush was stunningly eloquent in what he said. It is Worth noting Here that someone not Given to rhetorical virtuosity is potentially More moving than the most finished orator. La in Abner saying just the right thing in just the right Way in extraordinary circumstances might move in ways even Cato Henry a Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King could not. What reaches the listener is the raw agony of the Effort to communicate emotion. What the president of the United states told his audience was that he and his wife prayed together before making the final decision to Send americans in some cases to their deaths. As he recalled that on that eve Ning in january he had broken into tears tears came freshly to his face. Quickly he disposed of them but questioned on the air plane later he did not deny them. He said that the decision had been one that Tore at his emotions and he said this clumsily which was reassuring in describing his feelings on that historic night once again he was moved to tears. Quot Whittaker Chambers wrote to me in 1959, a american men who weep in droves in movie houses Over the woes of love struck showgirls hold that weeping in men is unmanly. I have found most men in whom there was depth of experience or capacity for compassion singularly Apt to tears. How can it be otherwise one looks and sees and it would be a kind of impotence to be incapable of or to grudge the comment of tears even while you struggle against. 1 am immune to soap opera. But i cannot listen for any length of time to the speaking voice of Kirsten Flagstad for example without being done in by that magnificence of tone that seems to speak from the Center of sorrow even from the Center of the  when during a presidential primary Campaign in 1972, sen. Edmund Muskie broke Down into tears in frustration Over an ugly libel against him and was then and there judged unfit for presidential office by the  i sent him that  Chambers so blindingly Beautiful so incandescent try True though never having heard Kirsten Flagstad speak i can say Only that her singing voice was a tremulous experience. It is recorded that the night that Harry Truman authorized the Enola Gay  atomic bomb Over Hiroshima he had his usual hoho Hearty dinner and went calmly to bed. It is admirable that Truman weighed the considerations and characteristically moved decisively without any compunction about wrongdoing. A but one must suppose that Abraham Lincoln a and George Bush a w Ould have spent the night less calmly. I am required to confess that some of the above is in part self serving. I have never condemned soldiers to action and possible death but i have once or twice been Given the assignment of eulogist and 1 remember two occasions when i was not Able to finish words i had myself crafted summoning As they did to the author of those words the palpable images of the men whose death i was mourning. I Admire but could not imitate a Man whose Lac Rymal glands could stand up against a Eulogy Over a departed child. Milton wrote an elegy to a Young Man dead and Bach wrote music searingly Beautiful his own tribute to a departed brother. One must suppose that Milton wept Over his poetry and Bach Over his music. George Bush a tears Lent that special Gravity that properly attaches to the act of condemning human beings to death. I can to believe that those soldiers who on the following Day would March in Triumph it re Washington and later in new York would think any less of their president who was willing to recall the devout experience on the night he acted speaking from theron Ter of sorrow As commander in chief. C a moral press Syndicate Andrew j. Glass no economic sense president Bush snorted when i a asked him in 1989 what he thought of having Mikhail s. Gorbachev come to the annual Bash for the leaders of the worlds seven richest nations that was the year France hosted the Summit the year fireworks and fanfares marked the 200th anniversary of the Bourbon collapse. Meantime in Moscow a communist a revolution was collapsing after just 70 years. A Quot it. A. A a Gorbachev sought a seat at that Summit. But Bush Wasny to buying. Between Long strides on the track behind the . Embassy he dismissed the Kremlin bid. Now Gorbachev is Back at the same stand and this time it looks As if he will get his Way. Despite Bush a misgivings a Deal has been Cut that turns the Summit in London next month into the big seven plus one. He will arrive at a time when soviet wages Are rising far faster than prices. As a result Russia faces hyperinflation and a nearly worthless Ruble. The Kremlin seeks to keep the lid on by upping social benefits. Those Steps of course Only serve to further sap an already ruined state Treasury Gorbachev seeks a huge inflow of Western goods. In theory in would sop up what economists Call a monetary overhang and lift what politicians Call a risk to their necks. This idea plays Well in Europe because Large if unpaid soviet orders could help ease the slump. Of course it would be too crass for Gorbachev to say that he needs a Quick handout to keep his Job. Instead Well hear some High flying talk about the future of the planet. In the Wake of world War ii americans move to fund the Western european and japanese recovery made both political and economic sense. The payback is still evident. Oil Price shocks of the 1970s had Bankers recycling a a petrodollars in Loans to emerging nations. But weak political structures saw much of the Money wasted. Those bad debts remain the no. 1 Issue on the North South Agenda. Any sound finance minister will Tell you that bankrolling the soviets today makes no economic sense. Bush knows that. Hence his reluctance to see Gorbachev in London. A Overall Summit politics requires Gorbachev to be paid upfront As the Price for pushing the West a sky Lotical Agenda. Bush wants soviet help in cutting arms sales. Bush wants a Middle East peace conference in Cairo. And Bush wants to get rid of cubans Fidel Castro. So political needs get in the Way of economic ones. By now the proper russian recipe is known in every Central Bank and Good think tank from Amsterdam to Zurich. Prices must Rise much faster than real wages. Private Commerce must be allowed to grow freely. Jumbo state budget deficits must be slashed by pruning hidden subsidies. And military costs must fall. But each Reform plan that has been put up to Date has been gutted because in the end All such plans would shift Power from the state and make Russia More like the West. Gorbachev wants it both ways the Aid he wants now. T he fixes he wants later. It is a futile and dangerous to set terms he warned in Oslo. Don t Tell us you la get the Money Only after you Are More like us. A but Wim Kok the dutch finance minister knows the score. Economic Reform is a not in the first place not in the second place and not even in the third place a matter of bringing Money to the soviet Union a he says. So which Summit Eer will look Gorbachev in the Eye and Tell him that c new York times the 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