European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - July 4, 1991, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Thursday Friday july 4/5, 1991 the stars and stripes a Page 13commentarywilliam Safi Herfe must retain its own Independent voice a if it ainu to broke a Bert Lance used to say a a done to fix  a a americans most effective broadcasting tools for promoting Freedom and democracy abroad a radio free Europe and its adjunct radio Liberty a have never been More needed to set the Pace of a free press in self liberating nations. But a bureaucratic Cabal wants to fix All that by placing the quasi Independent stations under the dead hand of the state department and the . Information Agency. Why one excuse is that the cold War is Over and we can dismantle the least expensive and most powerful Means of encouraging free speech abroad. Another is that we May save Money by folding the hard edged local news radio free Europe into the officially Bland International news voice of America. The real reason for the coming a a consolidation is a warping of purpose caused by Gramm Rudman. The bloating of the state department and the information Agency must come at the expense of an activity in the same budgetary pot a re is the designated victim. The decision to cannibalize re was made on the seventh floor at state. Now panels of distinguished citizens Are assigned to legitimate be the raid. The information Agency a advisory Board on Public diplomacy under the heritage foundations Ever accommodating de Fuelner dutifully rubber stamped  now a presidential task Force under the estimable John Hughes the pulitzer prize winning Christian science Monitor columnist and former chief Walter r. Mears of the information Agency and Voa is holding hearings before coming to a directed verdict its preordained conclusion is spelled out in what Are euphemistically called a terms orc Ferenec a but which Are strict instructions a the task Force will make recommendations. Under which All . Government broadcasting. Would be consolidated under a single . Government broadcasting entity and to advise a when and How such consolidation should take  not if re should be gobbled up but when and How. I can see How Rozanne Ridgway after a Long career at state would go along with this exercise in window dressing but Why such stalwarts As Ben Watton Berg Peggy Noonan and Richard Allen would lend their reputations to such a rigged verdict is beyond me. The takeover of re by the Agency which in turn takes its cues from foggy Bottom is an affront to diversity a misconception of roles and a surrender to complacency. The Agency a voice of America broadcasts our version of what is happening in the world and our idea of our own culture. Its editorials reflecting official policy Are often vetted at state. Recently when Voa dared use the word a a Independent in connection Voith the Baltic republics which has been . Policy for 50 year states censors struck it out lest that incendiary word give the balts ideas. Re on the other hand acts As a surrogate free press within a nation whose people hunger for factual reporting about what is happening to them. It hits Home a often distressing local Powers that be. When dictators or autocrats complain about the painful Domestic truth on re our diplomats can Cluck sympathetically Point to its Independent status and shrug off the complaint. For example after Quot bloody sunday Quot in Lithuania Boris Yeltsin flew to the Baltic to condemn the violence. Soviet radio suppressed his angry statement but a Helsinki based re correspondent a holding his phone to a local television set a sent Yeltsin a protest to re in Munich Germany which broadcast it throughout the soviet Union forcing Gorbachev to disavow the crackdown in Vilnius.  fettered a a voice of our government could do that. Voa is the Nice cop speaking in our behalf and re the Tough cop speaking in the local Peoples behalf. They work Well together provided they Are kept apart like the Treasury department and the Federal Reserve. Tidiness is not Reform. The Hughes task Force should take the bit in its Teeth. As Freedom streaks ahead embryonic local Media will suffer setbacks and require the stimulus of professional example. A most unconsolidated american supported broadcaster once removed from officialdom is More necessary than Ever a beaming into the cacophonous Dawn As it once transmitted into the silent night. C Tho now York Olmos nation s health care in political turmoil Back Home people Are talking about the High Price of health insurance and congressional republicans done to want the Issue to go to the democrats by default. So they Are putting together their own plan to overhaul health care rather than waiting for the White House. Sen. Alan Simpson of Wyoming the Deputy Republican Leader says the administration will have to present a health care program too. That May be months away. It is under study with no announced deadline. President Bush has proposed legislation to control medical malpractice costs but no broader Reform. And the subject keeps coming up when members of Congress talk with constituents. A in my town meetings its been the Issue of Cost Premium Cost a said Simpson. A i done to know How volatile it  the political volatility of the health care Issue May be headed upward. The visibility certainly is. A Senate democratic leaders Are pushing a plan to guarantee health insurance to All americans throw High their employers or through the government. Sen. Jay Rockefeller d-w.va., is trying to build a presidential Campaign around it. He said he will decide later this summer whether to seek the democratic presidential nomination. When the nations governors hold their annual conference in Seattle beginning aug. 17, health care Reform will top the Agenda. The american medical association heard a Republican warning that unless doctors act to make health care More affordable and available they will face Public demand that the government take it Over. For All of that there is no real likelihood that Basic changes in the health care and insurance system will be enacted this year or next. The cure is a matter of dispute the government is divided and the president Isnit pushing. In those circumstances republicans need to get their own terms onto the table for debate for bargaining a and to show the voters that they Are trying to fashion answers too. Sen. John h. Chafee of Rhode Island is taking the Republican Lead on health care As sponsor of the coming Senate gop proposal. But he said it is widely recognized that nothing will happen on health care legislation before next year if then. It is going to take artful balancing to get any health care overhaul past the powerful and competing interests involved a the doctors and hospitals who provide care the businesses and employees who pay for it and the health insurance Industry though which much of it is financed. There Are 34 million to 37 rail lion americans without health insurance and 60 million others with coverage inadequate to protect them against soaring costs. A a we re going to have to do something Complete More Complete than we be Ever done a Simpson said. And there is no Federal Money available for the purpose. The government health insurance envisioned under the democratic plan would Cost $6 billion the sponsors said they would decide later How to raise the Money. There also Are proposals in Congress and from Liberal interest groups to take More drastic action. Instead of a combination of employer and Federal health insurance those activists want q government run health care . Louis w. Sullivan the Secretary of health and human services told the american medical association that without self Reform the country could end up with just that. Sullivan said unless doctors themselves curb costs and act to make care More broadly available to those in need a we could find ourselves with a critical mass of our citizens demanding a total government takeover of health  c the associated press health coverage i