European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - October 18, 1991, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Friday october 18, 1991 the stars and stripes a Page 13 James Resto Thomas vote was also about for More than a week the Senate judiciary committee discussed sexual harassment without even being Able to agree on How to pronounce it. All the Central figures in this tragedy a the judge the professor and the committee members a were caught in a fog of contradictory information about the past and it was easy to be sorry for them All. But the question now is not about the past but about the future not about How to restore the Good names of Clarence Thomas and Anita Hill but How to restore the Good name of the Senate and do something about the moral squalor in the nation. Considering the underhanded tricks to Block Thomas a Elevation to the supreme court and the sneaky attempts to question professor Anita Hills sanity this won t be easy but it is Only part of the larger problem. There was a crisis of Confidence across the country Long before this Case startled the people. Since Vietnam and watergate it has been hard to read a newspaper any morning or listen to the nightly news without being told of some Leader in government or business even the Church violating his Trust or the Law then lying about it. This is much More serious than whether the judge or the professor told the truth. So the immediate question is whether the confirmation of Clarence Thomas will put a Brake on this mad political Rush to profit and win at any Cost. The hearings did not do that. They not Only raised More doubts about the honesty of our politics and the cheap Clever tactics of some senators but also increased the tensions Between the sexes and the races. This is precisely what we did no to need. We heard a lot about the flaws in the Senate a con commentary moral squalor firming a process a but few said anything about the flaws in the nominating process. One mystery of this avoidable scandal is Why president Bush Ever nominated Clarence Thomas in the first place. He said he never even considered Thomas a race but sent his name to the Senate because he regarded judge Thomas As the Best qualified person for the Job and nobody even laughed. This was such an obvious misrepresentation of the facts even Thomas was surprised that the nomination should have been examined against the presidents claim and a returned to  the hearings did however Tell us something about Thomas. He is an intelligent attractive Man. He was a believable witness with a most admirable record of struggle out of poverty and prejudice. But he pictured himself with self pity As a victim of racial politics As if this were the America of the rope and Lynch mob. Most committee members apologized for this process and its unfairness in dragging him and his privacy before the nation. This was understandable considering the Challenge to his character. But his anger and his condemnation of the Senate for trying to Deal with the contradictions facing it did not say much for his sense of history or judicial temperament which were relevant to his confirmation. After All this democratic process with All its shortcomings staggering and blundering has brought Clarence Thomas to where he is today. C tit new York time Walter me Arsnow it s time for the Senate to be judged this is no game for boy scouts Clarence Thomas was told in one of the few understatement of the seamy finale to his supreme court confirmation hearings. On that at least there can be no dispute a it is played for keeps with lifetime stakes Between political forces that will crush careers and sometimes people to win. After the Senate delivered its delayed judgment on Thomas it now is being judged for the incredible sometimes inept confirmation process that broadcast sordid details of sexual harassment accusations in a three Day Marathon Minise Ries on National television. The whole exercise was accompanied by demands for Reform of the system by which the Senate confirms of rejects presidential nominees to the court. For All the insistence that there must be a better Way and despite the vows to find it no Reform is going to guarantee against a replay of something like the Thomas Case. Next time it will involve different people different circumstances but the same reality when one Side has the Power to nominate and the votes to confirm the other looks for a Way to undo them. That was the origin of the accusations against Thomas. Anita Hills charge did not surface in a dispassionate investigation it was tracked and delivered by aides to two democratic senators opposed to his confirmation Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts and Howard Metzenbaum of Ohio. Since democrats have been in the White House Only four of the past 22 years they have had the opposition role on nominees. Republicans have controlled the Senate in Only six of those years. That is a formula for confirmation struggles especially Over nominees to the supreme court. Only one Justice of the nine was chosen by a democratic president 13 consecutive nominees including those who did no to make it were chosen by Republican presidents. For the democrats there Are Only two ways to alter the courts conservative course a winning the White House with the Odds against them again in 1992, or using the confirmation process to Force More moderate judicial choices upon the White House. C the associated press , Rosentha press does t need any harassment lessons every Day in newspapers and every hour on the hour on to the american press was telling the country that not Only the judge and his accuser were on trial in the harassment hearings but also the Senate the nomination process All men and the character of american society. True enough but missing from the list of defendants on the harassment charge is the institution that is shaking its Finger at the nation. The american press itself belongs on that list. So often and so casually that it hardly even notices anymore the press now practices a wide variety of harassment a based on sex politics occupation prominence vendetta or even personal tragedy. I am not dealing with the coverage of the Story. It was the hearings specifically the bravery of witnesses on both sides in risking attack even their jobs by speaking their minds and hearts that made this column pop out of my own mind and heart. For years i have thought of speaking Plain about harassment by the press. I did not because of reluctance to seem self serving since the new York times is not often an offender and because of fear a of again making my family the victim of harassment based on blood or marriage. But now liberated by and grateful for the courage of the witnesses in the hearings a lets get to it. It is sexual harassment to pursue a woman a every step leeching and leering about her her clothes her children her friends and her personal relations with a husband dead almost 30 years. The press has turned Jacqueline Onas Sis into a harassed everlasting profit Center for Factor into and for newspapers magazines and Book publishers. Three decades now we pursue her because she is the widow of a murdered american a in other words because she is a woman. It is sexual harassment to Send helicopters snooping above Elizabeth Taylor a wedding. It is sexual harassment to Send reporters peering into windows of a woman charging rape or the windows of a presidential candidate a or to print whether a person is Gay to make an a a activists Point. It is sexual harassment for the slavering a a reporters of those prime time �?oex-pos6�?� shows to invade schools trying to interview teachers about the sex lives of other teachers. I wonder How much they have to pay a reporter to do that maybe not much at All maybe they just like that line of work. I say it is loathsome political and personal harassment for detachments of reporters and camera people to Camp outside the House of judge Clarence Thomas or anybody else trapped in the news preventing him and his family from coming and going in the peace that every non criminal is supposed to enjoy in the name of civic decency. Is it not loathsome harassment to stick a camera and a Mike into a mothers face and ask her How she really feels about the shooting of her child still lying in a drawer in some Hospital morgue the harassing garbage pail journalism that once existed on the disreputable fringes in journalism a red Light districts is now a treasured feature of Many papers a the daily a dirt pages of Rumor and scandal. A Slick respected National monthly a no names because so Many publications Are harassers a quotes an Anonymous source As saying that a new yorker of achievement comes from the  that is harassment with a muggers mask More degrading to Magazine than victim. The garbage pail publications still exist of interest Only to their victims and their publishers who use them for social entree and profit. Some owners have become hostages of fear to their own staffs. Spare me the first amendment lecture. I know harassment by press is within the Law. I agree the Constitution is Worth the Price. So we have Freedom of press. Now All that journalists need is Freedom of conscience. C the now York times