European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - December 30, 1993, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Thursday december 30,1993 commentary the stars and stripes Page 11don t play Moscow is Vladimir v. A Mirinovsky the racist demagogue whose party took a surprisingly big chunk of the vote in the new russian parliament an incipient Adolf Hitler no. Is Russia in the painful throes of transition to capitalism another Weimar Germany no. Are we pumping up this Man s support by insulting voters who used him As their vehicle of protest yes. He won a Ross Perot sized slice of the ballots by organizing a party first by out spending his dozen rivals on television in the final two weeks by staying on his message of resentment of corruption crime unemployment and loss of National Pride by inheriting the support of fringe parties foolishly banned by a Remote president Boris n. Yeltsin and by Runnin William Safire against an establishment slate that too its pompous Campaign style from Thomas e. Dewey. He won a fourth of the seats in half of the lower House at the same time a Constitution squeaked through that shifts Power from parliament to president. Russians split their vote As some of us concerned about dictatorship had hoped a but with a vengeance. K that sometimes happens in democracies. It s no cause for Quot a new hitter wins in Germany s largest paper for France s be Figaro to castigate a a bewildered exhausted and desperate Quot electorate for Britain s foreign Secretary to find it All Quot alarming and for vice president a Gore in Moscow for what he assumed would be a Yeltsin Celebration to mix into a local scrap by declaring the Winner s views  the Gore plan was to say nothing until the High Riding a Mirinovsky said something outrageous and then to Zap him with Quot reprehensible and Quot anathema the same Highfalutin language that marked Yegor t. Gaidar s Campaign. Although the big z tried to adopt a moderate stance in his news conference in Moscow a Quot i am not a fascist a he soon blamed jews on television for creating anti semitism. Then asked about coalitions with like minded parties he made a tasteless Wisecrack about the women of Russia movement whose 9 percent vote had also stunned the experts Quot in our Cabinet we have a number of intelligent Good looking men who Are in Good shape in All  that sent me to have a talk with the other unexpected Winner in the election Alevtina Fedulova a grandmother at 53, a longtime soviet apparatchiks heading the women of Russia movement which has been widely described As anti Reform mainly concerned with housing for the military a Likely communist agrarian or a Mirinovsky ally. A a Quot we Are women for Russia a she corrected me Quot and we arc for a Transfer to a Market Economy but with less social tension. We say no to Gaidar of russians Choice. We will tighten our belts but not around our   be Independent. Seven out of. 10 of those thrown out of Joys Are women salaries that used to be 7c percent of men s Are now 45 percent. Half the movements members Are in their 20s, with Young children and Little Opportunity and most of the other half Are Over 40, being shoved aside with no retirement Protection. They Are resentful but espouse neither fascism nor communism and arc turned off by  a Bellicose bravado of reinstating Russia s czarist Empire. Why did the reformers do so badly?1 a fall they did was talk against the past without offering anything More appealing.  patriotism capability.�?�. How to Stop him a Don t think of  a voters As you think of a Mirinovsky himself Quot Fedulova advised. A your russian people very often vote against not for. In struggling against a Mirinovsky do not struggle against the people who voted for him. If we take that approach we could raise him  Yeltsin has created a Constitution that gives him the Power to Advance Reform but gives his successor the Power to reverse it. He will now use the threat of or. Z to discipline his own support. We should not let Yeltsin use the same threat late the West. To Manipur Nevsky played the string none of his opponents questioned him to patriotism and stoned Hii show the difference Between desires and a Mirinovsky has a Kooky Charisma but lacks the key Quality that lakes politicians to the top. Do you Trust him Madame Fedulova a Onyet c Tho now York Olmos on moment May be 1993 s legacy in june 1919, statesmen in and around Paris were poring Over and improvising maps As the Versailles conference fabricated such perishable things As lasting peace and Yugoslavia. No doubt in december of that year the professional sifters and weigher of what is called a a news decided that what the statesmen had done was the years most momentous Story. But also in june 1919, Ernest Rutherford a new zealand physicist working in. England published results of experiments involving the bombardment of nitrogen with Alpha particles resulting in the transformation of nitrogen sometimes into oxygen other times into Hydrogen. What alchemists had dreamed of Rutherford had done the transformation of matter. Few noticed and fewer understood. In brighter than a thousand suns the Story of the men who made the bomb Robert Jungk wrote that in 1918, when Rutherford was upbraided for missing a meeting of British experts studying defences against submarines he replied Quot talk softly please. I have been engaged in experiments which suggest that the atom can be artificially disintegrated. I that is True it is of far greater importance than a  a the end of a year is a time for taking Stock an undertaking which properly done is chastening partic Tarly for people whose Job is to decide what is and to report news. History teaches that history a say 100 years from now a probably will conclude that we did not recognize what was really important about 1993. At the end of 1809, the relatively few people informed about events probably thought the most important events of the year were the treaty of the Dardanelles Between Britain and Turkey or the French defeating the austrians at Wagram. They could not have known that the big news occurred feb. 12, when both Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin were born. In 1922, Benito Mussolini founded Europe a first fascist government. But did that event leave As lasting a Mark As the publication that year of James Joyce a Ulysses and . Eliot a the. Waste land the More journalism tread and do the More convinced i am not merely that ideas have consequences but that Only ideas have Large and lasting consequences a behind every War there Jurks an idea a and that books Are still the primary carriers of ideas very Little other than literature lasts least of All the everyday arrangements in which we Are immersed and on which we plan to depend indefinitely. In the 1850s, american Cotton was King feeding the Mills of England but on a tonnage basis America s second largest Export was. Ice. John Steele Gordon writing in american heritage says blocks of it were sawed from new England Ponds and shipped insulated under sawdust to warm climes As Distant As Calcutta. People probably thought that would go on forever. Nothing does. A Paradox defines a modern predicament. As new George f. Will technologies in invention and communication accelerate processes of change political elites seem More not less confident of their ability to anticipate and control change. This delusion is deepened by journalism which while doing its everyday duty concentrates on the Here and now encouraging the illusion that the future will be More of the same. But consider. What if anything that happened in 1993 will stand in 2093, silhouetted against history a horizon if history is understood merely As political history a what is done with state Power a perhaps nothing will. But there is much More to history than that. So perhaps a Century from now notice will still be taken of what happened around Midnight dec. 9, 1993, at the Princeton plasma physics Laboratory. A team of scientists operating a test reactor produced pulses of Energy from controlled fusion pulses of up to several million Watts of Power. Each pulse Only lasted a second or so and consumed More Energy than it produced. But then the task of producing in new Jersey the process that Powers the Sun which in turn Powers new Jersey is not to be sneezed at. Some scientists were stirred almost to tears understandably. They can reasonably Hope that they have moved humanity toward the creation of abundant Energy from a limitless Supply of helium isotopes without significant hazardous waste. If so perhaps in 2093 the production of electricity by burning Fossil fuels will seem to our great great grandchildren As quaint As shipping Frozen pieces of new England Ponds to  Washington Post