European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - January 12, 1994, Darmstadt, Hesse Of wednesday january 12,1994 commentary the stars and stripes Page 15 parents take foolish deadly View of condoms Anna Quindlen pop quiz a 16-year-old is appropriately treated at a school clinic after he is advised that the reason it feels As if he is going to die when he urinates is because he has a sexually transmitted disease. Told that condoms could have protected him from infection he asks for some. A nurse tells him to wait while she looks for his name on the list of students whose parents have confidentially requested that their sons and daughters not receive them. The student re plies a no problem b hmm an interesting Way to balance the re productive health of adolescents and the rights of parents c nothing. He sidles out of the office and not Long afterwards gets a whopping Case of chlamydia. Condoms condoms condoms. As those who oppose condom distribution in the schools gloated Over an appellate court decision that said the program Vio lated parents rights Alwyn Cohall the paediatrician who oversees several school based clinics in new York quoted Yogi Berra ". -. It s d6ja Vul All Over again said co Hall who has to clean up the messes made when sexually Active kids Don t use condoms. And he was t smiling. Over the last two years the new York Board of education has wasted time bet Ter spent on instructional issues giving and receiving lectures on Latex. The opt out provision its members Are now Likely to adopt is the let me see if you re on the list dear scenario outlined above and if you think it might have a chilling effect on a Young Man too self conscious to ask for trojans in a drugstore then you get an a in adolescent psychology. You get extra credit if you figure that being on the list will be scant Protection against disease if the Young Man has sex anyhow. A Victory for parents some have called the provision. But is it a pyrrhic Victory Cohall a Champion of condom Distri Clinton Button agrees that it is Best if teen agers abstain from sexual activity and talk to their parents about issues of sex morality and health. But he also notes that in 1992 his three High school clinics saw around 150 cases of sexually transmitted diseases such As Condyloma chlamydia and the better known gonorrhoea and syphilis. He has a 16-year-old in the Hospital right now who got aids from her second sexual partner. And he recalls a girl who broke her leg jumping out an apartment window be cause her Mother found her birth control pills seized her by the Throat and said according to the kid i brought you into the world. I can take you out of Don t you just love those Little Mother daughter sex talks he also knows that at the heart of the balancing act Between keeping kids healthy and keeping parents involved there has always been a Covert place in which Many opponents of con Dom distribution really Settle. It s called fantasy land. You could see that in the response to the rather mild commercials on con Dom use and abstinence that the depart ment of health and human services unveiled last week. The general Secretary of the National conference of Catholic Bishops immediately said the ads promote promiscuity and the networks should reject them. At the same time Abc said it would not run the spots during its prime time family oriented programs so foolish. Abc s own Roseanne has been far More candid about sexuality than any of the new government Public service spots. And what could be a better Way to foment conversation with the Chil Dren of the video age than a television advertisement right there in your living room you have a goad to the kind of discussion that opponents of condom distribution have always argued is the Purview of parents. And you put the ads on late at night do we really want to talk with our kids or do we just want to talk about talking to them the education Board could do a great Good if it found ways to truly Foster Par ent child communication in All things not t is matters sexual. Out instead its Mem cars argue about condoms. This in t really about condoms of course but about control and the Shock of adolescent sexuality and the difficulty parents have communicating with their kids and a deep and understandable yearling for simpler times. While we yearn and argue Cohall visits his 16-year-old aids patient. Her parents involvement my someday con Sist of visiting the cemetery. Imagine How they would feel if they put her on the no condom list then put her in the Hospital then put her in the ground. Some Victory. " c Tho now York Timos Ite what terrible secret drove Vincent w. Fos Ter jr., the Clinton personal lawyer to put a Bullet through his head when that question was posed in this space last sum Mer was dread of further scandal a triggering cause of the apparent suicide Linton aides blamed Foster s state of mind on the cruel mean spirited Washington press corps with its focus on questions about a lawyer with a guilty conscience were denounced As ghoulish the product of a conspiratorial mind set. We subsequently Learned that there was indeed a scandal brewing that involved the Clinton a go go banker crony who financed their Whitewater real estate Deal and an so failure now under criminal investigation that Cost taxpayers $60 million. Foster improperly kept the potentially dam aging records of that Deal in his White House office. Surely crossing his mind after the juror Over the abuse of Power in travel office patronage was the potential of far greater disgrace or prosecution in a Money and in fluence scandal. From the moment Foster s body was found White House counsel Bernard j. Nussbaum acted to keep those Whitewater development corp files away from prying investigation was confined to the Keystone Kop Park police Clinton lawyers refused to let them or the Fri see papers that might have revealed the suicide motive and then secretly the files were spirited away from the White House to the president s personal the existence of the hidden file came to Light president Clinton and his wife stonewalled. First William Safire lady Hillary Rodham Clinton attorney for the rotted out so while her husband was responsible for its regulation professed not to understand Why anybody would be interested in a Deal that lost them $60,000. But curiously the Clinton never took that loss if it existed off their income taxes More strangely they wrongly took other deductions and the Law yer who worked with Hillary Clinton on these returns was Foster. During the 92 Campaign to cover up the Messy re Cord Foster arranged for a lawyer to hire a Denver accountant to Whitewash Whitewater the Patten Mccar thy report omitted the largest transaction undertaken by the Clinton partnership a half million Dollar land Purchase from a paper company to which gov. Clinton granted tax Breaks. After the mean insensitive press raised a ruckus to produce the Whitewater files the president was forced to agree to cooperate with the investigation of the Bank s taxpayer rip off. He directed his personal lawyer to turn the Whitewater files Over to the Justice department a far cry from Public disclosure. But a curious lassitude overtook the Clinton Justice department. The files were not turned Over forthwith instead we were told they were being Cata logged which the White House said would take a Cou ple of Only last week As this and other denunciations were being written did one Box containing Foster s files and four boxes of backup to the accountants Whitewash begin to get delivered. Were the files so voluminous to require Cata Loging can we be sure the documents did not get the treatment Given the so called suicide note which appeared belatedly in 27 pieces not one with a fingerprint and with the signature space missing if i were Louis j. Freeh the new Fri director chosen by Nussbaum and known As Bernie s Good deed i would follow up by searching for a Foster Safe Deposit Box or Home Strongbox and would demand that Justice seek subpoenas to Force the Clinton and their former Law partners and accountants to produce All other Rele vant papers. What could explain the Clinton document Shell game that has been going on since the discovery of Fos Ter s body actions taken by lawyer investor Hillary Clinton in 1988, when she requested Power of attorney to manage and conduct All matters related to Whitewater development corp.," May soon come under the statute of limitations. Special in House counsel not unless it s Robert Morgenthau better to use this pressure for House Pas Sage of the Independent counsel act. No politician is so stupid As to try to hide something when there is nothing to hide. The Clinton pattern of behaviour in White watergate is that of Wheeler dealers with something serious to hide. Let s Hope it s Only politically embarrassing. C the new Yolk times
