European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - August 18, 1994, Darmstadt, Hesse Thursday August 18, 1994 commentary the stars and stripes Page 17 Clinton provides stuff Good writing s made of Andrew j. Glass the sixth Grade teacher told her class that the Best writing often takes in four major spheres of life religion Roy Alty mystery and sex. She asked her pupils to write essays that used All those elements. Freddie finished first. He wrote " Good god said the Queen. Preg Nant again i wonder who did it " it could be said that president Clinton covered three of the four spheres when his lawyers went to court to argue that the Constitution protects him from being sued for damages while in office. The Clinton Brief traces its lineage to the Credo of the Stuart monarchs that the King can do no this was an ancient doctrine that i a revolution ours. Presidents our forebears held were not Kings. When in 1807 Clinton s namesake Thomas Jefferson was served a subpoena in the treason trial of Aaron Burr he subjected himself to the judicial process just like the next Guy. So much for Royalty. Mystery and sex enter into it because a former Arkansas state employee Paula Jones sued Clinton claiming he asked her to perform a sex act in a Little Rock hotel room a few years before he moved to Washington. Clinton saying he can t remember any such thing wants the court to quash the civil rights lawsuit. To be sure the Clintonia Stab at immunity is in reality a Legal ploy aimed at putting the Jones Case on the Back Bur Ner via years of appeals. Yet the recent 20th anniversary of president Nixon s abrupt departure from the White House to avoid impeach ment and a Senate trial serves As a Handy Benchmark for studying the Issue. The judge in the Case might ask Clin ton s lawyer Robert Bennett whether he thinks the vice president similarly merits the right to avoid Pesky Legal distractions. After All should not Al Gore be free to reinvent government and build inf Bahns for the new Century and what about Secretary of state War Ren Christopher who is also Busy seeking to bring peace to the Middle East does t he deserve a pass As Well actually there s a firebreak to the immunity flame to be found with Henry Cis neros the Secretary of housing and Urban has been sued by a former mayoral aide with whom he had a Liaison on the grounds that he promised to pay her $4,000 a month after their affair had ended. Cisneros says he is ashamed and embarrassed by his past conduct. While he claims the lawsuit has no Merit he does not claim he should not be sued because he is too Busy seeking to save America s cities from rum. Is the White House a different kind of place from where the Clinton Cabinet folks hang out that s what Doris Kearns Goodwin holds in a new biography of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt. An excerpt has run in the new yorker. The historian recounts in detail the rather bizarre living and sexual arrange ments in the for household As the nation girded for War in 194l the message is that despite All of that stuff the Roosevelt made their marriage work and that the press which knew about the Hanky Panky looked the other Way. But you have to wonder if the message to the refined new yorker in crowd is for god s Sake give the Clinton. Break c Cox news service immigrants become too much like americans in san Diego hard by Mexico and with the surfs concussions rhythmically reminding natives of the Ocean across which asian immigrants now come As europeans once did across the Atlantic the debate about immigration is silting up with misunderstandings according to Wayne Cornelius director of the Center for can studies at the universe y f Oil forma san Diego. He believes one of today s problems May be too much taller than too Little certainly the Nightmare of Many immigrant parents is that their children Are becoming too much like us like the native populations they Are closest to. The alleged failure of or resistance to assimilation is the basis of the cultural As distinct from the economic criticism of current immigration. But Cornelius says suppose today s immigrants were importing a danger Ous culture value a advocacy of authoritarian government. Or More pointedly Cornelius continues suppose native born americans today had the 1960 rate of illegitimate births and immigrants were importing the soaring illegitimacy rates that native born americans now have 68 percent for african americans 30 per cent for society As a whole. the cultural critique of immigration would be understandable., but one problem concerning today s immigration says Cornelius is with Domestic minorities a conclusion supported by other research on the bother Side i the continent among haitian and other immigrants in Miami. A in their essay should immigrants assimilate in the Public interest Alejandro Portes of Johns Hopkins and min Zhou of Louisiana state University note that children of nonwhite immigrants usually live at close quarters with inner City minority youths who have an adversarial stance toward the White Mam George will Stream joining those native circles to which they do have Access May prove a ticket to permanent subordination and subculture of marginalized native born youths i often instills scepticism about the value of education As a vehicle for advancement a message that directly contradicts that from immigrant Cornelius concurs. Pick your indicator he says. School dropout rates involve ment in gangs indicators Are Apt to become worse As assimilation of Young inner City immigrants becomes Cornelius says _ America s aversion to immigration rises As the first generation effect wanes among immigrants. That effect is the shaping of Young people by conservative families with Faith in education and the work , immigrant parents in cities Are terrified of what their children Are Apt to learn at school sex drugs Petty idea that millions of immigrant parents Are re sisting assimilation is Cornelius says a myth. Cultural maintenance of the immigrants old Iden Tity is More Apt to be a goal of Anglo intellectuals than of immigrants. Lack of English says Cornelius is the single most important Factor working against improvement of immigrants economic condition and they know immigrant parents who remain monolingual do so primarily for two reasons. Working Dawn to dusk they Are too exhausted to attend esl English As a second language classes. And there is an acute shortage of such classes. The rising aversion to immigration masks americans ambivalence about immigration ambivalence rooted in economic rather than cultural calculations. There always will be Cornelius says jobs that americans do not raise their kids to it is to say no More rare to see an Anglo working in a carwash. Chances Are a non Anglo will serve you in a Southern California restaurant. There Are similar realities in other Industrial nations. Japan s 300,000 illegal immigrants Are less than 0.5 percent of the work Force but Are indispensable to Japan s Economy because japanese parents even More than american parents do not want their children per forming some work that society wants performed. In Spain child care is done largely by dominicans and peruvians. As America s population Ages the shortage of entry level workers especially for Small and medium sized businesses will deepen America s ambivalence about immigration. But Cornelius argues that if by effective control of immigration we mean equilibrium Between the Supply of immigrants and the demand for their labor we May have that now. There May be places . Los Angeles and sectors . Agriculture where equilibrium does not exist but nationally there is no Large Pool of unemployed immigrant labor americans says Cornelius would prefer that Immi Grants do their jobs and then disappear at the end of the Day. But they wont and americans won t do with out the work the immigrants do. So americans conflicted and with slightly guilty consciences about Immi Gration will he says continue to be wrong sometimes wilfully about facts and their inferences from them. C Washington Post
