Editorials
Tuesday, June 18, 1996
Russian election gives hope
for democracy
RUSSIAN voters remain deeply divided about their country's direction. That was reflected in Sunday's presidential election, in which President Boris Yeltsin finished barely ahead of Communist challenger Gennady Zyuganov, while a third of the electorate voted for other candidates. A Yeltsin victory in the runoff election is probable but far from certain.
Yeltsin's 35 percent of the vote represented a surge from his single-digit support in polls taken only a few months ago, but a more modest showing than expected in the days leading up to the election. Zyuganov captured 32 percent of the vote.
Yeltsin's popularity has declined since the heady days of 1991 when he led the revolution that brought down the Soviet regime. Some voters may have been annoyed by his erratic behavior, promises that will be impossible to keep and by the partiality of government-run television to his candidacy.
Having fired most of his reformist cabinet members, Yeltsin ran as a middle-of-the-roader whose re-election would prevent a return to the dismal days of communism. The hope in the West is that if he wins a second term Yeltsin will resume a program of economic reform.
Yeltsin acted quickly after the election to gain the support of third-place finisher Alexander Lebed by appointing him to be his top security adviser. Lebed, a retired army general who attracted 15 percent of the voters with a law-and-order campaign, threw his support to his new boss, but that is no guarantee all his supporters will follow. It is more certain that the 7 percent who voted for progressive economist Grigory Yavlinsky will be solidly behind Yeltsin in the run-off.
The presidential election, Russia's first since the breakup of the Soviet Union, went smoothly. That the polling seems to have been conducted with a high degree of honesty is a testimonial to how conditions have changed for the better.
But crime and poverty, especially for those on fixed incomes, have plagued Russia since the collapse of the USSR. Some people remember the Soviet years of relative security with understandable but myopic nostalgia. This helped Zyuganov and Lebed. However, it would be surprising if a majority of voters in the runoff election risked a return to totalitarian rule, or even a watered-down version of communism, by electing Zyuganov.
Other editorials in brief:
Gift to Hawaiians
THE saying is that no good deed goes unpunished, and it would seem to apply to the decision of the Hawaii conference of the United Church of Christ to give $4.5 million in cash grants and property to assist Hawaiians. The proposal attracted protesters to the annual meeting who condemned the church because the gift would allegedly benefit only church members rather than all needy Hawaiians.
The gesture was made in the spirit of healing old wounds and did not deserve the abusive response it received.
Accord with Beijing
THE Clinton administration's hard-ball tactics on trade seem to have worked with respect to China's blatant violations of intellectual property rights. Having announced punitive tariffs on $2 billion of Chinese exports in retaliation for Beijing's flaunting of a previous agreement, Washington got the Chinese to agree to take more steps to deal with the problem.
President Clinton commented that the agreement would "allow us to go forward in ways that would be good for the relationship." Perhaps, but there will be many more strains ahead as the Chinese flex their economic and military muscles. China is not about to play the game of power politics by American rules.
Published by Liberty Newspapers Limited Partnership
Rupert E. Phillips, CEO
John M. Flanagan, Editor & Publisher
David Shapiro, Managing Editor
Diane Yukihiro Chang, Senior Editor & Editorial Page Editor
Frank Bridgewater & Michael Rovner, Assistant Managing Editors
A.A. Smyser, Contributing Editor