Editorials
Thursday, January 15, 1998MAKING the government of the United States function effectively is no easy matter. It can become impossible if key members of Congress insist on having their way at all costs. 'Legislative blackmail' hurting foreign policy
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright is no newcomer to Washington and came to her job well aware of the pitfalls involved in dealing with Congress. In her first year in office, she tried to be diplomatic. But it's been frustrating, and now she is letting the frustration show. In a speech Tuesday, Albright decried "legislative blackmail" that, she said, halted payments of U.S. debts to the United Nations. As the United States seeks the U.N.'s help in resolving the crisis in Iraq, Congress has created a "truly ridiculous" stalemate with its allies, she said.
Albright became especially frustrated in November, after most conservatives agreed to start repaying the $1 billion U.N. debt. In return, they demanded reforms at the U.N. But the agreement fell apart as key figures tied the repayments to legislation involving abortion.
A big thorn in Albright's side has been Rep. Christopher H. Smith, R-N.J., who is chairman of the House Subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights. Last fall, Smith authored an amendment banning nearly $5 billion in payments to the U.N. and the International Monetary Fund unless the Clinton administration agreed to deny foreign aid to nonprofit groups that perform abortions or advocate abortion rights.
Albright pointed out that the failure to pay the U.N. weakens America's leverage while Saddam Hussein is challenging the U.N.'s authority to demand access for weapons inspectors.
Abortion rights are protected by the Constitution and favored in public opinion surveys, which makes it incongruous for the United States to take positions hostile to abortion in foreign affairs. Opponents' intransigence is undermining important foreign policy initiatives. The "legislative blackmail" that Albright complains about is part of the political process, but abortion opponents are carrying their blackmail too far.
The United States cannot get along without the United Nations and its allies. The politicians who are blocking the payment of the U.S. debt over the abortion issue are oblivious to this fact.
FURTHER escalation of professional sports up the economic ladder of the entertainment industry will be a boon for the few athletes able to make the grade and a greater allure for millions of others who are bound to fail. Anyone who thinks the money paid to Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods is absurd should prepare to double their amazement; that is what just happened in pro football. Sports fantasy
It all occurred in the American spirit of competition. NBC, the stalwart of pro football for more than three decades, was knocked off the field by ABC, CBS and Fox Broadcasting, all seen somersaulting in the end zone with eight-year contracts for which they will pay a cool $17.6 billion. The deal will pay the NFL at least $2.2 billion annually, compared with its previous contracts totaling $1.1 billion. It comes two months after the National Basketball Association signed a contract doubling its television revenue.
The increase will be of most interest to professional athletes and their agents, whose demands have soared in recent years. They will have every justification to demand that the increased revenues be reflected in the players' salaries.
Free agency, wider television exposure and increasingly fierce competition among advertisers are all aspects of growth in the sports industry. Superstars have become super rich. Even bench-sitters now achieve wealth that yesterday's sports idols could not have imagined.
But values long associated with sports have suffered. An NCAA scholarship is regarded less as a means of obtaining a college education than as a chance, however slim, of gaining enough exposure to grasp a pro sports contract. Financial considerations predominate; Chris Fuamatu-Maafala last week chose to drop out of the University of Utah a year short of graduation because an injury could turn his long shot in the NFL into no shot at all.
The dreams that become fixed in the minds of ghetto children can only grow because of such wild expectations. While fantastic sums will enrich the sports elite, the enticement is likely to lead many youngsters down a path of despair.
RECYCLING is the recommended process of the environmental movement, but the city has learned the hard way that recycling can create its own environmental problems. Community resistance has forced the abandonment of a plan to build a facility to recycle sludge from sewage treatment plants into top soil and soil additives. Recycling fiasco
In 1994 the city awarded a contract to N-Viro International, a company based in Ohio, that would have paid it $2.8 million a year for 10 years for recycling. After three years of fruitless effort, the company has abandoned the project.
The original plan was to locate the facility at Campbell Industrial Park. But a group comprised of owners of businesses at the industrial park fought the project, contending that it would pollute the air at their businesses and questioning the trucking of sludge from treatment plants all over the island.
After the Campbell plan was discarded, an attempt was made to place the recycling facility next to the Honouliuli wastewater plant, but that was abandoned as economically infeasible.
The city has already paid the company $450,000 and owes more. Negotiations are in progress.
Recycling, it turns out, is not always popular. The city is still faced with the problem of disposing of the sludge.
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
