Page A4The Chronicle, Thursday, May 17, 1984
i
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Winston-Salem Chronicle
Founded 1974
ERNEST H. Pin,
NDUBISI EOEMONYE ALLEN JOHNSON
C (? A uundt' t \r\ ytitr ttJiii"
ELAINE L. PITT MICHAEL VlTT JOHN LADE
Offiif \1jnuK?' Cirmlultiin Wwitorr' Ai.\isliiKl tdih*
Olympic 'games'
According to purveyors of doom far and wide, the
Soviets' withdrawal from the 1984 Olympics will herald the
downfall of the games as we know them today.
The petty, dastardly Russians have ruined the games, they
say, and cursed them to be used for political interests rather
than remain the pure contests of athletic skill they were
designed to be.
* Nonsense.
Those arguments are about as logical as naming an 4<of1984
Olympics with a straight face or
navrng- jr rtcir s Arrgct- cartytiit fWWfM'"'
way to Los Angeles.
Similarly, the "purity" of the Olympics is about as big a
I myth as the tooth fairy or Santa Claus. *
The games are commercial, hypocritical and, most of all,
political even without the withdrawal of certain nations or
nightmarish acts of terrorism, as occurred in 1972.
If politics weren't involved, they'd simply mix teams from
different countries and have them compete on international
squads rather than on national teams waving flags and wearing
patriotic colors.
Though many of us won't admit it, the main cause of our
Olympic heartache is not that the Soviets' absence will hurt
the Olympic tradition. What we regret more than anything
else is that Pat Ewing and Michael Jordan won't get to dunk
the Soviet basketball team all the way back to Siberia or that
our track team won't do likewise to the Soviet runners.
We really wanted to see Indiana's fiery Bobby Knight
coach the Soviets into the ground simply because they are the
bad guys.
It's sort of like Winstpn-Salem State and A&T: Losing to
anyone else is tolerable but losing to the Soviets is the worst
kind of defeat.
And that rivalry has its roots in politics.
Hitler knew that when he tried to use the games to assert
"Aryan superiority." Jesse Owens knew it when he showed
Hitler what he could do with his Aryan superiority.
So did Jimmy Carter in 1980, when he withdrew the
United States from Olympic competition in the Moscow
Games in a meaningless protest against the Soviet invasion
of Afghanistan. We're sure the Soviet military effort suf-~
fered mightily after that move and that the people of
Afghanistan were given the moral boost they needed to keep
up the fight.
We're by no means defending the Soviet snub. But we also
didn't approve of Jimmy Carter's decision to rain on the
Soviets' parade simply to get a measure of symbolic revenge
for Afghanistan.
Both acts reek of childish, tit-for-tat diplomacy that ac
complishes very little athletically or politically.
What the Soviets and Americans have managed to do in
the last two Olympics is stick their tongues out at one
' another and make nasty faces.
Given that these two children could blow up the world if
they irk one another sufficiently, we hope they grow up
soon.
Crystal-clear hindsight
Sometimes what you've written can be overshadowed by
where it is placed.
A case in point is last week's editorial entitled "Postelection
notes."
The editorial read, in part:
" - As we noted in the pre-election editorial above, the
Black Leadership Roundtable passed its acid test by endorsing
Tom Gilmore even while prominent members of iu
^Ednristcn. L_ 1
"Or u/p thonoht Qnmp Ifnnv \unrlfprc ot Qt 5tonhor?
W4 uvr tt v vuvw^aui vyviuv a%iiv/i vyi i\vi J u t k/ w uivpuvil
Baptist Church started the day by handing out flyers that
listed the Roundtable's slate of endorsements, but featured a
handwritten "amendment": Tom Gilmore's name was
crossed out and Eddie Knox's written in.
"Some say the tactic originated within the Roundtable's
membership.
"How the organization handles the matter will have a
significant bearing on the Roundtable's future.... v
Elections in these parts attract mercenaries like picnics
attract ants. You know the species: They'll campaign for the
highest bidder no matter what he or she might stand for.
"Maybe we should pay them to leave town."
Though dashes (--) and ellipses (....) were used to mark
where one thought began and another ended, some of our
readers apparently misinterpreted the two items quoted
above to be the same thought. They are not related.
The first item deals with the Black Leadership Roundtable
and its struggle to weather apparent discord within its own
- ranks. We said then and we underscore now the fact that the
Roundtable's status as the most influential black political
organization in Forsyth County will be severely tested by
that discord.
We hope it survives.
The second con scrns some among us who, for a few dollar
Please see page A5
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The genius
By CLIFTON GRAVES
Guest Columnist
Larry D. Little ... principled Par
ther ... progressive politiciaiv .
agitator alderman ... eloquent orate
... audacious organizer ... committe
... courageous ... sincere ... sensitiv
... strategist ... statesman ... genius
Webster's defines "genius" as "
great natural ability; a great menu
capacity; a person with a very high in
telligence quotient." While the terr
"genius" is used rather loosely in to
day's society, there is no better ap
plication of the definition, no bette
embodiment of the word, than Larr
Little.
In my opinion, Brother Larry -- a
the yet tender age of 33 - has don
more these past 15 years for effec
tuating change and progress in ou
community than anyone else, period
Like him or loathe him, the brothe
must have your respect for no othe
reason than having the courage t
stand up and fight for his conviction
- courage exemplified in his organi2
ing support for Joanne Little and th
Wilmington 10, and his standing u
to corporate giants like R.J. Reynold
and demanding that they demonstrat
more social responsibility toward th
community in which they hav
become enriched.
His courage was shown in his cons
Stats pron
By JOHN JACOB
Syndicated Columnist
Any way you look at the number
poverty is on the rise.
Just a few years ago, in 1979, thei
were 26 million poor Americans. B
1982, the poor had increased to 34.
million. Current estimates of the poc
place the number well over 3
million.
Why the jump? Simple. Two rece
sions in that three-year period be
ween 1979 and 1982, one of thei
deep enough to qualify for depressio
status, if there were a fair econom
labeling law- effect.
- ~ St&r there- **e Umwwhv ai gmMt
"?numbers of the poor are inflate*
That's the view of leading officials i
the administration who claim that tl
poverty figures include only peop
whose cash incomes fall below tl
poverty line.
They say that the value of feder
non-cash benefits should be added t
cash income in defining poverty. Pi
a dollar figure on a family's subsidi
ed housing, its food stamps and i
Medicaid benefits, and the numbe
of the poor would be much smaller
To me, that's just playing wit
numbers. It bears no relation to real
ty, and none to determing who
poor.
Most of those benefits ? medic
assistance, for example - flow direc
ly to doctors and hospitals, not 1
P&eSl&eNT7 Or C\
[ El ^
. WALKED OUT 1 _.
JCVA APMS 1 ? II >
V|?? I o
ib'
frkji - *
r unmirtN III r\ *1
b |1 V2J pOj ^ I
nsQkce I o J
of Brother L
tant confrontations with whitehooded,
blue-suited, and black-robed
white racists who have threatened to
blow him off the map, run him out of
town, or buy him off (as they have
^ been able to do with so many of our
so-called black
leaders). i
Brother
^ h jff*Jr
y beyond the j /
confrontations
t with the status ?
u ,u .u Clifton Graves
e guo in both the
white and black communities, Larry
r Little has demonstrated a political
growth and maturity which has
r resulted in widespread respect at the
x local, state and national levels,
o This is due in part to his uncanny
is ability to be both politician and
> statesman, prolific agitator and
e astute negotiator, idealist and
P. pragmatist.
is Thus, he can condemn the U.S. ine
vasion of Grenada and,
e simultaneously, assist a local black
e business get through bureaucratic red
tape. He can express outrage over the
- Klan-Nazi terrorism in Greensboro in
a
lit: Poverty\
poor people. It is just ridiculous to
say that a poor person is no longer
poor because a stay in the hospital
' ' boosts his income by the amount the
government pays the hospital and the
, doctors. *
4 The same reasoning makes it
' foolish to add housing subsidies to
Ij the incomes of the poor. If the
government pays a developer a subsidy
to build low-income housing,
does that make the tenants less poor?
It is interesting that the same peopie
who are so anxious to find the
specious ways to juggle numbers and
find specious- ways 4o juggle
in crease the incomes of poor pe
ie poverty, show no such incline
le benefits to the non-poor. "
ie ???
definitions to increase the incomes of
?1 nArtr nAnnlo anH tknc Hafina tKam mif
ai pvv* pwvypiv uiiu wuuo uvuiiv viiviii kjui
:o of poverty, show no such inclination
Lit to add the value of federal benefits to
z- the non-poor.
ts After all, if it is right to reason that
rs all aid be included in income, why
restrict the game to poor people. How
:h about adding the value of interest
[iw deductions and depreciation deducis
tions to incomes of the affluent?
Doing that would widen the
al statistical gap between the poor and
t- the affluent, and would make visible
:o the immense subsidies that flow to the
I
-TR& \irns \_EfT 7he
' \NTEGKAEDIATE RAN6&
KUCLEAG WEAPONS TAUS
IMSi
fHE SOVIETS HAVE MTHDGAWW
:CoM THE SUMtAEC. OLVAAPICS
OH, Wo/ If
arry Little
the morning and help his North Ward
constituents solve a zoning problem
. that same afternoon. He can express
righteous indignation over America's
cozy political and economic relationship
with racist South Africa,then
turn around and get an unemployed
youth a job with a local company.
Don't misunderstand. What I am
highlighting here are strengths, not
weaknesses; commitment, not inconsistencies;
courage, not craziness.
But if one were to ask of Larry Little
what he considers to be his crowning
accomplishments to date, certainly
he would have to list near the top
the court-approved redisricting plan
and his triumphant coordination of
the Forsyth County Jesse Jackson
presidential campaign.
In drafting the state legislative
redisricting plan, which now practically
guarantees two black state
legislators from Forsyth County,
Larry demonstrated a political savvy
and intelligence possessed by few individuals
of any hue. Indeed, the attorneys
representing the AfricanAmerican
plaintiffs in the lawsuit
considered Brother Little's draft plan
the most thoughtful, fair and ingenious
of those presented from
across the state.
As for Larry's orchestration of
Jesse Jackson's Forsyth County
Please see page A12
v on the rise
better-off, often at the expense of the
needy.
But the critics of the conventional
method of counting the poor -- by
cash income alone - are now powerful
enough to get their way.They had
the Census Bureau calculate the
numbers of the poor using alternative
methods that included the value of
federal non-cash benefits. And guess
what? Even by juggling the definitions
of the poor, it turns out that
poverty is rising and that some nine
million people became poor over the
1979-1982 period.
^numbers and definitions to in- ,
oole and thus define them out of
ation to add the value of federal
The numbers-crunching exercise
does reduce the total poverty figure,
but not significantly. And one reason
is that the savage cuts in those federal
benefit programs meant that fewer
poor people received aid, and that the
aid was not sufficient to lift the recipients
above the poverty line.
In recent years, while unemployment
and poverty were rising steeply,
spending for both cash and non-cash
benefit programs were declining in
real terms. The eligibilty requirements
for those programs were
Please see page A10
fBKOOtt AND
Chronicle Letters I
a* I
A word about I
Eddie Knox I
To The Editor:
Eddie Knox, a candidate for
governor of North Carolina, has
been endorsed by his former opponent,
Harvey Gantt, currently
mayor of Charlotte. Gantt's endorsement
is truly surprising, considering
Knox's campaign tactics
against him in the 1979 mayoral
election in Charlotte.
During the 1979 campaign,
Gantt, a black, in noting that
Knox's campaign ads injected
racial overtones in the mayoral
race, was quoted in the Sept. 22,
' ttr-^Itonox;
"Your ads arc sick. They are
bad." Knox replied, *'That's a
matter of opinion."
The July 29, 1983, issue of the
News and Observer reported that
Paul Luebke, an associate pro.
fessor of sociology at the University
of North Carolina at
Greensboro, testified in the federal
redistricting litigation and referred
to Knox's 1979 campaign against
Gantt as an example of political
campaigns in the state which have
appealed to racial prejudice
against black candidates through
"racial telegraphing."
Specifically, through his ads,
Knox attempted to project himself
as a representative for all of the city
of Charlotte, while indicating
that Gantt would represent only a
part of the city.
History shows that Gantt was
narrowly defeated by an unfair
campaign masterminded by Eddie
Knox who, as a member of the
North Carolina General Assembly
in 1973, was one of the sponsors of
Senate Joint Resolution 947. This
resolution honored George C.
Wallace, self-proclaimed racist,
and it was ratified May 24, 1973.
A candidate who engages in
despicable tactics such as those used
by Eddie Knox in - his 1979
mayoral race certainly is unworthy
of serving as governor of this state. 1
Further research reveals that in
1973, Knox co-sponsored a resolution
to ask Congress to convene a
Constitutional Convention for the
purpose of adopting an anti-busing
amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
This action was in the wake
of desegregation order of the
federal courts.
Black voters should not be
deceived by Mayor Gantt's endorsement
of Knox. Rather, they
should view the endorsement for
what it really is: a staged marriage
of political expedience designed to
enhance Knox's credibility among
black voters.
I believe that black voters have
enough political savvy to see
through Knox's scheme. Such insight
should lead blacks to vote
decisively against Eddie Knox on
election day.
As a black citizen of this state, 1
am currently an undecided voter
with respect to the governor's race.
I am sure, however, that Eddie
Knox does not deserve and will not
receive my vote.
E.H. Harris
More on Knox
To The Editor:
Recently, I received in the mail
an anonymous packet of information
designed to call into question
the integrity and commitment to
eaualitv of oooortunitv of Eddie
Knox. This is a blatant attempt to
undermine support for Eddie
within the black community.
Eddie Knox has been in politics
for a good part of his adult life.
Like most of America, over the
years, his views on civil rights
issues have matured and become
more liberal. Today, Eddie Knox is
a subscribing Hfe member of the
Please see page A5