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Perot's military plan for blacks
Although Dallas billionaire
Ross Perot did not object to the
remarks attributed to him in 1988
by Dallas journalist Laura Miller,
he now not only denies them, but
questions her professionalism and
suggests that she had engaged iiy,
"flights of fantasy." ?
However, Miller, now a colurn^
nist for the Dallas Observer, main^
A
tains that H. Ross Perot lobbied to
just go in there, cordon off the
whole area, going block to block,
looking for guns and drugs.
"You can simply declare civil
war," Perot replied in response to a
question about constitutional rights.
"There ain't no bail. You go to
POW camp. You can deal with this
problem in straight military
terms.. .we can apply the rules of
war."
TONY BROWN
Syndicated Columnist
have black and Hispanic communi
ties of Dallas "cordoned off so that
police SWAT teams could conduct
house-to-house searches for drugs
and weapons.
Miller repeats this charge on
"Tony Brown's Journal "(PBS-TV,
July 10 through July 16), and adds
that the man now leading George
Bush and Bill Clinton in the presi
In recent interviews, the
would-be president has repeatedly
said that eradicating drugs "won't
be pretty," without explaining what
he had in mind. But Laura Miller
and others say that when she report
ed the specifics of Perot's ideas in
1988, he did not object to the
remarks attributed to him.
Neither has he denied appoint
dential polls also wanted souped-up ing himself the Dallas police Czar
police helicopters with infrared and engineering a 1988 campaign
tracking devices to root out drugs in by the city's almost all-white police
the black neighborhood^oLsouth__ association to weaken a civilian
Dallas.
While Perot maintains that
these remarks were fabricated,
James Ragland, a former city hall
reporter with the Dallas Morning
News, now with The Washington
Post , recalls being at an off-the
record meeting with Dallas police
members and journalists at which
Perot urged that the police "ought to
police review board set up to give
ordinary citizens the right to know
what their police department was
doing and investigate complaints of
police brutality following a spree of
shootings of black and Hispanic cit
izens by police officers. Perot's
inspired leadership led to city legis
lation that restricted the review
board and stripped it of much of its
authority to investigate allegations
of police brutality.
His behavior and intervention
outraged black and Hispanic lead
ers. Said Domingo Garcia, a Dallas
city council member, "1 don't think
he has any conception of crime or
the social ills of the inner city/
These facts are largely unknown to
most Americans, even those in Dal
las. Therefore, no one can blame
Americans for supporting Perot's
sense of patriotism and can-do
style.
That's why in virtually every
population group, between 20 and
30 percent of the voters want him to
be our next president. The single
exception to this virtually all-white
Perot bandwagon is the black com
munity where only 20 percent7 a
substantial increase over the past
month, said they would vote for
Perot.
According to USA Today, only
6 percent of Perot's supporters are
non-white. But Jesse Jackson and a
group of his follower-leaders met
recently with Perot, with Jackson
(who had one of His junkets abroad
financed by Perot) praising Perot as
a candidate "not hostile" to blacks,
and a man who "can grow."
"" Money. you might say, can also
grow. A few checks placed in the
right hands in the black community
by big-bucks Perot will fill up a lot
of churches and "voter registration"
rallies on Perot's behalf. But the
black community's early distrust of
Perot may upset this "leader" apple
cart and set off alarm bells about
Perot's dictatorial tendencies in the
rest of the country at the same time.
Rebuilding without expanding welfare
The recent events in Los Ange
les have resulted in renewed efforts
to pass large new poverty programs
in order to improve the lives of peo
ple without hope. While these pro
grams are, in the mato.'ftiKKMed
?' -wftS the besfof 'iittemiG/nivWur
community cannot afford to expand
the welfare state. Instead, the most
likely approach to help people,
especially young people, is to create
an "opportunity society" for all its
* citizens. The three biggest chal
1 lenges facing our community and
' the country are 1) the destruction of
* the African-American family, 2) the
collapse of public education as a
* means of upward mobility, and 3)
* the lack of small business infras
~ tructure as a means of wealth cre
* ation. The current approach to
* social policy ? the bureaucratic
welfare state ? created and wors
ens these problems. Even under the
" 1960 oppressive hand of Jim Crow
laws, 70% of our families had both 1
spouses present in the home, people 1
worked at whatever jobs were
available, emphasized education as r
a means of betterment, and general
ly got married in the case of births
out of wedlock. What changed in
32 years? Is there less opportunity
than in 1960?
What has changed is the rise of
the welfare state with a set of incen
tives that is destroying our family
structure and with it the means by
which values are communicated
j- through generations. This system of
; social welfare has eclipsed the
f church as the provider of help for
; the temporary poor, has taken away
; responsibility from recipients and
! rather than benefiting the poor, has
created principal beneficiaries who
make their living from the poor.
An "opportunity society"
restores dignity by giving people
choices and demanding responsible
behavior in exchange for public sup
port during temporary hard times.
Ttie distinction rcftoeen the infirmed
or permanently handicapped and the
temporarily poor is important. In an
"opportunity society," no able-bod
ied person has a right to public sup
port without working.
Any type of labor in exchange
for assistance is superior to the
dole. We must restore choices in
housing, daycare, and education.
Giving people who have earned
public assistance by working hous
authority? Or how about more
spending in failing dangerous inner
city schools so that a few more
administrators and teachers can
send their kids to safe and effective
private schools? Or let's start the
pre-prison, pre-drug dealing, pre
welfare program a few years earlier
in a system of government-run day
care so that the teacher's union can
organize more members?
I don't think so. These ideas are
not partisan. Polly Williams, an
African-American woman and
Democratic legislator from Wiscon
sin, is in the front rank of building
an "opportunity society." Jack
Kemp, President Bush's HUD sec
retary and a republican, is in that
GUEST COLUMN
By VERNON ROBINSON
T ing vouchers to choose where they
will live, daycare vouchers to
choose who will keep their
preschoolers, and scholarships to
choose the schools, public or pri
vate, that best meet their child's
needs, will ensure quality, quantity,
and choice. These solutions, along
with ideas like urban homesteading,
can restore hope where the current
welfare state has created and fanned
the embers of despair.
Does anybody really think that
what our community really needs is
more dangerous state-run public
housing projects and a few more
middle class jobs at the housing
front rank as well.
The lines are well defined. Do
you support expansion of the wel
fare state or the creation of an
"opportunity society" for all Ameri
cans? If you support the latter, then
you must vote accordingly without
regard to party or race. You must
ask what approach politicians up for
election will take and they should
not get the benefit of the doubt
(especially not incumbents or an
incumbent party). This election year
offers a chance to choose the direc
tion of policy: failed welfare state
or "opportunity society"? The
choice is yours Nov. 3.
T
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DO XXJSUEARTD
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