Editorials & Comments. Tragedy Of Presidential Politics il current events are any indication of the kind of national leadership the nation will have after the November Presidental election, the American people face a tragedy of major portions. The Carter administration, if not the President himself, an nounced last week that a Re publican Party sponsored tax cut proposal was irresponsible and politically motivated. The Demo crats, the President's party, said instead that they'd offer their own, more responsible tax cut plan as a part of Carter's mid year budget review planned for next week. However, that has changed already because the mid-year review is expected to predict a federal deficit of nearly $60 billion in fiscal year 1980. This represents a $24 billion increase over the budget esti mate announced only last March. These sudden shifts ir the President's budget predic tions and his reaction to Re publican Party politics appear to characterize some of the con tinued weaknesses in his leader ship. Specifically, we are re ferring to the apparent lack of planning and research before making decisions and the result ing sudden and reoccurring changes in decisions. On the other hand, we're sadly mistaken if we think the nation's leadership will be any better under the Republican Party. For example, while former Presi dent Gerald Ford was telling the Republican National Convention in Detroit that Republicans r would save the jobs of the blue collar auto worker, the Republi can majority on the Mecklen burg Board of County Commis sioners used in the words of The Charlotte Observer (July 14), "a hatchet on the county's federally financed CETA jobs program..." The Commission majority re jected the $250,000 in federal job training and employment funds because they did not want to provide $27,000 in County money for program administration. ι ne reiauonsnip œiween Ford's comments and the ac tions of the Republican majority on the Mecklenburg Board of County Commissioners lies in the fact that in addition to being in the same political oartv with the same political mind-set or mentality, the Commissioners' actions more clearly reflect what a Republican president will do as opposed to the political rhetoric of the former President. It is evident from these ob servations and there are many more, that no matter which candidate - Carter or Reagan - wins the Presidency in Novem ber, we, the voters, may suffer from inadequate leadership; therefore, who you vote for and why will be of even greater significance in this year's election. Worker-Welfare Myth In a recent column William Raspberry wrote that welfare grants ought to be tied to a requirement - that able-bodied recipients go to work. Raspberry went on to give support to the idea and to note that such à program had been initiated by Republican Presidential candi date Ronald Reagan when he was governor of California. In a subsequent column, Rasp berry expressed considerable surprise that he did not receive. negative reaction from liberals and other so-called advocates of the poor. In fact, the syndicated writer said he received "an amazing degree of support for the idea; some of it, predictably, from people who describe them selves as 'taxpayers', but much of it from people whose sym pathies are with poor families." No one, least of all a know ledged writer like Mr. Rasp berry, should be surprised by the response received to the work welfare idea. The fact is liberals, many of them do-gooder whites . and some from the "black mid dle" class, and the nation's political conservatives, be they Democrats or Republicans, have perpetuated a myth that poor people, or more specifically wel fare recipients, have an aversion to work. The myth is designed by libers to serve their own need to feel important by giving wel fare recipients a sense of de pendence upon them. Many of these liberals survive economic ally or politically by perpetu ating the dependency myth. On the other hand, conser vatives seek to perpetuate this myth because they know our economic system simply cannot provide jobs for the vast major ity of the able-bodied welfare recipients. In fact, this vast majority is a very small per centage of those receiving public assistance. Therefore, much of the rhetoric about putting wel fare recipients to work is purely •for political reasons and to cause others to be less sympathetic to the needs of the poor. Among the hard facts in this regard is that as in any other institutional arrangement there are a few who will attempt to exploit the system. Poor people are no different in that sense. Poor people are no different also in that the largest majority of them are endowed with the work ethic and would thus prefer work to welfare if such work is eco nomically beneficial to them in the same sense that we all view work. Therefore, if a partial welfare payment was coupled with the person's earned income he or she probably could begin a successful struggle to rise above his poverty and eventually not need welfare. Χ! * ; • t · ν · 7 s tail the SUPREME ^-XOURT >^/ι / ν X The Supreme Courts' Congressionaly enacted Affirmative'Action program was a breakthrough for the first time. The Court explicitly endorsed the power of Congress to award federal benefits on the basis of race. A potent tool for racial minorities in the words of Chief Justice Warren L Burger is to achieve the goal of equality of economic opportunity. Congress' R^jht To Cointer Racial Discrimination I I As I See It JCSU- The Continuing Episode D.. " IJ fl " 111 i " * ' Poet Columnist First, let me apologize for an error made in last week's article. During the layout process two para graphs were transposed. Hence, the article's ending was not understandable This error was due to our brilliant layout supervisor who is a UNCC graduate. This proves that JCSU is not the only trouble spot in minority recruiting. The article appeared correctly in the Iredell County edi tion. Will wonders ever cease? We stopped last week talking about JCSU having a chance to regroup and make it through the hard times. The fund raising campaign currently on the way is a bright spot The institution has taken the initiative tn r···» »·. money. The athletic program (especially basketball) is improving rapidly. Athle tics is the publicity avenue for building a strong re cruitment program. Unfortunately, little else is worth blowing your horn about. What is needed is a rebuilding of the academic programs. In a world that is consistently changing, it is critical to have an aca demic prograpi to meet the challenges of those changes. This is impossible to do at an institution that offers nothing in the field of re search and development. How can an institution compete with schools that have professors writing the books that JCSU is using to teach from. The informa tion being taught at JCSU is history by the time the students get it. So, what student will go to JCSU if be or she has an opportunity to go else where. Moreover, it is un fair for those students who do attend the university. Gerald Ο. Johnson They are not prepared to face the challenges of the job market. If you need proof of what I'm telling you, go ask any individual that recruits for a major corporation. Ask them what do they think of the recent JC8U graduates. You will get the truth. It will be painfully true. Ironically, there are some excellent students coming through Smith. But, unfortunately, they get caught up in the vicious cycle of the sub par stigma associated with the school. For instance, a young lady used to work for me when I was Director of Computer Science at JCSU. She could have competed academically with anyone. However, when she applied for graduate school at UNCC, she was required to take undergraduate busi ness courses again. She was a business major. Several other people I know are doing work down town that requires a maxi mum of a high school edu cation. Again, they have degrees from JCSU in busi ness. These people are the lucky ones. Most graduate without jobe at all. It sounds hard to believe but it is true. But it is not an uncorrectable situation. Simply upgrade the faculty salary ranges, then up grade the faculty, then up grade the curriculum pro grams, and then upgrade the recruitment standards. Sadly enough, the cur rent faculty has grown weary of the fight. Con sequently, they have be come complacent. They live from pay day to pay day not trying to be cre ative, innovative, or even instructive. In fact, most have other jobs. Hence, they must go. I don't think most of the current faculty can be revitalized to be productive. In order to bring in good, new talent, you must pay the greens. More impor tantly, you must give them the freedom to be creative, innovative and instructive. To this end I think the current administrators must go. When you don't have the ability to admin istrate you inevitably le gislate, which does nothing more than frustrate. I fault the current administration with forcing out a lot of good talent because they did not have the ability to administrate. w îrn a new administra tion that is not composed entirely of educators, the school stands a chance. Every black institution inevitably turns the reigns of administration over to educators. Moet of these people can not perform the function of administration well. They get promoted jo a level of incomoetençv Now that we've cleaned house, we can institute some innovative and cre ative programs. Make sta . tistical analysis, computer science, communication skills and research a part of every discipline. Give monetary incentives for those who have books pu blished and new research ideas. Get the faculty key ed for self improvement. Then upgrade your ad mission standards giving scholarships to the reallv Affirmative Action The Black Senior Citizen By Gerald C. Horne, Esq. Special To The Poet It is often said that the humanitv of a country can be gaufed by how it treats its elderly citizens. If such be the case, then the United States so-called home of "Human rights", ranks high in the inhumanity poll. The late Black comedienne Jackie "Moms" Mabley used to say that "the only thing an old man can do for me is introduce me to a young man." The "humor" of this line is reflective of the lack of veneration of senior citizens in United States' culture. Today headlines blare out that Social Security and Old-Age Pensions are im perilled and may soon be bankrupt. Right wing politicians, by calling for voluntary contributions to the Social Security sys tem, imperil the system even more. Even if Social Security remains viable, the fact is that the payments are not keeping pace with rampaging inflation. An elderly person on a fixed income is the prime victim of the Carter Administration's disastrous economic i>olicies. ' — 1 ' a a. i * iuc 01511s aie cvcijfwircic aiiu vci uiiiuj not worthy of the leader of the so-called "free world." It is no accident that dog-food sales have skyrocketed in poor commu# ties, especially Black communities. Or that the number of senior citizens being arrested for petty theft has jumped tre mendously, as a recent ABC-TV documen tary pointed out. The social ennui and breakdown in community has led to the "dumping" of seniors in ill-regulated nursing homes, where brutilization and degradation are rife. The revelations about treatment of seniors in New York City nursing homes led to a State Assembly investigation and numerous headlines. But when all was said and done one of the main perpetrators, Bernard Bergman, escaped virtually scot free. Λΐ uie same urne, geniniicauon" nas mc the Black elderly especially hard. This is the process that has accelerated in the wake of the so-called "energy crisis," whereby whites have decided that living in far away suburbs is no longer chic' ana'have begun moving back to the cities with a vengeance. This has led to massive displacement of elderly tenants as landlords, not being deficient in math, have begun not renewing leases and re-renting them to white "gen try" at 100 percent profit aod.more. All this serves as a backdrop for the planning and preparation leading to the 1981} White House Conference on Aging. For a study om the black elderly just published by the United States Administration on Aging demonstrates unequivocally that there has been little progress in changing startling facts first reportea at the 1971 White House Conference: i.e., their paltry incomes, meager and inadequate health care, transportation, housing, education, nutrition, etc. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to say that the state of the black elderly should be declared a "disaster area" anc federal funds should be pumped in imme diately, ala Mt. St. Helens or another such calamity. If ever there was a segment of the population in need of affirmative action, it is most certainly the black elderly. Even a cursory examination of the statistics bears this out. THE CHARLOTTE POST Second Class Postage No. 965500 "THE PEOPLE'S NEWSPAPER" Established 1918 Published Every Thursday by The Charlotte Post Publishing Co., Inc. 1524 West Blvd Charlotte. NC 28206 Telephone (704) 376-0496 Circulation - 9,200 62 Years of Continuous Service BILI. JOHNSON ...Editor, Publisher BERNARD REEVES...General Manager Second Class Postage No. 965500 Paid At Charlotte, N.C. under the Act of March 3,1878 Member National Newspaper Publishers Association North Carolina Black Publishers Association ! Deadline for all news copy and photos is 5 p.m. Monday. All photos and copy submitted become the property of the POST, and will not be returned. National Advertising Representative Amalgamated Publishers, Inc. 2400 S. Michigan Ave. 45 w 5th st Suile ,403! Chicago. Ill 60616 New York N γ Ι003β talented. From Capitol Hill Helms Seems Obsessed With White Alfred· L. Madison Special To The Poet Senator Jesse Helms from the State of North Carolina which has been the scene of several Κlan incidents spares no oppor tunity in revealing that he is not pro-black. In a con versation with him about three years ago, he in formed me that he wanted some blacks on his Senate office staff, but until this writing he does not have any. It was Jesse Helms' lead ership that brought Ian Smith, the racist Prime Minister of Rhodesia to this country. Then later, the Smith hand-picked Mu zorewa, who succeeded Smith was brought to the United States. It was Jesse Helms' two staff members who were reported as having gone to England when Prime Minister That cher was meeting with the Rhodesian freedom fight ers and the Smith faction in trying to affect a peaceful solution, who told Ian Smith to hold his ground. Now that Rhodesia's name has been changed to Alfred· L. Madison Zimbabwe and a new go vernment has been set up with Mugabe as its Prime Minister Jesse Helms presented an amendment, which requires the Prési dent of the United States to report to the Congress ·· every sixty days after the authorization of funds to aid Zimbabwe, on the go vernment's internal situa tion and its observance of human rights. Robert Mugabe, who was jailed and denied all citizen rights by the Ian Smith forces, now that he has Decome frtme Minister has attempted no revenge, but instead has Drought the Smith forces all the whites of fair, Just and equal rights. Yet, Jesse Helms sounds off the Senate floor that Mugabe has set up a Marxist-style government and that many Americans are concerned about demo cracy in Zimbabwe. The Senator showed no concern whatsoever about demo cratic principles when Ian Smith and his few whites were denying any type of democratic privileges to the overwhelming majority of blacks in Rhodesia; when they were Jailed, beaten, killed and not al lowed any kind of humane treatment. Instead, the Senator sought to sustain the Smith government. Then, too, if Americans believe in true democracy, then they believe that the type of government should be chosen by the governed Mr. Helms also intro duced an amendment which would allow the United States to engage in covert actions in Angola, which calls for repeal of the Clark amendment which requires a congressional debate before any actions could be taken in Angola against the Southwest Afri can Peoples Organization (SWAPO) which is truly fighting for the liberation of Angola against the white racists supremacists who are supported by apartheid South Africa. Helms ranted and raved about the Marx ist SWAPO saying they are being supported by the So viets, Cuba, East Germany and now Nicaragua. He said, "there is a fight going on in Angolo for the very soul of a nation. On one side is pitied a group of Angola patriots, attempting to throw out occupation forces of nations which are enemies of the United States." Senator Tscongas in speaking against the Helms amendment, em phasized how several Ame rican corporations are do ing business in Angola; the Angolans have moved to strengthen their ties with the United States. They have built an embassy in Paris and that European business are dealing with them. Τ son gas stated that the Soviets would welcome the United States' turning away from Angola. Instead of the Helms amendment, a joint amendment by Tsongas, Javits and Helms was passed. It authorizes the President- to initiate ac tions in Angola if he de termined such actions were in the United States' na tional security interest. He could do this by privately informing the Foreign Re lations committee* of both Houses. This amendment has not yet reached the House floor for passage. Senator Helms, constant ly spoke of the immense natural wealth of Angola. He seems bent on seeing that Black Africans have neither control of the contb nent's wealth, or freedoiti from white oppression t each week * MAwb Mi· IttM k