α m. £ com mu Lancing, The Issues In 1978 By Hoy le H. Martin Sr. Post Executive Editor Among the ups and downs of President Carter's first year in the White House was the Bert Lance affair. Lance, the Georgia banker who became Carter's budget chief, eventually resigned under pressure because of his questionable banking practices while heading the Calhoun National Bank. Interesting, the clos er Lance came to actually resigning the more vicious the news media became in its criticisms and allega tions. In fact, a media mentality arose that appeared more concerned with character assassination than with merely forcing Lance to resign. We must add too that the media was not alone inltslrssault on Mr. Lance. The recently retired commentator Eric Sevareid noted this when he said, ignorant and biased reporting has its counterpart in ignorant and biased reading and listening." The entire Lance episode appeared to convey a mentality that said people at the top in whatever venture must be brought down. We wonder too whether President Jimmy Carter, Mecklenburg County Commissioner Liz Hair, National Urban League head Vernon Jordan and others in both public and private life may be facing the Lancing mentality. We are all familiar with the manner in which the highly popular Liz Hair was ousted from the Commission Chairmanship but few of use are aware of the uncon firmed report that some Carter administration sources are attemp ting to use the retiring congresswo man Barbara Jordan to weaken the leadership influence of Vernon Jor dan (not related). Search-And-Destroy The most obvious and clearly seen example of the search-and-destroy our-leaders mentality appears to be what is facing the President. We noted in this column in^Juoq: that many black leaders, congressional liberals and organizations had be gun to express growing dissatisfac tion with President Carter's domes tic economic policies. We thought then and we think now that the jury is still out on Jimmy Carter because six months and even a year is not long to make valid judgments about the effectiveness of the highly com plex job that the presidency of the United States is. While Carter himseu nas indicat ed considerably more failure than success in his first year - and it takes a good man to admit failure - his critics keep attacking his efforts with a Lancing mentality. Carter's less than successful efforts to reduce unemployment, hold down inflation and deal effectively with energy crisis and the wèlfare problem led him to say publicly, "My biggest -- · - «· · mistake has been in inadvertently building up expectations too high...I have dashed some hopes and disap pointed people that thought we might be quickec." Significantly, however, "building up expecta tions" is the stuff - the political rhetoric - that gets people elected to any public Office. Economic Recovery We do not feel that Jimmy Car ter's presidency needs to be defend ed by us, however, we believe that politics aside, $977 was not as bad a year economically speaking as ma ny would have us believe from the standpoint of the White House's contribution. It's true the economic recovery begun under the Ford administration has continued at a slow pace and unemployment has dropped only slightly (7.3 to 6.9 percent) since Carter took office, nevertheless, these trends are on the plus side and moving in the direction of greater recovery. Even the rise in the inflationary rate from 5.3 per cent in 1976 to 7.3 percent in the first three quarters of 1977 may be offset in part by the new federal minimum wage of $2.65 per hour, up 35 cent per hour. Delays in energy policy and wel fare reform are more a problem of congressional inaction and failure to compromise than in the Carter administration itself. The adminis tration's tax reform pledge is still largely just a pledge and his national health insurance program has just begun to become visible. Carter's first year wasn't bad by another standard too, this is, our output of real goods and services - six and one-third percent - for each of the four quarters in 1977 was greater than Carter expected. All these developments together mean, economist Paul A. Samuelson says that "3 million*more people hâve been able to find jobs (and these) should be weighed in the scale of economic pluses and minuses." of the Carter year. With this in mind we think it's time for black leaders to do a little less attacking of the Carter game plan and spend more time and energy attempting to put something into the plan that is realistic and helpful. If 1977 was the year Carter didn't deliver, let's make 1978 the year of delivery. To do that rhetoric must turn to action. Leaders must spend more time getting the masses to write their congressman demanding action and in writing and submitting alternative approaches than in just say Carter isn't doing the job. If we do these thing's, the 1977 that began with promises and ended with doubts can become a 1978 of action, hope and confidence. ι THE CHARLOTTE POST "THE PEOPLES NEWSPAPER" Established 1918 Published Every Thursday By The Charlotte Post Publishing Co., Inc. 2606-B West Blvd.-Charlotte, N.C. 28208 Telephones (704 ) 392-1306,392-1307 Circulation, 7,185 58 YEARS OF CONTINUOUS SERVICE Bill Johnson Hoyle H. Martin Sr Bernard Reeves.... Julius Watson Albert Campbell... Editor-Publisher Executive Editor General Manager Circulation Director Advertising Director , 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 becomes the property of the Post, and will not be returned. National Advertising Representative Amalgamated Publishers. Inc 45 W 5th Suite 1403 New York, N Y. 10036 (212 ) 489-1220 2400 S Michigan Ave Chicago, III. 60616 Calumet 5-0200 \0$LÀ Cuban Intervention Threat To Africa's Integrity miieiiuiii »ιιμμυι ι ιυι uk well-being and political inte grity of Africa is being under mined by a trend of thought in this country that minimizes the significance of the mas sive and widespread Cuban intervention in Africa. Rather than providing insights into one of the gravest political crises to threaten Africa sin ce independence or proposing a positive and constructive American response, this ap proach avoids or prefers to wish away the problem. Many statements from Afri can leaders forcefully express grave concern over the exten sive presence of Cuban forces on the continent. In January 1976, Zambian President Ken neth Kaunda warned of "a plundering tiger with its dead ly cubs now coming in through tfte(J6Ck doof," a clear refer ence to the intervention, with Soviet backing, of over 20,000 Cuban soldiers in the Angolan civil war. On April 19, 1977 a spokesman 01 the Zaire gover nment charged that the inva sion of Shaba province of Zaire "was masterminded by the Soviet-Cuban alliance us ing Angola as its puppet." Among the other African leaders who have strongly expressed alarm over Cuban and Soviet intervention in Af rica are President Leopold Seghor of Senegal, President Oman Bongo of Gabon, Presi dent Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya, President Houphet-Boigny of the Ivory Coast, and Moroc co's King Hassan. Moreover, at the meeting of the Organi zation of African Unity held in Libreville in July a resolution introduced by Senegal was adopted "inviting" all mem ber states of the OAU "not to permit the