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Official 'dialogue'
Ambassador Richard F. Pedersen spoke
with a small group of students Tuesday in
Centennial College. It is extremely unfortu
nate that more students did not have the
opportunity to talk with this State Depart
ment official. Probably no other experience
could demonstrate to students more clearly
how discouraging it is for individuals who
attempt to influence a government which is
unresponsive to the will of its citizens. Peder
sen's "dialogue" with the students was as
graphic, though less dramatic, an example of
governmental neglect of citizen opinion as
the fizzled-out Moratorium or the chaotic 1968
Democratic convention.
Although his pretense for speaking to
the students (as he is doing on other college
campuses across the nation) was to see what
they think, Pedersen had no intention of real
ly engaging with the students on critical ques
tions. He was here simply to spout the Nixon
foreign policy. It was a computerized bull
session. Q. Why is the United States involved
in Vietnam? A. To assure South Vietnam of
the right to determine their own future by
democratic methods? Q. Will we become mili
tarily involved elsewhere in Southeast Asia?
A. DOES NOT COMPUTE? It was impossible
to determine where the opinions of Ambassa
dor Pedersen stopped and those of the State
Department began. Pedersen occasionally
looked like a product of "social self-criticism"
American State Department-style.
If American citizens can trust the poll
sters, they must assume that a majority of the
people of the U.S. support President Nixon's
Vietnam policy, i.e. paced withdrawal of
troops and gradual Vietnamization of the war.
At the same time, if a poll was undertaken,
ii would show that a majority of America
views the war as a mistake and would oppose
extending involvement in Southeast Asia. Yet
Pedersen could say that "the U.S. is acting
responsibly in Vietnam," there is nothing to
guarantee that the U.S. might, not fight in
Laos, and our interest in Laos is to "restore
the conditions of the 1962 Geneva Agree
ments." Change the date to 1954, and where
have you heard that statement before?
"There are," according to Pedersen,
"some things in this world you can't talk
about." That's right. And some of the things
about foreign policy that can't be talked about
are the real reasons for erroneous decisions.
There is no moral justification for the Viet
nam War. Pedersen and the State Depart
ment won't say that the real reasons we are
involved are economic interests, power poli
tics, fear of Communism and our own glori
fied sense of nationalism.
But foreign policy and international poli
tics is a secret game played by governments.
No practical, pragmatic politican could af
ford to divulge certain information to the
people on such matters, and no one is more
pragmatic than Richard Nixon. The point of
it is, the government, by and large, does not
tell the truth when it does release informa
tion. So please Mr. Rogers, don't send your
officials to tell us the U.S. in Vietnam is act
ing morally and responsibly. Just tell us the
truth.
Jim Pedersen
DAILY NEBRASKAN
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"You can't leave. You've just arrived."
MHttltaasSt
Second thoughts for liherals
by FRANK MANKIEWICZ and TOM
BRADEN
Washington A certified liberal will
rise in the Senate Thursday morning to
make a statement which will upset the
liberal line.
It is well that Tom Eagleton, Missouri's
freshman Democrat, should be the chosen
instrument, for on everything from civil
rights to defense appropriations Eagleton
has taken positions which liberals regard
as "right." Thus they cannot fail to accord
him a hearing when he tells them that
Birch Bayh's plan for direct election of
the President could lead to disaster.
In the wake of the election of 1968,
liberals in both parties panicked in the
face of the George Wallace challenge and
resolved not to spend another Election
Night wondering whether they'd soon be
pleading their causes in the House of
Representatives. There emerged the Bayh
plan, simple and cloaked in one-man-one-vote
Democratic raiment. It swiftly passed
the House and is now the Senate's pending
business.
THE BAYH AMENDMENT provides
simply that the man who gets the most
votes anywhere In the country Is
elected President, provided he gets at least
40 of the votes cast. That, it was thought,
would do away with the specter of Wallace.
But as Eagleton began to examine the
possibilities, he began to reconsider his
earlier support. He will stress, In his speech
Thursday, at least two major drawbacks
both of which, he believes, would be
fatal to the preservation of the system
Bayh intended to save.
The first of these Is that a candidate
could be elected who carried only a handful
of states, perhaps only one. In 1968, for
example, Hubert Humphrey carried only
13 states. If he had lost 12 of these by
narrow margins, and increased his margin
in New York to the amount by which
Lyndon Johnson carried that state in 1964,
Humphrey would have led Richard Nixon
in the popular vote, though losing 49 of
50 states. Under the Bayh amendment,
Humphrey would nevertheless be President.
SURELY, so Eagleton reasoned, unless
the United States has become a s
homogenous as, say, Costa Rica, it is
unacceptable for a man to be elected
President with so limited a geographic
distribution of the popular vote. So much
for drawback No. 1.
Drawback No. 2 lies In the Bayh
amendment's provision for a runoff if
neither major candidate wins 40 of the
vote. Far from liminating strong third
party challenges, this provision would
guarantee them.
First, reasons Eagleton, many voters
in 1968 swallowed their natural inclination
to vote for Wallace only because they knew
theirs would be a "wasted" vote that
Wallace could not carry for example,
Illinois, New Jersey, Ohio or Michigan.
BUT IF the first vote were 'free"
to be followed by a probable runoff
between the two major candidates
Wallace might easily have received 7
more of the popular vote. He would thus
have forced a runoff and he could have
gone to Humphrey and Nixon and bargained
with them for his support.
Eagleton thinks the B a y h amendment
would turn a U.S. presidential election
into a Southern primary-at-large. If every
vote counts equally where cast, and if
there is to be a runoff, those with the
special Ideology would form their own
parties for the first election.
U.S. elections would be contested by
for example a Black Party, an Anti
Black Party, a Small W i n t e r W h e a t
Growers Party, an Anti-Income Tax Party
and so on. Each could get its votes in
the first election; then bargain them off
in the runoff.
EAGLETON and his co-sponsor, Kansas
Republican Sen. Robert Dole, are basing
their counterproposal on what they call
the federal system plan. Based on intensive
research by Washington attorney Myron
Kurzan, the Eagleton-Dole amendment
would preserve some features of the
present electoral college while guaranteeing
that the truly national popular choice would
always win. It is not without complications
which is why it must be discussed in
a future essay.
THE DAILY NEBRASKAN
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