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War and peace
Various colleges across the nation this fall have
devoted half-time shows at football games to anti- war
themes. The anti-war shows, which have been popular
with the students, are apropos since the country is
longing for the end of U.S involvement in the Vietnam
war.
But Nebraska fans did not get to see a half-time show
this fall devoted to peace. Instead, last Saturday the
Cornhusker Marching Band put on a patriotic show
honoring U.S. military troops.
There was no peace sign flashed by the card section
Saturday. Instead, the crowd at Memorial Stadium
named in honor of soldiers killed in action) saw flashes
of a tank, a bomber and a naval destroyer.
Saturday's football crowd did not get to hear what
the Vietnam war had done to the morale of the nation
or the U.S. military. Instead the grand finale of the
show saw the band play 'This Is My Country" while in
a formation spelling U.S.A.
However, an anti-war theme probably wouldn't go
very well with Band Director Jack Snider, who is in
charge of the half-time shows. For example, last year
Snider was quite upset after the card section flashed the
peace sign during a game.
There is nothing wrong with being patriotic, but it
seems more appropriate to honor peace instead of tanks,
bombers and destroyers. After all, any show that honors
peace is very patriotic.
Amendments:
for and against
Constitutional amendments are proposed all the
time. But there are two amendments now being
proposed by Congressmen that deserve special attention.
One of the proposed amendments would limit a
President to a single six-year term. The rationale behind
the amendment is to relieve the President of many
political pressures that arise when seeking re-election
and thus free the chief executive to devote more time to
running the government.
However, many of the opponents of the amendment
argue that political pressure make the President more
cognizant of the wishes of the people.
One unfortunate aspect of the proposed amendment
is the increased length of the President 's term. A six year
term is too long since it is very hard to impeach a
President. The present four year term gives the President
a chance to accomplish something while still giving the
voters a periodic chance to decide if they want the
incumbent or a new person in office.
The other proposed constitutional amendment would
lower the age requirement for serving in Congress by
three years. Currently the age requirement is 30 for a
senator and 25 for a representative.
Lowering the limits to 27 and 22 are only slightly
more realistic than the present requirements. If a citizen
is qualified to vote at 18, he or she should be allowed to
hold any office. But the amendment will probably have
a better chance of passing by only lowering the
requirements by three years.
The amendment lowering the age requirements for
Congress deserves speedy passage. However, changing
the President' tenure does not seem to be in the
national interest.
Gary Seacrest
Telephone: editor: 472-2588, newt: 472 2589, advertising:
472-2590. Second claw protege rates paid at Lincoln, Nebraska.
The 'Daily Nebraskan it a student publication, independent of the
University of Nebraska's administration, "faculty end student
government.
Address: The Doily Nebraskan, 34 Nebraska Union, University of
Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebreske 68508.
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Foreign aid: the changes
that are coming
by Elizabeth Peer
WASHINGTONFor a generation, Americans
glumly took it for granted that huge chunks of the
national treasure should be handed over to foreign
countries. But now, after years of ever-less-cheerful
giving, the largess seems to be ending-and so is the
unquestioned assumption that the U.S. forever
destined to parcel out foreign aid.
Of course, foreign aid, as it has been known in the
past, will not disappear. The U.S. will be sending guns
and butter to Vietnam and elsewhere for years to
come. And American helicopters will be landing with
supplies in disaster areas like East Pakistan whenever
the need arises.
But the foreign-aid programs of the future will,
nevertheless, be profoundly different The recent
rejection of the President's foreign-aid bill by the
Senate paved the way not only for cutbacks but, even
more, for change.
In the first place, that oddest of couples-military
and economic aid-will no longer be inseparable. The
era of mutual back-scratching by partisans of
development programs and militant anti-Communists
is probably already ended.
Liberals will no longer have to support arms
allotments to governments they don't 'like in order to
get economic aid for governments they do like. And
conservatives will not have to support
"humanitarian" projects in exchange for military aid
to anti-Communist regimes.
Strangely enough, nearly everyone wants this
separation, including the Pentagon. President Nixon
came out of it as long ago as September 1 970 when
he proposed that three different organizations be set
up to handle each component of the foreign-aid
program: one for military assistance, one for
economic development and one for humanitarian aid.
From the other side of the political spectrum. Sen.
William Fulbright of Arkansas has been trying for
years to detach military aid from the various
foreign-aid bills. To the chairman of the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee, the merger of the two
has distorted the entire concept of foreign aid.
Yet the system, like so much in the Federal
government, went on and on. And Congress, wishing
to avoid further dove-hawk imbroglios, simply took
the easiest course and let it continue.
A second major change, more controversial than
the first, is also a probability. It would entail devoting
a larger share of 11. S. funds to multilateral aid
centers--such as the International Development
Association of the World Bank-and somewhat less to
bilateral projects such as, for example, the direct,
country-to-country aid given to Cambodia.
Indeed, some officials feel that the public elation
shown by many delegates from "underdeveloped"
countries at the defeat of the American effort to keep
Taiwan in the United Nations was partially a result of
THE DAILY NEBRASKAN
their resentment at the Big Daddy quality of bilateral
aid.
On t'ic other hand, aid that comes through a
multilateral organization leaves the recipients less
humiliatingly beholden and, therefore, less prone to
accept "suggestions" as to how their economies
should be run.
Changing foreign aid will not be easy. Born of
Lend-Lease and nurtured in the wreckage of World
"War II, the program became frankly anti-Communist
at the height of the cold war.
Alliances with countries throughout the world
were built around U. S. foreign aid and frequently the
economic grants were the sweetening believed
necessary to make the military pact more palatable.
But late in the 1950, the focus of foreign economic
aid had shifted from Europe to the less developed
countries and these countries, less deterred by the
menace of Communism, tended to choose their own
paths in international affairs.
During the next decade, ix became ever more dear
that foreign aid somehow didn't accomplish what is
used to. In fact, many experts began to believe that it
was actually counterproductive.
"We stand in the year 1971 at the end of one
decade of illusion, with no good reason to believe
that we are not now embarked upon another,""
.Idaho's Sen. Frank Church told his colleagues during
the foreign-aid bill debate.
That is not to say foreign-aid programs have been
universal failures. Even in recent years, there have
been notable triumphs. The economies of Korea and
Taiwan have been vastly improved as a result of U. S.
aid. Brazil has made great strides and India has at last
become agriculturally self-sufficient, owing in ilarge
part to help from America.
There have also been domestic beneficiaries. The
aid program has financed 25 per cent of all US.
fertilizer exports, 16.4 per cent of all U.S. exports of
iron and steel mill products and 15.7 per cent of all
U.S. exports of railroad equipment The program,
further, gives VS. shipping companies 25 percent of
their total revenue from outbound cargo.
Self-interest, therefore, dictates that some form of
foreign aid be continued, and Congress will have
considerable material to consider when it again takes
up the question. But it seems certain that what finally
emerges will not have much resemblance to the $3.5
billion package 158 percent of which was for military
assistance) which the President originally submitted.
Still, the need remains. '"You just cannot have a
very large part of the world's people violent,
unhappy, prey to social unrest and demanding that
the food be shared," says former AID administrator
Will iam Gaud. "We are either going to have to pay
our fair share in the world or ii .isn't going to be a
world worth Hiving in. There really is no alternative to
a foreign-aid program.
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 1971
PAGE 4