editoriol
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n-ACTION kills
Over 11 years ago, in December 1960, the
Peace Corps was born. Thus far its life has
been a stormy and uncertain one. But where
is it now? And where is its future?
Formed to bring the technology of highly
industrialized America to its less-deveioped
world neighbors, the Corps is the embodiment
of an indeal-that knowledge can be shared in
a constructive manner among nations.
Somewhere along the line, that ideal has been
lost. j .
Today, the Corps and its domestic
counterpart, Volunteers in Service to
America, (VISTA) seem to be dying a
less-than-comfortable death. The sorry state
of the two can be traced to several causes.
In the first few years of its existence, the
Peace Corps was a growing area of interest in
America. It became the thing for those
"involved in the movement" to enter the
Peace Corps or VISTA in order to do their
part for humanity. Enlistment and budgets
soared in both programs. But then something
happened.
In March, 1971, President Nixon came to
Big Red Country and spoke to UNL students
in the Coliseum. During his speech he
announced formation of a new ACTION
program which, took charge ot ootn agencies.
(ACTION, you will recall, is the agency which
recently cut off funds for NU's highly-rated
NOVA program).
Agreed, both agencies were in bad shape
when they reached ACTION. The Peace
Corp's manpower had dropped from 42,000
in 1966 to 19,000 in 1970. But the ACTION
program, which was supposed to act as a
booster shot for the lagging programs, has
instead nearly finished the job of killing them
off. . .A . t u
First and hardest to explain of the two
programs' woes was financial. In a Congress
which didn't batt an eyelash at countless
millions in giveaway foreign aid, ACTION
found it harder and harder to obtain funds
even equal to those given to it the session
before.
Despite bi-partisan support from such
diverse sources as Sens. Barry Goldwater and
Hubert Humphrey, the Corps-VISTA budget
was pared mercilessly.
And ACTION managed not to help the
situation much, either. Evidently too busy
fighting for its own survival, ACTION did
practically nothing to help raise funds for the
Corp-VISTA setup. And so the two agencies
were forced to cut back their programs to the
bone, leaving them in their current financially
depleted state.
But the problem goes deeper than that.
Even within the Corps, which was founded on
a noble ideal, problems began to erupt.
Instead of remaining wmi .
individual-to-individual approach with one
person helping and teaching another, they
became institutionalized. Teaching and
learning became by-the-instruction-manual
ThePeace Corps and VISTA volunteers
working among those with annual incomes as
low as $100, found themselves to be rich
men" with salaries of $2,000 per year. This
suddenly made them over-revered and
important-and suddenly not one individual
to another. The volunteers found themselves
unable to solve problems in culture between
themselves and their trainees. m
All this reflects the crux of the entire corps
problem-the gap between ideals and action.
Americans today are all too fond of saying
one thing and doing another; the radical chic
of yesterday becomes the complacency ot
today.
And so the ideals of the Peace Corps and
VISTA have turned into non-news. Middle
America has written them off, forging ahead
to other causes. .
Which is why they're not financed, their
volunteer count has dropped and their
programs are disintegrating from
within-self-help has become a dead ideal.
And with the death of this ideal, the Corps
and VISTA bit the dust as well.
Jim Gray
Maude Vy"jS a
confront U J dVlrdL - s
! the enemy - -!: BqCM Eg-r
, orthur m T: :
hoppe II m -L 5
innocent o jftr -i
Jud Joad wearily climbed the ramshackle steps to
his little cabin up the road a piece from Appalachia
Corners.
"I'm back, Maude," he called. "And I'm bringing
ydu some good news."
His elderly wife pushed open the torn screen door
with a bony shoulder, rubbing her hands on her flour
sack apron. "You mean you got the can of roach
killer, Jud?" she said happily. "That's just fine. The
little varmints are about to drive me near right out of
my mind."
"Now hold on, Maude," said Jud, easing himself
into a rickety chair and shrugging off his suspenders.
"The Government Man said he didn't have no money
to give us for stuff like roach killer. But he says we're
going to get something a sight better instead."
"Not my gingham curtains, Jud?" Maude said
hopefully. "Not after all these years?"
"Something better'n that."
"Tell me, Jud," said Maude with the eagerness of a
young girl. "Tell me right now."
Jud cleared his throat and said slowly: A brand
new Trident submarine."
Maude fanned herself with her apron, i n un
got you, Jud?" She looked around at the barren,
scraggly hills. "What we going to do with a
submarine?"
"It ain't just for you an me, Maude. It's iui dll us
Americans. And we're going to get a whole bunch of
'em, plus a flock of new bombers, too."
"Well, I do like seeing an aeroplane flying over,
particularly at sunset. It's a right pretty sight. And I
reckon submarines must be pretty, too. Though I
never did see one. But what's that got to do with my
roach killer, Jud?"
"Well, the Government Man says it looks like
Congress is about to give the President the $75 billion
he wants to buy these submarines and bombers and
all sorts of other stuff like that we need. So there
ain't no money left for roach killer."
"It's only 59 cents a can, Jud."
"That's just what I told him, Maude. But he says
we want a can, other folks'il want a can. And it's
bound to mount up. What the President's got to think
about, he says, is defending us from our enemies."
"The President, Jud, he thinks roaches are
friends?"
"Now o'course he don't. But he figures the
Russians are our real important enemies, even though
he went to Moscow to make friends with 'em. Who
knows, they could attack us any time,"
"But the roaches, Jud, they're attacking us right
now all the time."
"Now tell the truth, Maude. Won't you sleep
better each night just knowing we got all them
submarines and bombers out there defending us from
our enemies?"
Maude shuddered. "Not with all them roaches
crawling around," she said.
Jud rose and put an arm around her. "Don't
worry, old gal. Once the President gets through
dealing with the Russians, he'll get around to the
roaches and maybe even give us a dollar or two more
in food stamps."
"When'll that be, Jud?"
"Well, I don't rightly know. But you got to leave it
up to the President when it comes to defending us
from our enemies. That's his job, Maude."
"I guess you're right, Jud," said Maude with a sigh.
"But I can't help wishing he'd start with those closest
to home."
Copyright Chronlcl PubMthlng Co. 1072
friday, September 29, 1972
page 4
daily nebraskan
