Opinion
September surprise
Oliver North cleared, not exonerated
US. District Judge Gerhard Gesell has pulled a Sep
# tember surprise.
On Monday, he dismissed all charges against
Oliver North, the main player in the Iran-Contra scandal.
North happily said he was “totally exonerated.... I’ve
had my last hearing forever, I hope.”
Monday’s action may close the book on North’s legal
involvement in the affair, which involved the diversion to
Nicaraguan rebels of profits from illegal U.S. arms sales
to Iran.
But the political reality of North’s actions remain omi
nous and on the fringes of a lively debate over covert
operations with Iran by the Reagan administration.
The charges essentially were dismissed on a technical
ity. Independent prosecutor Lawrence Walsh said he
decided to give up trying to get North s three earlier
convictions reinstated. Those convictions were overturned
last year when a federal appeals court decided that some
of North’s testimony came from information he gave to
Congress under immunity during its investigation of the
scandal.
North’s charges have been dismissed; his guilt remains.
No legal action can change the fact that his role in the
Contra resupply operation was in violation of the
Constitution. The important question now is how broad
the scandal was.
Throughout the 1986 Iran-Contra hearings, North tried
to portray himself as a lone, noble warrior fighting for
American ideals.
But later testimony from North’s superiors revealed
that he wasn’t alone. How far up the chain of command
knowledge of the scandal went has never been revealed.
While the Reagan and Bush administrations have done
their best to put the issue to bed, it keeps cropping up.
v^urrenuy, iran-^onira is me Key issue m me euuiiiina
tion hearings of Robert Gates to lead the CIA. Gates, the 1
No. 2 man at the spy agency when the diversion occurred,
maintains that he knew nothing about it.
Some members of the Senate Intelligence Committee
are not so sure. At one point Monday, Sen. Howard
Metzenbaum, D-Ohio, said Gates’ contention that he
didn’t remember some events in the affair was a case of
“willful ignorance.”
Other Congressional Democrats, too, continue to make
political hay out of the scandal by calling for an investiga
tion of an alleged 1980 deal between Iran and Ronald
Reagan, who was then a presidential candidate, to keep
the U.S. hostages until after the election. The theory is
that such negotiations, designed to avoid a Democratic
“October surprise” freeing of the hostages, initiated a
chain of covert operations with Iran that culminated in
Iran-Contra.
Against that backdrop, the dropping of charges against
North was a coup for the administration.
But his victory was merely symbolic. It does not clear
North of blame, and it exonerates no one.
— E.F.P.
Cutting classics negative,
disrespectful of history
1 am really surprised by the latest
developments regarding the budget
cuts and the devastating effects on the
departments of speech communica
tion and classics. Both offer unique
studies and have contributed to the
good name of the University of Ne
braska-Lincoln.
Erasing the classics department
from the academic map indicates an
action that has no respect or apprecia
tion for the past.
UNL has many excellent programs
and departments that should not be
affected by the cuts, but eliminating
an area that is still under heavy ar
chaeological and literary study will
be a negative step in the history of this
university. Athens has been called
the “cradle of civilization” and Rome
the “eternal city,” and their civiliza
tions influenced people, ideologies
and systems for thousands of years.
Simply, I can’t believe that an aca
demic institution such as UNL has
can forget history.
George Vatzias
graduate student
animal science
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I
MICHAEL STOCK
Thomas a political bird
Will the real Clarence Thomas
please raise his right wing.
Or his left wing? Middle
wing?
The Thomas who was nominated
for the Supreme Court by President
Bush because of his far-right politics
appeared to have moved toward the
middle in last week’s confirmation
hearings.
Thomas’ supposed move, however,
reeks of political opportunism. After
years of touting extremely conserva
tive politics, Thomas seemed to give
way to the pressures of the Senate
Judiciary Committee’s Democrats.
Thomas said he believed in a strong
separation of church and state, backed
public housing and allowed that
unmarried couples have a right to use
contraceptives.
All of these admissions are op
posed to anything Thomas previously
said or wrote.
Even Thomas’ strong defense of
natural law and its inherent role in
determining present laws seemed to
have disappeared.
But Thomas’ history is one of far
right tendencies, which are so deeply
entrenched that it is hard to believe
that he could shrug them all off in the
course of one week with a group of
grinning Democrats. All of this role
playing leaves me with a question:
How many Clarence Thomases arc
there?
One Thomas has neatly risen above
the ranks of oppression of blacks. He
kisses babies, asks how the rest of the
family is and might quote a passage
from the Bible. He is Ronald Re
agan ’s man, adamantly promising not
to take any job bound to racial issues.
This Thomas, a successful product of
affirmative action, has spent his ca
reer denouncing it.
Now there is a new Thomas. He is
a man for the middle. Welfare is no
longer so bad. Neither is public hous
ing. Non-marital sexual relationships
exist in this Thomas’ world, and
contraceptives arc fine. Even the idea
of abortion is looked at “with an open
mind.”
Which Thomas is the Senate con
firming?
Thomas’ story also is one of contra
dictions.
You’ve all heard the story. This
week’s Newsweek traces his growth
from under his grandfather’s roof and
This Thomas* a suc
cessful product of
affirmative action, has
spent his career de
nouncing it.
.shadow. Thomas’ grandfather was the
sharecropper who eventually founded
the Anderson Fuel Company. It is this
Horatio Alger “rags-lo-riches” story
that Thomas supporters cite as justifi
cation for giving him a seat on the
highest court.
After his admission to Yale, Tho
mas’ conservatism became clear. He
was chosen as the product of a new
affirmative action program requiring
that minorities make up one-tenth of
each class.
Thomas knew this, and despised
the fact.
“You had to prove yourself every
day because the presumption was that
you were dumb and didn’t deserve to
be there on merit,” Thomas said of his
law school experience in a 1980 inter
view printed this week in Newsweek.
This, apparently, was the begin
ning of an ideology.
Thomas seemed to abhor the idea
of being given different treatment
because of his color. To him it was
being “rewarded,” or, some kind of
treatment that wasn’t deserved.
To Thomai, affirmative action
made blacks dependent on govern
ment, rather than on independent
enterprise.
But Thomas fails to take into ac
count the individual who doesn’t
receive the good fortune that he has.
I’m not condemning the individual’s
desire for a Horatio Alger happiness.
I am critical of Thomas for denying
minorities the extra, often-needed
support that affirmative action pro
grams allow.
In February 1980, Reagan offered
Thomas a position on the White House
policy staff responsible for determin
ing energy and environment policies.
Thomas declined the position, admit
ting that it was a tempting offer.
This was Thomas’ area of exper
tise, focusing entirely on issues not
related to race. Immediately before
Reagan’s inauguration, Thomas told
a Washington Post reporter of his
plans and what he would not do,
Newsweek said.
“If I ever went to work for the
EEOC or did anything directly con
nected with blacks, my career would
be irreparably ruined. The monkey
would be on my back again to prove
I didn’t have the job because I’m
black.”
Four months later, Thomas was.
hired as head of the Equal Employ
mentOpportunity Commission—the
very position Thomas declared he
would never fill.
Once again, Thomas has been
chosen for a position because of his
color. And again, Thomas doesn’t
seem to mind. Replacing the only
black Supreme Court Justice—Thur
good Marshall — with another black
is an obvious political move.
Thomas supporters seem to weigh
his skin color as a determinant of his
dedication to minorities’ rights, ol his
ability to succeed the liberal Marshall
reign. The problem lies in the fact
that the public considers what he is
and not who he is.
He is black. He is the self-made
grandson of a poor sharecropper.
However, his opinions on public pol
icy, even his publicly espoused be
liefs, tell a different story.
Thomas is a politician. The face he
has been wearing for the last week is
only one of many. It is one handily
crafted in the guise of an acceptable
Supreme Court justice to please
Democrats.
I hope Joseph Biden’s bunch in the
Senate realize they only are hearing
what they want to hear, not what the
real Clarence Thomas believes.
Stock is a senior English major and a
Daily Nebraskan A&E senior reporter and
columnist.