ustxtxb_obs_1969_05_23_50_00020-00000_000.pdf

1111111111. , .”…….{……,….ner.,,sew.., …1*.!………… younger generation. The virtues of dirt over plastic, of steam over electricity, or an abacus over a computer will never be clear to me. I really like plastic, neon, freeways, Diet Cola, American cars, whopper burgers, discount houses, and washaterias. However vulgar this face of America might be, at least it exhibits some energy, some brave if tawdry gestures, two things notably lacking in the academic community which offers no delicacy or manners in compensation for this deficiency, and totally lacking among the local intellectual primatives whose idea of a big time is sitting under a scrub cedar drinking coffee and talking about Charles Lamb, with long significant, humanistic pauses during which you listen to the birds twitter and identify each one. I have kicked a champagne bottle down Fifth Avenue in the snow, and the only thing I can imagine that would be more fun than that would be cruising down Wilshire in an air conditioned convertible, high on dexedrine and easy on beer, watching the lights run like liquid fortunes on the lime-lacquer hood. That’s what I mean by lucky, and private, and mobile. Texans, ABM, and Vietnam Austin, Washington, D.C. An assessment by the American Friends Service Committee of how congressmen are leaning on the question of the anti-ballistic missile shows one Texan firmly against it, Bob Eckhardt of Houston; Henry Gonzalez of San Antonio is leaning against it. Apart from Burleson, Price, and Casey, “leaning toward” it, and Cabell and Bush, definitely for it, all other Texas congressmen were listed as uncommitted. Texas’ two U.S. senators have, predictably, split on the question, John Tower favoring and, it was lately disclosed, Ralph Yarborough dead set against. Yarborough has this month called the ABM “a big boondoggle packaged in a big hornswoggle.” He sees such military programs as severely undercutting domestic progress in America and, indirectly, leading to the divisiveness that now plagues the country. Yarborough, in speaking before a meeting of the Business Executives Move for Peace in Vietnam, noted that the federal education budget has declined from $4.1 billion in 1968 to $3.2 billion requested for the coming fiscal year. With fellow Texan and party colleague Lyndon Johnson no longer in the White House, Yarborough now is more free to criticize the Vietnam war, which he loathes. “Talk about students rioting,” he told the BEMPV, “if the people of this country understood what has been done to them in the last five years I believe the 20 The Texas Observer majority of them would be in a frame of mind to riot.” Yarborough is greatly concerned that President Nixon is not making good his campaign pledge quickly to end the war. “It isn’t about over,” the senator said of the war. “It won’t be over until we have a voice of reason being heard.” Yarborough said, “I tried to do something about it [the war] last year. I am the only member of the Senate who endorsed Sen. Eugene McCarthy.” He said he did so hoping that “we could write a plank in the Democratic platform calling for settlement of this war.” “We must stop this thing that is doing such damage to the American people, the American nation, the American ideals, that has brought about the divisiveness among our people, the near run on the dollar last year, the highest interest rates since the Civil War, the longest war this nation has ever fought, the only war except World War II that has cost over $100 billion.and is costing us about $36 billion a year.” He was scathing in his BEMPV speech of “the people who are making profits off of the $3 billion a month cost of this war, and who have made peace a dirty word in America,” the sort of people, Yarborough implied, who would profit from the ABM, which he deems unnecessary for national security and an unnecessary drain of national resources. Yarborough suggested that the warprofit industries may be behind some of the peace demonstrations that have yielded support for the war in persons who other wise might call for peace. “How would you get support for an unpopular war?” Yarborough asked. “You would have someone burn some draft cards, storm the Pentagon.” Present in the audience were BEMPV members Major J. R. Parten, Houston oilman; Fagan Dickson, Austin attorney; Jesse Oppenheimer, San Antonio attorney; and Bernard Rapoport, Waco insurance executive, who introduced the senator. All are important contributors to liberal causes and are leaders in the Texas liberal movement. CONG. ECKHARDT, in his current Quarterly Report, discusses his opposition to the ABM, concluding: That, in result, offensive nuclear technology outruns defensive nuclear technology, and it is not likely now or in the foreseeable future that this can be changed. That the goal must be a de-escalation of the nuclear arms race, and this must be done by negotiations. That in a world where mutual potential for nuclear destruction lies in two great powers, the building of a shield by one of them constitutes a threat, in the other’s eyes, of a pre-emptive strike, What I mean by a ‘pre-emptive’ strike is one launched by one of the major nations which would so cripple the other that the second nation could not strike back, or that the return blow could be shielded. I do not believe that either the United States or the Soviet Union can so protect itself, but there could be a race to get in that position. . . . “The only way to relieve tensions and reduce nuclear risks is for nations to de-escalate the nuclear arms race now and eventually lay down their arms permanently. But it does not help the situation, in an interim period, for one opponent ; to don armor. Could the other be expected to MEETINGS THE THURSDAY CLUB of Dallas meets each Downtown YMCA, 605 No. Ervay St., Dallas. Good discussion. You’re welcome. Informal, no dues. CENTRAL TEXAS ACLU luncheon meeting. Spanish Village. 2nd Friday every month. From noon. All welcome. For a fresh often impertinent view of the news Try THE VOICE Box 876, Austin, Texas 78767 Edited and published by Don W. Allford, former state chairman, McCarthy for President; former chairman, Dissenting Democrats of Texas; former Texas Coordinator, Citizens for Kennedy-Fulbright. Subscription $5.00 per year.