ustxtxb_obs_1993_03_12_50_00002-00000_000.pdf

0111’1On ,.g al ININ ,4b. , bH THE TEXAS server A JOURNAL OF FREE VOICES We will serve no group or party but will hew hard to the truth as we find it and the right as we see it. We are dedicated to the whole truth, to human values above all interests, to the rights of human-kind as the foundation of democracy: we will take orders from none but our own conscience, and never will we overlook or misrepresent the truth to serve the interests of the powerful or cater to the ignoble in the human spirit. Writers are responsible for their own work, but not for anything they have not themselves written, and in publishing them we do not necessarily imply that we agree with them, because this is a journal of free voices. SINCE 1954 Publisher: Ronnie Dugger Editor: Louis Dubose Associate Editor: James Cullen Layout and Design: Diana Paciocco, Peter Szymczak Copy Editor: Roxanne Bogucka Bad-Bills Girl: Mary O’Grady Editorial Interns: Carmen Garcia. Contributing Writers: Bill Adler, Betty Brink, Warren Burnett, Brett Campbell, Jo Clifton, Terry FitzPatrick, Gregg Franzwa, James Harrington, Bill Helmer, Ellen Hosmer, Steven Kellman, Michael King, Deborah Lutterbeck, Toni McClellan, Bryce Milligan, Debbie Nathan, Gary Pomerantz, Lawrence Walsh. Editorial Advisory Board: David Anderson, Austin; Frances Barton, Austin; Elroy Bode, El Paso; Chandler Davidson, Houston; Dave Denison, Cambridge, Mass; Bob Eckhardt, Washington, D.C.; Sissy Farenthold, Houston; Ruperto Garcia, Austin; John Kenneth Galbraith, Cambridge, Mass.; Lawrence Goodwyn, Durham, N.C.; George Hendrick, Urbana, Ill.; Molly Ivins, Austin; Larry L. King, Washington, D.C.; Maury Maverick, Jr.. San Antonio; Willie Morris, Oxford, Miss.; Kaye Northcott, Austin; James Presley, Texarkana; Susan Reid, Galveston; Fred Schmidt, Fredericksburg. Poetry Consultant: Thomas B. Whitbread Contributing Photographers: Bill Albrecht, Vic Hinterlang, Alan Pogue. Contributing Artists: Michael Alexander, Eric Avery, Tom Ballenger, Richard Bartholomew, Jeff Danziger, Beth Epstein, Dan Hubig, Pat Johnson, Kevin Kreneck, Michael Krone, Carlos Lowry, Ben Sargent, Dan Thibodeau, Gail Woods, Matt Wuerker. Managing Publisher: Cliff Olofson Subscription Manager: Stefan Wanstrom Executive Assistant: Gail Woods Special Projects Director: Bill Simmons Development Consultant: Frances Barton SUBSCRIPTIONS: One year 532. two years $59, three years $84. Full-time students $18 per year. Back issues 53 prepaid. Airmail, foreign, group, and bulk rates on request. Microfilm editions available from University Microfilms Intl., 3\(10 N. Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, MI 48106. Any current subscriber who finds the price a burden should say so at renewal time; no one need forgo reading the Observer simply because of the cost. INDEXES: The Texas Observer is indexed in Access: The Supplementary Index to Periodicals; Texas Index and, for the years 1954 through 1981,771e Texas Observer Index. copyrighted, 10 1992, is published biweekly except for a three-week interval 477-0746. Second-class postage paid at Austin, Texas. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to THE TEXAS OBSERVER, 307 West 7th Street, Austin, Texas 787\(11, Le Sueur Lives! I was enjoying reading your book review [“Working Papers” by Bill Adler, TO 1/15/93] … until I came to your closing paragraph. Your well-chosen quote from Meridel Le Sueur wrongly identifies the source. Ms. Le Sueur was indeed in the ’30s a journalist covering labor issues for the New Masses magazine and the Daily Worker. However, this woman, born in 1900, is still alive still writing and has become a minor cult figure in women’s studies circles. She has even been accorded respectability as poet laureate of St. Paul, Minnesota. Her mother was a writer and women’s suffrage leader and her father was a close associate of Eugene Victor Debs and was the Socialist mayor of Minot, North Dakota. She was developing a national literary reputation which was ended by anti-Red witch hunts and FBI,hounding until she could publish only under assumed names. This great talent turned out “trashy” romances to earn a livelihood. The women’s movement must be credited with the recognition which has finally come to Ms. Le Sueur. Ms. did profile by Patricia Hampl, “Meridel Le Sueur: Voice of the Prairie.” Perhaps you can find it at the [University of Texas] library and it may also have Ripening: published in 1987 by Feminist Press, Old Westbury, New York. She figured rather prominently in the “Save The Family Farm” issue to which Sen. Tom Harkin and Jim Hightower gave their leadership. Meridel Le Sueur is a living legend of the American left and a new generation of progressives needs to know her story. Lee J. Price Gainesville, Florida Fragments of News The Observer, by relying on fragments of news reports, misled its readers in reporting … on Kay Bailey Hutchison’s campaign [“Political Intelligence,” 2/26/93]. First, Mrs. Hutchison never claimed that “the President had no business interfering in the armed services” as you aver. She did state that when making decisions affecting military preparedness and national defense, a President particularly a President with the military experience of our incumbent should at a minimum consult with the Joint Chiefs before acting. Such decisions should be based on national security considerations, she added, and not be made as a political payoff to an interest group. Second, you reported that the San Antonio Express-News criticized Mrs. Hutchison for claiming wrongly that Congress had exempted itself from enforcement provisions of the Family Leave Act. Your account was severely truncated. Here’s the rest of the story. Two days later, the Express-News printed a letter, from me, pointing out that, on a party line vote, the House specifically rejected an amendment applying to Congress the same enforcement provisions that private businesses are subject to. Instead, it adopted a procedure that prohibits normal discovery procedures, restricts damages to back pay only \(busiestablishes secrecy in the proceedings and provides that judge, jury and executioner members themselves! Two days after that, the Express-News printed an editorial that comes about as close to an apology as any newspaper supplies these days. Perhaps it came too late for your deadline. David C. Beckwith Communications Director Hutchison for Senate Dumped Upon I am deeply offended by some of the language in the article by Debbie Nathan in the Observer I received today [“Love in the Time of Cholera: Waiting for Free Trade,” TO 1/15/93]. What is to be gained by including pornographic descriptions of Ms. Nathan’s sexual activities.in an otherwise well-written article? I feel dumped upon by both Ms. Nathan and The Texas Observer. Louise Crow Gilmer P.S. I have never felt dumped upon by anything Molly Ivins has written. Earthy and direct is acceptable; blatant pornography is not. Write: Dialogue Texas Observer 307 W. 7th St. Austin, Texas 78701 DIALOGUE 2 MARCH 12, 1993