Letter from a Whig

...The stories are simply the modern equivalent of fairy tales--movies which could and should be television shows...

...Are we in the last stages of our own Weimar Republic...

...Since all of these goals have been accomplished, or are in the process of being accomplished, grave concern is being increasingly voiced by German opposition party officials that the next logical step in the Wehner-Bahr policy will be the dissolution of the NATO alliance...

...This fear is compounded by the fact that Brandt was unable to solicit Wehner to retract (or modify) his Moscow statement, even after popular opposition to his position became evident...

...By placing the locale in fantasyland, they have placed it either everywhere or nowhere...

...The agreement was considered necessary because the Soviet Union has consistently avoided any formal recognition of West Berlin's ties to West Germany...

...And like Bridges, Anspach comes to grief...

...Energetic, Responsible, Able, Loyal, Decent, Reliable, Fair, Optimistic, Respected, and Dedicated"--was sworn in as Vice President amidst pomp and ceremony...

...Berlin, as a result of the post-World War II Four Power Agreement, lies one hundred miles within the Soviet-occupied part of Germany, and is divided into four sectors...

...In this article Hahn traced the origins of Brandt's Ostpolitik, the architect of which is Brandt's Special Minister, Egon Bahr...

...Strauss' visit to the nation's capital, during which time he met with leading congressional figures and their staff assistants, as well as key Administration officials, inchiding Secretary of State Kissinger, and Secretary of Defense Schlesinger, came at a time when a political storm in West Germany had erupted...

...He asked the government officials he met with to carefully question the motives behind the Soviet initiatives in bringing about a sense of relaxation to global politics, and he also discussed the implications of Wehner's statement...

...And pressures once again began to mount fm Nixon to resign or be impeached...

...Also in each, the "oppression" which compels the flight is superficial and cheap--a job, a boring husband, too much responsibility...

...To illustrate his point, Strauss discussed an article by Walter Hahn (an Associate Director of the Foreign Policy Institute at the University of Pennsylvania, who is currently residing in Bonn doing research), which appeared in the defense and foreign policy journal Orbis this year...

...The real lesson of the movies is their artificiality and lack of touch with real life...

...The Congressional Record of December 6 was replete with praise (and occasional criticism) of Ford...

...More recently the Wehner-Bahr coalition reasserted itself when Bonn rescheduled its normalization talks with Prague despite the deadlock over the status of Berlin...

...All of those are real forces, but breezes compared to the hurricanes of selfgenerated feelings of entrapment which real life spawn...

...Wehner's move was carefully calculated...

...Washington Humor Even in the midst of crises, however, Washington is not without its humor...

...His visit to the United States, which went by largely unnoticed, should serve us all as a reminder that America and its allies are faced with growing differences and very serious security problems, the glowing rhetoric of d6tente notwithstanding...

...In all three of these movies, as well as in too many other movies to count, the lover of the protagonist is a powerfully irritating and depressing force, at least at the outset...

...The political turmoil in West Germany was the result of a visit to Moscow this past October by Herbert Wehner, the parliamentary leader of the governing Social Democratic Party...

...These sectors are occupied by" the Soviet Union (East Berlin), the United States, Britain, and France (West Berlin...

...Unlike the character played by Bridges, however, Anspach's character obviously, from the very beginning, is one which will never be suitable for the realm of the free and the beautiful...

...Of course, not all liberal Democrats were so magnanimous, and the attempt by some left-wing ideologues to thwart Ford's nomination raised concern among at least one conservative Republican legislator that the inevitable result of this effort would be a policy of appeasement on the part of Ford, once confirmed Vice~ President...

...Consequently, during a Joint Session of Congress, Gerald R. Ford--Mr...

...While no one believes that the left wing of the SPD will be able to implement its policies today or tomorrow, Strauss warned of a possible gradual erosion process, and he indicated that the sentiment for such a policy is strong among the ever-growing radical factions of the SPD...

...This, in effect, would mean the "Finlandization" of the continent...

...was sworn in as the fortieth Vice President of the United States on December 6, after the Senate had confirmed Ford's nomination with only three dissenting votes, and the House with a vote of 387 to 35...

...On the same day the White House revealed that its Operation Candor was to reach even greater speculative heights with what one Administration spokesman called the "devil's theory...

...WASHINGTON) House Minority Leader Gerald Ford (R-Mich...

...This is basically a one-joke movie...

...This includes the signing of the renunciation of force treaty, the de jure recognition of the two Germarries, the formal acceptance of the Soviet control over Eastern Europe, and the withdrawal of troops from both sides of the European alliance systems...

...In a letter to his colleagues John Erlenbern (R-Ill...

...Rather, she was trying, like Bridges, to have all the good things, mainly material, of the old way, without any of the discipline (in her case, the discipline of having to seem like everyone else...

...Thus it fell to Louisiana's one and only John Rarick (D-La...

...Strauss' visit to Washington was consequently of major importance...

...In light of this, I'm confident that our Chairman would provide for early action on this bill if he were free to do so...

...West Berlin's status was also tenuous because the East German government, carefully controlled from Moscow, has made East Berlin its capital and it has always claimed to be the legal heir to the city's western sector...

...What is the bottom line...

...stated the need for a new minimum wage bill in no uncertain poetic terms: _9 . . John Dent's (D-Pa...

...And, if he won't, he's a real meany...

...P e t e r Hughes The Alternative February 1974 27...

...Her attempts to be a gentle, hippie-esque type are like trying to turn a German shepherd intc a mouse, or vice versa...

...He knows, too, that men and women at the low end of the wage scales deserve the time it would take for Congress to pass a good minimum wage bill...

...Since White House staffers l.qird and Harlow have indicated that their departure is imminent (both men have shown a healthy eagerness to leave the White House, though neither wanted to leave before the Ford confirmation), a rocky road still lies ahead for Nixon...

...Tom Smothers plays a young "junior executive" about to be completely swamped by his corporate responsibilities...

...Thus Wehner's Moscow statement represented an attempt to weaken Bonn's claim to West Berlin and strengthen the Soviet position...

...But we all know the great influence exercised by the leaders of Organized Labor on the majority of the Education and Labor Committee...

...Maybe my pleas in poem and song for action on the minimum wage bill have been misdirected...

...officials not to get caught up in believing their own euphoric rhetoric of the ddtente spirit...

...Nevertheless, his statement received no public response from the United States government (which under the Four Power Agreement is responsible for guaranteeing the integrity of West Berlin with its western allies), and with the exception of the New York T/mes, the Wehner statement received no press coverage in this country...

...The implications of that are too complex to understand all at once...

...The Devil Made Me De It On the day of Ford's swearing in, Alexander Haig, Jr., who handed in his resignation as full general to assume the White House position as Chief of Staff, testified in Federal Court on December 6 that he and the President's lawyers had been concerned that "some sinister force" was responsible for the eighteen-minute erasure of the June 20, 1972 Watergate tape...

...They bear the hideous birthmark of the television show:, no development of character, no direction, no acting--in a word, radio with pictures...

...But the Ford nomination had kept Congress in session, as had the energy crisis...

...This agreement supposedly gave the West German government the "formal" right to represent the residents of West Berlin...

...It does have some clever moments, but it is basically a television show (in fact, it is basically The Smothers Brothers Show) on a larger screen...

...Perhaps, but you cannot prove it by the movies...

...Ever wondered how your congressman justifies his existence...

...And the stilted, lifeless stories tell us which...

...In retrospect, these ideas are notable because they are being translated into policy under the Brandt government...

...And he knows that, as a subcommittee, we have had nothing at all on our agenda for the past two months...

...The parts of the film that show how he was lured into the corporate world again Pave some realism, so we might as well think that the '~Qoof" episode is just his daydream and that Smothers is still stuck at Century City...

...The return to earth is also flagged without subtlety in all thrcc murder, return to hubby, corporate responsibilities...

...But Jimmy the Greek is not yet giving odds and there aren't many in Washington willing to take a gamble at this point...

...GOP Succession Set Now that the GOP line of succession is once again firmly established, the question of impeachment or forced resignation has surfaced quickly among Republicans...

...He is engaged to a voluptuous but desperately conformist girl who leaves him when he quits his job to learn to be a tap-dancing magician...

...Franz Josef Strauss, the leader of West Germany's opposition party, the Christian Socialist Union (CSU), "recently paid an informal visit to the United States...

...You have already heard the joke...

...Mandatory fuel allocation programs are discussed interminably, but Congress is still not too eager to meet some of the real sources of the problem...

...Ode to Erlenborn' came across my desk last week . . . [and] a thought occurred to me...

...Her own internal fears and rages prevent any relaxation of the rigid discipline she must maintain at all times to keep herself from being overwhelmed by the flood around her...

...During this visit, Wehner had set off a trial balloon by arguing t h a t his (Bonn) government had '~pushed too hard" for concessions from the Soviet Union in its 1971 agreement on West Berlin...

...to raise the right-wing doubts of Ford's credibility...

...Thus for the city of Berlin, at least, d6tente has come to mean increasing apprehension over the integrity of its ties to the West...

...Wehner's wing of the SPD is composed of left-wing radicals who want nothing less than the dissolution of the western alliance system and neutralism for West Germany...

...He knows the importance of compomise in the legislative process...

...Television shows, like the Body Snatchers, are among us in the guise of movies...

...His transformation is so magical and unreal, though, that he might as well not have escaped...

...It is not blind coincidence that every one of the stories takes place in Angeles...

...A member of the German Bundestag (Parliament) since 1948, Strauss has held a number of major positions in the German government, among which were Minister of Finance and Federal Defense Minister...

...He is now said to be the odds-on favorite for the 1976 presidential nomination among congressional Republicans, who perhap:~ wish to exonerate themselves of the fabled "arrogance" of their party's current executive office-holder...

...At the very least, the final scenes show that except by supernatural forces, one cannot escape the corporate, work-a-day world...

...So again, resorting to simple rhyme, let me suggest: John, John, he's our man-If he can't do it, Geergie can...

...What conclusions can be drawn from all of this about the state of American life...

...The only unusual aspect of the film is that after repeated attempts have been made to ensnare him in the corporate life...

...Haig had no explanation for what the "sinister force" might be, but this latest theory caused at least one GOP congressman to question aloud whether the White House position was merely a parody of Geraldine's---'~Phe devil made me do it...

...In each story the escape takes on the most superficial form--travel, change of clothing, fantasy-change of occupation...

...He knows that, as troubled as the American people are about matters which come under the heading of Watergate, most are still concerned about their pocketbooks...

...As Strauss pointed out, this is not a new goal for the left-wing elements of the SPD...

...Strauss warned U.S...

...Rarick questioned Ford's association with the Bilderberg group, which as we all know is "a secret international association of the rich and super rich...

...Unknown to most Americans is the fact that Brandt, the internationally acclaimed West German Chancellor and leader of the Socialist Democratic Party (SPD), is not much more than the figurehead of respectability for his party...

...Hahn had conducted an interview with Bahr in 1969, during which Bahr outlined his ideas for future German policy...

...After all, our Subcommittee Chairman is an experienced legislator...

...Smothers escapes into being an itinerant magician by saying "poor' on the 23rd floor of Century City, ~ Angeles, U.S.A...

...No Early Earlier in the year Congress had hoped 26 The Alternative February 1974 for an early recess and most of the members have been waiting eagerly to get back to their constituents...

...The I_~uisiana congressman attempted to discern the implications of Ford's friendship "with these international kingmakers," but he was unable to muster much congressional support for his position...

...That is the most serious historical lesson that can be drawn from these movies...

...Dr...

...The man who controls the majority of the SPD is none other thanHerbert Wehner, a former communist who lived in the Soviet Union during much of World War II...

...As such, Europe would fall under the sphere of influence of the Soviet Union and would consequently be forced to coordinate its foreign policies with the Kremlin...

...Thus rationing is preferred over marketclearing prices for gasoline, and further control of the wellhead price of natural gas over the deregulation of the product...

...Reelection jitters are widespread...

...And once again it was Brandt who acquiesced and permitted the question to be taken off the diplomatic agenda...

...Because of the city's geographical vulnerability, the Soviet Union has consistently attempted to undermine West Berlin's ties to the West and over the course of the last twenty-five years, Berlin has repeatedly been a pawn for Soviet ambitions...

...Some was serious, and some was intended to be serious...

...Only in Get To Know Your Rabbit i~ there any consistent success in the leading character's attempts to break out...

...Many of Ford's ideological opponents, including freshman Democratic Congressman Gerry Studds (who has the distinction of representing the only one of Massachnssetts' twelve congressional districts carried by Nixon in 1972), were willing to concede that under the Twenty-fifth Amendment of the Constitution it was not their responsibility to judge a vice-presidential candidate by his philosophy...

...Ford Confirmed After what was billed as the most detailed probe ever undertaken of a public official, Gerald Ford remained untainted...