gb e Merato Jack Anderson 22 Monterey, California • Wednesday, February 1,1989, so<&'22 2%ent\\ Bribery probe muffed and thie wAS 12zhikistan, 1 Perestrolka, 413 .... what wes THIS? J sir. Paying Congress 1 r oxed style SINCE THIS nation's earliest years, pay raises for lawmakers have caused popular resentment. Citizens who would throw a fit if their own pay was kept in check nevertheless rail against the suggestion that anyone in Con- gress ever deserves anything. So deep is this public preju- dice that members of Congress can be half forgiven for wanting to insulate themselves from the usual dernagoguery that ac- companies "pay grabs." That explains why there is a President's Commission on Ex- ecutive, Legislative and Judicial Salaries, which suggested the latest pay raises for members of Congress and other public offi- cials. Backed by both presidents Reagan and Bush, these in- creases will take effect a week from today unless both the House and Senate pass legisla- tion block them. Yet this attempt to avoid po- litical pain has compounded the problem. The fact is that the size of the raises suggested by the commission ought to be put to a vote. The commission recom- mended a 51 percent increase - from $89,500 to $135,000 for most members of Congress. Also included are pay increases for some 2,500 top-level federal of- ficials - including the president and vice president, Cabinet members, and federal judges (ridiculously, even those who don't work). The total cost is estimated to be about $76.7 mil- lion for fiscal 1990. The rationale was to restore salaries to 1969 levels as ad- Nonsense i SALVADOR Dali, who died last week at 84, was the last of a generation of artists who in the earlier part of this century painted startling new chapters in the history of art. Dali was not the greatest of an era that included such gen- iuses as Pablo Picasso, and his public-relations ability to capi- talize on his own personal ec- centricities may have lowered his place in the eyes of critics and art historians. lames J. Kilpatrick Rulii WASHINGTON - Sixteen years have passed since the Supreme Court's controversial decision in Roe v. Wade. That was the decision that struck down the abortion laws of 40 states and wrote into the Constitution a brand- . new interpretation of C.. I a pregnant woman's "liberty." Now the 4 0;* bells are tolling. At- • 4 3 torney General Richard Thornburgh predicted last week that the decision will be overruled. Presi- dent Bush called on Monday for an end to Kilpatrick a right of abortion. The means toward that end are at hand. Earlier this month the court El) r MeraiD Published by Monterey Peninsula Herald Co. P.O. Box 271, Monterey, Ca., 93942 Phone Paul Ayars, General Manager Reginald Henry, Editor NEWS - Lewis Leader, Associate Editor; Bob Bullock, News Editor; Susan Bernhardt, Sunday Editor EUROPEAN BUREAU - Fernand Auber- jonois, c/o Reuters, Ltd., 85 Fleet St., London EC4P 4AJ. WASHINGTON BUREAU - Patricia Griffith, Bureau Chief; Michael Woods; Harry Stoffer; Jack Torry. 955 National Press Bldg.. Wash- ington, D.C.20045. ADVERTISING - James Rutledge, Manager; Alice Burton, Display Advertising Manager; Pam Dozier, Advertising Sales Manager; Pat Matson, Classified Telephone Sales Manager; Nanette Maysonave, Advertising Services Manager. BUSINESS OFFICE - Frank Damgaard, Controller; Kenneth Kraft, Assistant Controller. CIRCULATION - Mark Olson, Director; Sal. vatore Ursino, Manager; Roy Ulrich, Operations Manager. ' PRODUCTION - Don Fordham, Manager; Don Schneider, Camera Foreman; Dick Schle- singer, Cyposing Foreman; 42 Davison, Press Fore.yan. justed for inflation. The com- mission made it clear that the pay raises should go into effect only if members of Congress stop accepting honoraria - the fees collected for speeches and - appearances. But honoraria, a corrupting influence, should have been done away with anyhow. What justi- fication remains for the pay raises by themselves? In the case of unelected public officials, the case is quite per- suasive. According to the com- mission, the average senior of- ficial in the executive branch leaves after just 18 months - lured away, in many cases, by higher pay in the private sector Federal judges also make a big financial sacrifice when they come on the bench, and their turnover has become worrisome. Between 1958 and 1973, there were only six resignations from the federal bench. In the next 15 + years, there were 57. As for members of Congress, they work harder than their critics give them credit for, and it also true that they have the added expense of maintaining two residences. And while it is impossible to say that we would necessarily get better con- gressmen if they had bigger paychecks, their salaries should · reflect the importance of their job - as a matter of fairness. But there is a happy medium to be struck. Members of Con- gre must also act as good examples to the nation. Simply put, a 51 percent raise is much too much in the shadow of a giant budget deficit. :ade sense But Dali in his surrealistic paintings, such as the famous soft-watches painting, "Per- sistence of Memory," was able to portray on canvas the psy- chological insights of Freud and Jung and thereby captivate a wider public audience than most of his peers. As John Russell of The New York Times has put it, his me- ticulous visions of a world turned inside out made his audience believe that nonsense could make the best sense. g up for re agreed to hear argument in William L. Webster v. Reproductive Health Services. Webster is attorney gen- eral of Missouri. He is defending a state law that lays certain re- quirements on physicians before they may perform an abortion; the act prohibits the use of state funds for "encouraging or counseling a woman to have an abortion not necessary to save her life" and it inhibits abortions in other ways. Under the act, which was to have become effective in 1986, a physi- cian must explain the risks of abor- tion to his patient. Another section requires that after the first 16 weeks, all abortions must be per- formed in hospitals rather than in outpatient clinics. The record con- tains testimony that a hospital abortion costs $2,500, an outpatient abortion between $350 and $650. Before the law could become op- erative, a group of physicians and nurses sued for summary judgment declaring it unconstitutional under the rule of Roe v. Wade. A U.S. District Court agreed: The law amounted to an impermissible in- trusion into the privacy of the doctor-patient relationship. It trampled upon rights of free speech. The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed, and the state appealed. The U.S. solicitor general, siding with Missouri, has filed a brief say- ing that if the high court is prepared to reconsider Roe, "this case pre- sents an appropriate opportunity to do so." In its essentials, the Missouri law scarcely can be distinguished from a similar statute in Pennsylvania - a statute the court nullified three years ago. But since the Pennsyl- vania case was decided, the compo- sition of the court has changed. As court observers man¥ times if ·,Allf David S. Broder Bush's reh WASHINGTON - White House chief of staff John H. Sununu was just finishing up an anecdote illus- trating how "the very loose ap- proach the president wants to take" is shaping "a much more open structure" of White House decision- bil-- 0 making, when .9, George Bush made LJ the point for him. VtiTY. The door to the chief A 6. of staff's office .Ch/4- opened last Friday 14/ and, unannounced, 69/ Bush walked in on ' 1f the interview in Broder progress. "You going over to this thing?" he asked, referring to the swearing-in of Secretary of State James A. Baker III. "Yes," Sununu said. "Do you want to go now?" "Finish up what you're doing," Bush said, "and pick me up when you're ready." In three decades of White House interviews, this is the first time I can recall a president walking to the office of an aide, rather than having the aide summoned to the Oval Office. It illustrated the tone of openness and access the fledgling Bush administration set in its first days. For the press, it's meant frequent and lengthy news conferences with Bush, Sununu and others in the high command. For members of Con- gress, especially the opposition Democrats, it's meant not just sub- stantive formal meetings but social events in the White House resi- dential quarters, including glimpses of the new first family's bedrooms. Internally, it's meant that Sununu has for now shucked off the short temper and arrogance he often dis- played in his old job as governor of New Hampshire. Instead, he has view have remarked, more in honesty than in cynicism, ours is in fact a government of men, not laws. Roe was decided by a vote of 7-2, with Justices Rehnquist and White dis- senting from the opinion written by Justice Blackmun. Of the seven who formed the majority in 1973, only three remain. Since then the seats that were oc- cupied by Burger, Douglas, Stewart and Powell have gone to JusUces Stevens, O'Connor, Scalia and Kennedy. The Constitution hasn't changed, but the judges have changed. White and Rehnquist have vehe- mently opposed Roe from the very beginning. White termed the court's 1973 decision "an exercise in raw judicial power." Rehnquist consis- tently has regarded Roe not as ju- risprudence but as legislation. It is a fair presumption that Rehnquist and White have not changed their minds. Justice O'Connor dissented in the Akron abortion case of 1983 and again in the Pennsylvania case of 1986. Her objections in the latter case went more to procedure than to the mer- its, but hers is regarded as a third vote to overrule. If newcomers Scalia and Kennedy should be per- suaded that Roe was a terrible piece of constitutional law, which it was, there goes Roe v. Wade, 5-4. My guess is that in deciding the Missouri case, a majority will be mustered that will pay some meas- ure of deference to the aging Justice Blackmun. Instead of junking Roe completely, a way will be found to preserve a respectable shell. The states will be accorded power to discourage abortion and to erect formidable obstacles in its path, but at least in the earliest stages of rpregnancy, abortion may not be prohibited altogether. V emphasized the impatience with bureaucracy that comes naturally to a hands-on manager accustomed to dealing with a pocket-sized gov- ernment. Sununu suggested that the scene I had just witnessed indicated why he was optimistic about being able to "reduce the bureaucracy and paperwork in the White House. I tell the staff, 'If you've got a problem, don't write a five-page memo. Come ask. And if I can't answer it... I'll go in and ask him (Bush) and for the most part, you'll get your answer within two hours.' " "That's wonderful, if it survives the first big bump," I said, voicing the skepticism with which Wash- ington views such assertions. He replied: "It's easier to survive the big bumps with a system that is flexible than one that is rigid. A rigid system tends to be brittle. A flexible system can handle the give and take. People will pull together much better if the communication has been taking place on a personal level than in a more distant, for- malized way." There were no big bumps in the early days, just a couple of gaffes involving Cabinet members who are personal favorites of the president. Secretary of the Treasury Nicholas Brady set off one by letting mem- bers of Congress know that he was considering recommending a fee on savings accounts as a way of fi- nancing the savings-and-loan bail- out. And Dr. Louis Sullivan, the appointee to head the Department of Health and Human Services, aroused the suspicions of conserva- tives by again intimating that his private views on abortion may be more permissive than the presi- dent's. It took some quick scrambling to nudge Sullivan back into line, and to make it clear that Brady had not yet sold Bush on his S&L plan. But in neither case was there a White House crackdown. Talking about the congressional leaks that embarrassed the two Cabinet members, Sununu said: "You have to expect that when you talk to people early, and that's go- ing to happen again and again... The president hopes, and everyone here hopes, it will not inhibit a continued willingness ...togoup and consult as early as possible (with members of Congress)." Sununu's studied nonchalance is understandable, since the damage done to Bush in the Sullivan and Brady affairs was neither serious nor long-lasting. Heavier weather is just ahead, however, when the bad news in the Bush budget is conveyed in advance to the key players on Capitol Hill. "We're going to prepare people for some of the tough things we have to propose (to reduce the deficit)," Sununu said, "and there will be selective disclosures... what you call leaks in this town . . . There will always be somebody to say we're not planning to put enough money into this or that, and we know we'll have to live through that flurry. There's no way to avoid it, except by not having consultation, and consultation is going to be a hall- mark of this administration." Old hands in Washington will nod wisely and say that if this policy of openness continues to provide raw material for anti-Bush sharp- shooters, the iron curtain will come down around this White House as it has around others, I thought that myself, before Bush took office, but I am no longer sure that cynicism is warranted. The new president's approach to rival politi- cians (in both parties) and to the media is so determinedly relaxed and non-antagonistic that it may take a lot to end it, Given the difficulties of dealing with the nation's problems in a divided government, it will be a iblessing if it lasts. WASHINGTON - There are plenty of top-notch investigators at the Defense Department. But last year the wrong crew was assigned to check out an anonymous tip that a former Navy surgeon may have bribed his way out of The investigators first assigned to the job botched things so badly that a mop-up crew is now strug- 'gling to salvage what remains. The case involves Donal Billig, the Anderson former heart surgeon at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland who was convicted in 1986 of involuntary manslaughter and negligent homicide in the sur- gery deaths of three patients. The Court of Military Review over- turned the conviction last March. A month later, an anonymous caller told the Defense Department hotline for whistleblowers that Billig, working with a bagman, bribed one or more of the judges on Ithe panel, according to an affidavit filed in court by the Defense De- partment. We already reported that Defense Department investigators recently subpoenaed the banking records of Billig and his wife. Subpoenas are usually the last step in wrapping up a bribery probe. Seasoned criminal investigators often begin by nosing around quietly to find someone in- volved in the alleged bribe who can be scared into testifying against the others. But this probe is barely off the ground and the subpoenas are just about the only option left to the Defense Department. The ball was dropped by Special Inquiries, a group in the Defense Department inspector general's office that does not normally handle criminal in- vestigations. Several sources close to the probe told our associate Stewart Harris that the man who commands Spe- cial Inquiries, Stephen A. Whitlock, spilled the beans about the al- legations to judges on the Court of Military Review. Whitlock report- edly tipped his hand during a meet- ing with the judges last spring, shortly after the tipster called and before investigators had a chance to make quiet inquiries. The judges responded by chal- Jack Smith Cat con LOS ANGELES - It is axiomatic that anything you write about cats will be controversial. I can think of no other animal that has so divided humankind into such hostile camps. In observing that cats wefe in- capable of showing humiliation, I have provoked the author John D. Weaver into vigorous dis- agreement, to say the least. "You are dead wrong/' he says simply. "Missy, the amber-eyed, taffy- Smith colored tabby that moved in with us four years ago is, as you wrote with your character- istic accuracy, 'independent, in- solent, intractable, inquisitive, in- furiating, morally intemperate and intellectually inaccessible.' She is also elegant, haughty and decep- tive." (Let me say here that I would certainly have included "haughty" among the traits I listed, except that it doesn't begin with "in". I was seeking a literary consistency. Also I have never denied that cats are elegant and deceptive. They are, in fact, the most duplicitous of crea- tures.) "From my workroom sliding glass door," Weaver goes on, "I watch her awaken from a nap with a gentle, innocent look and then next morning I'll find a dead blue jay on the mat outside the door. Lady Macbeth will be asleep on a patio chair nearby." (That seems to bear out my statement that cats are sinister as well as deceptive.) "She pads about the place with a dignity and grace befitting her an- cient Egyptian ancestry. The first time I saw her misjudge a routine leap from floor to bookcase I was confronted by the most eloquent expression of humiliation I'd ever seen." Weaver says that, like me, he admires cats for their independence. "Missy and I both know damned well she's never going to fetch me the morning paper. I grew up on dogs, but on a recent visit to the San Diego Zoo the animal that held me the longest was the wolf. This, I concluded, is what dogs must have been like before they sold out." Perhaps their memory of having sold out is what makes dogs so subject to embarrassment, an emo- tion I personally have never ob- served in cats, despite Weaver's Missy. lenging the right of the inspector general to investigate them. Then they appointed their own in- vestigator who, in an interim report, said he found no evidence of wrongdoing. Early attempts by the Defense Department to verify the tipster's allegations met with "mixed re- sults," according to court papers filed by the government in support of the bank record subpoenas. Those subpoenas may now be the best chance the government has to re- solve the case. Normally, investigators try to rattle weak links in a suspected bribery scheme. If someone talks, a plea bargain is struck in exchange for testimony against the key play- ers. Prosecutors also can capitalize on the divisiveness and confusion that often breaks out among ner- vous conspirators. Inspector General June Gibbs Brown declined to say why the Special Inquiries team was put on the sensitive Billig case from the outset. But our sources tell us that Spe- cial Inquiries was assigned because Deputy Director Derek Vander Schaaf wanted a quick turnaround on the case. Special Inquiries is supposed to handle allegations of non-criminal improprieties within 30 to 45 days. Vander Schaaf calls it his "tiger team." But the team is a pussy cat when it comes to hard core criminal investigations. One source told us the "front office" - Brown or Vander Schaaf - failed to correctly gauge the criminal potential of the case in the beginning. Early last fall, the case was finally handed over to the team that should have had it from the beginning, the Defense Criminal Investigative Service. VETO STRATEGY President Bush is eager to coop- erate with the Democrats who con- trol Congress, but he is quietly pre- paring to fight them if they get in his way. Sources close to Bush tell us that he will compromise, if pos- sible, but will use his veto to block legislation he doesn't like · Bush has done his arithmetic and knows there are enough Republicans in the House to uphold a veto. All he has to do is keep the Republicans in line. So he is quietly offering in- ducements and tightening party discipline to make his vetoes fool- proof. w roversy Diane Silver insists that cats are not only capable of embarrassment, but also of that even more human emotion - compassion. "My white, blue-eyed Persian," she says, "knowing herself to be by far more beautiful than the other cats, never associates with them. Yet, when she fell off the ironing board in her sleep, the tortoise shell that she had snubbed all her life ran over and 'kissed' her all over her face. Of course, Frosty stood up and walked away as if nothing had hap- pened, and continued to treat poor Gatita like an unwelcome dust ball. "Of course," she adds, "cats are smarter than most men give them credit for." Meanwhile, several readers note that if I want to give our two new kittens names that reflect both the eternal feminine and the sinister, I could do better than Lorelei and Pandora (which were only ten- tative). "Why not Hedda and Louella?" asks Frank McDonald. "After all, you're a newspaperman, and you probably remember all the 'spitting and clawing' those two did at each other." McDonald obviously refers to those two feline Hollywood gossip columnists, Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons. Coincidentally, the same two names are suggested by Anne Olmstead. "Reading your list of the characteristics you feel that you share with cats, the first six sug- gested two names to me. Independ- ent, insolent, indolent, intractable, inquisitive, infuriating - who but Hedda and Louella? "Perhaps 'indolent' does not suit these long-gone but still remem- bered personalities, and I'm not at all sure what you mean by 'morally intemperate and intellectually in- accessible,' but do at least consider my offering." In case anyone else was un- certain, by "morally intemperate" I meant promiscuous, and by "in- tellectually inaccessible" I meant inscrutable. Marjorie Gross suggests Sheila and Lolly, obviously referring to Louella (Lolly) Parsons and Sheila Graham, another Hollywood col- umnist who was the mistress of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Not bad. Charles Stearns says he likes Mandu, the name of a neighbor's cat, but his own cat is named Fido. That's a good idea. I might name one Fido and the other Rover, just for the incongruity of it. Might be interesting to see if that embarrassed them. 4 , OCR Text: gb e Merato Jack Anderson 22 Monterey, California • Wednesday, February 1,1989, so<&'22 2%ent\\ Bribery probe muffed and thie wAS 12zhikistan, 1 Perestrolka, 413 .... what wes THIS? J sir. Paying Congress 1 r oxed style SINCE THIS nation's earliest years, pay raises for lawmakers have caused popular resentment. Citizens who would throw a fit if their own pay was kept in check nevertheless rail against the suggestion that anyone in Con- gress ever deserves anything. So deep is this public preju- dice that members of Congress can be half forgiven for wanting to insulate themselves from the usual dernagoguery that ac- companies "pay grabs." That explains why there is a President's Commission on Ex- ecutive, Legislative and Judicial Salaries, which suggested the latest pay raises for members of Congress and other public offi- cials. Backed by both presidents Reagan and Bush, these in- creases will take effect a week from today unless both the House and Senate pass legisla- tion block them. Yet this attempt to avoid po- litical pain has compounded the problem. The fact is that the size of the raises suggested by the commission ought to be put to a vote. The commission recom- mended a 51 percent increase - from $89,500 to $135,000 for most members of Congress. Also included are pay increases for some 2,500 top-level federal of- ficials - including the president and vice president, Cabinet members, and federal judges (ridiculously, even those who don't work). The total cost is estimated to be about $76.7 mil- lion for fiscal 1990. The rationale was to restore salaries to 1969 levels as ad- Nonsense i SALVADOR Dali, who died last week at 84, was the last of a generation of artists who in the earlier part of this century painted startling new chapters in the history of art. Dali was not the greatest of an era that included such gen- iuses as Pablo Picasso, and his public-relations ability to capi- talize on his own personal ec- centricities may have lowered his place in the eyes of critics and art historians. lames J. Kilpatrick Rulii WASHINGTON - Sixteen years have passed since the Supreme Court's controversial decision in Roe v. Wade. That was the decision that struck down the abortion laws of 40 states and wrote into the Constitution a brand- . new interpretation of C.. I a pregnant woman's "liberty." Now the 4 0;* bells are tolling. At- • 4 3 torney General Richard Thornburgh predicted last week that the decision will be overruled. Presi- dent Bush called on Monday for an end to Kilpatrick a right of abortion. The means toward that end are at hand. Earlier this month the court El) r MeraiD Published by Monterey Peninsula Herald Co. P.O. Box 271, Monterey, Ca., 93942 Phone Paul Ayars, General Manager Reginald Henry, Editor NEWS - Lewis Leader, Associate Editor; Bob Bullock, News Editor; Susan Bernhardt, Sunday Editor EUROPEAN BUREAU - Fernand Auber- jonois, c/o Reuters, Ltd., 85 Fleet St., London EC4P 4AJ. WASHINGTON BUREAU - Patricia Griffith, Bureau Chief; Michael Woods; Harry Stoffer; Jack Torry. 955 National Press Bldg.. Wash- ington, D.C.20045. ADVERTISING - James Rutledge, Manager; Alice Burton, Display Advertising Manager; Pam Dozier, Advertising Sales Manager; Pat Matson, Classified Telephone Sales Manager; Nanette Maysonave, Advertising Services Manager. BUSINESS OFFICE - Frank Damgaard, Controller; Kenneth Kraft, Assistant Controller. CIRCULATION - Mark Olson, Director; Sal. vatore Ursino, Manager; Roy Ulrich, Operations Manager. ' PRODUCTION - Don Fordham, Manager; Don Schneider, Camera Foreman; Dick Schle- singer, Cyposing Foreman; 42 Davison, Press Fore.yan. justed for inflation. The com- mission made it clear that the pay raises should go into effect only if members of Congress stop accepting honoraria - the fees collected for speeches and - appearances. But honoraria, a corrupting influence, should have been done away with anyhow. What justi- fication remains for the pay raises by themselves? In the case of unelected public officials, the case is quite per- suasive. According to the com- mission, the average senior of- ficial in the executive branch leaves after just 18 months - lured away, in many cases, by higher pay in the private sector Federal judges also make a big financial sacrifice when they come on the bench, and their turnover has become worrisome. Between 1958 and 1973, there were only six resignations from the federal bench. In the next 15 years, there were 57. As for members of Congress, they work harder than their critics give them credit for, and it also true that they have the added expense of maintaining two residences. And while it is impossible to say that we would necessarily get better con- gressmen if they had bigger paychecks, their salaries should · reflect the importance of their job - as a matter of fairness. But there is a happy medium to be struck. Members of Con- gre must also act as good examples to the nation. Simply put, a 51 percent raise is much too much in the shadow of a giant budget deficit. :ade sense But Dali in his surrealistic paintings, such as the famous soft-watches painting, "Per- sistence of Memory," was able to portray on canvas the psy- chological insights of Freud and Jung and thereby captivate a wider public audience than most of his peers. As John Russell of The New York Times has put it, his me- ticulous visions of a world turned inside out made his audience believe that nonsense could make the best sense. g up for re agreed to hear argument in William L. Webster v. Reproductive Health Services. Webster is attorney gen- eral of Missouri. He is defending a state law that lays certain re- quirements on physicians before they may perform an abortion; the act prohibits the use of state funds for "encouraging or counseling a woman to have an abortion not necessary to save her life" and it inhibits abortions in other ways. Under the act, which was to have become effective in 1986, a physi- cian must explain the risks of abor- tion to his patient. Another section requires that after the first 16 weeks, all abortions must be per- formed in hospitals rather than in outpatient clinics. The record con- tains testimony that a hospital abortion costs $2,500, an outpatient abortion between $350 and $650. Before the law could become op- erative, a group of physicians and nurses sued for summary judgment declaring it unconstitutional under the rule of Roe v. Wade. A U.S. District Court agreed: The law amounted to an impermissible in- trusion into the privacy of the doctor-patient relationship. It trampled upon rights of free speech. The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed, and the state appealed. The U.S. solicitor general, siding with Missouri, has filed a brief say- ing that if the high court is prepared to reconsider Roe, "this case pre- sents an appropriate opportunity to do so." In its essentials, the Missouri law scarcely can be distinguished from a similar statute in Pennsylvania - a statute the court nullified three years ago. But since the Pennsyl- vania case was decided, the compo- sition of the court has changed. As court observers man¥ times if ·,Allf David S. Broder Bush's reh WASHINGTON - White House chief of staff John H. Sununu was just finishing up an anecdote illus- trating how "the very loose ap- proach the president wants to take" is shaping "a much more open structure" of White House decision- bil-- 0 making, when .9, George Bush made LJ the point for him. VtiTY. The door to the chief A 6. of staff's office .Ch/4- opened last Friday 14/ and, unannounced, 69/ Bush walked in on ' 1f the interview in Broder progress. "You going over to this thing?" he asked, referring to the swearing-in of Secretary of State James A. Baker III. "Yes," Sununu said. "Do you want to go now?" "Finish up what you're doing," Bush said, "and pick me up when you're ready." In three decades of White House interviews, this is the first time I can recall a president walking to the office of an aide, rather than having the aide summoned to the Oval Office. It illustrated the tone of openness and access the fledgling Bush administration set in its first days. For the press, it's meant frequent and lengthy news conferences with Bush, Sununu and others in the high command. For members of Con- gress, especially the opposition Democrats, it's meant not just sub- stantive formal meetings but social events in the White House resi- dential quarters, including glimpses of the new first family's bedrooms. Internally, it's meant that Sununu has for now shucked off the short temper and arrogance he often dis- played in his old job as governor of New Hampshire. Instead, he has view have remarked, more in honesty than in cynicism, ours is in fact a government of men, not laws. Roe was decided by a vote of 7-2, with Justices Rehnquist and White dis- senting from the opinion written by Justice Blackmun. Of the seven who formed the majority in 1973, only three remain. Since then the seats that were oc- cupied by Burger, Douglas, Stewart and Powell have gone to JusUces Stevens, O'Connor, Scalia and Kennedy. The Constitution hasn't changed, but the judges have changed. White and Rehnquist have vehe- mently opposed Roe from the very beginning. White termed the court's 1973 decision "an exercise in raw judicial power." Rehnquist consis- tently has regarded Roe not as ju- risprudence but as legislation. It is a fair presumption that Rehnquist and White have not changed their minds. Justice O'Connor dissented in the Akron abortion case of 1983 and again in the Pennsylvania case of 1986. Her objections in the latter case went more to procedure than to the mer- its, but hers is regarded as a third vote to overrule. If newcomers Scalia and Kennedy should be per- suaded that Roe was a terrible piece of constitutional law, which it was, there goes Roe v. Wade, 5-4. My guess is that in deciding the Missouri case, a majority will be mustered that will pay some meas- ure of deference to the aging Justice Blackmun. Instead of junking Roe completely, a way will be found to preserve a respectable shell. The states will be accorded power to discourage abortion and to erect formidable obstacles in its path, but at least in the earliest stages of rpregnancy, abortion may not be prohibited altogether. V emphasized the impatience with bureaucracy that comes naturally to a hands-on manager accustomed to dealing with a pocket-sized gov- ernment. Sununu suggested that the scene I had just witnessed indicated why he was optimistic about being able to "reduce the bureaucracy and paperwork in the White House. I tell the staff, 'If you've got a problem, don't write a five-page memo. Come ask. And if I can't answer it... I'll go in and ask him (Bush) and for the most part, you'll get your answer within two hours.' " "That's wonderful, if it survives the first big bump," I said, voicing the skepticism with which Wash- ington views such assertions. He replied: "It's easier to survive the big bumps with a system that is flexible than one that is rigid. A rigid system tends to be brittle. A flexible system can handle the give and take. People will pull together much better if the communication has been taking place on a personal level than in a more distant, for- malized way." There were no big bumps in the early days, just a couple of gaffes involving Cabinet members who are personal favorites of the president. Secretary of the Treasury Nicholas Brady set off one by letting mem- bers of Congress know that he was considering recommending a fee on savings accounts as a way of fi- nancing the savings-and-loan bail- out. And Dr. Louis Sullivan, the appointee to head the Department of Health and Human Services, aroused the suspicions of conserva- tives by again intimating that his private views on abortion may be more permissive than the presi- dent's. It took some quick scrambling to nudge Sullivan back into line, and to make it clear that Brady had not yet sold Bush on his S&L plan. But in neither case was there a White House crackdown. Talking about the congressional leaks that embarrassed the two Cabinet members, Sununu said: "You have to expect that when you talk to people early, and that's go- ing to happen again and again... The president hopes, and everyone here hopes, it will not inhibit a continued willingness ...togoup and consult as early as possible (with members of Congress)." Sununu's studied nonchalance is understandable, since the damage done to Bush in the Sullivan and Brady affairs was neither serious nor long-lasting. Heavier weather is just ahead, however, when the bad news in the Bush budget is conveyed in advance to the key players on Capitol Hill. "We're going to prepare people for some of the tough things we have to propose (to reduce the deficit)," Sununu said, "and there will be selective disclosures... what you call leaks in this town . . . There will always be somebody to say we're not planning to put enough money into this or that, and we know we'll have to live through that flurry. There's no way to avoid it, except by not having consultation, and consultation is going to be a hall- mark of this administration." Old hands in Washington will nod wisely and say that if this policy of openness continues to provide raw material for anti-Bush sharp- shooters, the iron curtain will come down around this White House as it has around others, I thought that myself, before Bush took office, but I am no longer sure that cynicism is warranted. The new president's approach to rival politi- cians (in both parties) and to the media is so determinedly relaxed and non-antagonistic that it may take a lot to end it, Given the difficulties of dealing with the nation's problems in a divided government, it will be a iblessing if it lasts. WASHINGTON - There are plenty of top-notch investigators at the Defense Department. But last year the wrong crew was assigned to check out an anonymous tip that a former Navy surgeon may have bribed his way out of The investigators first assigned to the job botched things so badly that a mop-up crew is now strug- 'gling to salvage what remains. The case involves Donal Billig, the Anderson former heart surgeon at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland who was convicted in 1986 of involuntary manslaughter and negligent homicide in the sur- gery deaths of three patients. The Court of Military Review over- turned the conviction last March. A month later, an anonymous caller told the Defense Department hotline for whistleblowers that Billig, working with a bagman, bribed one or more of the judges on Ithe panel, according to an affidavit filed in court by the Defense De- partment. We already reported that Defense Department investigators recently subpoenaed the banking records of Billig and his wife. Subpoenas are usually the last step in wrapping up a bribery probe. Seasoned criminal investigators often begin by nosing around quietly to find someone in- volved in the alleged bribe who can be scared into testifying against the others. But this probe is barely off the ground and the subpoenas are just about the only option left to the Defense Department. The ball was dropped by Special Inquiries, a group in the Defense Department inspector general's office that does not normally handle criminal in- vestigations. Several sources close to the probe told our associate Stewart Harris that the man who commands Spe- cial Inquiries, Stephen A. Whitlock, spilled the beans about the al- legations to judges on the Court of Military Review. Whitlock report- edly tipped his hand during a meet- ing with the judges last spring, shortly after the tipster called and before investigators had a chance to make quiet inquiries. The judges responded by chal- Jack Smith Cat con LOS ANGELES - It is axiomatic that anything you write about cats will be controversial. I can think of no other animal that has so divided humankind into such hostile camps. In observing that cats wefe in- capable of showing humiliation, I have provoked the author John D. Weaver into vigorous dis- agreement, to say the least. "You are dead wrong/' he says simply. "Missy, the amber-eyed, taffy- Smith colored tabby that moved in with us four years ago is, as you wrote with your character- istic accuracy, 'independent, in- solent, intractable, inquisitive, in- furiating, morally intemperate and intellectually inaccessible.' She is also elegant, haughty and decep- tive." (Let me say here that I would certainly have included "haughty" among the traits I listed, except that it doesn't begin with "in". I was seeking a literary consistency. Also I have never denied that cats are elegant and deceptive. They are, in fact, the most duplicitous of crea- tures.) "From my workroom sliding glass door," Weaver goes on, "I watch her awaken from a nap with a gentle, innocent look and then next morning I'll find a dead blue jay on the mat outside the door. Lady Macbeth will be asleep on a patio chair nearby." (That seems to bear out my statement that cats are sinister as well as deceptive.) "She pads about the place with a dignity and grace befitting her an- cient Egyptian ancestry. The first time I saw her misjudge a routine leap from floor to bookcase I was confronted by the most eloquent expression of humiliation I'd ever seen." Weaver says that, like me, he admires cats for their independence. "Missy and I both know damned well she's never going to fetch me the morning paper. I grew up on dogs, but on a recent visit to the San Diego Zoo the animal that held me the longest was the wolf. This, I concluded, is what dogs must have been like before they sold out." Perhaps their memory of having sold out is what makes dogs so subject to embarrassment, an emo- tion I personally have never ob- served in cats, despite Weaver's Missy. lenging the right of the inspector general to investigate them. Then they appointed their own in- vestigator who, in an interim report, said he found no evidence of wrongdoing. Early attempts by the Defense Department to verify the tipster's allegations met with "mixed re- sults," according to court papers filed by the government in support of the bank record subpoenas. Those subpoenas may now be the best chance the government has to re- solve the case. Normally, investigators try to rattle weak links in a suspected bribery scheme. If someone talks, a plea bargain is struck in exchange for testimony against the key play- ers. Prosecutors also can capitalize on the divisiveness and confusion that often breaks out among ner- vous conspirators. Inspector General June Gibbs Brown declined to say why the Special Inquiries team was put on the sensitive Billig case from the outset. But our sources tell us that Spe- cial Inquiries was assigned because Deputy Director Derek Vander Schaaf wanted a quick turnaround on the case. Special Inquiries is supposed to handle allegations of non-criminal improprieties within 30 to 45 days. Vander Schaaf calls it his "tiger team." But the team is a pussy cat when it comes to hard core criminal investigations. One source told us the "front office" - Brown or Vander Schaaf - failed to correctly gauge the criminal potential of the case in the beginning. Early last fall, the case was finally handed over to the team that should have had it from the beginning, the Defense Criminal Investigative Service. VETO STRATEGY President Bush is eager to coop- erate with the Democrats who con- trol Congress, but he is quietly pre- paring to fight them if they get in his way. Sources close to Bush tell us that he will compromise, if pos- sible, but will use his veto to block legislation he doesn't like · Bush has done his arithmetic and knows there are enough Republicans in the House to uphold a veto. All he has to do is keep the Republicans in line. So he is quietly offering in- ducements and tightening party discipline to make his vetoes fool- proof. w roversy Diane Silver insists that cats are not only capable of embarrassment, but also of that even more human emotion - compassion. "My white, blue-eyed Persian," she says, "knowing herself to be by far more beautiful than the other cats, never associates with them. Yet, when she fell off the ironing board in her sleep, the tortoise shell that she had snubbed all her life ran over and 'kissed' her all over her face. Of course, Frosty stood up and walked away as if nothing had hap- pened, and continued to treat poor Gatita like an unwelcome dust ball. "Of course," she adds, "cats are smarter than most men give them credit for." Meanwhile, several readers note that if I want to give our two new kittens names that reflect both the eternal feminine and the sinister, I could do better than Lorelei and Pandora (which were only ten- tative). "Why not Hedda and Louella?" asks Frank McDonald. "After all, you're a newspaperman, and you probably remember all the 'spitting and clawing' those two did at each other." McDonald obviously refers to those two feline Hollywood gossip columnists, Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons. Coincidentally, the same two names are suggested by Anne Olmstead. "Reading your list of the characteristics you feel that you share with cats, the first six sug- gested two names to me. Independ- ent, insolent, indolent, intractable, inquisitive, infuriating - who but Hedda and Louella? "Perhaps 'indolent' does not suit these long-gone but still remem- bered personalities, and I'm not at all sure what you mean by 'morally intemperate and intellectually in- accessible,' but do at least consider my offering." In case anyone else was un- certain, by "morally intemperate" I meant promiscuous, and by "in- tellectually inaccessible" I meant inscrutable. Marjorie Gross suggests Sheila and Lolly, obviously referring to Louella (Lolly) Parsons and Sheila Graham, another Hollywood col- umnist who was the mistress of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Not bad. Charles Stearns says he likes Mandu, the name of a neighbor's cat, but his own cat is named Fido. That's a good idea. I might name one Fido and the other Rover, just for the incongruity of it. Might be interesting to see if that embarrassed them. 4 , Heritage Society of Pacific Grove,Historical Collections,Historic Properties of Pacific Grove,Lobos,512 Lobos,LOBOS_182_redacted.pdf,LOBOS_182_redacted.pdf 1 Page 1, Tags: LOBOS_182_REDACTED.PDF, LOBOS_182_redacted.pdf 1 Page 1