Newspaper Page Text
1 he Augusta News-Review June 26,1982
The Augusta News-Review
Mallory K. Millender ■■■■■ Editor Publisher
Paul Walker Assistant to the Publisher
Barbara Gordon Advertising Dir/Gen. Manager
Yvonne Day... Reporter
Rev. R.E. Donaldson Religion Editor
Mrs. Geneva Y. Gibson Church Coordinator
Charles Beale Jenkins County Correspondent
Mrs. Fannie Johnson Aiken County Correspondent
Geraldine Wilson Aiken County Correspondent
Mrs. Clara West.McDuffie County Correspondent
Mrs. Ileen Buchanan Fashion & Beauty Editor
Roosevelt GreenColunmist
Columnist
Barbara MotonColumnist
Mrs. Marian Waring Columnist
Philip Waring Columnist
Marva Stewart Columnist
Wilbert Allen Columnist
Carl McCoyEditorial Cartoonist
David DupreeSports Editor
Robert Caldwell Sports Editor
Olando Hamlett* Photographer
Roscoe Williams Photographer
Mailing Address
Box 953 (USPS 887 82O)-Augusta, Ga.
Phone (404) 722-4555
Second Class Postage Paid
Augusta, Ga. 30903
AMALGAMATED Published Weekly XZmL
PUBLISHERS, INC. *
National Advertising Representative
Mayor triumphs
Augusta made a number of
very significant advances this
week. The most significant
among them was the ap
proval of the realignment of
city wards that will have four
predominantly white wards
and four that are 66 percent
or more black.
This is important because it
paves the way for the black
community to get equal
representation on city council
for the first time in the
history of the city.
Even more significantly, if
blacks are elected from the
predominantly black wards
as expected, those eight black
councilmembers could
deadlock any vote that comes
to the council floor. And the
mayor, who at this point in
history is black, could cast
the deciding vote. This new
ward realignment potentially
gives the black community
political clout.
We congratulate the mayor
on getting this plan ap
proved. We also congratulate
him on getting city employees
what is said to be their largest
raise ever, while at the same
time lowering taxes for city
residents. What is even more
gratifying is that the lowest
paid city workers will get the
greatest salary increases, with
all employees getting a five
percent raise plus SSO a mon
th.
Letters to the editor
Appreciates editorial
Dear Editor:
Thank you for that timely editorial
entitled “A Thought for Busy
Fathers.” I know how easy it is to
become too absorbed in career and
community activities. We easily, but
not intentionally, put in less and less
time with our children and love ones.
Some of us excuse the neglect by
calling the little time we do spend
with them “quality time.” The
editorial is placed in my office as a
constant reminder to me to spend
Challenged every father
Dear Editor:
Your column entitled “A Thought
for Busy Fathers” was a real
challenge and thought-stirring com
mentary for every father.
Sometime it takes a real blow for us
to get the true meaning and under
standing of what is right and proper
in our life.
Robert C. Daniel, Jr.
County Attorney
Support the Black Press'
Page 4
Employees making less
than $12,000 a year will get at
least a 10 percent increase
with the additional SSO a
month.
But some people will view
both the ward realignment
and the salary increases as
terrible developments and
will look for things to attack
the mayor with.
Our guess in that it will be
the federal Trust Revenue
Sharing Funds. You will re
call all the flack in 1977 about
county funds going to the
Augusta Black Festival,
which the Mclntyre founded.
We suspect that there will
be a new wave of criticism
about the fact the Augusta
Arts Cultural Association got
SIO,OOO in Revenue Sharing
money. What’s wrong with
that? Mclntyre founded it.
Does that mean that it is
not worthwhile? Is it not true
that that organization has
brought plays and other
cultural activities to Augusta
that never would have come
here otherwise? Then what’s
wrong with it? Mclntyre
founded it. That’s all that
some people will need to try
to create a smoke screen
suggesting impropriety or
conflict of interest or some
such.
We would like to be wrong
about this, but we believe
that time will prove us right.
more and more quality time with my
children while I can.
Many persons could have spent
their recovery time in self-pity. In
stead, you were able to use that time
constructively for yourself and
pthers. This busy father appreciates
your unselfishness, and so will my
children.
Charles F. Smith
827 Brookfield Parkway
Martinez, GA 30907
Civil Rights Journal
Holmes, Cooney and racism
by Dr. Charles E. Cobb
America is obsessed with the idea
that the face of its champions must be
white. This idea most recently
manifested itself during the Holmes-
Cooney fight for the championship of
the world. A black champion and a
white challenger provided the perfect
opportunity for an anxious media to
fuel the flames of racism amid the
myth of a great white hope. The pre
fight promotion created attitudes that
drew a distinct line between the fans
and the fighters. Racial blinders
prevented an objective evaluation of
BUT WHAT
GOOD IS A
TAX CUT
\nhen i\
DON'T HAVE Wk
A JOB? J JXk
Jlum iF) ■s. |
J
BRANOOH, JR..
black resources inc.
To Be Equal
Help wanted:
Summer jobs for youth
by John E. Jacobs
With unemployment climbing well
past the ten million mark, there is a
danger that the;
urgent problem of
finding summer
jobs for disadvan- £|
taged I ■
people will go by
'the boards. mBSs
With com- j
panies laying Jn <
long-time work-
ers, little thought is being given to
creating the temporary jobs that
young people can fill until school
starts again in the fall.
And the problem is compounded
by deep cuts in federal summer youth
job programs. Not only will there be
far fewer subsidized summer jobs
available this year, but the entire
program is slated to be ended in the
future, folded into block grants to the
states where summer job programs
will have to compete with other needs
for scarce resources.
In city after city, mayors are
worried about their ability to
mobilize voluntary action by business
to plug the gap, and about the results
of the failure to do so.
That has led to dire warnings about
the possibilities of increased youth
crime and even “long, hot sum
mers.” I don’t think that kind of
speculation serves any useful pur
pose, for there are strong positive
reasons to create work opportunities
the fighters but instead pitted black
against white.
The fact is that Gerry Cooney was
never a formidable challenge for
Larry Holmes. But the hysteria of a
white hope overshadowed the objec
tive reality and Cooney was being
touted as a “Great Fighter.” In order
to support this factually absurb
notion we the public were blitzed with
Gerry Cooney, notwithstanding his
flimsy record.
The circumstances surrounding this
fight point clearly to the fact that this
so called sporting event was in reality
a war between the races. Why is it
for young people; reasons that tran
scend the more sensational aspects of
the problem.
Work experience and work habits
are essential if young people are to
take their place in the economic
mainstream. Study after study shows
that young people who work while in
school or during their summer
vacations go on to better jobs and
higher pay as adults.
Short changing those kids now
means they’ll need to succeed. And
the lack of jobs also endangers their
chances of staying in school, for too
many wonder why they should con
tinue their education when there is so
little chance for a decent job at the
end of the line.
Long-term, this has deep im
plications for the economy. As it shif
ts to producing services and
technology products, it needs a work
force that is more highly skilled and
better educated than in the past.
If our government doesn’t seem to
understand this, I am hopeful the
private sector will. In some cities
business groups have come together
to pledge money and job slots for
out-of-work youth. Their action tran
scends simple social responsibility. It
also aims to ensure the availability of
the future work force, preserve social
stability, and meet public expec
tations.
A recent Harris Poll showed large
majorities give business poor marks
for creating jobs and investing in
that the black champion entered the
ring amid a foray of catcalls and boos
while the doughfaced challenger en
tered the ring to howls of delight and
crys of hope? Why is it that the
challenger was given 50 percent of the
purse which diluted the value of being
the champ? Racism is the only reason
this champion who has not received
even a parking ticket, should be sub
jected to such shabby treatment.
In spite of a flurry of low blows
and two apparently sleeping judges,
Holmes prevailed as champion. Even
the most casual observer recognized
that Cooney lost all 13 rounds not-
future growth.
The Poll showed public frustration
with business’ big tax cuts and its
failure to deliver the economic
growth those tax cuts were supposed
to bring. Much of the public’s
frustration is directed at the Ad
ministration, but business will be a
bigger target if it does not begin to
fulfill those expectations and if it fails
to come through with jobs for young
people.
The problem with an approach that
relies entirely on business voluntarism
though, is twofold. First, even an all
out business effort will not plug the
gaps left by federal cuts.
In Baltimore, for example, a cor
porate effort set a target at 1,000 jobs
and overshot its goal substantially,
creating 1,400 jobs. But federal cuts
eliminated 5,000 job slots and the city
estimates there are 40,000 disadvan
taged youth that would qualify for
subsidized jobs if they were available.
Second, private sector efforts
usually wind up skimming the cream
of the crop; placing young people
most likely to succeed on their own
and failing to place the hardest-to
employ among the disadvantaged.
That is not to downplay the impor
tance of private sector efforts.
Rather, it is to restate the obvious -
that federal summer job programs for
the disadvantaged need to be sharply
expanded, with enough resources
committed to provide meaningful jobs
for all young people.
withstanding the 3 point penalty.
America wanted a white champion at
any cost. I applaud the challenger for
answering the third round and for
maintaining the perseverance to sur
vive 9/2 more rounds, but that does
not make a great fighter or even a
good fighter. Furthermore I com
mend Larry Holmes for exhibiting
such a high degree of professional
sportsmanship and preventing what
could have been a fatal evening for
the misguided challenger.
We must point out racism wherever
it raises its ugly head, whether it be in
religion, politics or sports. Gerry
Walking With Dignity
South Africa
Security law
boomerangs
by Al Irby
A new twist seems to have been ad
ded to South Africa’s spiral of
escalating guer- MHpnRHB
rilla violence and I "W
toughening state I J|
resistance. A » , $
statement by
white activist Dr. I V ’ * ;
Neil Aggett hours H ""I.
before his death in |
police custody—
which described
how security SKI f
police tortured him—has aroused
concern in the country that South
Africa’s security forces are overreac
ting.
Some suggest security practices
maybe counterproductive to the
state’s interests. Police security
procedures, these citizens contend,
maybe endangering the stability of
the white minority government again
st a growing challenge from the black
majority.
Dr. Aggett’s allegation of police
abuse was recently admitted, over
government opposition, as evidence
by a court investigating the cause of
his death last Feb. 5. The statement
alleges that Aggett was beaten by
police and subjected to electric
shocks. The physician that attended
Dr. Aggett at the time of the police
brutality was either killed by police or
driven to suicide.
MAN THROWS BOMB
Dr. Billy Graham, the world’s
famed evangelist, gave the Western
boys and girls something to beef
about in his recent visit to the Com
mies’ top city. The rapid talking TV
clergy demonstrates anew how men
tally captive the American people
have become. The good Rev. Graham
said that he went to the Soviet Union
because “Jesus said: ‘Go ye into all
the world and preach the Gospel.’ He
didn’t say, ‘Go into capitalist coun
tries only.’ ’’ But that in no way
satisfied Mr. Graham’s right-wing
friends. They feel betrayed, because
the articulate Mr. Graham has
suggested that life in the Soviet Union
isn’t exactly the police state that
President Reagan would have us
believe it is. Now ain’t that just too
bad.
TO BLACKS WHO ‘MADE IT’
No matter how high a black person
may climb up in the world, it takes
only a yank of the rope to send him or
her spiraling back to the bottom.
Take for example Major General
Titus Hall, the highest ranking black
officer in the United States Air Force.
He was forced to retire from the ser
vice at the age of 54. It was alleged
that the general, who was stationed at
Lowry Air Force Base Technical
Training Center in Colorado, showed
favoritism toward blacks under his
command, that means the black
general was treating his men like
human beings.
COONEY’S GANG
There was a sordid intrigue to steal
the championship from Larry
Holmes. Gerry Cooney hardly laid a
glove, with any force, on Larry yet
this quartet of robber-judges had
Cooney leading on points up to the
12th round. The judges saw what they
wanted to see—and what they wanted
to see was a white heavyweight cham
pion.
“The deck was stacked against
us,” shouted Don King, the
promoter, who really manages Larry
Holmes. “We were in for a sleigh
ride.” Cooney’s mother has a better
right hand.
His jab has no power. When he
punches, he wa? always off balance.
He seldom swings with any leverage.
He never did hurt Holmes, except
when he hit him with low blows. That
$lO million purse he will pick up most
surely will go down in history as the
greatest piece of larceny in pugilist
history. Whoever heard of such a'
ridiculous thing, as paying a lousy
bum like Cooney half of the purse?
Cooney has received a champion’s
treatment following his defeat. He
returned to New York where throngs
waited to shower the fallen star with
words of encouragement and con
fidence. We have barely heard of or
from Larry Holmes since the fight.
This one sided array of praise has of
ten left me wondering who was in fact
the victor.
Well we all know that it was
Holmes, who overcame all the hur
dles —and Gerry Cooney will go
down in our history as another great
white hope who turned out to be the
great white hype.