Newspaper Page Text
4A
♦ FRIDAY, JANUARY 14, 2005
( Y TTmistmx Mtntu' d
CLite JJnttriml
OPINION
Daniel F. Evans
President ,
Editor and Publisher
Julie B. Evans Rex Gambill
Vice President Managing Editor
Foy S. Evans
Editor Emeritus
Sunny days for education?
While Georgia still has a long way to go educa
tionally, Gov. Sonny Perdue’s just-announced
education initiatives may be the start of real
progress in some areas.
We couldn’t be happier to learn that he is giving
more flexibility to local school systems to deal
with funds for direct instruction and with class
sizes. Perdue’s plan still maintains some neces
sary priorities and emphasizes the importance of
holding down class sizes and putting money
where it matters, but it will allow local teachers,
administrators and even parents to work out
plans that fit the needs of students.
His plan to create the Georgia Virtual High
School is similar to a plan already in place in
Kentucky (another state working its way up the
educational ladder), and a real boon to gifted stu
dents and self-starters, particularly those in rural
areas who need access to more educational oppor
tunity. We do not see this as an answer to the
problems of basic literacy and math competence,
but as a very fine innovation for students with
good working habits and high goals.
Finally, we hope that Georgia’s teachers will in
due time get a better deal than a 2-percent raise.
If that’s the best we can do, so be it, but many
teachers are likely to find that with rising costs of
living and increases in health insurance premi
ums, 2 percent isn’t a raise at all. It’s just staying
even.
Still, a change from the “one size fits all” men
tality, and a fresh, 21st century outlook are to be
commended, and we hope that the governor’s
enthusiasm for both innovation and local control
will pay off for Georgia’s teachers and students.
SURVIVAL SKILLS
Z /?{ A WlI'M AFRAID \ frflm ISLANO WILL NOT 1 PROPOSE WE HANDLE ?
V L/yfPiAJ Tt4l6 DOESN'T ( m/f SUPPORT THREE ADULTS fl Tm 6 DEMOCRATICALLY.'
I 1 J -if A ALL IN FAVOR OF CURRENT
' (''nq’T
l ‘os CrXtt) CREATOHS SYNDICATE INC I
Send your Letters to the Editor to:
The Houston Home Journal 9.0. Box 1910 • Perry, Ga 31069 or Email: hhj@evansnewspapers.com
Tsunamis, earthquakes challenge nations of the world
July 11, 1999: We’d just
finished the morning brief
ing and were leaving the
command tent when the
earthquake struck. I was
serving as deputy command
er of a U.S. Army Reserve
Hurricane Mitch recovery
operation in southeastern
Guatemala, near the city of
Puerto Barrios. Overnight, a
tropical depression had
dumped 10 inches of rain on
our base. The soggy ground
shook, bricks toppled as the
walls of nearby buildings
swayed, and I fell to my
hands and knees, landing on
a wooden loading pallet. The
shake seemed to last forever.
I remember thinking, “lam
bouncing on this damn
thing like a rabbit.”
Our recovery and recon
struction aid mission quick
ly became an emergency
relief operation. The task
force commander, a reserve
colonel from Dallas who is
also a civil engineer, helped
the Guatemalans with dam
age assessment. Our med-
■'*l
Austin Bay
Military Affairs
Creators Syndicate
ical company provided emer
gency aid to the entire
region.
The Indian Ocean mega
quake and tsunami of Dec.
26, 2004, dwarf the magni
tude 6.6 Guatemalan quake
I experienced. There’s no
comparison in casualties.
The December tsunami’s
death toll has reached
160,000. The Guatemalan
casualties were fortunately
low, with two killed and a
few score injured. Hurricane
Top 2004 good news story
There was some good
news in 2004. It slipped in
under the wire on Dec. 29,
but there it was. The head
line read: “Schools say good
bye to cartons of milk.”
Could it be so? This was
almost too good to be true.
And then I read and, yes, it
was true.
Mr. J. M. Hirsch, reporter
with the Associated Press,
wrote: “yet another familiar
school-days object may be
going the way of inkwell and
the slide rule. Encouraged
by a milk industry study
that shows children drink
more dairy products when it
comes in round plastic bot
tles, a growing number of
schools are ditching those
clumsy paper half-pint car
tons many of us grew up
with.”
Hallelujah! What took so
long?
We had ’em 50 years ago
and the cartons were awful
then. Paper with wax coat
ing and put together so that
Iraq headed for the
As the date for the elec
tions in Iraq approach, the
hand-wringing on the part
of those opposed to
President Bush’s policies
there threaten to reach a
fever pitch.
“We can’t hold a fair
election without the full
participation of the
Sunnis!” they shout. “How
can you have a fair election
with all of this violence?”
they whine.
The question of whether
or not the Sunnis partici
pate in the election is their
problem. If they want to
participate, they can.
There is nothing holding
them back.
It hardly seems reason
able for one group to opt
Mitch, however, killed at
least 20,000 when it struck
in fall 1998 - a terrible nat
ural disaster.
The Puerto Barrios quake
was still a heartbreaker. It
damaged three months’
worth of reconstruction
work on river dikes that
Hurricane Mitch had
destroyed. At a meeting five
days after the quake, a
Guatemalan Coast Guard
captain - leaning on a pair of
crutches - told me with a
despondent shrug: “This is
Central America, Colonel.
Hurricanes, earthquakes,
volcanoes. We get ahead in
one place, another disaster
pulls us backward.”
Secretary of State Colin
Powell reportedly told
President George W. Bush
that the tsunami left
Indonesia’s Aceh province
“like something the equiva
lent of Hiroshima.” It will
take a long-term aid com
mitment to restore the
Indian Ocean region. Bush
told employees of the U.S.
jjj ■
Larry Walker
Columnist
lwalker@whgbc.com
Charles Atlas (then) and
Arnold Schwarzenegger
(now) couldn’t get into ’em.
The design of the carton
coupled with the Super Glue
used to close it made open
ing impossible. And, the
school officials wanted grade
school students to do it.
What you would do, if you
got a difficult carton (and
this happened over 50 per
cent of the time) was to tear
Timothy Graham
Staff Writer
tgraham@evansnewspapers.com
out of the electoral process
and then come back after
the voting is over and start
complaining. Of course,
approximately half of the
electorate in the United
States does that very thing
every four years, but that
is a rant for another time.
But is it possible hold a
fair election when part of
the country is wracked
with violence and portions
of the population might be
physically intimidated to
stay away from the polls?
Has any democracy held a
national election under
such extreme conditions
and lived to tell the tale?
I’ll take United States
for SIOO, Alex.
Let’s take the Wayback
Machine for a ride back to
the banner year of 1864.
You remember the time.
The War of Northern
Aggression had been going
on for four years and
things were looking bleak
for the South. The Yankees
were holding the upper
hand but they were pretty
tired of trying to force the
Agency for International
Development (USAID) that
the tsunami aid mission “is
one of those projects that’s
not going to happen
overnight. The intense
scrutiny (by the media) may
dissipate ... but our focus
has got to stay on this part
of the world.”
There are arguably four
types of aid: emergency,
recovery, reconstruction and
developmental. In the two
weeks since the tsunami,
we’ve seen a remarkably
agile and effective display of
emergency aid (medical,
food, rescue) provided by the
U.S. and Australian mili
taries and the Red Cross.
Once the immediate needs
are met, the recovery phase
begins - reorganizing basic
services, opening permanent
supply routes, reuniting
families. There’s a hazy line
between recovery and recon
struction - but reconstruc
tion aid intends to rebuild
damaged infrastructure.
Smart reconstruction aims
and pull and pull and tear
and finally get your pencil
out and force it open. And I
didn’t eveh like milk to start
with. And it never was real
ly cold, was it? Still, some
thing to wash down that
sumptuous lunchroom fare
was better than nothing.
Speaking of milk and
school lunchrooms, do you
remember the odor that this
seemingly lethal combina
tion created? One of my
enduring school memories is
the “smell” from the lunch
rooms. Soured milk. I bet it
came from students spilling
milk while tearing open the
cartons or tearing holes in
the bottom of the carton
while punching and “jab
bing” with their pencils.
And speaking of odors,
what about school rest
rooms? Is it any better
today? I hope so. It certainly
was bad in every restroom in
every school I attended until
I graduated from high
school. Another not-so
lairest ol elections
recalcitrant Rebels back
into the fold, and there was
a sizable group of voters in
the Northern states who
were more than willing to
let them go their own way
and good riddance to them.
Abraham Lincoln was
running for re-election as a
Republican. He was run
ning on a platform of keep
ing the Union intact no
matter what the price. He
was also running under
the banner of the
Emancipation
Proclamation issued two
years previously following
the Union victory at
Antietam.
The Democrats put forth
as their Candidate former
General of the Army of the
Potomac George
McClellan, nicknamed The
Little Napoleon. McClellan
and Lincoln were enemies
of long standing. Lincoln
had fired McClellan from
his post as army command
er twice due to his refusal
to take his forces into bat
tle in a timely fashion.
McClellan considered
Lincoln to be an idiot of
subhuman intellect.
Lincoln won the election
primarily because the war
was going well for the
North at the time. Had
that not been the case and
had the victory gone to
McClellan, our history
could have taken a very
different course.
But Lincoln won, the war
went on and our democra
cy survived.
We were able to hold an
election with a Civil War
raging on our soil and
to “rebuild better” (stronger
materials, better location,
etc.) to reduce the threat of
future natural disasters.
Reconstruction begins to
blend with developmental
aid - aid designed to ulti
mately permit “self-develop
ment” by locals. Education
and economic investment
are part of a long-term
developmental aid program.
The Guatemalan task force I
served with drilled new
water wells and built new
school rooms - reconstruc
tion stretching into develop
mental work.
The tsunami’s Hiroshima
like destruction leaves us
with an extraordinary chal
lenge. Wealthy nations have
been generous - the billions
raised are a blessing - but
sincere emotional responses
and initial charity must be
followed by sustained, effec
tive action.
That means a lot of sweat
and toil by men and women
working for both govern
ment agencies and civilian
THE HOUSTON HOME JOURNAL
pleasant memory.
But back to my “Good
News Story for 2004.” Mr.
Hirsch reports that more
than 1,250 schools have
switched to single-serving
plastic bottles - a significant
jump from 2000 when there
were none. And that fast
food chains Wendy’s and
McDonald’s recently
replaced their milk cartons
with bottles and sales
soared.
I wish someone had talked
to me in 1954. I could have
told ’em about those paper
milk cartons then. And
think about the misery
spared had they heeded my
advice. Still, what’s done is
done, and we can only move
forward. Now, if we can just
do something about those
open-proof sleeves of minute
ketchup that the fast-food
houses dispense. Wouldn’t it
be great to read this head
line in 2005: “Packaged
ketchup goes the way of
paper milk cartons”?
almost half of the nation
not even participating due
to their being in active
revolt.
Sure, we had an estab
lished Democratic govern
ment, we were not trying it
for the first time as the
Iraqis are. But the hurdles
the Iraqis are attempting
to scale cannot be any
higher than those we had
to 140 years ago.
We as a nation were able
to succeed in our experi
ment with democracy
because we were desperate
to get away from the alter
native. We were so con
vinced we could do a better
job running our affairs
than the British had that
we made the system work
and it has worked ever
since.
If the Iraqis are just as
determined to turn their
backs on Saddam Hussein
and his mis-government
they will make their exper
iment a success as well.
Despite Sunni intransi
gence, despite terrorist vio
lence, if they want it badly
enough they will trudge to
the polls and make their
choices. And they - like us
- will have to live with
those choices.
All we can do is do what
we can to make the elec
tion possible and abide by
their decisions as well. It
may be that the first thing
the new government will
want is for us to pack up
and move out. If so, we
should do so with alacrity.
In fact, that would proba
bly be the best ending for
this whole mess.
organizations.
Effective sustained action
also means sustained over
sight. Unfortunately, the
United Nations has a poor
track record for managing
big-ticket operations. “The
Lords of Poverty” by British
journalist Graham Hancock
(Atlantic Monthly Press,
1989) offers a lesson in the
pitfalls of “big development”
projects that aren’t held
accountable for results - and
sometimes aren’t held
accountable for funds.
USAID, fortunately, has a
good track record for man
aging its missions. A retired
USAID official told me
that’s because the U.S.
demands account
ability. This suggests that
tsunami reconstruction and
developmental aid programs
should be organized and led
by a “coalition of the
accountable.”
To find out more about
Austin Bay, visit the
Creators Syndicate web page
at www.creators.com.