CLINTON FACES NEW CREDIBILITY QUESTION OVER ABORTION RIGHTS

"Let us not be content to wait and see what will happen, but give us the determination to make the right things happen."

Peter Marshall,

Senate Chaplain, 1948

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Bill Clinton faces new credibility questions on abortion rights, after being quoted in the Reader's Digest as saying he has "no problem" in principle with a 24-hour waiting period. But, notes the New York Post's Washington Bureau Chief Deborah Orion, "Clinton presents the opposite stance in his position paper on women's issues, where he describes himself as pro-choice, and says he `fought successfully against mandatory waiting periods' in Arkansas.

This is the "second time," says the Post, "that Clinton's credibility on the emotional abortion issue has come into question. The Post reported in July that he told less than the truth when he claimed, in a New York debate last April, that he `opposed' a right-to-life amendment to the Arkansas state Constitution."

But Clinton did not publicly oppose the measure, reports Orin, "and, in fact, wrote a 1986 letter endorsing the right-to-life amendment, which also called for a ban on public funding of abortion."

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"Aggressive fighting for the right is the noblest sport the world affords."

President Theodore Roosevelt

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If Bill Clinton is elected this November, he promises to raise taxes on the wealthy, and, as analysis of his program reveals, he will have to raise taxes on the middle class as well. Part of Clinton's reasoning is that too many people unfairly benefited from tax relief during the Reagan-Bush years.

But the New York Times, in its latest research on the effect of the sweeping tax changes made during 12 years of Reagan and Bush, says that the average American family's federal tax burden--including income, Social Security, corporate and excise taxes--remains the same today as it was in 1980.

The average effective federal tax rate amounted to 23.3 per cent in 1980, according to three economists from the Congressional Budget Office, Richard Kasten, Frank Sammartino and Eric Toder, who recently presented their findings at a conference of public finance specialists at the University of Michigan. "Today," reported the Times, "it is 23.2 per cent, virtually where it was 12 years ago before a nationwide tax revolt helped sweep Ronald Reagan into the White House."

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"Magic" Johnson

Wrong About President

Basketball superstar Earvin "Magic" Johnson resigned from the National Commission on AIDS, after criticizing President Bush for having "dropped the ball" in the fight against the disease. He asserted the Administration has paid only "lip service" to the battle, and has derided its funding efforts. But Magic's charges are clearly untrue. Proposed funding for AIDS next year is nearly $5 billion or a 170 percent increase over 1988, and the federal government now spends more for AIDS research than for any other disease except cancer--$1.2 billion will be spent in FY '93, a 39 percent jump since the President took office.

The President also signed into law in August 1990 the Ryan White Comprehensive Aids Resource Emergency Act, designed to provide emergency assistance to localities disproportionately affected by the HIV epidemic, and he was criticized by conservatives for his backing of a provision in the Americans with Disabilities Act that provides legal protection to HIV-infected employes.

Sounds like more than "lip service" to me.

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For of those to whom much is given, much is required. And when at some future date the high court of history sits in judgment on each of us--recording whether in our brief span of service we fulfilled our responsibilities to the state--our success or failure, in whatever office we hold, will be measured by the answers to four questions:

First, were we truly men of courage--with the courage to stand up to one's enemies--and the courage to stand up, when necessary, to one's associates--the courage to resist public pressure, as well as private greed?

Secondly, were we truly men of judgment--with perceptive judgment of the future as well as the past--of our mistakes as well as the mistakes of others--with enough wisdom to know what we did not know and enough candor to admit it.

Third, were we truly men of integrity--men who never ran out on either the principles in which we believed or the men who believed in us--men whom neither financial gain nor political ambition could ever divert from the fulfillment of our sacred trust?

Finally, were we truly men of dedication--with an honor mortgaged to no single individual or group, and comprised of no private obligation or aim, but devoted solely to serving the public good and the national interest?

Courage -- judgment -- integrity -- dedication -- these are the historic qualities ... which, with God's help ... will characterize our Government's conduct in the 4 stormy years that lie ahead.

President-elect

JOHN F. KENNEDY,

address to the Massachusetts

legislature, January 9, 1961.

--Congressional Record,

January 10, 1961, vol. 107,

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