Swiss Cheesiness
Continuing Senate debate on the tobacco bill leads USA Today .
New prospects for Nigeria lead at the Washington Post and New York Times .
The Los
Angeles Times goes with a report bearing fresh allegations of Swiss
complicity in the Holocaust.
The tobacco bill, declared dead by Trent Lott just the other day, is still
twitching on the slab. The debate centers, says USAT , on the bill's
defining proposition, advocated by Republican Sen. John McCain and a host of
Democrats, including President Clinton: a $1.10 per pack in new taxes. The bill
wrangle is also on the NYT front, but inside at the LAT and
WP .
The NYT
lead reports that one day after taking office, Nigeria's new leader, Gen.
Abubakar, apparently among the cadre of army officers who want the military to
loosen its political control, says he will turn over power to an elected
civilian government by October 1st. The paper also states that there are hints
from the new leadership of the imminent release of many of the country's
numerous political prisoners. Doing so, reports the Times , would win
international praise but domestically could unleash a big popular movement
against the military. Indeed, pro-democracy opposition groups are calling for a
large demonstration on Friday. The WP lead says that the Clinton administration is
offering improved ties with Nigeria's government if it moves toward democracy,
but contrary to the Times , the Post says remarks by the new
leader "held little promise of a swift return to civilian rule." However, the
paper goes on to say that because of his military training in the States, Gen.
Abubakar is thought to be friendly towards the U.S.
The LAT puts another nail in the coffin of the image of Swiss purity
during World War II with word of a
new report from the Simon Wiesenthal Center describing how in numerous
secret meetings with members of a Swiss anti-Semitic group, the wartime Swiss
minister for justice and police promised that he would stop most Jews from
entering the country. Only a few Jews would be allowed in, he said, and these
solely for the purpose of showing the Swiss public how hard Jews are to live
with. The report contains copies of the minutes of these meetings.
The LAT goes top front with words and a picture regarding three white supremacists arrested yesterday, charged with killing
a black man by dragging him behind their car for several miles. Nobody else
deems the story front-page news.
The Wall Street Journal notes that this week's recall of a
major heart drug, Posicor, and the disclosure of another ten deaths of men
taking Viagra, are reminders that "While pharmaceuticals manufacturers test
their concoctions on several thousand subjects to monitor side-effects and
efficacy, the real experiment begins only after a drug hits the market and
vastly more people begin taking it." This is especially true of safety issues
relating to interactions with other medications. In fact, says the paper, it
took follow-up tests to reveal that one of the drugs Posicor has interaction
problems with is...Viagra.
The NYT off-lead is the news that the Southern Baptists, the nation's
largest Protestant denomination, which counts among its adherents Bill Clinton,
Al Gore, Newt Gingrich, and Trent Lott, has, at its annual convention, amended
its statement of essential beliefs to include the declaration that a woman
should "submit herself graciously" to her husband's leadership,
and a husband should "provide for, protect and lead his family." The
Times puts the woman's responsibilities in its headline, but not the
man's.
Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist has rejected a request by a
group of minority lawyers for a meeting to discuss the dearth of minorities
selected as Court law clerks, the USAT front says. The matter was first
broached by a USAT story last March revealing just how few non-whites
clerk for the Supremes: only 2 percent of the 394 clerks ever hired by the
current crop of Justices. Four sitting Justices, including Rehnquist, have
never hired a black clerk.
The WSJ runs a front-page feature about an emerging problem for the
airlines: brazen as well as non-consensual in-flight sex. According to the Journal , wild
goings-on often lead to explosive conflicts between passengers and crew, and in
at least one case almost produced a forced landing. Things have gotten so bad
that the airlines are addressing the issue in their training and hiring
consultants who specialize in it. The parents of Sarah Richfield must be very
proud--here she is, just thirty and already written up in the Wall Street
Journal ! Oh sure, it was for having sex with her boyfriend in the bathroom
on a plane while arguing through the door with the flight attendant telling her
to er, return herself to the fully upright and locked position. Which makes
"Today's Papers" wonder: Why was Richfield mentioned by name in the story,
while the Journal very decorously referred to another passenger,
ultimately convicted of abusive sexual contact for the aerial fondling of a
fifteen-year-old, only as "a Brooklyn man"?
