Sakharov and the Gipper
Reading Harvey Klehr's interesting review of The KGB File of Andrei Sakharov ("Sakharov Watch," Sept. 5 / Sept. 12) brings to mind an exciting and memorable occasion at the end of the Gorbachev-Reagan meeting in Moscow in 1988 during which one of our arms reduction treaties was signed.
The custom called for the United States to host a U.S. Embassy dinner on the last night of the event to match the introductory Gorbachev-hosted dinner at the Kremlin shortly after our arrival. President Reagan instructed our ambassador that he wanted the Moscow leadership of the human rights campaign to be invited to that dinner and to be spread throughout each table, alongside Soviet officials. At the reception prior to the dinner, I noticed Andrei Sakharov and his wife Elena Bonner entering the residence. I greeted them and then brought them with me on the receiving line that was being formed. I asked Dr. Sakharov if he had ever met Gorbachev, and he said that he had not.
When we reached President and Mrs. Reagan, I identified our guests, and the president quickly responded with a handshake, smile, and an embrace, which he immediately followed by turning to the Gorbachevs, who were standing next to him. He then said something like: "President Gorbachev, I'd like you to meet two of your constituents!" I did not understand the conversation in Russian between Gorbachev and the Sakharovs, but the smiles and the immediate warmth have remained with me.
Max M. Kampelman
Washington, DC
Who's Your Cheapskate?
Having lived in Indiana since 1981 and being the father of a true Hoosier, I enjoyed Andrew Ferguson's "Hoosier Daddy?" (Aug. 29). I thought, though, that his last sentence must be purely rhetorical, when he writes of the permanent cut-off of funds from the state-subsidized, tourist-attracting play, "Young Abe Lincoln." Ferguson wonders why the state legislature does not see why the play's value should warrant state subsidy.
The answer could have come from anyone walking the halls of The Weekly Standard: Mitch Daniels, the new Republican governor of the state, doesn't like deficits and certainly doesn't want his state's funds to subsidize the arts, however well meaning.
If "Young Abe Lincoln" can't succeed on its own, it's gone--as it is.
William O'Rourke
Notre Dame, IN
Mauling the Mall
Regarding Andrew Ferguson's "The Mess on the Mall" (Aug. 15 / Aug. 22): I have visited Washington, D.C., sporadically over the past 15 years or so, and my recent visit with my two young children was a great letdown for me. I could not understand why the national mall was in such a bleak condition.
It was fenced off, roped off, barricaded, and covered with trash and large areas of bare dirt. Even the reflecting pool was stagnant. I am not an activist, but I hope we can turn around the horrible condition of the mall so I can bring my children back and show them what a great place it really is. Monuments are needed and appropriate, but what next? A monument to PBS?
John M. Murray
Binghamton, NY
The idea of a Third Century Mall is interesting, but the question arises: How long would it take us to despoil that additional space with an array of tasteless, oversized monuments to events or causes or people that may or may not deserve to be so honored?
The best excuse available today for not satisfying some "injured" group's demand for a monument or a museum is that there is really no room for it on the mall--but that excuse would lose all validity if we expanded the available space. Isn't enough, enough?
Lynda Meyers
Arlington, VA
Build Up That Wall?
I am surprised that Matt Labash did not go on to recommend the immediate construction of an Israeli-style wall along our southern border with Mexico ("North of the Border," Aug. 29)--and I'm even more surprised that The Weekly Standard has not editorially advocated it long before now. As Labash points out, "building a Texas-to-California border wall like the one around the West Bank" would have an estimated cost of $2 billion to $8 billion, which "would still be considerably less than the $20 billion we pay annually in social services for illegals."
Both our 2,000-mile border with Mexico and our 3,000-mile border with Canada could be sealed tight as a drum, just like Israel's 245-mile border with Palestine, at a per-capita cost that would be a fraction of what the Israelis are paying.
The liberal media claim that America's economy would collapse without the Latino invasion, because Americans will not do the jobs they fill. Wrong. Did those jobs go unfilled in the decades and centuries before the coming of the Latinos? All of the country's work is always done--at market price. Not a single chicken-processing plant or tomato farm in America would be shut down by an Israeli-style wall: A few cents would be added to consumer prices. That's it--no disruption of the economy, no industries bereft of workers.
Charles Mueller
Ft. Pierce, FL
Should They Stay . . . ?
Tamar Jacoby employs some very handy straw men to make the unpopular case for an immigration policy that would essentially create open borders ("Bordering on a Policy," Aug. 15). Regarding the estimated 12 to 15 million illegal aliens currently in the United States, Jacoby gives the impression that there are only two alternatives: mass deportations or mass amnesty.
Completely left off her menu of options is elimination of those factors that draw people to this country illegally, namely the availability of jobs and access to public benefits and services.
Jacoby would also have us believe that these workers are essential to economic growth and that the only remedy to future illegal immigration is the creation of a guest-worker program that accommodates everyone who wishes to work here, as well as every employer who wants to take advantage of low-wage workers from abroad.
These workers are not essential, though; for the most part they take jobs that Americans did until very recently. Additionally, we should not institute immigration policies that would inevitably destroy what is left of this country's middle class.
Finally, Jacoby attempts to label anyone or any group that stands in the way of her open borders agenda as "anti-immigrant." Proponents of reduced immigration are no more "anti-immigrant" than advocates for health care reform are "anti-sick people."
There are still many who consider this a nation, not merely an economy, and who believe that American immigration policy must take into account the social, cultural, and economic impact of mass immigration on the nation and its citizens.
Dan Stein
Federation for American
Immigration Reform
Washington, DC
Tamar Jacoby responds: Dan Stein may or may not be anti-immigrant--I'll leave it to readers to make their own judgments about FAIR and its rhetoric--but he is in denial, and dangerously so, about our economy's need for immigrant workers.
The demographic boom is lowering, here as in all developed countries, with baby boomers retiring, birth rates headed below replacement level, and an increasingly skilled, educated, native-born workforce. Even now, we don't have the workers we need to keep our economy growing--and the shortages are only going to get worse in the years ahead.
No wonder that among sectors that rely on unskilled labor, virtually every industry that can has moved operations abroad. What's left? Agriculture, food-processing, hospitality, construction--all businesses that cannot easily move and that depend on immigrants.
Far from threatening working Americans, as Stein suggests, foreign laborers keep these businesses here, and they keep them healthy. (Agriculture could still move, after all, and, with it, food processing.) And this, in turn, provides jobs for all manner of Americans: skilled workers in these sectors, and in retail and services in surrounding communities.
Stein's solution is to "eliminate the available jobs"! But that is not possible even if we wanted to do so. Meanwhile, it is the denial encouraged by him and people like him that leads to the lawlessness all Americans find so troubling. We as a nation pretend we do not need these workers, so we provide no legal way for them to enter the country. But the economy churns on, and the workers come anyway, endangering our security and eroding the rule of law. Wouldn't it be better to recognize reality and deal with it responsibly?
That is neither "amnesty" nor "open borders." It is simply facing up to the world as it is. Of course we are a nation as well as an economy: a strong, vibrant nation with a tradition of openness, and more than capable, today as in the past, of absorbing newcomers who will only make us stronger.
There's No 'I'In . . .
In "Excelsior, You Fathead!" (Aug. 29), Richard Orodenker cited "Vic and Sadie" as one of radioman Jean Shepherd's favorite childhood radio programs. The program was actually titled "Vic and Sade."