Reluare miercuri, 25 martie 1981

by Les Daly

Date: 26 March 1981

As the Administration transforms ''high-powered business executives'' into ''highly placed Government officials,'' I recall my own impression that the only similar experience must be that of an astronaut who leaves home to operate weightless in space: The view is dazzling, but new forces are at play and nothing works the way it used to. As corporate managers become Government leaders, nowhere is the gravity of their change greater than in their new relationship with, and responsibility to, the news media. Yet media relationships are rarely mentioned in their briefing books, and their attitudes are perhaps irreparably warped by the often-stated (and overstated) warning that the Washington press corps is predatory, or worse. I recall one lawyer-turned-staffer brightly alerting an official heading for a news conference that ''the alligators are waiting.''

Full Article

STATE ASKED TO BAR INVESTIGATORS, FROM PRETENDING TO BE REPORTERS

Date: 25 March 1981

By Peter Kihss

Peter Kihss

The New York Press Club has asked New York's State Department to promulgate regulations barring investigators from posing as reporters after an investigator for the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation made videotapes of striking municipal hospital doctors while pretending to be working for WCBS-TV. He was gathering evidence to be used in a court action under the state's Taylor Law, which prohibits strikes by public employees. Stanley Brezenoff, president of the Health and Hospitals Corporation, sent a formal apology to the television station, calling the imposture ''reprehensible and totally inexcusable.'' He said such false ''media cover'' was now being specifically banned.

Full Article

SCHOOL PAPER'S ARTICLE ON DRUG DEALER SPURS BATTLE ON PRESS RIGHTS

Date: 26 March 1981

By Deirdre Carmody

Deirdre Carmody

An interview with a drug dealer on the front page of a high school newspaper, disclosing the sale of drugs to elementary students in Millville, N.J., has sparked a press-law controversy. The principal of the Millville Senior High School and the faculty adviser to the student newspaper have been ordered to appear in Cumberland County Superior Court this morning to explain why they will not divulge the name of the student who interviewed the drug dealer. The question-and-answer interview with ''Candy Man'' appeared last week in the ''Tattler,'' the Millville Senior High School newspaper, with no byline. The drug dealer contended that he had been selling drugs, including ''pot, speed, 'ludes and black beauties,'' to high school students. He was also quoted as saying that he knew of fourth- , fifth- and sixth-graders who bought drugs.

Full Article

News Analysis

Date: 26 March 1981

By Clyde Haberman

Clyde Haberman

''I am a pragmatist,'' Mayor Koch is fond of saying, and he has gone about @underscoring that point in a variety of ways lately. On several basic issues affecting New York City - the transit fare, the Westway, new construction at Tudor City, use of the Rikers Island prisons - the Mayor has altered his position, sometimes more than once. In some instances, his point of view has swung 180 degrees; in others, the shifts have been more measured. Either way, Mr. Koch's changes have, for some people, raised an issue that goes beyond the immediate controversies. To his critics - and to a lesser degree, even to a few friends - the shifts point up a question that arises quietly from time to time: Does the Mayor, who says over and over that he wishes to guide the city through the 1980's, have a vision of where he wants to take it?

Full Article

News Analysis

Date: 26 March 1981

By Hedrick Smith

Hedrick Smith

The exposure of a foreign policy struggle that has dogged the Reagan Administration since Inauguration Day has dealt a costly blow to the prestige of Secretary of State Alexander M. Haig Jr., and has even damaged the standing of President Reagan. Rarely has Washington seen so young an Administration hit by such a highly visible conflict over a question of jurisdiction, and it has wider implications for the power of the Vice President and Secretary of State. In addition to exposing tensions between the senior White House staff and Mr. Haig, it may affect prospects for two potential contenders for the next Presidential election, should Mr. Reagan not run again. By picking Mr. Bush to head the crisis management committee, the President has reaffirmed his confidence in the running mate he chose in Detroit last July and dealt a setback to whatever hopes Mr. Haig may have harbored for the Presidency.

Full Article

News Analysis

Date: 25 March 1981

By Frank Lynn

Frank Lynn

''There is so much posturing. All the characters - the Governor, the Mayor, the M.T.A., the Comptroller, the legislative leaders, the Council President -trying to avoid responsibility, and meanwhile the system collapses around us.'' That was the unusually frank assessment by Carol Bellamy, the City Council President, of the public agonizing by transit and public officials over an almost inevitable increase in the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's bus and subway fare. The attempt to demonstrate herculean efforts to avoid a fare raise while diffusing or shifting responsibility for it in an effort to influence voters has been standard procedure in the city and state for many years. The strategem is supposed to be particularly important now because Mayor Koch is seeking re-election this year and Governor Carey is preparing to seek a third term next year.

Full Article

Conoco Discovery

Date: 26 March 1981

AP

Conoco Inc. reported an oil discovery in Indonesia with a stabilized flow rate of 6,000 barrels a day. Conoco said the No. 3 Wiriagar well had encountered an oil reservoir at about 1,530 feet, but it gave no further details. A Conoco subsidiary holding a 25 percent interest in the project is the operator for a group that includes Pertamina, the Indonesian state company, with 50 percent, and two Japanese companies, which share 25 percent.

Full Article

News Summary; WEDNESDAY, MARCH 25, 1981

Date: 25 March 1981

International A dispute over foreign policymaking became public in testimony by Secretary of State Alexander M. Haig Jr. before a House subcommittee. He questioned a White House plan to put Vice President Bush in charge of the Administration's ''crisis management'' team. Hours after Mr. Haig had seemingly put his prestige on the line in saying that he regarded the possibility of Mr. Bush's getting the position with ''a lack of enthusiasm,'' the White House named Mr. Bush to the foreign-policy post. (Page A1, Column 6.) Polish unionists became more militant, calling a four-hour warning strike for Friday and a general strike to begin next Tuesday as a protest against police violence in Bydgoszcz last week and the authorities' refusal to make amends. But the union's leadership made clear that the stoppages would be called off if negotiations set for today with Government leaders proved satisfactory. Stanislaw Kania, the Polish leader, denounced the union's announcement as ''an invitation for self-annihilation.'' (A1:2.)

Full Article

News Summary; THURSDAY, MARCH 26, 1981

Date: 26 March 1981

International The status of Alexander M. Haig Jr. created a stir. President Reagan reaffirmed that the Secretary of State was his ''primary adviser on foreign affairs,'' but Presidential aides said that the tension between Mr. Haig and the senior White House staff was much more severe than had been publicly acknowledged. A Presidential adviser said that Mr. Haig had threatened to resign eight or nine times before Vice President Bush won a key policy making post Tuesday. (Page A1, Column 6.) Opposition to policy in El Salvador is being expressed in hundreds of letters a week that are being received by key members of Congress. The letters oppose the Reagan Administration's decision to send military aid to the country and, according to legislators, the protests are beginning to influence Congressional opinion. (A7:1.)

Full Article

NL'S PROFIT OUTLOOK

Date: 26 March 1981

Ray C. Adam, chairman and chief executive of NL Industries Inc., a supplier of petroleum equipment and services, chemicals and metals, said the company expected first-quarter net income to exceed last year's results by about 50 percent. In the first quarter of 1980, the company's earnings were $36.5 million, or $1.07 a share. The optimistic forecast caused a $4.125 gain in the company's stock, to $70, in active trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

Full Article

Date:

Full Article