Government & Politics

Film critic Stephen Schiff reviews the new movie starring Julia Roberts and Nick Nolte. Schiff says it never manages to get beyond kind of cute.

Christopher Buckley has just written a new political satire, "Thank you for Smoking" (Random), which pokes fun at everything and everyone associated with the tobacco industry-- from anti-smoking advocates to tobacco company executives. Buckley was George Bush's speechwriter from 1981-1983 when Bush served as Vice President. The son of William F. Buckley, he is the author of other political and social satires, including "The White House Mess" and "Wet Work." He is the editor of "Forbes FYI" magazine.

New York Times reporter John Darnton. This past Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, Darnton published a series of articles in the Times about the current state of Africa. He was the Times' Africa correspondent in the 70s. This 3-part series is his return to see how conditions have changed. He reports that living standards have declined far below the rest of the world, with most African countries in economic turmoil, replete with famine, war and drought. He says the World Bank has become the new superpower of Africa with the post-cold war pullout of the U.S. and Russia.

Merchant Seaman Captain Rudolph Patzert. In 1947 he captained a ship that was part of a clandestine effort by the Jewish underground to smuggle Holocaust survivors into Palestine. Palestine at that time was under British rule, and a British air and sea blockade prevented immigration to the country. Patzert's ship, the Paducah, was a 45 year-old rundown converted gunboat, his crew inexperienced; and they were thwarted every step of the way: British intelligence hounded them, preventing them from refueling and re-watering.

Journalist Martha Honey. She worked as a freelance journalist in Costa Rica from 1983 to 1991. Her clients included Times (London), The Nation, ABC television, and National Public Radio. In 1984, she and her husband, Tony Avirgan were covering a press conference called by contra leader Eden Pastora Gomez, when a bomb exploded killing three journalists, and injuring dozens of other people, including Pastora, who was the intended target. (Tony Avirgan was also one of the people injured.) Honey and Avirgan and other journalists set out to find the person(s) responsible.

Roger Connor is founder and Executive Director of the American Alliance for Rights and Responsibilities (AARR), a legal organization aimed at making individuals more responsible for their communities. Connor and the AARR have been active in helping communities enact anti-panhandling laws. His group recently drafted a law making it illegal for panhandlers to step in someone's path, or to panhandle in subway stations or at ATM machines.

Doug Honig works for the ACLU in Washington State. They recently challenged a Seattle ruling which makes it a crime to panhandle aggressively, and to sit on sidewalks in the downtown district.

Maria Foscarinis is founder and executive director of the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty. Foscarinis has been active in legal issues affecting the homeless since 1983. In 1985, she established the office of the National Coalition for the Homeless in Washington. She calls anti-panhandling laws inhumane and possibly unconstitutional, and works to prevent cities from passing laws which attempt to sweep people off the streets. She has litigated several federal laws which enforce the individual rights of homeless people.

New York City transit police officer Brendan McGarry. He's been at the job for 21 years. McGarry wrote (also in a recent New York Times article, 10 Apr 94) about the homeless and the panhandlers on the subways, "for a transit cop, they are a tough, unpleasant, sometimes dangerous part of a sometimes thankless job." McGarry complains the public misunderstands them and accuses them of mistreatment. But he says they've worked hard at finding shelter and services for the subway's homeless, setting up a homeless outreach unit.

Stewart Udall served three terms in Congress, and as Secretary of the Interior under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson. He is the author of a new book, "The Myths of August", (Pantheon) which chronicles his struggle as one of the first lawyers to represent thousands of Americans who were injured or killed by the testing of atomic weapons. Udall spent years investigating and litigating cases filed by Southwestern families who had been harmed by atmospheric testing of atomic bombs, and by families of Navajo men who developed lung cancer after mining Uranium for the Government.

Commentator Maureen Corrigan reviews: "Kay Boyle: Author of Herself," by Joan Mellen.

Norma McCorvey. She was the plaintiff in Roe vs. Wade. In the lawsuit she was called Jane Roe to shield her privacy. In her new book "I Am Roe" (Harper Collins), she tells her story. She was poor, alone and pregnant. Her case became a landmark Supreme Court decision--it gave women the right to choose abortion. But McCorvey ended up giving birth to the child because the Supreme Court decision came too late.

Pennsylvania Governor Robert P. Casey. June 14th will be the first anniversary of his "return from the dead." Last year when he was close to death from a fatal liver disease that was destroying his heart, Casey received a heart and liver transplant. The donor was a young African American man who was savagely beaten by drug dealers. Casey talks about his second chance at life. And he discusses his views--pre and post-surgery--on political issues of life and death such as abortion and the death penalty.

Mary Previte, superintendent of the Camden County (NJ) Youth Center. Previte, the great granddaughter of missionary pioneer Hudson Taylor, grew up in China with her missionary parents. During World War II, she and her fellow students and teachers spent three years in a Japanese concentration camp. Previte credits the structure her teachers' created with making the horrific experience bearable. For the past twenty years, Previte has run the youth center, a holding center for boys and girls charged with serious crimes.

Writer Mikal Gilmore, youngest brother of executed killer Gary Gilmore. Gilmore's 1977 death --at his own request-- by firing squad in Utah, was the first American execution in ten years. Brother Mikal finds seeds of his brother's two murders sown far back in Gilmore family history, and its Mormon roots.

British-Asian film-maker Gurinder Chadha is making her feature-film debut with the new comedy-drama, "Bhaji on the Beach," a movie in the British social realist tradition, about three Asian women on a day trip to a working class resort in England. Chadha is of Indian descent; she was born in Kenya, but has lived in Britain most of her life. She formed her own independent production company, Umbi Films, in 1990 which produced three documentaries for television. "Bhaji on the Beach," has recently made the round of film festivals

Historian and author Garry Wills. He looks at leadership in his new book "Certain Trumpets: The Call of Leaders" (Simon & Shuster). Wills chooses a broad spectrum of leaders--FDR, Harriet Tubman, Socrates, Martha Graham and others--and examines their leadership qualities and the bases of their success. He looks at the relationship between leading and following. He responds to the charge by some that there is now a dearth of leaders. And he sets forth his understanding of the universal conditions of leadership.

Peru's eminent novelist and former presidential candidate Mario Vargas Llosa. Llosa is the author of many books including "Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter," (which was made into a movie, based on his own relationship with his 32-year old aunt, who he married at the age of 19), "The Storyteller," and "In Praise of the Stepmother." A London Times writer says of Llosa's novels that they are "among the finest coming out of Latin America." Llosa lived for many years in Europe.

Alison Des Forges. She's a professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo, where her specialty concerns the central African countries of Rwanda and Burundi. She's also the Co-Chair of the International Commission on Human Rights Abuse in Rwanda, and a consultant to Human Rights Watch Africa on Rwanda and Burundi. Rwanda has descended into civil strife since April 6th, when the Rwanda and the Burundi presidents were both killed in a plane crash.

Writer Michael Ignatieff, who has investigated six of the world's trouble spots for a BBC television series, and a companion book: "Blood & Belonging: Journeys into the New Nationalism" (Farrar, Straus & Giroux). A Canadian of Russian ancestry who lives in England, Ignatieff's book raises the question of why nationalism, which once unified countries like Germany and Italy, today pulls countries apart.