Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site cylixd.UUCP Path: utzoo!lsuc!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!whuxl!whuxlm!akgua!akgub!cylixd!dave From: dave@cylixd.UUCP (Dave Kirby) Newsgroups: net.politics Subject: Reagan gets "tough" with Libya Message-ID: <673@cylixd.UUCP> Date: Thu, 9-Jan-86 10:17:24 EST Article-I.D.: cylixd.673 Posted: Thu Jan 9 10:17:24 1986 Date-Received: Sat, 11-Jan-86 11:45:25 EST Reply-To: dave@cylixd.UUCP (Dave Kirby) Organization: RCA Cylix Communications , Memphis, TN Lines: 45 Driving to work this morning I heard an interesting commentary by Peter Jennings on the president's latest news conference. He said that the news conference was noteworthy mostly because of what the president DIDN'T say. Two points stand out. (1) Reagan, in retaliation for Libya's terrorist activities, imposed strict economic sanctions against Libya, cutting off all trade. What he didn't say was that our trade with Libya is negligible anyway. In 1980 we did more than $5 billion worth of trade with Libya. By 1985 (first ten months' statistics) that figure was down to less than $32 MILLION. I'm sure Quadhafi's wrists really sting from that slap on them. In view of the billions of dollars of trade that the European countries give him, I'm sure he's really hurting for our measly $32 million. (BTW, for those in the UK and elsewhere who don't already know, one billion in the U. S. is one thousand million, not one million million. We are not as rich as you think. :-) (2) Reagan called for the European countries to join him in this heroic action. What he didn't say was that the chance of that happening, even among our allies, is virtually nil; the European countries have a lot more to lose than the U. S. if they join in this game. It would be like someone in Europe demanding that the U. S. cut off all trade with Saudi Arabia. The U. S. is recalling all its citizens working abroad in Libya. The average U. S. citizen working in Libya makes 95,000 US-tax-free dollars a year. These are the people that will be hurt most by the new sanctions. It will give Quadhafi a good laugh at best. (Still, I find it hard to feel sorry for someone who has been making $95,000 per year tax free all this time. But maybe I'm just cold-hearted.) The reaction of the president is apparently a political technique designed to cool off public pressure (by making it look like he is really doing something) until the president and his advisors can come up with something meaningful. Personally, I can't think of anything truly meaningful he could do to stop Quadhafi's antics, short of a declaration of war and blowing Libya off the map; but that could have most undesirable repercussions. Maybe if we repealed the law forbidding covert assasination plots? Or perhaps made an exception this one time? :-) ----------------------------------------------------------------- Dave Kirby ( ...!ihnp4!akgub!cylixd!dave) "Prosperity is just around the corner." - Herbert Hoover, 1930.