Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: Headline Article Date: Wed, 4 Nov 92 16:16:30 EST Message-ID: \SE A;NATION;INSIDE THE BELTWAY \BY John McCaslin \CR THE WASHINGTON TIMES THE TOURIST DOLLAR There's an old saying in Arkansas that "one tourist is better than two bales of cotton - and he's easier to pick." Down in Hope, Ark., where Bill Clinton was born 46 years ago, the only tourists they've been accustomed to seeing are those who drift off Interstate 30 in search of gas or a motel. "Our industry's basically poultry, wood products . . . a little cotton," Hope Chamber of Commerce volunteer June Downs said in a telephone interview yesterday. But count on that changing, just as Petit Jean Mountain northwest of Little Rock changed in 1953 when Yankee transplant Winthrop Rockefeller transformed some of the sorriest land ever seen into one of the fanciest farms in the world. Each year, 150,000 tourists viewed the Rockefeller complex with its stone-and-glass mansion. The former Clinton residence is no mansion, but Hope's newly installed tourist bureau would love to draw similar crowds, even if the curious are kept out of the house where young Willie lived. "The James Burton family lives there now, and they're not too well off. They're likely to sit on the property and get a lot of money out of it one day," June Downs said. "The house is pretty run down - it hasn't been kept up. . . . But right now they [the Burtons] aren't financially able to do anything about it." Twenty-five miles down the road from Hope is Texarkana, Ark., which hopes to cash in on the Hope overflow. Tourism hasn't boomed there since at least 1969, when Time magazine drove everything away except the marmots. Time wrote: "Texarkana . . . serves assorted crooks as a distribution center for stolen cars and appliances. Now the city boasts a new source of notoriety: 17 of Texarkana's 24 square miles, including some of the better sections, are infested with sleek, fat rats. According to U.S. Interior Department investigators, the town harbors about 900,000 of the rodents. . . . With their 11 internal parasites abd 18 kinds of fleas, they expose people to rat bite fever, murine typhus, bubonic plague and other diseases." AT YOUR COMMAND It had to come sooner or later: the first and only complete guide to today's top Russian leaders. We're talking about access to 8,500 Russian leaders in 87 republics and provinces, including names, addresses and phone numbers. Carroll Publishing Co. of Washington, in promoting Russian Government Today, accurately points out that "information about government officials in Russia has not been readily available." "Now you can actually pick up your phone and reach the Russian officials who can help guide you on the road to doing business successfully in Russia." To entice entry into the Russian market, the guide says nearly 40,000 towns in Russia need telephones, up to two-thirds of the bakery equipment dates back to the 1920s and there are few insurance companies. "For your company, big or small, the field is wide open," it notes. But the publishers also are the first to admit that "the Russian government still owns and manages virtually all business in the country, and the bureaucracy can be extremely frustrating." ZEALOUS LAWMAN Barry Lynn, former legislative counsel for the ACLU, once said "[Henry] Hudson's record on pornography is clear: He hates it, he wants to get rid of it, and he thinks it's a public safety menace akin to driving 100 miles an hour in a residential neighborhood. He's a zealous prosecutor of anything he thinks is dirty." Now Mr. Hudson, former Arlington County commonwealth's attorney, former U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, former head of the Attorney General's Commission on Pornography and now director of the U.S. Marshals Service, is cracking down again. This time he's going after fugitives who used violence or weapons in committing sex crimes or committed sex crimes against children. To prove he means business, Mr. Hudson has directed his office to review some 100,000 criminal records now in the crime computer banks. The nation's most dangerous offenders will be targeted by 200 deputy marshals and other law enforcement officers. PLAINS THINKING Leaders of the Oregon Lands Coalition are calling on Bill Clinton to calm fears spreading across the West that, as president, he would appoint an interior secretary who would pursue the "anti-people, pro-bugs and birds" agenda embraced by Al Gore. Coalition members say they've seen a list of possible new interior secretaries that includes Colorado Sen. Tim Wirth and former Arizona Gov. Bruce Babbitt, both known for being green. "We've been through this before with another Southern governor who had little understanding of the West and what it takes to keep a region economically stable when the federal government owns more than half of the land," says the coalition's Charlie Janz. "The fact is we can't handle a Carter comeback." IN CLOSING Final words before the nation decided: Dan Quayle: "As Indiana goes, so goes the nation." George Bush: "I learned that you fight when your back is up against the wall." Ross Perot: "We'll landslide this thing if the people vote their conscience." Al Gore: "Remember this day when you grow up." Bill Clinton: "Whatever happens, we've done what we could to make the best case for change." Pat Buchanan: "Do you really want Bill Clinton standing up there at Normandy two years from now, with those white crosses behind him on the 50th anniversary of June 4th, 1944, D-Day?" This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM