Page 37 - Demo

Off the Record B Y io n Ciner1 -------- -------------------- %u2014 ....................... %u25a0 .... .%u2014-----%u2014------------------------------------------------------------------ - -.................................... ...wHeating UpThe deadline for candidates to hand in nominating petitions to get on the ballot in the September primary is one week away. Soon the arena for the campaign will transfer from the streets to the courtrooms %u2014where everybody will challenge everybody else%u2019s petitions to throw prospective opponents off the ballot. But right now, it%u2019s the summertime political doldrums.Nevertheless, some campaigns are heating up, even if the candidates themselves are not doing much. In the controversial 14th Congressional district, petitioning has been going on quietly. But the racial tensions in Crown Heights may be having their effects on the race. Rev. Herbert Daughtry led a demonstration last Sunday there protesting, among other things, the activities of a Hasidic Crime patrol and the 77th Precinct after the death of community leader Arthur Miller. At the demonstration Daughtry said that if the %u201c Hasidic terrorists touch one more of our kids, we%u2019re going to tear this community apart.%u201dThere had been some question whether the Hasidim in Crown Heights and Williamsburg would support incumbent Fred Richmond after he admitted to making sexual solicitations to a black youth. Now there is little doubt that they will line up for the Congressman. Daughtry, after all, has been one of Richmond%u2019s most virulent opponents, and is supportingRichmond's primary chaiienger, Bernard Gifford. And while Gifford says he is running to represent everyone in the district, the Hasidim may not feel that way with the outspoken Daughtry on his side.Gifford expects some white support from Park Slope, where he lives, and from Brooklyn Heights, where the dominant club, the West Brooklyn Independent Democrats, is supporting him. But the leadership in South Brooklyn and the Heights%u2014personified by District Leaders Sal Ferraioli and Eileen Dugan, Assemblyman Mike Pesce and State Senator Marty Connor%u2014have yet to endorse him. So despite what either candidate may desire, the issue in this race from the voters%u2019 point of view could be purely black and white.Melting PotThe issues%u2014or at least the candidates%u2014 are not just black and white in the 57th Assembly race. It%u2019s a true melting pot race. There%u2019s a black, a white, an Hispanic, a Jew, an Italian, a senior citizen, a gay,, educators and a lawyer. Of course, there are only four%u2014or perhaps five%u2014candidates in the race: incumbent Harvey Strelzin, (Jewish/attorney/senior citizen); School Board 13 President Velmanette Montgomery (black/educator); union leader Alexis Miranda (Hispanic); and college teacher Ginny Apuzzo (gay/educator/ community activist).Montgomery hopes to run strong in Boerum Hill and Fort Greene, where shehas the support of the 57th Independent County Committee. But Eager Smith, the head of the Wycoff Gardens Tenants Association in the Boerum Hill-Gowanus area, as well as some other blacks there, are saying they're supporting Miranda. So much for ethnic politics. Miranda ran against Strelzin two years ago and lost by about 900 votes.Apuzzo, who has the Liberal Party endorsement, has opened up an impressive storefront on Dekalb Avenue in Fort Greene and from some reports it is bustling with activity. Apparently, she is concentrating petitioning in the Clinton Hill/Fort Greene brownstone areas, instead of in her home base in Boerum Hill.Procedure vs. MeritBernard Fuchs, who was elected to the Civil Court as a reformer two years ago, is seeking an endorsement from the Kings County Democratic Committee for state Supreme Court. His only problem is that the KCDC screening panel has not given him a top rating, largely because, according to the panel, Fuchs has insisted on %u201c procedure%u201d rather than on the %u201c merits%u201d of a case. Fuchs has been calling KCDC judicial delegates telling them that what it really means is that he is tough on lawyers, forcing them to prepare their cases and to appear in court on time. Fuchs says he asked to appear before the panel to review his rating but that the panel refused to grant him that review. He even says that the panel did not use any examples of how he puts procedure before merit. It appearsthat the panel in this case, whether Fuchs is right or wrong, may be putting procedure over merit.For the RecordThe League of Conservation Voters have given Congressman Fred Richmond (D%u201414th C.D.) a near perfect record of 98% on his 1977 voting record...State Senator William Conklin (R%u201421st S.D.) declared this week that the pro-fiscal austeritv forces symbolized by the California victory for the anti-property tax Proposition 13 would begin to be %u201c really felt in the aftermath of this fall's election campaign.%u201d Conklin said that there was %u201c a growing price tag mentality%u201d in Albany corresponding to the tax-cutting appetites of voters.. .Congressman Leo Zeferetti (D%u201415th C.D.), himself a former corrections guard, co-chaired the Bureau of Prisons on the Select Committee on Narcotics Abuse and Control in Washington D.C. to investigate drug abuse treatment programs for prisoners. The high incidence of drug problems among prison inmates %u201c makes it imperative that we look closely at our federal prison system,\rison Goldin said that the city picked up the bill for more than $200,000 in tuition reimbursements for such courses as yoga, tourism, modern dance, and martial arts for NYU Medical Center professional staff employees and their families. Calling this expense an %u201c improper practice that makes me and every other taxpayer very angry.%u201dCoping By Jody LinscottWriting in the pages of one of our more esteemed New York dailies not long ago, an emminent film critic posed a critical question for our times: in all of these movies about the %u201c new%u201d woman (read: not-a-housewife), we see attractive and immaculate homes or apartments, but we never see anyone cleaning them. WHO, he asked, is minding the house? Now he didn%u2019t have the answer (obviously) but he did have his SUSPICIONS, including that the housework is falling to SOMEONE ELSE (like other women). Which led him to critical and timely question number two: are women liberating themselves on the backs of other women?Well he might ask that question, 1 say. High time someone did, I say. And I propose, herewith, to attempt some answers. I speak from the vantage point of qualifying, I suspect, as one of his %u201c new%u201d women, inasmuch as I am past the age of 25, unmarried, living in a big city, and supporting myself at a job that takes too much time. I also live alone in a four-room, (five, if I cheat and count the hall) fairly attractive apartment. Were M-G-M to roll the cameras in, it would look neat and tidy and downright cute.As a matter of fact, I decided that I was the woman to tackle just these questions as I was scrubbing out the bathtub last night. Now scrubbing out the bathtub is not my idea of fun. In fact, I hate it. I also hate doing the laundry and vacuuming and washing dishes and making the bed and dusting. I even hate watering the plants. In fact I resent all this. If I were a mother, which luckily for children everywhere I am not, I would probably resent tending them too, and would be one of those wacky sorts that feeds her kids popcorn for dinner and is generally avoided by organizers of localplay-groups.That established, let me add that I am not in a position to pay someone to come in and execute these noxious duties for me. Lord knows if I were, I would. As far as I%u2019m concerned, anyone who is willing to make a living or some summer money by fishing%u2018As a matter of fact,I decided that I wasthe woman to tacklejust these questionsas I was scrubbingout the bathtub..under the couch for dust balls is welcome to do it through me. Unfortunately he, she or it would have to do it for free, and so far I haven%u2019t found any takers. In the meantime, I am levied with the burden of keeping four rooms and a hallway this side of disgusting.Let me tell you, it ain%u2019t easy. And let me suggest that the way I and probably millions of other women (and men) in this city do it is as quickly and painlessly as possible. One method, of course, is to just not do it. The drawback there is that it tends to lead to bugs and eventual eviction notices. The other method is to do it fast and at odd hours, when the brain is dulled (a bottle of bourbon helps on the awareness end, but tends to slow things up). I would suggest, in short, that one of the reasonsthat the critic in question never sees his screen women airing out the winter coats (aside from the fact that no one wants to pay to watch anyone airing out the winter coats) is that they probably do it at 3 a.m.%u2014and who%u2019s out with a movie camera at that hour?This is what I was thinking about as I was scrubbing out the bathtub at 1:15 (a.m.). The other thing I was thinking about was whether or not I would risk a lynching at the hands of my downstairs neighbor if I were to vacuum while the clorox was soaking in (I%u2019m a real advocate of letting things soak, preferably for three weeks or more). None of this is the kind of thing I particularly like to spend my spare time considering, and though the annoyance was adding a bit of vigor to the scrubbing process, I decided once and for all to put a halt to this nonsense. The upshot of my newly acquired assertiveness was to allow myself 15 minutes to get it done. All of it. Tubs, sinks, ashtrays, rugs. Anything that couldn%u2019t get done in that space of time, I decided, wasn%u2019t worth doing. Here is how it went:For starters I throw out all the rugs, or rather stuffed them into the back closet, figuring that I save myself some agony there. Next I whip around the place in a record three-and-a-half minutes, collecting every dustable object, deciding in one second that they aren%u2019t worth it and in another two seconds have them crammed into all available drawers (note: large closets and lots of drawer space make this job easier). In rapid succession 1 make several other critical, time saving decisions: go to paper cups, plates, and napkins; throw out all food and shut the refrigerator down (the deli carries a colder and more interesting selection than I do);sleep on top of the bed, thereby wiping out the necessity of making or changing it; and for future reference, avoid using the bathtub. Those decisions take approximately five minutes to make (I%u2019m a creature of habit, and slow to change) and execute.Five minutes left. For a moment I panic, but my %u201c new%u201d woman assertiveness comes to the rescue and I fly into action, maneuvering the vacuum cleaner with a finesse I never knew I had. The vacuum and I decide not to go under things, since we aren%u2019t allergic to dust and never look there anyway; this split second decision shaves at least two minutes from the operation. Throw the vacuum into the closet, slam the door and check the time: two minutes to go. Swipe the sinks with a clorox soaked towel and stuff that, along with 48 pounds of unwashed clothes, in a garbage bag to go to the laundromat tomorrow morning. Decide that it%u2019s not cheating to throw the garbage next to it and take it all down at once (executive decision maker evidences flexibility). Forty-five seconds to go. Panic strikes again: four weeks of New York %u201cTimes%u201d (including Sunday editions) stare at me from the corner. What to do, what to do. Aha! Stuff them under the bed, yank the cover down just so. Looks good. Anyway, the papers will keep some of the dust from getting in there. And who knows, I may get around to reading them some day.Finished, with six seconds to spare. Triumphant, I sink into a chair and smoke a cigarette, carefully throwing the ashes down the kitchen sink. If they filmed me now, I might look like hell, but my place would shine.And that, sir critic, is how we do it. Wouldn't it make a fascinating film?Inklings By Gene SuchmcaJuly 20,1978, THE PHOENIX, Page 5