You give an experienced thief a few tools, and he can quickly gain access to your home. I know that`s so because I have seen it in the movies many times and have heard friends testify to the truth of it.
It`s illegal, unethical, improper, unmerited access, of course, but it is nevertheless access. As the country ponders a plethora of issues in the coming months, it is well to remember that access can be legitimate or illegitimate and should carry with it certain requirements for successful entry.
The Soviet Union wants access to Western capital and technology, and China to our lowest possible tariffs. Mexico wants greater trading access to the U.S. market, and Iraq to world oil markets. The civil rights bill in Congress is all about access, and so in a large sense is the education debate.
Need we mention the problem of access in the nation`s health-care system? An official of the American Medical Association said the one defining characteristic of the U.S. medical system is that it denies care to the poor and minorities who cannot afford the price of entry.
What you should notice about all these issues is that the parties are haggling continuously about the price of access. And that`s the way it should be, because it is one key way we can confirm the principles of democracy, merit and the discipline of the free market.
Access should never be free. It should always carry a big price, but not necessarily a monetary one. As gatekeepers to what everyone else wants, America has the solemn duty to insist upon the right price, if for no other reason than to maintain a sense of fairness among our own ranks and to maintain our own traditions.
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But if we are not careful, we can get into horrible traps. We can ask too much or too little, or we simply can be mistaken about what the real gate of entry is. Often we are inconsistent and often we forget that to arbritrarily deny access for others is to make a mockery of our own principles.
The Iraqi access question is not as difficult as some of the others. Saddam Hussein wants to resume selling oil to the rest of the world, but wants to put aside 30 percent of the proceeds to help rebuild Kuwait. The U.S. is insisting upon 50 percent, and that seems extremely fair considering the damage to Kuwait. But as a price for access to that money, we should insist that Kuwait move faster toward democracy than it currently plans.
With China and the Soviet Union, President Bush is the model of inconsistency. For the right to most-favored-nation status, Bush would have the Chinese do virtually nothing, arguing that the country is too big and too important to be pushed into isolation. But that`s the wrong way of putting it. Precisely because China is too big and too important, we should insist that it pay the price of halting political repression.
The Soviets want to join the Western capitalistic monetary and economic system, obtain loans and aid, and become a major trading partner. As a quid pro quo, it is promising a quick transition to a free market. The president, rightly so, is demanding as the price of access that it carry through with these reforms and make some political concessions as well.
How far do you go with this? Some flexibility is wise, because both China and the Soviet Union at some point will get their backs up and say, ”You are interfering in our domestic affairs.” Of course we are. The only question is how far we want to drop our standards, and still be assured that both countries can carry through with their promises.
America should not fear that others are gaining access to the same economic and political freedoms that we enjoy. True, in the short run, it could be painful, but over the long haul there is nothing more destabilizing than huge gaps in income and degrees of freedom.
One of the most puzzling ”access” debates is the civil-rights bill before Congress. Contrary to what some would have you believe, this bill has some real substance to it even in watered-down form. It would shift the burden of proof in some job discrimination cases from employee to employer.
This has deteriorated into a nasty, legalistic, name-calling mess. The chief argument is over the legal meaning of such words as ”manifest” and
”significant.” There are many good things in this bill, including new protections against racial and sexual harassment, but its main drawback is that it throws the struggle for economic access into the courts for long, bureaucratic fights over definitions. Perhaps that is to be expected in a highly litigious society.
But if the struggle for access is chiefly an economic one, it really should be chiefly waged elsewhere-namely in the preparation process for jobs and in the expansion of job opportunities. Here, it is abundantly clear, America does a lousy job for all its young people, especially for minorities. Would-be entrants to our economic system have a duty to become skilled and able, but Americans already enjoying it have a duty to remove artificial and bureaucratic barriers that hinder them. We need not fear greater access. The more who participate, the richer the country and the world will be.