Zuber Leads Barons To Win Over Red Wings

Anka Concert At Lake Canceled 
A Concert By Singer Paul Anka Scheduled For Friday Night At The Harveys Lake 
Bud Light Amphitheatre Has Been Canceled, According To Promoter Thom Greco.

Friday, July 26, 1996 &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Page: 





Army affirmative action: Why it works -- Part I &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 Any reservist knows the feeling: You walk from civilian life -- where news
of racial strife, segregation and hard feelings inspire countless headlines -- &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; through the gates of a military base and find a world entirely
differentBlacks routinely boss around whites in the military, you find. Whites
and blacks eat together, live together, work together and joke together in
amazingly routine calm. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 Years can pass before you hear a racial epithet, and when you do hear one
you can be sure the speaker has just torpedoed his or her career. Whites don't
mutter about unqualified minorities, even among themselves. Blacks don't gripe
about lack of opportunity. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 And for a few short hours on your weekend drills, you find yourself
marveling at a world where race hardly seems to count. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 What's going on? &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 One of America's most respected sociologists set about finding out. He
tells the story -- and Americans should listen -- in a new essay, "Affirmative
Action in the Army: Why It Works." &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 "Nowhere else in American society has racial integration gone as far or
black achievement been as pronounced," writes Charles Moskos, sociology
professor at Northwestern University in Chicago, in the essay in the new
anthology, "The Affirmative Action Debate" (Addison-Wesley Publishing, 1996). &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 "Affirmative action has been crucial in bringing about this state of
affairs. It also has been key in our military's unquestioned effectiveness." &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 Before conservatives step up to dispute those statements, they should
understand: The Army's affirmative action is different from the civilian
world's, Moskos claims. It's different -- and better, too, because it's both
widely accepted and a policy that works. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 Here's how. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 The Army sets and keeps uniformly high standards. That's why soldiers never
belittled the career of retired Gen. Colin Powell: They knew he had met the
Army's standards at every promotion along the way. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 "In poor affirmative action, an organization promotes less highly qualified
people to buy temporary peace, but doing so invites long-term disaffection,"
Moskos writes. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 "One reason the Army was able to accomplish its goal was that it contained
no purportedly liberal constituency willing to accept an initial drop in
standards. Therefore, those blacks who were promoted in the early days had a
self-confidence that made them the strongest defenders of standards for their
own black subordinates ... No identifiable group of underqualified minority
members occupy positions of authority in the Army." &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 The military directs most of its affirmative-action efforts into increasing
the pool of qualified candidates. "The Army shows how youths with deficient
backgrounds can meet demanding academic as well as physical standards," Moskos
writes. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 "It has successfully introduced internal programs to bring young people up
to enlistment standards, to raise enlisted soldiers to noncommissioned officer
standards, to bring undergraduates up to officer commissioning standards, and
to raise high school graduates to West Point admission standards. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 "These programs are not targeted exclusively to minority soldiers, but
participants are disproportionately African-American." &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 As mentioned before in this space, the military's residential programs give
the lie to the notion that high school is too late to turn around kids'
grades, basic skills and SAT scores. The Army's West Point preparatory school
immerses underachieving kids in a year of intensive reading and math. They
emerge as minor powerhouses with more than enough ability to handle West
Point, from which they graduate in very high numbers. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 The services focus their effort on this pool of qualified candidates, not
the percentage of minorities in the population. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 The point is a crucial one. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 Although African-Americans make up 12 percent of the U.S. population,
suppose only 5 percent of Army captains who are qualified for promotion to
major are black. The Army's goal will then be to promote at least five, not
12, blacks among every 100 new majors. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 In other words, the goal of an Army that "looks like America" takes a back
seat to the policy that all soldiers promoted must be fully qualified. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 The importance of this policy "cannot be overemphasized," Moskos writes. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 "In contrast with admissions at certain universities, the military has no
hint of two promotion lists in which whites are compared only with whites,
blacks only with blacks ... Although affirmative action in the Army does have
its tensions, it is not a prescription for loss of self-esteem by blacks or
resentment by whites." &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 Promotion boards may consider race once all other qualifications are met.
Army boards are encouraged, though not required, to meet the above goals. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 Does this mean some marginally qualified blacks win promotion over
more-qualified whites? No. Instead, as one white officer put it, "Only fully
qualified people are promoted, but not necessarily the best qualified. But
don't forget we are talking micromillimeter differences in these people." &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 Clearly, the Army's system represents a compromise between those decent
Americans who want their government to be color-blind, and those who believe
African-Americans are owed a measure of redress. "The Army has come up with a
system that satisfies neither the pro- nor anti-quota viewpoints," Moskos
writes. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 "But it works." &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 
 And tomorrow in this space, Charles Moskos will offer a few basic lessons
the United States can learn from its own Army. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;

Army Affirmative Action: Why It Works -- Part I 
Any Reservist Knows The Feeling: You Walk From Civilian Life -- Where News Of 
Racial Strife, Segregation And Hard Feelings Inspire Countless Headlines -- 
Through The Gates Of A Military Base And Find A World Entirely Different.

Army Affirmative Action: Why It Works -- Part I Any Reservist Knows The Feeling: You Walk From Civilian Life -- Where News Of Racial Strife, Segregation And Hard Feelings Inspire Countless Headlines -- Through The Gates Of A Military Base And Find A World Entirely Different.