OPINION ,.ml. Page 4. Thursday, October 29, 1981. The Michigan Daily Edited and managed by students at The University of Michigan Wasserman Vol. XCII, No. 43 420 Maynard St. Ann Arbor, MI 48109 1w I'WR To CRA&5 THAT OUR ?gorR.AMv\ A'/ORS Editorials represent a majority opinion of the Daily's Editorial Board Creative accounting !V 7' T WAS revealed this week that the Labor Department is planning to push for changes in the method of computing the federal Consumer Price Index, the official gauge used by the government to measure the rate of in- flation. While no one is going to argue that the CPI is perfect and should be protected from change at all costs, there is a question of exactly what the administration's motivation is in proposing the changes. The proposals for changes in the CPI come on the heels of an announcement last week that the CPI climbed 1.2 per- cent in September. That works out to an annual inflation rate of more than 14 percent. A substantial portion of that large CPI jump was caused by continued high domestic interest rates, rates that, when computed as a part of housing mortgage costs, greatly in- cresed the housing component in the index. The government's proposed changes would reduce the impact of interest rates on the index and would thus, during periods of high interest rates like the nation is currently enduring, lower the reported rate. Granted, the record high interest rates are distorting the Consumer Price Index, but those interest rates are, at the same time, raising costs to millions of Americans for housing and other essential needs. What the government seems to be doing, in effect, is apply one of the basic rules of "creative" accounting: If figures don't come out the way you want them to, change the way you add the numbers. The administration move to change the CPI - coming as it does im- mediately after a particularly bad surge in the index - seems to throw its motivation into question. The ad- ministration seems to desire not so much an accurate measure of the in- flation rate as a way to ease the em- barrassmept of its inability to control inflation. The accuracy of the CPI probably can be enhanced; enhancement of the accuracy of the index, however, is much more likely to come from diligent study than from the dictates of political expedience. - 'A ' , , J l l ) C v LET ME POINT OUT THAT A RISING TIE LIFTSAXL FROM~ "THE PEOPLE viqftO DON'T OWN~ BOATS / OF COURs5, w~ C-XPeCT T4C-VUUAL &RUIM4BLN&.. a /a y ' A The Moonies' illegal aliens The need to remember By Andrew Ross IT WAS A reunion of sorts. Many had not seen each other for more than 30 years. But they weren't there to talk about the homecoming queen or who scored the winning touchdown in '45. Instead, they shared tearful tales as they remembered the electrified fen- ces, the mass graves, and the fear and pain they had experienced. But most importantly, they remembered. Liberators and the liberated met in Washington Tuesday at the State Department for a two-day conference of survivors of the Nazi concentration camps. Many of those who had been in the camps had not seen their liberators in over three decades. True, the stories the people at the conference swapped were not all tragedies-many survivors related their elation as they finally realized their liberators had arrived. At a time when so many are attem- pting to make us forget the past, it is important that we realize human beings are indeed capable of atrocity. Tuesday's conference served as a reminder of just that. As one survivor reportedly said: "There is a certain moral authority that goes with what we have seen. Together we must speak up against war, hate, racism, anti- Semitism." And although it certainly won't end those problems, remembering can strengthen our resolve to oppose them. .4 -4 * 1 HOPE ITS NQTmIN6 SERIOUS , MI f7- / SAN FRANCISCO-As the Rev. Sun Myung Moon faces charges of tax evasion and widespread criticism for the aggressive recruiting practices of his Unification Chur- ch, evidence is growing that the church's overall legal problems actually may involve thousands of its members. ' According to the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, as many as 2,000 church members-popularly known as "Moonies"-are illegal aliens. FORMER UNIFICATION Church mem- bers, as well as government and private in- vestigators, say foreign members now may account for up to 50 percent of the total church membership in this country. The church claims 10,000 full-time mem- bers in the United States, though most outside observers put the number at considerably less. "The number of illegal aliens associated with the Unification Church is over- whelming," says Robert Morscorak, who is in charge of investigations for the San Francisco office of the INS, "and I get the feeling it is becoming more widespread throughout the Unted States." Asked to estimate how many foreigners who are recruited here become illegal aliens, another INS investigator replied bluntly, "All of them." IN FACT, SAY former Unification Church members, foreign tourists are being specifically targeted by Moonie recruiters. "We were told to pick on people with back- packs and flags, anyone who looked like they were strangers or traveling," says Ken Con- ner, who, with his father, now runs a "deprogramming" and counseling service in Princeton, W. Va. "Tourists are much more impressed with the friendly, outgoing approach of the Moonies," says Harry Clay, manager of the San Francisco Visitors Information Center. "THEY'RE YOUNG, isolated and naive-and much less aware of the church's recruitment techniques," says Jerry Stuchiner, an investigator for the San Fran- cisco INS office. Pressure from Unification Church leaders to recruit foreigners is said to have increased dramatically over the past year, as the ranks of American members have been depleted by the wave of bad publicity surrounding cults in general and the Unification Church in par- ticular. "In a year or two, we'll be dealing only with, foreigners," says one East Coast deprogrammer. The church's foreign recruits are mostly white, middle class, from English-speaking countries and Europe. THEY ARE students and professionals, some of them from very wealthy families. Particularly noticeable are young people from England, Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, White South Africa, the Netherlands and West Germany. There is a sprinkling of others from France and Scan- dinavia. Unification Church recruiters often ap- proach them through front organizations, such as Project Volunteer and the campus- based Collegiate Association for the Research of Principles operating at airports, bus stations, and popular tourist spots. Their efforts are focused primarily on the San Francisco Bay Area, but they also are ac- tive in Hawaii, Los Angeles, New York and other major American cities. AFTER BEING indoctrinated in a Unification Church camp (and having out- stayed their tourist visas), the recruits are put to work in one of the church's various en- terprises-usually selling flowers and other objects on the streets of major cities and suburbs-or recruiting others. One Dutch girl, for example, was discovered selling flowers in a Detroit bar at one o'clock in the morning. A German woman was deported after she walked into the Federal Building in San Francisco and tried to raise money from a government worker who turned out to be an immigration official. ACCORDING TO Ed Carlson, who oversees INS investigations nationwide, a growing number of foreign Moonies are showing up along the Gulf coast between Mobile, Ala., and New Orleans, in Virginia Beach, Va., and Gloucester, Mass.-all locations of Moon's commercial fishing interests. Here Moonies are trained to become fishermen, working for low pay which under- cuts established local fishing businesses and produces serious community tensions. Immigration officials acknowledge that there is little they can do about Moonie illegal aliens, however. ONLY ONE quarter of the estimated 2,000 illegal Moonies are even investigated, accor- ding to INS headquarters. The INS says it picks up 75 percent of those it does get leads on. Apart from the limitations of budget and manpower, officials explain, their in- vestigations are hampered by the "evasive". tactics of the church. They claim, for exam- ple, that they have great difficulty gainin access to Unification Church residences even when they have evidence that a suspected illegal alien is there. In other instances, the church allegedly moves a member they suspect is under in- vestigation to a different location. "I HATE TO say this," says Stuchiner of the INS San Francisco organization." Some observers charge that the celebrated "mass marriages" between American and foreign Moonies are merely designed to ob- tain permanent residency status for the foreign members of the church. "I remember Moon saying if he has to marry people on the docks to avoid depor- tation he will," recalls Steve Hassam, a for- mer assistant director of the church who now runs an organization of former members called Ex-Moon. The Unification Church emphatically denies these charges. Kay Cullen, an assistant director for legal affairs in the Unification Church's New York headquars ters, describes the marriages as "sacred' and says that they are recognized by the INS as perfectly legitimate. Cullen, a lawyer from New Zealand, said that foreign tourists who are recruited here are advised to apply for a change or extension of their visas. Failing that, they are advised to return to their own countries and join a Unification Church branch there. Ross wrote this article for Pacific News Service. LETTERS TO THE DAILY: MRC and the athletic department . To the Daily: This is to clarify one point in Andrew Chapman's report on faculty attitudes toward the projected Michigan Research Corporation (Daily, October 24). Mr. Chapman correctly repor-, ted my concern that MRC might gain a degree of independence from the University comparable to that of the Athletic Depar- tment. It is a bit misleading, however, to characterize the Board in Control of Inter- collegiate Athletics as itself "too independent and ... hard to con- trol." Indeed, it is to this Board that the extremely difficult task of "controlling" the Athletic Department has been assigned. The comparison I wished to make was not between MRC and this Board, but between MRC and the Athletic Department itself. It may be that Mr. Chapman misunderstood this, or it may b that I expressed myself poorly in responding to his questions. Be that as it may, thank you for allowing me to make this correc- tion. -David A. Hollinger Professor of History and Chair, Senate Assembly Committee on Academic Affairs Oct. 26 A Ufer memorial To the Daily: I remember listening to Bob "Meeechigan" Ufer ever since I So now a generation of kids will grow up in this state without the evnprience nf Tfer's famns hnrn V