Currently making the rounds is a solution to the Panama Canal question—by novelist Louis Auchincloss out of Daniel Patrick Moynihan—that Ford and Reagan might just be able to agree on. Speaking to the American Newspaper Publishers Association in New York, Moynihan said he believes the Canal “belongs to the people who live there,” but he was wary about handing it over to the “not very attractive regime in Panama.” The solution: the U.S. should make an “evangelical confession” before the UN admitting that “we stole Panama” in 1903 when it was a province of Colombia—and then announce that “we are giving it back to Colombia.”
Representatives of every Washington newspaper and four television networks were at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington on May 3 to hear John Connally announce the formation of the Citizens for Mediterranean Freedom. Reminding his audience that thirty years ago Americans fought to help restore freedom to the Mediterranean region, Connally said the purpose of the newly formed group was “to demonstrate to thé people of the Mediterranean that the people of this country [still] care about their struggle for freedom.” NATO’s survival, he said, depends on Italy’s ability to resist a Communist government. The newsmen must have been unimpressed. Aside from a few radio announcements, the Citizens for Mediterranean Freedom (1511 K Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20026) received no coverage in the nation’s capital.
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