4A
Thursday, November 10, 1994
OPINION
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
VIEWPOINT
Airlines should have to be up-front about commuters
The recent crash of the commuter American Eagle flight has once again raised questions about the increasing use and safety of commuter planes.
However, the questionable judgment of using commuter planes is overshadowed by the airlines' deceptive practice known as code sharing, which allows airlines to "hide" the fact that passengers will have to fly in a so-called puddle-jumper for a part of their trip.
Code sharing is a practice most likely to occur when a passenger takes a connecting flight from a large city to a small one. In this circumstance, the passenger's flight itinerary would show similar flight codes between connecting flights, and it also would list the similar names between the large airline and its smaller subsidiary. But it wouldn't make clear the distinction that a jet would be replaced by a puddle-jumper on the connecting flight. This is potentially a dangerous form of decen-
COMMUTER FLIGHTS Honesty in presentation
tion that passengers should not have to tolerate from the airline industry.
Paul Dempsey, president of Americans for Sound Aviation Policy, has notified Congress by letter about his concerns over the safety of commuter planes and the deceptive use of code sharing. He wrote, "So long as the reprehensible practice of code sharing is condoned by the Department of Transportation, passengers find themselves in the unenviable position of being forced to change planes to smaller, commuter-type aircraft with an unacceptably narrower margin of safety."
Congress should pay heed to Dempsey and end the airlines' practice of code sharing. Because commuter planes aren't as safe as large jets, anything but a clear distinction between the different-sized planes on a passenger's itinerary is chicanery in its lowest form.
LANCE HAMBY FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Simpson trial worthless without sequestration
Now that O.J. Simpson's jury has been chosen, Judge Lance Ito will have to make a ruling on whether to fully or partially sequester the jurors. It seems that not sequestering the jury is not an option and should not be considered.
Sequestration is inconvenient but not a great hardship on jurors. The notion that jurors are locked in a room without any contact with the outside world is not true. Sequestration means that the jurors are protected from outside influences and unswayed by the media. It does not mean that jurors are tied to their beds and tortured.
The real hardship the jury may suffer is the minimal pay of $5 a day. However, the real sufferers may be the Simpson lawyers.
It is no wonder that the Simpson defense team is
O.J. SIMPSON TRIAL Sequester the jury
vehemently opposed to sequestration. With an unmonitored jury, the chances of influencing jurors through public statements would increase dramatically. Besides, on appeal, it could be argued that the jurors were influenced by the media.
The only way to give Simpson a fair trial is by sequestering the jury. The other options are not even worthy of consideration. Ito has already made a ruling on allowing the press in the courtroom, and a change of venue would be ineffective in a case this big.
The only clear and reasonable option in a case of this significance and enormity is to protect the jury as thoroughly as possible through sequestration.
ARTHUR T. COLUMNIS FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD.
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Misperception brings on memories
"Not even one's own pain weighs so heavy as the pain one feels with someone, for someone, a pain intensified by the imagination and prolonged by a hundred echoes."
or maybe I'm writing this to Dani. To tell her that I loved her and that I hope she is at peace now, even if I wasn't that close to her. To tell her that I would be glad to see her if it were possible. Maybe I'm writing this to tell Dani how missed she is, by me and more people than she ever would have thought.
— Milan Kundera in "The Unbearable Lightness of Being"
But when I realized my mistake, I stopped right where I was, frozen. The guy walking behind me bumped into me, saying something nasty. I just stood there, watching this girl go by. I couldn't do anything else.
Last week, as I was coming out of Strong Hall, I saw a girl that reminded me of Danielle Franzen. For a split second, I got that same pleasant feeling that you get when you see somebody that you haven't seen in a good long time.
Not a big deal, right, seeing someone that reminds you of somebody else?
Usually I would agree with you, but this was a special case.
I think that is what I'm doing. What I have just done.
You see, Danielle Franzen died on September 10, 1993.
BRIAN ENGLAND
The worst part about the whole thing was that I started to say hello to her. I saw her and was all ready to say "Hey, how have you been?" But I caught myself before any words came out. I thought it was her, I really did. I was a freshman at Colorado State when I heard about her death. It came from out of nowhere. I was about to
go to dinner with some people on my floor when the phone rang. I just sat on my bed, not believing. I felt so less way out in Colorado. The distance seemed so much greater. I wanted to go home, go to the funeral and maybe see that it wasn't true. But there was nothing I could do.
I wondered what would happen if one of my good friends died. Or somebody in my family. What if my dad had died when I was out in Colorado. What would I have done?
I didn't know then, and I still don't know.
Dani's death made a big impact on my life. And I wasn't even that close to her. She was somebody I saw at parties or in the halls at school, but that was pretty much it. When we did see each other, we would always talk and see how things were going, but we weren't that great of friends.
So why did her death affect me so much? Why do I catch myself thinking
about her sometimes or go visit her grave site? I honestly don't know. I don't even know why I'm writing this column. Maybe it's to help me deal with this or to help others deal with their own tragedies, but I don't know. Maybe I'm trying to make some sort of statement about how death affects so many people, but I really don't think so.
Brian England is a Lenox sophomore in English and theater.
Sean Finn / KANSAN
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Building prisons wrong approach
Thanks to Nicolas Shump for an excellent column last Friday on crime and welfare. I agree that many politicians are offering simplistic solutions to the complex issue of crime by insisting on more prison building with no funding for preventative programs.
Lets look at why there are over 1 million prisoners in the United States, far more that any other industrialized nation. For the last 12-14 years, Republican politicians (along with conservative Democrats) have sent large numbers of U.S. jobs overseas so management could skim quick profits. Meanwhile, the minimum wage was held down to $3.35 per hour for over 10 years under Reagan/Bush. It has been proven over and over that many homeless people work full time and still can't pay their bills with typical minimum wage jobs. Some people become so demoralized they resort to crime.
The same politicians who support massive expansion of prisons are usually against any program to give people a chance of reaching the "American Dream," such as child immunization, midnight basketball, Headstart or any true crime prevention programs.
With the end of the Cold War, prison building could be looked at as another welfare for the rich program, similar to the massive overcharging and fraud committed by defense contractors during the last 40 years.
Instead of creating a huge under-
class of people who live in areas with
no jobs infrastructure, surrounded by a walled-off prosperous middle class area we should try to bring everyone into the first world as columnist Nicolas Shump described it.
Rick Sheridan
Lawrence Graduate student
Voter loses right due to inept group
Someone stole my right to vote
No, I'm not one of those who neglects to register and then complains about the results. I registered. In fact, I registered at the Student Political Awareness Task Force table at the Kansas Union. I figured that it would save me the time and bother of going to the county courthouse. Now I don't have a vote.
I didn't think they would have someone irresponsibly handling the registration cards--but they did. One floul up and I was disenfranchised. When I contacted the head of this group, he apologized—but there was nothing he could do. Who knows how many other KU students were also robbed of their right to vote because of the way this group handled this responsibility?
Michele Kumm Leawood senior
Voting in this country is important. Many complain about voter apathy but there are some of us who did put forth the effort to register only to lose our ability anyway. In the future, I do hope that groups who undertake the task of registering voters realize that they are being entrusted with something more valuable than a simple piece of paper.
Poverty article was misleading
I was confused about the purpose of the article "Lawrence's Poor Lost Among Students" (Nov. 7), especially because of the crazy way in which it labeled any household earning less than Lawrence's median family income of $41,500 a year as "low-income." Earning less than your neighbors doesn't necessarily make you poor. Lawrence's median family income is almost three times the federal poverty index for a family of four. If Lawrence's median family income were $100,000 per year, would I be "low-income" if I made only $99,000?
I suspect that the real purpose of the article was to garner support for increasing the amount of housing officially set aside for "low-income" families. That would automatically raise the rents on all other rental units. Perhaps the article should have been entitled, "Rich KU Students Should Pay More So That Poor Lawrence Residents Earning Only $40,000 a Year May Pay Less!"
The reason why elderly couples "tend to shy away from government help" is because they realize that government cannot bestow privileges upon one group of citizens without forcing the costs on to everybody else.
Dan Drees
Hays Graduate Student
Thanksgiving cannot come soon enough
In sports, you always hear about athletes, particularly long distance runners and swimmers, hitting the wall, the point in the race where everything stops working and starts hurting. They want to stop. Somehow, though, they manage to continue onward and finish the race.
The wall. It打 about one week ago.
Not Pink Floyd's wall or the rock climbing wall or even the wall of my apartment, but the student's wall.
Well, I am of the opinion that this wall exists for students, too.
Take me, for instance. I am your average college student. I have stopped working. I lie in bed every morning and try to decide which, if any, of my classes deserve to be graced with my presence that day. If don't go, well then I justify it. Well, I am really tired. If I don't get enough sleep, then I will get sick, and then I will end up missing even more classes than if I don't go today. I look at my syllabi and decide that reading really isn't necessary. The test is a week away anyway. I couldn't possibly get all the reading done before then, so I'll just get back on track after the test. I don't study because, he, there is probably something more educational on TV, and I really do need to see that rerun of "Designing Women" again. I don't ever get dressed. What's the point since I will be back in bed in a little over 14 hours? And I haven't seen campus in days, but that is OK because I remember what it looks like.
Somehow, though, I have to continue onward, despite the wall that I have hit and hit hard. I'll have to turn off the TV, get out of bed, get dressed and perhaps attend a class or two. I have five tests and two papers coming up, and I just don't think I'll be able to get out of them. Motivation is not a pretty word, but, sadly, I am in school to learn.
If I can just make it to Thanksgiving break, I am sure, well, hopeful, that things will get better. The wall will fade, and I will no longer be subject to its stifling force. I will manage to continue onward.
I would like to know, however, who decided that Thanksgiving should be celebrated on the FOURTH Thursday of November?
HUBIE
Kathy Kipa is a Woodridge, Ill., sophomore in English.
By Greg Hardin