Monday, Nov. 20, 1961 University Daily Kansan
Page 3
The Kansan on Elections
The Kansan does not usually comment on any criticism of its policies. However, when such sweeping attacks are made as the one on the Kansan's election recommendations in the Sound and Fury column on this page, the Kansan considers it necessary to reply.
THE WRITER OF THE SOUND AND FURY article questions the objectivity of the Kansan's staff because eight of the ten candidates it recommended were running on the VOX ticket. A related criticism is the attack on the Kansan's method of evaluation. The student points out that the Kansan spent only three hours interviewing 27 candidates.
The Kansan spent only three hours interviewing the candidates because they took only that long to answer the questions that were asked them. In some cases the candidate was uninformed about the issue a question was based on and could not offer an evaluation or opinion on it. Very often the candidates were able to answer quickly because they simply mouthed the party line on the issue.
The candidates were recommended on the basis of their interviews, past records and written statements on their reasons for running for office.
THE RECOMMENDATIONS REPRESENT the combined efforts of six Kansan executives. Each executive gave his recommendations to the editorial staff, which made the final decision in each case. Agreement among the Kansan executives on the best qualified candidates was almost unanimous.
The Kansan made its recommendations with a far greater knowledge of the candidates than the majority of students have and its recommendations were made on an objective basis. The
fact that eight of the ten candidates recommended were on the VOX ticket is an incidental result of the candidate-by-candidate evaluation the Kansan made.
The student also criticizes the Kansan's recommendation of candidates on the grounds that the issues involved in an election are more important than the candidates.
The Kansan agrees that the issues are important and the failure of both parties to deal adequately with them in their platforms was criticized in a Kansan editorial.
But the qualifications and ability of the candidates to deal with the issues is also important. It was this the Kansan was concerned with when it conducted its interviews with the candidates.
The Kansan realizes that for many people politics are to a large degree subjective in nature. Complete agreement with the Kansan by all members of the campus community is not expected, however objective Kansan coverage may be. But the Kansan is the only non-partisan source of information and evaluation of candidates most students have.
THE CHARGE OF INADEQUATE COVERAGE of parties, platforms (The Kansan printed the full texts of both platforms) and candidates (The Kansan gave background material on each candidate.) may seem justified to the writer because of an intense interest in campus politics. But the Kansan must cover many other topics and can devote only a certain amount of space to any one subject. If the writer had explained what is meant by "inadequate coverage," a more precise answer to this charge would be possible.
The Kansan will therefore continue what it regards as a sound and useful service to the campus.
The Editors
Seating Plan Criticized
Editor:
Since the ASC seems to relish a good investigation now and then, there is a particular branch of the University which I would like to recommend for its next inquiry. That is the ticket office for the KU athletic department.
I have two complaints, both of which I think are valid grounds for a lynching; however, I believe recognition of the problem is probably the best I can hope for.
Number one complaint is that the ticket office sold me a ticket for the KU-KS game that was directly in the middle of the Froshawk's section. Don't misunderstand, I liked the seat, until the usher stated very bluntly that if I didn't remove myself from the seat he would remove me from the stadium.
The second, and more serious complaint, is that when I ordered my parent's and friend's tickets for the KU-MU game the office assured me that I had ordered in time to secure good grandstand seats (I ordered July 26). Then, when the tickets arrived, I found they were for the un-reserved bleacher section. This, I think, is an injustice and does not make for good public relations.
I don't believe that I am the only person who has been offended by the ticket office's shaky methods of managing their business. Consequently, for my personal satisfaction, as well as for other KU fan's benefit, I would like to recommend an investigation.
Larry Shawhan Belton, Mo., sophomore
Red China Issue Restated Editor:
May I thank your reporter, Mr. Jerry Musil, for his generally accurate report on my remarks made after the YAF sponsored showing of "Red China Outlaw." There is however, one important point which I would like to rectify. I am quoted as terming the admission of Red China to the U.N. a dead issue "because Red China will eventually be admitted to the United Nations." This grossly distorts what I actually said. My statement did indeed term the admission as being a dead one. However the reason I gave was different from the one quoted in your story.
... Letters ...
I termed the issue dead, because the Chinese People's Republic will refuse to enter the U.N. as long as the Nationalist Government of Chiang Kai-shek remains in the U.N. with pretensions to be the representative of mainland China. Since the only way in which Communist China could be brought into the U.N. is by a general acceptance by Red China, Nationalist China, the Soviet Union, and the United States of a "Two China's Concept," and since all of the aforementioned governments are firmly committed to a non-acceptance of such a formula, the issue of Red China's admission is dead until some radical political change occurs which will completely alter the present impasse.
I therefore regard both of these issues as being dead for the time being. I did however say, in another context, that I believed that Red China would eventually be admitted to the U.N., whether we liked it or not. The reason is that the small nations of the world will feel safer with China in the U.N., where they hope to be able to control and influence her—especially after she becomes a nuclear power. This may however be a vain hope, since the U.S.S.R. seems to pay little attention to what the Afro-Asian bloc wants when she considers that her vital interests are involved.
THE UNITED STATES Congress and the platform of President Kennedy's Democratic Party both categorically reject Red China's admission as well as recognition of the regime. Recognition, incidentally is an equally dead issue, since the Chinese Communists would never recognize us, nor permit us to send an Ambassador to Peking until we evacuate what they call "our territory of Taiwan." There seems to be little if any likelihood, possibly for years to come, that the existing impediments to both recognition and admission will be eliminated.
CERTAINLY THERE IS no good argument for changing U.S. policy towards Red China's admission at the present time, unless Red China should be willing to give iron-clad guarantees as to the integrity of Taiwan. Taiwan has become the equivalent of the Berlin situation
in Asia. We have committed ourselves to the defense of Taiwan, and we must now defend it. There will be no recognition and no admission of Red China to the U.N. until the status of Taiwan is guaranteed. It is on these grounds that I oppose the recognition of Communist China, as well as her admission to the U.N. and consider these matters dead issues for the time being.
Klaus H. Pringsheim Instructor of Political Science
UDK Executive Criticized
(Editor's note: This is a letter mailed to the editor of the University of the Philippines, and the letter was also mailed to the editorial staff of the UDK. The guest by a UDK executive and dealt with the John Birch Society.)
I have just finished reading your guest editorial, "What to Expect" in reference to Bob Love's appearance on the campus Thursday night, November 16, 1961.
Editor:
The writer states "But it is unfortunate that they have wandered into a half-baked fight against a harmless foe; the Communist sympathizer." Get the implication — a harmless foe!
It so happens the United States is pouring out its wealth and blood to fight Communism, and here is a writer in a college paper saying that a Communist sympathizer is a "harmless foe." This is a treasonous statement and I'll let you judge where his sympathies are.
Russia is engaged in a fight to the finish with our country. This is it, and if we lose, the last vestige of freedom will disappear from this earth; and it will be a long, long struggle for our children and their children to regain it.
A college student who thinks so little of the values of his freedom, is proof of the failure of our schools to teach American history in its proper perspective. He has his freedom today because men had the will to fight and die for it before he was born. And he calls a sympathizer with our enemy a harmless foe!
How can your paper lend prestige to such writing as this?
Don C. Simpson
307 South Clifton
Wichita, Kan.
Sound & Fury
Kansan Criticized
When a Daily Kansan reporter attempts to write an article covering a lecture or book review, he often distorts things so that the speaker can only shudder. However, we non-journalism majors at KU realize that student reporters are getting the necessary training for future, competent journalism. When the Kansan's editors attempt to write profound editorials on international issues, or oppose an issue one semester and support it the next equally as vehemently, we readers again keep in mind the fact that journalism students, like the rest of us, must learn, and often only through practice and mistakes. But when the whole Kansan staff, apparently, collaborates cooly and calculatingly to defy basic standards of campus journalism, then I must protest. I am referring to the following standards; bi-partisanship, objectivity and neutrality in campus issues outside the editorial columns.
NOVEMBER 13 THE KANSAN stated that the "executives of the University Daily Kansan" had tried to determine which of the candidates were best qualified and advised the students accordingly. The excuse, er, reason, given was that most students can't get acquainted with their district candidates. Since when in democratic elections is it necessary for the voters to personally know their candidates? I always thought that the issues were most important. The media of communication should be the press, the UDK. Instead of telling, er, recommending, to us how to vote, why not improve the Kansan's inadequate coverage of the parties, platforms and candidates? Granted that most students probably don't read about national and international issues in newspapers and magazines. But the majority of students do, it's unquestionable, read the Kansan.
I believe that KU students have a right to know exactly who did the dictating, er, recommending. If they were students, why were they assumed to be more wise and capable of judging the candidates than their fellow students? Who were the people who made the recommendations? It seems unfair to me that a few individuals should have such a splendid opportunity to plug for their favorites and yet not have to identify themselves. I wonder if I could get equal time.
I'm also questioning the method used to evaluate the candidates. If only three hours were spent interrogating the twenty-seven, it means that each candidate received only 4.44 minutes of attention. Each candidate was supposedly questioned about five issues, thus giving him less than one minute to explain his position on each issue. Thoroughness seems to be lacking.
I'M WONDERING ABOUT the staff's objectivity. Of the ten candidates recommended, eight were from Vox. Since the platforms of both parties were of such similar quality, I hesitate to believe that one party's candidates were so superior to the other's.
Perhaps the majority of KU students are apathetic towards the election. But the majority of students don't vote!!! The minority that does vote has clear opinions about the issues and firm beliefs concerning student government. It must, or how else could these students muster up enough perseverance to last through the process of voting that only enrollment can vie with in terms of confusion and red tape? The fact that ten per cent of the ballots cast in the primaries were invalid testifies to the difficulty of voting in a KU campus election.
UNDOUBTEDLY, THE KANSAN was merely trying to help me make the correct choice between the candidates. It only succeeded in insulting me. I could little more resent the open booth and army-patrolled polls method. I am as familiar with the issues as the candidates and "executives" are and feel quite capable of voting without anyone's help. And I'm sure that I'm not the only proud person on campus.
Oh! I'm surprised that the Kansan dared to print all the pictures of the candidates. Aren't the "executives" afraid that we students will become distracted from the issues?
At the Movies
Rv Rill Charles
By Bill Charles.
"A Ration in the canyon"; with Sidney Politer and Claudia McNeil. Directed by Claudia Petrie. At the Varsity.
Lorraine Hansberry's hit play is a story of a Negro family living on Chicago's South Side and the effect of a $10,000 insurance check on its members. Underlying this is the question of money versus man's dignity.
THE SCREEN VERSION suffers from what is usually a fatal film disease; most of it looks like a play photographed from the balcony of a theater. The direction by Daniel Petrie is about as imaginative and pedestrian as film direction can be. One gets the impression that his sole objective was to record the action on film. He seems to have exerted no control over his actors, an omission which probably produced the gross overplaying so evident in the film.
The cast is effective, but overzealous. Poitier exhausted the
stockpile of arm gestures available to an actor and had to steal a couple from the repertoire of the pop singers. He looked much too much like a dark-skinned Marlon Brando. He is good, but his hambone is showing. As the family matriarch, Claudia McNeil is the best in the picture. Her acting lends solidarity to the film, although she has the least believable part.
EASILY THE BEST thing about the film is the screenplay by Miss Hansberry It is good enough to compensate for the below-par elements and make the film worthwhile. Except for the grandmother the characters are real and believable. They avoid being stock because their race permits a view of things from a fresh angle. The story is entertaining, thought-provoking, and often moving. It asks a valid question and gives an equally valid answer. It might make good case material for an urban people-to-people program.