Opinion
Page 4 University Daily Kansan, March 12, 1981
And it's on to Wichita
By winning the Big Eight post-season basketball tournament last weekend, the Kansas Jayhawks proved they were the best team in the Big Eight. But they have yet to prove they're the best team in the state.
This weekend, as the NCAA tournament's field of 48 teams is whitted to 16, KU will play one—or hopefully two—games in Wichita's Henry Levitt Arena. Beware, hometown favorite Wichita State also will be a participant at the Wichita subregional.
Arizona State and Iowa, the teams' second-round opponents, may prevent such a matchup, there still is a possibility that the two Kansas schools may play.
The Shockers have long wanted to play KU, but the folks on Mount Oread have steadfastly refused. If both teams win their next two games, the Jayhawks will have no choice but to play Wichita State. Although
Wichita State won the Missouri Valley Conference regular-season title and has a formidable front line. A KU-Wichita State matchup would be good for the state, despite a reluctance on the part of many KU students and alumni.
New Orleans. It seems a faraway place for KU to prove it's the best team in the state. But don't be shocked if it works out that way.
Fortunately for the Jayhawks, a KU-Wichita State game—at least this year—would not be played in Wichita. Instead the game would be played in New Orleans, site of the 1981 NCAA Midwest Regional.
Black, white living standards becoming even more unequal
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By ROBERT S. ENGLAND New York Times Special Features
NEW YORK—The gap between the living standards of white and black people in the United States is wider today than it was when the civil movement gained momentum in the early 1960s.
The ushering in of a new age of legal equality between the two races has been followed by a decade, 170 to 1980, of losses in the struggle for economic equality.
This development is particularly disappointing in light of the large spending programs for social welfare and equal opportunity that began with the work of Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society program.
The bridge of understanding between the races that was built in the 1960s seems to be in disrepair, too. Gone are the days of hope that followed the enactment of stronger voting-right laws, the court initiatives to end separate-but equal education and the dawn of federal policies aimed at giving blacks a better chance to catch up to whites.
Although many have attributed the declining fortunes of blacks to the severe national economic problems of the last decade, the small economic gains that whites have made in the same period suggest that our national, state and local policies are failing to address the problem of inequality adequately.
It has become clear to just about everyone that some of the basic precepts of liberalism seem to have been off-target, in spite of liberals' good intentions.
A psychological barrier to blacks' progress is a misconception in 1960s civil rights liberalism that first appeared among whites and later was accepted by some blacks. The whites argued that blacks were not responsible for their plight in the white-collar job market, and that their inability to rise out of poverty and find a better life. Society was to be blamed; they said; some even called our society sick.
While the power of this indictment helped shatter the conservative rationale that those who actually try can overcome poverty, it has had some unintended side effects.
It slighted the fact that many blacks have indeed risen out of poverty since colonial times—those who bought their way out of slavery by labor; those who fled to freedom; those free blacks who made their way in the world after the Emancipation Proclamation. The liberals' argument is that in it that viewed black people as helpless—a view that in itself is a form of racism.
The new message from liberals in the 1960s
affected segments of the black population differently. Those who had been held back by legal and non-legal racial barriers took heart and struggled harder to overcome them.
An important visible minority of blacks has become very successful since then. A very large second group has risen into the middle class. Yet, at least half, and possibly more, of America's blacks are economically worse off than they were.
These blacks, the "hard core" as they are now called, reacted differently to the whites' message that society is to blame for the plight of the black man and woman. Since, in fact, society forces blacks to work harder than whites to "make it," some, accepting the stereotype of inner-city hopelessness, found it too easy to blame "Whitey" and excuse themselves.
And since the degree of work required to "make it" is, of course, considerable, the hard knocks and the lifetime efforts that are taken have taken their toll of ambitions and energies.
Further, the unrealistic expectation, propagated by liberals, that blacks trapped in a cycle of poverty can extricate themselves from it quickly by the infusion of federal money is wrong. Spending that is not accompanied by a stronger commitment by white employers and white neighbors to judge black people as individuals on their own merit will not work.
Morover, if only a few whites drop their prejudices, the effect is not sufficient. Rather, what is needed to break the psychological barrier that holds our nation back is a general improvement in racial attitudes across the whole population.
Further improvement in racial relations is possible. It must be preceded, among whites and blacks, by a clearer understanding of the task at hand.
Society must re-emphasize the role of individual effort in altering one's fortunes. As the conservatives note, self-help has been the traditional mode of success. It must, however, be accompanied by blacks' patience with their slow progress, for results do not appear overnight.
Black people have taken the initiative with efforts such as those of the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, head of Operation PUSH, which are aimed at instilling a sense of purpose in individuals whose vision is limited and trapped by the ghetto world they experience.
And, too, whites who have given up their own hopes that blacks can improve their lot and live equally with other Americans must re-examine the reality of their situation that impatience carries racial condescension.
Robert S. England writes frequently on public- policy issues.
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By ABRAHAM BRUMBERG New York Times Special Features
New attitude could ease Poland woes
WASHINGTON-Since September, the news from Poland has followed a consistent pattern: Mounting confrontations between workers and the party, peasants and the party, students and the party, followed by last-minute negotiation and compromises.
Similarly, the reaction in Washington has been consistent: As the clouds gather, doom-laden predictions of a Soviet invasion fill the air; when the predictions fall to come true, officals and newspaper columnists offer not yet "get" gone but in time for sure.
An attitude that in effect invests the idea of Soviet military intervention with legitimacy is profoundly reprehensible. And the complacent assumption—usually referred to as the "worst-case scenario"—that an invasion untreatable is "not only morally repugnant, but destroys our perception of the complex processes that have been unfolding in Poland.
To begin with, we should recognize that Poland is different, that its upheaval is historically unique, and that the Soviet leaders know this. What we are seeing is not at first glance as good as 1956, aimed at overthrowing the regime and extracting the country from the Soviet orbit.
We are not seeing a revolt of a party confident, as the Czech reformists in 1968, that "socialism with a human face" is devoutly to be wished, and therefore commuted, in Czechoslovakia and in the Soviet Union. Rather, we are seeing a movement of more than 35 million determined workers, intellectuals, peasants, professionals, students, and even civilian employees of the armed forces.
The movement enjoys the support of the Roman Catholic Church and of influential lay Catholic groups. In the movement's ranks are nearly a million party members. Its goal is not merely to obtain economic betterment but, essentially, fashion a new order by existing the existence of a multiplicity of autonomous social groups with the rule of a single political party.
How is the new relationship between the society and the political authorities to be forged? Only by continuous dialogue and negotiated settlements, and only, as Warsaw radio put it candidly the other day, if the nation would announce new policies and then expecting the nation "obediently to listen and pretend that it had been convinced."
A movement of this nature is not likely to succumb to intimidations or to submit peacefully to a foreign invader—which is, of course, we may be sure, Moscow also is aware of.
In recent months, voices in the highest party echelons have urged an end to the "old habits," pleading for a genuine "partnership" as the only way to avert confrontations that might indeed temp Moskow to seek to establish "order" by force of arms.
Yet many observers in Washington, obsessed with the "worst-case scenario," have paid little attention to them. Fortunately, Solidarity has stood its ground and the voices of realism have prevailed—at least for the time being.
The new prime minister, Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski, has asked for a three-month moratorium on strikes to allow the government to work with the social dialogue within a defused atmosphere.
The new deputy prime minister, Mieczyslaw Rakowski, who in his previous presidency has called for a nuclear deal.
urged the authorities to treat their "partners" with "respect," reiterated his plea in the Sjep (Parliament). He also urged speedy enactment of the new bill liberalizing censorship whose "intolerable" delay had caused bitter resentment in the country.
Other speakers fully supported the workers' and peasants' demands, and criticized the government's recent strident attacks on the "anti-socialist elements," especially the Social Self-Defense Committee, known as Kor.
In response, the unions have indicated readiness to accept the moratorium—as long as the government keeps its share of the bargain.
And in a remarkable interview in a Warsaw daily, Solidarity's press spokesman—himself a Kor member—praised Gen. Jurzelski's speech, pointedly stressing that only a "strong government" capable of taking even "unpopular measures" while fully "respecting Solidarity as a partner" could end Poland's political and economic chaos.
Of course, no one can predict the outcome of these complex processes. Negotiations may again break down, spawning new and even more dangerous crises. And any assumption that they will occur under no circumstances intervene is as absurd as the confident assertion that it will.
But the West can help—not by issuing somber warnings that the workers and others "cool it" lest they be overrun by foreign tanks, but by helping them and their allies—above all, by providing desperately needed economic aid—to bring an increasing measure of democracy, prosperity and stability to their troubled land.
Abraham Brumberg, former editor of the journal, Problems of Communism, is a visiting fellow at the John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.
Tourney tickets scarce for Kansas fans
It's time for a quiz. You're probably fed up with exams about this time of year, but this one was not.
Q: Which of the following is most difficult?
A. Passing a camel through the eye of a needle.
B. Making an "A" on your English midterm.
C. Getting a ticket to KU's sub-regional basketball game at Wichita State University this Friday
If you were one of the more than 250 people who waited outside the athletic ticket office at Allen Field House on Monday, you probably chose answer C.
“What Luck,” most Jayhawk fans probably had thought when the NCAA announced that KU would play its preliminary rounds at Wichita. But the game will see them see the game and cheer our dear Jayhawks on.”
So you and a buddy were numbers 101 and 102, or something like that. Bummer. You feel like you deserved those tickets. After all, you've invested a lot in the 'Hawks—$15 for a season ticket. Wednesday and Saturday nights for the past five months. The price of maybe 100 beers, dwned in celebration after winning games and in consolation after losses.
"What a disappointment," many fans ended up thinking when KU ticket officials had counted off the 100 students who would be allowed to purchase seats.
Before you start getting really mad and blaming everybody from Darnell Valentine to your mother for this calamity, you'd better understand how the tickets are distributed. A basic primer in the allocation of precision labels, namely sub-regional basketball tickets.
Now you're going to be rooting from your couch or the stool of a local bar, and it just won't work.
The tickets must be sold for an average minimum price of $9.
all needed them this year, so they were divided up equally, and each school got 125.
It all starts with the NCAA. It's their tournament, so they get to decide who gets how many tickets. NCAA guidelines stipulate that each participating school gets 20 for each student in the pool of 500 tickets that the schools can divvy up according to need. Well, WSU, KU, Mississippi and Southern
What the schools do with their 375 previous tickets is up to them. Here, students in general
JUDY
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got 100, slightly less than one third of the total attendance. According to sports information director Larson, this reflects the fact that he one-third of the regular season ticket holders are students.
Thirty-five tickets go to the pep band, because we couldn't have a basketball game without the sweet refrain of "I'm a Jayhawk" in the background. The rest go to Williams Fund contributors, alumni, officers of the players, coaches and other assorted athletic biewigs.
Now here's the tricky part. It's like a grade school math problem. Henry Levitt Arena at WSU holds 10,600. After you take out 375 for each class, 9,100 tickets remain. Who gets those?
Again, the NCAA stipulates that the host institution—in our case, it was WSU—gets to determine how these are distributed. Margie Dersi, a student at NC State, said last November, the WSU season ticket holders
and boosters had the first option. After Dec. 2,
tickets were fair game for anybody.
As Deral puts it, she doesn't care who gets the tickets, as long as somebody buys them. You just need to buy a ticket.
"The people who get really irate," she said, "are the ones who wait, the ones who want to be nice when people show up."
It doesn't seem fair. Fans are disappointed. KU Coach Ted Owens probably is disappointed. Knockout best of us, he thought having the game in Wellesley was better than not giving our fans an extra opportunity to be there."
In other words, he who hesitates doesn't get a ticket.
Well, you could get angry at the NCAA and say they should make more tickets available to participating schools. But what if the KU game were, say, in Austin? There's a chance that KU would win, which would be on the campus and the University of Texas, which has a bigger arena, would be left holding the bag. er. tickets.
So what do you do if you don't get a ticket? You plunk yourself down on the couch with a beer and watch a lousy black-and-white TV with no horizontal hold. You feel sorry for yoursef.
But you also feel hopeful. If the 'Hawks win Friday, you just may have a shot at one of the tickets for Sunday. (The ticket office here hasn't decided how they' be distributed yet, though.)
What's more, if they win Sunday, they get to play in the Louisiana Superdome, which could hold more than 30,000. And according to the headline, KU would give a whole 759 tickets for that one. AKA.
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