1.
Opinion
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY Kansan
Published daily since 1912
Lindsey Henry, Editor Marc Harrell, Business manager Dave Morantz, Managing editor Colleen Eager, Retail sales manager Kristie Blasi, Managing editor Dan Simon, Sales and marketing adviser Tom Eblen, General manager, news advisor Justin Knupp, Technology coordinator
4A
Thursday, March 5, 1998
PHILADELPHIA DAILY NEWS
...
Feedback
Kansan coverage of BSU activities disappointing
The Black Student Union would like to address specific concerns that have been raised in regard to the article that was in The University Daily Kansan on Friday, Feb. 27.
Overwhelming disappointment was expressed to BSU after realizing that one of only two stories deemed worthy of the front page of the Kansan was concerning the indiscretion of a single, now emember, of BSU. In the last four weeks BSU has brought such men as Rep. Lloyd Daniels and Dennis Kimbro to the University of Kansas campus. There have been panel discussions on entrepreneurship, community events, as well as a poetry reading all to display just a few of the achievements of African Americans. However, only minimal attention was given to these events by the Kansan, each article receiving only small segments, most on the back page of the paper. It is disappointing that the hard work of so many BSU members can be overshadowed by the mistake of one. Hopefully in the future the Kansan can help to show an appreciation of the achievements of the University's minority organizations, proving it is a paper worthy of its past accomplishments.
Black Student Union General Council
New parking booth policy actually helps students
I am writing this letter in response to several articles which have run in The University Daily Kansas regarding the KU Parking Department and the KU Court of Parking Appeals. I am a KU law student and a Court of Parking Appeals judge. During the past two years I have become quite familiar with this system and would like to comment about it.
On Tuesday, Feb. 17, the Kansan
ran a front page article regarding the new proposal to fine students who run the traffic information booths. I would like to bring it to your attention that the University of Kansas Parking Rules and Regulations state that "during the hours when information stations are in operation, access to and parking on central campus shall require a campus access pass which shall be issued to persons who apply to the Parking Board justifying need for access."
Also contained in the regulations is a violation for no valid parking permit or other authorization for use of parking facilities. Therefore, one who runs these booths and illegally parks on campus could be ticketed. Also, Regulation 8.1 states that City of Lawrence ordinances shall cover specified moving violations on the University campus and may cover specified standing or parking violations on city streets within the campus. Therefore, one also could be ticketed for being in violation of Regulation 8.1. The students who deliberately run these booths should be thankful for the proposal, because it would give them essentially two free passes to break the law.
While I am writing, I would like to take the opportunity to address the editorial which was published in your paper last semester demonstrating a dissatisfaction with the KU Court of Parking Appeals. This editorial was completely off base on several points. The major points of this editorial were that the process of appealing a ticket takes a long time and a very small percentage of appeals submitted are actually granted.
First, if this court did not exist, KU students would have no recourse when they receive a violation that they believe to be unfair. The court is one of equity. In the fall of 1997, the court attempted to speed up the process by expanding the time when the court was in session to three nights per week. The undergraduate students expressed extreme displeasure to the Parking
Department, as they were not willing to give up their Friday nights. Also, another reason for the extreme backlog is that some students appeal merely to extend the time in which they must pay the fine.
As to the number of appeals granted, about 20 to 25 percent of the appeals submitted are granted. This number included both in-person appeals and written appeals. However, I personally grant about 50 percent of the appeals that I hear and many judges are predisposed to grant appeals. The reasons for denying appeals are numerous. When submitting an appeal, it is very important to include enough information so that we may be able to understand the situation. Include every detail, background, or anything of even remote importance. Even the slightest thing may be the deciding factor in your case. Many appeals are granted on a good faith basis, so tell us if there are any extenuating circumstances. If enough information is not provided, then we sometimes have no choice but to deny the appeal.
Diana C. Melrose Tampa, Fla., law student
Announcement, bikini ad placement contradictory
Two weeks ago The University Daily Kansan ran a small announcement regarding the celebration of International Women's Day this month. Right underneath it was a much larger advertisement for "Spring Break '98 Swimwear" emblazoned with a bikini-clad, impossibly thin — the photo literally stretched to make her look like this — and large breasted woman, arms clasped behind her head. Now, does any body see a contradiction here?
Associate professor of sociology
Bill Staples
Kansan staff
News editors
Paul Eakins ... Editorial
Andy Obermuehler ... Editorial
Andrea Albright ... News
Jodie Chester ... Nees
Julie King ... Nees
Charity Jeffries ... Online
Eric Weslander ... Sports
Harley Ratliff ... Associate sports
Ryan Koerner ... Campus
Mike Perryman ... Campus
Bryan Volk ... Features
Tim Harrington ... Associate features
Steve Puppe ... Photo
Angie Kuhn ... Design, graphics
Mitch Lucas ... Illustrations
Corrie Moore ... Wire
Gwen Olson ... Special sections
Lachel Rhoades ... Nees clerk
Advertising managers
Kristi Bisel . . . . . . Assistant retail, PR
Leigh Bottiger . . . . . Campus
Brett Clifton . . . . . Regional
Nicole Lauderdale . National
Matt Fisher . Marketing
Chris Hagharian . Internet
Brian Allers . Production
Ashley Bonner . Production
Andee Tomlin . Promotions
Dan Kim . Creative
Rachel O'Neill . Classified
Tyler Cook . Zone
Steve Grant. Zone
Jamie Holman . Zone
Brian LeFevre . Zone
Matt York . Zone
“Cat, *n*. A soft, indestructible automaton provided by nature to be kicked when things go wrong in the domestic circle.” —Ambrose Pierce
How to submit letters and guest columns
Letters: Should be double-spaced typed and fewer than 200 words. Letters must include the author's signature, name, address and telephone number plus class and home-town if a University student. Faculty or staff must identify their positions.
All letters and guest columns should be submitted to the Kansan newsroom, 111 Staufer-Flint Hall. The Kansan reserves the right to edit, cut to length or reject all submissions.
For any questions, call Paul Eakins (eakins@kansan.com) or Andy Obermueller (andyo@kansan.com) at 864-4810. If you have general questions or comments, e-mail the page staff (opinion@kansan.com) or call 864-4810.
Guest columns: Should be double-spaced typed with fewer than 700 words. The writer must be willing to be photographed for the column to run.
Race against time, other people, not important
Nick Zaller
opinion@kansan.com
Perspective
Jack Handy recently had an enlightening experience and indirectly shared it with me via forwarded e-mail. Handy described his experience as follows:
But maybe it would be good if we could freeze time. We could stop what we are doing and look at everything that's going on around us. Maybe we would realize that time should not dictate how we live our lives. We should live life one day at a time and do what we love to do, no matter how long it takes us.
"As the light changed from red to green to yellow and back to red again, I sat there thinking about life. Was it nothing more than a bunch of honking and yelling? Sometimes it seemed that it was."
There was a TV show in the 1980s in which a woman found a strange medallion in her flower garden that stopped time every time she yelled "shut up." If some people had that medallion and froze time, then they might go crazy. Their life would no longer have any meaning. We are so dependent on time to provide meaning to our existence that we would be utterly lost without it.
And I wonder in all of our racing to get ahead in this world, who or what will be waiting at the finish line for the winner? Will the winner ever tell us all what he or she
wins? Or will the rest of us continue to live our lives in the dark, not knowing the lucrative prizes that we would have won if we had just bumped a few more cars off the road and edged our way past a few more people.
But time is an inexorable force that we cannot control. We are given only a minute slice of time, so we have to make the best of it and achieve our goals before we die. The race goes on, and it is not only a competition against humans, but against time. We seem to think we have a good chance of beating both. So hurry up, you cannot afford to be late. There is nothing for those who don't win.
There is never enough time to take a step back, breathe in the air and just chill out for awhile. This puts you behind in the race. We always are stressed out about something. Either we like what is going on and are stressed about maintaining it, or we dislike what is going on and we are stressed about changing it. Always on the go, we cannot ever stop or slow down.
Never blink or you will miss something important. Never keep your eyes shut or you will run off the road and be so far behind in the race that you will not be able to catch up. We are caught in between people leaning out of their windows, yelling at us to watch where we are going, and people honking at us to hurry up.
The screaming has become cacophonous. Hate or love, war or peace, death or life, your place or mine? We can't decide about
anything and so we yell and scream until we force our voices to be heard over the reviving of the engines of society. And as we nudge past a few more people, getting closer to victory lane, do we ever look back at the experiences that we have just raced through, or are we just putting the petal to the metal?
Perhaps we should stop trying to manipulate time to our advantage. We are only fooling ourselves. So the next time there is someone in front of you sitting through a traffic light, stop yelling and honking, take a deep breath and think about why you are in such a hurry — but not too long. I wouldn't want you to finish in second place.
Zeller is a Tulsa, Okla., senior in microbiology and Chinese.
Caring parents defined by actions, not by blood ties
1 One of them is a journalist—something I hope to be. The other is the director
have two of the best parents in the world.
And they're both women.
of a community center in West Dallas, which is one of the city's most impoverished areas.
Rufus
Coleman
opinion kansan.com
Nancy, the journalist,
is the eclectic one with
an obsession for I Love
Lucy, Star Trek and a
love of writing features
about weird pets. Her
last one was a retired
movie star horse.
She is also the one who
taught me how to write and to drive — both dangerous and difficult tasks.
Sarah is the practical one
They're the ones who remember my birthday and send a box of clothes I'm too cheap to buy for myself. They're the ones who provide a warm bed, popcorn and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington when I have no place to stay.
The person who makes sure I have an unbearably large winter coat and money to eat. She is the disciplinarian I hate telling about my 'C' in political science or the credit card bill I'll be paying.
Time and time again they have been there for me.
She is also the one who tells me to go to church, to study and to eat my vegetables.
These women are not my parents by blood, but by action.
They're the ones who listened to my complaints and heartache about the last break up or wipe away my tears after the death of
my grandmother.
They're the ones who teach me to give because there are so many people in this world besides myself.
And when I stumble through the trial and error of my own marriage, I often ask myself. "What would Sarah say?" "How would Nancy deal with this?"
They are my two moms and, as I grow older, my two friends.
Their marriage of action, but not law, is something I hope to have. After what seems like forever to me they still find the time to work on their ragged cabin and make dinner together.
When I go home to Dallas for Christmas or Thanksgiving, they're the family I go home to.
They are so ordinary it is spooky and so extraordinary it is blissful. They are the parents I look forward to seeing, no matter how bad my grades are.
Even as they disapproved of my early marriage, they opened their arms to that someone I loved.
They've been the best parents I ever could have wanted.
Rufus Coleman is a Dallas junior in journalism.
Whether they were holding my hand on the first day of college or supporting me when my first newspaper column was published, they were there. And when it was time to accept the award for that column or to walk across the stage for my high school graduation, they were there. I don't think a child could ask for anything more.
At a time when my blood parents were no where to be found and the one stable parent in my life died, they stepped up to the task and continuously proved to be more-than-qualified.
Feedback
Effect of air strike not considered in column
Tim Harrington's column about the Iraqi situation confuses me. He says that he has a "peace-loving, flower-child, pacifist streak" that leaves him reluctant to agree that the U.S. should jump into conflict. Later, however, Harrington says that "we may yet have to commit to the ultimate sacrifice, and give up a few hundred or a few thousand of our brightest and most dedicated, and undoubtedly kill a few thousand or a few
million Iraqis."
Harrington uses the rationale that Saddam Hussein is too dangerous to ignore, that the chemical weapon factor may yet push us to a justifiable war. What Harrington ignores is that air attacks on the chemical plants could unleash an ecological nightmare in the Middle East. We killed more than 100,000 Iraqis in the Gulf War, many of them casualties of our surgically precise air strikes. Further, the sanctions that we helped impose since the war have indirectly killed thousands of children, even as Saddam
padded his image of defiance against Western intruders.
I agree that Saddam is an evil man. But the idea that we need to punish him by raining our supposedly new and improved missiles on the chemical plants is wrong. I trust that the U.N. agreement holds. In the meantime, the U.S. should listen to the world community, except for Britain, and continue down the diplomatic track.
Duane Wagler Partridge graduate student