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University Daily Kansan Wednesday, Dec. 18, 1963
Nixon Again?
In politics, as in high school football, Richard Milhous Nixon has spent most of his political career sitting on the bench.
A man whose very nature makes defeat unacceptable has found it crammed down his throat at every major political crossroads he has faced in life.
"I'll be a lawyer nobody can bribe," he had said.
At the age of four, his mother reports, Nixon the child expressed an interest in politics.
THIRTY-NINE years later he was appearing on television before 58 million Americans to explain about an $18,235 gift to his expense fund from three Californians.
In any other case, the situation would have been dismissed as a simple case of three businessmen buying themselves a senator. But Nixon the man was not to be dismissed easily.
He emerged as the honest sincere young senator striving to bring his warning of Communist infiltration to the American people.
THE IMAGE emerged tarnished but unbroken. For Nixon always sought to convey an image to the American people, and the incident had left an odor of slick politics. He picked up the nickname "Tricky Dick." It was time to change the image.
In 1956, Nixon put on a new face. The "New Nixon" was dedicated to Eisenhower, to moderation, to his party, and to the nation. Time magazine said the "New Nixon" would rise to "a new and impressive stature in his party and his country."
Dwight D. Eisenhower said Nixon had committed an "error of judgment." Political scientists later were to call it an amazing piece of humbuggery.
Nixon's position on political issues was always elastic. He straddled the fence wherever he could and was proclaimed chief "me tooe."
ONLY IN PARTISAN politics did Nixon always go the limit. In 1956 he praised Republican advances in the field of civil rights and called Earl Warren "a great Republican Chief Justice" who has ordered "an end to racial segregation in the nation's schools."
the Supreme Court into sidewalk politics by the outlandish claim."
Again Nixon's political pot boiled over and spoiled the carefully polished image. Politicians and editors screamed at the assault on justice. The Washington Daily News said he had "dragged
"I intentionally don't lose my temper when other people are angry," Nixon had said in discussing the South American riots in Lima and Caracas where his life was threatened. His rule of thumb was that to get angry was the greatest error that could be made in politics.
BUT THE VENEER was wearing thin, and Nixon had plenty of other errors to keep the critics busy.
Sen. Robert A. Taft called him "a little man in a big hurry."
Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn had said in 1954, "As far as we are concerned, his name is mud." The statement followed the Vice-President's brush with the treason issue.
Columnist Walter Lippmann had said: "A man who will exploit for partisan purposes such a decision of the Supreme Court does not have within his conscience those scruples which the country has the right to expect in the President of the United States."
IN 1960, Nixon was pitted against a man who laid the issues on the line. John F. Kennedy, Democratic presidential nominee, would not allow Nixon to mount the fence during the television debates that year.
Nixon the man squirmed and perspired. The veneer of the image cracked with that 1960 defeat and later split wide open when Gov. Pat Brown beat Nixon in the 1962 governorship race. The man lost his image, as well as his temper. He was tagged as a loser, and a sore one at that.
At best, Nixon's major accomplishment was to strengthen and develop the Vice-President's role in our government, an important mission but not enough to make a President.
AND THAT is what Nixon has attempted to do—manufacture a President, a self-image that would coincide with the qualifications needed for the highest office in the land.
Nixon lacks not qualifications but quality. But who knows? The public's memory is short. Already Nixon's name is being mentioned for the 1964 Presidential nomination.
Perhaps Nixon will yet live up to the family name, a Gaelic mutation of the words "he faileth not."
— Rose Ellen Osborne
Editor:
The People Say...
By common consent, all Americans regard the assassination of President John F. Kennedy as a deplorable tragedy. However, some Americans regard the period of national mourning as tragic and unnecessary. Some students, as evidenced by letters appearing in the Kansas the last week, regard the cancellation of classes and the postponement of a football game as entirely unnecessary.
I reject this attitude for several poignant reasons. First, it was not only the death of one man, but also a stab at the American system of democracy. His death reflected a moral weakness and decay in the United States; consequently, a brief halt to the normal business of the country was proper, not only out of respect to John Kennedy, but also to allow Americans the opportunity to unite, temporarily to forget political differences, and to assess the changes imposed on the life of the country by this tragedy.
Second, it was altogether fitting and proper that classes were cancelled. That Monday was a day of unforgettable history; it seemed as
Daili Hansan
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if a page of a history book had become stark reality. Consequently, the cancellation of classes allowed KU students to witness the shocking, tragic events of that infamous weekend. The cancellation of classes was not a mistake, for on that day, one could learn more through mass media than he could in the classroom.
Third, the postponement of the KU-MU football game was a wise and respectful decision. All who argue that the game should not have been postponed have implied that the decision to postpone the game cost many people time and money. While this is undoubtedly true, the fact remains that most citizens felt that playing the game on that day was not only a sacrilege to the memory of the late President, but also an obstacle to the spirit of unity and national and personal reverence which the country so desperately needed.
Fourth, the normal business of the country did not simply stop when the President died. Lyndon Johnson, sworn into office less than two hours after Kennedy's death, immediately grasped the reins of government, smoothing the transition between Presidential administrations.
Thus, with respect to our martyred President, Americans steadfastly marched into the murky reality of the future.
Tragedy, inevitably, disrupts normal business. Americans should be willing to make the small personal sacrifice of time and money necessary to understand the awesome tragedy of that Black Friday.
It was altogether fitting and proper that we respectfully and resolutely commemorated the awesome, realistic significance of that event.
John Toland Iola sophomore
Part of Each Editor:
I am certain that the majority of the students and faculty members concurred with the administration's decision, regardless of personal inconveniences. The cancellation of activities for the period during which the nation mourned the loss of a president went much deeper that the formal observation of ceremony. The people who filled Hoch Auditorium for the convocation were expressing their feeling of responsibility for the passing of a man who, as a symbol of our democracy, was part of each citizen.
I feel several points should be made in reference to the letters of Mr. Wood and Mr. Hill Dec. 9.
There would have been something fundamentally wrong with a moral and intellectual institution which could not diverge from its schedule to recognize the very human senses of regret and sorrow which touched every American.
Maudlin sentimentality should be met with cynicism, and hysterical emotionalism should be tempered with down-to-earth, materialistic optimism. However, Mr. Hill and Mr. Wood have been seriously mistaken in regarding a dignified manifestation of human grief as "unnecessary."
"Reality is here," as Mr. Hill so unequivocally stated. True, football games, examinations and time and money are part of this reality. However, my time at the University has only made me more certain that decency, and compassion, and pity, are also parts of reality. To deny the expression of these qualities is to ignore the reason for existence.
James K. Campbell Paola senior
"Onward! ——— Help! I've Been Stabbed!"
Film Depicts the Evil Inherent in Mankind
By Byron Leonard
("Lord of the Flies," which Peter Brook adapted from the William Golding novel and directed, will run through Tuesday at the Varsity Theatre.)
Man has always been fascinated by himself and more courageous souls have ventured to put forth what they believed to be his "true nature." It has never been agreed what this nature is or even whether man has one.
William Golding revealed an interest in the nature of man in his novel "Lord of the Flies," in which, by his depiction of a group of young schoolboys stranded on an island, gave an indication of the potential for evil which he felt was inherent in man.
PETER BROOK, in his film treatment, has remained remarkably faithful (though this need not necessarily be a virtue) to the content and purpose of the book, but without sacrificing a cinematic approach to it. The basic simplicity of Golding's novel allowed Brook to rely heavily on visual images. The dialogue was thus kept simple and natural, and was not allowed to become intrusive.
Though the film lacks the book's insistent symbolism and the philosophical implications are in some ways less explicit, the film's presentation of the boys' descent into savagery is powerful and uncompromising. Brook has presented scenes like the killing and eating of the pig or the frenzied murder of Simon without hesitating.
THE TOTAL EFFECT of the film (and its effect is considerable, despite familiarity with the novel) is due largely to two aspects: the handling of the children and the photography. Drawing upon children without acting experience, Brook chose a cast that could hardly have been equalled and his handling of the boys can only be considered masterful. Such sensitive and realistic presentation of children is rarely encountered. The boys are at all times believable as children, rather than as child-actors trying to act like children.
Despite certain unpleasant aspects of the film (it is obviously not intended as escape entertainment) the photography is exceptionally beautiful. Brook makes considerable and very expressive use of close-ups, catching the often subtle display of feeling on the faces of the boys.
THE FILM AS a whole tends to be rather slowly paced and episodic. In structuring the film as he did, Brook has placed the burden of interpretation largely on the spectator. He has given him time to think about what he is seeing and to decide for himself what conclusions may or may not be drawn. Brook presents Golding's fable of evil simply and directly and without imposing any interpretation.
BOOK REVIEWS
THE SATIRES OF JUVENAL, translated by Hubert Creekmore (Mentor, 75 cents)Here is a new translation of a celebrated classic, one which the translator, Hubert Creekmore, views as "disturbingly applicable to contemporary life." All 16 of the Juvenal satires are made available—commentaries on the sexual and philosophical perversions of men, the hazards of life in either the palace or the slum, the humiliations on native Romans by the new rich, the condition of men of learning, the foibles of women, the evils of wealth and the prevalence of homosexuality.
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