OPINION
The University Daily KANSAN
March 22,1984 Page 4
The University Daily KANSAN
Published since 1889 by students of the University of Kansas
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Signals conflict
Carlyle's definition should be altered. Economics is also the confused science.
Conflicting reports on the nation's economy filter through the media every day. And with the contradicting signals, even the most experienced economists are bewildered to the point of inaction.
More Americans are employed than ever before. Yet the nation also has more impoverished citizens than it has since the 1960s.
This week, the Reagan administration swelled with pride again. New signs indicated that the economy is recovering from the recession.
But along with those signals, several of the nation's larger banks raised their interest rates, and inflation jumped by about 4 percent.
Some people point with good reason to the huge federal deficit, forecasting a resurgence of high interest rates and high unemployment within the year.
With this, though, economists such as Milton Friedman say that the high deficits do not have the tremendous import many other economists say they do.
But Friedman and the economic weathermen who do not see federal deficits as a significant force cannot so lightly dismiss the public demand for deficit reduction.
Last week, when Reagan reported that he would accept certain deficit-trimming measures, investors showed their approval by trading heavily, a sign that investor confidence, indicative of a fully recovering economy, hinges on cutting deficits.
With all of the economic contradictions, there is only one conclusion to draw: complete recovery requires investor confidence through lowering deficits.
And in this age of confusion and contradiction, that may be too much to hope for.
Security is excessive
Pity the average neck-craning tourist, slowly cruising past the White House. The ordinary citizen had better not stop for a second glance if he knows what is good for him.
Earlier this week, a woman was sent to a mental institution for such behavior. A captain in the Secret Service said it "didn't seem like normal action."
New security efforts had gone into effect the day the woman was stopped and removed from her green Pinto station wagon after nervous uniformed agents shattered her car window. All this for doing little more than stopping her car at several White House gates.
Indeed it might be abnormal for a private citizen to stop her car several times while going past an ordinary city resident's house.
But this was the president's house — the house where people wait for
But the incident is still disturbing.
But with the assassination attempt on the president, increased terrorism around the world, and an occurrence last week where a man apparently aimed a shotgun at Secret Service guards outside the White House, there is reason for increased safeguards.
But the incident is still disturbing. Overzealous security guards should realize that while the right to gawk at the White House may not be stated as such in the Constitution, in a free society such as ours, it shouldn't have to be spelled out.
End of winter's chill
Earlier in the week people wandering through a winter wonderland of ice may have had little hope.
But spring has finally arrived.
The season did not ease itself upon us with bright bursts of green or long afternoons of warm sun.
Instead, spring slowly announced its arrival. Crocuses poked their heads up through the soil ever so slightly as if testing the temperatures.
But Mother Nature did not want us to take her handiwork too lightly, and she sent us a sharp reminder not to look ahead to spring until winter had ended.
The ice storm came and removed any doubt that each season has its unique beauty.
The glistening coat of ice quickly melted away and with it, the magical spell it had cast. The handiwork of glaze that gave tree branches a hand-dipped look that even a skilled maker of fine chocolates would have difficulty reproducing was gone.
Spring offers hope of a more gentle season. Afternoons of sunshine stretch out the days and even early risers are treated to light skies and the songs of birds.
And if the storm made some of us a bit disgruntled, the situation was at least tolerable when we recalled that the harsher season was behind us.
A new season has arrived and winter, having had its grand finale, should take its final bow.
The University Daily Kanan welcomes letters to the editor. Letters should be typewritten, double-spaced and should not exceed 300 words. They should include the writer's name, address and phone number. If the writer is affiliated with the University, the letter should include his class and home town or faculty or staff position. The Kanan also invites individuals to submit a post-fellowship Columns and letters can be mailed or brought to the Kanese office, 111 Stauffer Flint Hall. The Kanese reserves the right to edit or reject letters and columns.
LETTERS POLICY
Vietnam button is a reminder
"What is that? What's it mean?" my friend said as she peered at the blue and white button on my coat.
"It says 'KU Vietnam Memorial.'"
"I know what it says," she said.
"But what does it mean? Why are you wearing it?"
I was a little taken aback by the question.
"It, uh, it means that I support the memorial."
the way she asked it, and in the silence that followed my answer, there was disapproval.
"Oh."
My friend didn't say anything more about the subject, but later on, I began to think about her question and I felt as though I was answering another question followed. Why?
In the four and a half years that I have attended the University of Kansas, I have never displayed any interest in college or campaigned for any candidate.
This is partly because, as a journalism student, I am trained in objectivity — partly because nothing has ever moved me to action — the only kind of activism that I've engaged in is voting.
On the button.
I also kept thinking about my friend's question because implied in
It was something like the response of another acquaintance who, after reading the button, said, "Oh, I bought it was something important.
Those attitudes bothered me, because neither of those people
MICHAEL ROBINSON
Staff Columnist
really wanted to know why I wear that button. To each of them, it said something that they disagreed with or weren't interested in. But for me, it was important to answer the question.
For me, the button is a reminder.
It reminds me that 55,000 U.S. students live in Vietnam. I want to remember that, though many people don't.
Some are bitter because they see the Vietnam War as a time when disruptive elements at home deter civilians from the nation and prevented victory.
For others, it was a time when the United States turned its back on its ideals and values, and supported corruption and repression in the
And for many in my generation, Vietnam is one of those ghostly words — like Watergate that hovers somewhere in the past between John Kennedy and Jimmy Carter.
But Vietnam is real to me, not just because I grew up listening to body counts on television, fearing that my oldest brother would be drafted, or even because my father, a career officer, fought and was wounded there.
I remember Vietnam because of those things and more: a belief that the past lives in all of us, whether we know it or not; a realization that we wouldn't be the nation we are if we hadn't been the nation we were
The Vietnam War was a mistake. We were wrong about the nationalist movement there and what it was
trying to do. To us, Vietnam was a domino in a row, but to the Vietnamese, both north and south, it was their country, a country we didn't understand.
But the need for a Vietnam Memorial here goes beyond the lessons of history. To me, this is a memorial not to a war, but to men.
That's something we need to be reminded of, and it's part of the reason we need the memorial. Nations, as well as individuals, can learn more from failures and mistakes than they can from victories.
It is not a glorification of battles, but a recognition of those who went to fight them, believing that they would gain great good of their families and their rights.
Someone said, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." An easier way to say that now is "Vietnam."
So I believe that the KU Vietnam Memorial is a good idea, even though the war wasn't I'll support it. But it's very easy that I can I won't forget
And I'll keep on wearing the button.
MOUSE
MICE
MEESE
Preparing students for the real world
Two weeks ago, one of my professors expressed concern about her teaching methods.
She thought that perhaps she concentrated too much on making her students "marketable" for employers, and not enough on
HARRY MALLIN
Staff Columnist
teaching the subject. I almost strangled her.
Finally, a professor is willing to admit a real world exists. Most teachers end up reading the text and then to us in 50-minute monologues.
I was afraid that I would be handed my diploma and shoed into the cold world without any practical training. Thank goodness there are employers who want to act as surrogate employers until we meet the real ones head on.
I got a chance to test what I had learned in this class when interviewing with one of those real employers last week. Thanks to this professor, I was able to sound as if I knew the subject well and wasn't just a tenderfoot. The interview was successful.
Other professors merely wanted me to tell them what they already
I've learned a lot in my four- and-a-half years at the University of Kansas. Dusty diatribes, spotted by dust professors, were memorized and regurgitated for tests. From them, I learned the art of short-term memorization.
knew, in five pages, typewritten. The catch was that I had to tell it to them in the same way they had told it to me. Creativity was wrong. From them, I learned to compromise my creativity for an "A."
To some professors, creativity was all that mattered. Craft and style were ignored. I learned, too late, to avoid these professors.
And finally, here's a professor who wants to prepare me for reality instead of stuffing me full of gray hair. I almost didn't know how to handle it.
But it made me realize that most of the knowledge that I have gained and, more importantly, retained was from outside. It has been from outside the classroom.
It may sound as if I hate school. I don't. Enjoy learn to see those dusty professors fret and strut their few minutes in front of me.
But the best thing about college is
the intellectual atmosphere. In our bubble of academia, we can say almost anything to each other without having some redneck say, "What the heck are you talking about?" (My apologies to those who consider themselves rednecks. My sympathies, too.)
I have had more intelligent conversations over a few beers at a local bar than I've ever had with a teacher in a classroom.
And in those conversations, we don't talk about proofreader's marks. Whitman's sensuality or the inverted pyramid. We talk about it because it's important to handle a delicate relationship; how tough it is to find a summer job.
Good professors are out there. I've had my share, and I have learned from them. But my award for outstanding educator goes to my friends, family and employers, who taught me a little about life.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Story realistic reporting
To the editor:
I was favorably impressed by Gary Smith's article about Suchitoto, El Salvador, in the March 5 University Daily Kansan.
Good reporting — he has actually been to the place and talked to a variety of people involved
We see in one photo soldiers who aren't more than kids, casually carrying guns with their hands on the trigger guard. We read the words of a guerrilla soldier, aware that the guerrillas' methods have lost them friends among the public, but hopeful for renewed support.
He portrays them as human beings. He doesn't give us a simple good guys-bad guys explanation. We are told about the predicament of the small farmers who are in danger from both guerrillas and government troops and have no means to improve their situation.
I would like to point out that while various isolated regions in countries in Latin America are in the same shape as Suitcho, these do not characterize Latin America as a whole, nor do they even characterize any one country.
Hurrah for realistic reporting!
Why don't you send Gary to Nicaragua, too? Maybe then we would get something better than that. It's not hard to imagine.
Timothy Goring Lawrence graduate student
complained of in her letter last week.
Article missed the point
Jesus said, "I am the way ... no one comes to
the Father but through Me."
To the editor:
Though I have no hard feelings toward the reporter, I think my message was distorted in two ways. The first concerns the issue of what it is to be a Christian.
The article reads, "And to accept Jesus, one must have a personal relationship with him and be grateful."
In response to the article "Religious groups provide support for students," (March 7, University Daily Kansan) in which I was interviewed and quoted, I think that the writer not only understood that Christian groups did not miss the whole point of what support Christian groups provide to University students.
I was asked my belief concerning Jews and
The second distortion was a judgemental attitude that was portrayed. The last statement says, "And Jews, Muslims and others who do not accept Christ will go to hell..."
Moslems and what happens to them when they die.
My response, I made clear, was based on the
morals of my culture.
Being a Christian does mean to accept or receive Christ personally, which involves trusting Him to come into our life to forgive our sins. But if we fail to do so in result a not requirement of that willful decision.
Therefore, according to the Bible, those who do not know Christ, whether they be Jew, Muslim or Christian, will be persecuted.
That is not being personally judgmental, singling out a specific group as the article made it seem, but it is a sobering Biblical fact which pertains to all in a personal way.
God loves us and desires all of us to know Him, but requires that a decision be made on our part to accept it.
Unfortunately, it seems that some controversial issues overshadowed the potential of such an article to supply information of the opportunities Christian groups provide.
There is a great spiritual need in the lives of University students which is not unique to the faculty.
Christian groups provide an opportunity to help that need by sharing with students what it means to know and experience God's love and forgiveness through a personal relationship with Jesus Christ while providing an atmosphere to that relationship with other like-minded students.
Dave Meserve
.
president of Campus Crusade for Christ