OPINION
The University Daily KANSAN
January 13,1984 Page.4
The University Daily KANSAN
Published since 1889 by students of the University of Kansas
The University Daily Kaman (USP$ 60-640) is published at the University of Kansas, 118 Stauffer First Hall, Lawrence, KS 60055, daily during the regular school year and Monday and Thursday during the summer sessions. Subscriptions are $15 for a month or $27 for a year in Douglas County and $18 for any month or $3 for a year inside the county. Student subscriptions are $3 a semester paid through the student activity page (FOSTMaster). Subscription fees are $199.
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Gov. John Carlin talked during his State of the State address Tuesday of the need to address the "quiet crises" in education, the environment and the state's prison system.
In one of those areas — education it is clear that a greater commitment is needed from Carlin and the Legislature.
If anything, however, these factors are all the more reason to think of the role that the state's higher education program — and its libraries — play in the future of Kansas.
Carlin's proposals, made to a joint session of the Legislature, may be what are needed to address many of the problems in education. On the matter of a strong library system, however, his proposals are far from adequate.
Yes, it is clear that in many areas the state is still financially strapped.
Yes, it is clear that the state is coming off a year of budget problems in which one of the largest tax increases in history was enacted.
The Board of Regents requested money for a science library at the University of Kansas. Such a library is desperately needed. Indeed, within a few years, even Watson
Library, which has been recently renovated, will run out of shelf space.
Admittedly, such an amount is a weighty sum. Particularly when balanced against the economic stress in some parts of the state, and when balanced against tight state financing. But when balanced against the costs of not proceeding with the library now, the necessary action is clear.
The governor has pegged a great part of the state's future on high technology and the jobs that it can provide.
But if the education necessary to such jobs is to be provided, and if the University is to have the needed materials to teach students about such occupations, a new library is particularly critical.
Carlin's proposal calls for $277,000 to be spent on the library in fiscal year 1986. The library is expected to have a total cost of $13.9 million over its 5-year construction.
If professors are to have the needed materials, and students are to have access to them, and the state is to be able to compete against others in the high-tech market, plans for the library must be speeded up.
A clearer conscience
Carrot diplomacy is essential when dealing with nations that have such atrocious human rights records.
Financial support to the Salvadoran government has gone unchecked by Congress and the American people. Both have condoned the Reagan administration's direction in the matter, if only by their tacit consent.
The report rightly recommends making the Salvadoran government meet human rights requirements if it is to continue to receive U.S. aid.
But the recently released Kissinger report may signal a new and enlightened direction in U.S. foreign policy, which may allow the Reagan administration to continue its intervention and at the same time give liberals some say in the matter.
Status reports on the regional conflict: Some complain that the U.S. is the oppressor, while others counter that the United States must protect its economic and security interests. The bitter debates will continue.
But many key Democrats, such as Walter Mondale, though they continue to lambast the administration's goals in the region, agree with the report's proposed conditions.
The report seems to be an attempt at resolving some of the key issues in the region, and it may give the Reagan administration the needed leverage to expand its aid by making concessions to liberals and moderates.
So far, the conservatives have won the battle over giving aid to El Salvador — unconditionally. And the Kissinger Commission report recommends further economic and military involvement in the country.
But the report has also called for conditions of economic and military aid. This is an important step forward.
The United States should not ally itself with despotic governments, as it has in the past. A possible new direction in foreign policy in Central America would give the United States a clearer conscience.
The human warehouse
Chief Justice Warren Burger . . . recently repeated an opinion that he has had for years: Prisons should teach criminals useful skills, a view that most Americans would be happy to applaud but not to pay for.
Most states try to get by with the bare minimum, and even then find themselves paying $15,000 a year just to feed and guard each inmate.
Burger disparagingly calls the prisons in which more than 400,000 inmates are kept "human warehouses." That is precisely what they are and all they will be until the public is moved to spend a great deal more than it spends now — $17
million a day — on its correctional facilities.
.. As beneficial as prison work programs are as an antidote for boredom and unrest, there is no evidence that they have much effect on whether or not an inmate will go straight after his release.
Brattleboro, Vt., Reformer
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LETTERS POLICY
Portrait of social change
The Lebanese government's failure or unwillingness to recognize this change is the most important explanation for the country's continuing susceptibility to meddling by foreign powers.
WEST POINT, N.Y. — Carriage has stolen the headlines, but the real story in Lebanon is social change. Vast numbers of Lebanese who were once politically mute have now found their voice and content to accept a political system that ignores their demands.
Nine years of internal conflict, invasion and disorder have intensified the social and economic began before the civil war in 1975.
Improved education, increased travel inside Lebanon and abroad, wider exposure to the press and television, the decline of agriculture and the expansion of the service sector — all of this has greatly changed life in villages and urban slums. People who were once nearly irrelevant to the political system are now increasingly determined to assert their political will.
A wide variety of political
AUGUSTUS NORTON
Professor
organizations are competing for the loyalties of these newly political men, but the most successful movements have been those that appeal to the recruits' communal, or religious origins.
'Vast numbers of Lebanese who were once politically mute have now found their voice and are no longer content to accept a political system that ignores their demands.'
This is hardly surprising: In fragmented and embattled Lebanese society, a man finds it difficult to escape from his identity as Sunni or orthodox or Maronite Christian. Each citizen carries an identity card specifying his religion.
Political offices and other rewards are allocated among communal groups according to a precise formula. It is impossible for a person to be simply Lebanese — and the growing
political demands of villagers have meant deep shifts in the distribution of communal power.
Berrie, a lawyer born in Sierra Leone of a trader family, evokes contempt among zuama, who deside his lowly birth and education. Nonetheless, it is nabah Berri who now speaks for a majority of Lebanon's influence of many zuama no longer seem to extend very far beyond the Presidential Palace.
The United States is backing Lebanese efforts to reach a communal reconciliation — intermittent negotiations in Geneva and informal diplomacy among faction leaders at home. But these negotiations will not succeed if they remain merely a vehicle for the zuma to recapture political privilege.
In particular, the last nine years of fighting and social change have given a new prominence to such groups as the maronite Lebanese Forces, the Shiite Muslim fighters known as Harakat Amal and the Druse's Progressive Socialist Party.
Reconciliation between the traditional leaders is not unimportant, but it is not enough. If blood-drenched Lebanon is to return to civility, the zauma must voice the legitimate demands of newly emerging communal groups.
But that is only one part of the political change that is greatly complicating efforts to reunify Lebanon. Lebanese politics have long been controlled by a small group of political bosses known as zaumaa.
The increasing power of these new leaders and the groups they represent grossly complicates the Lebanese puzzle. In the end, the fragmentation of Lebanon political leadership and the unrest in Syria may make it impossible to put the puzzle back together.
But years of conflict and accelerating social and economic changes have rendered the zuwa increasingly powerless. They are scrambling desperately to hold on to fiefdoms that are being splintered and usurped by a new generation of leaders — men with obscure family names who are all political significance, but the breadth of their influence has been considerably narrowed.
But certainly, those who seek a reconciliation will get nowhere if they allow their own rigidity to undermine their efforts. Attempts to put Lebanon back together according to an obsolete blueprint are clearly doomed to failure.
Each of these men has represented a clientele from a single communal group that has traded its political loyalty for the zuuma's stock in-trade — political favors. Power was passed from father to son as a political inheritance. For decades, surnames like Gemayel, Chamoun, Salam, Assad, Jumball and Solh appeared again and again on ministry portfolios.
The contenders for power include political no-names like Fadi Frem, the commander of the Lebanese Forces, and Nabih the leader of the rebels are a new breed of men, lacking in wealth and different in temperament and social origin from the zuma they seek to supplant.
Augustus Norton is assistant professor in the department of social sciences at the United States Military Academy.
Making an about-face on China
In praising "the courage and foresight of those who opened the doors" to full diplomatic relations in 1979, Reagan crossed another political conviction that began before he took office.
WASHINGTON — The Ronald Reagan who welcomed Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang to the White House this week seemed light years removed from the ideology whose allegiance to Taiwan has cast a shadow over U.S. Sino relations for three years.
This was, after all, the same Reagan to whom thought of rapprochement with the communist government on the mainland once was anathema, his loyalty to the American hawan unqualified and unquestioned.
As the process instigated by Richard Nixon moved toward consumption in 1978, Reagan said President Carter appeared "willing to pay the price Peking has put on him." It is hard to see what is in it for us.
Even as recognition of the sole legitimacy of the Peking regime loomed as a fast accompi, candidate Reagan accused the architects of normalization — and Carter in particular — of deserting an old and trusted ally by breaking off formal ties with Taiwan.
Reagan promised to seek a restoration of "official" relations with Taiwan, raising the specter of an abrogated agreement with Pei Chang. But Mr. Bush in China by his running mate, George Bush, who headed the first U.S.
NORMAN D. SANDLER United Press International
liaison office in Peking, only backfired.
The confusion Reagan created during the campaign spilled over into the early stage of his presidency. The Chinese treated the new U.S. administration with suspicion as Reagan sought to reassure Peking he would uphold the policy set into place before him.
The Zhao visit appeared to open a new chapter in this continuing political and diplomatic saga. This week Reagan voiced readiness to "strengthen the ties between us" and "walk at China's side."
In blunt campaign parlance, Reagan would be accused of "flipping" on the China issue — a term used freely by some of the ideological parists who constitute his base of support on the political
But the shift on China, which is far from complete, can be viewed as another recognition by Reagan that many of his views have been tempered by the realities of his office.
To conservatives, this is needless moderation. Moderates call it pragmatism. But rhetoric must not be confused with personal convictions. And as long as Reagan is in office, there will remain the biggest obstacle to significant strides in the improvement of U.S.-Sino relations.
Be conscious of water's importance
The story was unique to neither me nor to other residents of Lawrence. Over the holidays when the weather was extremely cold, dealing with broken water pipes was an irritating but familiar experience for people across a large portion of the country.
Welcome to Niagara Falls. One day the water gushed forth from our broken water pipes. For the next five days, the spiromets ran dry.
The unpleasant situation made me realize that most of us take water for granted. Our awareness of this natural resource often ends at the faucet.
The ability to simply turn water on or off at our convenience makes it easy to ignore its value. "Water is simply not visible until people are without it," said Peter Bourne, president of Global Water, an organization based in Washington, D.C. Without it, how often people turn faucets on is indeed more obvious.
While without water for a few days over semester break, I realized the extent to which many of us take it for granted. Almost unconsciously, someone at home would forget about the predicament and head to the sink to get some water. Noone could even make a cup of coffee to help the situation become more bearable. Contact lenses couldn't be rinsed off before insertion. Showers and baths were idle dreams.
Spit stayed in the sink and toothbrushes got grungier. Toilets went unflushed. The stack of dirty dishes grew up. One day was tolerable
- two days bearable. But by the third day, any willingness to be
understanding or tolerant of the situation had evaporated.
I would not wish the experience on anyone. But beyond the aggravation and inconvenience, a new appreciation of our company being used up at an alarming rate.
Concern about the world's water situation is growing. Millions of dollars are being spent to explore ideas about how to handle the problem. Schemes are being developed around the world to move water from places where it is running out of water where it is becoming scarce.
is impossible to do much to alleviate or prevent the problems. But there are some issues of less magnitude that individuals can influence — issues that will be affected by either action or inaction. As with the oil shortage that we experienced in recent years, one of the results of the water shortage will be increased prices for the consumer.
But even the abundant sources may suffer in the future. Millions of dollars more will be spend as expert look ahead to life with a ever dwindling water supply. The topic is of such international concern that the United Nations has declared the 1980s "The Water Decade."
Yet many people are oblivious to the seriousness of the situation. They have the idea that though we use water, it is replenished each year by the rain and snow. Some people fail to realize that the amount of water used each year is largely disproportionate to the amount we consume.
The Ogallala Aquifer, an enormous reservoir of groundwater reaching from mountains beaches been mined two times as fast as it can be replenished
An increasing world population is depleting the water supply at a faster rate, not only in the water consumed by individuals but in the amount of water used to grow crops to support the growing numbers of
MARGARET
SAFRANEK
by rain and runoff. Surface water sources are also endangered. The western part of the United States is largely dependent on irrigation, and some of the sources are literally drying up. It is not unusual for several states to drain a river for irrigation.
Staff Columnist
Though droughts and severe water shortages have been with us
Acid rain, an increasingly important issue in the United States, also takes away from the amount of water that is counted on to replenish our supplies.
Most of the water issues are of such magnitude that individually it
since biblical times, never have there been such other related problems. Today industrial waste makes some fresh water unusable
Water shortages in the United States are not something new. City ordinances against washing cars or watering lawns have been issued in various towns during dry summers. Many restaurants now serve water only upon request, reducing the amount wasted when people order beverages and leave the water glasses untouched.
Conservationists and others concerned with the water problem say that there are many things that people can do to reduce the amount of water we now use. They cite not only the steps taken during dry summers, but others that we often ignore because our taps flow so freely and our water bills have not yet reached the point where we take a conscious approach to consumption.
We do not see the dollar signs going down the drain while we brush our teeth with the water running. Although we think twice before raising the thermostat, many of us ignore a draining faucet.
The water problem is growing in large ways while we continue to consistently abuse it in small ways. We may not pay dearly tomorrow for the resource, and there is no hint that we will be limited to using a certain amount of water in the near future. But no one can disagree that one of our most precious resources is running out.
If it is difficult for you to grasp the gravity of the situation or find reason to become a conscious water consumer, a broken水 pipe water pipe or a morning or two of grungy toothbrushes should get the point across.