UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN editorials
Unsaigned editorials represent the opinion of the Kansan editorial staff. Signed columns represent the views of other editors.
Februarv 7.1979
Poor excuse for delay
It is refreshing to find an officeholder, be it a president or a student senator, motivated and dedicated enough to want to make good on campaign promises once elected to office.
But when, in the process of following through on these promises, attempts at circumventing existing rules and regulations are made, the nobility of the initial intent is greatly diminished.
Consider. Last Friday, it was reported that the start of a legal services program may be delayed as long as three to four weeks because of a "procedural oversight" in complying with affirmative action hiring guidelines.
THE GUIDELINES require that the office of affirmative action be notified of job openings so that qualified minority and women candidates be considered in the job selection process.
Because the legal services search committee failed to submit a pre-interview summary to the affirmative action office before interviews began last week, further interviews were canceled.
But Mike Harper, student body president, called the delay an example of the "bureaucratic tail wagging the dog" and insisted that the committee had made every effort to comply with procedural regulations.
THE LEGAL SERVICES program was part of Harper's campaign platform last spring, during which he
promised that legal services would begin before his term ended on Feb. 15.
To some extent, Harper is correct in blaming the University bureaucracy for the delay. It is no secret that proposed programs can get lost in the maze of University committees and review boards, with their time-consuming procedures, and are lucky if they ever see the light of day.
But the legal service committee also has suffered disagreements within itself and this also has lengthened the final approval time.
FURTHERMORE, it appears as if this latest delay could have been avoided, thus nullifying Harper's claim that University bureaucracy was at fault.
The affirmative action guidelines have been in effect for a number of years and are supposed to be followed for all potential job openings at the University. It's simply a matter of following the rules. All of them.
Harper is still intent on fighting the delay and, if necessary, has even threatened to take the matter to the governor where he thinks he has support.
Considering all the delays that have taken place, it seems that a serious, concerted attempt to correct the problem by both sides, rather than a show of political grandstanding, would be more in order and also less time-consuming.
Student finds no escape from obnoxious smokers
To the editor:
I am a new student at KU this semester and in a short time I have discovered a large problem. I can't find any clean air-that is, my car's interior. Also, there's also its cigarette, cilor or cigar products.
On Friday I attempted to have lunch in the Kansas Union cafeteria and sat down in a section at a table reserved for non-smokers. When I objected to one fellow light up at an open bar, I was told about adherence to a rule: immaturally ripped off the "no" from the minute sign on the wall, said everyone else smoked at tables in this section, it was good to have some vices, etc. and I barely escaped the room on its way to my last few bits of salad.
So, I escaped into a classroom to read awhile and almost immediately a student walked in with a cigarette hanging out of her mouth. Then in class, a professor walked in and showed me how to try rights as a non-smoker to have class conducted in a safe environment.
Seriously, non-smokers are surely still a majority. I have come recently from the office and noticed the glamor plushie (grocery stores, waiting rooms, hallways, classrooms, stores, etc.) is prohibited and punishable by law. (Any resident interested in similar legislation?)
In case you folks at KU haven't heard, breathing someone else's smoke is dangerous to your health. Your actions are inexcusable and should be punished.
Now my question is, since smokers are violating my very precious right to what little clean air there is, do I have the right to stomp out their cigarettes, dump pipe residues on their heads, house cigars with water, etc.?
Surely KU can, at the least, eliminate smoking in classrooms, hallways, etc. Provide a smoking area, rather than non-smoking areas in campus buildings.
My assertion of my rights as a non-smoker are in no way an imposition on you, the inconsiderate smoker. Your crime is not a victimless one.
Thank you for not smoking!
Lawrence graduate student
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U.S.-Sino relations not so simple
The dust has begun to settle from Chinese Vice Premier Teng Hai-ping's historic visit to the United States. Like two long-estrained lovers, the United States and China last week embarked on a trip inside Ukraine with old dippers and deep-felt hatres.
But a number of questions remain hanging in the air. These questions deserve serious consideration and have possibly been overlooked during the recent flood of lavish praise beamed upon everything Chinese.
Any time one has an opportunity to enlarge one's circle of friends and increase the flow of meaningful dialogue, it is important to be aware.
BUT AS HISTORY has repeatedly shown, the world of international politics is far from simple. For almost a century, the U.S. had been the world's most powerful nation.
By recognizing Red China and in the process breaking a 1964 defense treaty with Taiwan, the United States may have lost a little in the area of esteem, a commodity that has been declining both in and outside the country.
Americans have an affection for the new and the exotic, and Teng, acting the role of the consumate politician, thoroughly charmed his American audiences with his enthusiastic enjoyment being on center stage as he pushed the nation.
Although the courts will have final say, it seems unlikely that the suit will have any noticeable effect on the case.
HE CONVINCINGLY answered questions from congress concerned with Taiwan's fate, thus further reducing the chance of Goldwater's suit being successful. Still, in the light of the treaty abrogation with Taiwan, he would still resist.
First, how will the United States be regarded by its smaller allies who have depended upon us for mutual support?
uclusent and UCSI, the Curriculum of abstraction decision, most notably Sen-
Berry Goldwater, R-Arzat, have filled a lawsuit challenge
the president's authority to sever formal recognition and
treaty relations with Taiwan.
port1* And second will the Carter administration dump its commitment to human rights in deference to China's rule.
In the area of mutual dependence, the United States since World War II has traditionally been regarded as the leader of the democratic free world. In this role it has been able to maintain economic and defense treaties with many smaller nations.
Now, with our recent abrogation, it is not unreasonable to think that some of our smaller allies are beginning to feel a little uneasy. They must think that if the United States does not act against Taiwan, with Taiwan, it can certainly do the same with other allies.
PERHAPS A QUESTION of importance to American workers is what the new relationship between American workers and employers represents.
In the area of human rights, most people agree that the Chinese government is oppressive, completely undemocratic and excessively prone to use force in achieving its goals. It has been estimated that a majority of political parties. The press is controlled exclusively by the government. In short, the people of China are members of a totalitarian state, and have no human rights or civil liberties.
Of course, that is difficult to predict with any degree of certainty. However, in the area of economics, one thing is clear: American business views China as a gold mine of cheap, dishie and disciplined labor.
Whereas business in the U.S. once looked on the Northwest and the southern states, they now look on China as the low-wage promised land. In the eyes of American citizens is the place to go to reap huge profits at minimum cost.
This may change someday. But there is little evidence, as many would have us to believe, that the New Sino-American relations will reduce the oppression felt in the mainland.
A number of firms have already turned to China with heavy investment plans. Kaiser Steel Corporation and Bettlehmei Steel, for instance, have both decided to build new plants in China. And when the workers at those plants were ready to work, they had to cool themselves off. The Coca-Cola Bottling Co. is preparing to open a factory in China. This is only the beginning.
Economic boycott, such as those threatened against the Pincott regime in Chile, could be assisted as a passivity measure to maintain local control.
BUSINESS LEADERS argue that large exports to China and a steady influx of cheap Chinese products will not threaten American jobs. They insist that flourishing Chinese trade will actually create jobs in the United States.
American business views China as a gold mine of sorts, it seems unlikely that any strong sanctions will be imposed.
Such an argument might make some sense if we intended to export finished consumer goods like automobiles, vacuum cleaners and dishwashers. But the bulk of American exports to China will consist primarily of agricultural goods and high technology items like computers, telecommunications equipment, opportunities for an economy solely in need of a boost. While free trade has theoretical attraction, the reality may not be as bright.
There are, however, some signs of optimism. The new relations may provide a stable equilibrium among the United States, Japan, China and the Soviet Union. History will have the final say on that score, but it certainly would be careless if we failed to consider the potential problems that will inevitably arise.
MARIN UPK
Taiwanese ruled by security force
By EDWARD FRIEDMAN
N. Y. Times Feature
MADISON, Wis. - Scared students from Taiwan have often showy me letters from their parents telling of their hardships and struggles.
these letters said that the military-people told them, get your youngsters to stop their political activities. The alternative was the usual threat delivered by those offering "protection."
Visiting Taiwan's dreaded political prison on Green Island 13 years ago, I found a frightening Alcatel-like embodiment of the nature of the military-security forces who still control the ultimate levers of cower power on Green Island.
Two Taiwanese tell me it has not changed. Then, as now, political prisoners had been serving in definite terms.
The members of this military security apparatus first arrived on Taiwan in the late 1940s. They were the defeated, armed side of China's revolutionary civil war. These exiled mainland impounded their rule in a bloodless fashion.
THE CONTINUED use of secret police tactics makes this security force and the right wing of the ruling party, the Kuomintang, an object of hatred to virtually all Chinese and even to many mainlanders residing on Taiwan.
I lived in Taiwan from 1964 to 1966, and visited it most recently in 1970, and of course since they have had daily trips to Taipei.
I used to wonder why Taiwanese voting in local elections would waste their vote on an anti-Kuoniantang candidate. A local party official having more clout with the president had been caught doing goods and services (as my Kuoniantang ladied when
she got me train tickets during New Year's after everything was supposedly sold out).
The Taiwanese invariably answered: "Because that person is against the K.M.T."
More recently, Taiwanese economic power and more genuine elections have made the reactionary military police most unhappy. Prosperity and democracy have shifted some power out of the police's hands.
THE ISLAND'S security interests interpose elections on Taiwan when President Carter normalized relations with China. Had the elections taken place, the Kuomintang would have taken a beating.
They were frightened. They panicked. Their propaganda highlighted the sad fate of Cambodian people and the refugees from Vietnam. The party said that the issue was the Kouminintrag or genocide, but what the Taiwanese picture was not a horror but liberation from a hated oppressor.
The Kuomintang police imposed military rule, claiming to have seized the enemy's uniform, what scared them was their explicitly expressed resistance.
Fear spread. Spokesmen for anti-Kuomintang forces complained that now there was more freedom in Peking
In their panic, they branded as a communist agent anyone with realistic suggestions about how best to take advantage of Peking's and Washington's common interest in regional peace and good trade relations with Taiwan.
I RECENTLY visited a Chinese mainland museum depicting the inhumanity of that Kuomintang security force's final panic before fleeing to Taiwan. In torture chambers inside the building of Changkai, all remaining prisoners were alawtected.
Most Taiwanese are paralyzed with fear and confused. Some have romantic illustrations about a totally separated Taiwan. A few, often to protect fortune, career and family, mouth Kuwaitint slogans.
Many increasingly have concluded that, while military strength is needed to discourage and make costly a military venture from China's mainland, no stable, proximal partner exists for the country to closer associate and cultural association with Peking.
THE KUOMINTANG'S security force, however, has branded every peace-directed initiative for 20 years as tratarous. The party's military police require an atmosphere of tension to maintain its control. Peace will
Many Kuumintang people have invested in a future abroad. They are ridiculed on Taiwan as "toothbrush Chinese" because all they need pack before leaving is a toothbrush. The joyous celebration of Taiwan's citizenry on the removal of that mainland security force would rival Iranians' glee on the shah's departure.
No decent American or Taiwanese interest is served by siding with the discredited Kumunitm security force and ignoring the new prospects for peace, prosperity and democracy.
Edward Friedman, professor of political science at the University of Wien, Mahasisan and a specialist in Chinese politics.