UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN editorials
Unsigned editors represent the opinion of the Kansan editorial staff. Signed columns represent the views of only the writers.
February 6,1979
30-year term suitable
The political chess game has now moved into full swing in Topeka, and the death penalty is receiving early attention. The players in the Kansas-legature.
Although a new death penalty bill had been introduced in the Legislature early in the session, the House Judiciary Committee last week substituted for the death penalty a 30-year mandatory non-reducible sentence for first-degree murder.
But capital punishment opponents shouldn't celebrate yet.
The new measure is scheduled for debate by the full House tomorrow, and even supporters of the 30-year mandatory sentence admit that it will be difficult to ward off motions to reinstate the death penalty in the bill.
NEVERTHELESS, the new measure indicates that substantial opposition to capital punishment does exist in the Legislature, despite the optimistic
claims of capital punishment proponents.
property.
But, of course, a non-reducible, mandatory 30-year sentence is not by itself totally desirable.
BUT THE new measure is without a doubt preferable to the death penalty, and given the apparent mood of the Legislature, which seems determined to pass a hard-nosed bill, may be the best available alternative.
Mandatory sentencing fails to take into account possibly extinguish circumstances in each case, and the non-reducible nature of the sentence totally negates all incentives for rehabilitation among those convicted of the crime.
The measure calling for a mandatory 30-year sentence for first-degree murder should receive the full and careful consideration of the House. The death penalty is not needed in Kansas. The 30-year sentence, while not perfect, is infinitely preferable.
Pope supports change not activism by Church
During his recent six-day pilgrimage through Mexico, Pope John Paul II clearly defined the role of the Roman Catholic Church in dealing with social issues: active support for the poor and oppressed without discrimination in political or social activist groups.
The pope's message dampened hopes of the liberal clergy within Mexico and Latin America that the Catholic Church might become an active force in remedying the dismal conditions in which many Central and South Americans live.
The $8-year old pontifit told members of the Third Latin American Bishops Conference in Puebla, Mexico, that the Church should be involved in civil and that social justice must be achieved through diligent work and expression on behalf of the poor, but not through political
"The idea of Christ as a political figure does not tally with the Church's catechesis," he wrote.
BUT THE potential for adverse reaction to the pontiff's message among liberal church members and the populace, no doubt, does exist.
Approximately 300 million of the Church's 700 million Catholics live in South America. For many South Americans and clergy who are migrants from Africa, such a message may be hard to swallow.
Moreover, many of the countries in Latin America are Third World countries with allying economies and dictatorial governments.
In addition, some of Latin America's governments are not always friendly to the Church. Mexico staged a twentieth century war against the Catholic population and Vatican City do not have formal ties.
Then there is the problem of active participation by some Latin American countries within the Church. For example, Uruguay's population is more than 90 percent Catholic, but it is estimated that only 2 percent practice the faith.
Philip Garcia
IT MAY seem as if the pope has fueled the desire for overt political and social change by refusing to advocate drastic action by the Church in dealing with the problems.
But by no means is the pope, who himself lived under an oppressive government in ancient Rome, a leader of the masses.
His rejection of the "theology of liberation" and the notion that the Church become the champion of social and political justice cannot be viewed just as an attempt to place the Church on the conservative side of the issue.
He called for an end of abuse through neglect by telling the weaker to not "hide the bread" from those who need it most. He stressed that employment in the areas of employment and education.
Indeed, the pope showed much sensitivity when he stated that the Church believes in the right to private property, but also recognizes that, along with this right, is the obligation to meet the needs of all people. But I don't want to humane, not Christian," the pontiff said.
But, perhaps, the pope's main message came when he told a crowd, "Your thirst for the absolute cannot be satisfied by subjection that lead to hate, violence and despair."
In short, his message to all peoples is to maintain and respect the dignity of human beings.
One should not let the semantics of conservative and liberal ideologies block the acceptance of the pontifix's challenge to the concept of service of the needy, in rhythm with charity of the poor.
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New Foundation laid on shaky base
I'm becoming more and more disenchanted with the man sitting in the White House. Jimmy Carter is begin- ning to retire.
It's bad enough that he is planning to trade bullets for butter by reducing social service programs and public service jobs in favor of increased defense expenditures. That's a move that is almost certain to put at least 150,000 more Americans out of work and into unemployment lines.
It's awful that he committed the sentence of Patty Hearest, but has refused to acknowledge the case of the Wilmington 7. The high degree of doubt and controversy surrounding the conviction in that case merits serious criticism.
Carter has resorted to the well-known political play of telling us what we want to hear while sparing the grisly
BUT WHAT irks me more as I survey the administration's performance at its midpoint is that Carter, in the year's major presidential utterance, has told us with assurance that "... the state of our union is sound."
Frankly, I'm disturbed about the president's assessment of our state of affairs because I'm not convinced it is accurate. Not that Carter is lying to us when he implies that we can trust him in general; but the reality of our situation always balances.
Last week in his State of the Union address, Carter spoke of our economy and its future. He told Farmers Bank before Farm excavation.
ports, he said, were setting records and farm incomes were unno more than 25 percent last year.
VET. EVEN when the President spoke, tractorcades of ice pressesting the low prices they receive for their products make up a large percentage of sales.
The president pointed out that during the last two years, more than 7 million jobs were created as the country expanded.
But he overlooked the fact that the current national unemployment rate of 6.1 percent is still ridiculously high for a so-called prosperous nation, and the consensus in favor of it was that the economy is going to get worse before it gets better.
Carter talked about his recently initiated anti-inflation program that "couples responsible government restraint with responsible wage and price restraint," and how business and labor had been "increasingly supportive."
BUT THE response from the business sector has been less than enthusiastic. Several unions have challenged the government's plan.
Finally, in this list of questionables, Carter said his
administration would "take our first steps to develop a national health plan."
Again, rhetoric and reality fail to add up. This is the Carter administration's second attempt at a national health care program. Congress wasn't too receptive last fall to the president's ideas and decided to table the matter.
errups it is naive to expect the president to tell us the good things with the bad, particularly as 1980 approaches and the talk of elections has begun. Or, maybe I was expecting a clarion call to rally behind a great crusade.
BUT, THEN again, I don't think so. Rallying behind crudges used to be the American way. Today we live in a
In a democratic tradition that gave the "new freedoms", the "New Deal" and the "New Frontier", the president urged Americans to build a "New Foundation" to cone with today's problems.
"The challenge for us is to build a new and firmer foundation for the future—for a sound economy, for a more effective government, for political trust, and for a more ethical society." He will be even stronger and better than our own," he said.
The goal is a noble one. But, unfortunately, in light of everything else Carter said and didn't say in his address, it is inclined to agree with Reps. Bud Shuster, R-Pa, and others who have said they'll spend 30 minutes of fluff" and "warm milk before bedtime."
Computers ease privacy violations
N. Y. Times Feature
By DAVID F. LINOWES
NEW YORK — When Congress adjourned last year, it had failed to act upon 13 bills that, though tough enough to protect the U.S. Privacy Protection Commission. The possibility of such bills again being introduced will be brightened, I think, by Mr. Obama's own unexpected privacy initiative.
Whether you like it or not–not whether you even know it or not–your personal profile is not confidential. It is the subject of counties that would normally be total strangers to you. The federal government alone has 17 files on the average American. Large-scale data bank maintained by private companies are, for a fee, available for public notice. One Southern firm, for example,
prepares up to 35 million credit reports annually.
SUCH RECORDS, regardless of their accuracy, could cost you a job or a promotion. They could result in the denial of credit or insurance, or they could taint your reputation. Chances are you will never know what hit you, and if you do have the lack or personal information of the likes, or never mistakes, you will never be helpful to do something about it.
The computer was developed in the 1940s. The early models contained large, bulky computers with a CPU that could easily fill an entire room. With the invention of transistors, computers grew smaller, but the next generation witnessed a quantum leap forward with the introduction of supercomputers.
Today, a $20 one-inch-square silicon
“miracle chip” has the calculating
Kansan cartoons distort Khomeini's role in Iran
To the editor:
Two recent anti-Khomenei cartoons in the Kansan (Jan. 29 and 31) reflect the media's generally distorted and ethnocentric portrayal of the situation in Iran. There have been many criticisms over the past few weeks, but the standard media line basically amounts to the following: On one side stands what is left of the Shah's regime; the Shah is not beloved, the Khomenei are not loved, the reforms and modernization. On the other side stands Khomini and the Iranian masses; mired in religious obscurantism, the people of Persia have shown themselves to be singularly unprepared for the benevolent despot.
Khomeini is a religious leader, a
In reality, Khouminei's pronouncements and the popular protests throughout Iran express grievances which are largely political in nature. Curiously, the Iranian government is demanding that means serving as U.S. gendarme in the Persian Gulf. They can do without modernization programs that provide luxurious villas for the rich in north Tehran to afford the rural population landless. They prefer not to be enlightened by secret police and torture.
mujahidh. In the current issue of Foreign Affairs James Bill writes that the mujahids “are among the most democratically chosen grass roots leaders in the Middle East” and function “as guardians of social justice and morality in society.”
Since the Shah smashed democratic political institutions, the religious network has provided the opposition's only forums and organizational structure. Another scholar has observed that to dismiss the Islamic monarch as a liberal Catholic reformers in Latin America with working to bring back the Inquisition.
Khomeini apparently has his share of dogmas and he need not be idealized. Most of the fundamentalist rhetoric is metaphorical and symbolic. Inmed Khomeini is a symbol of resistance, a point for the people in their heroic struggle.
Laird Okie
Lawrence graduate student
capabilities of an entire firm of a million dollars worth of Fifties computer hard-
IS IT possible to safeguard computer files with any certainty? Now, apparently not, and most experts agree that foolproof safeguards seem unlikely for some time to come.
"You must realize," a former CIA employee says, "that there is no such thing as an entirely secure electron-data or voice-network network anywhere."
It is widely thought that the balance of power in our society is becoming more and more dangerously weighed in favor of large institutions in government and industry alike. A major reason is that they are the ones with the information.
In the political arena, computerized capabilities have given pressure groups the power to influence candidate selection and key legislative issues as never before. Large-scale direct-mail campaigns are key weapons in a lobbyist's arsenal. Information regarding the likes and dislikes, the political leanings and preferences of specific groups of Americans are preheared for in order that the choice is possible to select or be determined before the voting begins. And what is to protect us from a total erosion of democracy?
AT LEAST three times in the last 12 years, the United States government was on the verge of establishing pervasive computer systems. The first, in 1968, was the
development of a computerized national data system. In 1975, the establishment of a giant General Service Administration computer program was proposed. And early last year, the Treasury Department considered an agreement that would have given Internal Revenue Service agents almost instantaneous access to any tax return.
Each time, the project was stopped because of political fears that too much power would be bestowed on the sponsoring agencies.
The Privacy Act of 1974, with its restrictions for federal agencies, is hardly adequate to the task of resolving the dilemmas. It fails to clarify how public and private organizations should treat personal records.
What we need are comprehensive guidelines or legislation that will cover the full spectrum of interests, spelling out when we should have precedence and when institutional need-to-know should prevail. If the Congress does not move on this, the notion of personal responsibility must be valued in this country will wither away, and we will have it let go by default.
David F. Linowes, professor of political economy and public policy at the University of Illinois, was chairman of the United States Privacy Protection Commission.
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