UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN editorials
Unsigned editorials represent the opinion of the Kansan editorial staff. Signed columns represent the views of
DECEMBER 1, 1978
Senate abuses power
Corrupted by a perverse righteousness, the Student Senate has managed to go beyond its usual inanity.
This time the Senate moved in a frightening direction, abusing its powers as controller of student activity fees.
At its meeting Wednesday, the Senate voted to become financial pupeteer for the Student Bar Association, which comprises the entire law school enrollment. The Senate agreed to fund the organization only after restrictions were placed on the bar association's actions concerning the Jimmy Green statue.
The Senate, with only about a third of its members present, voted 23-17 to amend a bill giving the bar association a block allocation of student activity fees.
THE AMENDMENT stipulated that the student money would be lost if the bar association or any of its members acted on behalf of the association or the law school student body "to persuade the governor of Kansas to issue an executive order directing that the Jimmy Green statue be moved from its rightful location on Jayhawk Boulevard to new Green Hall."
The amendment, was introduced by Senator Barry Shalinsky in response to what he said was a petition drive by the
narr association asking Gov. Robert F.
Bennett to order the statue to be moved.
That clearly seems to be the overly righteous precedent the Senate has set with the Student Bar Association. Moreover, the Senate appears to have based their decision on faulty information.
However, Jeff Roth, association president, said the association backed no such petition. The only thing close to such a petition was, according to its circulator, merely a poll.
NEVERTHELESS there can be no reasonable explanation for the Senate's action. It exceeded the farthest reaches of responsible student government.
Is one now to assume that the Senate has become the self-appointed policymaking body for all student organizations at the University of Kansas? Must a student group now bow to the political and individual dictates of the Senate or face a loss of student funds?
As the amendment says, the Jimmy Green statue should stay put—but that doesn't save the sting of the Senate's notion it can suppress student opinion.
Carrot and stick tactics may have a place in the political arena, but the Senate's action was far from proper or responsible. It would seem, as Lord Acton said, "Power tends to corrupt."
Cairo mirrors history future of Arab world
N. Y. Times Feature
By FOUAD AJAMI
NEW YORK—There is a multifaceted
President Anwar el-Sadat
and his Al-Qaeda.
The one we hear of the most is over the issue of war and peace with Israel. Two others are deeper cultural struggles: One is a struggle for and over Cairo itself—the last real city in the Arab world; the other is between cosmopolitan Cairo's intransigent elites and the more fundamentalist, sheltered outlooks of Arab deserts and provincial towns.
Arab Islamic history began in the Arabian Peninsula, for that was Islam's birthplace, the site of its initial simplicity and triumph. But it was in Cairo, more than anyplace else, that Islam fashioned a civilization, made its peace with the world, outwitted and out-waited conquerors, debated the great issues of the day.
Cairo is home to the Arab-Moslem world's leading university, to its pre-eminent press. It is also the last major bastion of religious co-existence between Moslem and Christian
Lebanon was another, but it fell to the passion and fanaticism of its inhabitants
If the Arab world possesses a measure of political-cultural unity, that unity was achieved through an agreement between
During the days of the Ottoman Empire's tyranny, Cairo provided a haven for the talented and the dissident to think and interact with the world. Cairo and Beirut were the two places where mobile Arabs—businessmen, students, intellectuals, conspirators—got to know one another. But it was Cairo that the bearer of a paradox was the one. There were bourgeois, cosmopolitan civilization had its heyday in the Arab world.
Modern-day Arab nationalism may have been conceived elsewhere, but it was Cairo that gave it power and meaning. The Egyptian film, book, university, and the Egyptian teacher knitted together a vast region of considerable diversity.
Colloquial Egyptian was popularized by films that were the cultural diet of the overwhelming majority of Arabs. The film *Sayid* (1962) depicted shipping of tastes and mores of other Arabas.
Egypt's universities were a magnet to Arab youth at a time when few Arabs could and would go to Europe and America. The Egyptian teacher, living as he did in a crowd society, sought to make a living as the Arabians in the Arab Peninsula and Algeria.
The lights of Cairo, like the lights of other metropolitan centers, have attracted and
repeled. When Col. Muammar q-eldafadi of Libya wanted to play Bismarck and unite the Arab world he wanted to recalm Cairo; women's liberation, institute law, women's liberation, institute law.
But Cairo was too sophisticated—or compromised and lost, to use the Libyan president's language—to accept his ideas. This of course is an old theme; the decadent urban civilization and restoring the austerity of tradition.
Intuitively, the Libyan president understood Caire's centrality and realized that he must make a concerted effort to order. In the peninsula, with men immense wealth are busy trying to erect massive and beautiful homes.
They wish to combine the puritanism of the desert with the technology of the West. They want to make cities, for a city is more than prefares and steel bars. What is naval are the habits of mind, the culture, the vibrancy—and the impossibly imposed, duplicated, or bought off the rack.
Damascus and Baghdad were the seats of two Islamic empires, but they are large provincial towns today. The latter was a fortress that served as a military base ago and has never recovered its grandeur.
All this, in addition to the obvious military calculus, must have figured in the recent Baghdad summit meeting that brought together Arab "moderates" and "rejicee-ries."
Predictably, Mr. Sadat turned it down. Egypt, he confidently stated, can isolate and cannot be isolated. There was in that country a great degree of its pride and its artifacts, its beliefs that its lights and wealth will prevail, and that such things must not be still lead and that other Arabs will follow.
If Cairo was giving up on war, so they reasoned, it must have been because of the appetites of the city, and so maybe an offer would do it and bring Egypt out into the jungle.
Cairo is an authentic capital, a world in its own right, and no shadow of something else. It holds up a mirror for other Arabs: In its successes or failures, its visibility or troubles, they can see the harvest of much of their history and a great deal of their future.
Whether stated or not, Mr. Sadat's was that it is the saver faire of his capital, and not the hardware of Saudi Arabia or the provincialism of the outwardly militant capitals, that offers the best interpretation of the world in which the Arabs live today.
Found Ajiam, assistant professor of politics at Pretoria University, is a guest speaker.
Letters Policy
The University Daily Kansan welcomes letters to the editor. Letters should be typewritten, double-spaced and not exceed 500 words. They should include the writer's name, address and telephone number. If the writer is afiliated with the University, the letter should include the writer's home town or faculty or staff position. The Kansan reserves the right to edit letters for publication.
The ministers of the 13-member Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries will meet later this month to review the price at which they sell crude oil.
Oil price rise will devalue dollar
All signs point to a price increase.
The figure heard most often in OPEC capitals is 10 percent.
Nothing will be welcome next year in oil-dependent America. But, at the same time, nothing seems more certain than that the United States will pay the cartel's cost.
For the United States, no acceptable alternative exists; either we pay or we give up high living. Anticipate, therefore, that oil prices will rise next year—and with them prices of all the products into which we place everything from plastics to fertilizers.
When the QPEC ministers met a year ago to decide price, the news was better. Saudi Arabia balked at a price rise in the neighborhood of 10 percent because it felt the Western economies would be hurt badly. The West is no stronger this time, but Saudi Arabia seems less adamant about holding the line.
Skippy, they differentiate themselves from the believe, but the reason behind it grows more preposterous. The Sauds, like their OPEC sisters, are losing money primarily because of the
THE SAUDIS' change of heart probably involves pure economics.
Rick Alm
Simply, they have been losing money.
huge volume of their sales to the United States.
One must start with U.S. imports of oil. Commerce Department figures released Wednesday indicated that oil imports had doubled in September, despite the deficit in October, which increased the deficit for the first 10 months of the year to $28.3 billion last year's record $25.9 billion deficit.
The problem is foreign oil. The United States consumed $3.5 billion of it in October.
It has been the same story for 29 consecutive months, creating a crisis that has led President Carter to pursue tighter controls on corporate responsibility, although not solely, for the glut of U.S. currency flow overseas—$200 billion was held by foreigners in October. The excess of dollars has caused inflation, precipitously on foreign money markets.
OPEC prices, however, are quoted in dollars. The oil producers have found themselves being paid less, in terms of purchasing power as the value of the dollar has dropped.
OIL ANALYST Paul Frankel estimated in the latest issue of Forbes magazine that the decline of the dollar has caused the $12.70 posted price of oil in the Persian Gulf to fall to an equivalent of less than $8.50.
"Producers obviously want to bring the price up," he said, "and that can happen two ways. You can change the system to shield receipts from fluctuations in the price of horses or do that: if the dollar starts to go up, then they will have backed the wrong horse.
"For the moment, they are more likely to keep the raise in dollars. The question is how far it can go without triggering a new world recession. If there are no surprises, the smart money is better on a maximum 10 percent increase."
Considering the fact that the dollar's fall has cost oil suppliers at 33 percent of the value of their output, an increase of 10 percent or less, however unpopular it may be in Europe, ought to be considered an act of charity toward the West, something on the order of Saudi Arabia's stand last year.
PUT THIS appears to be one of those tread-suils that makes economics confounding. "The United States buys more oil next great," will fur-
BUT THIS appears to be one of those readmails that makes economics confounding. If the United States buys more all next year, precipitating perhaps a recession, OPEC will further decline. And, when OPEC sets time to set price, it will be forced to charge
more to compensate, at least partially, for the dollar's diminished value.
The trick is to get off the treadmill
The trick is to get off the tread.
Or hook the various circle.
It's the nature of a vicious circle, of course, to have no beginning or end. Each one of them is another. The oil conundrum laid out here can be solved by either eliminating the trade deficit, perhaps by importing less, or strengthening the value of the dollar.
Both actions are advocated by the Carter administration
Consuming less has proved downright un-American.
But bolstering the dollar serves only as a temporary expedient when the underlying supply chains are unabated. We could, of course, continue our level of oil consumption and import less of other commodities. The possibility of a price stabilization balance of trade by selling more abroad.
THE PROBABILITY of doing either is low. Buying less oil has been a national goal, never achieved, since oil prices rose after the OPEC oil embargo in 1973.
It presents no easy task. But the silver lining in the otherwise dark cloud of the falling dollar that it U.S. products will sell overseas. Exports should increase.
That, in fact, may be the only painless solution.
But just in case: buv American.
"---AND AS A MEMBER OF THE ORGANIZATION OF PETROLEUM EXPORTING COUNTRIES, I SPEAK RIGHT FROM THE HEART"
To the editor:
Metric value needs remeasurement
I am writing to express my concern regarding Allen Holder's recent editorial concerning the current 10-year gradual increase in the metric system of weights and measures.
A study of this conversion has convinced me that the associated costs will be massive and quite inappropriate in this era of financial catastrophe, taxes and sparinged national debt.
This is only the tip of the iceberg, for there are millions of hardware, home appliances, business equipment and other everyday items that also will become obsolete and become outdated. This would result in a tremendous inconvenience and confusion to the public at large. For example, how can the average housewife who bakes her own bread at 350 degrees oven cook with a microwave one-half pound of shortening be expected to produce an edible product with her new
Although the adoption of the metric system would provide a degree of worldwide uniformity of weights and measures and would be pleasing to the scientific community, may I kindly indicate some very real problems that are arising.
UNIVERSITY DAILY letters KANSAN
Further increase of these costs can be anticipated. Literally millions of gasoline pumps will have to be totally recalibrated. The amount of fuel required in grain market, truck weigh station and hospital will become outdated. Thermometers and barometers will all become obsolete, and automobile gauges made to comply with industry standards square inch, degrees Fahrenheit and gallons in every American car will all now be in comprehensible. Of course the tool and die factories producing such items will have to be equipped to accommodate the new standards.
Currently signs throughout the nation's highways are gradually being replaced by similar signs in kilometers. This, of course, incur considers coastal an increase in car accidents; most automobiles have speedometers and odometers calibrated in miles. Few drivers have concept of the length of a kilometer. In other words, virtually expensive road signs are virtually same.
oven calibrated only in degrees Celsius, a measuring cup that is in units liters and a measuring cup that is in inches.
It is also quite interesting to note that with a national issue of such great magnitude as this, virtually no public disclosure of the proposed metric conversion would be necessary if the American public had been adequately informed regarding the proposed metric conversion, the adverse opinion would have been ignored.
This is not to suggest that the United States should completely ignore the metric system inasmuch as it has been used to some extent for 200 years.
As a student who is currently majoring in two different scientific fields, I think that I am able to evaluate this situation from both sides. The sciences have for years operated independently and should continue to do so. With most scientific endeavors being shared internationally, it would be extremely impractical for scientists to operate with computers in the system. This is currently what is being practiced. For scientists, the use of metric in the laboratory and the English system domestically poses no problem. However, for the average American familiar with the metric system, it is easy to foresee great confusion.
it has been said that the solution is education of the public. From whence will the funds come to finance such a massive program?
Hence it seems that in the United States, the metric and English systems of weights and measures should both survive but remain segregated. The United Nations' recommendations for international trade is desirable, there is not reason why the English system should not be perpetuated among the states. A program of voluntary mutualism is needed to meet current mandatory regulations.
It is most interesting to review the government publications concerning the metric conversion. Regarding the financial resources, the budget is the maximum of $45 billion to the country. However, current reports state that "costs will be more appreciable than had been" in previous years.
Proponents of the change continually maintain that a uniform metric system is necessary to promote foreign relations. These countries have been said has been a significant hindrance in our foreign relations have been grossly exaggerated. Scare tactics have been employed in the Congress in an attempt to move the country into making unwarranted change.
It is for these reasons I feel strongly that positive action must be taken before this conversion has gone on. For example, if we already have become law; however, because we are only in the fourth year of a 10-year conversion, there is no reason why this poorly conceived law will work.
Oread neighborhood needs unity. leaders
To the editor:
The resolution was not even an attempt to
David Holroyd is misleading Kansan readers in charging the old leadership of the Oread Neighborhood Association with being ineffective and too slow to enact projects.
The vote to remove him and his fellow officers from DNA office (we both would have preferred the resolution to have concerned Holroyd alone) was certainly not an attempt to reinstate a sluggish leader among the old leaders were anything but sluggish.
reinstate the old leaders, or to exclude one viewpoint, and Holroyd and his friends were immediately asked to serve on a committee to nominate new officers. The resolution was a reaction to observed incompetence in running a meeting, to the lack of an agenda for important issues and to apparent willingness to enact only the most picayune projects.
The Oread neighborhood is an unusual place, a city neighborhood in the middle of a valley with beautiful hills and live or own property here value its special qualities and are willing to work with residents.
This is what the Oread Neighborhood Association is about. We hope Holroyd will forget his disappointment, regain the ONA leadership to make this neighborhood a better one.
Judith Roitman
Assistant professor of mathematics Stanley Lombardo Assistant professor of classics
Assistant professor of classes
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