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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Friday, October 4, 1968
Congress skirts veto
Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas asked President Johnson to withdraw his nomination for Chief Justice Wednesday and ended a sordid little piece of Congressional history.
That the Senate, which surely had other more important matters to discuss, should have used so much time in unending speeches attacking, not Fortas, but the Supreme Court in general is disappointing.
After Fortas announced the withdrawal, Senator Strom Thurmond of S.C., one of the filibuster leaders, said:
that the House previously spent much time in private session watching "skin" movies for the purpose of dubbing Fortas immoral because he had ruled that the Supreme Court couldn't censor such erotica, is even more disappointing.
"This is the wisest decision Fortas has made since he has been Supreme Court Justice. I think he might go a step further now and resign from the Supreme Court for the sake of good government."
Thurmond and the rest of the Senators opposing Fortas have changed the battle against Fortas'
nomination by a "lame-duck president" into a direct attack on the Supreme Court.
Although, because of the law and order cult and the rise of George Wallace, the Supreme Court has been under severe attack in the past year, Thurmond can't really be sure that all Americans want Fortas, Warren and the rest of the Supreme Court out.
The "lame-duck" argument is a recognizable one if not too fair. But Congress virtually side-stepped that point.
Instead the House members against Fortas tried, without much success to undermine Fortas' character and according to columnist Drew Pearson, even used a behind-the-scenes attack on his Jewish background.
And the Senate antagonists chose to decide for themselves the mood of the country and stop the nomination by filibustering attacks on the Court.
Fottas' nomination never came to a vote in the Senate. Instead Congress practiced a series of stabs-in-the-back that circumvented the purpose of their veto power of nominations.
Letter to the editor
Wondering
To the Editor:
A few days ago the Kansan ran a story which carried the following statement. "When asked why he was opposed to long hair and beards Almquist replied, 'Those kind of people just aren't clean. They're also dangerous. We've got a lot of girls living over here and they (bearded or long-haired tenants) are a threat to their security.'"
It makes you wonder doesn't it.
A few day ago the announcer on one of the Kansas City, Missouri radio stations said "Today is American Indian Day." He proceeded to explain that he did not have all the details but the day had been set aside to pay tribute to America's Indians—a people who have not always been given a fair shake of things. Then he said "This is also the second day of National Dog Week."
It does make you wonder.
Yesterday the Kansas reported the following dialogue.
"Yeah, I was just getting used to calling them 'negroes' instead of 'niggers.' . . But now I have to start all over and begin calling them 'blacks.'"
"Well, dammit, if they play football like that every Saturday, I'll call them whatever they want."
A little further down in the article another exchange was related.
"Say, wasn't that one run of his great?"
"Yeah, too bad he had to get hurt. But I know colorados, he'll be right back in there next week, sweating with the rest of them."
Yes it really makes you wonder. It also really makes you sick in the gut.
Willis H. Jacob Lake Charles, La. Graduate student
Quotes
"Today's community standards do not permit girls to dance nude before an audience. To permit such conduct at the University would open the door to nude dancers throughout the community."
"They wrote in the old days that it is sweet and fitting to die for one's country. But in modern days there is nothing sweet nor fitting in your dying. You will die like a dog for no good reason."
MADISON, Wis.—Dist. Attty James Bell, in ruling obscene a University of Wisconsin version of "Peter Pan" in which nude coeds appeared:
Ernest Hemmingway
'It's disgraceful that Mr. Fortas would accept money for his law lectures!'
The Hill With It by john hill
"You're probably wondering why I called this meeting," said the last remaining dodo bird on the face of the earth.
“It’s about our soul-brother, the ASC,” he said, in solemn tones, addressing the last passenger pigeon, and the last dinosaur, who looked as sleepy as always.
"I have a prepared speech," said the dodo, taking some folded sheets of blank paper from his inside coat pocket and tearing them up, "but I prefer that my remarks be off hand, the cuff, and the top of my head."
“Mah friends,” he began in a deep, affected tone, “as we know, extinction is an honor that comes to only a few species. In spite of their many efforts, mankind has not even achieved it. As yet. But we now welcome a new member to our exalted ranks—the All Student Council of the University of Kansas.”
He paused to make an unsuccessful effort to muffle a fake sob.
"A student government which, for years, has had a disappointing, inactive image to the student body, will soon re-emerge in what appears to be a more solid, promising form of representation," the dodo slammed his fist down on the podium loudly, hoping to both emphasize his point and wake up the dinosaur, "like a noble phoenix rising from its own ashes!"
The dodo, a skilled politician, smiled to himself at his shrewdness in always using bird analogies, since the passenger pigeon always found them somehow personally flattering.
The dodo liked being chairman of Extinction Anonymous, and, after all, this was an election year.
"But our concern, sadly ironic as it may be, is not the future but the past," he continued, secretly glad that Mickey Mouse couldn't make it as guest lecturer for this occasion.
"We shall not only welcome the ASC as a fellow extinct species, but we shall pay them the additional honor of being in our Hall of Fame due to an evolutionary precedent that still has Darwin spinning!" he yelled, trying for his big finish.
"And now, in respect for the ASC, which from our perspective will soon become a household word, we will hold a moment of silence for a species that will soon democratically be able to vote itself out of existence!"
The dodo peeked a few moments later, head bowed, to see that the total effect was slightly marred by the passenger pigeon who was preoccupied trying to look as noble as a phoenix, and only succeeded in making an ash of himself, not to mention the loud snores of the dinosaur . . .
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Kansan Movie Review
'Petulia' beautiful slice of non-fidelity
by Scott Nunley
"Petulia" is a beautiful and poetic, fast and fascinating slice at marital non-fidelity. If the cut itself does not bleed, in the world of "Petulia," marriage is bloodless and only imitates the motions of life.
"Petulia," however, should have been titled "Archie"—it is George C. Scott's triumph throughout, as he treks that actor's nightmareland between comedy and tragedy. Julie Christie is more lovely (or more lovingly studied) than ever, but she is merely one of the irritants under the raw eyelids of Scott's wise and stupid Archie.
Yet infidelity would hardly be the word for the relationship between Petulia and Archie, implying the serious violation of agreements that (at least in this film) are meaningless to begin with.
Certainly the lovers are not being faithful, but there is also little for them to be faithless to. When asked why he is breaking up a long marriage and leaving two young sons, Archie can only shrug: he is "tired" of being married.
Petulia herself is newly married, to a man she found "beautiful" at first glance. But she owes him neither fidelity nor explanation—she seems to scarcely think of him. His murderous fury at her is somehow, in this world, a fault of his, a lapse of urbanity and tolerance (or care-lessness).
The nearest Petulia approaches self-examination is to muse that she has transformed her husband's gentle hands into iron fists and that she was doing the same thing to her new lover. That's all, a moment of musing, an interesting observation not followed by any meaningful criticism or guilt.
After Archie's best friend reveals that he wishes he too had the courage to seek divorce, the friend's wife admits that she feels exactly the same. Even those marital relationships that maintain their surface cohesion are hollow beneath.
amongten criticis of guru. Other marital arrangements in "Petulia" are no more successful.
This is certainly not a pleasant analysis of contemporary life. Nor does there seem to be any solution: Archie's "escape" brings him no visible benefits. He hasn't learned why he left, he hasn't decided what he wants instead, he doesn't achieve any better situation.
But as entertainment, "Petulia" is certainly not a depressing movie.
Director Richard Lester has paced his actors swiftly and interjected a multitude of amusing sight jokes into the script. What might have been a crushing thematic weight is lightened by Lester's attitude toward his material-lightened perhaps in the same way that the modern dramatist advises his audience to accept the absurdities of their lives and yet laugh at them.
it is more important in "Petulia" than in many films that the audience accept this basic reality of the screen situation. It is never easy to open the public's eye to ugly truths—one false note or trick and the viewer will seek escape in the cry that this is all, anyway, just an illusion: the "real" world, his world, is certainly not so sick.
Lester's almost-Antoniois demand for perfection of detail completes the casual script's solidifying "Petulia's" world. A rumple bed has obviously been slept in by a flesh and blood owner, a battered body is too horribly bloody for an illusion. And when Lester demands a realistic discotheque background, he won't settle for less than Janis Joplin.
But Lester's camera screams this message in a rhythm that builds to an irresistable intensity.
at one moment the empty, mechanical vistas of modern America appear in monotonous or chilling glares of light. Lifeless skyscrapers trail to the horizon, government slums sprawl in inhuman regularity, servo-powered motels open to reveal antiseptic chrome cells. (One especially horrifying supermarket lies frozen under a pale of blue-lite ice.)
Then in juxtaposition appear the exaggerated, sensual, decadent, scenes of modern pleasures. Satanically blood-red topless restaurants cloy the appetite while luxuriously expensive mansion-homes conceal decayed family structures. The only apparent retreat from the mechanical sterility outside is to an equally sterile mind-bending hallucinatory light show inside.
Back and forth Lester moves: sterility, sterility. Take your choicest.
But do choose "Petulia"—there is no uncertainty here: "Petulia" is an exceptional motion picture experience. Richard Lester has added another sensitive study of contemporary life to his credits and has somehow achieved a light drama that both entertains like comedy and illuminates like tragedy.