UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN editorials
Unsigned editorials represent the opinion of the Kansan editorial staff. Signed columns represent the views of only the writers.
OCTOBER 25,1978
Agent Orange at home
The horrors of Agent Orange never seem to die. They keep recurring.
First the public learned that the use of the jungle defoliant might be the reason for an increase in birth defects in Vietnam. Later stories surfaced of the chemical's effects on Vietnam veterans who had been exposed to it - complaints ranged from nervous disorders to deformed children.
The use of Agent Orange in Vietnam was stopped in 1969, but not so in the United States. Domestically the spectre of Agent Orange remains.
NOW, JUST AS then, the use of the two compounds that made up Agent Orange continues. Its use is not small scale either-thousands of acres are being sprayed with the herbicide each year.
Currently there is a drive to ban one of the compounds in Agent Orange because of its hazards. Scientists suspect that 2,4,5-Trichlorophenoxyoacetic acid is the cause of many of its problems with humans. A contaminant in 2,4,5-T can cause birth defects and miscarriages in laboratory animals.
But tests on the chemical's effects on humans are inconclusive. Despite an environmentalists' push for a ban
shortly after the Vietnam halt, many people—especially farmers and foresters—resisted, saying the herbicide was safe when used properly.
The U.S. Forest Service sprayed about 6,605 acres of national forest land in 1977, but only 1,486 acres so far this year.
WHEN THE USE of 2,4,5-T was restricted in 1989, it was prohibited from usage on food crops, except rice, and in residential areas.
The Environmental Protection Agency announced in April that it would study a possible ban of 2,4,5-T. This action was prompted, in large part, by hundreds of letters from people across the country complaining of the effects of the herbicide.
But a 1974 EPA study of 2,4,5-T produced no concerns about its hazards, as scientists were unable to measure infinitesimal amounts such as part per trillion. New technology could change this, however.
Until the long-term effects of the chemical are known, 2,4,5-T should be banned. The potential harm to the environment and to unsuspecting humans far outweighs any economic arguments herbicide supporters can offer.
Enthusiasm of joggers is difficult to understand
I've decided there must be something to this jigsaw stuff. At least that's what I say now that I seem in the minority—those who don't tog.
Early one morning last weekend, at least 3,000 persons gathered downtown in Kansas City. Mo. They gathered to run. And enough people ran. So the Kansas City's Main Street came to watch.
I thought they were nuts.
STILL I couldn't figure out why all these people were running. This was a 10,000-meter race—2.6 miles. That's a long enough distance to walk, but to run?
But I kept my mouth shut and watched. What a mob I saw -old and middle-aged, men and women, young men wearing sweatbands and teenagers and even little boys. There were women who were old enough to be my friend, but who looked like high school cheerleaders.
But who was it to say? I had only gone to watch. And to try to figure out why anyone would waste his Sunday morning by running with 3,000 other people. Yet I wondered what he was for coming in first. The chances for finishing in the ten hundred seemed slim.
I had to find another reason for all this nonsense, but it looked as though they were trying to be more sensitive.
It was a warm morning in the mid 60s, so there weren't too many acrylic running suits noticeable in the crowd. I went with one suit and a new $240 running suit was a reason for many runners' participation. But because I saw only seven or eight suits in the crowd, I obviously needed more.
At this race the participants had to pay a $5 entry fee. For that, they received a simple tan-colored cotton T-shirt that told them what place they finished and that told them what place they finished.
but that still didn't seem to be enough to inspire 3,000 runners at the same time.
A FIRST I was worried that all those bills would end up in the pockets of the company that sponsored the race, but later I was told the money went to charity.
They kept coming and as 10 o'clock neared, Main Street was jammed with runners. A loudspeaker blared that all onlookers should stay off the streets unless
they wanted to be run over when the race began.
I moved back quickly and started picking
out persons in the race who I thought would
"The gun went off and what seemed at first to be a never-ending sea of runners began to jog by. Then they were gone and it was 30 minutes before I saw any of them again.
I BEGAN to get bored, and to stay awake I again started thinking about what inspired joggers. Before Sunday, I had been told often about the wonders of jogging. I had been told it improved your circulation and heart health, and alert. I heard all sorts of good things.
All I knew was that running made me tired.
Then about 10:30 the first runner crossed the finish line and everybody clapped because he was first and because he was about two minutes ahead of the No. 2 run.
Applause couldn't be the reason. Besides,
applause weren't applause, so I rulped that out.
applause, so I rulped that out.
The rest of the runners finished over the next 45 minutes and they looked tired. Some of them ran faster than others.
IREALLY began to doubt that there were any valid reasons for some of these participants. I heard a woman complaining about her time. It couldn't have taken her an hour and three minutes, she said. But that's what the card said.
I still don't know what made all those people run Sunday. Or what makes jogging so popular that you can hardly walk on a bike during evening without seeing jogger after jogger.
Overall, I was a little bit inspired by those 3,000 runners. I'd thought about jogging before, but never seriously. But this time I found enough that I going to start jogging.
Maybe it's the suits. Maybe it’s the camaraderie among joggers. Maybe it’s the jeans. Maybe it’s the boots.
One of these days
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
No axiom of American politics has been more pervasively honored than the notion that conservative Republicans are venal servants of Big Business, while liberal Democrats are the noble champions of the masses.
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY
Their initiative rests on the premise that working people and conservatives share an interest in jobs. Heavy taxes and government regulations, they tell the workers, weaken the economy and stifle private investment, the base of their economic growth.
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Everyone except Rep. Philip M. Crane, R-III., and a renegade band of New Right Republicans who have the gall to polish up some traditional ideas and go stumping among ordinary working people.
Like the Peter Finch character in the movie "Netflix," he is a common man to say, "I'm work as well and I'm going to do."
Everyone believes that
THE NEW RIGHT worries about how inflation shrinks paychecks, but the frustration with high taxes has proved a strong push for an economic stimulus.
The New Right may have struck a responsive note. Crane and Rep. Mickey Edwards, R-Oka., both officers of the American Conservative Union, took their New Right style to economically troubled Youngstown, Ohio, last winter. After talking with union leaders, Edwards gave this report:
"What these workers said, in effect, was this: The Environmental Protection Agency has blocked the steel mills from using a river created for that purpose. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has come in and driven up costs. Few free-market conservatives as well as those union leaders are engaged as an did those union leaders in Youngstown.
Conservatism for the common man, at least for now, appears to be a fleeting, but necessary flirtation with political extremism—something like the New Left of the 1960s.
New Right destined to fade away
But with anti-government sentiment festering, substantial potential exists for the New Right to carve out a place for itself, as long as the political establishment roots. What it needs now however, is a spokesman.
Extremists and ideologues play an important political role in the *twistededee-Tweediede* two-party system. Often, they emerge precisely because of the failure of the parties to issue these issues. They provide the forum for issues moderate ignore.
But if it doesn't have a future, at least it can have a function.
Crane thinks he's that man.
If the New Right is lean on leaders, issues are a bigger problem. The program of the New Right emerges negative because few identifiable goals have been emphasized.
Ask the typical New Right politician what he stands for and he will invariably tell you something he is against! "1
Neither the Republicans nor the Democrats, for example, responded to popular frustrations about government. It was in that frustration the New Right found its opportunity.
Now, however, the issue of big government has the attention of the major parties and New Right boasts about an emerging American conservative majority appear more than ever to be wishful thinking.
PARTY LOYALTY cost Reason the support of the New
arrangement the same cost the New Right dearly. It lost its only plan
of payment.
After his unsuccessful bid for the presidency in 1976, Reagan was counted to lead conservatives out of the political desert. He refused. The final split came this summer when Reagan's Citizens for the Republic, with $250,000 left over from the 1978 campaign, returned to back him. He also led a group of clerics closed down Sen. Clifford Cissard, R-N.J., for one year.
The New Right has been casting about for a leader who can bring it into the political spotlight. Reagan, once its darling, has abandoned them for the more respectable—and electable—moderates.
THE 47-YEAR-OLD congressman, who has John Kennedy's hangoring forelock and Barry Goldwater's chin, is the only announced presidential candidate for 1980. He also may now far be greeted by an underwhelming ho-hum.
Without Reagan, Crane happens to be the best of the New Right. Although he has the look of a corner, he lacks the experience and the wisdom.
Without leaders or issues, the New Right, like the New Left of the 1960s, appears destined to wither away. There is no longer any need for a third wave of
BUT THE NEW right keeps loses the issues it has to the old-right and the old left. Issues the New Right had just six months ago have been stolen by the two major powers. The U.S. and its lower taxes and less government cannot be found this fall.
But no one else does.
Gerald Ford was amused; Ronald Reagan mildly irritated. Since announcing in August, Crane has been ignored in favor of more plausible candidates—Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., and Reagan, the former
The announcement, which came from a political nobly two years before the election, failed to panic Jimmy Carter, although the president should remember that he generated the same boredom when he announced his
Press him: "Well, yes, but what are you for?"
This, in a way, is inevitable. The movement was born out of frustrations and failures with a Democratic government that has not succeeded; it has succeed only in putting the country in a regulatory straitjacket and sending government spending money back into the system.
In U.S. politics, moderates end triumph. The New Right, again like the New Left, will be absorbed into the political center—but only after the conflict that created it has been resolved.
MAYAIDU
RECKLIMDOR NAUK LEADER ©PETER CHIANGO TRUMBLE
Tax cuts feed racial. social divisions
And one way to commit a similar indiscretion in California today is to speak out against Proposition 13 and the whole state's anti-immigration compassion and social democracy in our state.
FULLERTON, Calif.—As the little boy in the fairy tale discovered, telling the truth about the emperor's lack of clothing was considered to be a dangerous faux pas.
N. Y. Times Feature
BY STANLEY I WILLIAM BOSTON
Meanwhile, the governor of California has picked up the banner of radical conservatism and has slashed the already scrawny budgets of health, education and welfare. It is a gesture of importance. It is also important because everyone has a stake in the cultural and welfare services that improve the quality of life in our society.
THE CUTTING of educational budgets across the state transcends all other issues. Some budget tightening may or may not be appropriate, a restructuring active program may or may not be desirable.
AT THE center of the present crisis lies the problem of school integration; the feeble designee has resisted and desegregate has resulted in their becoming more segregated than ever. It is a testimony to the worst features of our society, the failure of our schools to be denied their share of the American
What is needed is a leader who will understand and fight for the children. What is missing is a constituency that will lobby for the rights and needs of children and the professional staff that services them.
There isn't much that can be done about the systematic throttling of public education in this state; the pious words and promises of politicians and board members are believed by no one. There is a general consensus that the schools have been cut the length they were supposed to be, Sacramento. And because no one seems to really care about public education.
Educators from every part of the nation believe these demands for fiscal responsibility are sound and they are eager to develop such programs. But what is needed, you ask, is think, is the budget slashes that the schools have suffered for more than a decade.
dream. Against the racism and bifogy of some Americans, public schools have been a symbol and haven for many who believe in the promise of equal opportunity.
Certain religious and racial groups have not shared these feelings; but the glory of the nation has been that generations of immigrants have come to America and have become acculturated through their experiences in free public schools.
THAT MAY be the reason why all politicians have expressed a commitment to public education even as they demand more. But now the likelihood of the abandonment of the schools by white middle-class families makes it more likely that educators are aware of the consequences of these actions.
We need leaders 'who will tell the truth to the American people,' Adai Stevenson once said. And the need was never more apparent than here in California. What is needed is a leader who will understand and fight for the children. Who is a leader, who uses the rights and duties of children and the professional staff that services them.
THE MOST troubling part of our present dilemma is the lack of leadership in Sacramento and Los Angeles. There has been a tendency to confuse the words of reform while providing the schools with the budgets of austerity. And there has been a tendency to confuse the issues. All public leaders have been guilty of so it is climate.
The desire of white middle-class families to send their children to segregate schools is everywhere evident. It reflects a fear of the urban experience and the poor. And if the middle class were more susceptible than human, then it is not difficult to understand the frustrated, angry reactions of the urban poor. So it is that even the Los Angeles Board of Education must also plan in the courts, thus giving aid and comfort to the segregationists.
portant risks for California and our society. The first risk is that the leaders of education and the state, who have been given some power in government, will be the past, will no longer be taken seriously by even the most befuddled citizen. If, as the fortunes of politics turn, the politicians shift their positions with the power they gain, they will be surprised by the results on election day.
SUCH A vacuum of leadership runs important risks for California and our society.
become more severe—the most secluded suburbanite will not be able to escape the consequences of living in a state which is segregated on a de facto basis. If property conditions continue, California will certainly forfeit its right to leadership on the national stage.
Racial and socio-economic divisions will
It is a fact of this election campaign that the voters do not have much of a choice. The candidates are difficult to tell apart, and only media hype gives one the advantage.
THE SECOND danger is that California will become the center of ultrasonic conservatism. If this happens, it will mean that the most selfish interests of our people will have triumphed over the old moral standards and lied the lack of compassion and latent bigotry that lies behind the facade of genteel conservation and opportunistic liberalism.
California's best course of action is to reevaluate its recent soak-the-poor-to-give-the-rich philosophy. That idea was behind the enormous windfall firms large corporations and landlords received as a result of Proposition 13.
The best thing California's political leaders can do is to re-impose those taxes. And a large part of money should be directed to improvement of welfare and education services now.
Stanley William Rothstein is associate professor of education in the School of Human Development and Community at California State University, Fullerton.
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