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University Daily Kansan
Opinion
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Thursday, Nov. 7, 1985
Squeezing in spaces
About 400 students live in KU's eight scholarship halls, but only 157 parking spaces are available in the three lots designated for hall residents.
Residents at the University's scholarship halls are known for their unique brand of community living. Besides sharing housing, they divvy up cooking, cleaning and other hall chores.
But, unfortunately, they can't share parking spaces.
Residents can pay $20 a semester for permits, but even with a permit, there's no guarantee they will find a spot for their Toyota or Buick.
The lots, situated oh-so close to campus, are tempting targets for students who attend night classes or study at the library. Patrons of two of Lawrence's most popular taverns — The Wagon Wheel Cafe and the Jayhawk Cafe — also find the lots convenient.
Why? Because students who don't live in the halls swipe the spaces.
To make matters worse, parking services oversells permits for the three lots — thinking that the same 157 spaces rarely will be filled with the same 157 cars.
The solution seems simple. Build another parking lot.
But there isn't much room for expansion in the scholarship hall neighborhood. To the west sits campus; to the east sits a row of Greek houses on Tennessee Street.
Parking services recently submitted a proposal to the office of facilities planning to build a lot just east of Joliffe Hall. The lot would hold about 40 cars.
Squeezing in 40 more spaces might not accommodate every hall resident who has to park his or her Buick down on Kentucky Street.
But the sooner such a lot is built, the better. Forty extra spaces east of Joliffe would save at least 40 students a long—and potentially dangerous—walk home to the scholarship hall
Stephan's blunders
Bob Stephan should have known better.
Kansas' attorney general, who wants to be the state's next governor, has made two decisions that together may rank as one of the biggest blunders in Kansas political history.
Decision one was agreeing this spring to secretly settle a suit by Marcia Tomson, a former clerk in his office. Tomson says Stephan fired her because she wouldn't warm up to his sexual propositions.
The decisions most likely will cost him even a shot at Cedar Crest next fall.
Decision two was encouraging a friend to publicize the terms of that settlement last week.
Now the whole mess is splattered across front pages of newspapers statewide. Tom-
He compounded that mistake by going public with details of the settlement — an act that came off as a chinny attempt at public disclosure.
son threatens to refile her suit on grounds that the secret deal was violated. And Kansas Republicans jockey to fill what they see as a probable void in the governor's race.
The whole mess leaves Stephan looking increasingly less like the Republican nominee for governor. Perhaps that's for the better.
Regriddess of the truth of Tomson's charges, Stephan broke a rule of public office: Don't make secret deals.
Stephan has mishandled his personal affairs. Those questioning his candidacy for governor stand justified in doubting whether he can handle the affairs of 2.4 million others.
NATO's strong support
Western European allies in NATO last week gave three expressions of clear support to President Reagan as he heads toward a summit meeting with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev on Nov. 19-20 in Geneva, Switzerland. Now he must find ways to use that support.
Then NATO defense ministers met in Brussels, Belgium, and issued a statement that "the president goes to Geneva with the full support and solidarity of the alliance." They also called on the Soviets to stop using a "double standard" by which the Soviets violate current treaties.
First, the Netherlands announced its long-delayed decision to accept U.S. cruise and Pershing 2 missiles. The decision was a defeat to a strong, six-year domestic opposition. Further, it was a rebuke to Gorbachev, who had appealed directly to the Dutch to refuse the missiles.
At the same meeting in
Brussels, Great Britain dropped a condition for guaranteed amounts of research of the Strategic Defense Initiative, commonly known as Star Wars. The British now support the program fully and soon should have an agreement on sharing research.
The NATO statement; however, avoided specific support of Star Wars by keeping its support in general terms.
Even if a cynical view says the statement is a necessary pre-summit exercise, it still shows the failure of constant Soviet efforts to divide NATO. Especially backed up by the Dutch decision on missiles, it helps Reagan go to the summit as he wants — able to negotiate from strength.
That being the case, Reagan can afford to negotiate with a firm philosophy but a flexible list of bargaining points — the best way to make progress. If he does, he will justify the support of the United States, NATO and the world.
Rob Karwath Editor
Duncan Calhoun Business manager
John Hanna Michael Totty
Managing editor Editorial editor
Lauretta McMillen
Campus Miller
Susanne Shaw
General manager news adviser
General manager, news adviser
Business manager
Brett McCabe Sue Johnson
Retail sales Campus sales
Megan Burke
National/Co-op sales
John Oberzan
Sales and marketing adviser
The Kansan reserves the right to reject or edit letters and guest shots. They can be mailed or brought to the Kansan newsroom, 111 Slauffer Fint Hall.
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MINNABACK STREET AND ROUND
I'M NOT SURE, BUT IT COULD BE ONE OF NATURE'S LITTLE SIGNS THAT WE'RE IN FOR A ROUGH WINTER...
Newspapers' rough and tumble game
A lot of people understand basically how football is played, and surprisingly it's a lot like putting out a newspaper.
For one thing, both football teams and newspaper people work hard, but they make their mistakes in front of God and everybody. Nobody else on campus risks looking foolish so regularly. That notoriety may contribute to their image problems.
Drawing an analogy between football teams and newspaper staffs may help people understand newspapers. A recent national survey suggests a lot of people don't.
Today's football teams play different players on offense and defense. Likewise, newspapers have advertising and news sides, and they don't tell each other how to play. Both sides work to make sure that advertisers don't decide the news any more than alumni call the plays.
A good ad side, like a good defense,
can take a team a long way. It sets up
the offense in good position over and
over.
line: They're the beasts of burden that move the offense. But the ball handlers, the news editors, make it work. Photographers, if they fit in, are like tight ends who both block and catch.
Reporters are like the offensive
Then there's the special teams, the opinion page people. These kamikazes stick to themselves. They don't dictate the offense or defense, and they don't take orders on how to play their game.
Editors — an editorial board — write editorials. Columnists write columns, and they don't have to agree with the editorial board. From editors, readers cheer and boo and write letters, but they don't write editorials.
News editors and reporters don't write any of those things. Reporters, even with bylines, do not give opinions any more than offensive linemen return punts. Good news mix opinion and news except in clearly labeled "analysis" or "commentary" columns.
Newspapers have behind-the-
Dan Howell
Staff columnist
scenes people equivalent to trainers and equipment managers. Those include the layout and wire editors and the copy desk. By the way, copy editors write most headlines; don't blame the reporters.
Commercial newspapers also have circulation departments that equate roughly with ticket and concession staffs.
As for coaching, the Kansan operates more or less with all the coaches (faculty) in the press box. On the field, it really is a student operation. It resembles — sometimes too much — sandlot games in which the captain is the quarterback and calls the plays.
Not all student papers are that way, and of course commercial papers have publishers who often
work about like head coaches or even athletic directors. You know, set up schedules and speak to local organizations.
That's the scoop on who does what.
Of course, every analogy breaks
down.
Few newspapers have their own weight rooms or say prayers before press runs. Newspaper people eat half a pizza as their entire daily nutrition, not as part of an evening snack.
Football players, on the other hand, don't pretend to know the meaning of everything. And for all they care, liberal bias might have to do with snow tires.
Well, sports folks spend half their waking hours watching people play games and the other half measuring the results of that play. The closest thing to that is being on the chain gang.
Oh, by the way, an analogy of a football team to a newspaper staff seems to call for mention of the sports page. At least sports seems like the logical connection, right?
On the road to Geneva
Reagan faces tough summit choices
WASHINGTON - President Reagan is taking a crash course in Kremlinology to prepare for the Nov. 19-20 meeting in Geneva with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.
One of his toughest decisions is how to respond to Gorbachev's proposal to cut the superpower nuclear strain in half if Reagan will give up his effort of building the futuristic Star Wars space defense system.
The public relations aspects of the run up to the summit also have White House officials scrambling to raise Reagan's foreign policy profile with a rash of interviews with foreign reporters and an important televised speech a few days before the Geneva meeting.
The same officials are telling Reagan to clam up when White
Helen Thomas
United Press International White House Reporter
House reporters fire questions at him concerning the summit or world affairs. As a result, Reagan refused to answer any questions for three days while at the United Nations in New York last week.
It has taken Reagan five years to get around to what most of his recent predecessors have viewed as a top priority from the moment they stepped into the White House — the need for tensions in superpower relations.
Officials fear that Gorbachev gained the high ground by proposing the 50 percent cut in offensive nuclear arms.
In Reagan's presidency, East-West relations have been conducted in a cold war atmosphere, fueled by
adventures in Central America sponsored by the Soviets, the occupation of Afghanistan and the downing of an unarmed Korean airliner.
In the past, the president has scoffed at nuclear arms agreements, always certain that the U.S. had gotten the worst of the deal. He stacked the National Security Council with hardline anti-Soviet experts.
But hardliners still predominate in the administration and are vocal in the shunk Reagan should approach the Soviets on the nuclear arms issue.
Those experts have more or less departed the scene, going back to unmasking the evil forces.
Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle are the leaders of the group who believe the Soviets have defended on arms agreements too often in the past to be trusted now.
Weinberger wants to go to Geneva
as a member of the summit team and canceled an Asian tour to press his case. But others in the administration want him to stay home.
The makeup of the U.S. delegation to Geneva will be revealing. The U.S. arms negotiators already are there and may be called upon for advice.
In other sidelights on the summit, one of the preliminary scenarios called for Reagan and Gorbachev to have a private talk without advisers that would last 20 minutes or more before each meeting. But now it is understood that the time has been shaved to seven minutes or so.
Reagan apparently is going along with the plot line. He also hopes to have the last word by flying to Brussels to report to allied leaders on his way back to Washington on Nov. 21. When he arrives in the nation's capital he will head for Capitol Hill to deliver a report of the summit results to a joint session of Congress.
Mailbox
The open highway
Some of your readers who have not driven toward Kansas City recently may be interested to know of an improvement. It was apparently about three weeks ago that the intersections of L-435 and L-35 were opened.
This means that one may drive east on K-10, continue on I-435 east, and very shortly afterward turn off to I-355, either southbound toward Wichita, or northbound toward Des Moines.
I found that the driving time from south Lawrence to Kansas City International Airport (using 1-635 and 1-29) is now as low as one hour and ten or fifteen minutes, with comparable reduction in driving time to downtown Kansas City. Although some construction is now underway on 1-35 north of the intersection with 1-435, there is now no essential impediment to traffic.
To my mind, the only goal yet to be
achieved is placing signs on I-35s, near I-455, saying that the next exit is the proper one for K-10 and Lawrence.
Interestingly enough, I wrote the above information to another regional newspaper, which decided the letter nor to write a separate story.
I think this opening is newsworthy,
I cannot figure the reason for the
 reluctance, which I have met before
on such highway stories. Could it be
pressure from some local merchants
who do not wish local customers to
find out how easy it is to shop in Kansas
City?
J. Bunker Clark professor of music history
A foolish, deadly fad
As Kansas State Chairman for the Operation Lifesaver program, a railroad-financed public safety effort endorsed both by Gov. John Carlin
and the National Safety Council, I am writing to beg your editorial support in halting the foolish fad that has already cost the life of one University of Kansas student: an act called "training."
An individual who is in a vehicular accident with a train is 40 times (not 40 percent, 40 times) more likely to be killed or to suffer serious injury than in a traffic accident involving two highway vehicles.
Although the Operation Lifesave program originally was aimed principally at balting railroad-highway grade crossing accidents, we have become involved in any situation in which members of the public encountered with trains or railroad counters with trains or railroad equipment.
Now take away the limited protection the shell of the vehicle offers and figure how susceptible the pedestrian or trespasser is when struck by a train.
A locomotive alone can weigh 200 tons or more, not to mention the fact that most trains, with multiple locomotives and fully-loaded freight cars, weigh between 5,000 and 10,000 tons. Gambling an 180-pound human being against such odds is unimaginable.
Please help us stop this senseless practice before it reaches epidemic proportions. Other railroaders and I are available at any time to provide education, assistance and programs — free of charge upon request
Jim Johnson
Jim Johnson
Southern Pacific
Transportation Company
Kansas City, Kan.
Correction
Because of an editor's error, Ray Dillinger's name was misspelled in Monday's Mailbox.