4 Monday, February 17, 1975 University Daily Kausan KANSAN Editorials, columns and letters published on this page reflect only the views of the writers. ominions of the writer Nonvoters excused Well, another student body presidential election is over. A total of 2,703 students bothered to vote in the election. This represents less than 15 per cent of the potential electorate of about 20,000 students. So we write an editorial criticizing student apathy, right? No thanks. Indeed, staying away from this election was quite justifiable. The candidates offered no starting new proposals for student government—at least no new proposals that seemed realistic or worthwhile. The campaign statements were the most important and ephemeral as any written by national presidential candidates, Two of the candidates had campa- man managers—just like the real thing, folks. There were endorse- mentes, media campaigns (some of which hittered the campus) with jury tickets—real big-time stuff, gang. And yes, even after the lessons of the past year, we had small-time versions of dirt tricks campaigns. We had hundreds of kickstocks in this election were amazing. All of this makes one think, "What's the use in voting? Is there really a candidate with support most voters?" The answer is mostly of students thought not. Most students apparently saw what some of the student politicss failed to see—it was only a student body presidential election—not a referendum on the end of the world. It seems to me that the post isn't worth the machinations used to reach it. Maybe, just maybe, students would be attracted by intelligent, cleanly fought campaigns that offered clear-cut choices. Maybe candidates should offer something new, be honest and talk like people-not like professional politicians. We hear enough doublespeak and obfuscated claptrap from state and national elections—we don't need to hear it from our peers. College politicians ought to try to stop emulating the political pros. If we can't manage to stage reasonable, sane elections in college where chances are relatively small, what chances are there for clean big-time politics? I don't expect these words to change student elections. Voter turnout will continue to be light and candidates and their followers will continue to take the elections too seriously and look silly. I just hope the new president, Ed Roifs, realizes that he has but one mandate. The overwhelming number of students have charged him with giving him a reason to get interested in campus politics. -Craig Stock Demon rum loses The annual battle over demon rum in Kansas is over again, but I still can't decide whether Carrie Nation is resting peacefully or revolving in Recently a few of our more heathen state senators put together a small campaign to amend the state constitution to allow liquor-by-the-drink. The amendment would have allowed individual counties and cities to decide whether liquor by the drink could be served within their boundaries. These senators made their usual speeches and ran the big ads in newspapers appealing to citizens to write to their congressmen demanding votes for the amendment. Their opponents, every one of them a true Christian, put out their propaganda, too. One of these stance cheers the decision by the Elmer Gantry, claimed that liquor-by-the-drink led to death on the highways. His colleagues spouted their own spies about the wickedness of the amendment. When the measure came up for a vote in the state senate last week, the Christians won, as usual. The vote was 23-16 in favor of the amendment, four short of the two-thirds majority needed. A bit of a heathen myself, I was, at first, rather depressed by the outcome. So I picked up a couple of friends and we headed for one of Lawrence's many clubs. None of us were members, but by paying $1 each we entered as guests of the house. They had an excellent little jazz band playing that night, so the dollar was well spent. I sat there in the smoky haze, sipping my scotch and soda, watching some young women wiggle to the music, hearing occasionally the click of poker chips in the next room and began to wonder what all the hubbub in Topeka had been about. —Mike Rieke I got up at 8 a.m. Tuesday and spent one of the coldest days of my life, shivering uncontrollably for hours both at the Capitol and at the governor's mansion, then working from home to help prepare Wednesday's Kansan coverage of the event. The obvious question has to be, was it worth it? Reflections on Ford's visit The President has been to Kansas and gone, and I'm left to reflect on the day. AT THE RISK OF being actually joked with the press while waiting for Air Force One to land. But with the squeak of tires on the runway, our man reported, the government man Joe Geechee with the Steelers trailing in the Super Bowl. Downright hostile, they were. BUT THE CROWD downtown at the Capitol, they were in great spirits. When the President comes to town, you need a big, noisy crow on hand. And the powers that be in By John Pike Editor considered too easily impressed, I will have to say it was. I never seen a president before, but that really wasn't the highlight of the day. The machine of experience was just seeing the machinery of a presidential visit in operation. Secret service men are really quite friendly, by the way, until the President approaches. Our photographer who covered Ford's arrival at Forbes Air Base said the agents there Take the Secret Service, for example. Of course they need to maintain security and I realize that they often prefer to go incognito, but they make sure we grow muratively) talking into their fingertips. The agents hide the microphones of their walkie-talkies there, you see, and run wires up their sleeves to the radio and out their collars to provide production looks like a discount version of the Six Million Dollar Man. Topekna exactly how to get one—let the schools out. Kids of every description were everywhere. They were hanging in trees, sitting on monuments, you name it. A LOT OF US were looking for the White House press corps because we wanted to see familiar faces and we were curious to see whether the methods of these media giants differed substantially in their approach, are still looking for the White House press corps, only for a slightly different reason. You see, when you've never dealt with these people before you naively assume that they're all photographers. So photographers you're used to—some good-natured jockying for the best camera angle, maybe, or a little pushing to get to the head of a line for questions. We When Ford moved up the drive shaking hands with the crowd, the White House press simply covered him up, screening him totally from the local press, which was helplessly trapped in their rope-off corral. These people, who had had to endure the fire, were the White House men waited in their heated bus, cursed as their fears of not being able to make frozen fingers operate their cameras evaporated in the face—or rather, in the back—wall of their national brethren, nothing to photograph but the carefully-groomed heads of the White House press corps. The drive up to the Capitol steps was lined with well-wishers on one side, photographers on the other. Such troubles come in three, did you say? Right you are, and frustration reigned again as the President arrived at Cedar Crest. Kansas' state governor, Todd Popkin, again reporters and photographers waited in a little rope corral a safe distance away, hoping that the President might step around his limousine and say something. Alas, he stepped from his Lincoln, surely the finest-looking armored carrier ever built, waved a kiss inside and inside to enjoy Mrs. Bennett's lunch of Kansas beef. BUT IT WAS THE President's exit that cemented the feeling of glom that had befallen the local newsman. A reporter driver emerged from the house and started the limousine. Cameramen shouldered their equipment, reporter's notebooks were opened and brought to the ready. We waited. And waited. And waited. Twenty minutes later and light sleet had begun coming down. And we waited. Another fifteen minutes and sleet, heavy, blowing snow that covered cameras and drifted down inside collars. And still we waited. And the limousine idled on, keeping warm for the President. YOU'VE HEARD OF the "hostile media?" Well, that's what was waiting when Ford emerged from the house, more than an hour after the car had been started. He looked our way and tossed out the best comment of his visit. "Well, looks just like Vail." After that episode, the rest of the day was largely anticlimactic. The Secret Service moved again at the evening news closely inspecting all purses and camera equipment for weapons. Lens caps has to be removed and the lenses inspected before photographers were allowed in the room. SO IT WAS a day or two experiences. The President didn't say a lot that was new or do anything really dramatic, but he provided an enjoyable day for many people, reinforced the importance of another chance to challenge the Congress to produce an economic program as comprehensive as his own. That made it a good day for him, and now that I'm thawed as much as was a pretty good day for me too for the next visit is in the summer. "The Dale Carnegie Course gets you to recognize and use your capabilities." I had a tendency to under-rate myself', recalls Gerald Ford, 'especially when I tried to put across my economic ideas to large groups... they all laughed at Me! Not anymore. Now they're terrified!' says Gerald, confidently- Now, thanks to the Course, I feel I have the self-assurance to sell all the unemployed people my new slogan: DON'T JUST DO SOMETHING, STAND THERE! DALE CARNEGIE COURSE Readers respond To the Editor: We have noted with much interest Gov. Bennett's recent comments regarding his willingness to see increased teaching professor in Kansas colleges and universities, if he will just spend more time teaching. We wholeheartedly supported Bill in adding a few thoughts of our own, prompted by Bill Hoch's story Student's mom praises Pearson profs Female inmate is victim Disillusionment and outrage are only mild expressions of what I feel about North Carolina's effort to convict 201 Just when you start believing that man has plucked a bit of the driftwood of reason from the deluge of time, and moved away from ignorant passions and brutal racism, something happens to shatter your confidence and fill you with roaring anger. year-old Joanne Little of first degree murder and send her to death row when the evidence and all rules of reason suggest That little mercy protected against rape by a jail guard. Maybe you've read about her case in the newspapers or you've seen the story on the television news. If so, you too must be saying to yourself what I've been saying for days: about the Pearson Integrated Humanities Program in the Jan. 27 Karsan. "Dear God, help Beaufort County, N. Car, to prove that it is now a trifle more enlightened than it was in that tragic era when the lynch mob was the law to be enforced, but he will be violated at the will of the lowliest white scoundrel who could get near her." In the wee hours of Aug. 27, 1974, Little was sleeping in the cell of the Beaufort County jail where she had been for months, awaiting appeal of a conviction for breaking and entering. She was the only woman in the cellblock, which guarded solely by white males. There should be an even greater premium placed on the salaries of those professors in all disciplines who, like Quinn, Nelick and Senior, do so outstanding work with fresh-faced students, to the talent and inspiration of great teaching is most needed. Let me repeat the facts: MY CLIENT FEELS IT WOULD RELIEVE THE TENSION IF HE CAN PLEA BRAINFIRST AND THEN GUARDER SOMEONE —The guard that morning that Alligood was naked from the waist down, and Dr. Harry M. Carpenter, the county clerk, told the judge evidence of recent sexual activity by Alligood. On the contrary, they carried editorial permission Alligood into the martyr. He courageous law enforcer. —The Southern Poverty Law Center reports that "the state medical examiner was prepared to support Little's story from his observation of the evidence, but he was not charged." He was the grand jury which indicted her" for first degree murder. SOME READERS may complain that I not only Probably the best evaluation of the effectiveness of great teaching by professors such as Quinn, Nellick and Senior is the acceptance, enthusiasm and interest of their students. Contrary to what Professor Seaver states in the Karans story, Pearson pupils choose their own program and avenues of study. They are inspired to wonder and to reason. The static set of values, unlike the great mass of freshmen and sophomores in our colleges who have no choice Do you want to count teaching time? The contact hours of these three men separately and individually is more than twice the amount of time the nine semester hours of most professors. And you'll not find Pearson students cutting classes, either. To the contrary, Mr. Baldacci wants anticipation to what awaits them in each and every class. Many youngsters embarking on a college career have no direction. Their experiences become fragmented and are difficult to appreciate from the experience of our own son how important a good start is during those critical first two years. Too many kids spend their early years in college because having ever been fine teacher. Not so with Pearson students. To quote Chancellor Archie Dykes in his inaugural address "We need at KU superior quality education with all this implies for bold, imaginative teaching and personal interaction between faculty and students." of teachers and so often receive the dulest kind of instruction, primarily from graduate students and those who have neither the experience nor the training required in spiration and dedication to younger students in these huge universities. I wish Gov. Bennett could take a few hours from his busy schedule on a Tuesday or a Thursday, and perhaps himself to one or both of the humanities lectures at Wescoe. Evidence can be found on the faces and in the reactions of the freshmen and sophomores of this department from excellence in teaching. It's a tragedy that type of instruction can't be offered in some measure to all students. —SOME NEWSPAPERS in the area suppressed the fact Mrs. Richard W. Dean 102 Crescent Hutchinson Hopefully, Gov. Bennett's goal for higher education can be achieved by increasing salaries for TEACHING professors. If my campaign was to have meant anything, it was that the individual can make a difference, that given some kind of determination, we can all change our situations. But had I won the election by some miracle, such changes as might have caused would have been territely unimportant to anyone who was person, without votes or publicity to sustain him, can do. **TWO YEARS AGO** I asked a geography high school student to think about what could one person could inflict upon another. Their answers were such as "to take away a perch" or "to imprint him, to ignore him," and so on. Election reply If they are right, this means that the worst indecencies and crimes we can commit didn't happen in a jungle war, 9,000 miles from here, nor in a desert over a canal in the Middle East. EVEN BEYOND THAT, if I would not write this column if I felt there was a ghost of a chance of Little getting a fair trial in this area where a black juror is a rarity. To the Editor: —Little fled the jail, but later turned herself in when a friend lawyer established a lawsuit against her being shot on sight. ALLIGOOD WENT into Little's cell in the wee hours for some reason, carrying his own box by his side. He outpaced by his outskirt. He wound up stabbed to death with his own ice pick, and when found was a victim. presure Little innocent prior to the trial, but I declare it in print. I assure you that I would not do so if I could think of any explanation for a male jailer who was bottomed into the cell of a single black woman in the wwe hours, wielding his ice nick. There are some rules of simple deduction here that ought not mystify even Beaufort Holmes, excuse for Sherlock Holmes. was Clarence Alligood, a 92-year-old farmer and former driver driver who was known to keep an ice pick in his drawer. By Carl Rowan Copyright 1975 Field Enterprises, Inc. Published at the University of Kansas weekdays during the academic year. Second-class payments paid at Lawrence, Kann. 60454. Subscriptions by mail are $8.95. Subscription by phone is $1.35 a semester, paid through the student activity register. Accommodations, goods, services and employment are provided for students from any background to recoverently those of the Student Society, the college, or the student body. Kansan Telephone Numbers Newsroom--864-4810 Advertising--864-4358 Circulation--864-3048 Editor THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN Associate Editor Campus Editor Craig Stock Dennis Ellsworth Associate Campus Editor Assistant Campus Editors Chief Photographer Sports Editor Entertainment Editor Associate Sports Editor Business Manager Serve New Advertising Manager Assistant Business Manager Debra Adachian Career Hours INSTEAD, THE cruelest profanities that we commit happen now, in our schools, on our playgrounds, in our homes, in the very rooms and apartments that we rent on this campus. And they happen not to our enemies or to people who have raised their hands against us. They are people we love. And worst of all, it is we ourselves who commit them. Classified Advertising Manager Steve Brownbock National Advertising Manager Gayle Tillman Cindy Kline Assistant Classified Manager Deb Lyaugh Promotional Manager Mark Nelson Mark Nelson Multiple This problem can't be solved in our Student Senate, in the Kansas Senate or in any other difference that only the individual can make. Seven years ago Robert F. Kennedy said, "Each time a man strikes out against injustice or stands up for an ideal, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope. And coming together to do that can be daring those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance." A HUNDRED YEARS ago a man named Pierre Teilhard de Chardin wrote, "Some day, after we have mastered the wind, the waves, the tides and gravity, we will harness for God the energies of love, and then, for the second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire." That is what the individual can do and that is what Jerry Long and I had to say in our campaign. Paul Sherbo Colorado Springs Junior Candidate for Student Body President For the past four and one-half years I have been a student at this institution. Out of those years, two of them have been spent as president of a campus organization. As a campus organization member, I solicit membership from the students and faculty. The Kansan is the prime method we have to do so. Because of the price of paid advertisements, we have found it often preferable to try to be included in the "On Campus" section of the paper. I say why because that is exactly what I mean. We have tried various methods of being included in the course. The named teacher We have called, and come in person to try to be included regularly for the entire semester. That's never worked. We have tried calling, writing and coming over early in the week to be included that week. That week was probably not the best possible effective, but not really worth the time spent. Why do you have such a block against allowing student organizations in on this a regularly based? After all, we all shell out money to you. You aren't in danger of using your phones. We don't. And Student Senate allocated funds only go so far as to the number of times we can afford a paid spot. I won't even go into the appalling lack of coverage student organizations have in your paper--that's another whole lot to be a little more considerate of those of us who feel we have a responsibility to ourselves and to the University community to keep everyone informed of our actions, maybe buy you a memo pad? Linda C. Lassman Lawrence Senior