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Friday, October 17, 1986 / University Daily Kansan
426
A simple reminder
You don't shoot it up, snort it or smoke it out of a glass pipe, but it's the drug that kills the most young people every year. Alcohol.
In the recent fervor over drug abuse, alcohol — the most prevalent and easily obtainable addictive drug in the United States — seems to have been forgotten. It's time to remember.
Alcohol awareness week at the University of Kansas is an annual event conveniently ignored by students as a parent-supported plot to remove a beer bottle from their hands. It's actually only a reminder of the consequences of too many bottles, too often, during one night or over a long period of time.
Drunken driving and the death and crippling injuries that can be its result are the effects of having one too many. Alcoholism is the disease that silently seizes its victims over time.
No one is asking you to stop drinking. They're asking you to be careful, know your limit and recognize if you or a friend has a drinking problem. No tem per ance, just responsibility.
Take Alcohol Awareness Week for what it is — a reminder. Alcohol kills the same way any other drug can, only more often. Call the tips taxi or find a sober driver and be aware of the signs of alcoholism. It's a part of growing up, and staying alive.
The U.S. Senate elections in Missouri are heading for the final furlong, and candidates Kit Bond and Harriett Woods are going at the finish line no-holds-barred.
In the candidates' pigsty
it is a race that has been notorious for pointed barbs and mudslinging in television advertisements and debates between the Republican Bond and Democrat Woods. National attention has been focused on the nasty tactics of the race, the outcome of which could determine which party controls the Senate. The Republicans now hold a 53-47 lead in the Senate, and President Reagan has said that keeping a Republican majority was vital to the success of the rest of his term.
The candidates vowed recently to clean up their acts and stick to the issues, and the negative commercials disappeared briefly. But as Nov. 4nears, the claws are being unsheathed again.
Wednesday, Woods unveiled a television advertisement re-emphasizing her pro-choice position on abortion. The ad criticizes Bond for supporting a constitutional amendment that Woods said would make criminals out of women who get abortions.
Bond, asked in a debate to correct any distortions that arose in the campaign, commented that it would take longer than the two minutes he had been allotted.
Bond and Woods have slung their petty mud pies the entire campaign. Any efforts to play fair have been tainted by their previous childish tactics. The short-lived truce did little to clear their tarnished images, and now with Wood's new ads pulled out at practically the last minute, can Bond's counterattack be far behind?
Opinions
Both candidates are gathering strength from an impressive arsenal of media stars. Woods has gotten the controversial support of actress Jane Fonda, as well as that of Senator Tom Eagleton and Senate Minority Leader Robert Byrd. Backing Bond are Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, Secretary of Transportation Elizabeth H. Dole and former U.N. ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick.
What a shame that the two people, one of which will play an important role in the governing of the country, cannot pull themselves out of the dirt for the final days of the campaign, and present a fair and issues-oriented campaign for the Senate seat.
Lessons in responsibility
But the sexual revolution and women's rights movements of the past two decades have changed that way of thinking.
Last week, a nurse visited a fraternity, showed a film about men's sexual responsibility and discussed birth control with about 45 men.
In the past, birth control was mainly a woman's concern, if only by virtue of her biological makeup. The attitude was: women get pregnant, so women should be the ones to prevent the pregnancy.
It is encouraging that sex education is taught at colleges
More and more men today are taking responsibility for birth control. And the KU campus has begun to do its part to boost this attitude.
and not only to women. Not everyone gets this education in high school, and not everyone
Michael Brown, a nurse at the Haskell Indian Health Center wrote two pamphlets about male contraception because very little birth-control information was directed toward men, he said.
is knowledgeable about birth control when they get to college. This education needs to continue.
His inspiration for the pamphlet was a unique perspective on fertility: a man's anatomy makes him fertile more often than a woman. A man can promote conception every day, but a woman is capable of conceiving only 15 to 18 hours out of every month.
However, men should not be solely responsible for contraception. It is a concern that should be shared by both men and women.
News staff
News staff
Lauretta McMillen ... Editor
Kady McMaster ... Managing editor
Ted Clarke ... News editor
David Silverman ... Editorial editor
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Frank Hansel ... Sports editor
Jack Kelly ... Photo editor
Tom Eblen ... General manager, news adviser
Business staff
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Not necessarily the news
One minute after George Shultz's dour face filled the TV screen, my phone rang and my friend Tony began bellowing.
"Can you believe this," he said.
"Are these politician people crazy?
Or are they trying to drive me crazy?"
Tony was talking, of course, the decision by CBS and NBC to bust
Mike Royko Chicago Tribune
in on Sunday's football games for lengthy reports on the diplomatic goings-on.
"I work hard all week," Tony blustered. "I bust my tail to earn a living. I pay my taxes on time. So it is too much to ask that on my day off, I can sit down and forget my problems and watch the Bears?"
"So what? I like entertainment. It makes me happy. What am I supposed to do for laughs on my day off — go to the mournge and look at corpse?"
Tony, you must understand that football is a mere game, a form of mass entertainment.
But you must understand that what has occurred in Iceland is of historic significance, with potential impact on unborn generations.
"Ho, big deal. So what occurred?" The heads of the two most powerful nations on earth met to see if they could reach some tentative agreements on whether they can get together later and reach further agreements on controlling the arms
"So nothing much happened,
right?"
"Then why couldn't they wait until the football game was over before they tell us that nothing much happened? Hey, I could wait a few hours for that kind of hot news. Or they could just break in during a time-out and say: 'We have an important announcement to make. It looks like nothing much went down in Iceland. Stay tuned for the dull details later.'"
race.
"So after all the talking, did they agree on anything important?"
I guess you could put it that way.
"Yeah, I read the papers. I know what it's all about. And did anybody except the dummies who write about this stuff in Washington expect them to agree on anything important?"
In short, Chapman stressed the eagerness of today's liberals to host a communist government in the Western Hemisphere, while ignoring the true reasons why so many Americans oppose intervention in a country that is already torn apart by war, poverty and famine. Wake up Mr. Chapman.
Tony, the assumption the networks and the politicians make is that because they are in Iceland, it is now the center of the universe, and the rest of us have been holding our breath waiting for news of the Iceland conference.
The point is, Tony, that even a failure to reach any agreement is perilous.
"I'm just holding my breath waiting for Shultz to stop talking."
"I get it. Before this meeting started, the Russians didn't trust us and we didn't trust the Russians, right?"
Right.
"So Reagan and Gorbachev have this meeting. And when it was over, the Russians still don't trust us and we don't trust the Russians, right?"
"I mean if Reagan and Gorbachev push the buttons tonight, then the whole world goes boom, just like it's been all along."
I suppose so.
Depressingly true.
Dan Grossman Denver freshman
It's a matter of journalistic responsibilities, the setting of priorities.
"Then why can't I just enjoy watching the Fridge fall on somebody and they can tell me about it later on the 10 o'clock news. Why do I have to look at George Shultz and Dan Glover?" The Fridge would fall on both of them."
"What does that mean?"
It means that the network's new executives decided that they would be failing in their journalistic responsibilities if they didn't interrupt the football games to bring us the news from iceeland.
"Even if nothing much happened "
Thes right
Another important factor that Chapman conveniently chose to ignore was the apparent violation of international law involved in the attempted overthrow of a legitimate government. In April, the Reagan administration hid behind the United Nations Charter by claiming the United States aircraft fired on Libyan targets in self-defense while conducting military excurses in international airspace and waters. Only months later, the United States thumbed it's nose at the World Court after the court decided the United States violated internation law by funding the Nicaraguan revolutionaries.
I suppose that might be a consideration.
"And it couldn't be that they want to be sure to get Dan Rather's face on the tube, even though he really didn't know anything to say that was worth hearing."
"I'll tell you one thing. The next time somebody punches Rather on the street, I know what they're going to say to him."
Well, he is a star.
"They'll say: What was the score of Sunday's game, Kenneth?"
What is that?
Mailbox
Off the point
in ms Oct. 13 column, "Nicaragua: sanctuary of a Soviet devil." Mike Chapman blasted the American left for supporting non-intervention in Nicaragua. Specifically, he stated that the liberals of our country "have built a new altar at which they now pray," in reference to some Americans' praise of Sandanista leader Daniel Ortega.
It seems that Chapman has confused the issues that face the American people. The contra-aid perplexity is not a matter of supporting or fighting communism in Central America. Rather, it is a question of intervention and legality.
Chapman warned against drawing such parallels. But, as the saying goes, those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it. Go ahead Mr. Chapman, but Managua just isn't my idea of an ideal vacation spot.
With the approval of $110 million in aid to the contrasts, the United States has hedged closer to the same pit that sent 600,000 American troops to Vietnam and culminated in the embarrassing fall of Saigon.
Those crazy Russians
Sometimes it's difficult to understand the Russians. Take the summit for instance: The president made a perfectly fair proposal and they turned it down and walked out.
The proposal entailed a rapid reduction, and eventual elimination, of all nuclear weapons in both the United States and the Soviet Union. Of course, the United States must be allowed to continue developing and testing Star War weapons; but we would pledge not to deploy any of them during a ten-year period. If, after that time, our Strategic Defense Initiative research and development is successful, we could then put our protective shield in place.
This would enable us to tell any nation that dares to challenge us where to go. We could still easily destroy their cities, while they could no longer touch us.
Honestly now, can you see anything wrong with such a fair and
sound proposal? If you were the leader of the Soviet Union, wouldn't you grab at such a proposal before the United States changed its mind and withdrew it? Harry G. Shaffer
Professor of economics and Soviet and East European studies
Cure the fever
I really must protest the biased reporting in the story "Writer expresses hope for summit" that appeared in the Oct. 10 Kansan. Dr. Garlinski, an expert on World War II, presented an interesting, if not controversial, interpretation of the Cold War based on his original research
Unfortunately, the writer of the story chose to concentrate on several cursory remarks by Garlinski about the summit.
In the future I hope the Kansan will not allow itself to be caught up in "summit fever"
Christopher W. Donald Lawrence graduate student
Truth hunt ends with the absurd
"The absurd is the essential concept and the first truth."
Albert Camus
Christopher
Cunnyngham
Columnist
I have searched for truth in life and made a few discoveries. Truth comes in the middle of the night. Truth is always pursued and seldom encountered. Truth is Racer X hiding his true identity from Speed Racer. Truth is a dog from Hell. Truth is naked and burns easily in the noon-
Age wouldn't be such a bad thing if it only happened to someone else.
day sun. Truth is the Real McCoy.
Truth is Arnold Horshack. "What was, was, what is, what will be was,
and will be again." Truth is relative
(don't tell it to your parents.)
- I want to play a game and I can't seem to get the rest of the world to play along.
In America, words mean very little.
*Obscene is a word used too freely to describe the wrong things.*
In my search for truth I found a temple in Tibet, inhabited by a solitary monk and one of the best stocked junkebooks I have ever heard. It was here that I meditated and reflected upon truth. I now publish my findings in hopes of making the world a better place for all of us.
Always date a girl who has no knowledge of firearms or hand-to-hands.
Sleeping is a recreational sport
It is possible to kill a vampire with a holy water balloon.
- If we lived on the ceiling we would constantly trip over light
■ Organizing religion into groups is like organizing bodily functions into committees.
If Christ were alive today, he would shave more often.
Ninety percent of ali humans can't dance
Humans are the only animals that use bunk beds.
Dogs secretly dislike humans.
God created nipples as decorations.
Birds gloat above our heads
The sun is a few degrees cooler than everyone thinks.
*Ties serve no purpose whatsoever.*
Planes can fly, but birds worked out a deal with gravity.
no one is around, it sings "I Put a Spell on You" by Screaming Jay Hawkins.
Secret elite societies run the world as well as a chain of dry cleaners in Shawnee, Okla.
- Laundry is a curse from Satan.
House plants keep diaries on your every move.
■ Laundry is a curse from Satan.
■ Guitars are the most important of man's inventions (and then the wheel, so bands can tour.)
Hormones are a practical joke
We only use 15 percent of our brain; the rest is for storing old National Geographic magazines.
Europe is America's biggest theme park.
Foreign people only pretend not to speak English to confuse us.
Actually, there are only about 100 or so Canadians.
Big Brother is watching you and he is bored stiff.
There you have truth. Use it wisely, take heed of its message and remember it well. Share it with your friends, guard it with your life, mingle and try the dip. If rash develops discontinue use. Do not use while operating heavy machinery