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Friday, September 19, 1986 / University Daily Kansan
Opinions
Easy targets, dire results
The world is a tragic place when freedom of expression bows to governmental pressures and political goals. And yet, recent events across the globe have shown that journalism, and the men and women who practice it, are increasingly becoming the targets of political wars.
On Sept. 9, Jose Carrasco Tapia, the editor of a Chilean opposition magazine banned under the government's recently imposed state of siege, was found shot to death. It has not been proven whether the Chilean President, Gen. Augusto Pinochet, was responsible for Tapia's murder. However, it is common knowledge that the editor and his weekly news magazine, Analisis, were extremely critical of Pinochet and his regime.
Tapia was also a member of the executive committee of the federation to which most Chilean journalists belong. Should these people fear for their lives?
Tapia's brutal murder follows the increasingly
restrictive press regulations imposed in South Africa that have virtually cut off access to reliable information from black townships and, for that matter, the rest of the country. Then, when it appeared that things could not get worse for the international press corps, came the arrest of U.S. News and World Report's Soviet correspondent, Nicholas Daniloff. Why are journalists becoming pawns in political games?
So what happens when journalists no longer can be neutral observers and are forced into playing a part in political games? The world loses a valuable source of information while nations become more distant and separate from one another.
There are thousands of journalists and correspondents stationed in almost every nation who bring the world the events and happenings in foreign countries. Although some may argue the fact, these journalists do help in the spreading of information, knowledge and debate on the key issues of our time.
The irony of silence
A 53-year-old American school teacher is kidnapped off the streets of Beirut, another victim of the never-ending cycle of violence in that war-torn city, and no one seems to care.
Frank Herbert Reed, a native of Malden, Mass., was abducted by two gunmen who later claimed to be members of the shadowy pro-Khomeini terrorist group, the Islamic Jihad. While the whereabouts and well-being of Reed and the three other American hostages are unknown, the Reagan administration continues its policy of "quiet diplomacy."
Reagan insists that his policy is the only way to resolve the situation. That's a change of pace from his 1980 presidential campaign, when he dragged then-President Jimmy Carter through the mud for inaction during the Iranian hostage crisis. Then, it was to Reagan's advantage to remind the American public that Americans were in constant peril at the hands of dastardly captors. He forced
the issue at every turn. And, more than any other factor, it helped vault him into the Oval Office.
But now the tables are turned, and Reagan has decided that the best approach is a quiet one. Ironic, but not suprising. The president knows all too well the damage that 450 nights of Ted Koppel's nationally televised hostage watch can do.
But even with all the publicity surrounding the Iranian hostage crisis, and the damage it did to Carter's reputation, all of the Americans were brought home — alive.
That is something Reagan will never be able to do. One hostage, Peter Kilburn, a 62-year-old librarian at the American University in Beirut, has already been killed and another is presumed dead.
Yet, the silence continues.
No yellow ribbons. No Ted Koppel. No answers. Just uncertainty, a body and the waiting.
Sharing success and ills
As proven last Tuesday, women are becoming more and more commonplace in elections.
In the first truly overwhelming show of their effect on the American political scene, women dominated the winner's circle in primary elections held across the country last week.
This year, women won 39 nominations for Senate and House seats and eight more for gubernatorial offices. There are more women candidates this year than ever before. This is clearly a sign that American politics is entering a new phase, one that reflects society's changing attitudes
Women are even dominating some races this fall. The
senate race in Maryland features only the second pair of women in U.S. history to win the nomination of both major parties in a senate campaign.
Most of these women are not running with feminist labels. In fact, they are avoiding such things. Their success is a culmination of 60 years of activism and devotion.
Along with success, though, come the problems that men have suffered from for years: high blood pressure, obesity and stress.
The rise of women in the corporate world and politics is encouraging. Yet, with their newfound success almost certainly will come new problems that previously have been associated with men.
News staff
News staff
Lauretta McMillen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Editor
Kady McMaster . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Managing editor
Tad Clarke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . News editor
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Frank Hansel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sports editor
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Business staff
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'Spy' talk sizzles in Washington
Congress seems ready to storm embassy walls
Although he once occupied a desk next to mine in the Senate Press Gallery, I've never been prepared to go to war over Nick Daniloff.
Dick West
UPI commentary
In more ways than one I was pleased that he was released from a Moscow prison last week to the custody of the U.S. charge d'affaires in the Soviet Union.
Pleased and relieved.
I never believed President Reagan wanted to fight for Daniloff's freedom any more than I did, but one can never be sure some hot-headed group like the U.S. Senate won't drag the whole country into war.
The Senate earlier had indicated its combat readiness by approving a resolution calling for Daniloff's release.
Storming the walls of the Lefortive prison would have been the next logical move. But the Soviets might have taken a dim view of that.
They might not have been as tolerant as the French were of the storming of the bastille nearly 200 years ago in Paris.
Anyway, both sides breathed a little easier when Daniloff was transferred to an American diplomat's apartment in Moscow and returned to work.
I was willing to believe Secretary of State George Schultz when he said there was "no equivalency" between丹iloil and Gennadi Zakharov, a Soviet accused of snipping.
He said it with a straight face, didn't he?
If he wants to call it an "arrangement," that's OK by me.
The United States probably had planned to release Zakharov to the custody of Soviet Ambassador Yuri Dubinin as soon as he was indicted on espionage charges.
I'm sure it was only a coincidence that Daniloff and Zakharov were unjailed on the same day.
Likewise, it probably was more coincidence that Daniloff, who now works for U.S. News & World Report, was arrested in Moscow a week after Zakharov was picked up in New York.
The KGB must have been trailing him for months.
Anyway, since his arrest, I have seen Daniloff's name in the headlines more than I did in bylines in these parts.
We used to call him Nick. This is not to suggest that American journalists would have referred to Czar Nicholas as Nicky. But when you work around someone on an almost daily basis, a certain amount of informality is permitted.
Nick would have been justified in calling me by my nickname, Richard, had he so chosen.
Surprisingly, what I remember best about Nick is how loud his telephone was.
"Mr. Daniloff's office," we would say when we answered, a note of cutting irony in our voices.
When he was away covering a Senate hearing or something, his phone would ring with a particular shrillness and insistence.
Most likely it was a wrong number, somebody trying to dial the Senate Finance Committee, on whom irony was lost.
The French-born Daniiloff apparently never caught on to the good old American custom of letting the Senate gallery staff field his wrong numbers.
President's supporters deal harshest criticism
President Reagan's strongest supporters have become his most irate critics — temporarily at least.
The supporters, including
Helen Thomas
UPI commentary
newspaper columnists George Will and William Safire, expressed their outrage over Reagan's decision to make a deal with the Kremlin to relieve the "mental torture" of U.S. reporter Nick Dani洛, who was confined to an 8-by-10 KGB jail cell on trumped-up charges of espionage.
But Reagan rejects their argument that it was a sign of superpower weakness, and said he acted out of humanitarian concern for the reporter.
Others on Capitol Hill such as Sens. Richard Lugar, R-IN, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Daniel Moynihan, D-N.Y., have taken Reagan to task over the arrangement.
Reagan is not usually put on the defensive in his dealings in foreign relations. He has acted tough.
Former national security advisers Henry Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzeinski, who have made Soviet affairs their specialty, were indignant.
And it is doubtful that the Soviets now think of the United States as a paper tiger because it agreed to a swap. Compromise is the name of the game in diplomacy and world affairs, and swaps of prisoners have been going for a long time.
Vice President George Bush says Reagan did the right thing and has the support of the U.S. people.
In many ways, Reagan is being subjected to the same perception of caving in that his predecessor, Jimmy Carter, suffered when he sought ways to bring the U.S. hostages in Iran back alive. The price was heavy in terms of his political image.
As Carter moved into the election mode, his opponents skewered him. Still, Carter, who believed that human rights was a key element to foreign policy, held out to ensure the safety of the hostages in Teheran.
When he tried to get tough and devised an ill-fated rescue plan, the failure was nothing less than a catastrophe and lives were lost.
Although Reagan is taking a lashing from his traditional conservative supporters in the maneuvering to bring Daniloff home safe, the Soviets have to be concerned about their image. At a time when they are seeking detente and trying to put a cap on the arms race, they are playing hard ball.
The gamble has probably hurt Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, who has tried to project a new look in international affairs and a turn away from Gulag and darkness at noon.
Mistakes may have been made on the U.S. side by seeking a full-blown trial for a low-level accused spry the FBI had tracked for two years. If U.S. officials followed past procedures, the United States would have disposed of the case of Gennadi Zakharov, the accused United Nations mission staffer, by expelling him.
The Kremlin has suffered a significant propaganda setback and has jeopardized the several meetings that were planned to lead to the second summit between Reagan and Gorbachev. It could blow up hopes for a summit and it's doubtful that Moscow wants that.
As it is, he became a cause celebro and Daniloff was caught up in the inevitable retaliation.
Mailbox
Cunnyngham off base
Chris Cunningham's "Reagans" drug war is lost battle" column displayed his ignorance and poor writing skills. Every sweeping generalization he attempted was incorrect, uninformed and stupid. He utilized the most feeble sarcastic and cynical humor and then had the audacity to state that, "I am optimistic and idealistic by nature."
Bah, Mr. Cunnyngham. Opinions such as yours typify the apathetic attitudes that have made drugs more and more acceptable.
Amid the cynicism, generalities and misinformation in his column (not to mention a dangling participle, sentence fragment and misplaced modifier), only one thing was obvious: He has never seen a family, relationship or life destroyed by alcohol or drugs. Grow up.
Jane Hoyland
Clerk-typist, geology department
Jane Hoyland department
Excuses hide sexism
The Sept. 16 Kansan article on women receiving higher grades than their male counterparts was laden with sexist biases that were disturbing.
It was reported that although the women's grade point averages were
not considerably higher, it was enough to "baffle some University officials." Why the bafflement? Are women still not considered intelligent beings? If the men's grades were higher than the women's, would it be seen as so astounding, or just normal?
Several professors gave their best guesses and they all shared one quality: they belittled women.
Barbara Ballard, ironically the director of the Emily Taylor Women's Research Center and the associate dean of student life, suggested that the reason was that women are more studious and work harder on their studies.
Her comments implied that if men were only to devote a little more time to their studies, their GPAs would automatically surpass the women's. The implication: Women have to try harder to be something they're not, that is, intelligent. While men, who are obviously bright, have simply to rearrange their priorities to be ahead once more.
Robert Lineberry, dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, "jokingly hypothesized" that either women were brighter than men or men tended to take harder courses than women.
The first part of his hypothesis is,
no doubt, a joke — no one would think
Angela C. Howell Wichita sophomore
otherwise. The second, however, is not funny. Why does anyone teel the need to rationalize this development? Is the threat of female intelligence so alarming that we must make excuses for it? It may have been a joke, but the underlying innuendo is serious. Discrimination is always a serious matter.
All of the sources admitted that they had no idea why women had better grades. Perhaps I can be so bold as to suggest a reason no one else listed: Women are highly intelligent and quite capable of any workload put in front of them. I think that since we are now in the 1800s, we should be able to throw away our outdated chauvinistic way of thinking and accept this premise as fact.
Skewed priorities
Two groups of giants were
During a rather forgettable football game Saturday, one moment during halftime left a haunting impression on me. Was it irony? Did my cynical side create a mountain out of a molehill? It was a very moving experience . . . a graphic portrayal of American values. . .
honored. Both had tasted the thrill of victory after surmounting incredible odds. The first group who walked to the center of the field consisted of persons who had received transplanted hearts at the University of Kansas Medical Center. The crowd applauded courteously and moderately. The second group was our championship basketball team. They received their rings from the NCAA — to which the crowd responded with a thunderous ovation.
The heart recipients had stared in to the face of death and defeated it. What courage! one of the former patients had received his heart only two months ago. The basketball team had traveled to the Final Four, defeating nearly every other team in sight. For the first group, life itself was the reason for living. For the other, athletics and youthful vigor were priorities.
It seems to me that the true giants; the real heroes, had overcome a much greater foe than any basketball team. Perhaps we are too young, too healthy to realize that life is a fragile gift. My applause goes to the surgeons who perform lifesaving acts every day and to the patients who learn to persevere to the end.
Neil Brown
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Lawrence graduate student