4A
Monday, August 28, 1995
OPINION
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
VIEWPOINT
THE ISSUE: ROCK CHALK SIDEWALK ART
Sidewalk art not bad for KU
Sidewalk chalk messages recently seen on campus should be viewed as harmless expressions of opinion and left alone. Cleaning the sidewalks each time a new message appears wastes money which could used on other projects.
Rape prevention, warnings against divorce, and Christian meeting times all have been popular subjects of this medium. The sidewalk provides a way to express ideas to a large number of people at no cost, except for the chalk.
Facilities Operations routinely washes away these messages when they are discovered. But money and time could be saved if Facilities Operations ignored the writings.
Facilities Operations spends large amounts of student and state money removing these messages. This money and manpower could be saved for more important projects by let-
The University of Kansas wastes money and time rinsing chalk messages off campus sidewalks
ing the rain wash the chalk art away.
Some say that the messages should be washed off because they give parents and incoming freshmen the wrong idea about the University of Kansas. But a college atmosphere should emphasize freedom of expression. The messages haven't become offensive enough to render censorship necessary. The chalk messages allow students, faculty and staff to view opinions in a unique, harmless forum which is a part of the learning experience.
As long as the messages remain respectable, nature should be allowed to erase the chalk. Time and money could be better used in other areas of campus improvement.
CHARITY JEFFRIES FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD.
THE ISSUE: STUDENT SENATE INVOLVEMENT
Students should join Senate
Students love to complain about Student Senate without taking any action to change things.
The complaints are often about the programs Senate spends money on or the lack of representation it offers the student body.
Now, students have the chance to affect change. The ball is in their court, but students must get involved to make a difference.
Simply whining about what Senate is doing wrong with students' $35 activity fees will do nothing to change the way that Senate is run.
The Senate office is accepting applications for students to join Senate's five standing committees: finance, graduate, multicultural, student rights and University Affairs. The deadline for applying is Sept.1,and everyone who applies will have the chance to be a student leader.
Besides being able to do some good for the student community, students who serve on committees will gain useful
Applying for a Student Senate committee is a good first step toward becoming involved in student government
experience and knowledge.
Committees offer students a first hand look at the bureaucracy of the University. Committee members see the challenges of accomplishing the smallest task at a large university. Students will gain a new appreciation for how difficult it is to spend more than $1 million wisely.
Plus, Senate committees are good training grounds for students who would like to serve as student senators in the future.
The time commitment of committees isn't unreasonable, either. One meeting and a few hours of research each week are the primary job responsibilities.
Students should apply, as long as they're going to take their jobs on Senate committees seriously.
IAN RITTER FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD
KANSAN STAFF
COLLEEN MCCAIN
Editor
DAVID WILSON
Managing editor, news
ASHLEY MILLER
Managing editor, planning & design
TOM EBLEN
General manager, news adviser
Editors
CATHERINE ELLSWORTH
Technology coordinator
STEPHANIE UTLEY
Business manager
MATT SHAW
Retail sales manager
JAY STEINER
Sales and marketing adviser
Newy & Special Sections .. Deedra Allison
Editorial .. Heather Lawrens
Associate Editorial .. Sarah Morrison
Campus .. Virginia ... Virginia
Associate Campus .. Teresa Vocavoy
Associate Campus .. Paul Yodd
Sports .. Jennifer Koehl
Associate Sports .. Tony Erickson
Associate Koehl
Wife .. Robert Allen
Jeff MacNelly/ CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Business Staff
Campus mgr ... Meredith Heinning
Regional mgr ... Tom Dolce
National mgr ... Heather Barnes
National mgr ... Heather Nihanea
Production mgr ... Michael Mauger
Krista Kney
Marketing director ... Konan Hauser
Public Relations director ... Both Chelli
Director ... James Clappett
Classified mgr ... Heather Vailer
In every "Under Siege," "Die Hard," "Passenger 57" flick made, the bad guys always were foreigners plotting to blow up some sacred piece of America.
Macho heroes are sending the wrong message to us
And our only hope was some dashing young cop leaping from flaming buildings and exploding airplanes, guns flaring and a wity toe to boot, "Yippi-Kv-Yi Aye!"
I know I ate every mega-macho minute up. It's better than reality.
When I flew home last summer, I wasn't expecting any terrorists, just a dull flight. And the balding businessman next to me was going to ensure it.
We had nothing in common, and we did what people with nothing in common do — we ignored each other. He read his newspaper, and I read my book, and that was fine with me.
Before anyone was even prosecuted, an entire race took the blame for the acts of one person.
Until he decided to start a conversation. "So why are you going to Dallas?" he asked.
At the end of the flight, Muhammad's biggest concern was his daughter starting college. How many bad guys worry about that?
I knew I didn't want to talk to this guy, so I tried to be polite, say my spill and get back to my book. But he kept talking to me.
"You should never feel that way about your family."
"Not really. Actually, I'm dreading it." End of conversation.
"You must be excited to see your family?"
Now I really was getting irritated
STAFF COLUMNIST
According to a poll of 1,004 Americans, 45 percent think "Muslims tend to be religious fanatics." Another poll by the Asharq Al-Awsat, a Saudi-Arabian owned newspaper in London, reported that 37 percent of Americans think Muslims lead respectable lives.
Rufus Coleman is a Dallas sophomore in Journalism.
that this guy was about to give me a lecture, but as I listened, I realized that he made sense. We talked the entire flight.
He told me that his father recently passed away in Cairo. Before he died, his father built a house and left it to the family." He wanted us all to be together.
There's a section for me and everyone of my brothers and sisters. Now, I love taking my children there."
It turns out that the man, Muhammad, was a trader, bringing goods from Egypt to America.
reporters labeled it a Middle-Eastern threat.
He even invited me to attend his mosque, a Muslim church. He said that since the Oklahoma City bombing, people had been a little afraid to go. They already had received 40 death threats.
Even worse, some kids tossed garbage on the steps of the mosque. They spied away screaming, "Here's your bomb!"
Everyone was affected by the increasing death counts of the bombing, but before the body count began, more lives had been harmed by CNN and The New York Times as
Because of an assumption, windows were shattered in Iraqi women's homes by Oklahoma vigilantes. Some Middle Easterners were too terrified to come outside. A woman who was seven months pregnant crawled into her bathroom in fear as windows were smashed. She miscarried her child.
"We'd really like to go through it again with the knowledge we've garnered in living this long — but with your energy, muscle tone and hair. Especially your hair."
- Melissa Kerdock, Scottsdale, Ariz., senior, on her roommate Julie Tolbert's disappearance
And supposed "experts" like Steven Emerson, a film director, created a documentary telling us that every Muslim was a part of some conspiring terrorist group.
Our grand American heroes screaming, "Ippi-Ky-Yl-Aye!"
QUOTES OF THE WEEK
"I figured she would explode and take off eventually."
-Chancellor Robert Hemenway on re-living the college experience
"Most students might be uncomfortable, but there are no risks."
"I don't think I can require my students to read books that are not there." William Tuttle, professor of history and American studies, on why he put 430 books on reserve at Watson Library
Former NBA champion has had it with Washington
Bill Bradley bailed.
And when a politician like Bradley walks out, we all have reason to be terrified.
Senate. His reason, he said, was that "on a basic level, politics is broken."
Bradley, a three-time Democratic senator from New Jersey, announced last Wednesday that he would not seek a fourth term in the
STAFF COLUMNIST
Broken. When Bradley talks, I listen. Bradley is not your average politician, some glossy Joe from Jersey with one eye on the interest groups and the other on campaign contributions. Bradley
was a Rhodes scholar. He is a 17-year Senate member with a reputation for patient, methodical decision-making and a specialty in tax reform and Soviet economics. More importantly, Bradley was a two-time NBA champion with the New York Knicks.
A smart jock. A nerd with a great jump shot. Add in his bad clothes and mussed hair, and he seems like someone outside the gleaming smiles of Washington. His mixture of intelligence, devotion to a cause, skill and general coolness makes him someone rarely found in today's politics — a great man. And now one of the few good men is leaving.
He pointed fingers at both parties, claiming that the American public feels "disconnected" from the political process and therefore has little faith in it.
How could we? Our grand two-party system seems to have separated into two opposing camps, with both parties barricading themselves behind their agendas and philosophies with little concern for what the people outside the walls, the American public, want. Issues like health care and the environment are monumental to the factory worker whose wife has breast cancer and whose children may never get to see a black rhinoceros.
But rather than acting out of concern for the everyday man's well-being and rationally finding solutions, each of the two parties seems more concerned about insuring that its ideological stance will triumph. Standing high on their opposing, inaccessible mountain tops, they can cross their arms and declare, "Our party will win." Far below, without a political position but with a terror of being without, we wonder who will come down and listen.
Even though Bradley, at 6 feet 5 inches, is one of the tallest politicians, he could be the trusted to bend down and ask how you were doing. He visited projects in Chicago alone — after he had heard about their horrors and talked to a mother who barricaded her door with the refrigerator to protect her three children.
People have dreams: to be a senator, to be a scholar, to be a great basketball player. Bradley dreamed and then conquered all of them.
The rumor is that he will run for president as an independent. He has not made any commitment to it and said he will not challenge President Clinton in the Democratic primary.
"You always have to recognize your own frailty and your own place in time. Which always passes," Bradley once said. In a political system that he feels no longer addresses our needs, the great man has found that his time has come to an end.
Angela Lopez is a Tulsa,Okla, senior in Journalism.
HUBIE
By Greg Hardin