There's still a war
Why can't the people of United States stop the Vietnam war?
The latest mood in our macabre non-war is complacency: the peace negotiations will take time; meanwhile ignore the dying while men argue about the shape of a table.
Likewise the present attitude toward leadership is laissez-faire: our new leader, elected for want of change in war policy, can be cautious and not do anything. We can't complain about nothing.
A great number of the American public turned this country upside down last year by denouncing the war. An incensed population dethroned a ruler, shaped a campaign and stopped the impetus of military maneuverings on far away rice paddies.
But the American people seem both too easily satisfied by bits and pieces and, on the other hand, too easily bored by a crisis.
We have a new leader, we have peace talks. Are we going to let the Paris round table and the Vietnam hari-kari go on interminably?
But every day we hear casualty reports until the numbers are even less important
than the statistics of the Colgate report on tooth decay. We hear war news interspersed with Dial soap and read accounts of battles in between Blondie and Mary Worth.
And our eyes and ears quickly travel to student rioting, to spectacular murders and to 43-inch busts.
Vietnam is old stuff. We want new crises.
A year ago, the American people gained hope because they began to see that they could change the world. Why can't we finish the change this year? Why can't we demand a ceasefire to stop one of the most indefensible wars in our history?
America's hopes don't have to be so abortively dashed. If the American public could so effectively influence Lyndon Johnson last year, there's no reason why Richard Nixon could not speed a ceasefire and the momentum of the Paris talks if given a little push from the almighty voter.
Vietnam may be an old crisis but it's certainly the most important crisis we've got, influencing the domestic troubles with its horrendous budget.
Let's have a repeat performance of last year; let's get Vietnam over with. (AMS)
ROTC and tickets revisited
To the editor:
When reading your editorial in today's UDK, I couldn't help but to allow a knowing sort of grin come across my face. I am referring to the first editorial, entitled "7,001 - an oddity" All I can say is that the person who wrote that editorial has never attended Wichita State University and consequently does not know how good he has got it. WSU, a school of around 12,000 students, has an athletic department which is run by the businessmen of Wichita, the WSU Alumni, and, last but certainly the least, the student body. I am a transfer student to KU this semester, glad to be relieved of the burden of an institution referred to as the "UN-College" by its various graffiti-writers.
If ever a KU student might feel slighted by the bureaucrats over in the Athletic Department, all he needs to do is to travel 165 miles and sit in a half-filled
student section, not getting involved, watching all the beautiful people go by.
Sincerely yours,
Thomas H. Hays
Wichita, junior
To the editor:
If ROTC credit gets abolished at KU because of its teachings, let us go one step further. Abolish chemistry because from
chemistry comes the formulas for Napalm and chemical warfare. Abolish physics and mathematics because formulas from these two sciences enable men to plan trajectories for artillery and missiles. Abolish all forms of thought except one in order that no one will have a conflict with another and have to settle it by various means, usually violent.
Mike Walker Atchison senior
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Paperbacks
EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY ENGLISH MINOR POETS, selected by Mackie L. Jarrell and William Meredith (Dell Laurel, 75 cents)—A collection that includes, among others, Jonathan Swift, William Congreve, John Gay, Samuel Johnson, Thomas Gray, Oliver Goldsmith, William Cowper, Robert Burns. Which leads one to ask, what's a major poet?
Photo by Ron Bishop
Let's get something straight Photo by Ron Bishop
You either block traffic or direct it. One doesn't justify the other.
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