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Tuesday, March 28, 1989 / University Daily Kansan
Opinion
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Nuclear industry ignores Three Mile Island lesson
Ten years after Three Mile Island suffered the nation's worst nuclear accident, U.S. atomic reactors are still not up to safety par.
That accident illustrated the need for nuclear safety. However, the need has not been met.
The March 28, 1979, accident provoked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to require sweeping changes in plant safety codes. However, four of five reactors have not met the requirements, according to commission records.
Only 24 of 112 reactors have fulfilled the changes in safety codes. Many of those changes are labeled top priority. For example, 23 reactors have not installed display equipment that helps operators determine plant safety. The deadline for those improvements was Jan. 1, 1982. Also, 63 reactors have not met their Jan. 1, 1983, deadline to determine control-room sufficiency.
After failing to meet all requirements, 25 plants are still in operation. Nine others have reopened or soon will open without meeting any of the regulations.
Rep. Edward J. Markey, D-Mass., said it best: "Nuclear power isn't horseshoes. The difference between close and getting the job done can mean the difference between safety and catastrophe."
Commission officials argue that most of the necessary changes have been made since the accident. But most isn't enough.
The commission acted boldly in ordering such widespread reforms, which cost each plant an estimated $50 million. But orders must be backed by action. So far, no plant has been fined or shut down for not meeting the regulations Such action should be considered.
The extra money and time the NRC spent in making the requirement changes were a worthwhile investment. The efforts are lost, however, in weak implementation.
Grace Hobson for the editorial board
Soviet election an example of democracy in evolution
Sunday's parliamentary elections in the Soviet Union were unprecedented. Boris Yeltsin, a candidate representing Moscow, voiced concern that the election wasn't completely democratic. He was concerned about ballot-box stuffing.
Democracy evolves through a series of small triumphs. The Soviet Union is in the midst of celebrating such an achievement.
So far, unofficial results show that Yeltshin won more than 89 percent of the vote. Yeltshin, who at one time was ousted by the Gorbache administration, is one of the more controversial candidates.
However, it is rumored that the election may have been flawed. Flawed or not, there is much cause for celebration. The Soviets have taken a step that will not be reversed easily. The people have had a taste of democracy.
Many other non-party, grass roots candidates also are projected to prevail.
Foreign news media were allowed to film and interview voters at the polls, and it was obvious that the Soviet people were moved. It was the first time they had been allowed to choose between candidates who disagreed. Before, they had merely ratified the party's choices.
They appeared to enjoy their new-found freedom.
Even in the United States, the democracy we hold up as an ideal remains incomplete. We have a representative form of government, but citizens are not always heard. However, we are much closer to democracy than when we began.
And the Soviets are much closer than they were last week.
Karen Boring for the editorial board
The editorials in this column are the opinion of the editorial board. The editorial board consists of Julie Adam, Karen Boring, Jepit Euston, James Farquhar, Cindy Harger, Jennifer Hinkle, Grace Hobson, Jill Jess, Mark McCormick and Mark Tillford.
News staff
Julie Adam...Editor
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Jill Weiss...News editor
Deb Gruver...Planning editor
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Natal Grotte...Artist/Fanatica
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Rape: We must break the silence
We don't sit around in my Women and Violence class and talk about Plato or calculus or how to write a hard-edged news story.
We talk about rape.
I usually can bring myself to attend, but sometimes the reality of our topic is too much for me to handle. So I choose to miss my class.
But when I decide to miss class, I don't even go outside to throw around the frisbee with friends or walk lazily around Potter Lake, as I did when I used to skip algebra.
I usually think about the reasons why I am skipping the class. No matter how I avoid it, the class has taught me an important lesson.
It is time to break the silence about rape.
Rape is a reality for one of every three women.
That fact itself may be enough to shock us into silence.
Today, KU students have the opportunity to start breaking the silence. Because rape usually affects people between 16 and 24 years of age, college students are likely to come in contact with rape. We must begin taking the crime more seriously.
As part of Women's Health Week, Mary Koss, psychologist from the University of Arizona School of Medicine, is speaking on campus today about "Violence in Women's Everyday Lives": Her extensive study on the effects of rape has produced concrete figures that cannot be ignored.
Deb
Gruver
Guest columnist
Koss' Ms. magazine Campus Project on Sexual Assault surveyed 6,159 college students from 32 college campuses. Her study found that, after rape was the victim of rape or attempted rape,
84 percent of those raped their attackers.
57 percent of the rapes happened on dates.
The problems surrounding this violent crime begin with our perceptions of the role of women. Although we have made progress, the women's movement has a long wav to go.
A good friend of mine teaches music to preschool children. That was the class where the teacher made you sing "Three Blind Mice" while you played with those green wooden drum sticks. Sometimes you got to be the star and ring the triangle.
We all hated it.
The other day, my friend decided to do her part to change the music class. She brought her electric guitar and taught the 3- and 4-year-old a new way to remember the ARC's.
The kids thought it was cool. She started to
play, and a little boy told her. "Girls can't play rock 'n roll. Only boys can."
My friend told him that women can play the guitar as well as men, but he refused to believe he
My friend got over it. She knows she can play
this game and knows that a woman's hands are
just as capable.
The little boy probably has spent too much time watching MTV.
Obviously, the 4-year-old isn't a rapist. I can't say that he'll never become one. But he already has a lot of rapists in his life.
Studies have shown that people with non-traditional views of women are much more concerned about the tragic effects of rape. They are more willing to believe women who report being raped by an acquaintance. They are more willing to place the blame where it belongs — on the rapist. They are less likely to say, "Well, she was wearing a short skirt."
Rape affords us. One of three women becomes a victim at some point in her life. Most of us will know someone who has been raped by the time we graduate from KU.
■ Deb Graver is the Kansan planning editor and a Garden City senior majoring in journalism.
A 4-year-old questioning my friend's musical abilities can be overlooked.
Street Sweeper is latest trendy weapon
Just when we have found the weapon of my dreams, President Bush shows signs of turning into a gun wimp. So it will be a footrace to see if I can buy it before it is
footrace to see if I can buy it before it is banned
Before I describe the gun I intend to own, I will explain why most firearms are of little or no use
Take the pistol. It doesn't matter if it is a revolver of an automatic, small caliber of a Dirty Harry blaster. Beyond two or three feet, I can't hit a thing with it.
One reason is that I can never remember to aim with my left eye, my right eye, or both eyes. A markman told me to keep both eyes open. When I tried that, my eyes crossed and I saw two targets, which meant I was immediately outnumbered.
Besides, I have weak eyes. That's really why I find a pistol useless. By the time a murderous friend was close enough for me to get a shot at him, he have我 by the throat, and I'd be doomed.
This is why I've argued for years that the gun laws should take into account the many weakened people in this country for whom pistols and rifles offer little protection from those who are lurking outside our windows, waiting under our walls and hiding in the branches of our backyard trees.
Mike Rovko
Why not get a rifle, you say? The same problem as the pistol. Weak eyes. You have to be able to see your target, aim and hit it. Why, even with an AK-47, the famous repeating rifle, if my coat is coated with it I would probably blast my coat reck to pieces when the felon was making off with my CD player.
Syndicated columnist
Years ago, I organized the Committee for the Total Legalization of Machine Guns, so that any
citizen could buy them at their local K mart, as the Founding Fathers obviously intended.
I sought the help of the National Rifle Association, pointing out that if every little old lady had been mounted on a tripod in her parlor, neer ever heard a twist think about stealing her best silverware.
I received little cooperation from the NRA. Sometimes I wonder how dedicated that outfit really
While reading all the stories about the efforts to ban repeating assault weapons, I came across the gun that I've dreamed about but didn't know existed.
The weapon is called — what a colorful and anorobrite name — the "Street Sweeper."
It is a shotgun, but not the old fuddy-duddy shotgun that you have to keep reloading every few shots, or pumping on pounding a lever. In other words, if you don't need them, they are upon you, there's no wasted time or effort
The noble Street Sweeper takes a clip holding a dozen cartridges. And you can fire that dozen as fast as you can squeeze the trigger. In some cases, you can blow them up, but heaveed off all 12 blasts in four or five seconds.
And because it's a shadgun, you can be miserable shot and taken in nothing, in anything, in anything, that isn't in sight.
As a gun dealer told me: "I'd rather be standing 10 vards away from an AK-47 than a
Street Sweeper."
They aren't cheap. A dealer gave me a $540 price, not including the clips and shells. But, then, what a price for peace of mind? With a Street Sweeper, I could blast an entire gang of bullets, unless they missed them. I would do so much damage, that the house would collapse on their heads anyway.
I know some readers are saying, "Why would a same, peaceful, reasonably normal person want to take away my rights?"
Well, I have another motive. There is always the possibility that I will be deranged. But if that happens, what deranged act could I come up with much more than to hit my wife with a larm
You only go around once in life, and who wants to be remembered as the deranged man who hit his wife with a lamp? That wouldn't even make the local 10 o'clock news.
Ab, but with a Street Sweeper. I could become a nationally renowned looey. I could take out the door and find a friend.
Actually, I fit the psychological profile of the deranged gunman. If you've ever noticed, after someone goes on a shooting stree, his family and neighbors almost always say, "He was a quiet kind of guy, a nice guy, really. I can't believe he'd do something like that." You never hear them say, "Yep, nutty as a fruitcake. I knew he'd kill a dozen people some day."
Well, that's what family and neighbors say about me. Quiet, pleasant, wouldn't hurt a fly. The perfect profile of a potential madman. So if you are the quiet, pleasant, harmless sort, now is the time to get your Street Sweeper. Maybe we'll meet on the 10 o'clock news.
■ Mike Royko is a syndicated columnist who writes for the Chicago Tribune.
BLOOM COUNTY
by Berke Breathed