UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN editorials
Unsigned editoriats represent the opinion of the Kansan editorial staff. Signed columns represent the views of only the writers.
MAY 2,1979
Primary price too high
The cost of advertising, as is everything else, is going up, up, up. But $1.1 million should be a little too steep for anyone, particularly the state of Kansas.
That is the cost of the first presidential preference primary in Kansas, now slated for April 1, 1980. And yes, the growing trend for states to institute presidential primaries can be seen as a grab for the national spotlight, a chance for each state to assure itself of its importance in the political scheme of things and get a little publicity to boot.
BUT THAT publicity doesn't come cheaply. In Kansas it will cost $1.1 million, the amount appropriated by the Kansas Legislature in its final session last week.
And the returns on that money are questionable. The Kansas primary is scheduled on the same day as the New York and Wisconsin primaries, states whose combined total of 52 electoral votes will certainly be more enticing than Kansas" electoral votes.
That will mean that Kansans probably will receive little attention from the candidates. And while primaries can help voters become
more involved in the candidate selection process, that advantage will be nullified if no candidates choose to show their wares in Kansas.
INDEED, the 1980 Kansas primary promises to be of little importance to anyone but Bob Dole, whose presidential image would be severely crippled by a defeat in his home state. And that leaves a strong possibility that the Kansas primary could turn into a favorite-son effort for Dole—a prospect that isn't encouraging considering the $1.1 million price tag.
But the primary will not necessarily become an election year feature in Kansas. The primary bill specified that the primary will not be repeated in 1984 unless the Legislature takes specific action in the future to reinstate it. So legislators can view the results of next year's primary before deciding whether it should become a permanent fixture on the Kansas political scene.
But $1.1 million is expensive for an experiment. While attempting to draw Kansans deeper into the political process is an admirable goal, the hoopla and publicity normally engendered by such primaries is something that Kansas doesn't need, and certainly shouldn't pay for.
Last week, in the first such negotiations ever, the U.S. government freed two Soviet spies who were being held in the United States and other countries to arrest students who were being held in Soviet prisons.
The irony was nearly overwhelming.
Soviet dissidents winners in trade
Then, stranger yet, we applaud their criminals and they applaud ours.
we instead traded two Russian citizens—criminals in our eyes—for five Russian citizens—criminals in the eyes of Soviet leaders.
Soviet leaders greeted the spies with a VIP reception and showers of flowers, and a warm, smiling American throng greeted the five dissidents.
It was the largest U.S.-Soviet prisoner exchange to date and it came at an unusual time. In the midst of SALT II agreement negotiations between the two nations, the exchange seems like a high-stakes trade of prisoners once steered cars; now we trade prisoners.
BUT, BOTH nations have denied that SALT II was a major factor in the exchange. Nevertheless, both sides benefited, in their own eyes, from the switch.
we gave them Validk A. Enger, 39, and Rudolph P. Cherrayaye, 43, both sentenced to 50 years each last November for at least one of the warfare planes from a U.S. naval officer.
The Soviets gave us Alexander Ginzberg, 42, a leading Soviet dissident; Eduard Kuznetzov, 40; George Vins, 52; Mark Dymshits, 51; and Valentyn Morzul, 43. All five were stripped of their Russian citizenship shortly before the exchange.
The exchange culminated more than five months of top-secret negotiations, mainly between Zbigniew Brezinski, President Carter's national security adviser, and Anatoly Dobrynin, Soviet ambassador to the United States.
THE FIVE dissidents, who had been prisoners 24 hours before, were uncomfortable with their newly acquired enemies and the warm reception they were given.
Aussie economic ethics un-American
LARGHOMB, N.Y.—While living in Australia, I discovered that banks do not return cancelled checks. Having tossed away receipts on the assumption that our checks would come back, I asked the teller what evidence we would have for the tax
"Not to worry," he said with a smile, "you just show the stubs in your checkbook."
could, couldn't one? He had to be kid!
in your checkbook.
"But I could write in any amount," I said.
He pondered that for a moment and replied, "I suppose one couldn't cnnn?"
He had to be kidding, I thought. How dumb could they be? Can you imagine the Internal Revenue Service's accepting the money we write on our check stubs? The entire country would hold up of state-padding that would send sales of ballpoint pens soaring.
Every day I was dumfounded by behavior that Americans would consider plain dumb.
Yet this prospect has eluded the entire Australian government and its people. And that's just one instance.
THE AUHSIES Sell soft drinks in return bottles, but require no deposit. They expect people to return the empties without monetary reward, and they do - placing them neatly in boxes set out for the purpose. At events like the Sydney Royal Easter Show, picnic areas with cauldrons of boiling water are provided for people to brew their own tea - missing the whole American tradition of using hot water. The prices flated prices. They don't even inflate prices. We paid no more for soft drinks or meat nets in a stadium in a street shop.
I was the smart American advertising man who came to show him how to sharpen their marketing, American-style. A lost case.
INCREBIDLY, PACKAGED products are sold in containers of uniform size and shape, violating the first law of American marketing: Befuddle the consumer. Comparing prices was abruptly simple. They wouldn't even entertain the idea of the product being a bargain. It felt right that can you imply it is?" asked a client, the leader of a giant soap company.
Why. I once worked with one of America's corporate giants that spent a fortune designing a bottle to look larger yet contain less than its competitors That tail bottle with the pinched in middle made them millions. "Women don't read if it is 28 or 32
Hopeless
ouences," the product manager said, beaming, "as long as it looks bigger."
Australian SALESPEOPLE actually try to save customers money. When we tried to buy shoes for their son, only after half an hour of tortuous fitteds did the salesman confess to having "dearer" shoes in the stockroom. Let the laid back in the cheaper ones, he urged. A far cry from the American gambit of shamminic customers into buying the high-profit item.
Australian doctors are appallingly ignorant; their fees are so low that they live no better than other college-educated members of the population. Lawyers don't know enough to pressure for a tax system that one would not want, and a tax system with expertise with a few basic deductions.
way in the United States the dentset college student quickly figures out how to get food stamps. And how many of us have been affected?
LANDLORDS CLEVERLY builr buildings for the insurance, tenants burn them for the welfare money. We cross class lines as we spot opportunities. To save an ancient tree, Australian unions refused to dig an underground parking garage, striking themselves out of a work project. At this very moment, New York City is providing for a highway regardless of its effect on the environment.
Before leaving, I attempted to settle my electric bill. Without batting an eyelash, the authorities said they would mail it to the United States. When it finally arrived, I did exactly what they expected. I paid. And don't think it was easy converting American money into an Australian money order. "Why don't you just forget it?" I friends asked. "If they're dumb enough to
I guess I wasn't smart enough.
Re-entry wasn't easy. One startling thing followed another. Odd-size packages one store shelves. Utilities charging more for less. A $50 eye checkup. Dummy candy bars in theaters, and a little of the cash in your purse. Orange juice on the easy-payment plan. Every night on TV another mob screening for theiics - bus drivers, teachers, welfare recipients. And the tax form with no end of possibilities.
But that's OK. I have a smart tax man, and I'm saving all my canceled checks. You bet I am.
Bernard Sloan is copy chief of a New York advertising firm.
Jake
Thompson
Kuznetsov said through a translator, "We are here. It seems inconceivable. It is difficult to get this through our heads. We have not as yet gained full consciousness. We are still somewhat ill at ease wearing civilian clothes. We still have not grown accustomed to free faces expressing good will. We still understand that all past burdens are behind us."
Arrangements are underway to have the families of all five transferred out of Russia for a new home.
united only in that they were political
relatives of the state, and to unite
relishly live out their homes.
The five had been sentenced to prison terms ranging from eight to 15 years for various crimes against their government. Each sought to extend freedoms for all Russian citizens and were imprisoned who had spent many years in and out of prisons.
BUT NOW THEY are free. They must learn to live with the cost of that freedom—loss of Russian citizenship and possibly permanent loss of their country. It won't allow for any of them.
"Today we are here in a country which form more than 200 years has been a symbol of freedom," he said. "We realize that this country, too , has its own problems and difficulties. But these are misfortunes of freedom. These are liberty's burdens, which are not easy but which cannot be compared to the heavy weight of unfreedom."
Yet, all were glad to be out of prison. Kuzmetov, who had been imprisoned for attempting to hijack a Soviet airplane to strike for the live after their arrival in the U.S.
BUT. WHATHEVER the reason, the five were freed. Whether SALT II dominated consideration, or our government saw a chance to unburden itself of the spies in exchange for men whose political views it supported, does not matter.
The five dissidents are now free men. They must learn to live with "liberty's burdens" and not the hazards of Soviet life. They are the true winners in the exchange.
Nuclear power plants too dangerous
To the editor:
Linda Koenigsman
Beloit junior
I'm writing to defend the Kansan's coverage of the Three Mile Island nuclear incident and to address a few comments to Kevin Travis concerning his letter of April
The facts speak for themselves. We do not need an energy source as dangerous as nuclear power when so many other sources are being depleted (nuclear) are begging for research and development.
Levels of radiation are not comparable
And true, some miners lose their lives in the coal fields, but they have freely chosen mining as their job with full cognition of the dangers. I certainly do not choose to lose my life in an accidental nuclear explosion or massive radiation leak, nor do I choose to give birth to a defiant child under radioactive gas leaks" poured upon me over the years. Yet this may be our fate if nuclear plants continue to operate as they have been.
To the editor:
The level of background radiation in Denver is twice the level of background radiation in Harrisburg, Pa., due essentially to the extra mile of atmosphere above Harrisburg that blocks much of the intrinsic radiation before it reaches the ground.
According to public statements by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, measurements made in the vicinity of the Three Mile Island plant during the week following the explosion of a nuclear fuel level of about 50 times the normal background level. When this increased radiation
Travis' attitude seems to be one of "let's close the barn door after the horse has escaped," or in other words, "let's wait until people are killed before we question the nature of this situation" is a sad position to take, when recent facts show that nuclear plants are far from safe.
According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch of April 15, 1979, an examination of Nuclear Regulatory Commission files by an Associated Press task force disclosed 2.485 nuclear incidents in Nuclear Power plants threaten public safety. Besides mechanical malfunctions, these incidents included unexpected radiation leaks and small hydrogen explosions. At Crystal River 3 nuclear plant in Florida, there were 59 'inadvertent radioactive gas releases' from nuclear reactors in the United States today are closed because of concern that they could not withstand an earthquake. Dresden in Illinois is closed until next year for decontamination. Every one of them was closed down at least once in the past 677 there were 892 unscheduled shutdowns.
True, oil spills are untractive, but far more unattractive and difficult to decontaminate would be an entire city abandoned and left as a desolate, leaky or explosion from a nuclear plant.
In my opinion, these facts lend strong support to the assertion that nuclear power is more efficient than gasoline in one year, and the Three Mile Island near-disaster, it's only a matter of time before a new disaster turns Travis's "zero-fatality nuclear system" into a "many-momentary disasters."
UNIVERSITY DAILY letters KANSAN
level for one week is averaged out over the 52 weeks of the year, the average level for the year of the accident is computed to be roughly twice the normal yearly level—hence the comparison is often made because the attenuated Harris and normal Denver.
The comparison is ridiculous. Suppose the normal yearly rainfall in Denver is 200 cm, and the normal yearly rainfall in Harrisburg is 100 cm. If, during a week of cloud bursts, Harrisburg receives an extra 100 cm of rain, it is foolish to conclude that there is no flood damage in Harrisburg just because Denver normally receives 200 cm.
It is somewhat more reasonable to compare the radiation levels in Harrisburg and Denver during the week following the accident. Harrisburg, with times normal for 25 times the normal background level of Denver. But again, the radioactive emissions in Harrisburg were not uniformly distributed throughout the week, but oocer leakage rates high in indoor leaks which have been averaged yet the figure 50 times normal!
Imagine the normal low level background radiation as the faint glow of moonlight on an overcast night. Then an accident releases a quantity of glowing clouds, which spreads wind and falls out to contaminate the local countryside in patches, depending on wind patterns. The average light intensity for the local area during the week the accident is computed on the basis of spot measurements to average roughly 30 times normal.
When some of this glowing dust is inhaled and lodges in the lung, the surrounding tissue is illuminated at thousands of times normal background radiation is not sufficiently the inhaled irradiating source, even though the average radiation experienced by cells at some
Radiation itself, whether emitted from distant background sources or from radioactive material, cannot blow in the wind, be washed off, inhaled on others' faces, be thrown away, or other hand, is a chemical substance which blows around like any other chemical substance, but being radioactive, it constantly emits radiation. In Harrisburg, after the accident, it was possible to ingest or inhalate a radioactive material剥裂 from the plant.
There is another more subtle flare in these comparisons. The increased radiation level in Harrisburg was not caused by background radiation from distant sources (such as the sun and radioactive minerals buried in the earth's crust.)
Rather, the increase was caused by the radioactive material released from the Three Mile Island plant and dispersed by the wind.
Readings with a light meter will indicate values much higher and much lower than 50 depending on where there is fallout and how long it has been decaying (Glowing). When there is radiation emitted from radioactive material will decrease with time.)
distance from this source is 'only' 50 times normal background.
To the editor:
Without making any claims about the actual medical effects of radiation exposure due to contamination, it is clearly not comparable to exposure due to background radiation which is essentially uniformly distributed in space and time.
We have recently heard many scientists and official spokesmen offer the comparison between Harrisburg and Denver as reassurance that the health hazards resulting from the Three Mile Island accident are insignificant. In the face of such misleading overstates of scientific truth, the rational response of non-experts is the formation of a strong bias against believing the arguments of scientists in defense of nuclear power.
I was very disappointed to find that there was no story in the Kansan about the winner of the Ruth Hoover Award. The award is given to a senior in senior in the women's athletic department.
Dennis Devlin
Instructor of mathematics
High athletic honor missed by Kansan
Softball player Kelly Phipps was given the award April 21 at KU's Women in Sports banquet. It is the highest award in the women's athletic department and is based on athletic ability, scholarship and leadership.
As a member of the KU softball team I know firsthand the dedication and hard work Kyle displays on and off the field, the tremendous respect our team has for
Anyone who receives an award of this kind should receive recognition for their her efforts.
it seems to me that if one inch could be given to the announcement of Darnell Valentine's selection to the Pan Am team, then at least that much could have been spared for the winner of the Ruth Hoover award.
Being selected to the Pan Am team is a great honor for Valentine but the same could be said of Katy Philips. Her beauty treat is in a manner indicative of its significance.
Pam Clark
Pam Clark
Overland Park junior