4 University Daily Kansan Opinion Wednesday, July 16, 1986 THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN Don't ship it near here The derailment last week of a railroad car in Ohio caused an explosion, a cloud of poison gas and the evacuation of thousands of people. The car was a tanker carrying white phosphorous. We should contemplate the fact that substances more deadly and more contaminating than white phosphorous soon will be riding our spindly rails. Of course, nuclear weapons already ride on white trains that criss-cross the country, including northeastern Kansas. Soon radioactive waste from government projects will be transported regularly from all over the country to a national dump site that nobody wants near them. Tons of spent nuclear fuel will be shipped to regional dump sites from temporary storage at nuclear reactors. Northcentral Kansas still could be picked as the site of a regional radioactive waste dump that would be the destination of shipments from five other states. The Army is forming plans to dispose of old nerve-gas weapons. One plan would destroy them where they are, but the other two plans would ship the weapons either to several regional sites or to one national site for disposal. The regional plan would send some of the weapons through eastern Kansas. The best answer to that problem is obvious, too; stop producing the stuff. All of us would say that if the waste were to be shipped past everybody's house, or if it were to be buried near everybody's ground water, but there isn't enough to go around yet. To a layman far more interested in his safety than in expense, a decision on the nerve-gas weapons seems simple enough — destroy them where they are. The problem of transporting and storing radioactive waste will be with us a little longer. But the growing list reflects the number of people who have decided that they don't want the stuff near them, near their children or near their grandchildren. grandchildren. Someday, enough of us will reach the same conclusion. Classification a gamble Classification may be the sleeper of the constitutional amendments we are to vote on this fall. Classification of property for tax purposes certainly lacks the popular appeal of liquor by the drink, purimatuel or the lottery. It has seemed to be a dry issue, destined to be passed as a matter of necessity, like making out a will. But wills aren't boring when it comes time to divide up the money. Neither will Kansas voters find classification boring if the amendment is defeated and we find our property taxes taking a quantum leap. The Kansas Association of Realtors has hinted that it will oppose classification. The realtors say that placing the assessment rates — 12 percent of market value for residential and small-business property, 30 percent of market value for railroad and utility property and 30 percent of the "use value" of agricultural land — into the constitution now will be a mistake because no one knows exactly how much revenue these percentages represent. The dollar amounts won't be known until all property in the state is reappraised, a project scheduled to be completed Jan. 1, 1989. The realtors want to wait until the reappraisal is completed and then use that concrete information to establish the assessment rates. If the rates are set in the constitution now, another amendment would be required to correct them. The plan makes sense, but it involves a risk for most Kansas voters. The constitution now requires that all property be assessed for taxes at a uniform and equal rate. Everyone knows that the rate may be the same, but that the tax value of most residential, farm and small-business property is far lower than the market value Meanwhile, the tax value of railroad and utility property has been accurately appraised, and raised, annually. If a court rules that taxes are being assessed unequally, it can order that the results of the statewide property reappraisal be used to assess taxes. The result, without a classification amendment to tax property at different rates, would be a massive shift in property taxes from utilities and railroads to the small property owners we've been trying to protect all along. Legislators who helped fashion the classification amendment say it won't be easy to pass another. The property reappraisal is underway and its higher market values could be ready for taxing in 1989. Voting against the classification amendment in November should appeal to those who want the lottery and parimutuel betting. News staff News staff Cindy McCurry Editor Kady McMester Managing editor Shawn Aday Editorial editor Grant Biller Campus editor Dawn O'Malley Sports editor Shawna Norfleet Photo editor Tom Eblen General manager, news adviser Business staff David Nixon Business/production manager Beverly Kastenst Retail sales manager Jamie Simons Campus sales back to school manager Richard Morrison Classified manager John Oderzan Sales and marketing adviser Letters should be typed, double-spaced and fewer than 200 words and should include the writer's name, address and telephone number. If the writer is affiliated with the University, include class and homeetown, or faculty or staff position. Guest shots should be typed, double-spaced and fewer than 700 words. The writer will be photographed on the right reject or edit letters and guest shots. They can be mailed or brought to the Kansas newsroom, 111 Stuart-Flint Hall. The University Dally Kanaan (USPS 650-640) is published at the University of Kansas, *118 Staffer-First Fell-Hall*, Kansas, Kan. 66045, daily during the regular school year, excluding Saturday, Sunday, holidays and final periods, and on Wednesday during the summer session. Secondary students pay $29 for six months or $27 a year, County and $18 for six months and $35 a year outside the County. Student subscriptions are $3 and are paid through the student activity fee. dent subpsych POSTMASTER Send address changes to the University Daily Kansan, 118 Stupper-Final Hall, Lawrence, Kanus, 68045. Memorial's defacement cowardly act Vet feels betrayed Shuttered minds I am a Vietnam veteran and, since late 1965, much of my life has been punctuated by events directly or indirectly related to the Vietnam War. Thus, I readily admit Thomas Berger Guest columnist that the vandalism to the KU Viet Memorial on July 4 has aroused in me strong feelings of anger and betrayal. That deseration was a not-subtle reminder that some people cannot, or will not, understand the difference between the warriors and the war. Just as jaws were locked in polarizing perceptions in the 1960s, that perception remains a twisted ignorance that continues to blame the Vietnam vet for a national policy he or she did not create. Even more aberrant, however, is the blind stupidity that causes people to deface memorials that are erected to honor the dead of the conflicts resulting from such policy. Would those who vandalized the KU memorial also deface the memorial at Kenyan University? University of Nicaragua? Probably not. I guess personal memory? Who can only make their personal statements about the war by scribbling on monuments to the war's dead when no one else is around, are the worst of cowards. The symbolism of the KU memorial is not like that of the Iwo Jima statue, which glorifies the heroic aspects of war by depicting the struggle to place the U.S. flag on Mount Surbiach in World War II. On the KU memorial, the names of the dead and missing students are listed without any such intention to glorify war. The KU memorial is not part of an exercise in which we must search for a collective guilt. Neither it is, in the words of Henry Kissinger, an exercise in self-flagellation. It simply seeks to honor the courage and sacrifice of our fellow students. It seeks to confer upon them the afference they were denied upon their deaths, affirmation that most Vietnam veterans still seek in quiet desperation. We, as a community, must set aside the politics of Vietnam because honoring our dead should be beyond rancor and debate. The message of the KU memorial is not that the war was good, bad, moral or immoral; each person must decide that for himself. The memorial's message must always and only be: Here is the price they paid. Thomas Berger, chairman of the KU Vietnam Memorial Committee, is a research assistant in the executive vice chancellor. I'd like to take this opportunity to address the brain-trust that recently defaced the KU Vietnam Memorial. I'm sure it took more than one person to think of such a Jon Gregor Staff columnist profound political statement only 10 years after the fact. What a bright bunch, huh folks? Thomas Berger, chairman of the KU Vietnam Memorial Committee, said this vandalism probably wasn't related to the vandalism committed earlier this summer at the Vietnam Memorial in Kansas City. Mo. I must point out an obvious point of comparison: ignorance and the illegal exhibition of it. Are these people silenced so that they can only proclaim their ideas with ugly scrawls? Are they restricted from speaking their political views? Of course not. Perhaps they don't realize that the war is long over, or perhaps they are just bored without a war to protest and the old one will have to do. I also question the statement itself, something about genocide or mass murder. There is no evidence that the Vietnam war was a campaign of mass murder or genocide against the Vietnamese. But what happened in Vietnam or what the war stood for really isn't at issue in the memorial. The KU Vietnam Memorial is not for the war, it's for the young men who died in it. If these vandals were to open their minds, they might comprehend that those young, innocent, confused KU students certainly didn't go to Vietnam with mass-murder or genocide in their minds. the memorial honors the sacrifice those men made. We can never fully comprehend that sacrifice, nor should we generalize their reasons for making it. Many men and women protested the war for political and moral reasons. It was their right. They made a strong, public statement that could not be ignored. If they weren't respected then, they should be respected now. But how can we respect political statements scrawled in silence and shadows? Attacking the KU Vietnam Memorial attack was an act of cowardice that deserves contempt, not respect. Religious Right threatens free society A salient feature of the 1900s has been the unparalleled rise to political power of the Religious Right. Using the electronic media, its leaders have enlisted the support of millions with an authoritarian, fundamentalist message. Well-financed and well-organized, their influence in the Reagan administration reaches Christian Colbert Staff columnist even to the selection of Supreme Court justices. Most alarming, the long-term goal of the Religious Right is to destroy I can't believe Kansas taxes food! Well, there goes about half of my 2.5% pay increase from the university. Jerry Palwell also would like to see the separation of church and state ended. the wall of separation between church and state so that they can impose their agenda on society. The Religious Right refuses to acknowledge that other U.S. citizens with different beliefs have equal protection under the U.S. Marshals' US Evening News. "This thing about separation of church and state is a fragment of some infidel's imagination." "The fact is, one day Jesus is going to come and strike down all the Supreme Court rulings in one fell swoop," he said recently. increasingly, the wall is showing signs of wear. President Reagan reproves those who oppose the Religious Right by saying, "God, world, and were enjoined by Scripture to oppose it with all our might." Also, Carlo Sundseth, the President's liaison for religious affairs, said all "saved Christians" should pray that her fellow White House staffers "get saved or get out" of government. Fundamentalism, for those not familiar, is the acceptance of every word of the Bible as literally true. To fundamentalists, the Bible is the The political influence of the Religious Right is also gaining acceptance among members of Congress. Intimidated by the capacity of the Religious Right to mobilize voters, Congressmen are listening to their extremist political views. For example, the Religious Rights laws against congregations and wife abuse. They say the laws would infringe on the biblical duty of husbands to discipline their wives and children. unthering, the island. I view a bit of a片learning story of the story of Jonah being swallowed by a whale and surviving. Don't you? If not, you're surely one of the guilble folk contributing money to religious hucksters like Pat Robertson, Jerry Fawell, Jimmy Swaggart and a host of others. unerring, ultimate authority Much more than a set of doctrines, fundamentalism is a mind set. It is authoritarian, intolerant and unremittingly rash about imposing itself on others in fundamentalist settings in black and white; there is no compromise. Their crusades to burn books and prohibit wine, their determination to keep women in traditional roles and their utter disregard for the separation of church and state is endangering individual liberties and cultural pluralism. Rather than encourage free thought and action, they foster ignorance and accustom people to obedience. They take refuge in a book of fiction written in prescientific times, because it supplies them simplistic answers to complex issues. Ernest H. Sommerfeld, a minister of the Unitarian Church offers an alternative: "The need in America," he said, "is not to return to the God of the Bible but to outgrow him. What is needed in all the world, in all religions, for men and women to ourgrow their gods. We don't need to go back; we need to grow up. It is our religious responsibility." The choice is to surrender one's identity to mass organization or choose the path of reason and self-knowledge, which leads to freedom and enlightenment. ---