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University Daily Kansan
Opinion
Thursday, Jan. 16, 1986
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
The Lawrence City Commission is not the place to discuss abortion. The commission showed wisdom and good judgment by choosing not to support one side of a controversial argument over which it has no jurisdiction.
On a 4-1 vote at the Jan. 7 meeting, the commission denied a request to proclaim the week of Jan. 18 "Abortion Awareness Week." Although the proclamation — proposed by the "pro-life" Lawrence Kansans for Life — did not specifically stress pro- or anti-abortion views, supporting it would have implied support for the group sponsoring it and the activities planned to recognize it.
The right to choose
The group plans to go ahead with the activities it scheduled to recognize the anniversary of the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion.
Those activities include a march, speakers and picketing the office of a local physician who performs abortions. Views other than "pro-life" will not be expressed, according to the coordinator of Lawrence Kansans for Life.
Sororities struggled a little with computer problems and a new quota system, but rush went on. And members and rushees alike lived through it all — albeit stressed and tired.
Angino may think the proclamations "don't amount to a hill of beans," but they are important to those who propose them and should be given the consideration due them.
First impressions and a decision on whether to initially invite a woman back to a house are all made after a 30-minute party on the first day of rush.
Commissioner Ernest Angino, who did not oppose the proclamation, said that many proclamations the city read were trivial and that denying this one would put the commission in the position of "picking and choosing."
Passing a proclamation implies that the commission endorses the views of those who submitted it. "Picking and choosing" is entirely appropriate.
Monday night, 580 relieved women received invitations to pledge a sorority after enduring five days of meeting hundreds of women and producing miles of smiles.
Rush cries for revisions
Nearly 70 percent of the 800 women going through rush pledged a house. Some of the 580 women who pledged were undoubtedly happier than others. But almost all of them were undoubtedly happier than the 250 women who didn't pledge a house at all.
Rush, by design, is a hectic, stressful, impersonal and often disappointing process.
At best, a rushee will have spent a total of three hours during rush at any one house when a final decision on her membership is made after
various recommendations are considered.
But it is not the pledge percentages that necessarily should increase. Sororities and fraternities have always correctly pointed out that Greek life is not for everyone.
Fraternity rush is one place the Panhellenic Association should look for suggestions. Fraternities rush, in one way or another, throughout the year.
Improvements definitely need to be made, however, in the process of formal sorority rush.
Fraternity parties are more casual and a rushee is able to spend more time at a house before any decision is made by him or the house. Voting takes place on several different occasions, not at marathon sessions which often go on past midnight.
There would be no need for sorority rush to lose its dignity or formality, if Panhellenic is attached to those elements. But there is a need for more interaction and less stress for both the rushees and sorority members.
Kansas needs tax hike
Gov. John Carlin took a step in the right direction Tuesday when he called for a 1 cent increase in the state sales tax in his State of the State address.
The sorely needed increased revenue is slated for boosting the floundering Kansas economy hit by the triple whammy of recession in the agriculture, oil and gas and aircraft industries. Areas of the state heavily dependent on one or more of these industries are suffering badly.
As part of his long-range economic plan for the state, Carlin has suggested that $30 million of his $190 million "investment budget," which would be financed by the sales tax increase, should go toward highway development. Such an investment would help stimulate the economy in areas where poor transportation has hampered the attraction of new industry and has
led to losses in existing industry.
He also has suggested an aggressive campaign to attract industry to the state. Let's hope that these depressed areas of Kansas won't be neglected in the effort and that the type of industry being recruited will be appropriate for the community and its work force.
Sitting back and hoping the state's economy will turn around won't bring industry to these areas. As Carlin told legislators, competition from other states won't allow us to stand still.
What is needed is sensible investment by state government like that being proposed by Carlin. The added burden on Kansans of an increased sales tax will pay dividends in the future economic health of the state.
News staff
News staff
Michael Totty ... Editor
lauretta McMillen ... Managing editor
Citrix Barber ... Belle editor
Cindy McCurry ... Campus editor
David Giles ... Sports editor
Brice Waddill ... Photo editor
Susanne Shaw ... General manager, news adviser
Business staff
Brett McCabe ... Business manager
David Nikon ... Retail sales manager
Jim Williamson ... Campus
Lori Eckart ... Classified manager
Caroline Innes ... Production manager
Pallien Lee ... National manager
John Oberzan ... Sales and marketing adviser
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AIA acting as watchdog,not censor
KU professors breathed a sigh of relief last semester as the first issue of Accuracy in Academia rolled off the presses.
Why the sigh? Because none of the professors had been mentioned in the newsletter.
Accuracy in Academia (AIA) is a non-partisan and non-profit organization formed to promote greater accuracy and balance in instruction in college-level institutions.
It opposes professors who use inaccuracies, distortions, and deceptions in an attempt to influence students.
But AIA is under fire. The American Association of University Professors, a professional society for academics, called AIA a "threat to academic freedom." Other complaints have been less kind.
AIA can in no way force professors to change the way or what they teach. AIA can, however, act as a watchdog and report to the public the names of professors who distort the truth.
What is all the fuss about?
We are supposed to live in a marketplace of ideas, but liberals now regard criticism against their ideology as some form of censorship.
report on any professor, left or right,
that allows only one point of view.
However, professors complain that only those with leftist ideology are being targeted. AIA says it will
This is not a liberal versus conservative issue. It is a freedom of press issue.
Richard Pipes, a conservative professor in the Harvard history department and critic of AIA, said, "What goes on in the classroom is sacrosanct."
"I regard teaching as a form of publication. No professor has the right to complain if people report on, comment on, or criticize his teaching," he said.
However, John Silber, president of Boston University had the opposite opinion.
But members of the Left somehow think that AIA is trying to censor them. The opposite is happening.
The Left is trying to censor those who want to expose the truth. Yet the hypocritical screams of censorship and McCarthyism are trying to drown out the truth. In fact, the Left is acting like McCarthy because it is
Victor Goodpasture Staff columnist
accusing AIA of being something it is not.
According to a Dec. 9 Kansan editorial, AIA "tries to persuade guilty professors to balance their teaching with literature provided by AIA."
Is this censorship? Of course not. It's called freedom of the press, something the media think is a right reserved only for themselves.
This statement is totally false and part of the biased media's attempt to distort and misreport the actual purpose of A1A.
AIA does not send out literature to professors. That's absurd. It does, however, call up the professor and ask him whether the reported misdeed did ever occur. Then it asks why the statement was made and next time the professor would be
In a ridiculous New York Times editorial (Oct 27, 1985), the Times suggested that "a student who disagrees with a professor's philosophy ought to argue, explore and espouse his own ideas in class." Who's kidding who?
If the professor refuses, AIA will print the report in a monthly newsletter. But AIA cannot force the professor to be fair, it can only report misdeeds.
Some students may fear that if they bring up a point and irritate a professor, their grades may suffer for it.
AIA is a watchdog and information group. It seeks accuracy and truth. It doesn't censor anything. It merely brings to the attention of the public untruths within academia.
Also a student may not be knowledgeable enough on the subject to question a professor's statement.
Only those who deliberately misinform students and refuse to let students give other points of view have to be concerned about being exposed for their misdeeds.
Whether that list will include KU professors remains to be seen.
Halley's comet one giant snowball
There are almost as many ways of pronouncing Halley as there are of spelling Khadafy.
(The Geographic must be assuming that there is only one way to pronounce "valley." How little it knows!)
According to the National Geographic Society, if you are referring to Edmund Halley, the English astronomer, you should make the name rhyme with "valley."
As for Libya's leader, United Press International spells his name Moammar Khadab. But beyond those guidelines, apparently, everyone is on his own. No improvising, please. And that goes for the country as well.
Anyway, we are talking here about comets, in particular the one Halley discovered in 1705, which still bears his name. (The comet, not the year.)
Halley's comet, now visible in the United States away from city lights, passes this way every 75 to 76 years. It was last seen by Americans in 1900.
was taken by Abel Rains in 1810.
He was born then and he had heard
Dick West
United Press International
my parents talk about it and they agreed their oldest child, then about 5, had the best chance of seeing it twice.
My brother missed the current visitation, but the Geographic says that much has been learned about comets since 1910, and I believe it.
For one thing, my parents thought they were seeing a fiery object streaking across the night sky. How wrong they were!
As astronomers now know, Halley's comet is more like a big snowball that moves slowly in relation to the stars.
Scientists theorize that comets are composed of such frozen substances as water, ammonia, methane, carbon dioxide and hydrogen cyanide.
I don't know what they figure a snowball is composed of, and the
For one thing, my parents thought they were seeing a fiery object streaking across the night sky. How wrong they were!
It is known, however, that some of the ice evaporates when a comet gets close to the sun.
Halley's comet, incidentally, has a tail that is about 4 miles in diameter and 50 million miles long. Yet, we are told, all of its cosmic dust, which may be the same stuff from which the Universe was formed, would fit into a single suitcase.
I'm just guessing now but I would suppose that if all of its gases were fitted into your stomach, you would have a case of heartburn that even a suitcase full of Rolaids wouldn't relieve.
At any rate, the comet's 1986 visit is said to be among the dimest on record. It must have been brighter in 1910. Otherwise, my family probably wouldn't have noticed it.
They say you need binoculars to spot it now and I can tell you that nobody in my family habitually went outside at night with field glasses.
The so-called "Oort Cloud," where Halley's is thought to have originated, is suspected of containing at least 100 billion orbiting comets. About half a dozen are discovered each year.
There is talk of putting a person on a comet, possibly before Halley's next scheduled return in 2061. Let us hope the spacecraft is equipped with plenty of snow shovels.
'60s hippies become '80s Yuppies
Baby boomers remain contradictory
The speaker at the rally in the park was angry, and so was the crowd he was addressing in urgent words. "We are not going to accept the establishment's garbage any more. We are the largest generation in American history. We can shape this country's future, and we will."
The cheers went up and the crowd surged forward to march down Michigan Avenue in Chicago. The year was 1968, a bad year for predicting the future. The generation of youth in the streets; these we now call baby boomers and Yuppies, were the backbone then of the culture of protest.
That generation, whose slogan was "Never Trust Anybody Over 30," is now approaching 40. In a variety of ways, it is one of the most mysterious generations of recent times. It is more liberal than its elders on social issues and more conservative on economic issues.
Most mysterious of all, this largestever American generation has given little recent notice of its likely
Robert C.
Maynard
Oakland Tribune
political bent. Indeed, author and political analyst Michael Barone has wondered aloud at a curious paradox.
This generation, Barone said, might go down in history for having altered the social and cultural context of its time without ever having held political power. The generations in front and in back of it might wind up dominating it for the rest of the century.
While the baby boomers have yet to flex their muscle to any large degree in the political arena, that could change between now and 1988. Meanwhile, it is clear this generation is rising in the corporate establishment.
Fortune magazine found not long ago that executives in their middle and late 308 are having a significant
True to its heritage of protest and change, this generation is still about change in the business. Fortune found.
"Baby-boom managers." Fortune said, "truly are unwilling to accept the world as it is handed to them. They are slow to define themselves in terms of their relation to a particular employer or institution."
influence on corporate America. This generation that made so much noise in the streets in the '80s is now making its way up the corporate ladder. But it is not emulating the style of the previous generation.
Politically, it is still hard to figure out what the boomer generation will do, but the one thing that is clear is that it did not engage in sustained
Furthermore, the magazine said: "They take change for granted and without timidity precipitate it themselves. Rather than being blocked by the old order, they are ushering in the new. If American industry is trying to revitalize itself, here is the vitality."
war with the establishment. The evidence in the corporate world is that it is becoming the establishment but on its own terms.
This struggle to make ends meet is at old variance with the Yuppie image of the baby-boom generation. As yet these unfulfilled anxieties have not assumed a clear political context, and neither party has figured out a way to capture the many contradictions posed by this largest-ever generation.
Only one thing is clear. As a generation, the boomers have yet to show the anger in the '80s for which they were so well-known in the streets of the '60s.