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Tuesday. March 24, 1987 / University Daily Kansan
Opinions
A deadly cost cut
The Kansas Legislature might end up making some dangerous decisions before the legislative session closes for the year.
The decisions center on the life of the death penalty, left to the hands of legislators and Gov. Mike Hayden. And, going hand in hand with the life of the bill are the lives of people, innocent or guilty, convicted of capital crimes.
The seriousness of the issue demands careful consideration and fair play on the part of the Legislature. Unfortunately, one Legislative committee already has shown tendencies for unfair play.
One important consideration about reinstating the ultimate penalty is whether the state can bear the financial drain. A three-member Senate subcommittee, which is preparing an estimate of some of the death penalty costs, already had recommended several changes to cut the cost of the death penalty. The Federal and State Affairs Committee is considering the changes.
One of the changes could have serious ramifications. The subcommittee recommended that a death penalty bill delete a provision requiring two juries for each capital murder case. One jury would decide guilt and a second would decide whether to impose the death penalty.
Having only one juried instead of two, as a cost-cutting measure could be reducing a person's right to the fairest trial possible.
if the Legislature votes to reinstate the death penalty, the officials have a responsibility to make the system fair, maybe even more fair than a regular trial, because human life is at stake with the death penalty.
Although the death penalty process is complex and costly, the outcome of human error in a trial is even more costly. If the state cannot afford to reinstate the death penalty in the fairest way possible, it should just forget it. And, we would all be much safer and better without it.
Equal punishment for all
What began as a shocking discovery of illegal practices on Wall Street has gone past the national scandal stage and is now a national disgrace.
It probably shouldn't come as such a surprise to discover that the people who are paid to make money for others aren't above breaking the rules to take care of themselves. The most disgraceful part of the ongoing investigations on insider stock trading is that it seems everyone is involved, yet only a few people will spend time in jail for their crimes.
The Securities and Exchange Commission, the federal regulatory agency overseeing stock and bond transactions, seems more concerned with getting names of offenders than preventing future offenses.
The Commission apparently has adopted a policy of finding
a name, exposing the violator and then working out a deal with the violator to pay a fine and provide more names. But even the assessment of fines like the $100 million penalty speculator Ivan Boesky agreed to pay in November cannot strike fear into those traders as much as the threat of a long iail term.
Stock traders and the SEC need to remember that using illegal means to make money is fraud and robbery. If a mugger in Central Park goes to prison for stealing $100 and a wristwatch, or a con man for defrauding an elderly couple, then why should traders go free.
They may dress nicer, but the plain truth is that they have stolen millions of dollars from investors and their punishments must be made to fit their crimes.
Fight all discrimination
Discrimination has made another ugly appearance, but this time, unfortunately, it has gone relatively unnoticed.
recently, an ad was placed in a weekly Chicago newspaper seeking gay companionship. The responses then were used to disclose the sexual orientations of these people to their neighbors, landlords and employers.
In at least eight cases, copies of the response to the ad, along with a letter saying the person may be a carrier of AIDS, were sent to people who knew the respondents. The letters also urged the people to avoid contact with those homosexuals. In one case, the letter was sent to the person's
employer and co-workers
In response, a story about the discrimination was buried inside newspapers. This type of discrimination is no different from groups or individuals discriminating against blacks. Yet, if this had been the case, stories would have covered front pages; marches and protests would have followed like those earlier this year in Forsyth County, Ga.
To wipe out discrimination, all types must be fought. It is not just a question of picking and choosing just those types of discrimination that affect the most people or will illicit the most response from the public or media.
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News staff
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Book strikes out with writer
A New York publishing house has sent me a copy of a new paperback book it has just brought out.
Mike Royko
Columnist
With it came a note that said,
"We take pleasure in presenting you with this review copy and ask that you please send two copies of your notices to our offices."
I seldom review books in my column. The Chicago paper for which I write has a section that takes care of that. But in this case, I'm going to make an exception.
This book is called "If At First"
"... with a subtitle that says
"With the exclusive inside story of
the 1986 Championship Season."
The author is Keith Hernandez, who is the first baseman on the New York Mets baseball team. Actually, he didn't write it, some professional ghostwriter did. But the words and story originated with Hernandez.
I will begin my review by saying that this is a very solid book. The moment I opened the package and saw what it was about, I threw it against my office wall as hard as I could. Then I slammed it to the floor and jumped up and down on it. I beat it on it with a chair for support. It smashed onto my couch, emotionally and physically spent.
Although slightly scuffed, the book was still intact.
It also is a book that can cause excitement. I dropped it on the desk of a friend who has had weekend season tickets at Wrigley Field for the past 10 years. It immediately stirred him to emotional heights. He shouted:
"Why are you showing me that piece of (deleted). I say (deleted) Hernandez and (deleted) the Mets and (deleted) the whole (deleted) city of New York. And (deleted) you, too."
It's a book that can move a sensitive reader to tears, as I discovered when I showed it to a man who has been going to Cubs games since 1946, a year that is known as The Beginning of Darkness.
Then he flung it against a wall and gave it a kick. It still remained intact. I told you it was a solid book.
When he looked at the cover, he choked back a sob, a tear trickled down his cheek and he said, "Why them? Why not us? What was our sin? How can we atone for it? You know, I asked my clergyman that, and he said he wishes he knew, because he lost $50 betting against them."
But enough generalities. Let us consider the contents of this book.
On the very first page, Hernandez and his ghostwriter say, "ad made the second out on a long the
Mets were through for 1986; o out,
nobody on, two runs down, ox
already leading the World Series
en our scoreboard operator at"
And on page 81. Hernandez says,
"round during infield practice.
I draw a line man and myself and
a manager over. avy? I ask.
He laughs."
Moving to page 125, we find,
"Oh, sweet bird of youth, however,
were a different story. It's dif-
fiquently as I work my way out of a
bad me to listen to his judgments.
I wrong with my swing. I know not
to hardheaded. Dand and I have bad."
Don't misunderstand me. I'm not doing that out of spite. I'm a good sport, a cheerful friend. Why, in the last two years, I don't think I've watched my video of the movie "Fall Safe," in which New York City gets nuked, more than 30 or 40 times.
I know, it sounds kind of garbled,
incomprehensible. But that's the way a story reads when you rip the pages of a book in half, one by one, as I've been doing.
The fact is, I have found this to be a useful book.
I have been tearing out the pages and crumpling them into little wads.
When I have about 30 or 40 of these wads, I put them in my fireplace under the kindling and light them.
Then I pour myself a drink, lower the lights, sit back and stare at the crackling flames.
Pondering life's little worries
And I pretend that I'm looking at Shea Stadium.
I worry about the future. I sometimes sit up at night and think about how screwed-up the world seems. Since misery loves company, I thought I would share a few of my deep thoughts just to give everyone else a little more to worry about.
Brian
Kaberline
Editorial editor
1. I worry that by the time I have kids, all music will be played on computers and synthesizers. How can I share the sounds that made this country great, like Chuck Berry, Credence Clearwater Revival, B.B King and the Police?
2. I wonder whether Ronald Reagan's elections were a fluke, or whether the people of the United States actually want to be led by a senile old man who does better acting in press conferences than he did in Hollywood. The only thing that scares me more than two more years with Reagan running around the White House telling anecdotes is George Bush as president, running around the White House looking for hiding places.
How will I be able to convince some 10-year-old that people sat down with only an acoustic guitar and a harmonica, and made great music?
Already, most popular music sounds like it was recorded in an IBM laboratory, not a studio. Even people who used to be good, like Lionel Ritchie, have networked and are putting out three albums a year. And people buy the trash.
Many people in this country have the intelligence, stamina and guts to be president. My question is: Why don't any of them ever run for president, and if they do, why aren't they elected?
3. I worry about being bumped off the road someday by some idiot with a car and driver's license, but no brain. I know everyone hates bad drivers, and you just have to live with some of them, but my neighborhood has more bad drivers than Lebanon has terrorists.
but in the wrong lane.
Three times I have ripped down signs offering driving instruction that allows you to get your license without a highway patrol test. All this world needs is someone else driving 35 mph on the highway, or 55 mph.
4. I used to worry about Oral Roberts not raising enough ransom money to stay alive. But now that he paid off God and can stick around, I worry what will happen when he finds out about the $500,000 in fake pledges I made last month.
A friend of mine said I was stupid for worrying about him. He said Oral had a backup plan just in case. He told me that Oral would act dead and leave a message saying that God had told him that if he could raise $5 million more, he would be resurrected. It probably would have worked. too.
5. Finally, I worry that I might do serious bodily harm to some rich person soon. By now, I've heard more than enough about Padre Island or Daytona Beach. In fact, it all sounds BORING. Why should I be so concerned about giving two month's pay to go to Florida and get so drunk that I wouldn't know if I ever left Kansas?
Well, now that all that is off my conscience, I probably will sleep like a baby in history class. A good confession always helps clear your head . . to make room for a new set of problems.
Racism not dead in college
Recent events involving Black Student Union have raised questions about the presence of racism in Student Senate. The questions were raised recently after the Student Senate Executive Committee voted to deny BSU revenue code status.
Christian Colbert
Columnist
StudEx's decision has encountered protests from BSU, whose members wonder whether they are the victims of discrimination. In turn, BSU has encountered opposition from students skeptical about the existence of racism here on campus. I have read or heard statements such as: Racism here at KU? that's absurd; or, it's irresponsible of BSU to insinuate that racism exists here. Prove it; or, if racism exists at all, why then is the Cosby Show the most popular show in the land?
In the Reagan era, racism has become more widespread because it is more permissible. I'm not blaming Reagan for all racism in the U.S., but his administration has created a national climate that makes it safe for people to discriminate. Reagan, after all, accused Martin Luther King Jr. of communism and supported the decision to give tax-exempt status to Bob Jones University, which discriminates against minorities. And the Justice Department is trying to undermine affirmative action.
I'm sure the people saying these things would change their minds if they were shown evidence proving the existence of racism. However, proving where and to what extent racism exists is not a simple task Perhaps the most pernicious thing about racism, and certainly the reason it has plagued our society so long, is the arduous task of proving its existence.
Unless someone openly discriminates, (this rarely occurs, because racism is easily disguised) the public is reluctant to believe that racism exists. This phenomena, of giving the benefit of the doubt to the person being accused of racism, makes proving racism difficult — not to mention getting people outraged by it.
Racism is flourishing in the United States, even on college campuses, as recent incidents indicate.
According to The Associated Press, racial tensions at the University of Michigan prompted a hearing about that campus's problems this month. In the fall, white students at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst attacked black students. In October at The Citadel, five cadets dressed as Klausmen broke into a black freshman cadet's room, shouted obscenities and left a burned paper cross. At the University of Virginia, students said in a poll this winter that racism is the school's biggest problem. On Jan. 26, a cross was burned in front of Purdue University's Black Cultural Center.
I easily could cite more reported incidents, but I think you get the picture. We are not immune to racism here at KU. I don't know whether the Student Senate Executive Committee's decision was racially motivated, but I don't know that it wasn't.
I suspect, as does Reginaal Wilson, head of the office of minority concerns of the American Council on Education, "that a number of things are happening on campus that would tend to give students the idea that minority interests are of diminishing value."
BSU should not be admonished for its recent protests; it is justified in raising the question of racism in regard to StudEx's decision. If anyone is offended by the BSU's actions, let them come forth and prove that the decision was not racially motivated.
BLOOM COUNTY
TAKING A MORAL STAND
IS AN EXERCISE IN PHILO-
SOPHICAL PURITY, ABUSING
AND CONFIRMING ANIMALS FOR
THEIR MILK AND EGGS IS NO
MORE ACCEPTIBLE THAN KILL
by Berke Breathed