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Friday, February 13, 1987 / University Daily Kansan
Lend a hand to homeless
The United States, one of the richest and most advanced countries in the world, has people living on its streets.
The situation is sad but true. Some Lawrence residents are forced to live on the streets because they cannot afford the luxuries of a home and a "normal" life. Others choose to escape from a fast-paced, high-pressure society.
Regardless of whether the homeless choose to roam the streets by day and night, the government at all levels, city, state and national, has a responsibility to help them improve their lives.
The U.S. government spends billions of dollars on defense and national security. The government spends billions of dol-
ars to protect its residents. But the government cannot even protect its residents from the winter weather.
The U.S. government needs to pump more money into programs for the poor and the homeless. Their needs must become a top priority.
The Salvation Army and the American Red Cross are trying to shelter the homeless in Lawrence. Salvation Army Lt. David Jones converted the Salvation Army gymnasium, 942 New Hampshire St., into a shelter in November.
Many of the homeless in the country have given up on society. But they are also crying out for help. Society should not give up on them.
"Grossly underfunded "
Increase not sporting
"Grossly underfunded."
That was how David Ambler, secretary for the Kansas University Athletic Corporation, described the state of the University's non-revenue sports. He said this when trying to justify a recommendation by the KUAC to increase the amount of money the sports receive from the student activity fee.
Non-revenue sports include all sports except football and men's basketball.
The proposed increase would raise the amount of money the sports get from the activity fee from $6.50 to $10 for the spring and fall semesters and from $3.75 to $5.00 for the summer session.
Non-revenue sports at KU are $232,000 less than the median figure of other schools studied by the board. But it is
not reasonable to ask financially strapped students to bear such an increase at one time.
If the University is to maintain teams with adequate coaching and equipment, there must be some increase. But you can go to the well just so many times before it dries up. The increase doesn't seem so large by itself, but that isn't the case.
Students also are facing reductions in government student aid, higher costs of living and will be forced to pay taxes on a portion of scholarship and aid money.
The KUAC should reach a compromise on the increase. One that will allow the affected sports to make some progress in reaching acceptable budget levels while allowing the student to survive financially.
Protect patients' rights
The anxiety about AIDS may be going too far. Though concern about the deadly disease is justifiable, last week's proposal by the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta to give tests for the AIDS antibody to all hospital patients is not.
Testing for the virus itself is often necessary. It is not only in the best interest of the hospital to ensure the safety of its personnel, but also for the patient who must receive adequate treatment.
In testing patients for the AIDS antibody, health officials claim, hospital personnel would be in a position to encourage those who test positive to behave more responsibly. Their aim is to minimize
Sometimes, the rights of the individual AIDS sufferers must yield to the protection of those who surround them. The proposal put forward by the medical community to test patients for the AIDS antibody, however, is an unnecessary infringement on the rights of the individual and is not likely to protect the community from the growing threat of the deadly disease.
the spread of the disease. Officials estimate that as many as 1.5 million U.S. citizens carry the antibody and 30 to 50 percent of them will develop the disease within five years.
Their intentions to limit AIDS are good, but these efforts are inconsistent with individual rights. Allowing antibody tests for all patients violates their right to privacy. Testing for the antibody must be voluntary, the results should be kept confidential, and professional counseling must be made available to patients.
Widespread testing also may hinder potential carriers from seeking medical care. Carriers are often stripped of medical insurance as high-risk cases, which in turn deprives them of necessary treatment and counseling.
By driving potential carriers from the hospital, the antibody tests may only serve to spread AIDS further. While health officials have a responsibility to protect the public from AIDS, they also have a responsibility to protect the rights of individuals.
News staff
News staff
Frank Hansel . Editor
Jennifer Benjamin . Managing editor
Jul Warren . News editor
Brian Kaberline . Editorial editor
Sandra Engelland . Campus editor
Mark Siebert . Sports editor
Diane Dultmeier . Photo editor
Bill Skeet . Graphics editor
Tom Eblen . General manager, news adviser
Business staff
Lisa Weems . Business manager
Bonnie Hardy . Ad director
Denise Stephens . Retail sales manager
Kelly Scherer . Campus sales manager
Duncan Calhoun . Marketing manager
Lori Coppie . Classified manager
Jennifer Lumianski . Production manager
David Nixon . National sales manager
Jeanne Hines . Sales and marketing adviser
Opinions
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 a university, include class and hometown, or faculty or staff position. Guest shots should be typed, double-spaced and fewer than 700 words. The writer will be photographed.
The Kansan reserves the right reject or edit letters and guest shots. They can be mailed or brought to the Kansan newsroom, 111 Staffer-Fint Hall.
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Beginning Sunday night, ABC will air its $40 million miniseries, "Amerika." Not to give the whole thing away, the series portrays the United States after a decade of Soviet occupation. To read the reaction of "concerned" liberals, viewing of this movie will turn all but the most fervent fellow travelers into frothing manias resplendant with anti-Soviet rabidity.
Overreaction to miniseries rampant
This worry is so pervasive to those who defer to the Soviet Union as a death god — who, if angered, will wreak havoc upon the world — that extreme steps have been taken to soften the impact of a particularly unlikely scenario.
Mother Jones, Rolling Stone and other flagships of liberal sycophancy have run articles warning the faithful that Jesse Helms clones have taken over ABC and are turning the network into ratings hounding right-wingers. The predictable letter-writing campaigns have been encouraged.
Paul Campbell Columnist
A fair question that can be raised at this point is whether "Amerika" is the right-wing fantasy that its liberal detractors claim it is. There is enough evidence to at least suggest that it is not.
not Line, really a series of armed fortresses, on the Franco-German border. This contributed an interwar mentality of safety. The German Army simply went around the defended area to make quick work of France.
Donald Wrye, the writer and director,
is a self-described Kennedy
Perhaps the most ludicrous aspect of this affair is some groups successfully have pressured six (at this writing) ABC affiliates into providing airtime for criticisms. While viewer feedback should be encouraged, groups with the public interest (or is it private concern?) in mind should not go about bullying their local stations into submission.
Democrat, not exactly the kind of person deemed critical of the Soviet Union. Kris Kristofferson, one of the main actors, was arrested recently in Nevada for protesting nuclear weapons, an activity people supportive of a strong national defense are not prone to engage in. Other people still call for a nuclear freeze and decry aid to the contractions fighting the communist government in Nicaragua.
The United Nations hired Theodore Sorenson, a former aide of President Kennedy, to insist on changes in the show. While the United Nations admittedly does not receive favorable treatment from the program, it doesn't have jurisdiction to censor a member country's programming because it feels some ideas are offensive.
That the enemy of the United States in "Amerika," as in the world today, is the Soviet Union only presents the audience with a likely threat. "Amerika" may well provide U.S. citizens with an understanding of what the people of eastern Europe have been going through in real life since 1945.
These people, who were active in the film's making, could hardly be described as right-wing, conservative, or Reaganite unless these terms are currently being used in the liberal pantheon to describe only those who do not favor the violent overthrow of the U.S. government.
While nothing to lose sleep over, the premise behind "Amerika," the United States being trampled upon by soldiers of a foreign power, is sound enough even though it has not happened since the War of 1812. If we carelessly insist that a Soviet occupation is impossible, we are in danger of making the same mistake the French made after World War I.
To prevent another attack from Germany, the French built the Magi-
The ultimate decision of what place "Amerika" will have in the chronicles of television history rests ultimately with you, the viewer. All the hype generated about the series indicated that it is indeed a controversial program. Whether it will be remembered as good viewing has yet to be seen. At the very least, it has given the hardcore liberares something to froth about for awhile . . . and that's entertainment!
No winners in onaoina debate over music
I'm involved in an ongoing debate with a friend of mine about popular music. I'll admit it, right here for all to see and ridicule. I like Top 40 music. You know, Lionel Ritchie, Huey Lewis, Whitney Houston — all those people we sophisticated college students aren't supposed to like.
Bob Hart Columnist
Anyway, this friend, whose musical taste leans more toward Frank Zappa and the Dead Kennedys, says that most popular music is . . . well. I can't say what he thinks it is, but I'm sure you get the idea. I frequently find myself in the position of having
to defend the music I like, which isn't always easy.
Huey Lewis," I argue. "They just do. His music is good, and he's a nice guy. And at least the people I like are good examples for our youth. While your alleged musical geniuses are telling them to rape and kill, Whitney Houston is thanking God and her parents at the American Music Awards."
Ever try to defend "Walk Like an Egyptian"?
"You cannot say this music," my friend says, "because it is virtueless. You degrade yourself by even listening to it. Popular, Top 40 music is the lowest of all art forms, if you can even call it an art form."
When we get into these discussions, as we do quite frequently, I avoid using phrases like "pompous, elitist pig," but I do try to point out a few things to my pompous, elitist friend. First of all, I have maintained, popular music wouldn't be popular if a lot of people didn't like it. Simple, right?
"Thanking them for what?" he shrieks. "For the chance to sing bland, empty-headed songs to twelve-year-olds who don't know any better? Why don't you admit that most popular recording stars are just cunning businessmen, draining the pocketbooks of a tasteless public incapable of recognizing their inepitude?"
“Ah!” I retort, “but what if it’s ineptitude the public wants? Is it so terrible, then, to create catchy ineptitude that you can dance to?”
"No so," he says. "Songs become popular only after saturated airplay forces the mindless masses into blind acceptance."
"Why do we even discuss this?" he asks. "If you don't care about social injustice, if you're not concerned with using art to make a statement or to possibly change the attitudes of ignorant people, I give up. Listen to your mindless crap, I don't care."
"Sadly not," he says, as I put my Michael Jackson album on the turntable. "I'm going home to watch 'Masterpiece Theatre.'"
"Nobody is being forced to like
"It's not fair to say that I don't care." I reply. "But must EVERYTHING be deep and meaningful? Is entertainment for entertainment's sake a thing of the past?"
"Tonight"? I ask, stunned. "You can't! Dynasties and Krystina can!"
"You really are pathetic," he groans.
But that's another argument altogether.
Mailbox
Capital punishment has other benefits
Though I personally support rein-
statement of capital punishment. I would readily admit that there are strong moral arguments against it.
Opponents of capital punishment, including the Kansas, have raised a couple of misleading issues in attempting to block its adoption by the Kansas Legislature. A brief editorial cannot do justice to the moral arguments for or against the death penalty.
However, arguments against capital punishment based on its alleged expense are very misleading. It is naive to ignore the impact that the death penalty will have on plea bargaining. Most criminal trials are decided through a plea bargain rather than a trial.
Under the death penalty, the criminal has an obvious incentive to admit guilt to a lesser offense or sentence to avoid the death penalty. If used effectively, this could more than offset the added expenses of the longer trial and appeals in capital cases.
While studies have shown mistakes in the past, opponents to the death penalty have used these in a misleading way. For instance, Frank Housh quoted a study "since 1900." The criminal justice system has undergone substantial changes to minimize the possibility of a mistake.
James R. McKown Great Bend law student
Article missed mark
I am pleased that my comment during the talk on faculty unionization at the University Forum on Feb. 4 was reported in the Kansan the next day. Nevertheless, I am a bit dismayed at the quote reported in the article. My statement did not mention younger staff, and the point I wished to make never got across.
My point was that a faculty union would, quite properly, be run by
those faculty who had the time and energy to become involved in union affairs. The best faculty and most active research staff would have nothing to do with the union for the most part because they would not have time for it; they would be too busy in their research and teaching.
David Beard
I would expect research conditions and excellence to be underemphasized by a faculty union because the elected officers and most active union members would have other priorities in their professional careers. This would lead to mediocrity.
professor of physics and astronomy
Sweep out litterers
The Oread Neighborhood is a relaxed environment whose outskirts are dotted by various bars, Greek houses and snack shops.
Noise is a pollutant we residents cheerfully accept, and to be honest, sometimes add to. We do not expect a quiet, nor a particularly private neighborhood. A clean neighborhood, however, seems to me a reasonable dream.
It is depressing to look out my window on Sunday morning and see piles of empty beer cups and fast food remnants with or without wrappers. It is even more depressing to think of the permanent residents of these blocks, older citizens who have treasured their homes for years and who now must continually face yards filled with garbage.
What is an angry citizen to do? I called the city engineer's office and was informed by George Williams, director of public works, that Lawrence does not post signs to remind people that littering is illegal and punishable by fine. Because I am originally from Topeka, a city that does post such signs, I found this news discouraging.
I called the Judicial Department and spoke with a police officer who assured me that litterers may be sent to court, assuming they hang around
long enough for a witness to call the police and for the police to arrive on the scene. Apparently, police officers themselves do not spend much energy watching out for litterbags.
Feeling somewhat helpless against the faceless masses of swine who scatter their trash upon my lawn, I considered tracked the perpetrators to their homes and dumping a collection of garbage on their lawns. Such tracking would prove to be a simple task considering that many of the litterers are branded like cattle with the symbols of their residences on
their chests and hindouarters.
At last, I chose this safer, and hopefully effective tactic of an angry letter to the editor. I presume that because most of my target audience attends the University, they can and do read the Kansan. I presume further that these people give a damn about their fellow human beings. If not, I hope that other environmentally-minded people will consider showing litterers the error of their ways.
Catherine Weed Lawrence sophomore
BLOOM COUNTY
by Berke Breathed