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Tuesday, April 19, 1977
University Daily Kansan
Comment
Opinions on this page do not necessary affect the views of the University of Kansas or the School of Journalism
The sky is falling
After more than five years of hesitation, oil company commercials and farcies like former President Nixon's "Project Independence," the United States is finally going to consider adopting an energy program.
Last night, President Jimmy Carter tried to prepare the nation for the storm that will inevitably come when he announces his energy program tomorrow. Rumor and news leaks have it that the program will include more than 10 percent of the sizeable increase in gasoline taxes; more use of that pollution-prone energy source, and a large tax on big cars.
IN WHAT some are calling his "The Sky is Falling" speech, President Carter tried again and again to get the American people to realize than the harsh measures he will propose are necessary. He talked about the need for sacrifice, shortage and about the need for sacrifice.
The question is: Did anyone believe him? Polls indicate that most Americans believe that finding new sources of oil and natural gas—not conservation—is the solution to the energy crisis. They also increasingly believe that there really isn't an energy crisis, except one artificially created by the big oil companies and the Arabs.
Carter is not a charismatic speaker. He was not telling people what they wanted to hear. It is far from certain that his Monday was able to sway these people's opinions.
AFTER ALL, this is America, and this is the 20th century. This is the land of plenty, and this is the age of miracle technology. People are accustomed to having a lot of everything and more of it all the time. Progress just keeps coming, and science has come up with ways to solve problems. The only problems we have seem to come from growing too fast.
And this President has the nerve to tell us that we must conserve? and gasoline prices comparable to those paid in other lands?
What gall!
Yes, these people are very likely to not believe Carter's whole Monday night talk and are likely to scream bloody murder when they hear what he has to say tomorrow.
AND A lot of politicians are going to be screaming bloody murder along with them. A whole lot of them.
Enough, in fact, that it isn't that difficult to envision a long and heated session of Capital Hill tooth-pulling and political-infighting that won't end until the energy crisis becomes an energy disaster and the whole thing crumps down around our heads. But such, one supposes, are the risks one takes in a democracy.
But it is easier—and a lot better for one's sleep—to take a more optimistic view. A view that figures there will be changes and compromises in the plan, but that the people who will realize this is a very important game they are playing and will act accordingly.
THAT THEY will disagree on solutions, but agree on the problem and the lack of time.
Gasoline prices are artificially low, and keeping them that way will cut our collective neck. Something—a big tax, deregulation or rationing—must be done.
Nuclear power is not a miracle solution. The supply of uranium is far too limited to ever make fission plants an important energy source, and fusion plants are easy prey for terrorists. Solar power and wind power are still in primitive stages of development, with little time to grow. Coal is comparatively plentiful, but pollutes. Things—incentives or government programs—must be done to make the most of all of them.
AMERICANS are still wasting energy in their cars and homes. Something—taxes, regulations or tax incentives—must be done to make them conserve.
The form of an energy program is debatable. Its necessity is not.
It was disappointing, but not very surprising, to learn last fall that the federal Office of Education will render Kansas' beneficial new student loan program virtually useless for next fall's
The case is a classic example of federal mismanagement. In February, Gov. Rob Bennett sent a letter to the state Education to approve a Minnesota nonprofit foundation as the administrator of $23 million in student loans in Kansas. In August, the governor wooed into guaranteeing student loans made by commercial banks and lending money to students refused loans — all at no cost to the state.
Federal mess stalls fall loans
LAST WEEK, Bennett signed in law legislation that established a state guaranteed priority for education in the organization, the Higher Education Assistance Foundation. But it was to no avail. The Office of Education has no position on the foundation, and financial aid officials in Kansas have been left to speculate that the request "has been sitting on somebody's desk" for years, weeks and weeks."
By preactinating this way, the Office of Education has blocked the way for an estimated $10 million increase in the amount of guaranteed student loans available to Kansas students next semester. The state that new money provided by the Minnesota foundation will be available in October—three months after it can be of any use in Kansas.
THERE IS no plan for deferred payment of tuition funds in Kansas. In other words, you have to pay at enrollment in August simply won't be a student. Money in October won't be of much use. Officials of the Minnesota foundation say they will pay the number of Kansas students receiving loans would more than double under the new state law. Education has slimmed shut the door to new, easily accessible funds for those students.
The Office of Education's action—or lack of it—would be understandable if it had been necessary to spend a lot of time
sured student loans. The loans aren't very profitable, and there is a lot of messy paperwork because of the federal connection.
The result is that banks often
Jerry Seib
Editorial Writer
investigating the Minnesota foundation. But it wasn't necessary—Kansas officials had done that before they submitted the plan for approval.
As under the present system,
students from households with
an annual income of more than
$25,000 would pay interest from
the start of the loan. Students
from households with lower
income wouldn't have to start
interest payments until graduation.
BUT THE real benefit of the program would be the avenues it would open to students who now have difficulty getting loans. Commercial banks are reluctant to give federally in-
ON ITS FACE, the Minnesota plan sounds too good to be true. A nonprofit organization, which has a proven track record and which is now guaranteeing $80 million of loans annually, would allow students in lower-interest guaranteed student loans in Kansas.
Kansas banks would still be free to write federally insured banks with the maximum interest rate of 7 per cent. The Minnesota foundation would guarantee those loans, a task now performed in the bank's office.
refuse to write student loans. The banks' money can be invested elsewhere for more profit and less trouble.
The Minnesota foundation would be able to help students who were refused money by commercial banks. Student
loans would become more available and more visible, and it is estimated that the amount of money in insured loans in Kansas was rise from less than $10 million to $20 million.
STATE OFFICIALS looked on with a high-sophistication program with appropriate skittishism. The Minnesota organization to Kansas and grilled them in search of a catch. They had to conclude finally that the snow is "pure as the driven snow."
So word went on to Washington, where progress came to a screeching halt.
This is a series of events not unfamiliar to people on college campuses. The federal
government, which in this case would have no more responsibility than supplying a stamp of approval, has constructed an insurmountable roadblock to progress.
THE FEDERAL government performs many admirable functions for colleges and universities, the federal government's offering of help, schools have to endure affirmative action policies, stacks of forms, threats of fund cut-offs—and desks in the Office of Education. The paperwork that new loan programs are lost in the shuffle.
The latest turn is event is, if nothing else a graphic argument or the reinforcement in the presshe by President Jimmy Carter.
Letters
Liberal hash unpalatable
To the editor:
What? The St. Thomas More Association unseaths its flaming sword of good sense once again? I thought for sure it
Beatles show mirrors change
Friday night, SUA pulled a fast one on Beatle lovers in Lawrence by showing five "unforgettable" performances of a Beatles multimedia production.
Aside from being lousy from every technical and artistic experience, we have few psychological merits. It showed the students of the post-Woodstock generation how much the times really have changed.
A case in point is the nulty in the production, of which there was a pointless overabundance. A few years ago the men in the audience would have hooted or gaped at shot after shot of beauty (all female, of course) and grumbling to the derriers. Instead, the men sat and grumbled along with the women. A few walked out.
got "porn" a la 1960s, it knew it was being biked, and with lousy "born" at that.
NO LONGER can nudity cover up mediocrity. The movie-going audience of the '70s is much more sophisticated than that, thanks to the artistic eroticism of this decade. When the audience that came Friday night to see pictures of its idols
Then there were the psychedelites. Though a few people said they wanted to die, the girl and the grief that splashed across the screen,
the so-called ministerial credentials of the Universal Life Church, showing anyone who does not personally person to whom the fee is to be
and work shirts. Not even law students wore suits.
Now the women are wearing skirts; the men have washed and cut their hair. The aging freak with a ponytail and Ben Franklin glasses is an anarchism; talking acid and
Diane Wolkow Editorial Writer
most groomed in self-revelation How old we are, and so far past the drug cult of the '60s.
The times, they really are achangin'. Just look around campus. It's quiet, and the people are well-dressed.
A FEW YEARS ago, banning a guitarist from Wescoe's lawn would have caused an all-campus protest in front of the band. When it stirred only a few rate cuts to the editor of the Kansan.
A few years ago, the standard evening wear for a typical college student was holey leans
quaaludes is out of tune with the times.
PART OF the change is nice. It's refreshing to once again be able to tell the boys from the girls where they are from backside. It also feels good to wear makeup and a dress without being stared at as some strange apparition from Mars. We're all in the party and discovering that 50 per cent of the people there are speaking coherently because they're straight. Or else finding someone who is staying home on
Modern times is the cleaner cut student of the 1970s, the one who worries about finding a job in the music industry is discovering that all your girl friends aren't husband-hunting and that all your boyfriends aren't wife-hunting. Modern times are celebrating with a toast instead.
Saturday night, because all your friends are also loaded with homework that they're trying to get in on time.
ALTHOUGH SOME of the superficialities of the times are commendable, those of us who reached the age of awareness in a bygone era miss some of the qualities that are lacking today. The quietness on campus of one university is unlike one wonders when the protesters will be here if we were them.
An interest in the world has been replaced by interest in self and finding a job and making money in this era where recession hovers like impending doom. Conversation, which was once sparked by that urge to change the world and make it a
provoking articles. It is a most welcome change of diet from the steady run-of-the-mill, to the clever and even distracting)
better place in which to live, has been reduced to trivier and more self-centered interests by the problems of modern times.
With modern times, we've come a long way from the drugs and turbulence that marked the late 1980s and even the early 70s. Now we should remember some of the ideals that that other era stood for. We should never become so concerned with our own interests that we forget there is in the world that needs protesting and change for the better, even in modern times.
would be devoured by those hungry dragons Liberalism and Humanism that run rampant in Lawrence when they had the audacity to claim that the death penalty was just. And now they dare to suggest that the death penalty worked with the Soviets might possibly be "mad!" (A Parable, Kansan, April 13, page 5).
This leads me to believe (hope) they might even defend the rights of private property, individual freedoms and family over state. Would they go so far as to denounce homosexual "rights," and man the battlefield with opponents to government, and finally, strike on the massive slaughter of innocents generally referred to today as abortion.
If such be in place, I tip my hat (or perhaps sword would be the more appropriate word) to such a bold punch.
I am hopeful the association will provide more thought-
Readers Respond
Key Bello
813 State
Kansas City, Kan
articles that pass for "editorial" material; material that seems to be spoon fed from the liberal-minded source of the libelary, then rehash it in varied styles and forms, but all unpalatable to anyone who still maintains an interest in the moment of an appetite for good sense.
Identity cleared up
To the editor:
For several days a "personal" classified advertisement in the Kansan has been peddling
sent is a "Rev. T, Miller," who is otherwise unidentified.
This advertisement has caused me considerable embarrassment because a number of individuals believe that I should not have anything to do with it and have never had any involvement with the Universal Life Church. Although on civil libertarian principles I can support that group's right to exist, I am rather interested in nor amused by any group of its kind.
Thank you for the opportunity to set the record straight.
Tim Miller assistant professor of religion
Somewhere Along a Kansas Highway, 1980-It had been a hot, frustrating day for Jane and Jill, two girls just graduated from an Alabama high school.
They were on their way to the University of Kansas—where
Name game is confusing
people in his hall smoked marijuana. We'll have to try to live there. And guess what the name of it is?"
"Tell me," Jane said.
"Hashinger Hall . . . tee bee!"
"It looks as though this might
Jay Bemis Editorial Writer
Jill's brother Jack had been a graduate student to get a first-hand view of the campus. They were potential students.
Jane had been yelling at Jill most of the day because he had given them a hug and then given them. Jane calmed down some, however, when they were able to get free directions from an attorney's calling station in southern Kansas.
Jill tried to get Jane in a better mood by reiterating some of the great features at KU. Jack apparently had a good time when he went to school there
"THE CAMPUS is on top of this mountain . . . Mount Oread I think they call it, "Jill said. "Then there some bakeery where you can get hot doughhouses. They are supposed to be a lot of students there, especially late at night."
"And, ooh-h-h ... the dormitories. When Jack lived there, the student newspaper said that 80 per cent of the
be it according to the directions," Jane said.
THEY PULLED off the interstate and began to cruise the town. Once they were near the bridge, they thought something had gone wrong.
"Hey, this campus isn't on a mountain," she said. "Jack had better not have been lying to us."
"I'm hungry," Jane said.
"Let's go get some of those hot doughnuts."
The girls saw what appeared to be a student and pulled off to the side of the road to find out where the bakery was. The student told them there wasn't a doughnut but they had doughnuts and that they have to settle for a Dunkin' Donut or Mister Donut instead.
WHEN THEY stopped at the next gas station, Ijask asked an attendant, "Why isn't the campus here on a mountain.
and where's this bakery that sells hot doughnuts?"
"Maybe we ought to stop at another gas station and see whether we're in the right place," Jill suggested.
colleges and to make them more specialized.
"Mount Oread," the attendant muttered. "Why . . . you must want the University of Kansas at Lawrence. This is the University of Kansas at Emporia."
"WELL, it sounds pretty darn confusing to me," Jane said. "Maybe we just ought to go to Kansas State instead." Jane slammed her car door shut and sped her car down the road.
The attendant then explained to the girls that the state legislature had passed a bill that changed the names of all the colleges in the state. The purpose of the bill, he told them, was to eliminate duplication of programs at the seven state
"Hey, wait a minute," the attendant shouted after them. "Did you want the Kansas State University at Fort Hays or the Kansas State University in Manhattan?"
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KANSAN
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