4 Mondav. March 18. 1991 / University Daily Kansan Opinion THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN Presidential race Bush's failure to deal with domestic problems could give Democrats a chance in '92 election The campaign trail to the U.S. presidential election in 1992 already has begun. President Bush is off and running. President Bush is off and running again, but someone should tell him to slow down. It looks as though the Democrats have opted to sit this one out. Perhaps no one in the Democratic Party has put it in such a crass way, but judging from the party's overall attitude about the '92 election, they might as well. Some polls taken after the war in Iraq ended showed that the president now has close to a 90 percent approval rating from U.S. citizens. Many Democrats are saying that there is no chance for their party to gain the presidency in '92. The polls are certainly discouraging for the Democratic Party, but by no means should it give up so easily. Bush may have succeeded in the Middle East and in the diplomatic area of his office. but he has not succeeded in domestic matters. Working people all over the nation are feeling the bite of an ongoing recession. Small towns across the nation are dying. Homelessness in the United States continues to increase daily. The ever-growing budget deficit has forced state governments and the federal government to make large cutbacks in the area of health care for the poor and elderly. The list of problems inside the United States goes on and on. One person cannot be expected to conquer all of them, but Bush hardly has declared war on any of these tragedies. The Democrats should choose a strong contender to run against Bush in '92. Not only would they have a good chance of winning by focusing on domestic issues, but they also would be contributing to an essential part of democracy — the freedom to have a choice. Carol Krekeler for the editorial board Reducing oil-dependency GM's plan to build electric cars is a good one General Motors Corp. announced early this month that it would produce an automobile that did not burn fuel and therefore would not emit noxious fumes into the atmosphere. GM is taking an important step toward producing the first commercially available electric car. Producing alternatives to gasoline-powered automobiles needs to become a high priority for the nation. The electric car, the Impact, is a two-seat sports car that runs on 32 10-volt batteries. Production of the Impact could begin as early as next year, which would mean that a 1993 model could appear in dealer showrooms a year from this fall. GM said the new model would comply with increasingly strict federal and state clean-air and fuel-efficiency standards. GM selected a plant in Lansing, Mich., as the production site. Although the car is experimental, it will be produced in a plant that can turn out 25,000 cars a year. This would be the company's most ambitious venture in electric vehicles After the oil shocks of the 1970s, many companies started programs to develop domestic alternatives to gasoline, but most companies did not follow through with plans because oil prices declined. What may keep alternative fuel projects alive this time is the new drive from the public to clean up the environment and decrease air pollution. The United States also will be reminded for the next couple of years of the uncertainty of some oil sources. Even though the United States has begun its military pullout from the Middle East, the Persian Gulf will continue to be blackened from burning oil wells. Before the electric car can help reduce U.S. dependence on oil and reduce tailpipe emissions, consumers must be willing to switch to the unfamiliar — a car that does not run on gasoline. If GM can produce an economical and attractive car that is fuel-efficient, now is the time to make the switch Amy Zamierowski for the editorial board Pacifistic view angers reservist Today is Feb 27, 1991, the time is 9:16 p.m., and it is my 45th day in Saudi Arabia as a soldier from the United States of America. I regretfully need to inform you that you are wrong. I do not believe in Today I received some copies of the University Daily Kansan. I had not read the Kansan since my reserve unit was activated on Nov. 21, 1900. I was so excited that I nearly ripped the paper in half. My excitement soon turned to anger as I read through the papers. The article that angered me as I read through it was Dave Wakefield's dissertation on the "New World Order." I am glad Wakefield gave credit to all the Americans who have died for our country to preserve the rights and freedoms we have all become accustomed to. But then Wakefield went on to explain his philosophy of how economic sanctions and embargoes would make nations interdependent economically and unite them. He then went on to reject President Bush's deployment of U.S. troops to intervene in this crisis. He stated that he believed that months or even years of embargo and sanctions would have happened even before than to use a show of force. His reasoning was that if you cut off their economic stability, you could stop them, meaning less killing. Kristy Rohr Guest columnist nuclear armament, violence or unnecessary displays of aggression. But you have not spent seven consecutive nights in chemical protective attire. You did not see SCUD missiles blow up 500 feet above your head. You did not live with the fear of a sniper in your compound. You are not here to see the emaciated enemy prisoners of war who have no shoes, who have not eaten for weeks, and who have not had proper medical attention for life-threatening ailments. You do not have to hear the sounds of helicopters bringing food to the hospital. You don't hear the reports of the children of Kuwait who were slaughtered before their parents' eyes. You do not have to live in of being 32 miles from the Iraqi border. Can you in all honesty say that economic sanctions and embargoes are going to stop a man who has nothing to lose and a lot of wealth to gain if he can take over Kuwait? Do you really believe that these restrictions would have stopped him from using mustard gas on his own people. or from killing innocent children? in the six months of anticipation before the declaration of war, we had embargoes and sanctions against Iraq. All that it seemed to do was increase the risk of spying and the spread of terrorism that Saddam Hussein carried out. It is with an uneasy conscience that I must deal with everyday weighing of my actions, but one thing I have no problem deciding is that I am an American. I am proud to serve in the Armed Forces of the United States. And I firmly believe that our presence here in the Persian Gulf is well worth it. If it saves one person's right and freedom, then it has made me a former FCU member. I do believe that waiting for economic instability to occur while genocide occurred was the answer in this situation. It is my hope that one day nations will not need to be greedy for wealth and power but instead that we may all live in true unity and stability, and may come together and not be governed by interdependent economics. Kristy Rohr is a Lawrence junior majoring in cellular biology. She is currently on active duty in Saudi Arabia. Bush talks tough, but war on crime needs action As Bush pointed out in a speech to some prosecutors and judges, some soldiers were safer in the Middle East than in North America, making the streets of their hometowns Now that we've shown that we can win a war with Iraq, President Bush has called upon America to win the war on crime. So Bush said we must show the same moral force, determination and fortitude as we did in freeing Kuwait to free our cities from crime. As a city dweller and an occasional crime victim (one armed robbery, one unarmed mugging, three burglary victims) I call for freeing our cities from crime. Bush talked about how we need a "real death penalty." I'm not sure what that means. We're executing someone who is really dead when we bury them, But it isn't clear to me how Bush and his administration plan are going about it. When two young men stuck a gun to my nose, I didn't even consider displaying any determination or moral force, and I doubt if they would have been impressed. More likely, they would have shot me in the nostril. So there are times when it is better to restrain your moral force, lose your wallet, but retain your nose. Mike Royko Syndicated columnist If not, they have legitimate grounds for an appeal. But we've discovered that while execution satisfies the statute, it does not do much to reduce the murder rate. He also implied that we coddle criminals too much, letting them appeal their sentences and use "technicalities" to avoid punishment. If that's the problem, then the solution seems simple enough: Abolish the appellate courts and the state and let the courts do the work. We might, we would do away with courts entirely and let the cops dish out punishment at the station house. But the knee-jerk liberals would mean about that, so we're stuck with our present system, which brings us to another problem — not enough prison space for all of our criminals. That's why they get out early. There's a solution to that, though. President Bush should tell Congress that he wants to raise everybody's health insurance coverage and can help local governments build more prisons. Or he can take a more direct approach to launching a war on crime — using methods that have proven highly effective. In every city, the cops know which general areas have the highest crime rates. They can even tell you which blocks are the most dangerous. In some cases, the police offices are used by the well-armed street gangs and the crack dealers. So why mess around with writs, warrants, judges, juries, appeals and the rest of the paper work? It's like diplacy. There comes a time when the talking stops and the stomping starts. We have the planes, we have the keenly intelligent bombs, the profoundly intellectual missiles and the pinpoint precision. So why not send them in to take out — a fine phrase, "take out — parts of the Bronx in Chicago and all the other high-crime sections of the big cities?" Some might call that harsh. But he us be realistic. Presidents and other politicians have been taking tough about crime for decades. They said we should hang the varmints high, lock them up and throw away the clues in their minds of innocence. Why some have even gone so far as to say that we should kick ass. But America must have the world's most stubborn criminals. They simply refuse to heed the hard words of their commander in chief. Why, some of them won't even listen to their own moms. Of course, there are those dreamy-types who have theories about crime and its causes. They talk about the unemployment and busted families. Fortunately, we've been blessed with Republican presidents who didn't buy any of those bleeding-heart theories: Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush. They know why a criminal is a threat. Beetle. Beetle. Beetle that's why. And there's no sense in throwing money atborn criminals, even if they haven't been born yet. So it's just the luck of the draw that more born criminals grow up on the West Side of Chicago and drop out of school when they're 16 than grow in New England and go to George Bush's old prep school. Anyway, our president says the answer is moral force, and he must be right. But if that doesn't work, move way out to the suburbs. Most of his friends did. Mike Royko is a syndicated columnist with the Chicago Tribune. LETTERS to the EDITOR City, KU police racist This is concerning the ongoing racism in both the Lawrence police department and the KU police department. After the comment made by former Lawrence police representative Chris Mulvenon in a recent edition of a Kansas Fraternal Order of Police magazine, there again is no doubt about the obivious problems in our city and University police departments. For the last 10 years and more, we have been hearing city commissioners and the chief of police say we have no racial problems in Lawrence. Three American Indians have been murdered in the past four years. Poor people in trailer courts have been denied access to water. Homes of African-American people have been badly damaged because of the color of their skin. Yet, according to city officials, Lawrence has no racial problems. On the political front, we have a city commissioner running for reelection, saying he opposes an ordinance that would allow at least one minority group a little protection from discrimination. We have a mayor saying that all statements made on racial matters must be cleared by the city manager before going to the media, which does nothing except hide the problem even more from public view. It does nothing to correct the attitudes of city officials, which is the source of the problem. Let's face it people, until we remove these city officials who believe in and continue to support racism and discrimination. We need to take the ground for future riots, and the whites will remain supreme. I think that Ron Olin and Chris Mulvenon from the Lawrence police department, as well as John Mullens from the KU police department, should be released from their positions immediately, before their racial attitudes destroy the entire community. Frederick M. Markham Lawrence resident KANSAN STAFF Editors CHRIS SIRON Editor RICH CORNELL Managing editor TOM EBLEN General manager, news adviser Business staff Editors Business staff News Melanie Matthes Campus sales mgr. 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