4 Friday, November 12, 1993 OPINION UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN VIEWPOINT Harassment decision by court long overdue The Supreme Court recently ruled that psychological damage is not required to prove on-the-job sexual harassment. The Justices created more precise guidelines for such cases. This decision is long overdue and will be beneficial to many women who have been victims of sexual harassment. The Supreme Court should be applauded for reaching this decision both quickly and unanimously. Sexual harassment is, by its nature, psychologically damaging, but this can be difficult to prove, clinically speaking. The victim may not be visibly depressed; however, she may be affected by the experience. She should be allowed to take her case to court without being required to prove this one facet. On-the-job sexual harassment is a serious and far too common occurrence. This decision will enable more women to take the perpetrators of this crime to court and win their cases. The guidelines will make sexual harassers aware of the price they will pay. In the past, the ambiguous nature of the laws was the excuse Hopefully this will change in the future. MICHELLE SMITH FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD Slattery, Meyers voting against public opinion Despite popular support and solid reasons to support the North American Free Trade agreement, two U.S. representatives from Kansas are not planning to vote for its passage. Second district Rep. Jim Slattery has stated he would vote against NAFTA, despite his early support of the idea of a free trade agreement. He says he is dissatisfied with the agreement as it is written and will vote against it in hopes that the pact will be renegotiated. Slattery's decision to wait until after Mexican elections next year is flawed because the NAFTA debate should be resolved soon. While the magnitude of NAFTA's benefits can be debated, even Slattery admits that it will help Kansas farmers by opening new export markets. U. S. Rep. Jan Meyers from Lawrence has stated that she is leaning toward voting against the treaty. Concerned students and Lawrence residents should contact Slattery and Meyers to express their support for the agreement before the vote on the agreement next week. Slattery's phone number is (202) 225-6601 and Meyers' number is (202) 225-2865. A strong message from their constituents could sway their votes and help the economic future of Kansas and the nation. CHRIS REEDY FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD NATIONAL PERSPECTIVE Clinton must work to control population A new U.S. Department of State bureau says massive population growth and accompanying environmental degradation have replaced the Cold War as the United States' biggest global challenge. It is encouraging to see the Clinton administration recognizing the seriousness of a problem that underlies much of the world's social and political unrest. That is a welcome change from former Presidents Reagan and Bush, who de-emphasized birth-control efforts and cut off U.S. aid to the United Nations Population Fund and other population-control programs. Shortly after taking office, Clinton restored population-control funding. Department of State's new Bureau of Global Issues, says an even more aggressive effort is needed to make voluntary family planning universally available by the year 2000. But Tim Wirth, counselor for the The gravity of the problem is illustrated by the fact that the world's population of 5.5 billion people could double in 40 years. Each year, the world adds 100 million more mouths to feed. and 92 million of them are in Third World countries. The U.N. World Food Council reports that 41 developing countries are unable to provide enough food for their populations. The United States should do what it takes, ideally working with the United Nations and other international bodies, to ensure that people everywhere have access to family planning information and birth control devices. The Sheboygan Press Sheboygan, Wis. THE GREAT NAFTA DEBATE PIE CHART This week's column full of drivel deals with the second portion of the bus-riding experience, The Ride, and the rules that should govern it. For those of you who were not the faithful readers you should have been and missed the first portion, Embarking Do's and Don'ts From An Expert, a few reprints are still available, although most have been snapped up by teachers eager to make this world a better place by brainwashing, er, teaching our youth how to ride the bus properly. You may request a reprint by sending $10 or more in small, unmarked bills and a self-addressed, stamped envelope to me, care of this paper. I will consider your request and probably not give you one but will keep your money. Bus survival part two: How to ride properly One of the most important things to know when riding the bus is who exactly is deaf, and who is not. It may seem like a complicated and confusing issue, which I guess is why no one seems to have bothered trying to master it. But it is really quite simple. Only the deaf people on the bus are deaf. Since it is generally not possible to tell who these people are simply by looking at them, one should assume, just to be on the safe side, that no one on the bus is deaf. This means that one should not yell to one's friends while riding the bus and then be surprised when nearly being burned to little crispy bits by the looks from the rest of the passengers that say, "What are you, sohe kind of moron?" This also means that one should not sing out loud to the tune on one's Walkman and expect to be treated as a normal passenger, or even as a human, by the rest of the world. Last and most important, this means that one should not talk about any blind passengers as if they cannot hear. Blind people are not necessarily deaf. I see this at least once a day. It goes something like this: Dumb Person 1: "I admire her so much! How does she do it? I wouldn't even have come to school. I would just be so scared." Dumb Person 2: "And look at her dog! Don't he just the cuteest with his little harness on, just lying there on the floor? I wonder what his name is." Blind (but not deaf) Person: "Her name's Jodine." The second Riding Rule pertains to a very important activity while riding the bus: sitting. As absurd as it may seem, many people do not know how to sit properly. In order not to become one of these, please follow a few simple guidelines. Do not put your bag on the seat next to you, especially when the bus is near capacity, and every seat will be needed. There is nothing more childish on the bus than doing your best to make sure that no one sits next to you, which I assume is the purpose of this type of activity. Each person is allotted one half of one seat, as dictated by the butt-shaped indentations in them, and each person should take no more than one half of one seat. Nothing should be filling the other half of your seat. Not even you or parts of you. In order to make your standing ride more enjoyable for everyone, simply remember two things. First, move to the back. Second, the bus is going to move. Again, this is a seemingly elementary notion, but one which is constantly forgotten. The bus moves away from a stop and at least half the standees are caught off-guard, their faces displaying this sentiment: "Holy diesel fumes, Batman, this thing's moving! EARTHQUAKE! Man, what have I gotten myself into? Did I accidentally get on the space shuttle? I thought this was just a little building you could come stand in to get out of the cold for a minute." The last of this series of rules deals with the second-most important activity while riding the bus: standing. This is an important activity because one often must ride while standing, either because there are more people on the bus than there are seats, or because there are a selfish few using all the seat space with their bags and feet. Ryan McGee Is a Worland, Wyo. soophomore. LETTER TO THE EDITOR Regents should hear Tonkovich's appeal The writer's opinion is based on the fact that "five impartial faculty members" have "spent nine months (at lower hearing) listening to 49 witnesses and observing 96 pieces of evidence on the 20 allegations." The editorial in the Oct. 27 *Kansan* that the Board of Regents should not hear Emil Tonkovich's appeal is rabble-rouser. Their "hearing, all 8,176 pages of it" must be "a fair evaluation" of Tonkovic his guilt. Suit are the tactics used to appeal to popular imagination. 1) The campus mood surrounding this case is such that the cost to put Tonkovich back in the classroom is too high, even if justice calls for it. Disturbing elements beset this case: 2) Prosecutors build cases hoping for the synergy or combined effect of multiple allegations. This is a kind of appeal to the masses or jury emotions. To counter, a serious judicial principle holds, "a series of misdemeanors, however long the list, do not add up to a felony." The question: Is any of the 20 allegations, taken singly, enough to revoke tenure? Only the Regents, removed from the campus mood, can decide. Finally, the editorial says, "Tonkovich (will) draw out this case as only a lawyer can do." That is an aspersion on the lawyers' profession. This is not necessary. Lawrence graduate student Katie Greenwald Washington report Police power squandered on infamous cookie crooks Unless you have been hibernating for the last decade, you know that crime is a big problem in Washington. But the worst offenders the police seem to be able to catch are the cookie criminals. Yes, cookie criminals. While the mayor of Washington, Sharon Pratt Kelly, has requested that the National Guard be called in to search for real criminals, the undercover Metro Transit Police busted a couple of my friends for eating cookies on the bus. Granted, it is posted on buses and the metro that passengers may not eat or drink while riding. Claudia and Allison knew this, and they risked "fines or jail" for the pleasure of Pepperidge Farm cookies. But shouldn't some of the cops relegated to cookie patrol and Metro Transit duty be assigned to another division, at least temporarily, and hunt down real criminals? Claudia was livid about the $10 tickets she and Alison received, and everyone else got a good laugh out of it. But is it really that funny? police officer and the shadown. According to *The Washington Post*, Kelly plans to assign Guard members to "accompany police officers on patrol in crime-plagued neighborhoods." Situations that require the Guard must be serious. I wonder why the police cannot handle the situation. :: President Clinton said he could not grant Kelly's request to "act on her own to call out the Guard" because "his authority as commander-in-chief of the D.C. National Guard cannot be delegated to the mayor or anyone else outside the executive branch." Clinton has indicated that he will support a change in legislation that would make the Washington mayor commander-in-chief of the city's Guard. Currently, about two dozen Guard members provide technical and administrative aid to the police. It seems, though, that Washington did not exhaust all other possibilities before it called the Guard. Claudia's and Alison's ordeal did not end with the issuance of tickets. The police would not accept Claudia's out-of-state check, and they told her that Alison must be present when the ticket was paid. So, I drove them to the police station at 11 p.m. We figured that there would be no line. We were right. But still, we waited for more than half an hour. The cops had to make sure that Claudia and Alison had no priors. And it took three cops to do this. Through all of this, my car was in a 30-minute parking zone, and we were at the station for more than half an hour. We took turns going outside to see if I had been ticketed. For some reason, with all the cops hanging out at the station, I did not get one. But I want to know what all those cops were doing at the station. I could tell that at least a few of them were wearing bulletproof vests, so I thought that they still might be on duty. But what do I know? Apparently, citizens have asked the mayor to call out the Guard. I cannot blame them. I worry about walking after dark in safe parts of Washington, I still think the Guard would be unnecessary if the police were doing their jobs. Or, in the case of the cookie patrol and the administration, if they were not doing their jobs and doing something of consequence, the Guard would not be needed. Katie Greenwald is a Denver graduate student in Journalism. KC TRAUER Editor JOE HARDER, CHRISTINE LAUE Managing editors TOM EBLEN General manager, news adviser BILL SKEET BILL SKEET Technology coordinator KANSAN STAFF Assistant to the editor ... J.R. Claimborn News ... Stacy Fiedman Editorial ... Terilyn McCormick Campus ... Ben Grove Sports ... Kristi Foger Photo ... Kip Chin, Renel Number Features ... Erra Wolfe Graphics ... John Paul Fogel Wire ... Alexander Bloemhof, Vicki Bode, Kevin Butler Assistant Editors associate editorial Colleen McCain Associate campus Dan England Assistant campus/planning Jesse Beutner Associate teachers Kody Sherles Associate features Almee Estrada Copy Chiefs Alexander Bloomhof Allison Lippert Tracy Ritchie News Clerk Teresa Veazey Scott Anderson ... Sara Bennett Mark Button ... Traci Carl Chesley Dohl ... Matt Doyle Anna Felstet ... Gerry Fey Christoph Fuhmans ... Donella Heane Konti Nohlfeld ... Justin Baker Lie Klinger ... Shan Schwartz David Stewart ... Kathleen Stolle Carlos Tejada ... JL Watson Elizabeth Beary .Cmigl Boxx Kevin Butler .Carver Lisa Counitto.Joes Delavan Dan Ericksen.Jack Fisher Matt Hydeman .Stephen Martino Stacy Morford .Sarah Nagi Munera Naeer.Benra Schutz Goliath Photographers William Alix Valerie Bontner Julia Clarke Richard Devillh John Gamble Doug Hesse Paul Kotz Melissa Levey Tom Leininger Holly McQueen Susan McSeadden Graphics Artists Dave Campbell James Frederick Micah Leaker Dan Schauer Josephine John Paul Fogel Stacy Friedman Will Lewis Business manager AMY STUMBO Retail sales manager JEANNE HINES Sales and marketing adviser PAT BOYLE Business coordinator BILL THOMAS Production Business Staff Campus sales manager...Ed Schager Regional sales manager...Jennifer Perrier National sales manager...Jennifer Evanson Co-op sales manager...Blythe Focht Production managers...Jennifer Blowey ...Kate Burgess Marketing director...Shelly McConnell Creative director...Brian Pusco Classified manager...Gretchen Knorrhlentt Management manager...Judith Stanley Tear sheets manager...Jaquelyn Pang Retail assistant...Tricla Bumpus Creative assistant (photographer)...Andrew Amone Zone Managers Zone Managers John Carlton ...Jason Eberly Justin Garberg ...Josh Hahn ...Robin Kring Retail Account Executives Mindy Blum ...Chris Bulgren Chris Butler ...Kelly Caffrey Jennifer Carr ...Jenni Goerke Laura Guth ...Allison Kaplan Jason Kort ...Mark Mastro Chris Morrissey ...Frank Muller Paula Ostrowski ..Heather Richetto Jenny Schweb ..Andrew Shriver Dave Smith ..Stacey Stricklin Campus Account Executives Kerl Kimmal ...Beth Pols Shannon Reilly ..Troy Tarwater ...Jeanne Toohey Regional Account Executive Arville Crawford ...Alex Kolb Brian Platt ... Account Assistants Shelley Folevits ..Bradley Feinberg Dean Hovind ..Marcel Slotnick ...Matt Spett ?