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Friday, January 27, 1989 / University Daily Kansan
Opinion
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Grant loss will badly hurt KU Latin American Studies
Earlier this semester, the co-directors of the Center for Latin American Studies announced that they would not renew their contracts after this term. Their decisions underscore the center's need for more money and faculty from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.
Literary Arts and Sciences.
Co-directors Charles Stansifer, professor of history, and Jon Vincent, professor of Spanish and Portuguese, chose not to renew their positions, strengthening the blow of a government decision not to renew the center's annual $125,000 grant. The soon-to-be-determined new director will take on the task of healing a once outstanding but allying program.
The Center for Latin American Studies, created more than 30 years ago, has offered KU students what many universities don't offer: well-rounded instruction in Latin American languages, culture, geography and politics. The center also has offered the oldest inter-university exchange program in the Western hemisphere. The exchange program with the University of Costa Rica has been successful since its establishment in 1958.
In 1986, KU's Center for Latin American Studies was one of 10 of its kind in the nation. And it has been rewarded for its excellence. The center has received more than $2 million in financial support since 1975.
Despite its record, the center has lost a U.S. Department of Education grant supplying from $100,000 to $125,000 each year since 1983. The center used the money for expenses such as travel, student fellowships and library acquisitions.
Why did they lose the grant? The department of education said that there were too many students and not enough teachers. In order to compete with other universities for the grants, the program needs more faculty.
grants. But even if KU had not lost federal funding, the student interest and current relations between the U.S. and Latin America would still mandate the hiring of more faculty and expansion of the program.
the program in Latin American studies are becoming increasingly popular, based on KU and nationwide. More students are competing for classes at KU, and more universities are competing for federal grants.
expansion of the program. Thanks should go to Stansifer and Vincent for their dedicated years to the program. Good luck to the new director.
Cindy Harger for the editorial board
KU ignores others' needs
A recent column in the Wichita Eagle-Beacon accused the University of Kansas of trying to sneak another institution into the Regents system by building a new Regents Center in Overland Park.
KU, the column said, is building its educational empire without regard for other Regents schools.
And maybe there is some truth in that accusation. KU seems to be ignoring the needs of other Regents institutions to benefit its satellite campus.
its satellite campus.
Certainly the need for the Regents Center cannot be discredited. The old facility, a former elementary school, is inadequate to meet the needs of the Kansas City community.
Enrollment in the next few years could reach 15,000 at the new Center. The need is present.
The building costs are not a concern. The land has been donated and plans have been made to reimburse the state for building costs through special student fees for those attending the Center.
The Center's real expense to the state, though, is not in the building, but rather in maintaining and staffing a campus.
building, but rather in handmade. The Board of Regents recently approved the new Regents Center. The Regents, in recent decisions, have been somewhat inconsistent in doing out money.
The Regents are concerned that if Topeka's Washburn University is admitted into the Regents system, money might be taken away from present Regents institutions. Yet a 15,000-student KU Regents Center gains the Regents full approval. This satellite campus could rival other Regents institutions in size and in demand for financing.
There's no doubt that the Kansas City area needs the new Regents Center. The question is whether it is fair to other Regents institutions if those needs are met.
Jill Jess for the editorial board
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"Shower Stall AUSCHWITZ 1941.
Pharmaceutical Plant LIBYA 1989.
Law allowed deaths of 5 children
Maybe Americans are getting soft. But we seem to have forgotten that liberty and freedom don't come easily. Noble sacrifices must be made. And that can mean Americans giving their lives for those cherished causes.
cherished causes.
Last week we saw a clear example of those who give their lives for the liberty and freedom of others.
I'm referring to the five little kids in California who were gunned down by a man who sprayed a school with a military assault weapon.
school with a human interest. Surprisingly, most Americans didn't realize that what they were seeing was patriotic self-sacrifice.
People saw it simply as the case of a deranged young man with criminal tendencies, who went on an insane rampage, pointlessly killing and wounding innocent children.
And if we isolate the sad event, that might be all it was. But we must look at it with a broader, more patriotic view.
Editorialists and other commentators demanded to know why a crazy man with a criminal record could walk into an Oregon gun store, plunk down cash and walk out with an AK-47.
the patriotic view. Within hours, the predictable, silly, knee-jerk reactions were being heard and read across the nation.
47. They wanted to know why laws didn't require a waiting period so his past could be checked out and the gun denied him.
gun of choice.
Are weapons sold in the first place, especially because they can be converted easily to full-autoatic.
mature
That just shows how little theseattering nabobs of negativism know about liberty, freedom or even the history their own nation.
Mike Royko
Syndicated columnist
As the wise men of the National Rifle Association could tell them, if you take away the opportunity for a crazy man to buy a military assault rifle, the next person to lose that right will be the rational man.
Let us say this rational man is taking a solitary stroll along the seashore. Suddenly he sees Red submarines surface and unload an invading force of Cuban and Russian soldiers.
of Ubushan in the hailies? No. Thanks to our present sensible gun laws, he happens to have his trusty AK-47 in his beach bag, and he bravely holds off the horde until help arrives.
But take away his right to have an AK-47 in his beach bag, and what's he going to do, throw sand in their eyes?
The NRA also will tell you about the dreaded domino effect of disarmament. If you can't buy an AK-47, then the reformers won't let you buy a common hunting rifle. (Of course, hunting rifles were sold long before the AK-47 was invented, and still are, but let us not quibble with impeccable logic.)
After the rifle is banned, then they'll get the shotgun and the pistol and the slingshot. After that, it will be the hunting knife, the pocket knife and the hatpin. Then they'll go after our kitchen knives, and finally our butter knives, spoons and forks.
We will be helpless, unable to defend ourselves and forced to eat with our fingers. You ever try
to wrap pasta around your pinkie? It frazzles the nerves.
No, instead of condemning the legalized sale of the AK-47 and other military assault weapons, we should be giving credit where it is due.
We should praise those members of Congress who vote for the laws that make the sales possible. We should salute the NRA for their generosity in contributing to the campaign funds of those congressmen. We should salute the local politicians who are brave enough to stand up to the shrill criticism of the parents of children who are killed by gun-toting loonies.
are killed by giant wolves.
And let us think of those dead and maimed children in California as fallen heroes. Maybe the NRA could give them teeny Purple Hearts.
The children die for your right and my right to own an AK47, the NRA's rights, and the right of congressmen and other lawmakers to pick up fat contributions. They died for the right of gunmakers, gun importers, gun dealers and the ammo manufacturers.
ammo manuafabricated.
And for the right of the deranged to take up automatic weapons and defend themselves against the demons lurking only in their brains.
against the defensives backing on it.
Finally, we should look back to history and remember what Jefferson said about the right of everyone to bear arms.
evyderfdefen jefferson put it: "Hey, even a lunatic
A jefferson have a gun. You think a hungry grizzly
bear knows if it's eating a lunatic or a pork
shank? "
shank?
Incidentally, that wasn't Thomas Jefferson. It was Orvile Q. Jefferson, who sold guns and whiskey to the Indians.
If Orvile were around today, he'd still find a way to make a good buck. And it would be legal
■ Mike Royko is a syndicated columnist who writes for the Chicago Tribune.
Reagan success gives Bush a dull start
New president must maintain "normalcy" that characterized the past eight years
P perhaps the most accurate description of the excitement and drama stirred around the nation by the presidential inauguration would be 'under what mind'?
The campaign over, George Bush no longer has to knee the opposition and can return to doing what he's best at: being inoffensive. It's doubtless during a gala occasion in the nation's capital that Bush identified with James Madison, who on the morning of his 1899 inauguration, said, "I'd much rather be in bed sleeping."
None of this is meant to slam political boredom, which is often the best sign of a well-runation. The most boring administration in recent times. Dwight Eisenhower's, also may have been the most successful. Only now are historians beginning to catch up to the voters of the 1950s and give like his due. An era of good feelings would be most welcome just now, and George Bush seems just the ample type to preside over kinder, gentler periods of U.S. history.
Unfortunately, it may require a leader of some vision and imagination to assure a nice, uninteresting era. The relative absence of the nation's usual dissension and anxiety now may be less a tribute to Bush than to his predecessor and patron. Ronald Reagan did not lack for dramatic
Paul Greenberg Syndicated columnist
In another nation, the past eight years would be hailed as an economic miracle
issues, yet he leaves the White House with the nation basking in normalcy.
nation basking in the glory. One can pay no greater compliment to the departed president than to compare Bush's physical manifestation with the dramatic circumstances surrounding his own eight years ago. The U.S. hostages in Teheran — whose treatment had frustrated and humiliated the United States — were finally on their way home that day, but the Cold War still raged, the national economy was a basket case and it wasn't clear whether Reagan would help or hurt matters.
In another nation, the past eight years would
be hailed as an economic miracle. But Americans are so accustomed to the miraculous that the recovery may be considered our due, and the policies that prompted it were overlooked or even bad-mouthed by the usual prophets of doom.
But the Gipper must have done something right: December was the 73rd straight month of economic expansion; the unemployment rate is holding at 5.3 percent, roughly a third of its raging height in the last two years of the Carter administration; and at last report, consumer confidence was close to an 18-year high. The federal deficit remains a cloud on the horizon, but it is beginning to dissipate, at least the extent that some gurus are worried about the availability of federal bonds in the 1990s.
availability of federal buildup. Arms control, in terms of nuclear and conventional weapons, has become a realistic possibility rather than a hollow one, largely because of an administration that took peace through strength seriously. The Cold War seems to be drawing to a quiet end — and though it wouldn't be prudent to boast about it — we won.
- Paul Greenberg is a syndicated columnist who writes for the Pine Bilt, Ark., Gazette.
BLOOM COUNTY
by Berke Breathed