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Thursday, December 1, 1988 / University Daily Kansan
Opinion
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Trying to find answers in a tragedy's aftermath
The explosion that killed six firefighters Tuesday has deeply shocked and saddened the Kansas City community. The effects, though, will be felt in Lawrence and across the country.
Everyone can share in the grief of the firefighters' families and colleagues.
The death of anyone who was performing a public service is especially hard to accept. And the news that police suspect the fire that sparked the explosion was set makes the deaths even harder to understand, and grief is replaced easily with anger.
The anger, though, should not overshadow firefighters died heroically. They were doing their duty, risking their lives for the safety of others. They knew and accepted the risk, and we are all thankful for their courage and dedication. The six who died and their colleagues should be honored for their bravery.
The community also owes it to the dead that questions about the explosion are answered satisfactorily. And there are many questions.
- Why was security at the site apparently lax enough to allow arsonists near the explosives?
- Why wasn't the trailer that held the ammonium nitrate clearly marked to warn the firefighters?
- Why didn't the firefighters heed the dispatcher's warnings that explosives were on the site?
- Why hadn't the Occupational Safety and Health Administration ever investigated a construction site operated by the companies involved in the explosion, and why did the city not inspect the site, either?
**What will be done to prevent such an accident from occurring again?**
The answers may take a while or they might never be found But because a similar disaster could strike even closer to home, and because the dead firefighters deserve it, a strong effort must be made to answer them.
The editorial board
U.S. wrong to deny visa
The United States has once again made a mockery of international law and has flouted world opinion, this time by not granting Yasser Arafat a visa.
Arafat needs the visa to enter the country and speak at the United Nations in New York City. By denying the visa, the United States is denying his right to be heard. The United Nations is an international diplomatic body that the United States has no control over. The United States was given the honor of being its host after World War II with the understanding that it would be completely independent from the host nation, as an embassy is.
The U.N. legal counsel said the U.S. decision violated the 1947 U.S.-U.N. Headquarters Agreement that requires the host country to grant visas to people invited by the United Nations. There is no reservation in the agreement that allows the host country to bar entry to those who are seen as a threat to its sovereignty and security, he said.
The U.S. government cited the Palestine Liberation Organization's ties to terrorism as the reason for denying Arafat entrance to the country. It's true the PLO has been involved with terrorism, but Arafat recently appeared to make a move toward moderation by recognizing Israel's right to exist. It was this and the Palestinian declaration of independence that Arafat planned to explain to world representatives at the United Nations.
The United States is being inconsistent in its crusade against terrorism by denying Arafat a visa. What about Iran? Our avowed enemy, which has been implicated in much of the terrorism against U.S. citizens and may have control over the destiny of the hostages in Lebanon, is allowed to send ambassadors to the United Nations without any unproof Filename
bossassors to the United Nations without any diplomacy. Both allies and enemies are denouncing the visa denial and have asked the United States to reconsider, but State Department spokesmen say the decision is "firm and final." The U.N. session probably will be moved to Geneva to allow Arafat the right to speak.
The United States is acting like a spoiled child who thinks the rules apply to everyone but him. As in the past, when the United States stopped payment to the United Nations and ignored World Court rulings, the U.S. will lose a little more world respect.
Julie McMahon for the editorial board
News staff
Todd Cohen ... Editor
Michael Horak ... Managing editor
Julie Adam ... Associate editor
Stephen Wade ... News editor
Michael Merschel ... Editorial editor
Noel Gerdes ... Campus editor
Craig Anderson ... Sports editor
Scott Carpenter ... Photo editor
Dave Eames ... Graphics editor
Jill Jess ... Arts/Features editor
Tom Eblen ... General manager, news adviser
Business staff
Greg Knipn ... Business manager
Debra Cole ... Retail sales manager
Chris Cooper ... Campus sales manager
Linda Prokop ... National sales manager
Kurt Messerith ... Promotions manager
Sarah Higdon ... Marketing manager
Brad Lenhart ... Production manager
Michelle Garland ... Asst. production manager
Michael Lehm ... Classified manager
Nathan Hines ... Sales and marketing adviser
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Not all Bambi killers carry a gun Critics of game hunters ought to think about their own menu
Critics of game hunters ought to think about their own menus
Big game season has opened across the country. All the signs are there. Just the other morning I saw some. Good signs. Earlier there had been some readable traces, such as protests in front of big-name New York department stores. But that day, while I sat in the cab of my pickup truck during an early morning recommissioning, I caught a knock on the door that I read by the light of the truck's radio greeted with the headline "Deer hunt planned by Navy protested."
The starry sky turned pink under the coffee-
steamed windshields and I smiled. The hunting
dogs were on my shoulder.
One of the all-time great sports is to sit in ambush of the large-spherized HARA (Hypnotical Animal Rights Activist). I've found great success stalking them in local fast food restaurants, grocery stores and student unions. I just wear a blaze-orange National Rifle Association baseball cap and talk loudly about "dropping deer."
To bag the game this season, people will use a 30.69 caliber 180 grain hollow-point bullet or a 2117 camber" graphic-shaft arrow with a Wasp Razor lock-breadhead broadneck on a 65-pound pull. However, I'll be packing a proverbial run-on sentence and offering a plate of chicken nuggets.
Staff columnist
Tom
Wilhelm
As with all game, the secret to getting a good shot at a HARA is to wait for a clear profile. Fortunately, that requires less waiting than for, say, something with four lees and commons.
Usually, a HARA quickly will degenerate any mention of hunting into the classic admonishment. "It's not exactly fair for you to attack poor, dumb, woodland creatures in their homes. They don't hunt you. You're not part of the forest life cycle."
I take careful shots early on to avoid any senseless wounding of an ego. "That's right." I'll agree, while serving up some tasty morsels of fried chicken in animal fat. Then I let fly the fatal rounds.
day, for hours at a time while waiting for a trophy to come in to sight; after maintaining a steady hold with the rifle or bow and allowing the keenly sensed, alert animal to come into range; after getting a clean hit and spending the afternoon on the trail, after spending three hours in a hallway, after entering the carcass out of the woods and butchering the meat; I guess you could say 'I nailed Bambi.'
"However, that is after spending days and days choosing the right powder load and adjusting the pull weight on the bow limbs until I can get a three-bullet shot group 'inside a quarter' or a quiverful at the bull's eye; after sitting still in the crook of a tree, more often than on a cold, rainy
“But you, who hide your carnivorous nature across the safe side of a grocer’s meat counter or in brightly packaged styrofoam containers with cute McNames or under globs of ketchup, have made no right of passage at the delicate scales where we inevitably choose death over life for the sake of sustenance. Instead, you have let others tip that balance for you for so long that you no longer appreciate or understand those sacrifices that stock your refrigerator.”
That's how I handle the HARA. Meanwhile, people are protesting against wheelchaired archers who are murdering deer at the Sandpoint Naval station. Those hunters may have better luck with their game than I will. After all, I have not found a way to make roasted hypoherite palatable.
- Tom Wilhelm is a Lawrence graduate student in Soviet and East European Studies.
KANU quiz: Part II
Quiz time. How many of you out there used to be listeners to KANU? That is, how many of you remember when KANU used to have quality, live orchestral programming such as the New York Philharmonic, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, etc.? And how many of you now find yourselves listening to classical stations from the neighboring areas (example Kansas City) to hear live performances of great classical music?
I will not proceed to answer these questions. However, I believe that there must be other classical music enthusiasts who, like myself, no longer listen to KANU very much, because its programming of classical music, for the most part, consists of commercial recordings. Furthermore, many former listeners do not enjoy jazz and are not happy with the absence of classical music from KANU's nighttime schedule.
In December the Metropolitan Opera returns for its 49th broadcast season, and I will listen to KANU on some Saturdays up through April. It
In the past two months I listened to KANU for no more than 16 hours. In November I have not and I will not listen to KANU at all.
was for this reason alone that I contributed to KANU last year, and I made this clear at the time of my contribution. If I should decide to take a year earlier, I will similarly make my preferences known.
I am not against the airing of recordings, but they do not take the place of live performances. Classical music more than any other kind of music lives in performance. It has a long history — a tradition, to which recording came only recently.
Attendance at a good performance of a symphony is just as memorable and impressive as the last rock concert one attended, and many of us who listen to classical music get few chances to hear the great musicians of the world in person. Therefore, public radio could provide a service to us.
At present, KANU does not provide this service to the extent that other stations do. However, if it were to, I believe that it would have fewer problems with fund raising.
Alan R. Anbari
Topeka sophomore
Cartoon sad,but true
I am responding to a response to a Stephan Kline cartoon. The cartoon showed George Bush holding two coat hangers and dealt with Bush's stance on abortion. Laura Heim, Topea sophmore, responded to the cartoon (Nov 28) by
calling it tasteless and ironic — ironic because activists who are for such causes as Save the Whales and civil rights do not support unborn children's rights. The cartoon might have been tasteless to some, but Heim misses the point of the cartoon, I think.
One must agree that if Roe vs. Wade were overturned during the Bush administration, which is possible with three judges hinging on retirement, women who desperately need an abortion, are those who do, might be unable to do so because of state laws and other methods, which in the past, when abortion was illegal, included the use of coat hangers.
Until the scientific community is able to prove at what point in time the "fetus" or in Laura's words, the "child" is actually alive and therefore having rights guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution, the woman, who is definitely alive and who definitely has rights, is more worthy of constitutional protection. Of course, one can argue that the baby has no choice, but the real question is whether or not the baby is alive and thus able to choose. It is interesting to note that under a non-Roe vs. Wade society, neither the baby nor the mother has a choice, only the states do.
My final point, then, is that although the cartoon seems tasteless to some, it paints a true portrait of the society we would have without Roe vs. Wade, like Laura, do not find it funny, but instead of finding it ironic, I find it a frightening possible reality.
Pete Lundquist Overland Park sophomore
BLOOM COUNTY
by Berke Breathed