page 4
daily nebraskan
tuesday, november 1 1, 1980
mm
Caistitutional abortion ban is improper
A constitutional amendment to
ban abortion?
The Moral Majority wants one, the
Republican Party wants one, Sen.
Strom Thurmond, the new Senate
Judiciary Committee chairman,
wants one, Ronald Reagan has prom
ised to push for one and the National
Conference of Roman Catholic
Bishops now says it wants one as
early as possible.
The Daily Nebraskan's position on
abortion this semester has been de
cidedly pro-choice. However, we do
not wish to oppose the constitution
al amendment plan on the basis of
our abortion views.
Rather, we think the idea lacks
merit because of our views of what
the constitution was designed to be:
A framework for government, estab
lishing and limiting the powers of the
government created therein.
The right-to-life position is based
on a very simple, straight-forward
argument. A fetus is a human life,
therefore it is murder to abort a
fetus.
If it is appropriate to place a ban
an abortion in the United States
Constitution, why then is there no
constitutional ban on murder? Or
rape? Or robbery?
It seems fairly clear the nation's
founders did not intend to codify a
judicial code with which to clutter
up the document intended to set a
Eat, drink and be stuffed;
midnight hunger conquered
BOSTON--In my long career as a lunch
eater, I have been flanked by thin coconut
cream pie eaters and fat carrot-stick
munchers. I have heard underweight people
tell me they can eat anything they want
to and overweight people swear that they
hardly eat a thing.
I confess here that I have not always be
lieved them.
..mm!
MU!
The way I figured it, the thin people
probably skipped things. . .like supper.
They probably stopped eating when they
were full. Kinky stuff like that.
As for the chubbies, I assumed that they
kept Hershey Bars in their sock drawer and
didn't count anything they ate between
meals. . .even the meals.
But now scientists have proved that
Mother Nature has played yet another
nasty little trick on us. Some people can
eat whipped cream and look like whippets.
Others can eat modestly and look mount
ainous. Lurking in the blood cells of each inno
cent newborn is the real villain of the
weight-watching world, something known
as ATPase. According to the latest study
coming out of a group of Harvard-affiliated
hospitals in Boston, there is this biochem
ical base to weight.
This is, of course, the ultimate proof
that life isn't fair. If you have a lot of
ATPase, you are going to burn more calories-so
you can eat more. If you have a
little, you will use up fewer calories and
add on more fat.
The good news here is that maybe
people will stop judging self-worth by the
pound. Some of us apparently have no
more control over our weight than our
height.
The bad news is that you can't go out
and buy a pack of ATPase. Yet.
There is room for fantasy. After all, the
the real growth industry of the decade has
been loss-weight loss. Anybody who can
get a patent on this stuff could make a
fortune.
If I were a king or president of Harvard
University, I'd drop all those plans to go
into the business of DNA development
and start talking ATP.
The sales possibilities here are endless.
Every Monday, millions of Americans are
eager to burn up the weekend bloat-over.
Every day millions more are starting the
eternal 10-pound crash diet. The ATPase
tablet could replace everything from the
Scarsdale to saccharin.
Few of us, I know, actually suffer from
a loss of ATPase. I myself have a different
sort of biochemical problem. I was born
with a defect in my genetic makeup that
forces me, entirely against my will, to keep
moving my hand toward my mouth. My
hand is rarely empty.
Also, from time to time, a metabolic
switch in my brain is turned on which can
only be satisfied with a bag of chocolate-
framework for government and
government powers.
This society is full of real and
imagined evils, but the constitution
is not designed to solve them. It is
intended to set up the machinery
that solves them, and to refine that
machinery when it is necessary.
It is for that reason that the con
stitution does not list the 10 (or
100) commandments of right living
in the United States. State legisla
tures are there for that purpose.
Certainly, murder, robbery and
rape should be illegal in every corner
of America. To ensure that, should
we pass a constitutional amendment
banning those violent crimes? Or
should we just leave it to the states?
Those who oppose abortion, if
they want a federal policy outlawing
the act, could approach Congress re
questing a law making it illegal to
cross state lines to obtain an abor
tion. But they should not clutter the
framework of our government with
their morals. They should not weigh
down the consitution with some
thing that doesn't belong there.
If our argument is in error, then
we call for constitutional amend
ments to ban murder, rape, robbery,
burglary, bribery, blackmail, heroin
sales, double parking and whatever
else tickles your fancy as being a
wrongful crime against society.
THIS WK&
EXEMPLARY
BftOKBliRNERS...
2
p
covered wintergreens. A friend of mine
has a similar problem, a deep chemical
response to the sight of a full plate. He is
compelled to empty it.
But the discovery of this wonder in
gredient gives hope to the hopeless.
The drug companies, which have
brought us all kinds of goodies, are surely
inventive enough to develop a blue pill that
would burn off cheesecake, and a red one
to gobble up a banana split. Someone will
produce a main-line injection right smack
into the old blood cells to work off a regu
lar six-course pig-out.
I could envision television ads with car
toon ATPase creatures gobbling up human
flips. Billboards across America will boast.
"Eat, Drink And Be Thin." The Anti-Exercise
Institute will instruct: Let Enzymes
Do The Jogging.
At last there is promise from the won
derful world of science. Today, eat your
heart out. Tomorrow, eat to your heart's
desire.
(c) 1980, The Boston Globe Newspaper
CompanyWashington Post Writers Group
to the editor
Following the insurrection of the oppressed masses of
Iran, and the downfall of the hated regime of the Shah,
the reactionary regime of Iraq found that there existed an
(aj$j7 nebrastian
UPSP 144-080
Editor in chief: Randy Essex; Managing editor: Bob Lannin;
News editor: Barb Richardson; Associate news editor: Kathy
Chenault; Assistant news editors: Tom Prentiss and Shelley
Smith; Night news editors: Sue Brown, Nancy Ellis, Bill Graf;
Assistant night news editor: Ifejika Okonkwo; Entertainment edi
tor: Casey McCabe; Sports editor: Shelley Smith; Assistant sports
editor: Larry Sparks; Photography chief: Mark Billingsley; Art
director: David Luebke; Magazine editor: Diane Andersen.
Copy editors: Sue Brown, Nancy Ellis, Maureen Hutfless,
Lori McGinnis, Tom McNeil, Jeanne Mohatt, Lisa Paulson, Kathy
Sjulin, Kent Warneke, Patricia Waters.
Business manager: Anne Shank; Production manager: Kitty
Policky; Advertising manager: Art Small; Assistant advertising
manager: Jeff Pike.
Publications Board chairman: Mark Bowen, 475-1081 , Profes
sional adviser: Don Walton, 473-7301.
The Daily Nebraskan is published by the UNL Publications
Board Monday through Friday during the foil and spring semes
ters, except during vacations.
Address: Daily Nebraskan, 34 Nebraska Union, 14th and R
streets, Lincoln. Neb., 68588. Telephone: 472-2588.
Material may be reprinted without permission if attributed
to the Daily Nebraskan, except material covered by a copyright.
Second class postage paid at Lincoln, Neb., 68510.
appropriate situation for its expansion into the Persian
Gulf. Since then, it has been preparing itself for military
actions against Iran.
The downfall of theShah's regime, which was the im
perialists' gendarme in the region, has created a situation
which has encouraged the reactionary Ba'athist regime of
Iraq to consider undertaking expansions and becoming the
mam power in the region of the Persian Gulf and the sea
of Oman. The Ba'athist regime has claimed that some
Iranian islands in the Persian Gulf are in fact Iraqi territor
itories, and has waged a war of propaganda against the
Islamic Republic of Iran.
The foreign policy objectives of Iraq are to extend its
land and sea borders by occupying the above-mentioned
islands in the Persian Gulf, and to become the unrivaled
military power to which the small countries of the region
will accede.
The domestic policies of Iraq have revealed its reaction
ary and counter-revolutionary nature. It has harrassed and
massacred revolutionaries, released unbridled suppression
on the workers and toiling masses of Iraq and has shed the
blood of the Kurdish people of Iraq, who are waging a just
struggle.
The goal of these domestic policies has been to sup
press the popular movement in Iraq. Iraq's military inter
vention into Iran is in fact a continuation of a policy
which does not benefit Iraq but in practice is in the ser
vice of world imperialism.
It is the duty of progressive Iraqi people to condemn
the military intervention of Iran and the anti-popular
policies of the Ba'athist government of Iraq.
Approximately 19 months have now passed since the
bloody and heroic victory of the people and the downfall
of the Shah's regime. Our poor and toiling masses arc still
living in the worst conditions. The economic crisis, pover
ty, lack of housing, unemployment and high prices and
are all threatening to destroy the lines and existence of
the toiling masses.
The ruling system, in spite of its continuing statements
of promises, has not been able to improve the living condi
tions of the working class, the peasants and the toiling
masses of our country. The Islamic Republic's policy to
ward the oppressed nationalities of Iran (i.e., Kurdish.
Turkamans . . .) has been a policy of confrontation and
suppression rather than accommodation of their basic
lemands.
Continued on Page 5