Daily Nebraskan
Thursday, April 5, 1C24
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America took a giant step backward Tuesday
when Walter Mondale cleaned up on Gary Hart in
the New York primary.
Hart seems hopelessly behind in the race for the
Democratic presidential nomination. A contest be
tween President Reagan and Mondale seems immi
nent. If you can call it a contest. Envision a Mondale
Reagan campaign.
Mondale would be destined to lose in November
because he plays straight party politics. He has rela
tively no appeal to independent or moderate Repub
lican voters. He reeks of the old school, Democratic
campaigners ... no innovation, tired issues, and a
death wish connection with big unions.
Mondale won't capture cross-over votes. He won't
appeal to broad interests that Gary Hart and Jesse
.Jackson could bring to the polls. Reagan will play to
America. Mondale will just play to tne Democrats.
Add to that the fact that the country seems to be
completely buffaloed by the Reagan propaganda
machine, and Americans seem trapped by another
four years of reactionary leadership.
What harm could another four years of Reagan
administrated policy do?
United States Supreme Court justices recently
commercialized Christmas and allowed Christianity
into everyone's public life by allowing creches on
public property. This is the last in a long line of
progressively conservative court decisions which
could undermine all the civil rights advances this
country has made in the past 25 years.
All of this with a court that is considered rela
tively moderate. However, the only liberal elements
in the court are not in good health and are due to be
replaced in the next four years.
Presidents appoint justices and history shows
that they appoint justices that they agree with polit
ically. Reagan appointed a conservative lackey in
: lBoI when he put Sandra O'Connor on the bench.
: Wexarronly-assriTne that he'll do the same if and
when presented with the opportunity.
Reactionary justices, then, will not feel obligated
to retain voters' rights, women's rights and the sepa
ration of church and state and thus throw the coun
try back to the 1940's.
At best they can only retain present decisions and
not make necessary advancements in human and
civil rights. Without these advancements, the coun
try could slip into social stratification which would
make the 1960s look tame.
On the domestic side, then, Ronald Reagan is too
dangerous to have a weakling like Walter Mondale
running against him. The Democratic party needs
someone who can attract independent and cross1
over voters.
Jeff Browne
I pi i . I ;
r, .J 41
Douglas ordeal discloses white collar crime
The Commonwealth bank failure and Nebraska
attorney general Paul Douglas's related impeach
ment trial have at least temporarily interrupted
business as usual in this state. And it's hard to think
of anything which would have more graphically
illustrated the sorry state of business (and politics)
C ,.: Eric
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as usual than the implication of Nebraska's top law
enforcer in sleazy deals with a bank which stole
depositors' money.
All this stench and public outcry come as the
greatest surprise to Douglas's friends. Jerry Fennell,
an Omaha attorney quoted in a Lincoln Journal
story by Kathleen Rutledge, is still hard put to
explain it all "I think he had a friend get him in
trouble. I'm sick about the whole thing I just
adore the guy." It appears that Douglas has been less
lovable to law breakers. Fennell noted that Douglas
has been a strong supporter of the death penalty
and believed in people paying for their offenses. "He
Aged are just more experienced
"Generation gap closing" read the headline, or
something to that effect.
The article, which appeared in the Duluth News
Tribune and Herald, said that, based on the 10
years of interviews, university students now share
more political, social and moral values with their
parents than in the past. The article suggested that
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parents are no longer "square" and their children
are no longer "crazed, radical, reactionaries." The
article insinuated that generations are becoming
closer-knit. I have my doubts. ;
Maybe students are parroting their parents'
values. Maybe students just aren't as politically
vocal as they were in the late 1960s. Or, maybe the
generation gap still exists but in a broader sense
than the article put forth.
Instead of a gap between students and their par
ents, we have a gap between students and their
grandparents and the middle-aged and graying
Americans.
Growing' old is -considered a dirty trick It is
nature's trump card, a card we can't accept
Gray hair is dyed its "natural" color. Wrinkles have
' ' become symbols of senility rather than wisdom. We
are afraid to grow eld, and because of that, we are
afraid to associate with older Americans. We won
der what we could possibly have in common with
our grandparents. .'....
I was shocked; over spring break, to discover that
my grandparents are "cool people." I didn't like to
visit them when I was younger. There was nothing to
do. They lived in a small town. No one between the
ages of 15 and 25 lived there. I felt stranded, locked
in with people who wouldn't understand me.
Grandma dealt the first blow to my misconcep
tions last week. She told me about growing up.
About an impermissable trip to a neighboring city
with some boys she barely knew and coming home
at 3 a.m. to a worried mother. I realized that growing
up in the '20s was similar, in some ways, to growing
up in the 70s or '80s. ,
I began to see my grandparents as ageless. They
were no longer older, than me, just more expe
rienced. I also realized that they weren't stagnant,
but still were growing and experiencing. ..... .
No one else seemed to notice. Waitresses appeared
rude. Salespeople openly showed their exaspera
tion over miscommunication. No one else seemed to
notice that medical expenses increase with age, cost
of living increases regardless of age and income
decreases with age.
As the United States continues to gray, the young
must learn to accept the idea of aging. They must see
senior citizens as people. They are' people who have
needs that the younger generation can fulfill by pro
viding monetary and emotional support. , ' ,
."Growing eld is not easy," a teacher told me the
other dzy. "Cut the alternative is death." ..
was as hardnosed on the Parole Board as I think any
member's ever been."
The irony at work here, to which Fennell appar
ently is oblivious, is that the man on top of Nebras
ka's entire law system is now suspected of financial
misdealing and abuse of power on a much more
serious scale than many of the people he's sent to
jail. Omaha state Sen. Ernie Chambers, a savvy and
brilliant man who was treated as a maverick and a
joke when he ran against Douglas two years ago, has
insisted on pointing out the injustice inherent in a
legal system which puts one person in jail for two
years for stealing a refrigerator, and lets another off
with a moderate fine for bid-rising construction
contracts. White collar crime is buisncss as usual for
many people at the intersection between big busi
ness and government and, for a lot of prosecutors
and judges, white collar crime is too pale, smooth,
and clean to be discerned. For Edwin Mecse, there is
nothing incongruous in attacking welfare mothers
for filling up on the free soup at private charity soup
kitchens while making very sure that he continues
to get his own good thing from Uncle Sam.
ine impeachment charges brought Dy the MeD
raska Legislature are misrepresentation and lying,
insider borrowing from Commonwealth, failure to
investigate the Commonwealth situation after being
warned of it by the FBI, failure to disqualify himself
from a later investigation in which he had a conflict
of interest, and failing to avoid the appearance of
impropriety. This is as much an indictment of his
conduct in the office of attorney general as it is a
revelation of his own personal financial machina
tions. Prosecutor Richard Kopf of Lexington stated
the irresponsibility of it perfectly: "Now at the time
Mr. Douglas was sitting as the chief law enforcement
officer of the state, Mr. Douglas never disclosed to
anyone the intensity, the complexity or the depth of
his involvement with Commonwealth."
Douglas's story is not the sad tale of a man led
astray by a false friend. It's hard to forget the name
of the bank on a $371,814 check, as Douglas said he
did. Even if the special proceedings of the state
supreme court do not result in Douglas's removal
from office, he has been discredited. State senators
could not overlook Douglas's indiscretions. Whether
the case will result in a chanage in banking law, or
business as usual, is of course a different thing.
Daily
EDITOR
GENERAL MANAGER
PRODUCTION MANAGER
Larry Spsrks, '472-1 7S8
Daniel thtlUl
Kitty Po5!efcy
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