Friday, February 20, 1937
Pago 4
Daily Ncbraskan
Jeff KorbeUk, Editor, 4721766
James Rogers, Editorial Page Editor
Lise Olsen, Associate News Editor
Mike Reilley, NUjht News Editor
Jean Kezac, Copy Desk Chief
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University ol Nebraska-Lincoln
0 woe, Ik(Dinrir
Demon rum imperils virgin
;
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Lips that touch wine, will
never touch mine."
Oft-repeated adage amongst
Unl lasses. -
Oh woe is us, oh woe is us.
Shall this pure maiden of
scholasticism be profaned
by establishments selling liquor
within 300 feet of her undefiled
hem? Nebraska's fair unicameral
is considering oh perish the
thought amending a sage old
law and allowing alcohol to be
sold within the respectable 300
foot limit: Oh creeping insanity,
what will become of the abode of
the 25,000 purest of the Nebraska
pure? ;
How' tJnssemly what will
the othir universities think of us
if such h obviously reasonable
statute jfers. to be passed?
The Law ; originally sought to
keep the lips of university inno
cents free from the taint of
demon rum. Of course, at the
time of original enactment, Unl
was an outhouse with a library
about two miles south of Ceresco
and "Our Street" was an only
dreamed-of border. But Unl's for
tunes prospered, and the stout
yeomen of Unl pushed south.
Block by precious block, the
Kingdom of Unl expanded under
the courageous liedership of King
Letters
Regent defended, Roskens questioned
In an editorial Feb. 17 the Daily
Nebraskan engaged in a mean ad
hominem attack on Regent Robert
Koefoot. Attempting to discredit Koe
foot's proposal to close architecture
and dentistry in such a fashion is vile.
If I interpret Koefoot's action correctly,
he merely was trying to show that Pres
ident Ronald Roskens's list of cuts was
not the only list that could be made.
The editorial states that the chan
cellors were given authority to propose
cuts for their campus. But that was a
hollow authority. Roskens first pro
posed his list of cuts, and all discus
sions or proposals start with those
cuts. The head of every other program
is ducking, ducking, ducking.
Leading the list of proposed cuts
was the Lincoln campus of the College
of Nursing. Why? In July 1985 the
regents decided not to cut that pro
Students won't get
The belief that the proposed recrea
tion center will be open to general stu
dents and therefore should be con
structed (held by our elected big fish,
Chris Scudder, and others) is so near
sighted that we might as well declare it
legally blind. The sports hierarchy run
ning this show, believe me, will post
the schedule stating the rec center's
use only after it has been built. So don't
Letter Policy
Letters will be selected for publica
tion on the basis of clarity, originality,
timeliness and space available. The
Daily Nebraskan retains the right to
edit all material submitted.
Letters and guest opinions sent to
the newspaper become property of the
Daily Nebraskan and cannot be returned.
Kimball, Bishop Temple (in a
most holy crusade) and our most
honored Prince Lied. (So great is
the latter, that, via approbation,
"leadership" is now spelled
"liedership.")
But costless the campaigns
have not been. The empire of Unl
has imperiled the drunken bar
barians on Our Street's southern
border. A host of infamous clans,
scarcely mentioned without trem
bling, have united in a cam
paign. They share horrific names
like "Skywalker Beastro" and
"Arturo D-2." In the height of
perversity they are prevailing upon
our august legislators to pre
serve their dens of iniquity' from
the onslaught of the most right
eous Lied.
Could the Legislature embrace
such an obvious common sense?
Oh spare us, we pray thee, oh
spare us.
And if not, we shall be united
in purpose; pupils united. Save
the soul of the innocents! Let the
cry wring out. Save the virgins!
(Er. . . well, save the virgin.)
To the capitol we will march,
onward to moral death; with a
song in our hearts and this chant
on our. lips we shall march:
"Where the boys are the squar-
gram or the College of Pharmacy. They
have the right and the responsibility to
make these decisions. Why, then, does
nursing head the list of cuts?
Have you looked carefully at Ros
kens's list? Do you understand the
rationale for selection? Each of the
programs he proposes to cut has a pub
lic that is expected to rise up and say,
"Not my program. I will support a tax
increase to keep it." There are many
things the university spends money on
that could be cut without a whimper
from the public executive dining
rooms, central-administration fat
you can add many more. The DN would
better serve its readership by question
ing how Roskens made his selections
than by attacking Koefoot.
Beverly A. Cunningham
assistant professor
nursing
to use rec center
gnash your teeth and wail in a loud
voice when it runs something like this:
"The recreation center will be open to
non-athlete students every third Tues
day in July from midnight to 3 am.
Enjoy!"
Paul Morin
senior
English
Anonymous submissions will not be
considered for publication. Letters
should include the author's name, year
in school, major and group affiliation, if
any. Requests to withhold names from
publication will not be granted.
Submit material to the Daily Ne
braskan, 34 Nebraska Union, 1400 R St.,
Lincoln, Neb. 68588-0448.
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Eeny-meeny-miney-mo, the upper class is where she'll go
It is the one unmentionable word.
The lawyers don't talk about it
directly. The parents behave as if it
has no bearing. The media refers to it
only obilquely. But in the Baby M trial,
M stands for money. As this test case on
surrogate mothering shifts focus from
contracts to custody, from the conflict
ing rights of the parents to the best
interests of the child, there is barely
even a veiled message about the role
money may play in its outcome. People
are testifying and behaving as if class
a dirty word in the American lan
guage or socio-economic background,
if you prefer, is irrelevant.
The lawyers do not bring in econo
mists to describe the difference between
the Whiteheads and the Sterns. That
would be too crass. They bring in
psychologists.
Noboay suggests in court that the
wife of a garbage collector and the
husband of a pediatrician are not equal
under the law. Nobody states overtly
their ability as providers. But it is
money that determined Baby M's birth
and money that may well decide her
custody.
In the beginning, both the White
heads and the Sterns chose to believe
that Mary Beth wanted to carry this
child for altruistic reasons. I don't dis
pute that belief. But in real life the
wealthy don't become surrogates and
the poor do not buy surrogates and the
hired matchmakers do not work for
love.
Psychologist Lee Salk may have been
too crude in his testimony when he said
that Mary Beth signed on to be i "sur
rogate uterus," not a surrogate mother.
But the financial arrangment is telling:
She would be fully paid by the custo
mer only if she delivered his product,
finished the job.
Real American columnist would fix
godless, Russkie, sissy Commies!
Ed Anger is more than a columnist;
he's a parody of Southern red
necks, McCarthyism, blatant sex
ism, racism, homophobia and people
who think the Smurfs are a Commie
plot to turn our kids into "spineless,
pacifist liberals." Every week in the
notriously seedy, pulpy tabloid The
Weekly World News, Anger talks about
the plight of his country in "My Amer
ica," an editorial column that makes
William F. Buckley and William Rusher
look like crumbs from Abbey Hoffman's
leftover ideological tools.
"I'm madder than a camel jockey
with hemmorhoids over those towel
headed Iranians," he'll write. Or "I'm
madder than a yappy women's libber
who torched her tootsies after a bra-
swim? msoaisr vm xrz&& 150 rocs
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What now of the custody struggle
between those who have more and
those who have less? "Three Experts
say Baby M's Mother is Unstable" read
the headlines. We hear about her death
threats and her hysteria, her "mixed
personality disorder," her "immature
personality structure." One psychia
trist says: "Her need for having posses
sion of the baby is so overwhelming
that it seems to impair her judgment in
properly caring for SaraMelissa."
Those "experts" are more confident
than this reader in judging Mary Beth's
behavior. "Her need for possession of
the baby"? What if this mother was
Ellen L
Goodman
driven to "craziness" by the loss of a
child and then lost against because she
sounded crazy?
But we are talking about money. The
court record also shows that Mary Beth
worked briefly as a go-go dancer, that
she was on welfare, borrowed money for
her house and faced a foreclosure. The
facts subliminally add up to the portrait
of unstable family. Or it is, rather, just
the portrait of a family on the financial
margin?
What should a high-school dropout
who married at 16 and had her first
child at 17 do for a living when she is
separated from her husband? Brain
surgery? Add another $20,000 a year to
the Whitehead bank account and would
the family suddenly become more sta
ble? Stable enough? A stronger con
burning ceremony over this feminism
stuff."
And his greatest fear centers on
what he calls "sicko Russkies." Ed's
Scott
Harrak
convinced that the Russkies are plan
ning to strike America any day now.
I went to bed last night, closed my
eyes and somehow found myself in a
dream with Ed Anger. He had become
HVE BET, EHIT BKJ2S 1J1L?
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tender for Baby M?
I write this because quite frankly, as
a custody judge between two equal
claimants, I would award Baby M to the
Sterns. In the best interest of the child,
I would go with the odds, keep her in
the home that appears to offer her a
better chance. I would entrust her to
the parents who had the better educa
tion, whose lives were more predicta
ble and less volatile, who seemed more
able to attend to her emotional and
personal needs.
But having said that, I am aware of
how class and money factor into this
equation. How many other mothers in
more conventional situations have lost
custody of their child to a father who
can provide it with a house, a better
neighborhood, dancing lessons or sum
mer camp?
In the end, the Baby M trial may be
resolved as a contract case or a custody
case. But either way, the whole sorry
business of surrogate motherhood is
riddled with economic bias. It's rife
with messages about buying and sel
ling children, about who can "afford"
to have them.
If this woman indeed has a "person
ality disorder" immature, impul
sive, narcissistic, possessive then
she was exploited by the clinic and by
the Sterns: her genes sold, her uterus
rented.
If not, she is an equal contender, and
one of the reasons she may lose the
baby is because of this unmentionable:
money. In a courtroom that's inun
dated with lawyers and judges, M.D.s
and Ph.Ds, the Whiteheads are simply
outclassed.
1987, The Boston Globe Newspaper
CompanyWashington Post Writers
Group
Goodman is a Pulitzer prize-winning
columnist for the Boston Globe.
"the prez of America," thanks to a
space alien he interviewed for The
Weekly World News. The little green
intergalactic dude was so happy that
good old Ed gave him press in the tab
loid that he used his magical powers to
turn the columnist into whatever he
wanted to be.
"Make me the prez of my country
and give me a first lady who knows her
place and stays in the kitchen making
me sweet-potato pie," he asked the
wish-granting space alien. "And make
all the men in my American real men.
Get rid of all the limp-wristed pansy
hairdressers and yappy feminiits. Make
all gals like Vanna White, a real Ameri
can woman. And make me invade the
See HAH HAH on 5