Monday, April 20, 1937
Pago 4
Daily Nebraskan
;Jl'it
Jtff Korbelik, Editor, 472-1766
James Rogers, Editorial Page Editor
Lise Olsen, Associate News Editor
Mike Reilley, Night News Editor
Joan Rezac, Copy Desk Ch ief
Nsbraiskan
University ol Nebraska-Lincoln
Budget prospects low
Morrale prorrjected loworr
The unicameral's Appropria- relative pay. The unicameral
tions Committee is close to should look at the systematic
approving a state budget difficulties the budget projec
that includes proposals to in- tions have had so far, with an eye
crease state employees' salaries to amending the procedure to
by 3 percent and spending on avoid systematic overpredication.
higher education by 2 percent. A second point to keep in
While the proposals are mod- mind during this spring's sprout
estly heartening, two points ing of buds and budgets is that
should be kept in mind that cer- Gov. Kay Orr submits her own
tainly diminish the probability budget to be considered along
of optimism. side the Appropriations Corn
First, the proposed budget as mittee's budget. And Orr's budget
in past years, is based on revenue appropriates fewer dollars to the
projections. Over the last few university than does the corn
years, revenue projections have mittee's proposal modest as
been notoriously inaccurate. This the latter' s is.
perennial inaccuracy has resulted During last year's campaign
in special sessions to make for governor, Orr had a lot to say
further cuts in budgets that were about making the university
cut in the spring. budget priority: It was one of the
These late, special cuts have three consistently highlighted
taken their toll or. the morale of "issues" of her campaign. Addi
the university. What's given in tionally, Orr indicated that she
the spring has too often been appreciated the role that beef
taken away in the fall and ing up UNL's technological re
that after months of planning search capabilities would play in
and reliance had been done on long-run economic development,
the earlier budget. Although her current proposal
The unicameral only adds is only her first budget, and she
insult to injury when it cuts has had only limited time to pre
twice in one year and explains pare her budget suggestions, an
the action only with a rather, objective observer probably would
lame "oops, projections were have a hard time believing, by
wrong." looking only at her proposal, that
The widely reported "brain university education and research
drain" among UNL professors is were campaign priorities. Orr
as much a function of the uncer- should be gently reminded (gently
tainty of the Legislature's disor- because it's only her first budget),
ganized and unintelligent ap- that one need not be a Republi
propriation process as it is a can elephant to have good recall
function of declining real and of the 1984 campaign.
Letter
Regent praises
Your editorial "Regents can't decide,"
(Daily Nebraskan, April 13) was most
insightful and right on target.
The regents were confronted with
difficult and painful decisions in
determining which of a numberof good
university programs would be elimi
nated to handle the midyear budget
cuts forced upon us last December by
the Legislature and former Gov. Bob
Democrats silent for maximum effect
Supporters of President Reagan
who fondly imagine that "the
worst is over" as far as the Iran
contra affair is concerned are in for a
rough spring. The Democratic impresa-
rios of the forthcoming congressional
investigation are keeping their mouths
shut these days, but privately they are
satisfied that the testimony of Adm.
John Poindexter, Col. Oliver North and
others will rock the country and seri
ously damage President Reagan.
Have you noticed the almost total
absence of leaks for the special House
and Senate committees investigating
this subject? These are legislators and
staff members with long histories of I
running off at the mouth ("not for
attribution") to their pals in the media,
and their recent silence should not be
nnHprctnnH aQ odHonco that thou hava
m.wv v,..vv...v, vn-j
decided to reform. Nor would it be wise
t.n rnnnhidft that, the mpriin in thpir
t :
turn, are simply being thwarted by the
yimtiuaiia in uicii uiiigcub attciupka tu 1001. anu pnvaie American sources wnne
telegraph the investigative committee Poindexter and North, as you know, Congress was trying to starve the con
punches, are to be granted limited immunity tras of military aid, it's a near-certainty
On the contrary, the po!l3 and the from prosecution for their testimony, that some of it can be alleged to have
media have tacitly agreed not to jump ( after special prosecutor Lawrence Walsh been mishandled: stolen, misdirected,
DN editorial
Kerrey.
As one who supported the reduc-
tions recommended by President Ronald
Roskens and the chancellors, I appre
ciate endorsement of our position in
your thoughtful analysis.
Margaret Robinson
chairwoman
Board of Regents
the gun with revelations that might
well lessen the impact of the investiga-
tions when they finally go public. To
put it another way, the Democratic
masters of these revels and their media
flacks are setting up the American
public for the maximum possible shock
effect.
William
A.
Rusher
Still, despite the best effect of the
past masters at stage-managing the
news, an occasional fume escapes from
tha cmomn Kara than ic a KirtVl.i
wiv onmuji. Mien, 10 a iiiftiuj
unauthorized preview of what you can
oYnApt whon tha nii-tain itnoo nn in a
vr v.. ...v v..wU 6uv r ... .
few weeks on the Washington Follies of
" f r-O oN "
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"OKAY ,OKM,So pOOlWS Aiope ffyVLARTHAN PUT NOBopy
BgTOR 6N CRACK A SfAlL.6 UAiW &SI Tb SAnTA PC "
FCC w-mts to b-j a v-w-I.
Censorship of innuendoes gives language, not speakers, control
"Indecency can be defined as
language or material that depicts
or describes, in terms patently
offensive as measured by con-
temporary community standards
for the broadcast medium, sex-
ual or excretory activities or
organs.
the Federal
Communications
Commission
"The radio is in the hands of
such a lot of fools
Tryin ' to anesthetize the way
that you feel. . . "
Elvis Costello
T
he issue is innuendo. You know,
innuendo is the stuff you say when
you really want to be saying some
thing else. Innuendo is often conceived
as harmless. It hints at things that if
said outright would throw old women
into cardiac spasms and land candi-
dates for public office in slander court,
It's a joke you have to wink about
alter telling so you can put people on
your own twisted wavelength. Innuendo
is never nice.
Innuendo is how clever disc jockeys
get away with a dirty joke or two on
their radio programs.
Of course, there are a lot of things
you've never been able to say on TV or
on the radio. I won't play Wheel of
Fortune with you on this. The words are
has been given several more weeks to
try to amass enough evidence to jail
them without the help of that testim-
ony. So Poindexter and North will be
forced to testify, and the congressional
probers have fingered Poindexter as
the loose brick. He is rumored to
believe he was "let down" by the White nervously aware that too heavy or too
House, and the hope is that his leaden protracted a barrage against President
bitterness can be transmuted into pol- Reagan might backfire, triggering a
ltical gold for the Democrats. Whether popular revulsion against the hearings
he can be induced to try to implicate So they have consolidated their two
President Reagan personally in fresh ring, investigatory circus into one and
aspects of the controversy is not known, . floated speculation that it may all be
but Congress is certainly going after over by midsummer, rather than by late
exactly that. October as originally planned.
1 North is judged less likely to cooper- But meanwhile the orchestra is tun-
ate in compromising the president, so
he is to be deleted as a wnnzv . nff-thp.
wall nut who should never have been
llAiim) l maJI. i.
uiuncu tu uicuuic in aciiuus aiiiuis.
Then there is always the grand old
noma "VJhar AiA tun o
6u"' o uiu nic uiuucjr gu;
Given the amounts raised from foreign
in your mind, safely lodged in the gray
matter so that whenever you read a
newspaper and see "s-" you say it in
your head. You nod. You know. You're
watching some edited-for-TV movie on
the tube and Eddie Murphy's mouth is
hanging open. He can't believe it. The
edited soundtrack says "gosh." His lips
say something else.
Charles
Lieurance
Censorship is based on the idea that
a section of the populace out there
doesn't know certain words or couldn't
deal with them if it knew them. We've
lost control of our language, in other
words. Instead of us controlling it and
adapting to its variety, it now controls
us. By using "s" and "f-" we hide
from ourselves. They are words too
powerful for us. But thev coniure ideas
we are already more than passingly
familiar with,
While watching TV or listening to
the radio with my grandmother I some-
times wonder if, when something is
bleeped or demoted by the network
from "s -" to "heckfire," she has the
of testimony
or lost. Even if no malfeasance can be
proved, the committees will be able to
spend weeks in a gratifying tangle of
Swiss bank accounts, Cayman Island
corporations, etc.
Despite the obviously toothsome dos
sibilities thpnpmnHpipaH0rciXo
ing up in the pit. Prepare to SDend a
larnartnfvmcf
television set watching f carefullv
' P ClUUj
seiecieaj excerpts from the testimonv
of the victims of this political feeding
- ...um. . .. .
iiBiiij, wane your iavonte anchorman
on the evening news nretpnrk hp i
trying, not quite successfully, to con
ceal a smirk.
1987, Newspaper Enterprise Assa.
Basher is the publisher of the National
Review.
word in her mind, if it floats to the
surface and offends her. If she were to
guess the word, would she guess
correctly?
The whole idea of the unsayable
word is absurd. Like the secret name of
God.
How can our tongues betray us.
Friends of mine who swore like Billy
Martin during high school find Jesus as
their personal savior and then stop
swearing as a part of the discipline of
religion. The words still cling to the
convolutions of the brain to be dredged
up on the censor's Wheel of Fortune,
but as evidence of their salvation, the
word is held in unutterable storage.
Because these words are in such
careful storage, their meaning has
broadened until they become mere
vocalizations of frustration. This float
ing meaning, or in some cases meaning
lessness, frequently attaches itself to
the dirty word. Granted, a few of the
"seven dirty words" are so explicit that
they signify anatomical specificity with
no ambiguity whatsoever. You know
what the words are. But for the most
part, words once denoting intimate
encounters and fecal functions con
note a broader, nearly infinite number
of ideas (degrees of frustation: fear,
worry, hate, envy, etc.; degrees of happ
iness even: sexual elation, material
elation, spiritual elation, etc.)
By not even allowing disc jockeys
and TV actors to even hint at these
words, the FCC hopes to de-emphasize
the Wheel of Fortune effect.
Unfortunately, the effect of handcuff
fing DJs like WXRX's Howard Stern,
whose New York radio broadcast is at
the center of the new FCC decision to
crack down on the airwaves, is to take a
medium that is already deluged with
neutered drivel and send it spiralling
down into an abyss of mediocrity. But
since most radio already flounders in
crap, who will be most hurt?
The minute you set a government
agency loose to sniff out something as
intangible as "innuendo" you're head
ing for trouble. For many the sight of a
toilet buys you a vowel in the word
"s ." And measuring contemporary
community standards is like estimat
ing how many times you can wrap a
whale's intestines around the Empire
State. Buildin2 or guessing how many
nanniac gro in a Mocnn iir
pennies are in a Mason jar.
The FCC undoubtedly will be chal
lenged on this decision to reapply a
generic definition of indecency.
Undoubtedly Pat Sajak will run the
court.
Lieurance is a senior English, art and
philosophy major and Daily Nebraskan
senior reporter.