Editorial _
Nebrayskan
University of Nebraska
....» .illi i 111II.I
Mike Keilley, Editor, 472-1766
Diana Johnson, Editorial Page Editor
Jen Deselms, Managing Editor
Curt Wagner, Associate News Editor
Scott Harrah, Night News Editor
Joan Rezac, Copy Desk Chief
Joel Carlson, Columnist
Firm backs out
Glitz, cost may scare others
Lincoln Mayor Bill Har
ris and the City Council
need to take a hint from
Taubman Co., Inc., and reevalu
ate the downtown redevelop
ment project.
Robert Larson, Taubman
president, told the council Mon
day that the project is financially
impossible. The developing firm
backed out of the project, leav
ing Harris scurrying to find an
other developer.
“This project, as conceived
over the past two years, is not
feasible at this time,” Larson
said.
How true. Taubman agreed to
invest a maximum $50 million
in the project, with matching
funds coming from the city.
However, the $100 million was
still short of the $120 million to
$130million needed to finish the
project.
The Taubman project would
have included a four-block area
within a six-block project
bounded by 10th, 0,13th and Q
streets.
Harris has said the city is still
committed to some kind of rede
velopment, which makes re
evaluating the project a difficult
task. The city has already sunk
$12 million into the redevelop
ment from a general-obligation
bond issue approved by voters.
So far, Dillard Department
Stores of Little Rock, Ark., has
been the only major department
store committed to the project,
according to an Omaha World
Herald article. Harris said Dil
lard officials arc still interested
in die project.
To put the project back in per
spective for developers, Harris
should cut certain areas of the re
development. The Taubman
plan called for two to three large
department stores, multi story
parking garages, restaurants and
roof gardens.
The first thing to go should be
the roof gardens. They just aren’t
practical in Nebraska. No one
wants to spend time on a roof
during one of Nebraska’s frigid
winters. The roof gardens would
go unused for at least six months
of the year.
The parking garages could
also go. Downtown businesses
have trouble attracting custom
ers because of costly parking,
and the area already has parking
garages in die Centrum and
Rampark.
There is hope for the project.
J.C. Nichols Co., a Kansas City,
Mo., real estate development
company, has shown interest in
the downtown project. Accord
ing to the Omaha World-Herald
article, Harris has scheduled a
meeting with the firm, but the
Nichols officials have said they
can’t be more definite on their
plans until studying the possi
bilitics offered by a downtown
Lincoln project.
Let’s just hope the glitz and
cost of the project doesn’t scare
away this firm, too.
Attitudes ‘mystify’ athlete
In response to some of the letters
that have appeared in the Daily
Nebraskan, I am mystified by
people’s attitudes toward the colle
giate athletic system. There are some
things I think these articles have
failed to point out.
The first is that there are few re
strictions upon who can become a
student-athlete. If these people feel
athletes gel extra unfair advantages,
which they do not get, why don’t they
become student-athletes to receive
these so-called extra benefits?
Second, a student-athlete has to
pass the same number of hours to
graduate as the “regular student.”
How can these people say the ath
letes’ education is inferior to theirs?
The effort that individuals put into
their classes, whether they’re ath
lctesor not, is going to determine the
education they receive.
Third, the student-athlete has to
deal with pressures that can’t be
equalled by non-athletes. Student
athletes who succeed in dealing with
pressures will be better suited to deal
with pressures after they’re done
with college. This will help them
become better lawyers, doctors,
engineers, teachers and scientists.
Fourth, if people are working 30
hours a week at a job they dislike, my
advice to them is to find a job that
they like. No one forces anyone to do
a job they don’t like.
J. Cody Olson
senior
sociology
1987 Big Eight Champion wrestler
Kerrey in D.C. ‘devastating’
Former Gov. Bob Kerrey is
quoted (Daily Nebraskan, Jan. 21) as
saying he knows nothing about farm
ing. I find this devastating to Ne
braska if he should find himself in
Washington, D.C. Agriculture and
its related industries arc a mullimil
* lion dollar-a-year boost to this
slate’seconomy,providingcountlcss
jobs for its residents.
Such companies as Campbell’s
Soup, Weaver’s, Farmer’s Coop^
Con-Agra, Monfort, Wimmer’s,
Farmland Industries, Norden, Dow
Chemical, Elanco, Purina and IBP
wouldn’t even be in Nebraska if it
weren’t for agriculture. Political
platforms across the nation list agri
culture as one of the most important
issues of the 1988 election.
Nebraska’s next representative will
be dealing with the Farm Bill, price
supports, subsidies, export restric
tions and the grain surplus, all of
which affect this state at every level
of agricultural production.
I feel it is imperative that our next
U.S. senator have first-hand knowl
edge of agriculture and its complex
structure to insure the livelihood of
the state, and that man is not Bob
Kerrey.
Steve Bath
senior
animal science
uu'5 SOUTHING IN A PLAIN PRowN WRAPPER... PRD0A0LY CAhAPAl^N
LITERATURE FROM GARY KART l n*
Caucuses: Better them than us
Nebraska spared burden of non-representative beauty pageant
Nebraska’s prox im ity to Iowa
and its Feb. 8 caucuses gives
Nebraskans a unique advan
tage in the scheme of the 1988 presi
dential election: We arc c lose enough
to see what goes on, but fortunate not
to have all thecandidatcs pestering us
to shake our hands, kiss our babies
and milk our cows in front of the TV
cameras. It is our curse that Lincoln
is just within range of Omaha’s TV
stations, which beam political com
mercials at us that are meant for
Council Bluffs.
We must endure countless pic
tures of Jesse Jackson pitching hay
and George Bush wearing overalls
and a seed-corn cap, candidly a
visilin' the good friendly farm folk of
Iowa, solving all their problems.
These are the chosen means of cam
paigning because they get results in
the polls and on TV.
In Nebraska we arc spared from
most of the sour effects of the cau
cuses. The candidates stay at the Dcs
Moines Hilton, not the Cornhusker,
and they tromp across Iowa’s corn
fields, not ours. Maybe Iowa likes
this kind of attention, but I suspect
Nebraskans would sell their votes to
w hichever candidate would make the
first promise to just leave them alone.
The early dale of Iowa’scaucuses,
however, has come under fire. Some
political types complain that Iowa—
with a population of 2.8 million in a
nation of 243 million — has more
than its fair say about who becomes
our next president.
And they’re right. It is next to
impossible for a candidate to win if
he does poorly with this tiny sam
pling of the American electorate.
From the liberals’ perspective, the
system is unfair, because their favor
ite sons get reamed in Iowa for their
left-leaning positions. For example.
candidates learn quickly that Iowa is
the wrong place to emphasize sup
port for abortion rights. They smartly
keep quiet on that sensitive subject
until they are back in the big cities of
the East. Iowans arc not single
minded on the issue, but the odds are
stacked so heavily in favor of conser
vative pro-life candidates that
Iowans rarely get to hear both sides of
the issue.
i 1 i
——'
Iowa’s position as the first test of
voter sentiment is also a plus to agri
culture interests. Just imagine how
little attention would be focused on
agriculture issues if the first primary
were in Connecticut. Family-farm
supporters sec to it that their issues
are at the top of the agenda.
So liberals want a change in the
system — namely, a different state to
go first. They want a state that more
fairly represents America as a whole.
But is there a state that fairly rep
resents the whole nation? And if there
is, how could all the powers-thal-be
ever agree upon which state to
choose? Iowa’s position in the presi
dential election — whether good or
bad—is solidly in place and unlikely
to change.
The question we should be debat
ing is: Why has Iowa become so
critical in the campaign process? The
answer is that American voters have
become overly dependent on opinion
polls and TV for information on the
candidates. A substantial share of
supporters will write oil their lavor
ite candidate if he finishes worse than
second in the Iowa caucuses. People
don't read the papers and the news
magazines any more— they switch on
the TV and look for a face-man w nh
style.
It has often been said that in
America we like winners. Given this,
who is likely to support a candidate
who finished third with 12 percent of
the vote in Iowa? Right after a show
ing like this, we expect a TV news
report announcing his withdrawal
from the race, noting that there is no
chance of his winning the nomina
tion. The same candidate might fin
ish first with 60 percent of the vote in
California and New York, but it
wouldn’t matter, because Iowa’s
early judgment will force him out ol
the race before they get a chance to
vote.
TV news dominates public opin
ion to such an extreme that it is hard
to consider a candidate who doesn’t
lake a good picture or tell a good one
liner. Would a man as homely as
Abraham Lincoln or as overweight as j
William Howard Taft have had a
chance at the presidency in the T V
age? Today we prefer a pretty pack
age to a great leader, and with TV we
arc able to sec the package better than
its contents.
Iowa is not to blame for this prob
1cm. Indeed, many other states would
probably make fai worse choices.
But there is something wrong with
the psyche of the American voter and
his fixation with polls and TV. Unless
we soon come to realize how badly
we suffer from it, Bill Cosby may be
our next president, and nobody will
know or care how he stands on the
issues.
Snodgrass is a senior economies major.
All college students
strive to meet goals
I would like lo take this opportu
nity to respond to all the letters that
the rest of the University of Ne
braska-Lincoln students have been
subjected to since Nebraska volley
ball player Val Novak wrote to the
Daily Nebraskan (Letters, Jan. 18). 1
must agree with Scott Juranek (Jan.
26), who wrote, “The way I see it, the
people who are complaining are
speaking out of jealousy.”
It’s not fair for the scholars to
attack the athletes who complain
about hard work and who have defi
nitely earned their scholarships. And
on the other hand, it’s not fair for the
athletes to attack the students who are
upset because all of their hard work,
for the most part, goes unnoticed and
unrecognized. The fact of the matter
is u.at both of groups of students have
worked very hard for many years,
dedicating their time to a particular
goal, be it athletic or scholastic, and
deserve recognition. The athletes
have spent hours sharpening their
athletic skills, and the students have 2
spent countless hours working to pay
for school or studying to get here.
Finally, I feel everyone should be
given credit for all their hard work
that has paid off. You have all made
it to college and deserve credit for
that itself. Let’s just forget about this
whole thing.
Thomas Michael Dedscn