Many complaints made to DN letter writers
raper criticized
Over the past year or so, I’ve read
the Good News fairly regularly, but
instead of getting a good laugh a lot of
other people seem to have been get
ting, I’ve never been anything less
than horrified at the overzealous fun
damentalist propaganda. It was a
great relief when Chuck Green and
Bob Nelson took it upon themselves
to respond with equally zealous
humanism.
Whether or not fundamentalists
can accept it, homosexuals are people
and condoms save lives. Most mod
em, enlightened people accept these
two facts.
Whether or not these facts accord
with every last letter of the Bible is
another issue. Most people take a
more broad interpretation of the
Bible, rather than a strict, letter-by
letter interpretation. For isn’t Christi
anity the unconditional love of fellow
man? Or is it a complex legal system,
fraught with conflicting demands for
every possible human action?
witri tnc letter response trom
Bruce Gregg and Ron Stephenson,
Green has been labeled as intolerant
for his column in which he labeled
Nels Forde, publisher of the Good
News, as intolerant. I think both
Gregg and Stephenson need to distin
guish between being critical and
being intolerant
As Gregg himself has confessed,
“zeal has clouded thought” and “we
have appeared intolerant of homo
sexuals/’ In truth, the Good News
has been on a a vigorous campaign to
alienate homosexuals from God and
their fellow human beings. This is
intolerance.
Green has merely identified and
brought this intolerance to light. He
made no attempt to change Nels
Forde or the people who write for the
Good News, or try to undermine their
self concepts, he has merely dis
agreed openly with them. This is
criticism.
Nels Forde and the Good News
exemplify intolerance while Green
and Nelson exemplify justified criti
r—-—
cism. Mind you, I’m not being intol
erant of anyone here. I just want to
point out the difference.
Gregg’s letter is a cause for hope.
If he really has been appointed to try
to ‘ ‘end the intolerance that has found
its way into our pages,” then maybe
something will change.
I issue the new editor of the Good
News a challenge. Print editorial let
ters in the Good News. Not just letters
that you agree with, or letters that
Nels Forde agrees with, but letters
that you may violently disagree with.
The Daily Nebraskan has been open
minded enough to print your letter
and Stephenson’s letter, along with
hundreds of others the editors of the
DN may not have agreed with.
If Gregg accepts this challenge,
perhaps the labels of intolerance and
closed-mindedness will cease to ap
ply.
Chris Potter
sophomore
physics and philosophy
Blame misplaced
This Idler is in response lo a re
cent commentary (Daily Nebraskan,
May 1) concerning your call for a
boycott of Exxon products in retali
ation for its recent oil spill in Alaska.
I know it seems quite obvious that
Exxon has been in the past, as are
most corporations in America, quite
insensitive to environmental issues,
but is Exxon really completely to
blame for the oil spill?
How many people reading this
letter drive their cars to school every
day? How many could possibly use
alternative means, such as public
transportation, or better yet walk or
ride a bike? Before blame is placed
anywhere, we should all take a hard
look at how efficient we, as individu
als are - especially when the week
ends come and O Street is bumper-to
bumper with cars.
Kenneth P. Cannon
Lincoln
Heckman blasted
The announcement that Craig
Heckman's column (DN, May 4) was
his last was a cause of anxiety. In
deed, I shuddered for most of the
morning hours over the grim prospect
of spending the next three years in
darkness without such a sage to en
lighten me. My spine might never
have stilled, were it not for Heck
man's comments on the justice sys
tem, which represented a flaw in his
otherwise tremendously sanctified
and inviolate contentions. Heckman
believes that the attorney is the guar
anteed key to the prison cell, and that
any suspect rich enough to retain
expensive representation will cer
tainly walk. This belief is erroneous.
Heckman has first ignored the
concept of a court-appointed attor
ney. It surprised me that someone so
informed and thoughtful was un
aware of the clause in every suspect's
Miranda rights stating that, if the
suspect cannot afford an attorney,
one will be afforded for him. This
attorney may be a public defender, a
private practitioner willing to work
on a pro bono (volunteer) basis, or an
attorney from a legal services organi
zation such as the ACLU who will
work for a m in imal fee or no fee at al 1;
or the attorney may be any one ap
pointed by the court to represent the
suspect, regardless of whether the
suspect can pay normal hourly fees.
The attorney’s position or hourly
rate is not a gauge of his ability, but
the format under which he chooses to
work. The most expensive attorney
available may not be the one truly
most able to help a suspect; con
versely, a legal services attorney may
be extremely able and willing to take
on the demands of time and personal
expense, merely because he or she
believes, as most of us do, that every
suspect’s rights to quality representa
tion and a fair trial should be equal.
In fact, not a few major Supreme
Court verdicts — including Roe vs.
Wade have been won by attorneys
who have provided free representa
tion. Hourly fee is not an indication of
how hard an attorney is willing to
work.
Nor, moreover, is hourly fee a
guarantee that a suspect will be ac
quitted. The second and more impor
tant concept that Heckman has over
looked is that of concrete facts in a
case. If the suspect is clearly guilty
and the facts presented in a trial prove
it, no attorney can make that suspect
into an innocent man
A good example is the case of John
Joubert currently under deliberation
in Omaha. Joubert’s court-appointed
attorney (an extremely competent
and reputable private-practice attor
ney in Omaha) has the monumental
task of trying to change Joubert’s
death sentence by saying that his
previous representation was incom
petent. Unfortunately, Joubert’s
chances are slim to none.
An attorney s personality cannot
work miracles. The attorney’s job is
to work with the facts of the case for
the best possible outcome for his
client; if the facts are obvious, the
suspect will be found guilty, and no
attorney can change that.
Even more significant to note is
that many felony cases are heard, at
the defendant’s request, by a jury of
the defendant’s peers -- and it’s the
peers part that matters here: it is the
defendant’s peers, people who are as
likely to acquit as to convict, who will
make their decision based on the facts
of the case.
As much as Heckman wails about
the injustices of the justice in the
United States, he might concede (no
guarantees here) after a little research
that the American justice system
tends to go out of its way to protect
the rights of the accused. In fact, the
justice system is one of the few in
stances where a person’s money isn’t
a consideration - the greatest finan
cial burden in most criminal cases,
after all, is borne by the court in the
interest of assuring a defendant’s
right to a fair trial. No self-righteous
“enlightenment” can nullify the
truth, nor can it transcend the facts.
Maren Chaloupka
freshman pre-law
Research justified
Considering graduate student sti
pends, one would think Steve Morin
would be supersensilive to the 20
percent increase in energy cost for his
car over the past month, and be sup
portive of an alternative source of
power. As reported (DN, April 26),
Vaimont Industries had invested $9
million toward the development of a
Stirling engine which would use a
broad range of non-petroleum based
fuels. They were still faced with
problems in metallurgy, lubrication
and heat transfer which required re
sources beyond their capabilities and
they had decided to abandon the proj
ect.
We may or may not be able to
solve these problems although we
believe we have the expertise - I
believe that is legitimate research. If
we can foster the development of a
power source that can economically
utilize waste combustibles — every
thing from cow chips to old car tires -
then I believe that is a public good.
William Splinter
associate vice chancellor for
research
Signed staff editorials represent
the official policy of the fall 1988
Daily Nebraskan. Policy is set by the
Daily Nebraskan Editorial Board. Its
members are Curt Wagner, editor;
Amy Edwards, editorial page editor;
Jane Hirt, managing editor; Lee
Rood, associate news editor; Lisa
Donovan, columnist; Diana Johnson,
wire page editor; and Chuck Green,
copy desk chief.
Editorial columns represent the
opinion of the author.
The Daily Nebraskan’s publishers
arc the regents, who established the
UNL Publications Board to supervise
the daily production of the paper.
According to policy set by the re
gents, responsibility for the editorial
content of the newspaper lies solely in
the hands of its student editors.
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