« . Daily Nebraskan Thursday, June 13,1991 * . Stop whining_ Salary distribution fair to UNO, UNK Faculty members at the University of Nebraska at Omaha and the soon-to-be University of Nebraska at Kearney need to stop whimpering and count their blessings. When the regents decided how to divvy up scarce state funds for faculty salary increases, they doled out more money for UNO and UNK faculty salary increases — by percentage — than for UNL increases. That — plus a hefty tuition increase on both campuses — will enable the regents to meet the collective bargaining agreements they agreed to before the shoddy state eco nomic situation became apparent. Those agreements will give UNO faculty members a 6.5 percent raise, with UNK faculty members getting a 8.7 percent raise. University of Nebraska-Lincoln and University of Nebraska Medical Center faculty members will get only a 4.25 percent raise. Staff at all campuses will fare the worst under the plan the regents approved. They will only beef up their pay checks by 4 percent this year. * But UNO and UNK faculty members and administrators persist in whining about their alleged misfortunes. They insist that they should have gotten more of the state dollars, which would have taken some of the pressure off of their students, who face 9 and 11 percent tuition increases. uiNL s tuition will go up / percent. Looking at the numbers, it seems that UNO and UNK faculty members got a more-than-fair shake. The $10.6 million in state dollars available for salary increases will pay for 4.06 percent of the 6.5 percent UNO salary hike and 4.16 percent of the 8.7 percent UNK salary increase. UNL and UNMC settled for state funding of 3.76 percent of their 4.25 increase. This is fair. UNO and UNK must pay the price for higher raises than their colleagues will get at UNL and UNMC. Actually, it will be students at UNO and UNK paying for the higher raises. A tuition increase higher than the usual 5 percent may be inevitable in a tight budget year, but faculty members’ greed in saving their raises will cost the students at UNO and UNK. Tuition bills wilLgo up 2 percent at UNO and 1 percent at UNK higher than expected. Surprisingly, faculty members at UNL are not insisting that their students’ tuition go up to allow for salary raises equal to those at UNO and UNK. That indicates collegial ity. UNO and UNK faculty members showed their true colors when they refused NU President Martin Massen gale’s request to renegotiate their salary raises to accom modate the lower-than-expected level of state funding. UNO and UNK faculty members’ gripes are unfounded. The quality of education at those campuses may go up as a result of the raises due to increased ability to recruit faculty members, but the price has been high. * Collegiality within the university has been lost. — Victoria Ayoue for the Daily Nebraskan -LETTER POLICY The Daily Nebraskan welcomes brief letters to the editor from all readers. Letters will be selected for publication on the basis of clarity, originality, timeliness and space availability. The Daily Nebraskan retains the right to edit letters. Letters should be typewritten and ‘ less than 500 words. Anonymous submissions will not be published Letters should include the author’^ name, address, phone number, year in school and group af filiation, if any. Submit material to the Daily Ne braskan, 34 Nebraska Union, 1400 R St, Lincoln, Neb. 68588-0448. ______- 1IIVJ IWIIIKU UK WIC UI UIC UCIIIUC racy movement, but workers, jour nalists and intellectuals soon joined. By the middle of May, Tiananmen Square had seen several demonstra tions with up to 1 million partici pants. The Chinese government watched this demonstration of the people’s will with growing concern but took little substantive action until martial law was imposed on May 20. Tens of thousands of soldiers in ar mored personnel carriers ringed the city. But in an astonishing display of nonviolent resistance, ordinary citi zens of Beijing rushed into the streets to protect the students from soldiers. They pleaded successfully with the soldiers not to fire on their own brcih „ ren. Witnesses reported soldiers crying quietly. Senior military officials re portedly balked at attacking Beijing’s citizens. This military compassion and re straint continued until around mid night June 3, when soldiers took Tian anmen Square back from the students. They shot, bayonetted, drove over, tear-gassed, and beat the students and other protesters who were still at Tiananmen. A definitive death toll could never be established because hospitals declined to reveal the num bers of dead sent to them that night for fear of government reprisal, and the army is thought to have burned corpses in a great bonfire. At least several hundred died. On the day of the massacre, a New York Times reporter in Beijing was approached by a university student who implored: “We appeal to your country. Our government is mad. We need help from abroad, especially America. There must be something that America can do.” There is something the United States can do. It can withhold economic concessions. But two years later, the administration would instead like to reward the Chinese government for its inhumanity by continuing to ex tend Most Favored Nation status. Holding MFN status entitles a coun try to the lowest rale of import tariffs available in the United States. As a result of holding MFN last year, China’s overall bilateral trade surplus was a In China s case, the distinction between democratic reform and eco nomic reform is even sharper. The very same Deng Xiaoping who or dered the Tiananmen Square crack down instituted agrarian economic reform by decentralizing farms in 1979. On the other hand, Zhao Ziyang, the former Communist Party chief who continued Deng’s economic reforms through the ’80s but dared to support democratic reform, was soundly dis credited by China’s regime after voic ing support for the protesters at Tian anmen in 1989. Bush most likely will muster the votes necessary in Congress to extend MFN status to the Chinese govern ment, though perhaps with some weak caveats. In his eagerness to see free markets flourish, he seems to have forgotten the Chinese martyrs to lib erty. But the world has not forgotten. History will judge against Bush’s China policy. This, however, is little consolation for those who lost their lives at Tian anmen Square on June 3 and 4 of 1989. Potter is a senior physics, philosophy, math and history major. massive $10.4 billion. Supporters of Bush’s China policy argue that to continue to punish China’s government for its human rights abuses would only empower the hard-liners, forcing China to renounce its recent economic reforms in favor of its pre vious policy of rigid slate control. By* extending MFN, the supporters say, the United States would give the re formers more credibility and power by encouraging trade and thereby increasing China’s gross national product. But such arguments fail to distin guish between economic reform and democratic reform. They simply as sume that in some vague way capital ist economies necessarily promote civil and democratic rights. They do not. One need look only as far as South Africa, El Salvador, or South Korea for flagrant human and civil rights abuses perpetrated by capitalist coun tries. Bush would ex CrtUnge numun ngfUS /fir Lfli/igir gestures toward a market econ■ devoid of humanity and defies logic.