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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 19, 1991)
Opinion Passing the buck Administration shells ‘the Hill’ again For weeks, President Bush has tried to play on voters’ frustrations with Congress by complaining that he can’t get anything done because of those stubborn people “up on the Hill.” Cantankerous Capitol Hill residents prevented early approval of unemployment benefits, Bush said, making him look as though he had no compassion for Americans who have no jobs. Last week, finally, an agreement was reached on jobless benefits. Also last week, Congress tried to heed Bush’s call on a different domestic issue. The Senate endorsed a plan to place a floating cap on credit card interest rates. It did so only after Bush on Tuesday urged banks to lower rates from the 18-19 percent range. Lower interest rates, he said, would make people spend again. That could bring the economy out of recession. On Friday, the stock market experienced a mini-crash, the fifth-worst drop in its history. Many economists blamed the collapse on the enthusiasm for the ceiling on credit cards. Eliminating usurious interest rates, they said, would dry up the easy credit that makes economic growth possible. With no plastic, people wouldn’t spend because they couldn’t spend. But the Bush administration tried to sidestep blame for the stock decline. Jack Kemp, secretary of housing and urban develop ment, argued that the Senate was actually at fault. Bush’s appeal for lower interest rates, Kemp said, was merely a request for bankers to act voluntarily, not for increased government regulation such as the Senate plan. But if Bush really believed that bankers would slash the interest rates merely because he said it would be nice if they did, he is either naive or he doesn’t understand a capitalist system. Banks exist because they can make money. Right now, however, banks are hurting. Because of the large number of bank failures recently — many brought on by even riskier loans made during the 1980s — money lenders must earn all they can from credit cards. High credit card interest rates are a risky but profitable way of making some money to alleviate the financial hurt. Banks won’t drop their rates simply because the president fusses about the high price of plastic money. If Congress passes some sort of flexible ceiling on these interest rates, Bush once again will have achieved part of a backhanded domestic agenda. Once again, however, he will also be able to blame the negative side effects, such as the stock market drop, on the Democratic Congress. — E.F.P. Trading Apollo spacecraft preserves space heritage On behalf of the Nebraskans for the Advancement of Space Develop ment, I would like to state that we were gratified to sec your positive stand regarding the trading of Apollo 009 for a number of valuable space artifacts. It is in the best interest of this spacecraft that it be restored by the Kansas Cosmosphcrc for future generations to enjoy. We should always remember that this spacecraft docs not belong to us as Nebraskans, but it belongs to all citizens of the United States whose taxes paid for its devel opment and to the people of the world who share in the promise of space. On the other hand, the altitude shown in the letter from David Davis (“UNL bungled Apollo 009 barter,” DN, Nov. 18) typifies the sad lack of knowledge about our heritage that is all too common in regard to not only the space program in the United States but also to the efforts of nations around the world. Davis may be new to UNL, but he is also totally uninformed as to space history. Apollo 009 was a test capsule used in a sub-orbital flight. It did not go to the Moon, nor did it have any crew. It was simply a test vehicle. The items the Cosmosphcrc has of fered arc of such historic and educa tional value as to be deemed price less. For instance, the Apollo 13 computer is the device that literally saved the lives of three astronauts. When a pressurized lank on their craft ruptured, the injured spacecraft was already on the way to the Moon, thou sands of miles from Earth. This on board computer was used to navigate Apollo 13 to a safe return to Earth. I doubt Jim Lovall, Rusty Swigert or Fred Haisc — the crew of Apollo 13 — would have considered their com puter to be a piece of “trivial space junk.” Craig Cleaver president Nebraskans for the Advancement of Space Development -LETTER POLICY The Daily Nebraskan welcomes brief letters to the editor from all readers. Anonymous submissions will not be considered for publication. Let ters should include the author’s name, year in school, major and group affiliation, if any. Requests to withhold names will not be granted. Submit material to the Daily Ne braskan, 34 Nebraska Union, 1400 R St., Lincoln, Neb. 68588-0448. ' f rs SHE YiftfCWG. K ^\UA 7 WALTER GHOLSON Colleges should remove blinders One of the most complex issues facing university administra tors these days is how to re tool their institutions to reflect state and federal mandates for cultural, racial and gender diversity. This problem is not going to be easy to solve because of the long history of excluding these groups from mainstream American institutions. Affirmative action guidelines at most universities arc at best long range promises to achieve racial and gender equity by some far-off date that has passed several times since the document was written. The guidelines arc usually huge volumeschock full of grandiose plans for implementing the almost impos sible dream of equal opportunity for all Americans regardless of race, creed, color, sex and sexual orientation, re ligion, national origin and just about everything else that has been used to discriminate against minority groups. For the most part, they arc collec tions of wishful-thinking documents designed to appease federal inspec tions. In short, they arc hundreds of words saying the university is “plan ning” to become an equal-opportu nity employer as soon as it can locate some “qualified” people. Ana lor years, the elusive question of qualification has been used as the main reason why most of these “lib eral” institutions cannot find anyone from these under-represented groups whom they believe has the education and experience to become a member of their elite academic country club. As a result of being forced to find qualified members from those tar geted groups, the institutions say their standards must be lowered to find someone or risk losing funding and accreditation. At this point in the game, the old boys’ network starts to chant “quotas, quotas” while its spokesmen make speeches about how unfair it is to have to hire a person just because of race or gender. Maybe I missed something, but isn’t that the main reason for all those pages of plans affirming the actions of universities to provide equal op Affirmative action guidelines at most uni versities are at best long-range promises la achieve racial and sender equity bv some far-off date that has passed several times since the document mi written. portunitics for those who have been locked out of mainstream education for centuries? After all, it seems perfectly clear to me that if all the ducks in the pond happen to be orange and male, and all the ducks outside of the pond arc purple and female, the solution would be simply to make room for the other ducks before they forget how to swim. But in the university pond, the prob lem seems not to be in the choice of ducks, but in the size of the pond. The prevailing fear is that in order to include qualified ducks of other genders and colors in the pond of qualified swimmers, either the pond must be enlarged or some of the old boy network ducks must get out of the water. And this seems to be one of the major problems facing our educa tional institutions when it comes to implementing their plans for equal ity: The fear that draining the pond to enlarge it will uncover those ducks who haven’t been swimming, just treading water for the last 20 years; the fear that after such long and illus trious careers in pursuit of academic stagnation, many of these “qualified” professionals have developed some thing to replace their webbed feet — a permanent set of blinders that pre vents any peripheral vision and keeps their attention on the security of their elitism. As a result, they have become non functional fixtures in the ivory towers of academia and arc having a difficult time with anybody’s suggestions that they have to change. But change they must if they arc seriously committed to providing challenging educational experiences for today’s students. To prepare these students for a future that is not color or gender-blind, they will have to undergo some radical surgery. The real problem here seems obvi ous. These old ducks have grown quite fond of their ivory-tower blind ers and many of them really don’t want to swim with the landlocked ducks. The other day one of my favorite professors said that if American uni versities arc really interested in chang ing their image, they should discard all that affirmative action jargon. He said they should just come out front and say they need a Native American, a Mexican, an African-American and a female. ui course, nc was rignt, out sum talk means that he runs the risk ol being labeled quota-happy. For me, the need for such a simple solution is also easy to understand. It’s like being in a race where every one has been issued track shoes ex cept you. By the time you get your shoes, the other runners arc half-way around the track. No one wants to talk about why you weren’t issued shoes, but if you happen to gel close to the other run ner, everybody wants to know how you got your shoes, not why you got them late. (i hoi son is a senior news-editorial major and a Daily Nebraskan columnist. -:-EDITORIAL POLICY signed suut editorials represent the official policy of the Fall 1991 Daily Nebraskan. Policy is set by the Daily Nebraskan Editorial Board. Its members are: Jana Pedersen, editor; Eric Pfanner, editorial page editor; Diane Brayton, managing editor; Walter Gholson, columnist; Paul Domcier, copy desk chief; Brian • Shclliio, cartoonist; Jeremy Fitzpa trick, senior reporter. Editorials do not necessarily re flect the views of the university, its employees, the students or the NU Board of Regents. Editorial columns represent the opinion of the author. The Daily Nebraskan’s publishers are the regents, who established the UNL Publications Board to super vise the daily production of the pa per. ( According to policy set by the re gents, responsibility for the editorial content of the newspaper lies solely in the hands of its students.