The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current, February 18, 1999, Page 4, Image 4

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    EDITOR
Erin Gibson
OPINION
EDITOR
Cliff Hicks
EDITORIAL
BOARD
Nancy Christensen
Brad Davis
Sam McKewon
Jeff Randall
Bret Schulte
Our
VIEW
Silent
statement
With a budget cut, UPC
is forced to make choices
Faced with a budget cut, choices must be
made.
The Committee for Fees Allocation sent a
clear message to some student fee users
Tuesday: Do more with less.
Though CFA pledged earlier this semester to
hold the line on spending, it voted Tuesday to
increase student fees $14, raising fees from $240
to $254 each semester.
Part of the increase was because of a state
mandated 4 percent salary increase pending in
the Legislature.
Each year, a group of students forms the
CFA, and pours over the budgets of fund-using
organizations. The group is sometimes forced to
make difficult budget cuts.
Most fee-using organizations, including
Campus Recreation and the Daily Nebraskan,
provide stellar services for what they receive.
Some fee users, however, could follow the
way of big-business, and “downsize” to trim
costs.
Both the University Program Council and
* *_ Student Involvement
•• were denied parts of
I don’t want their budget increase
requests.
UPC to so . UPC s budget
° increase request was
away. I want £,ut i° p®rcent
Tuesday, which one
them to CFA member said
would force the pro
shape up.” gramming group to
r r evaluate which shows
Jeff Woodward and musica* acts are
CFA member most, lmPor,ant an<1
_ popular.
CFA didn’t deny
the increase to be
malicious, but instead it realized that UPC need
ed to, well, get its acts together.
“I don’t want UPC to go away,” CFA member
Jeff Woodford said. “I want them to shape up.”
Often, UPC members say the organization
doesn’t have enough money to lure big-name
acts to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
It’s indisputable that Lincoln doesn’t quite
have the reputation in the entertainment world of
Lawrence, Kan., or Ames, Iowa, but the pro
gramming council certainly can draw more than
a washed-up rap group once a year.
With its pared-down budget, the Daily
Nebraskan agrees with CFA, and charges UPC
to bring students more for less.
While it’s important to bring musical acts,
comedy shows and plays that aren’t of Top-40
popularity, it’s also possible for UPC to cut down
on smaller shows and put more money toward a
few bigger ones.
Few students attend small concerts in The
Crib, and frankly, a concert during the mid-after
noon can be annoying to students hungry for a
quiet place to study.
UPC’s events aren’t a total bust, with appear
ances by old-school rap group Run DMC,
Simpsons animation director David Silverman
and MTV’s Loveline topping the list of student
favorites.
The organization should build on these suc
cesses and put more money toward program -
ming of its caliber - programming that people
actually attend and enjoy.
Editorial Policy
Unsigned editorials are the opinions of
the Spring 1999 Daily Nebraskan. They
do not necessarily reflect the views of the
University of Nebraska-Lincoln, its
employees, its student body or the
University of Nebraska Board of Regents.
A column is solely the opinion of its author.
' The Board of Regents serves as pubisher
of the Daily Nebraskan; policy is set by
the Daily Nebraskan Editorial Board. Tne
UNL Publications Board, established by
the regents, supervises the production
of the paper. According to policy set by
the regents, responsibility tor the editorial
content of the newspaper lies solely in
the hands of its student employees.
Letter Policy
The Daily Nebraskan welcomes brief
letters to the editor and guest columns,
but does not guarantee their publication.
The Daily Nebraskan retains the right to
edit of reject any material submitted.
Submitted material becomes property of
the Daily Nebraskan and cannot be
returned. Anonymous submissions will
not be published. Those who submit
letters must identify themselves by name,
year in school, major and/or group
affiliation, if any.
Submit material to: Daily Nebraskan, 34
Nebraska Union, 1400 R St. Lincoln,
NE. 68588-0448. E-mail:
letters@unlmfo.iml.edu.
Lupo’s
VIEW
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LETTERS
So you say •••
Throw out the political parties,
“convicted” or “acquitted,” and let’s
get down to the heart of die matter.
The problem is the decision-making
of William Jefferson Clinton. It
makes absolutely no difference
whether what he actually did is our
business or not. He made many deci
sions out of totally selfish motives
(which he has admitted to) and that
reflects on him as a person. We DO
have a right to know about the charac
ter and integrity of a man who can
affect the entire world with one state
ment
How can any justification be
found in saying it was all right for
Clinton to lie because the question
shouldn’t have been asked? That’s
like saying it’s OK to kill somebody
because you don’t think they should
own a gun! There is no correlation
between the two whatsoever. Also, is
it any solace that Clinton is morally in
the bottom third of the people in this
country? According to die polls cited
in “Our View” (2/15), two out of three
people in the U.S. think it’s allowable
to cheat on your spouse as long as you
don’t lie about it*
If Clinton is truly sorry for what
he did, then it was good of him to
apologize. However, that doesn’t
change the fact that he is not above
the law. In America, there is supposed
to be “justice for all,” even the presi
dent.
Jayson Bishop
sophomore
computer engineering
JeffHemje
sophomore
electrical engineering
Suspicious facts?
I am writing in response to Mr.
Peterson’s column “Suicidal tenden
cies” (Feb. 12). In it, he states that in
the Netherlands “babies bom with
Down’s syndrome and spina bifida
are now routinely euthanized ” This
statement is false and defaming to the
people of the Netherlands. In my
country, babies are never euthanized,
regardless of their condition at birth.
Under Dutch law, such an act would
be considered murder, and those
guilty of it would be punished
accordingly.
I feel deeply offended by Mr.
Peterson’s portrayal of my country as
a place where newborns are “routine
ly’’ killed according to the whims of
parents or doctors.
Considering Mr. Peterson is a
news-editorial major, he should be
careful to verify the source of infor
mation before allowing his columns
to be published.
Sander Arendsen
department of biochemistry
Contesting assertions
I want to compliment Matt
Peterson on his column on euthana
sia. I agree with part of his conclu
sion that death should not be ruled
out as a final option for those in
severe physical pain.
However, I am disturbed by what
Peterson writes about the euthanasia
policy in my country, the
Netherlands.
The allegation that babies born
with Down’s syndrome and spina
bifida are routinely euthanized in the
Netherlands is false. Peterson’s infor
mation is coming from unreliable
anti-euthanasia Web sites such as
http:/fwww. worldmag. com/world/iss
ue/05-23-98/cover_1. asp.
The accusation that comatose
patients have sometimes been put to
death in our country without individ
ual or familial consent is, at least,
One-sided.
Euthanasia is illegal in the
Netherlands. However, doctors are
not prosecuted for it if the patient is in
hopeless and intolerable pain, if the
patient has voluntary and well-con
sidered given permission and if at
least two doctors agree on the proce
dure.
: My country has adopted this poli
cy to prevent situations like the shoot
ing of his terminally ill wife by the
74-year-old Nebraskan Bob Olrich.
In the Netherlands, people can
say goodbye for eternity to their ter
minally ill and suffering loved ones in
a more human way.
Richard Luykea
finance
graduate student
exchange student in finance
from the Netherlands
Editors note: The information for
the column “Suicidal tendencies ”
has been called “suspect ” by more
than one letter writer, so the locations
from which the columnist took his
information are presented here:
http://www. ohiolife. org/euth/neth
hist.htm and http://x\,ww.chninterna
tional.com/chninfo3. htm.