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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (April 10, 2000)
Opinion I Good intentions, poor execution - Local entertainment taskforce ; lacks solid planning The best shows don’t come to Lincoln. Concert-goers are forced to travel at least to Omaha, if not hundreds of miles far ther, to catch their favorite acts in concert. That is the way it has been for some time, but now the mayor wotild like to change that. In January, the mayor formed a task force to determine how to improve concert and entertainment opportunities in Lincoln. - • That’s a nice idea - we’d love to have better shows closer to home - but it has beeu poorly executed. The 23-member task force includes representatives from jr . the major venues in town (Pershing, 1J a promoter Devaney, the Lied Center), local appa thfit promoters and advertisers and the ^ UL University Program Council. Lincoln can’t I Our sole student representative is former^ASUN President Andy sell out shows Schuerman, who may do a fine job, 7 7 7 but what does he know about con at local bars, certs? thp mninr nrtv Local Performing artists. wh° ntujKJt might know about booking shows in will never area anc* constraints °f tour ing, were omitted from the task come. force The mayor’s task force also excluded representatives from Lincoln’s smaller venues (Duffy’s Tavern, Knickerbockers and The Zoo Bar) even though they feature regular concerts. Sometimes they bring in nationally-known acts. If anyone would know why Lincoln can’t attract big-name acts, it would be these bar owners. They have the expertise. Not only were representatives from The Zoo Bar and Knickerbockers initially excluded from the task force, they didn’t even know it existed until a Daily Nebraskan reporter contacted them last week. The task force’s chairman said it doesn’t matter if Duffy’s or Pershing is involved, because they face the same issues. It demonstrates a lack of thought and effort that the most active participants in Lincoln’s concert scene did not even know the task force existed. Better concerts must be built from the bottom up. If a pro moter sees that Lincoln can’t sell out shows at local bars, the major acts will never come. Not everyone involved in Lincoln’s music scene needs to * be on this task force, but the experts need to be consulted. Without them, this task force’s recommendations will be worthless. Editorial Board Josh Funk (editor) • J. J. Harder • Cliff Hicks • Samuel McKewon • Dane Stickney • Kimberly Sweet • Lindsay Young 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 or reject any sub missions. Submittpd material becomes property of the Daily Nebraskan and cannot be returned. Anonymous material 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, 20 Nebraska Union, 1400 R St., Lincoln, Neb. 68588-0448 or e-mail to: letters@unl.edu Editorial Policy Unsigned editorials are the opinions of the spring 2000 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 col umn is solely the opinion of its author. The Board of Regents acts as publisher of the Daily Nebraskan; policy is set .by the Daily Nebraskan Editorial Board. The UNL Publications Board, established by the regents, supervises the publication of the paper. According to policy set by the regents, responsi bility for the editorial content of the newspaper lies solely in the hands of its student employees. The Daily Nebraskan strives to print fair and accurate coverage; any corrections or clarifications will be printed on page three. Obermeyer’s VIEW # ^ |F Bill ’wE#e~'~hiso~WcmG£ of *Ufc MS iNMT SrJi bCkVBMK f&Ncyftriohi c... ' ~ wSriM. 1 ,rZJl OLYMPIC-CLASS \ ~ . tTI ^tms [^£BL SUR£ IS \ \ U!«E; gur TUB ONPi f ”¥ \ f&SgIBM WfTU -mOQ> [\ \Stairs wMpi°os£^.y i \UAWD j :' ^ w $ut at least \ | NoW we can stay \ COMPETITIVE / * ^rr« other / rkUN!V£/?S(T/^. / 1 fN^!^ * A few left off Jacob Glazeski, I was reading your column on Friday and thought of a few groups you were leaving off your “evil” list. For instance: fraternities. Or how about campus sports teams? How about the university itself? You see, these are all agents of “political socialization.” All of these “gangs” prey on “vulnerable and lonely individuals.” Your family is probably the worst because they get you when you are just a wee little baby; die rest get you when you come to college in prob ably one of the most open-minded stages of your life. They all teach “val ues” (read: evil) and build powerful relationships within their groups. And I can’t see how any of these are evil. So, Glazeski, you are a hypocrite. You are using the same tactics that these “Gangs of Faith” use. Calling some thing “evil” is perhaps the easiest and laziest way to make a point. You think that you could do a little more in a half page article than call people names. Some agent of freedom you are! You seem to like everything about the first amendment — except that nasty clause that allows religion to exist. Joe Fraas junior English ‘My answer is YES’ In “Time Served” (DN, 4/6), Cliff Hicks poses the question, “Is it really fair to prisoners who have served their time... to be haunted by their mistakes until their lives become a living hell, regardless of whether they will ever commit another crime?” ■*> My answer is —YES! I was a victim of sexual assault as a child. The “mistake” that my attacker made has haunted me ever since and will continue to do so for the rest of my life. No amount of therapy or support will ever take away the pain. I am left to deal with this for as long as I live. I Meanwhile, my attacker, who f was sentenced to one year in prison i (but was released after six months) > wanders around my hometown and ? lives his life as though nothing ever happened. If Megan’s Law will keep even one child safe from a repeat attacker, then this law has suc ceeded. There is always a chance that this law will be ■ abused. Every law is; that’s v why we have a penal system. No, our legal system is not perfect, and it never will be. But instead of condemn Letters to the EDITOR ing a law that actually works to serve the good of the community, why not attempt to answer the real question: Are we serving to punish criminals, or are we out to rehabilitate them? Name Withheld Glad we’re around In response to Jacob Glazeski’s “Gangs of Faith,” (DN, Friday) Joyce Minor from the University of Alabama School of Law once asked, “How many hospitals, universities, orphanages, homeless and abuse shelters have been founded by the ACLU or American Atheist Society?” Now, aren’t you glad we “thumpers” are around? Jason Bresley sophomore aviation No hypotheses I am writing in response to the edi torial by Betsy Severin (DN, Friday) on the scientific value of “scientific cre ationism.” It is unfortunate that the debate between evolution and “scientif ic creationism” is mostly just that: a debate, where the most convincing speaker with the most palatable argu ment wins. People outside science seem to feel they cannot judge the merit of either side because they are not experts in biology or geology. Luckily, all of us are capa ___— ble of judging science and non-science. Science is a rational process that involves testing a hypothesis, creating the potential for others to repeat the test and making predictions about the sys tem under study. Science is a self-cor recting process because ideas and con clusions are reviewed by other experts in the field, who use these criteria and their expertise to judge the merit of a scientific idea. We can observe evolution occur ring all around us, from antibiotic resistant bacteria, to mutating viruses, to corn varieties that resist disease, drought and pests. Hypotheses about how evolution works are constantly being tested, tests are being repeated on different organisms and situations and are helping humans by their predictive power. The development of flu shots is a good example. Researchers collect data on what strains are virulent and spread ing around the world, and using a hypothesis, predict which one is going to get us that year. Usually they’re right, and those of us who get flu shots don’t get the flu. If this didn’t work, researchers wouldn’t do it, since it wouldn’t help and would be a huge waste of money. Proponents ot scientific creation ism” have not developed any working, testable hypotheses. Biology textbooks contain huge numbers of references to peer-reviewed scientific papers, are often written by researchers who have done much work and hypotheses are included after a great amount of work has been published. None of Severin’s sources are peer-reviewed, and although I do not ■ have them in front of me, I doubt \ * they contain references to scien tific papers. I encourage anyone > V interested in this debate to focus vM on the scientific criteria of the publications, rather than attempting to figure out if the arguments make sense to them or sound appealing. Severin and I seem to agree on one thing: it’s impor tant to keep asking questions and increasing our knowl edge. Delan Lonowski/DN Andrea Bair graduate research assistant Division of Vertebrate Paleontology University of Nebraska State Museum