l4 £fs~ri$!an Daity Seventy-nine years of editorial freedom Edited and managed by students of the University of Michigan Footing the government's propaganda bill 20 Maynard St., Ann Arbor, Mich. News Phone: 764-0552 Editorials printed in The Michigan Doily express the individual opinions of staff writers or the editors, This must be noted in all reprints. TURDAY, JANUARY 17, 1970. NIGHT EDITOR: JIM NEUBACHER The new VP: A man for all students IDEALLY, the new v i c e president for student services would be selected this spring in the election held for the next SGC president. The SGC president would' serve for one year as vice president, shar- ing executive duties equally with .other officers. Students would then be repre- sented in the administration through their choice of this student andr through the election of SGC representatives. There are perhaps valid reasons why this procedure might not work. For one, the fact that an SGC president is a full- time student would prevent him from full time duties in the administration. IT WOULD SEEM that the next b e s t thing would be for students to elect a board t h a t would determine policy in student affairs. Students could influence and effect policy through this board and through SGC. This board would employ the services of a vice president who would be a full-time admrinistrator and repre- sentative of student interests in the Uni- versity administration. But such an arrangement would pre- vent problems for the University's execu- tive officers. And well it should. For the administration sees the new man as one of them. T h e y cannot reconcile them- selves to the idea that a vice president for student services should owe his pri- mary allegiance to the students. The University's executive officers de- fine themselves as olicy makers rather than as employes o the University who have been hired to tend to its adminis- trative affairs. The administrators see themselves as heading a kind of corpor- ation, and the selection of a new v i c e president for student services, is like the appointment of a company personnel di- rector. UNFORTUNATELY, the fact that t h e student -faculty search committee named several candidates, thereby giving Fleming a choice, complicated the prob- lem. The committee should have decided upon one choice for the job and present- ed the name to Fleming. If the commit- tee could not reach a consensus then sev- eral names could have been presented to a student vote or to SGC.' But the committee determined to offer{ Fleming several choices, choices he really has no right to make. And it seems prob- able that Fleming's choice will not be the man who would necessarily best repre- sent student interests. Already, he has re- fused to interview Peter Steinberger, who vants any meeting between himself and Fleming be made public. IT IS ALSO apparent that Fleming and the administration want the new vice president to have only minimal ties to the proposed policy board. The argument goes that a vice president bound to a pol- icy board would be little more t h a n a clerk and thus ineffectual in .the admin- istration. There is no reason to believe that this need necessarily be true. A vice president who believes in student input into decis- ion-making will remain his own m a n when he follows policy board recommen- dations. Naturally, the executive officers prefer to deal with a man who is only responsible to himself a n d to Fleming, but it is clear that students know their own interests and need a representative' not a consoling guru in the administra-, tion. STUDENTS MUST make use of the delay n Fleming's choice to make it clear that the next vice president is to repre- sent their interests, and that these in- terests w ii11 be determined by a policy board and not by him. Students must also take steps to insure the creation of a strong policy b o a r d, which would mean that the board has the power to hire and fire the vice president. for student services. Only then will student interests be the purpose of the new vice president's role and not merely the excuse for it. -STEVE ANZALONE Editorial Page Editor By DAVE CHUDWIN AT A TIME WHEN the administration is asserting the n e e d for spending priorities, millions of dollars a year are being wasted on expensive, propagandistic, self-serving public relations efforts. With $200 billion budgets, the several million dollars spent by gov- ernment agencies on "public affairs" - the bureaucratic name for public relations - might not seem important. But a million dollars can build 200 low-cost housing units, pay a hundred school teachers for a year, or start the clean-up of a polluted river. The Defense Department, for example, has almost 6,000 civilian and military personnel performing public relations activities oriented toward the public. Another 684 people are assigned to Congressional liaison. The total bill for these lobbying activities is unknown. The depart- ment admits spending $9.2 million on public affairs but the pay of military personnel involved is not included. SEN. WILLIVM FULBRIGHT (D-Ark.), who is making an investi- gation into the department's public relations efforts, estimates that the total amount is a minimum of $28 million. The Defense Department gives an additional $8.2 million as the cost of its congressional lobbying contingent. This is not to say that public information efforts are totally wrong. The public has a right to know what its government is doing. However, it does not take 6,000 people to explain what the military is accom- plishing. Or perhaps it does. With budget priorities so out of touch with real needs, it is not surprising that federal agencies must employ huge pub- lic relations staffs to justify their programs. Far too many of these people spend their time writing glowing press releases about personnel in their unit, producing propagandistic unit newspapers and movies, going on speaking tours, and escorting VIP's around bases and battlefield areas. Far too few Defense Department public affairs officers are engaged in working directly with the press, helping the dissemination of infor- mation. For example, of the 215 people assigned to the office of the As- sistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs only 20 work in the Press Division. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is another agency top-heavy with a public affairs staff that performs functions other than the distribution of information. Only 82 of NASA's 249- person public relations staff are concerned with public information THE REST ARE USED to produce lavish, full-color movies and publications about NASA's glories, write speeches for space agency of- ficials, lead VIP's around NASA facilities, and construct exhibits de- fining the space program and man's trip to the moon. A final example, the State Department, employs only 10 of the 181 people in its Bureau of Public Affairs for working with the press. The State Department public affairs effort, now headed by former astronaut Michael Collins, illustrates another fact of life about most government public relations operations - they are often blatantly propagandistic.. One of the State Department's series of publications, for example, is called Vietnam Information Notes. Titles include "Viet-Cong Terror Tactic in South Vietnam," "Legal Basis for U.S. Military Aid to South Vietnam," "Why We Fight in Vietnam," and "National Reconcilation in South Vietnam." Making assertations such as "If there had been no violation by North Vietnam of article 10 of the Geneva agreement, calling for total cessation of hostilities, there would be no war in Vietnam today." These pamphlets, not surprisingly, present a propagandistic, one-sided view of U.S. intervention in Vietnam. Another ploy common to many public affairs staffs is aggrandize- ment of top officials of the agency involved. The State Department has issued a number of fancy, elaborate pamphlets with speeches and pho- tographs of the President and Secretary of State. Similarly, government public relations operations are far too often self-serving, effusively presenting good news and hushing-up the bad. THE SPACE AGENCY is one of the masters of this art. To view its spectacular launches NASA usually invites five to ten thousand of- ficials from government, commerce and industry, providing them with special briefings and transporting them to an exclusive viewing area near the launch center at Cape Kennedy NASA provides lavish arrangements for the press during launchings in a two-story building rented for that purpose. Comprehensive tours, press conferences, interviews and transportation to a reserved viewing stand to see the launch are provided.. Despite this open-arm hospitality for launch shows, when prob- lems develop the space agency clams up. For example, after the Apollo fire of January, 1967 in which a as- tronauts died NASA imposed a total blackout on news of the tragedy for three days, leading to all kinds of wild rumors about what really happened. Similarly, a week before NASA announced the closing of its Elec- tronics Research Center public affairs officials denied any knowledge of plans to shutdown the laboratory. NASA, AN OLD JOKE among space reporters goes, stands for Nev- er A Straight Answer. President Nixon this last week asked for further cuts in the plan- ned 1971 budget. Rather than slash funds for anti-pollution programs, urban rehabilitation, education and medical research, the President should consider scaling down the expensive, propagandistic public af- fairs operations in the federal government. 4y What nakes a Regent tick? By JUDY SARASOHN WHILE FACING an occasional crisis, the Regents prefer to make University policy decisions in a calm and orderly fashion. However, this principle was car- ried to extremes yesterday after- noon when it took more than two hours for the Regents to give their approval to a proposed Bursley branch of the University Student Discount Store. During the course of what amounted to a two hour filibuster by Regent Robert Brown, various other Regents let their thoughts drift in a calm and orderly fashion off to some nether world far away from the University. Regent Otis Smith napped for a little while at the beginning of the meeting. But he awoke and after gaining a second wind he alternated between alert comments and glassy eyes and proposed-up head. Sleep being his first priority, Regent Gerald Dunn, only man- aged to open his eyes every quarter of an hour. During one of his particularly long snoozes, Regent Robert Ne- derlander tried throwing notes across the table at Dunn to wake him up-but to no avail. "LET HIM SLEEP, let him sleep," whispered Regent Gertrude Huebner, admonishing Nederland- er. With Mrs. Huebner waving her arms up and down and stage whispering to Nederlander across the table, the other glassy eyed and nodding Regents gradually noticed their sleeping comrade, Dunn jolted awake and good- naturedly chuckled at himself when he realized everyone had, been watching him but immediate- ly proceeded to go back to sleep. Dunn periodically awoke and he tried to stay awake-he really did try. He rubbed his eyes, he lit cigarettes-he never did itfe smoke but held them straight up in the air and let them burn down. Dunn also tried walking around the room but sleep' would always prevail over his better in- tentions. Regent William Cudlip did not fall asleep during the afternoon session because he did not attend the afternoon session.. Although Regent Lawrence Lin- demer started off strong, towards 3 p.m. he collapsed and put his head in his arms on the table. Lindemer would pick his head up to argue a point and when he fin- ished speaking he would collapse again. Mrs. Huebner and Nederlander appeared to be alert during most of the meeting alt ough they seemed to enjoy watbhing Dunn sleep. Dunn awoke again during the discussion on the store's Xerox. machine. He brightened and ex- claimed, "Four cent a copy is cheap." Dunn grew grumpy when Linde- mer told SGC Treasurer Dennis Webster not to worry if the Re- gents did not approve the recom- mendations he wished. "We meet every month, you know," explain- ed Lindemer: Dunn, along with many others, did not wish to go through those discussions anymore. There were several smiles when President Fleming explained that he ar- ranged with Webster to have the question settled this meeting and not bring it up again. WITH THAT assurance, Dunn stretched out in his chair and with his mouth open went back to sleep. He awoke again later to say, "Mr. President, if I don't get home soon you'll be sued as co-respondent in a divorce suit." Everyone laughed and proceeded to gather up their papers - and when Brown asked another ques- tion Dunn fell back asleep. And one can only wonder just how alert Regent Paul Goebel was yesterday afternoon. He made comments, asked questions, looked at people when they spoke, and appeared to be satisfied with the student store's advocates. When roll call vote was taken several people gasped when he voted against the recommendations for the store. Lindemer immediately turned on Gobel and with his arms raised in disbelief started to question Goebel. Goebel just waved a "be- cause" gesture back. SOME STUDENTS have the sneaking suspicion that the Re- gent's ars not very interested in student 'concerns. aybe before those students try o rouse the Regents interest by taking over a building, they ought to try leaving them some no-doze pills by their agendas. a School inte ration: Same sentiments, new tactics T'HE SUPREME COURT'S ruling that calls for immediate integration of schools in six Southern states has won the nodding approval of .many liberal civil rights sympathizers. With two-thirds of the student reshuffling already ac- complished in Mississippi, and relatively no violence as of yet, liberals imay well regard tpie action as a "qualified suc- cess." They may now see the nation finally on the road to solving the prob- lems of black America. Unfortunately, too few people have tak- en notice that for the most part the public school's classrooms .are still .all-black. Forced integration his resulted in mass migration of whites into all-white private schools. In Mississippi, 100 such schools have been established since September, and the enrollment in previously existing private schools has swelled by as much as 500 per cent in the same period. Then, too, there are many schools which are announcing compliance with the integration order but then continu- ing with segregation in the classrooms. The NAACP is aware of this intramural segregation and hopes to have it declared illegal by next year. But the point is that if the intentions of school integration are to mix white and black enrollments in the same edu- caional facilities, then the recent inte- gration efforts are hardly even a qual- ified success. LEGISLATION HAS again failed to change the entrenched racist atti- tudes of Southern whites. Once enraged at having to bus their children 17 miles to integrate black school districts, they now unhesitatingly transport their children even further to insure them of white classmates. Editorial Sta.' HENRY ORIX. Editor Steps taken by Southern church lead- ers are also effectively blocking real inte- gration in many instances. They are re- sponding to the plaintive cries of their congregations and setting up all-white academies in their churches. Just as Southern whites escaped orders to inte- grate public eating facilitPer by establish- ing private clubs, they r avoid inte- gration in their schools in much the same way. Nor can we disregard the promises of more violent reaction by people 1i k e Lester Maddox. Maddox describes the Supremae Court directive as "a declara- tion of war... . waged against the South and her people." It is clear that the Lester/Maddoxes will do almost anything to "protect" white citizens from the pre- sence of black people in any public facil- ity. When white parents go to the extremes of demanding that toilet seats be chang- ed in previously black schools, it is clear that Washington directives are going to have little effect in changing the atti- tudes of Southern whites. At least in a tactical sense, it is certainly question- able if school integration is really a sign- ificant approach to the plight of the black man in the South. IF THE RESULTS of school integration look unpromising, perhaps we a r e grappling with the wrong problem. It has been several years since J a m e s Meredith crossed the threshhold of white educational institutions, and the status of the black man in the South-or even in the nation as a whole-has not been ele- vated to a desirable extent. Whites in the South, like people a 11 over, have found new methods of react- ing against change. Skirting issues is far more effective than meeting them head on. But sentiments certainly remain the same. And because the reactions are now Ii Letters: The Black Manifesto demands a hearing To the Editor: IT DOCES seem sadly ironic that of all the churches and congrega- tions in Ann Arbor who have been approached by Mr. Charles Tho- mas in his request to give a read- ing of the "Black Manifesto" a Jewish congregation should be the only one to have legal proceedings effected to prevent it. But of even greater irony is their claim that it would effect "irreparable dam-. age" to .them. I have no doubt that this same Jewish congregation and all other Jewish groups would (indeed. have) hastily defend to the nth degree the right to protest the centuries of maltreatment and discrimination wherever and when- ever possible with accusations of anti-semitism cast at whomever would deny them this right and opportunity . and not without great justification! Can it be that now that they find themselves cast in the same light as their historical oppressors tas the "Black Manifestd" most certainly does by addressing its text to "the white Christian churches and Jewish synagogues ... and to all the white racist im- perialists who compose it") this Jewish synagogue is showing its true colors where questions of white versus black justice and op- Jews, Atheists or whatever . will do themselves a tremendous social, and soulful service by not only listening attentively to it being read, or better yet reading it yourselves.) whenever and wher- ever the opportunity presents it- self, but by reacting positively and decisevly to its requests before we are all made to suffer .the irre- parable damage" of another series of racial explosions!! -P. W. Charles Jan. 12 Cynicism To the Editor: 1 YESTERDAY A "large group of Americans" were portrayed in the article "See the U.S.A. as it stagnates away" Daily, Jan. 8). I attack this article not on the truth of the superficiality and low idealism in those American lives, but on its failure to offer a pro- ductive channel for the anxiety it builds. up. Amid today's growing polariza- tion of student and society, editor- ialists on both fides must take the responsibility of thwarting grow- ing cynicism by attaching to their insights into the problem, some of the. positive alternatives other .4 _ ..