Seventy-eight years of editorial freedom
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News Phone: 764-0552
Editorials printedin The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of staff writers
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TUESDAY, AUGUST 5, 1969
NIGHT EDITOR: MARCIA ABRAMSON
Y
ABM and the
professional
THE SHOCKING revelation of defense
contractor links to pro-ABM adver-
tisements comes as appropriate fore-
shadowing for tomorrow's Senate vote on'
that system.
According to research done by New
York Times reporter Neil Sheehan 55 of
the 344 signers of a widely distributed
pro-ABM newspaper advertisement are
intimately tied to the defense industry.
Among those linked to the defense com-
munity are 14 who are connected with
firms already doing work on ABM under
the more than $1 billion in contracts, let
by the government in previous .fiscal
years, for development of the system.
Also included in the 55 ar~e 20 men con-
nected with companies which rank among
the top 100 defense contractors in volume
of business and 21 more who are asso-
ciated with firms that do some defense
business or will be potential, contractors
for ABM if the administration's plan is
approved. The advertisement made no
mention of the defense connections of
any of the signers.
THE 'COMPLICITY between th'e admin-,
istration . and the organizers behind
the ad is amazing.
Toward
educational
relevance
FROM TULSA, Oklahoma, comes this
startling manifesto: Only one Com-
munist has been uprooted in the country
in the last 25 years, "and the time has
come when our government must capture
more."
And recognizing the value of educa-
tion in this pursuit, Christian Crusader
Billy James Hargis, a conservative
evangelist in a time of booming conser-
vatism, initiated groundbreaking cere-
monies for a new, hyperpatriotic. college.
Fittingly, the name of the new school
will be American College. Still more fit-
tingly, the college will take up residence
behind a gas station, adjacent to the
Christian Crusade headquarters.
"Dear God," prayed Hargis at the
groundbreaking ceremony, "young people
can. go to so few schools that champion
conservative principles and Americanist
ideas, may we see tonight the neessity of
putting to work what we have while we're
still alive"
"I need $350,000. I need some big gifts.
Not only for the school, but for, all the
other things we're doing."
And with the funds flowing in from a
number of Crusade enterprises - book
sale, tours and a newsletter for George
Corley Wallace - American College will
no doubt be a spiritual Berlin airlift to
beleagured patriots everywhere.
Could it be a new-found relevance for
education?.
-M.H-.
Suimmer S/a f
MARCIA ABRAMSON ............ .......Co-Editor
CHRIS STEELE.......................Co-Editor
MARTIN HIRSOHMAN ..Summer Supplement Editor
JIM FORRESTER ,.. ... Summer Sports Editor
LEE KIRK.........Associate Summer Sports'Editor
ERIC PERGEAUX ................ Photo Editor
war-makers
The ad was paid for by the Citizens
Committee for Peace with Security, an
organization formed last May and headed
by William J. Casey, a prominent New
York Republican. Casey is a law partner
of Leonard Hall, a former chairman of
the Republican Na'tional Committee.
Stories of the way in which chief White
House staffers were instrumental in the
formation of the group have been circu-
lating in the Washington gossip mills for
several months and have grown to con-
siderable credibility. Casey, of course de-
nies these reports.
It is interesting to note that, earlier
this year, Casey was nominated by Presi-
dent Nixon to the Advisory Council of the
United States Arms Control and Disarm-
ament Agency.
More amazing is the cavalier attitude
displayed by Casey in sloughing off the
defense links of those who signed the ad.
"Purely accidental" says Casey of the 55
defense related signers.
Of the three men associated with Olin-
Mathieson who signed the ad, Casey said
"I wouldn't think of Olin-Mathieson as a
defense contractor. That's a chemical
company. They make pesticides."
Olin-Mathieson is among the 50 largest
defense contractors in the nation.
OVER THE PAST several months of
debate on the Safeguard ABM system
an overwhelming body of argument has
been raised against an anti-ballistic
missile system.
Experts have raised considerable doubts
as to the effectiveness of the system.
Several have indicated flatly that ABM
will not work under conditions caused by
recent nuclear explosions. Others have
said that the radar control system, with-
out which the system would be entirely
inoperative, is inpossble to defend from
nuclear assault. Still others have shown
that by the use of decoys the whole sys-
tem could be rendered useless.
PERHAPS MORE significant are the
arguments which have gone beyond
the merely practical aspects of the sys-
tem. Foreign policy experts have insisted
time and again the aggressive nature of
ABM. They say the introduction of the
ABM would only result in a gross escala-
tion of the arms race. They indicate fur-
ther that deployment of the ABM system
would effectively end any hopes of
reaching nuclear arms accord with the
Soviet Union.
Not the least of the arguments raised
against ABM is that of its part in the
continuing story of the domination of
American policy by the military ndustrial
complex.
The support given to the pro-ABM ad-
vertisement by this complex of war-
makers and the thinly veiled connection
between it and the White House are only
the most recent, if perhaps the most
blatant, indications of the power that
complex wields.
BECAUSE THE existence of the military-
industrial complex has come into such
public prominence of late the battle over
ABM has assumed vastly important pro-
portion. By the defeat of ABM a signifi-
cant blow may be struck against the
'monstrous power of the great American
war-makers.;
-CHRIS STEELE
K iartin hirschliain
Letter from NYC
BECAME yesterday, one of the privileged few who is up to date on
an old high school classmate of mine, Frank . The word
came in a letter from a close friend in New York-in Eastern Queens
where we all went to school together.
I quote, in part:
"I shall now make you one of the very privileged few who will be
up to date on the whereabouts of old friend Frank . Several
days ago, I was in the library and I noticed a scraggly-long-haired
kid with well-muscled forearms scribbling equations that were straight
out of Fantastic Four Magazine.
"Without seeing his face I knew who it was. When I accosted
him, he gave a very expressive look which I understood exactly. It
was: 'Damn! I've been discovered!' Well, neither of us was in the
mood to rap with old high school friends, but I found out that he is
still a math major with no idea what he will do with it: he could have
graduated this coming year but will stay an extra year to better devise
a method of draft-dodging: he was home for a week; has a beautiful
apartment in Chicago which he' can't wait to get back to, does not
communicate with any one from home nor cares to; and he does not
give a shit what Brian, you, I, Danny or anyone else is doing; and
hopes he can make it back without running into anyone else."
WHEN WE ALL graduated Martin Van Buren High School in June
1967 Frank had just turned 16. He was that one-in-1200 student (MVB
graduating class of 1967: 1180) who had taken the 12 years of public
school in 10.
And unlike most of the people in that category, Frank had not
collapsed-academically at least-in the process.Without much strain
he ranked 16th in our graduating class; and with seemingly less strain,
he came in fifth in the nation-wide Westinghouse Science Talent
Search.
I could go on. Frank was turned down by Princeton. They've never
accepted anybody from my school. They hate New Yorkers. He went
instead to the University of Chicago. He went alone. He had a 94.3
average in high school and an 800 score on his Math level II college
board.
But in going on, I am, perhaps, presenting more of a picture of
life at Martin Van Buren High School than of Frank. I know all these
irrelevant statistics about him because I knew the same 'about the
other top 20 people in my graduating class.
THAT IS TO SAY, we were competitive. In gym we talked about
physics. At lunch we talked about English. In the evening, we talked
about grades.
And having hated all of, it, I'd much rather talk about Frank.
Unfortunately, I never knew that much about him. What I did know
remains but an uncreased convolution of the mind.
There are some general outlines. Like the gatherings we eumphe-
mistically called parties and how Frank was the first of us-me, Glenn
(who wrote the letter), Danny, Brian and a host of others-to have
the sense to stay home and listen to records instead.
And occasionally we went to play minature golf or bowl or play
cards or just visit one another.
When we graduated, Danny and Brian went to Yale, I came here,
Glenn went to the University of Pennsylvania and Frank went to
Chicago because of the math department there.
Like it or not, (and this has varied considerably with the persons
involved) I have seen all of them since then, except Frank. The word
was that he was enjoying himself and taking graduate courses in math
and not giving a thought to Eastern Queens or Brian, Danny, me or
Glenn.
NOW GLENN'S LETTER confirms all that. Oh, yes, there was one
more paragraph about Frank which, perhaps, sheds some light on why
the letter came from Glenn:
"It was good to see him; I've decided not to tell Brian or anyone
else that I saw him. Frank would want it that way."
In a way, I'm rather glad I remember so little about Frank. Given
my current inclination to splash old friends all over the pages of this
paper, it is of some comfort at least that I haven't given away their
little secrets or their identities. I never knew them very well to start
with.
And peacefully tucked away in some apartment in the university
district of the Windy City, I imagine, Frank would want. it that way.
II11111I~
roll* I
, , l'
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JAMES WECHSLER
Persecuting the President
V
SOMEHOW THE MYTH persists
that large numbers of Amer-
ican liberals retire each night ut-
tering a silent prayer that the
next day will bring a national dis-
aster sufficiently grave to discredit
the Nixon Administration finally
and forever. Such perversity, it is
suggested, makes them incapable
of rendering homage to Nixon
when it is deserved; that explains,
reports Stewart Alsop in the cur-
rent Newsweek, why there is deep-
ening resentment and disdain in
the White House circle toward
any liberal criticism.
It is time to respond that these
lamentations reflect a survival of
the kind of paranoia that produced
Mr. Nixon's ill-fated outcryafter
his defeat in California's guber-
natorial race.
No doubt there are a few fanatic
anti-Nixonites who would experi-
ence a moment of sadistic pleasure
if Nixon stumbled into an atomic
debacle at home and abroad.
(There is another small hate-cult
deriving sickly delight from the
weekend calamity at Martha's
Vineyard.) But such mini-minds
represent no large body of Amer-
icans of any political attachment.
It can be far more persuasively
argued that some of us. during
these first six months of the Nix-
on era, have betrayed excessive
self-consciousnessabout appear-
ing to condemn the man prema-
turely even when the news from
Washington was worst.
THE BASIC TRUTH is that in
what seemed to many the bleak
dawn of Mr. Nixon's election, one
widespread emotion of hope was
discernible in the liberal commu-
nity. It was that he would move
swiftly and decisively in the open-
ing weeks of his Administration to
end the Vietnam war. I know no
liberal tormented by secret appre-
hension about the political divi-
dends such a development would
have brought Mr. Nixon, now or in
1972. I know many who genuinely
believed that-with his impeccable
anti-Communist credentials - he
would be able to force the real
political change in Saigon that
still remains crucial to a nego-
tiated peace.
Now six months have elapsed,
thousands more have died and this
Administration has not even dis-
played .the will or, nerve to insist
upon the release of imprisoned
Truong, Dinh Diu-the runner- up
peace candidate in South-Viet-
nam's 1967 election.
IN PRIVATE AUDIENCES Hen-
ry Kissinger and other Nixon
deputies continue to plead for time
and Mr. Nixop himself assures his
Republican brethren that his goal
is large-scale American withdraw-
al before the Congressional elec-
tion of 1970. I have little doubt
that this is his aim for obvious
political reasons, and that is why
the delay is unconscionable. For
there is little reason to believe
that the finaltscript will differ
sharply from the one that could
have been drafted soon after Mr.
Nixon took office-unless, of
course, a new ' madness seizes
Washington and another escala-
tion begins. Never did casualties
seem more wasted and indefensible
than in this interim of slow mo-
tion.
Yet even as the end almost in-
evitably approaches and "author-
itative" sources whisper optimistic
forecasts of peace in progress, Gen.
Wheeler is sent off to Saigon to
"discover" that the lull in enemy
activity is no semblance of a sign-
al. If, after further quiet, the other
side undertakes a 'new offensive,
the military will proclaim its wis-
dom and foresight.. Is it incon-
ceivable that, in fact, Wheeler's
words will be construed by the ad-
versary as evidencethat we have
again rejected a signal?
One milst assume from the Alsop
report that these comments will
be set down as further proof of
incorrigible a n t i-Nixonism,. It
might only b~e observed that they
are no less harshthan those print-
ed here when Lyndon B. Johnson
and Dean Rusk were floundering
in the Vietnam wasteland. And it
was Richard Nixon who asserted
during his campaign that he had
a secret plan for peace in Viet-
nam. How long will it remain
secret?
Letters
To the Editor:
BY IMPLICATION and omission,
Martin Hirschman' story on
the State Court of Appeals ruling
("U ordered to negotiate with
unions," page 1, Aug. 1) is mis-
leading.
So far as the University is con-
cerned, and has repeatedly stated,
the question is not one of collec-
tive bargaining, but of possible
conflict between the constitution
and legislation. The legislation
happens to involve public employe
unionization.
While raising the question of
legal. conflict, the University has
voluntarily followed the proce-
dures of the Public Employe Re-
lations Act, and was awaiting a
decision of the State Labor Media-
tion Board concerning appropriate
bargaining units when some em -
ployes walked off the job in 1367.
THE DECISION of the Media-
tion Board on this matter was not
one over which the University had
control either in substance or tim-
ing. At the time of the walkout,
the University stated it would con-
tinue doing what it was already
doing-following the procedures of
'
and
unionization;
the legislation, but also would con-
tinue the legal test.
As President Fleming has stated
in a public Board of Regents meet-
ing, the outcome of the litigation
is not going to change the' Uni-
versity's acceptance of collective
representation.
--Jack H. Hamilton
Assistant Director
University Relations
Aug. 1
Michigan Union
To the Editor:
A8 A REGULAR user of the
Michigan Union, I am of the
opinion that the management of
the mug cafeteria be replaced by
a competent one. I am certain that
practically every user has by this
time observed the progressive de-
terioration of the cafeteria service
over the past few years.
Once, the Michigan Union used
to be a center of student activities;
a place where student groups could
meet informally; a place where a
student could walk in any time of
the day and have a cup of coffee;
a place where one could have a
decent dinner for a reasonable
price. Live music was featured on
Friday night, and the cafeteria
stayed open until 1 a.m.
Since then the closing time has
been advanced to11 p.m., then
to 8 p.m. and now,' to 3:30 p.m.,
with Saturdays and Sundays closed'
all day. (I assume that the man-'
agement has decided that the
Union is primarily meant for Uni-
versity employes and not for stu-
dents.)
The quality of the food has de-
teriorated considerably and prices
have gone up. Two lines of rood
in two rooms were replaced by
one. At times there is an army
of employes, cleaning up tables
vigorously, even before the cus-
tomer has finished eating; but few
are seen at times most needed.
IT HAS BEEN suggested that
financial difficulties have forced
the curtailing of cafeteria services.
I say that the cafeteria loses money
because it is an outstanding ex-
ample of misman'agement. Don't
forget that it used to be operated
profitably once. The student pop-
ulation is increasing every year-
and therefore the profits 3hould
increase accordingly, if the place
is well managed. Even if financial-
ly not profitable, the services .pro-
vided by the Union are vital to
the student community, and should
be maintained. Where else can a
student have a cup of coffete and
study in a quiet corner for a few
hours? Where else can student
groups meet conveniently? Where
else can a student watch sports or
news events on TV?
I suggest that the University in-
vestigate the cafeteria operations,
and take steps immediately to im-
prove the service and open it all
days of the week.
-George Varghese, Grad.'
July 31
Reviews
To the Editor:
O F ALL the perversions current-
ly running amok in the Ann
gram)'notes, certainly not reviews.
Miss Wissman in her article on
Much Ado About Nothing sustain-
ed a nice discussion about the
problems inherent in Shakepeare's
comedies, but why didn't she 'save
it for her Shakespeare prof. In a
play with a cast of 21 characters,
she had the grace to mention one
actress as being "especially ef-
fective in the early acts." She sug-
gested that Richard Burgwin di-
rected the play, which he did not;
and she glibly passed through an
entire article without giving an
honest impression with which one
could agree or disagree.
Miss Wayne, thank goodness,
told us what happened on stage in
Hogan's Goat. She mentioned
characters, costumes, staging, in-
terpretation, lines, and total im-
pact. Most important, she gave us
the impressions that she saw the
play and reacted to it.
THE MOST DECENT abortion
by Richard Allen, however, was in-
excusable. His mindless discussion
of Shaw's Doctor's Dilemma was
not only boring pedantry, but it
was disgustingly unreadable. I
suggest you reread the sentence
which starts "Instead, the play
centers on . . ." and ends fourteen
lines later for a gross example
of pretentious nonsense .
Allen did happen to mention,
however, in his final paragraph
that there were actually two actors
who appeared on stage Thursday
night. I seriously question wheth-
er or not Allen even saw the Rep
Company's production.
I do not demand that Daily,
reviewers posit bubblegum recaps
telling us "she was good and he
wasn't." But I do wish that they
would follow Miss Wayne's ex-
ample and give readers and play-
goers provocative and readable re-
actions instead of superfluous in-
tellectualizing. Thanks to review-
ers Wissman and Allen, I know
little of what went on on stage
in those nights, and I feel it a
definite insult to the company in-
volved.
THE BIGGEST decision of
Nixon Administration to date.
been its declared resolve to
approval of the ABM. There
the
hes
win
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'sour intimations that liberal fervor
on this issue has risen only since
Mr. Nixon became President. But
it would be more accurate to say
that the big, decisive push for the
program began with Nixon's 'ad-
vent-and amid reports that he
had assured Strom Thurmond at
the GOP convention that he would
bless the operation.
Yet despite evidence of a right-
ward drift-(mingled with occa-
sional affirmative steps such as
this week's overture to Red China
and the birth control program)-
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