Seventy-eight years of editorial freedom Edited and managed by students of the University of Michigan 420 Maynard St., Ann Arbor, Mich. News Phone: 764-0552 Editorials printedin The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of staff writers or the editors. This must be noted in all reprints. 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' t w 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 are N PCA Maw~ CI'Iit-- t.x , -. COOL? , ^1 IAA}- . 'ft d- n , ffIIU , m V ~m I a4 M k . ; '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)- 50L OA -U OF 00 CRA'T6- WO ONt~T LEARN~ i IIr Mik h,