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August 05, 1966 - Image 2

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Michigan Daily, 1966-08-05

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FEIFFER

Seventy-Sixth Year
EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
UNDER AUTHORITY OF BOARD IN CONTROL OF STUDENT PUBLICATIONS

1 s Are Free, 420 MAYNARD ST., ANN ARBOR, MICH.
1I Prevail

NEws PHONE: 764-0552

Editorials printed in The Michigan Daily express the inidividual opinions of staff writers
or the editors. This muit be noted in all reprints.

WITH

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FRIDAY, AUGUST 5, 1966

NIGHT EDITOR: MEREDITH EIKER

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A Problem of Caring
Not of Killing

AMERICANS ARE glorious people. Self-
ish, lazy and fat, they nevertheless
rise to the occasion whenever they can
see it. Americans are glorious when there
is glory to be had.
Nothing has been able to bring this
out as well as armed conflict. (In fact,
almost nothing else has been able to bring
this out at all.) The "Texas Tower" inci-
dent is a prime example.
During the battle, brave young men
risked their lives Ito save the wounded, as
the police sought out and gunned down
the killer. It could have been the Civil
War, a G-imen chase, or a 945 spy film.
All hands cpoperated: the wounded looked
sick, the dead looked peaceful, the heroes
were breathless, the crowd was aghast,
the cameras clicked and the wire services
kept the tally up to date.
BUT WHEN THE CRISIS was over,
Americans became themselves once
more. How dreary.
First came the inevitable "preventa-
tive" reaction: Ban guns! Ban killing!'
Ban insanity! Then the equally inevitable
man on the street reaction, such as the
television reporter who asks victims: How
do you feel about the man who just cri-
tically wounded you?
And throughout all this the wire serv-
ices and television stations kept up a
running commentary on the story from
every conceivable angle. Stories on the
heroes, the father, the friends, his house,
his brain, his life story, and previous
visits to other towers were written.
SURPRISINGLY, though, the cries for
laws to ban guns were not pressed. The
nation has learned too much by the Ken-
nedy assassination to get enthusiastic
about the chances for such a law.
Now that is really a shame, for the call
for preventative measures was the health-
iest part of the Kennedy affair after-
math. It stemmed from the great Amer-
ican belief that things can be done, situ-
ations relieved.
Although the same basic reaction was

there after the Texas killings, it was very
weak and hopeless. Similar calls for re-
forming laws on dealing with the crim-
inally or near criminally insane are also
weak, and ranked with calls to suppress
a book the killer may have read that
gives a fictional account of a similar in-
cident.
IT IS PART of the great American spir-
it and politics that, hopeless and glory-
less as it is, one must always try to im-
prove an unfortunate situation.
Whether or not all Americans may be
allowed to carry guns may be less im-
portant than whether or not Americans
care whether all Americans may carry
guns.
-gMICHAEL HEFFER
Airline
Merry-Go-Round
THE AIRLINE STRIKE merry-go-round
has slowed with both Johnson and
Congress striding the powerful stallion
of control. After a series of back and forth
matches that would make even Pancho
Gonzales shudder, the legislative and
executive powers have compromised.
The Senate passed and sent to the
House yesterday a measure that would
bring the striking airline mechanics back
to work for 30 days, and let President
Johnson keep them there for as long as
six months.
The only problem, now that Congress
and the White House have agreed to share
the hot coal, is the union. The mechanics
have already won a price increase above
the suggested executive guidelines and
are likely to raise even this level. In six
months they should be able to get what
they want.
MEANWHILE, the merry-go-round con-
tinues. Anyone else, want a ride?
-PAT O'DONOHUE

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The Chancellor and the Prime Minister

THE PRESIDENT'S two favorite
European statesmen are Chan-
cellor Conrad Erhard and Prime
Minister Harold Wilson. Both are
in trouble at home, as it happens,
at the very time when the South-
east Asian war has become larger
and fiercer. The two phenomena
are not unrelated.
THE GERMAN ELECTIONS in
the pivotal state of North-Rhine-
Westphalia, which' includes the
great industrial complex around
the Ruhr, show a marked loss for
Chancellor Erhard's Christ ia n
Democrats and a corresponding
gain for Willy Brandt's Social
Democrats
While domestic problems arising
out of the coal situation played a
part in the outcome, there is gen-
eral agreement that the Social
Democratic attempt to open a
dialogue with East German social-
ists was an important factor in
the result. This conclusion is sup-
ported by the fact that the Free
Democrats who are conservative in
domestic policy, but like the Social
Democrats favor a policy of de-
tente, also gained a seat.
DR. ERHARD'S Christian Dem-
ocrats no longer reflect the dom-
inant feeling of the West Ger-
man& who have turned toward ie-
unification through a relaxation
of tension in the cold war.
Chancellor Erhard profited little
from the support at the White
House and in the State Depart-
ment or from his identification
with the hard liners in Washing-
ton, with those who have regarded
the West Germans as the principal
instrument in Europe for holding
off both the Soviet Union and
Gaullist France.
If, as the Germans appear to
think, the overriding power of the
Christian Democrats in the Fed-
eral Republic is broken, we are

witnessing another and most sig-
nificant event in the evolution of
European affairs. We are witness-
ing a movement of the West Ger-
mans toward a European as con-
trasted with a transatlantic policy.
THE CENTRAL POINT in Brit-
ain is that once again the pound
sterling is in a critical condition,
and there is great expectation of
a devaluation. The history of Har-
old Wilson's Labor government has
been dominated since its first week
in office by the decision not to
devalue the pound sterling and to
defend the present exchange rate.
In foreign policy this has meant
satellitism to Washington.
In order to play a British role
east of Suez, as the American ad-
ministration plunged on with its
crusade in Asia, the Wilson gov-
ernment has had to take a smaller
interest in European affairs, mak-
ing more difficult its eventual en-
try into the Common Market.
The policy is a very considerable
mess: east of the Suez the British
government is ineffective and de-
pendent on Washington; west of
Suez it is an outsider which will
be compelled to go through a dras-
tic experience in order to restore
its power and influence in Europe.
DESPITE THE swelling chorus
of voices from Washington which
say that the future of the world
and the future of peace is being
determined in Asia, our isolation is
increasing. The fact is that our
influence in Europe is declining
long before there is any prospect
of success in Asia. Yet it is in
Europe, which includes the Soviet
Union, that all the world's great
powers, except Japan, are to be
found.
Has President Johnson ever dar-
ed to ask himself why, if he is in
fact the savior of the world's
peace and freedom, there is no

Today
and
Tomorrow
By WALTER LIPPMANN
great power that stands with him?
It begins to look as if the more
righteous we feel, the more alone
we are.
T HE NEW PROGRAM to pay
for medical care for old people
went into effect on July 1, and
there is every probability that the
strain laid on hospitals, clinics and
nursing homes and on doctors,
nurses and technicians will be
critical. For the new laws, the
Medicare program itself and the
Kerr-Mills Act which Congress en-
acted at the same time, will in-
crease the effective demand for
medical services. But these laws
do not create any new additional
supply of the medical facilities and
the trained personnel which are
necessary to meet the demand.
THE CRUX of the matter is
that the new legislation provides
the money for old people to pay
for the medical services which
many have wanted and have not
been able to pay for. This in itself
is, of course, a worthy objective.
But this new demand for hospitals,
doctors, nurses and the like comes
upon us when the existing medical
facilities are already hard put to
serve those who can afford to pay
for medical service. For, as every-
one knows from his own exper-
ience, doctors' offices and hospi-
tals are already overcrowded and
overworked. Yet the additional
Medicare patients are still to ap-
pear.

The existing tightness is a result
of two main facts: that so many
people have become so much more
affluent and are able to pay for
medical services; yet the govern-
ment which responds to the wishes
of the majority has not provided
the money needed to enlarge the
supply of medical facilities and
personnel.
WE CANNOT EXCUSE our neg-
ligence by pleading that we are
overtaken by surprise. On the con-
trary, the gruesome gap between
the supply and the demand for,
medical services has been studied
and documented repeatedly.
Fifteen years ago President Tru-
man appointed a commission on
the health needs of the nation,
headed by that very distingushed
man, Dr. Paul Magnuson. The
commission spent a year investi-
gating the medical situation and
preparing its recommendations.
It found (in 1952) that "the ex-
pected supply of physicians in 1960
will fall far short of the number
needed . . . for broadened medical.
services." In 1959 there were 134
doctors of medicine for 100,000
of the population. In 1961 the
dean of the Yale Medical School,
Dr. Vernon W. Lippard, reckoned
that in order to maintain the
same (and inadequate) ratio there
would be required by 1975 an
annual production of 11,000 physi-
clans.
"The only solution," he wrote,
"appears to be the establishment
of at least 20 new schools of medi-
cine during the 1960s." Since he
wrote that, the ratio of physicians
to civilian population has, in fact,
deteriorated. There are especially
severe shortages of pathologists,
anesthesiologists and radiologists.
THERE IS a critical shortage of
nurses, Dr. Magnuson's commission
predicted in 1952 that "the short-

age for the country as a whole in
1960 may exceed 50,000." The
President of the American Hospi-
tal Association stated recently
that "there are budgeted vacan-
cies fortat least 75,000 registered
nurses and 25,000 licensed practi-
cal nurses."
The shortage of trained people
is the most worrisomde condition
because it takes so much longer
to train personnel than it does to
build hospitals and clinics and
laboratories. Yet the Congress is
far more willing to spend money
on buildings than on medical edu-
cation.
Thus, in fiscal 1965, $17 million
of federal money was spent on
nurses-training while under the
Hill-Burton program of support
of construction of hospitals and
other medical facilities .$220 mil-
lion was spent. No doubt they
were well spent. For among all
the shortages there is also a short-
age of good medical buildings. But
without trained people the build-
ings cannot provide medical care.
IT IS A GRAVE reflection on
our capacity. for self-government
that, having been put clearly on
notice 15 years ago by the Mag-
nuson commission, we have pledg-
ed the money to increase the de-
mand for medical service without
enlarging the facilities which are
to meet the demand.
It took the shock of Sputnik to
arouse public opinion to the need
for federal money to provide bet-
ter primary and secondary educa-
tion. It took the savage riots in
Birmingham to make the nation
realize that the Civil Rights Act
was overdue. Will.its now take a
crisis in the hospitals to cause us
to take seriously the need to
remedy the shortage in the medi-
cal services?
(c), 1966, The Washington Post Co.

,4

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The Underpaid Professional
Or Capitalism Wins Again

STANDING ALONGSIDE the flag, apple
pie and motherhood is another of
America's most highly cherished institu-
tions-the great free enterprise system.
Free enterprise is the constantly laud-
ed mechanism which is often given the
credit for molding the supposedly typical
firm, independent, competitive American
character and for creating the nation's
industrial prominence, yet there must be
something seriously wrong with a system
which almost ignores the most necessary
members of society in passing out 'its fi-
nancial rewards,
IT IS THE GLORIOUS free enterprise
system which enables a TV comic to
make $10,000 for a 10-minute guest ap-
pearance, a pro football rookie to take in
$500,000 for spelling his name right on a
contract and a rock 'n roll songwriter to
garner $500,000 for a year's effort.
This same infallible system limits the
salary of the most distinguished professor
at Harvard to no more than $28,000, the
earnings for a rookie cop on half the na-
tion's police forces to less than $100 a
week and the starting salary of the aver-
age registered nurse to well under $5000 a
year.
IT IS IRONIC that the people engaging
in the occupations which society stress-
es as being most important to the preser-
vation of civilization are denied both the
opportunity to put their services on the
open market and to bargain collectively
for higher wages.
In a society which makes any pretense
of equality before the law and equality of
opportunity in education, police protec-
tion and medical care cannot be distrib-
uted only to those willing to pay the best
prices.
It is also against the public interest, at
least in the short run, for the educators,
nurses, policemen and other civil servants
to go on strike. Therefore these people are
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tential candidates to fill these vacancies
will be attracted to better positions else-
where.
The worshippers of free enterprise will
then find their children educated, pro-
tected and cared for by only a pitifully
inadequate number of the most dedicated
and the least qualified.
-CHARLES W. WILKINSON
A Bit of
Information
RESEARCHERS with the Michigan Stu-
dent Survey have found out that some
30 per cent of the students who begin
work at the University never finish it
here. That's not to say they all flunk out.
Many get married, change to majors
taught better elsewhere and the like.
Still, to those of us who have struggled
along for years with no more than "If he
can get in, he can stay in" as a guide, the
knowledge that only "roughly 65 per cent"
of students who enter the University fin-
ally get a degree here is disturbingly en-
lightening.
IT'S AN EXAMPLE of how difficult it
often is-sometimes by way of intent,
usually simply by way of not having the
proper equipment-to get at important in-
formation about the University.
This paucity of information is wrong,
for whatever combination of reasons it
exists. It creates a danger that gifted
faculty and students interested in pre-
paring the University to meet its future
will be discouraged from doing so because
they don't know precisely what the pres-
ent state of affairs is. Worse, there is a
danger that administrators charged with
the responsibility to prepare the Univer-
sity for that future will be unable to do it.
'nr nTV ~ATr rianacnaPar +Viie fall

Spare Time and the Creative Spirit

By MICHAEL DOVER
T HE SPARE TIME being created
by automation could possibly
bring us one step closer to Utopia.
Unfortunately, today little is
done to utilize, or make worth-
while, the spare time that many
persons enjoy. Many do little but
vegetate in front of the television.
We find factory workers who come
home, take a six-pack from the
refrigerator and plop down for an
evening of the unaesthetic exper-
ience of trying to hear the tele-
vision over the screaming kids.
Also, we find increasingly more
college-educated executives who
have decided that it is no longer
worthwhile to continue to study
and read. They would rather have
a few highballs, play a little bridge
and stock their libraries with
little-read books.
THE WORKING DAY now is
much shorter than it was a few
generations ago. But, what has
been done with all the spart time?
The quality of modern music, lit-
erature, and art has not improved.
Neither has our ability to cope
with the most pressing modern
problems, of which the results of
automation are but one aspect.
And, the increase in spare time
which has occurred over the last
few years will be nothing com-
pared to the greater increases
which are likely to occur in the
,..-..i ra -aprh ~ .11 +his nld

for himself. He may become bored
and seek to expend his energies in
an antisocial manner. His rebellion
could be much more violent than
that of the Negro today; neither
feeling that he is part of his so-
ciety.
Chaos could result very easily
unless the man of the future can
fulfill his individuality-not as a
unique member of a society 'which
rejects or has no need of his
abilities-but as a living, thinking,
creating human being.
His ego must become correlated
with his individual spiritual and
emotional depth and prowress,
rather than to his material
achievements. He must become
educated to the extent that he
can come closer to using the full
powers of his brain.
THlE HUMAN MIND is virtuailly
untapped: Many of its powers are
virtually unused. To enable him to
live in this new automated world
man will have to use these powers
to a greater extent-to strain
them, if necessary, through a
greater variety of experiences and
emotional cohtacts with the world
around him.
By reading the great literature,
living with the great music and
viewing the tender arts, man can
deepen his understanding of these
emotions, scooping deep into the
reserves of his past experience.
But not all persons are capable

learn to understand the work of
lesser artists; hopefully he will be-
come involved in them to the point
of preferring them above the dull
arts of today. A new classification
of literature and art must be de-
veloped that will appeal to him
more than things like television in
its present form-which puts no
strain on his brain and, therefore,
does not improve him or itself.

A whole new generation of
creators must be called upon:
people whom men of lesser in-
tellectual ability could appreciate
and understand.
Perhaps then the millions of
man-hours of spare time will help
man as an individual to fulfill
himself-society no longer being
an integral part of his experience,
no longer needed as an important

part of his self-respect.
TO ACCOMPLISH all this, man
has the means, if not the method;
the emotional potential, if not the
technique to apply it; the power, if
not the present desire.
In the words of Kahlil Gibran:
"You are your own forerunner."
Mankind must foresee and not
forget, revive or not survive.

REVIEW:
Ghastly Humor in 13lithe Spirit

By BETSY COHN
H UMOR IS AN omnipresent
spirit which has been accepted,
dissected, analyzed and utilized,
yet remains a delightfully puzzling
abstraction.
Noel Coward's comedy, "Blithe
Spirit," currently being presented
by the University Players, is a
comedy which borrows directly
from spirits and makes havoc out
of laughter derived from absurdity,
extreme situation and portrayal
of funny caricatures.
THE STORY is about an Eng-
lish novelist, Charles and his sec-
ond wife, Ruth, who are paid an
unnerving visit by Charles' dead
first wife, Elvira.
Elvira is a lovely vapor who
returns to live with Charles after
seven years of "living on the other
side." She is a taunting figure who

Elvira, played by Beth Rankin,
is a very convincing apparition
who is draped in etherial clothes
and who moves about in a light
air of graceful ephemeralness.
Her antagonist, Ruth Evelyn
ten Pas), is by contrast a very
stark and cold concrete figure
whose acidic temperment, dry dia-
logue and haughty aristocratic
mannerism, keeps the Coward
comedy on a level above total
farce. In a caustic interchange
with Elvira acute insights and
portrayals of true feline feminity
are unmercifully revealed is mas-
ter. Elvira has appeared after a
seance conducted by Madame Ar-
cati, a high-strung ecentric psy-
chedelic; the delightful bizarre
character type who is usually
plummeted into comedies.
HOWEVER, Arcati is more than

"some of the most classic lines in
comedy."
In another caricature role is
Edith the befuddled maid: a com-
bustible sort who struts about in
a perpetually distraught and dis-
jointed manner. She resembles an
incompetent product of taxidery.
The part, played by Claribel Cone,
was unfortunately overstuffed with
stereotype characterization and
deprived of the necessary unique-
ness and spunk needed to invigor-
ate it with a much needed vitality.
THE PLOT WORKS toward an
intermingling of the various ele-
ments: after some tedious chatter
and activity the play finally comes
to a ghostly and ghastly conclu-
sion.
A master of the "naturalistic
dialogue," Coward makes this plot
of fantasy and ghosts seem bes-
tially human. The play is a suc-

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