I A Seventy-FiftbYear EmrrED AND MANAGEDE X STUDENTS OF THE UNVErSITY OF MICHIGAN UNDER AUThORiTY OF BOARD IN CONTROL OF STUDENT PUILICATIONS "Forget That You're Not Supposed to Forget!" -=L la.s TODAY AND TOMORROW: Unstable Governments' Block European Unity LOpinions Are Free, 420 MAYNARD ST., ANN ARBOIL, Mi-H. suth Will Prevail NEWS PxoNE: 764-0552 Editorials printed in The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of staff writers or the editors. This must be noted in all reprints. FRIDAY, 8 JANUARY 1965 NIGHT EDITOR: DEBORAH BEATTIE Americans in Vi et Nar: Policy of Contradictions FOR A NATION which supposedly de- termines its public policy on a rational basis, America has an amazing facility for ignoring glaring contradictions. We have been involved in Viet Nam for a decade now. In that time we and a series of South Vietnamese "leaders" have cooperated in denying the South Vietna- mese people popular government, in im- posing martial law on them, in herding them into "strategic hamlets" and in al- lowing thousands of them to be killed. - And all along we have asserted that we are acting in their behalf, to protect them from being being conquered and enslaved by an essentially alien force: the Viet Cong. But the truth has been too glaring and persistent for even the cooperative American press to hide. The most docile American newspaper and the most ferv- ently anti-Communist South Vietnamese now calmly report it: the Viet Cong, though it gets tremendous aid and com- fort from North Viet Nam and probably Communist China, is made up of South Vietnamese. And most of the people of South Viet Nam, especially in the poor rural areas, support it. SUCH EVIDENCE, one would think, would provoke at least a reconsidera- tion of our involvement there. But listen to the President's State of the Union ad- dress: Why are we there? We are there, first, because a friendly nation has asked us for help against Communist aggression. Ten years ago we pledged to defend it. Three Presidents have supported that pledge. We will not break it. Both the Vietnamese attitude and the U.S. government line now are calmly re- ported in the American press, but neither the press nor the people seem to have set the two side by side. Even the grow- ing circle of critics of U.S. involvement close their eyes to this cruel contradiction. The currently respectable argument is that we should pull out because we are losing the war-not because we shouldn't Coordination THE NEW State Board of Education de- sires to present a coordinated educa- tion budget request to the Legislature. Such a program clearly entails an exten- sive, well-considered plan. But it also re- quires much more than this: The board must realize that the way in which the coordination plan is presented to the state's colleges will have effects beyond the immediate results of the plan itself. For the board is dealing with far more than simple organizations. Michigan's colleges and universities have been bred In a long tradition of independence from any port of governmental controls. Grant- ed, they have accepted, the principle of coordination; but the approved coordina- tion was voluntary, not required, and it was accepted in principle, not in fact. Despite efforts of the Michigan Coordi- nating Council for Public Higher Educa- tion to sumbit a joint budget request next year, itis not at all clear that state col- leges are prepared to sacrifice part of their valued autonomy. Moreover, the schools will probably react even more pro- tectively toward a board which may pos- sess the power to actually set their budget requests. THE BOARD must not necessarily move slowly, but administrative pride is a delicate thing and delicate things require careful handling. College administrators must be made to realize that coordination offers advantages which outweigh the small amdunt of independence that might be surrendered in its attainment. Although the board may have the pow- er to coordinate budget requests, it must not alienate itself from the state's col- leges in doing so. Such alienation would classify the board as ,simply another branch of the government out to give the colleges trouble instead of a group to which the state colleges can turn for aid. And if the board becomes more a restric- tive government agency than an educa- tional assistant, it will have made a major mistake. be fighting it in the first place. Why are we there? BECAUSE, the argument runs, the South Vietnamese don't really want the Viet Cong to win. The poor, ignorant peasants have simply been duped and/or terrorized into thinking that the Viet Cong is the best alternative. If we pull out, they will be herded into communes and subjugated to a monstrous military machine. Too late, they will regret having chosen Com- munism. Will they? One of the few Western writ- ers to visit Red China, Jorgen Bisch, gave a picture of what life is like under Asian Communism. In an article for National Geographic magazine which made the most of Red China's faults, particularly its leaders' oppressive secrecy and dogma- tism, the following passage was tucked inconspicuously near the end: Life in a commune is hard and drab. Holidays are few, and food, sometimes served in huge community dining rooms, is only adequate. But most of the Chinese I saw tilling the fields seemed to have a sense of se- curity. Tonight they would sleep be- neath a roof; tomorrow they would eat, no matter how little. If the part of China I was allowed to visit was a fair sample, the Com- munists have at least raised the poor from their timeless misery. Nowhere did I see starvation; nowhere did I see a beggar. And, while I saw numer- ous men and women with fascinating patterns of patches on their blue working trousers, I saw none in rags. Cities boast hundreds of new schools. The number of universities has multiplied. Even the humblest villages have hospitals and clinics. Machinery is still scarce, and most heavy earthmoving depends upon thousands of workers lugging buckets of stones, sand and clay. Yet I saw dams rising throughout China at an impressive pace. This hardly constitutes a definitive statement on the general merits of Com- munism as a social system. But it does indicate that in Asia in 1965 it may well be the best alternative. Raising some 800 million people from starvation is the most important goal that could be achiev- ed in that part of the world today. The future the South Vietnamese would find under Communism seems brighter than anything they have known-and certainly brighter than what they know today. Why are we there? LYNDON JOHNSON mentioned another reason: Second, our security is tied to the peace of Asia. Twice in one genera- tion we have had to fight against ag- gression in the Far East. To ignore aggression would only increase the danger of a larger war. Our goal is peace in Southeast Asia. That will come only when ag- gressors leave their neighbors in peace. If one ignores the inadvertent irony in Johnson's use ,of the word "aggressors, this argument has some substance. If the Asian Communists continue to be the in- satiable expansionists they are claimed to be, they won't be satisfied with the na- tions in which their presence will be wel- come and possibly beneficial. BUT OUR EXPERIENCE with Russia seems to indicate that the way to paci- fy a militant Communist is to fill his stomach with food rather than with a bayonet. The assumption that Red China intends eternally to be an aggressor is hardly an unassailable one either. Al- ready some conciliatory words have be- gun to dilute the tough talk emanating from Peking, and the tough talk itself is hardly surprising since half the world has done everything it can to isolate and strangle Red China. And, all this aside, from a standpoint of cold military strategy, we seem ill- equipped to draw the line in the guerrilla- filled'forests of Viet Nam. In short, the "we must contain them now at all costs" argument is plausible, but it is far from self-evident. What is self-evident is that hundreds of people are dying in Viet Nam every week, and fr , ,, , . r. - . 4 k , ° , p lttCN _ ,. - , ,, I w n t I .._. '.ui . .. IT HAS been said of Giuseppe Saragat, the new president of Italy, that he is in the exact cen- ter of the spectrum of Italian par- ties and factions. Any government of the left which did not include Saragat would be too far to the left and almost the captive of the Communitsts; any government of the conservatives which did not include Saragat would probably be the captive of the extreme right and of the neo-Fascists. In this sense, the agreement on Saragat after the prolonged ballot- ing may be taken as signifying a general agreement against all ex- tremists and a desire to keep Italy on a moderately progressive and democratic course. There is no overlooking the fact, however, that Saragat did not have the support of the whole Christian Democratic Party. This is the largest party in the govern- ing coalition. In order to achieve a majority he had, therefore, to ask for theuvotes of the Com- munists, though he is himself a hard anti-Communist. The significant thing about the manner of Saragat's election is that the center-left coalition, which now governs Italy with Al- do Moro as premier, was unable to unite on a candidate for presi- dent. The governing coalition, therefore, is not very solid and may not hold together long enough to assure a stable government. * * * A FEW WEEKS before the elec- tion, I heard one of the party leaders in Rome say that it was immensely difficult to govern through a coalition wedged be- tween two ruthless groups to the right and the left of it. 'The Italian Communist Party is not only very large in numbers, but it is much mere than a poli- tical party in our sense of the words. Through its control of trade unions, of cooperatives, of all kinds of recreationand sport facilities for the working class, through its political control of scores of city and village govern- ments, the Italian Communist Party is a kind of state within the state. It exercises great power to reward and to punish individuals. At the other end are the various conservative and reaction- ary parties and factions. Though they are not so large in numbers as are the Communists, they have large financial resources and very large influence over the press. The governing center-left coali- tion is between the upper and the nether millstones and is in dan- ger of being ground to pieces be- tween the two extremes. NOBODY, therefore, can say with much certitude that there is a clear future for the democratic parliamentary system of parties. It did not work in postwar France. It is threatened in Italy. And no one can be quite confident that the system will prove to be workable in postwar, post-Ade- nauer Germany. On the western part of the European continent we shall see, one may suppose, some years of political turmoil before really stable governments are ro'. ned. Even in France, which now bas a very strong government, there is the overhanging question wtietlu r under Charles de Gaulle's succes- sor the government will st4ll be strong, enlightened and f r e e. About Germany there is much greater uncertainty. Indeed, it is hard to conceive of a stable gov- ernment in Germany as long as the German nation is divided and not in possession of its own capi- tal. Until stable governments are achieved in Europe, larger pro- jects for European unity will move slowly. (C)1964, The WashingtonPast Co. Genera lize TRADITONALLY in our culture the bachelor's degree marks both the end of supervised general education and an opportunity to change one's major field. After this comes professional training. The college curriculum is the stu- dent's last chance to be taught anything outside his professional field, and his last chance to learn how to choose his professional field. It is therefore a waste of time and a disservice to the stu- dent to teach in college the tech- nical skills of any single profes- sion. --Martin Brilliant in a letter to Science Magazine T' T'Itc WA i j r-,:>r4 sr Who Are Job less LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: A Call for a Less Tense 'U' To the Editor: WELL, we're back. The ones of us that are coming back, that is. But what about the sacrifices to the god of academic attrition -the flunkees, the drop-outs, and especially the suicides? Why couldn't this institution be hu- manistic enough, inspired and in- spiring enough to reverse the practice of human sacrifice and keep these students as integral parts of its society? But no, it has to maintain statistical con- formity and stay in the top of the averages. And these cases are not the only ones in which the University has failed to provide a stable emo- tional background toethe educa- tional experience. Let's face it: few and far between are the stu- dents who love the place without reserve, and theiranks ofuthe frightened and tense or disgusted are swollen by each new onslaught of innocent freshmen. I feel strongly that I am not just croak- ing from the depth of my own gloom when I observe that, won- derful though she is in many ways, sometimes there is an awful in- humanity about our alma mater. Certainly there will be few Oedipal complexes about her when we fare forth to graduate schools or into the working world. WHY the feeling of estrange- ment from human reality in Ann Arbor? What is at the bottom of this failure of our university? Is it the knowledge of being caught up in a vast impersonal machinery that we get from not being able to find seats at the libraries? Is it the fatal second sense that comes to seasoned Michigan stu- dents which tells them that if they want to attend a movie, a concert, a morning lecture, or a record sale at Follett's, of course the place will be jammed? Is it the feeling that professors regard the average student as something loathsome which causes the aver- age student to loathe himself and in this way stifles his initiative? It seems that several of the problems involved here have to do directly with size, and we all know that only catastrophe or the Leg- islature can do anything about that. Big families are often the happiest ones, and it seems to me that the problem in this one is the old lack of communication and of mutual love among the members. Just because our campus somewhat resembles a factory at times and our time schedules look like instruction booklets for run- ning a mass-productioncomplex. we don't necessarily have to act like time-clock workers who, un- nerved by automation, break their necks to achieve quotas and never exchange a lazy, friendly word. * * * WHY CAN'T WE relax a bit and enjoy our college years? They can still be productive years intel- lectually, in spite of a reduction in tension. Why not indeed? We have all the facilities at hand to create a community of scholars living together without trauma in an atmosphere of earnest study-- if we will only use them. But we can cheerfully accept our enforced largeness only with the creation of some sort of general esprit de corps. Can't we let down a few of the unnatural barriers we have erect- ed between ourselves and our fel- low-labourers and love every min- ute of what we are doing here? Let us smile at our comrades and remember that self education need not be an exclusively selfish pro- cess. Anything which keeps one student from taking his life dur- ing finals week or from failing or dropping out for emotional rea- sons increases the stability and worth of the society of which each of us is a part. And if you reading this are a professor at this factory of in- formed minds, please pay par- ticular attention to the tools with which you equip the average stu- dent, for he may never have an- other employer. m -Megan Biesele, '67 GETTING PEOPLE off relief and unemployment rolls and onto payrolls is a worthy objective, which these days is getting the attention of all levels of govern- ment and many private organiza- tions. The suspicion is beginning to dawn that the forcedcreation, of jobs is in many cases merely the creation of job vacancies. There are many jobs that remain open for weeks or longer in the ab- sence of even vaguely qualified applicants. Louis P. Kurtis, Westchester County,, New York, welfare com- missioner, has added some in- formation that helps explain the paradox of people who can't find jobs and employers who can't find people. He has announced the resultof a survey that shows that 75 per cent of those on relief in his county-and the survey covered .5600 - are- emotionally unfit to earn a living. This includes a large number of alcoholics, men- tally ill, retarded, addicted and even persons with criminal rec- ords, who can be helped neither by the mere creation of jobs nor by the "retraining" approach. WHATEVER the federal govern- ment does or fails to do will affect these people little in the foresee- able future, but their cases are far from hopeless in many in- stances. What is needed in such situa- tions-and we can be sure that similar conditions exist nearly everywhere-is individual atten- tion to individual problems. This is the kind of help that only other individuals and community groups can provide. Alcoholics, the mentally ill and addicts all can be, and many have been, rehabilitated. The retarded can occupy many kinds of jobs, but they seldom have the initia- tive to prepare for them or hunt them. There are organizations which specialize in getting a break for the freed criminal. We can be sure there will still be unemployment, no matter what Washington does, unless private efforts are enlarged. -National Association of Manufacturers t. 'MARRIAGE': How To Make Money, Italian Style GREAT CAST: They Were All There In the HUAC Comedy BOY THAT MOVIE, "The House Un-American Activities Commit- tee," shown yesterday by VOICE political party was one of the funniest in a long time. They were all there. -Martin Dies (his temporary committee evolved into HUAC) claiming that, "all strikers are Communists"; -J. Parnell Thomas, former chairman of the committee (who later spent several years in jail for income tax evasion), asserting "The New Dealers are planning their programs hand in hand with the Communists"; -Francis Walter declaring "30 of the 95 National Council of Churches Clergymen who wrote a revised version of the Bible recently were Communists"; SOME OF THE SCENES were hysterical. Bucking stiff com- petition, Fulton Lewis Jr. easily came out with top honors. In his narration of "Operation Abolition" (HUAC's movie of students who picketed a San Francisco hearing which has been seen by 18 million Americans), Lewis says; "And a student jumps over a barricade, grabs a policeman's nightstick and begins beating him over the head." The scene with this narration shows about 200 students standing passively while fire hoses pour water on them. No barricade or nightstick is even shown. The student they were talking about went to court over those charges and was aquitted. S4 4 YES, a real comedy. One almost has to laugh at this preposterous committee that At the Campus Theatre "MARRIAGE, Italian Style" was made with money, obviously. It was also made for money. And the best way to increase one's pecuniary reserves through the cinema is to borrow-money, ac- tors, names and situations and the Italian empathy for the pa- thetic sob and smile. This is what Vittorio de Sica (director), Carlo Ponti (producer), Sophia Loren (actress), and Marcello Mastroi- anni (actor) have done. Money, obviously, was lavished -on the color film, shot on loca- tion in Naples; on the director, de Sica, of the old neo-realistic school, now only a bundle of ad- mired film in the archives; on Sophia Loren, the world's num- ber one exponent of the premise that life, for all of its disappoint- ments, is to be enjoyed, enjoyed; on Marcello Mastroianni, the world's number one exponent of the premise that life, for all of its disappointments, is usually dis- appointing; on Eduardo DeFilippo, who wrote the play, "Filumena Marturano" many years qgo, eventually made a film by the same name, and has now obviously decided that it is time for him to really cash in. FILOMENA Marturano was a prostitute during the war, when she met Domenico (Mimi) Sori- ano, a well-to-do Neopolitan busi- nessman. He enjoyed her, she loved him and was ultimately given everything she could ask for in the way of security except the honor and respectability of becoming Mimi's wife. Now, he is dallying around with enough to be a fine film, but de Sica only has a half-ripened idea of how to film a script that is better left as a play. Sophia Loren can- not be resisted when she smiles, she is too easily resisted when she emotes and-well, she can't be put into a smiley picture for everyone to enjoy because that would be such a waste of her limited cine- matic charm and talents. MASTROIANNI knows how to put on the drole face with effect- iveness only when the script is up to his kind of talent. "The Or- ganizer" best revealed this. "Mar- riage, Italian Style" never gives him a chance. -Michael Juliar 'RASHOMON': Kurosawa's Directing .Makes Excellent Film At the cinema Guild BRILLIANT DIRECTING by Akira Kurosawa makes "Rashomon" a cinema masterpiece. He relies upon the excellent acting of Toshiro Mifune and Machiko Kyo to present his stimulating inquiry into the nature of truth. Kurosawa's use of an exciting, violent story creates a high level of audience interest. A bandit seduces a woman, and her husband is murdered. Four people describe the incident, leaving the audience to determine the "truth." Audience eagerness matches that of the nian listening to the four accounts, as it tries to reconstruct an apparently simple situation. But increasing confusion, increasing complexity is the result of each additional account. Hence Kurosawa leads from a straightforward story with clearly outlined characters to a confusing story of complex humans. The use of symbol further demonstrates Kurosawa's ability as a