A1 Eighty years of editorial freedom Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan friday mmOring A dull crunch ...and baby is smashed by da iiel zwerdli4.........i 420 Maynard St., Ann Arbor, Mich. News Phone: 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,. JANUARY 15, 1971 NIGHT EDITOR: JIM BEATTI E I Diary Dec. 28 - Jan. 10 EACH DAY I look out my win- dow and watch my neighbor working with his car. How he tink- ers with it - his white MG sports convertible! I see him spreading his tools, wrenches and rackets and screw drivers and myriad s m a l I bolts . and screws, on a crumpled oily cloth laid care- fully on the sidewalk. The car's hood is open; if I crane my neck I can just see his shoulders hunched over thc mani- fold intake, and although h i s head is hidden by the carburetor and air filter, every four seconds I see great rushes of steam which must be coming from his poor laboring lungs; sometimes there is a long pause and then a sudden gush of steam as he tenses his muscles and focuses his wits and, poised, suddenly exerts tremendous force on his socket wrench. When it is very cold outside he some- times disappears for long per- iods; from my vantage point on the living room couch I look anx- iously for his return, and marvel at this small white coupe, left alone with his hood opened trust- fully, almost naively, baring its wonderful and complex engine and innermost parts to any who would tamper with them or disturb their broken repose. I imagine my neighbor warming his hands and feet in his apartment, gulping hot rushes of coffee before returning to his devotions, to the cold and his white MG coupe. Jan. 13. Today, and starting two days ago, I look for my neighbor but he doesn't come. The car's hood has been closed, though; I think he has fixed it. Jan. 14. This morning as I was waking up I heard a dull crunch. I ran outside. An enormous b 1 u e Chevrolet with four doors and enormous tires and eight cylinders, this whopping ode to men's mast- ery over machines, has skidded on a solid sheet of ice, smashed into the white MG's left side and stopped wedged against this little auto's back left side. I run out- bile, too, has given me cause for pain: a second hand SAAB in ex- cellent condition. purchased one year ago for only $750. It is a very good deal. Through a special in- surance agre ment I pay only $260 per year: parking tickets nave not exceeded $60 Twice a year. once in spring and once in fall. I give my SAAB a preventive check- up which costs each time $40. I think of the care my parents used to give me in my annual visits to the doctor and dentist. Last spring I give my SAAB a special 24.000 mile checkup, and pay $90. Two months later the clutch gives out; the mechanic repairs it for $75, and during the repairs notices a faulty distribu- tor which he repairs for $15. In October my radiator overheats and I find some rotted hoses: I pay $12 to fix the leaks. In De- cember my car suddenly shakes and lets out a frightful wheeze, an;: stops on a highway: one of the pistons has a hole in it and the engine. has overheated. The repair costs $140, plus $60 for a new clutch and flywheel since the garage discovers that the clutch has gone bad again. That's be- cause the flywheel was bad to be- gin with and, unreplaced, has quickly worn out the new clutch I installed several months ago. One week ago my Oar drives fine but suddenly the engine sounds as if it is going to explode and great gushes of exhaust pour from under the fotor: the muffler has rusted through. I pey $35 to replace it. MY BROTHER has purchased a Lodge Dart for $900, but can't drive it as the transmission has gone bad. He has recently pur- chased new tires for $100 and can't afford a majo- repair as of yet. Epilogue My parents replaced the trans- mission on their Ford twc months ago, and tell him it cost $250 in parts and labor. A 4 -Daily-Jim Wallace side to make sure the driver isn't going to speed away without leav- ing a note: it happened to me be- fore. It's a friend of mine whom I haven't seen for 10 months! She is upset, as she is a wee late for an appointment with her psychiatrist. WE LEAVE the two cars, wedg- ed together in stasis after the im- pact, and walk into my house as a light freezing rain begins to fall, dribbling inside an enormous hole which this woman's Chevrolet has punctured in the small MG's metal side. As she calls the police I make some constant comment tea to sooth her. 'We hear a loud crunch. I r u n outside. A massive brown Olds- mobile station wagon has skidded on a solid sheet of ice, smashed into the white MG's front grille and hood and stopped with i t s bumper wedged underneath t h e sports coupe so that auto is up- lifted as if in a plaintive cry, of despair. The drive is angry; he is driving to a business meeting. Now he has warped the small white car's entire hood so that it will no longer function, and shreds of glass and metal are hanging crumpled from the front; once instruments to pierce the night, now shredded and useless. T h e entire front is stoved in; I fear to look, bevause I know that just as a person, fragile and vulnerable to life forces, will suffer unbear- able injury to his vital organs when crushed from without, so the MG's little engine is crippled from the station wagon's blow. the police came, one policeman in fact, a man with a friendly smile which softens his riot hel- met. He tells us 158 other cars have crashed around Ann Arbor since last night. The two drivers fill out innumerable f o r m s, slumped in the squad car's back seat which warms them from the frozen morning rain. Forty min- utes pass, me sitting quietly on my living room couch; a tow truck appears and pulls loose the Chev- rolet, then the station wagon, pulls loose these intruders from the foreign convertible. And fin- ally, the squad car, the tow truck and the two automobiles drive away, leaving alone the white MG sports coupe: very small looking and very crumpled. MY NEIGHBOR hasn't returned yet. Reflections Who can estimate, who can compensate, the incalculable time and effort, the emotional involve- ment and expenditure of saved up funds, the pure devotion, which my neighbor has invested in his tiny white MG? I empathize: I understand his loss. My automo- Another commission reports v 1 °A DIURABLE 1UNDER WAY S - I OLj IN ()NEMIGHT SUPPOSE that a society anxious about increasing criminal violence would take measures to control weapons, and to concentrate its resourc- es in an effort to control the trend. It therefore appears somewhat remark- able that in the United States, where the control of crime has become a major po- litical issue, virtually anyone can acquire a gun, drug addicts are treated in such a way as to make their commission of crime inevitable, and a large portion of resourc- es are devoted to the prosecuting of vol- untary acts in a futile struggle to enforce an archaic conception of public morality. ON THIS SUBJECT, another commis- sion has issued another report. Like the commissions on Civil Disorders, Vio- lence and Pornography before it, it has made some constructive proposals. Like its predecessors, it will probably be ig- nored by the officials who established it. The National Commission on Reform of Federal Criminal Laws has recommended A hip plot? VICE PRESIDENT for Student Services Robert Knauss should be taken to task for, in his own words, accepting a hippopatumus for the SAB "without con- sulting anyone." While it is not to be re- gretted that he failed to ask President Fleming, the Regents, the executive of- ficers or Grad Assembly, Knauss erred seriously in not consulting SGC, his policy board or any of the student organizations housed in the SAB. The hippo, as described by its creator, Jonathan Kantor, is "the natural predator of the pig. He seeks him out and kills him. Pigs must tread softly wherever hippos are found." A LTHOUGH at first blush, such a guard- ian may seem desirable for the SAB (especially in light of last summer's at- tempted invasion by Yorkshires of the Legal Self-Defense office), the prospect for some groups may lessen when it is realized that such protection for their offices may lead some office-dwellers to let their guard dewn. This could be an especially serious situation in light of the fact that pigs can be taught to walk on tiptoe. Knauss should realize the error of his hastiness and consult with the tenant- constituencies of the SAB before he de- cides to accept what may be a subversive plot to undermine the SAB and make is vulnerable to invasion by pigs - or hip- pos, for that matter. --RO RIR in its final reports to President Nixon and Congress that private ownership of hand- guns be outlawed, that homosexual acts and other 'deviate' sexual activity be le- galized, and that penalties for drug pos- session be substantially scaled down. In addition, the commission h a s proposed that fraudulent acts by corporations be punished more severely and that capital punishment, which has not been used for over three years in this country, be abol- ished. Under t h e commission's proposals, handguns could not be owned by private citizens, and all other firearms w o u 1 d have to be registered. There is a signifi- cant demonstrable relationship between the availability of firearms, the commis- sion of crime and the general level of vio- lence. Certainly this is not the only fac- tor making America's crime rate so high in relation to other societies where fire- arms are strictly controlled, but the easy availability of guns does facilitate t h e commission of crimes, and does result in numerous deaths - in personal conflicts, during the commission of crimes, and in accidents - which would not have other- wise occurred. THE COMMISSION'S recommendation that laws prohibiting homosexual acts and other sexual practices commonly considered deviate be repealed, merits wide support. Even for those who would not agree that governmental restrictions on voluntary sexual activity are a cruel and unwarranted intrusion into individ- ual lives, there remains the compelling argument that at a time when the entire police, court and prison systems are un- able to deal effectively with rising crime, it seems pathetically wasteful to burden these systems further trying to enforce crimes involving voluntary acts victimiz- ing no one, which appear not to be signi- ficantly deterred by the law. On the questions of drugs and porno- graphy, the commission has unfortunate- ly compromised with prevailing political sentiment. Though its proposal that mar- ijuana possession be punished only with fines is an improvement over current law, its basic approach is still punitive. It con- tinues to treat the heroin question sim- plistically - ignoring the facts that ad- dicts will continue to need heroin, that supplies will continue to be available des- pite the law, and that the drug's illegality raises its price greatly, virtually forcing the addict to steal. The recommendation favoring reten- tion of anti-pornography laws ignores convincing scientific evidence, compiled most recently by the President's porno- graphy commission, that the alleged harmful effects of pornography a r e mythical. Letters to The Daily To the Daily: THIS MORNING I read in your newspaper a letter by Miss Fai- genbaum and Miss Welch in which they criticized their treatment while working at one of the cam- pus bookstores. Out of sympathy with them, and feeling that the more skeptical segment of Daily readers should be more fully con- vinced of the unethical practices of certain community employers I encourage you to publish the fol- lowing s t o r y of my experiences with the Follett's bookstore man- agemnent. A few weeks ago, while still a student at the University, I ap- plied for a full time job at the State street bookstore. At t h a t time I was told that my chances of getting such a job were "very good," but that I should c o m e back around December 10 to con- firm them. Returning to Follett's on the designated date. I was told that I would have to start work- ing part-time during the rest of the semester in order to make certain the availability of the full- time job. As it happened I ended up working for them from four to six hours a day during the study and exam periods in addition to my other job as a janitor at a more honest business in our com- munity. Having been told that I would be eventually working in t h e i r Spanish book section, I was mean- time given the j a b of marking books that would be sold to the students in this semester's Nook rush. When my exams were over I began working full-time for them. I worked through New Year's up till last Tuesday, when the book rush came to its virtual end, and Follett's completed an- other lucrative transaction with the students. Without having ful- filled their promises of having me work for their Spanish book sec- tion, without giving me previous warning, I was conveniently dis- posed of at that time. NOT BEING a union member. and having signed no legally bind- ing contract with them I can do nothing but accept my misfortune. My possibilities for t h e coming months are reduced to returning to school, paying late registration and hazzling insurmountable dif- ficulties, or praying that I will find another job in the extremely tight Ann Arbor market. What I would like to see is the formation of a unionby bookstore employes in the n e a r future to prevent the type of exploitation I have been subjected to. and the type of mistreatment Miss Faigen- baum and Miss Welch experienc- ed. -Robert Wende Jan. 14 Strike To The Daily: STRIKING is a right. It is a right in exactly the same way as freedom of speech, freedom of the assembly, and freedom from hun- ger are rights. If you c a n n o t strike you are literally a slave. To the degree that individuals, insti- tutions, or states infringe upon these rights, they are authoritar- ian enemies of ful free democ- racy. The low pay and poor working conditions of the AFSCME work- ers in the University, alone justi- fies their decision to "withdraw services," i.e. strike. As members of the temporary steering commit- tee of Ann Arbor's new left-radi- cal political party, we will fully support these workers in their struggle to obtain a decent life. It was the democratic decision of the founding convention (Dec. 12) of this party to support AFSCME workers not just with paper reso- lutions and militant words, but with all our resources and energy. In keeping with this mandate. the steering committee has voted to formally affiliate with the AFSCME Support Coalition and to offer what assistance we can to the strike effort. We urge oth- ers to do t h e same. SUPPORT THE STRIKE! DON'T SCAB! --The Temporary Steering Committee ,.' ~O~j~>~A ADVANCEC I-' ,',, PLACE. ~ '. -,f.r. !f ~)d M,,JA 1. T' g' REPORT FROM PEKING: Sihanouk appeals to U.S. . . . images By NORODOM SIHANOUK (Dispatch News Service) (Editor's Note: Norodom Sihanouk, former head of the Cambodian gov- ernment, was deposed by a coup on March 18, 1978. He is presently in Peking where he is head of a government in exile, the U n i t e d National Front of Cambodia). PEKING - THE UNITED na- tional front of Cambodia now has its own liberation army com- posed of soldiers who are neither Viet Cong or North Vietnamese, the majority of whom do not even know what Communism is. I might just mention the following state- ment of the French reporter Xav- ier Baron, who spent several weeks in the territory liberated by our Front. He wrote in English in a bulletin released by Agence France Presse on the 28th of August: "Most of the people in the liber- ated areas had rural backgrounds. Their attachment to Prince Si- hanouk had been sentimental at first. But it changed as the weeks passed and the families they left behind began to suffer from air attacks and to sometimes die in them. Some did not know the meanings of the terms Marxism and Communism. They said, 'I am fighting for my Prince.' The guerillas have two enemies - the Americans and General Lon Nol." Your own countryman, Richard Dudman of the St. Louis P o s t Dispatch similarly reported, "What I saw and heard during nearly six weeks as a cantive in Liberated turned into a massive dedicated and effective revolutionary base. We have seen evidence of alleg- iance to Sihanouk, and of its counterpoint, extreme hatred of the U.S. and President N i x o n. American shells and bombs mean to Cambodians that the U.S. is waging unprovoked colonialist war against them. They see America as a would be successor to the French trying to turn back the clock of history in the face of a swelling spirit of Asia for Asians." These statements -speak elo- quently for themselves. IT IS NOT difficult to see why Lon Nol and his regime are doing everything possible to hide the truth from world public opinion and from the American people, from whom President Nixon is now extracting more than 250 million dollars annually to allegedly help Lon Nol repulse a foreign Com- munist invasion. On Nov. 25, 1970, AP cabled from Phnom Penh that, "The Lon Nol government has re- fused to acknowledge the presence of any significent number of Cam- bodian Communists or supporters of Prince Norodom Sihanouk. Censors have been heretofore in- structed to cut almost all refer- ences to such anti-government ele- ments out of dispatches filed by correspondents here." Mr. Nixon's administration knows the truth, but it too is trying to hide it from Ameri- The Nov. 9 issue of Newsweek de- scribed the results of such an air strike: "When newsmen arrived to inspect the damage last week, they found no trace of the deep Communist bunkers described in Phnom Penh briefings, nor a n y other sign of a North Vietnamese occupation force. All evidence in- dicated that the massive air as- sault had done more damage to the Cambodian town than to the enemy. More and more U.S. planes have roared into action over Cam- bodia. The stepped up use of air power there has had an impact on the civilian population. Hospitals in Phnom Penh and many pro- vincial centers are jammed w I t h civilian casualties. One U.S. dip- lomat in Phnom Penh said, 'We are terribly aware that the de- struction in civilian areas could swing the peasants into the arms of the Communists far more ef- fectively than all of Sihanouk's rhetoric.' " IT IS MY HOPE that what I have written here will be seen by responsible representatives of the American people in Congress so that they might give some thought to the terrible wounds being in- flicted on my people by U.S. planes before they consider voting more credits to President Nixon's "protege," Lon Nol, who is plainly and simply a murderer of t h e Cambodian people. It is very imnortant that t h e '~ ,' -~