Elle t i an tly Eighty years of editorial freedom Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan friday morning Poisoning the Earth in order to save it by daniel zwerdlinG 4i 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, OCTOBER 9, 1970 NIGHT EDITOR: LYNN WEINER Cynicism undercuts the Left SLOWLY, BUT perceptibly, the mood has changed. What started. off as a charged feeling of activism, bordering on the McCarthy-ish idealism of '68, has under- gone a gradual metamorphosis. A year ago, thousands of. people thought that by marching to Michigan Stadium and sit- ting through a cold evening of speeches, they were helping to end the war. The mounting public revulsion would force Nixon to bring the troops home, they thought. Twelve months have come and gone since then. So has the march on Wash- ington, various moratoriums and finally the "Princeton Plan." What word have we had of such efforts lately? Instead of the p i c t u r e of thousands of peaceful marchers, the chilling image of four life- less bodies at Kent and a bullet-ridden dormitory in Jackson, Miss., are inbued in the minds of the former idealists. The Movement is confused, tired and angry, but above all it is cynical. As the work within the System has proven fruitless, the years of frustration against the war were voiced outside it. The rash of bombings makes the situa- tion more confused, for while we sense they hurt those we are angry with, we must realize those now dead and maimed because of the bombings were visited with injustice. All this notwithstanding, can bombings actually be considered "blows to the em- pire?" The bombed buildings will be re- built in some way and, as in the case of the Army and its research center in Madison, the cost will be a pittance com- pared to the institution's billions. rFUT THE CYCLE is complete is seen from last Saturday's abortive march from the stadium to the Diag. Where the idea of a march and a rally to protest the war would draw thousands of enthusiasts 12 months ago, only a small group of rad- icals were visible this time-more intent on taunting the liberal speakers than voicing a solid determination to oppose Nixon's policies of war. It seems now as if everything has been tried, yet the System continues, ceaseless- ly, despite all the protests. We, as students, are victims of only a vague repression. Too comfortable to re- ject everything in our society, we prefer to rebel against what is most frustrating -the lack of feeling, the lack of con- science, the lack of commitment to hu- manity. Not being truly oppressed, the white middle class student must identify with those who are (or those whom he thinks are). He must copy and emulate these oppressed in order to feel radical, but his fervor in a cause is sapped quickly, leav- ing him emotionally exhausted. It is an artificial intensity that is shown-it can only exist by impassioned arguments. A mystical respect is held for the black, the poor, the minorities-the truly oppressed of the world. Quick to defer to others and unsure of himself, young white anger be- comes almost laughable next to black pride. IT IS NOT that the young white middle-, class peace movement can't be radical, it is just that whites ironically can't over- come imposed conditions of affluence to make the Movement successful. For ex- ample, true black consciousness can lead only to a true rage and noble pride while the white intellectual is too consumed with his own self-hatred to be effective politically. Thus, with solutions in an abyss and lacking in all but an artificial identifica- tion with the oppressed, whites retreat into the only emotion left: cynicism. This is not the answer. Instead, we should be honest about how we can really identify with the oppressed. Otherwise, we can only look forward to more dialectic arguments and simply re- act to the rhetoric of 'the right rather than have an alternative to it. -MARK DILLEN (This is the second of a two-part series on pesticides) WHILE THE U.S. Department of Agriculture battles conservationists who attack its sanctions of deadly pesticides like 2,4,5-T and DDT, it is quietly waging a $200 million, 12-year war which will dump 450 million pounds of theinsecticide Mirex over cities and fields in nine southeastern states. It's the most massive insect eradication program in U.S. history, and could become one of its worst ecological disasters. The government is out to get the imported fire ant (it came from Argentina), an insect which builds three- foot mounds in fields and has a nasty bite. Officials bill this program as the last phase of the fire ant eradication campaign authorized by Congress back in 1957 on a cost-sharing basis with the states: their folks pay half, the rest of the nation's taxpayers pay everything else. The government and the states have been eager to start the aerial bombardment this fall over the cries of scien- tists and conservationists who fear that Mirex will con- taminate millions of acres, poison and kill wildlife, and end up in the human food chain. "The history of the fire ant program makes your hair curl," laments Ray Johnson, assistant director of re- search at the Interior Department's Bureau of Sports Fisheries and Wildlife. USDA began battling the fire ant 13 yeai's ago using Dieldrin, a pesticide found in house- hold pest sprays, and heptachlor. The fire ant popula- tion continued to spread, but thousands of friendly an- imals died. So in 1962 the government switched to Mirex, which Interior researchers swore had no harmful affects on animals tested in their labs. THEY WERE WRONG. Two years ago, millions of blue crabs and shrimp died from Mirex poisoning off the Atlantic coast from North Carolina to Florida - putting hundreds of fishermen out of business. A curious chemist repeated the lab experiment last year, observing the test animals for 10 days after they were treated with Mirex, instead of the standard 96 hours. A miniscule one part per billion of Mirex in sea water killed 11 per cent of the shrimp tested. In other experiments, 78 per cent of mallard ducks tested drop- ped dead after 10 days. All the mice in one experiment died. Conservationists fear that with these t e s t results dropping 450 million pounds of the stuff over 120 million acres is environmental suicide. The new and supposedly final phase of the fire ant program calls for fleets of World War II-vintage planes to drop Mirex in the form of corncob grit baits doused with soybean oil, about 757,- 000 granules per acre. The planes will focus on one area at a time, applying three separate treatments six months apart. USDA officials, are at last convinced that Mirex ac- tually does kill shellfish, so they've agreed to stop spread- ing the insecticide directly on waterways and estuaries. No worry that the grits will get in the water by mistake: "the planes are monitored, and are incredibly accurate," marvels T. C. Byerly, Agriculture's top pesticide adminis- trator. But Mirex still shows up in water samples, notes Interior's Johnson; perhaps the rain is washing it in. It can't be the wind, adds Byerly, because the bombers are supposed to stay at base when gusts come up. WHAT'S TO STOP animals from accidently eating the corncob grits (which, after all, will stick to vegeta- tion) and perhaps dying of Mirex poisoning or passing it on to humans? Leo G. K. Iveson, USDA's Agricultural Research di- rector, told me why that's no problem. When planes drop the grits, he says, the fire ants will scurry from their homes. "remove most of the bait and haul it back into their mounds." While no one really knows whether Mirex does harm animals in nature,,no one knows for sure that it doesn't. Opponents of the program argue that far too much doubt exists to justify the most expensive, extensive insect eradication program in the nation's history. "There are too many things we don't know about Mirex," says Den- zel Ferguson, a Mississippi zoologist, "sophisticated bio- logical data like its effects on hormones, enzymes, and metabolism." Studies by the National Cancer Research Institute found Mirex includes cancer in laboratory mice; a spec- ial HEW pesticide commission last year urged the gov- ernment to severely restrict Mirex to use where advan- tages to human health clearly outweigh the potential hazards. Ferguson and a scientist-dominated conserva- tion group called CLEAN (Committee for Leaving the Environment of America Natural) wrote a letter in May asking the Agriculture Department to suspend the Mi- rex program pending more research. But Iveson flatly refuses to delay his ant battles. "Research has not developed data showing that Mi- rex has caused significant harm to a hontarget environ- ment," Iveson insists. ACTUALLY, USDA has established a field testing program to see if it can trace Mirex in animals, but the study won't be completed for six months. Researchers haven't .yet found any animals killed by Mirex, but as Interior investigator Tom Carver points out, "if an an- imal is killed in nature; its predators dispose of it quick- ly." Investigators are finding Mirex in living animals - zoologist Denzel Ferguson at the University of Mississippi has discovered 150 parts per million in songbirds as LETTERS TO THE L)AILY much as one year after an area has been doused with the chemical. The Food and Drug Administration con- siders Mirex so dangerous that it will confiscate any foodstuffs sold on the market with more than .3 parts per million. Iveson won't stop the program for other reasons: "a delay in the program would give advantage to the pest which may- never be recaptured." Prominent etymologists don't think the ant can be eradicated, under any conditions. A report by the Na- tional Research Council of the National Academy of Sci- ences, commissioned especially by USDA three years ago, flatly concluded that "an eradication of the imported fire ant is not now biologically and technically feasible." That's not what USDA officials wanted to hear, so they buried the report in department files and never released it. ETYMOLOGISTS will tell you that one colony of fire ants can reproduce and repopulate several square miles in less than three years. No aerial bombardment could possibly come close to hitting every fire ant mound, of- ten hidden in thickets or woods. "If one colony is missed, the entire ant population would spring back in a couple of years," says Harvard etymologist Edward Wilson who pioneered research on the ant in the Fifties. Even if it were feasible to wipe out the ant, scientists say, it's just not worth the money and effort. The ant ranks low on the etymologists list of pests. It doesn't threaten farm animals, it doesn't damage crops. In fact, there is strong evidence that the ants eat other insects which do threaten crops, such as the boll weevil. "The ant is primarily a people pest. It has a strong bite," a USDA official told me. William Murray, a Gov- ernment pesticide research administrator, says t h a t while the fire ant seems unimportant to people in the North, it poses a real threat to Southerners. "If you were ever bitten, you'd feel differently," says Murray. "I know. Once I knocked off the top of a fire ant mound, stuck my hand in and let it get stuck 10 or 12 times. Mississippi, North and South Carolina have already started dumping Mirex over their countryside and towns. The Environmental Defense Fund in New York has filed suit in Washington, D.C. district court to stop the fire ant program. So far the court has said nothing, and USDA will forge ahead with the fire ant fiasco. Who is USDA to tell the people what to do? In Geor- gia, the Mirex program is so popular that it plays., a prominent part in local politics. "The people through elected representatives in Congress have asked for the program," declares Byerly. "We are obligated to carry out that directive." #, 4 A proposal on coipor te recruiting The Nixon cease-fire plan PRESIDENT NIXON'S proposal for a stand-still cease-fire in Indochina has been denounced by NLF and North Viet- namese negotiators. Hopefully this will not be a final re- sponse on the cease-fire qgestion. Even a temporary halt to the killing in Indo- china should be welcomed. But if one believes the United States has no legitimate purpose fighting in N0 comment THE FOLLOWING item appeared in last Thursday's New York Times: "SAIGON, South Vietnam - A 34-year- old member of South Vietnam's National Assembly defied President Nguyen Van Thieu today and renewed a call for the formation of a provisional governnient as a step toward peace.? The proposals of the legislator, Ngo Cong Duc and the response to them from the Thieu government have stirred ex- citement since they were made several days ago. President Thieu implied that Mr. Duc was a traitor and said he would be in jail if not for his legislative immunity. A pe- tition seeking the possible removal of Mr. Duc's immunity is being circulated in the House of Representatives. At least two advocates of peace proposals opposed by Mr. Thieu have been jailed." -MAYNARD Editorial Staff MARTIN A. HIRSCHMAN, Editor STUART GANNES JUDY SARASOHN Editorial Director Managing Editor NADINECOHODAS . ... Feature Editor JIM .NEUBACHER Editorial Page Editor ROB BIER.............Associate Managing Editor LAURIE HARRIS .. . . Arts Editor JUDY KAHN..... Personnel Director DANIEL ZWERDLING......... ..Magazine Editor ROBERT CONROW................Books Editor NIGHT EDITORS: Dave Chudwin, Erika Hoff, Steve Koppman, Robert Kraftowitz. Lynn Weiner EDITORIAL NIGHT EDITORS: Jim Beattie, Lindsay Chaney, Steve Koppman, Pat Mahoney, Rick Periof. Indochina, it becomes difficult to cri- ticize NLF and North Vietnamese reaction to any American peace proposal. Apparently, the Nixon Administration has decided that because of next month's congressional elections and the current Indochina military situation, the time is ripe for a cease-fire. For these same rea- sons, the NLF and North Vietnam may decide it not to their advantage to accept it. No concessions were made by the Presi- dent in his speech Wednesday on the substantive issues of the future South Vietnamese government and American troop withdrawals. The Saigon govern- ment, maintained primarily by 400,000 American troops, remains unwilling to negotiate with the NLF on the formation of a provisional coalition government. There appears to be no chance of a ne- gotiated settlement in Vietnam under these conditions. BUT THE question of a negotiated set- tlement is almost beside the point. There are disagreements over the pri- mary motivation our government has had in establishing and defending a succes- sion of landlord-military r e g i m e s in South Vietnam over a sixteen-year period. The most prevalent theory is that U.S. policy has attempted to maintain 'na- tional security' by preventing one hos- tile power (i.e., China) from dominating all of Asia. Another view is that. U.S. policy functions to aid American and European capitalist economies by keep- ing underdeveloped areas open for invest- ment, extraction of raw materials and marketing of exports. The reasons for American intervention in Vietnam appear to involve a combina- tion of these motives. In both cases, Viet- nam is seen as a test case of America's willingness to engage and defeat 'Com- munist expansionism.' But there have never been any serious claims of Chinese intervention in Viet- nam. The foreign invasion force in Viet- nam has been ours. Serious study of what has happened in Vietnam shows a conflict stretching in- termittently over nearly twenty-five vnears To the Editor: ON OCT. 6, 1970 the Brain Mis- trust (BMT) addressed the Office of Student Services Policy Board regarding enforcement of the Uni- versity's policy governing the use of its facilities by corporate re- cruiters. Our proposal reads: Regarding the response to our proposal, BMT says: The argument that there must be a full discussion of a suggested new policy in all its ramifications is specious. BMT replies that what is needed is enforcement of pre- sent policy-we are not initiating new policy. Do University rules aply to the University? The University of Michigan maintains the following policy for campus recruiters: The University of Michigan Placement Services is adminis- tered in a manner which pro- vides equal opportunities for placement and employmen of University of Michigan students and alumni. Consequently its services are not available to any organization or individual which discriminates against any per- son because of race, color, creed, sex, religion or national origin, nor which does not maintain an affirmative action program to assure equal employment op- portunity. This policy has not been en- forced. Many of the companies recruit- ing on campus operate in the Union of South Africa. It is well known that these companies prac- tice b 1 a t a n t discrimination through unequal wage scales based entirely upon race, through segre- gated facilities in their plants, through discriminatory promotion practices, and through adhering to other apartheid laws and policies. The companies themselves openly admit to practicing apartheid. No corporation operating ac- cording to South Africa's apart- heid policies should be permitted to use University of Michigan re- cruiting facilities. We call for strict and immediate enforcement of the University's stated policy. The argument that it is not the businesses, but the South African government, that practices apart- heid is equally specious, for Amer- ican businesses have voluntarily submitted to apartheid and have profited from it. In fact, they have bolstered apartheid. For ex- ample; after the Sharpeville mas- sacre, a group of American banks, notably Chase Manhattan, bailed South Africa out of a foreign ex- change crisis with a $150 million dollar loan. Subsequently Chase Manhattan acquired huge banking interests in South Africa. Some argue that enforcement of at the total situation. Mr. Brose University policy has widespread also failed to mention: 1) the eli- implications. This may be true. mination this year of both the However, it is irrelevant to the clothing and "special'? allowances present point, and is no argum:nt (unusual dietary needs, laundry, against the BMT position, telephone, etc), and 2) newly plac- ed restrictions on deductible ex- -Don L , penses (transportation, u n i o n for the BMT dues, taxes, etc.), The last item, an especially cruel blow, represents a disincentive to employment thus Error contributing to the myth that wel- To the Editor: fare recipients do not want to SPOKESMEN FOR the Poor of Two years ago the County Washtenaw County have b e e n Board of Commissioners "found" making front page headlines. As a after considerable pressuring, $70 result, Alfred Brose, Director of per child for clothing. Last year the Washtenaw County Depart- the total was reduced to $38.50 ment of Social Services, was for the year. This year the Board recently questioned in the A n n of Commissioners flatly refused to Arbor News. Mr. Brose, in at- allocate funds for a clothing al- tempting to provide information to lowance stating that the $7 a clarify the welfare situation, month per child increase w a s merely listed average in o n t h l y sufficient. grants by specific categories. Be- What does this all mean to a lieving that we should be m o r e recipient in the largest welfare fully informed about the realities category - mothers receiving aid of both* the "clothing allowance" to dependent children (ADC) ? and the most recent political solu Mrs. Jones, a working mother with tion to the welfare problem, I 5 dependent children, will be our did some digging of my own. hypothetical illustration. In 1969, Mr. Brose stated that each wel- she worked full time receiving a fare recipient receives $44 p e r gross income of $450 a month be- month. He did not say that this fore the above mentioned employ- represents a $7 a month increase ment expenses were deducted. over last year (which in the light Each month she received $215 in of spiraling prices seems a reason- welfare aid for her family of 6 able figure), But wait, let's look (plus the one time $38.50 amount). This year Mrs. Jones still earns $450 a month. However, as a result of changes in the welfare system and including the $7 a child per month, Mrs. Jones receives $125 per month - a decrease of $90 each month rather than the pro- jected $35 increase (5 eligible children times $7). IT SEEMS to me that some- thing is basically wrong with our County government when a work- ing mother, struggling to m a k e ends meet, is penalized that much money by a new political "solu- tion." And this, unfortunately, is no hypothetical example. Between 110 and 115 mothers (10 per cent) of the total) were either dropped from receiving any aid or had their payments reduced under these new provisions. Furthermore, Direct Relief, in itself w o r t h another letter would not apply in Mrs. Jones' case - she is simply $90 a month poorer than last year. Surely the citizens of Ann Ar- bor, when made aware of s u c h facts, would agree that the Board of Commissioners is doing our community a grave disservice. We must find a way to guarantee that no human being is denied, by de- ceit or otherwise, a decent stand- ard of living. -John Evans 5th Ward Candidate, County Board of Commissioners 4 1 in the mother counitry Feeling out a popular front mnartini hirschmn EDITOR'S NOTE: This is the unexpurgated version of an article that appeared in the New York Times yesterday. THE TORRENT of criticism that has lately been. leveled at violence on campus seems sadly mis- directed. Quite possibly students have been responsible for far too much senseless destruction. But has the vision of those outside the universities become so clouded that they cannot perceive the source of the vast pre- ponderance of violence in our society? Are we not now in our sixth year of watching scores of Americans, hundreds of Vietnamese (and now Cam- bodians and Laotians) slaughtered each week? Are U.S. bombers not continuing the systematic destruction of vast rural areas of Indochina? Have not dozens of blacks, especially black political leaders, been shot down on the streets of our cities-and even while sleeping in bed-by racist law enforcement officials and others? Are there not thousands of Americans in Appalachia, the Mississippi Delta and the inner cities who are slowly starving because of the low priority our government has nlne in +he Pliinann n onn.0 what has happened on campus in its proper context. Except for those who wish to allow this nation to con- tinue its inhumanely destructive course, campus unrest is a long way from becoming our most pressing problem. For those of us who have attempted to sort out new directions for the student left, the question of violence has become increasingly difficult to deal with because our alternatives seem to be disappearing rapidly. Dozens of times and in growing numbers over the last five years students have petitioned the government to end the war, but they have been ignored or offered only token successions. Lyndon Johnson had the audacity or ignorance to inquire naively into the source of student "restlessness." From the Nixon administration has come only ad homi- nem attacks and the news that while hundreds of thou- sands marched below his window, the President watched football on TV. Many students at one time or another have turned to electoral politics. But they soon learn that these traditional mechanisms have become, and perhaps al- name and say, "Oh, Joe McCarthy," don't correct them. The lack of political content to the actual foot work of the McCarthy campaign has since been exposed further by elections analysts: Polls show that the major- ity of those who voted for McCarthy in the New Hamp- shire primary thought they were showing a preference for an escalation of the Vietnam War. A basic realignment of the social and political philosophies of the American people is, however, essential if there is to be any chance of democratically instituting meaningful, lasting change in our society. Since heavy campaign financing and manipulative techniques have rendered even discussion of basic political issues ir- relevant or damaging to the vote-getting process, activi- ties like campaigning for dovish candidates is, in and of itself, simply a waste of time for those truly interested in achieving long-term change. ALIENATED FROM traditional political processes, yet conscious-stricken by the diseases that continue to infect our nation, many young people have turned to violence -some spontaneously, others by design. 4