RI £id4gan Dailu
Eighty-four years of editorial freedom
Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan
Friday, March 21, 1975
News Phone: 764-0552
420 Maynard St., Ann Arbor, Mi. 48104
PIUGIM: Set fees or bust
ODAY A PROPOSAL comes before
the Regents that, if approved,
would create a mandatory fee assess-
ment policy for funding the campus
branch of PIRGIM-Public Interest
Research Group in Michigan.
Under the new system, each se-
mester a $1.50 assessment would ap-
pear as an asterisked entry on stu-
dents' tuition bill. Students would be
informed that they have the option
of not paying the fee, a process that
would require filing a form card with
the Student Accounts office.
The reasons for PIRGIM's push
for a new funding system are many-
faceted. Local PIRGIM staffers claim
that their current voluntary funding
system is not applicable to the new
CRISP student registration system.
Over the past three years, PIRGIM
volunteers have staffed desks during
Registration at Waterman Gym,
relying on personal contact with reg-
istering students to keep funding at
an adequate level.
RUT THE STUDENT-RUN public
interest group feels that with
CRISP a voluntary system would not
work, both because they can't afford
to staff each of the more than twen-
ty CRISP registration points, and
because, in their absence, it would
be unfair to expect students to volun-
teer if no one is available to answer
their queries.
Ideally, no independent groups
should be granted mandatory assess-
ment privileges. However, in this
case, an exception should be made.
Student support for the indepen-
dent watchdog group was amply
demonstrated by over 16,000 pro-
PIRGIM petition signatures three
years ago. Since then, the percentage
of students who have volunteered
their money has risen from 30 to
47 per cent.
Meanwhile, the campus and state
PIRGIM offices has more than prov-
ed itself a worthwhile venture, ag-
gressively working in the public in-
terest on a broad range of issues -
generic drugs, ambulance safety
standards, nuclear w a s t e dispos-
al, returnable bottles, and toy safe-
ty, to name a few.
IN A FEW YEARS, PIRGIM has de-
veloped into an effective lobby
in stateand federal government and
an excellent educational forum for
its studentvolunteers.
PIRGIM has already shown itself
responsible user of student trust. And
its performance can only improve
with a move to fee assessment.
Though not perfect, the system does
preserve individual rights of choice.
Without it, PIRGIM's very existence
would be jeopardized.
We encourage the Regents to seri-
ously consider all the merits of the
issue and vote to adopt the PIRGIM
mandatory funding proposal.
.. . Ir
By DOC KRALIK
IT HAD BEEN a very nice party. There
had been lots of Irish coffee. And
green beer. And all the girls in Ann
Arbor who still have enough guts to come
to one of our parties. They were really
very nice girls. We had taken the last
of them home and were driving back.
"When the gas station open-
ed, a big hulking attendant
asked them where they had
slept the night before. When
they told him they had slept
in the car his face broke out
in a toothy grin. "Ilawt dang,
Didva? *"
Suddenly there was nothing to say.
Mike saw I was still in my melancholic
state.
"Aw come on, Doc, snap out of it. That
makes two more girls that're after you.
Why can't you just forget her?"
"I'M TRYING, Mike, I'm trying."
Mike snapped his right fistinto my
stomach, and slammed on the accelerat-
or sending us squealing down a dirt road
that we suddenly realized was a dead
end, turning, braking at once, throw-
ing us in a big, slowing moving circle
that kept us from cracking up on these
huge oak trees, and turning us com-
pletely around so that we could stare
at the huge cloud of dust we had thrown
up. It was going to be that kind of
night.
Mike started following a car. He fol-
lowed it all the way past our apart-
ment. "I just know that guy wants to
drag," he said. The car turned down
into an apartment complex and parked.
A sign for I-94 came up. "We should
go and see Charley at Notre Dame."
Mike said.
"WHY THE hell. not," I said. "I've
got lots of friends there."
Mike jumped on my words. "Ya mean
it Doc! Alright! Now you're talking!"
Mike's eyes were lit, his face flushed
sh
eyes are
red. He started punching me in the
chest and chain smoking. We w e r e
going to South Bend for St. Patrick's
Day.
Mike explained to me all about draft-
ing trucks for mileage. Then he enum-
erated all the things that could possibly
go wrong with the radiator. And how
to fix them. I was the perfect ploy for
Mike because I knew nothing about cars.
Mike loves to talk about cars, espec-
ially his car, a gray '68 Olds Cutlass
that can do 110 when Mike gets things
set right. Mike was always setting things
right.
"Ya know, Doc, I keep seeing this one
bright star ahead of me in the west.
The real bright one. Look. I always think
it's leading me somewhere."
"MIKE THAT's just an airplane." And
so it was.
Mike hunched over the wheel. He
smoked cigarette after cigarette, always
offering me one. Mike calls cigarettes
"pleasure sticks" after the billboard with
the ravishing blonde that obviously nev-
er smoked in her life but claims to
smoke Winstons for pleasure. I always
smoke Carletonswhich are for chick-
ens. I think it's pretty silly to be afraid
of throat cancer at nineteen, but I smoke
Carletons anyway.
I crawled into the back and tried to
sleep. I discovered for the eightieth time
that I can't sleep in cars. Mike kept
shouting and playing the AM stations
loud with the static and all the songs
you're sick of. But I kept trying to
sleep. I had to get up tomorrow and fin-
ish typing my thesis. Finally I gave
up. I went back up to the front seat.
I realize that the euphoria of the Irish
coffee had worn off. We were only ten
miles outside of South Bend and I was
not so sure I could wake up my friends.
It was 4:30 a.m.
ALL THE MOTELS on the way into
town had signs welcoming Gerald Ford.
The streets were absolutely deserted.
We wandered around in downtown
South Bend for a while before we found
the street on which Charley lived. Then
we took that for about a mile until we
came to Charley's address. It was a
rather run-down red brick building.
There were no lights. As we stood on
the porch and sheepishly rang the bell
a cat looked out at us from the house
next door. After about five minutes the
door opened and a frail figure with fuz-
zy tied back hair let Mike into the
house. There was a faint, glum recog-
nition in the darkness. I followed and
met Charley.
Mike and Charley talked for two hours
straight, Charley always automatically
getting up when the record was over.
He played record after record from his
collection of at least six hundred. Mike
would explain things to me, so I didn't
feel left out.
ble
'eding
Patti told me that once Mike and
Charley had "jungled" her. Jungling is
collapsing in public to the embarrass-
ment of one's escort. Just before collap-
sing, junglers are supposed to emit a
cry resembling Bhinky's high pitched
squeal. Bhinky Harvey is the most ob-
noxious kid on Mike and Charley's block.
He is fond of saying, "Hey neAT!"
WHEN WE finished the beer and the
joints we decided to go to Perkins Pan-
cake House for breakfast. At Perkins
there was a neon sign saying "Happi-
ness is a Perkins omlette."
We had pancakes and omlettes We
were in hysterics the whole time because
"Mike jumped on my words. "Ya mean it Doc! Alright!
Now you're talking!" Mike' s eyes were lit, his face flushed
red. He started punching me in the chest and chain smok-
ing. We were going to South Bend for St. Patrick's Day."
".{:: :,4".LV ".'".::k"}twt, r::. d": r." xf":":e..w4"'mem
"Listen, things started early here,"
Charley said. "Beer was free in all the
bars between seven and eight this morn-
ing and they were Packed. After that it
went up a nickel an hour. Everybody
was completely ....faced by noon."
"DID YOU go see the Gerry show?"
Mike asked, refering to the appearance
of our honorable president.
"Yah, there wasn't a sober eye in the
place."
"Did you walk out in protest?" Mike
asked.
"Nah, I walked out in disgust. I
didn't know he was that stupid."
Mike went into the bedroom to talk to
Patti, Charley's girlfriend. Charley rolled
precision numbers on a Playboy maga-
zine in the kitchen. I went to get a
six pack out of the car.
PATTI GOT semi-dressed and the four
of us sat around in the bedroom while
Mike and Charley discussed his impend-
ing marriage.
"So when's the big date?"
"Oh, I don't know, sometime."
"Can I be worst man?"
"You're the worst guy I know."
No more aid for Vietnam
Naderom ics:
Eulof holes
AS THE MILITARY position of the
South Vietnamese government
continues to deteriorate, citizens can
rest assured that President Ford and
his advisors will revive the ancient
arguments that were used in the
1950's and 1960's to prop up one cor-
rupt government after another. As
Ford cited the domino theory and
termed the Cambodian government
"vital" to U. S. security last week,
he will certainly raise the same ar-
gument in yet another attempt to
prevent the Thieu regime from being
overthrown. We must not allow our-
selves to be taken in by the Presi-
dent's inverted logic.
Ford says that Communist-led ad-
vances in Southeast Asia will lead to
the fall of one Asian nation after
another, ultimately endangering the
United States. Apparently the Presi-
dent still believes in the "specter of
monolithic Communism," a group of
nations working together to over-
throw the western nations. This ar-
gument is so ludicrous, so at odds
TODAY'S STAFF:
News: Gordon Atcheson, Barb Cornell,
Stephen Hersh, Sara Rimer, Kate
Spelman, Sue Wilhelm
Editorial Page: Paul Haskins, Jeff
Sorensen, Steve Stoj ic
Arts Page: James Valk
Photo Technician: Steve Kagan
with the political realities of the past
three decades, that one is forced to
wonder whether there is any possi-
bility that the President himself ac-
tually believes in the theory he doles
out to the American public. Appar-
ently he believes that the public is so
gullible that it will accept even the
most bald-faced lie, so that addi-
tional military aid can be shipped
to prop up the Thieu and Lon Nol
regimes.
IF THE DECADE-LONG American
fiasco in Vietnam proved any-
thing, it 'surely demonstrated that
the U. S. has no right to interfere
in the internal affairs or civil wars
of another nation. We believe that
neither the American public or the
Congress has forgotten this lesson:
the days when the military could
drum up aid for Indochina at the
drop of a hat are gone forever.
For these reasons, we must remain
absolutely firm on the point of no
further aid to the South Vietnamese
government. No more dollars and no
more arms should go to that corrupt
regime. Although the fall of the
Thieu administration is no cause for
celebration - that government may
well be replaced by another which is
just as corrupt and cruel - we be-
lieve that the U. S. has no obligation
to send more aid to prop up a regime
which cannot govern its own people.
By MARK SULLIVAN
WHEN RALPH NADER, the na-
tion's number one advocate of
consumer power spoke last Friday at
Hill Auditorium, he described a plan
whereby consumers might claim the
voice in the production of goods and
services that is rightfully theirs.
He proposed a system of coopera-
tives and elected consumer organiza-
tions that would serve to combat the
power of the agribusiness interests.
The idea of broadly based popular
support as a weapon against the pow-
er of capital makes perfect sense.
It has been espoused in so many con-
texts that it need not be explained
here. But it appears that the plan
that Mr. Nader proposed would not
be ablerto effectively usedthat base.
Nader proposed a program of in-
formation followed by organization.
Through increased effort on the part
of social action groups and individual
consumers, increased information
flow will become available to the
average consumer.
The greater information flow will
cause a corresponding rise in con-
sumer consciousness. Widespread
awareness of consumer's plight and
of what consumer power could bring
will manifest itself in the establish-
ment of cooperatives of every type
and consumer organizations which
wil serve as a base of support for
grievance procedures.
The combined buying power of the
consumers woud then represent a
powerful weapon for use against ex-
ploitive production interests. Con-
sumer representatives would be
elected to represent the body of con-
sumers and would wield the budgeon
of consumerism over the producers'
head.
WHILE THIS may sound magnifi-
cent on paper or in a speech, in
practice it would fall prey to the
same drawbacks that our present
system of elected representatives en-
counters. As one fellow observer at
the Nader speech observed, "it does
not matter it they're
advocates or United
it's the same trip."
called consumer
States Senators,
What is meant is that wherever
power accumulates in the hands of a
few, all the corruptions contingent on
that power also accumulate. Consum-
er advocates would be subject to lob-
bying, campaign promise commit-
ments and massive pressure from
producer interests. Obviously, those
business complexes that now hold the
power over the production of goods
and services in this country will be-
come upset when they feel their pow-
er slipping from their fingers.
They will look for a target from
whom they could wrest their power
back. The very strength of diffuse
consumerism lies in the fact that
there is no target left for the moneyed
inerests to attack. Through Nader's
plan of cenralized consumer organi-
zation we provide such a target.
THE ONLY solution is to separate
from large power structures through
small scale cooperative action. It is
the diffuse nature of a popular move-
ment that strips its opponents of pow-
er against it.
By concentrating all of the power
of the consumer in the consumer ad-
"W herever power accum-
ulates in the hands of a few,
all the corruptions contin-
gent on that power a l s o
accumulate. Consumer ad-
rocates would be subject to
lobbying, campaign prom-
ise commitments and mas-
sire pressure from proditc-
er interests."
vocates, the possibility for meaning-
ful individual or small scale action
has been dealt away. The democracy
inherent in cooperative action is what
makes such action so personalized
and responsive to the needs of its
constituents.
By turning to the republicanism of
consumer advocacy, we establish an
extra link in the consumer-producer
communication line that is not only
vulnerable to corrupting influences
but also separates the consumer from
his power base (which now lies in
the hands of the elected consumer ad-
vocate). The power for consumer ac-
tion again lies with someone other
than the consumer himself.
Obviously, however, some organiza-
tioin is needed. The powerlessness of
one disgruntled consumer against a
corporation is all too well known.
But these organizations must re-
main inherently regional and respon-
sive on a daily basis to the needs
of the consumer-constituent if the
pitfalls of bureaucracy, are to be
avoided.
Mark Sullivan is an LSA junior and
an occasional contributor to the Edi-
torial Page.
of a Polish lady with a very loud voice,
and because the salt shakers were for
sale and because a guy in a bright red
sportscoat was trying to make a waitress
at 7 a.m. in the morning.
On the way out we picked up a poster
of Gerry Ford. He had the cocky, self-
satisfied grin of someone who had just
got laid.
Before we let off Charley and Patti
they told us that the best way to get
back to Ann Arbor was to go through
Sturgis, Michigan. Charley told us about
the time he and Patti ran out of gas
in Sturgis. When the gas station open-
ed, a big hulking attendant asked them
where they had slept the night before.
When they told him they had slept in the
car his face broke out in a toothy grin.
"Hawt dang, Didya? "
WE SAID goodbye to Charley and Patti
after Mike picked up some records he
had lent Charley,
When we were back on the road Mike
told me. "Ya know, now I know why
we came. We came to get these records.
No, we came to see Charley. I was glad
to see him. I really hope he was glad
to see me."
I tried to sleep in a car for the 81'st
time. When I gave up we were at an
auto parts store in Sturgis. Mike was
unhappy with the way the car was
idling.
We pulled over by the curtain rod
factory. A friend of mine is writing a
thesis on the curtain rod factory in
Sturgis. I never thought I'd get to see
it.
MIKE CHANGED all the spark plugs
and the points, which was a more com-
plicated job. He explained everything he
was doing to me. It took about an hour.
The day was a warm one, the warmest
of the year. The taste of the warm air
was better than a cup of coffee, better
than a glass of beer.
After we got the car fixed we decided
to stop at the McDonald's in Sturgis and
get our McMeal cards punched.
"But, Mike, we don't have McMeal
cards."
"That's just the point."
IT TOOK me awhile to figure out what
I was going to order. Finally I ordered
a vanilla milkshake. A girl who *Rd pret-
ty brown eyes gave it to me on a tray.
I fell asleep for an instant, or closed my
eyes for a second while I was turning.
A spilled vanilla milkshake was at my
feet. I was overwrought. The girl with
the pretty brown eyes smiled and hand-
ed me another one. She had a little too
much purple make-up under her eyes.
It was the American dream - sleep-
walking away from a spilled milkshake.
After that things were tense. In be-
tween saying things that made less and
less sense I was wondering why the hell
we had gone to South Bend. I guess the
reason we went was to celebrate St.
Patrick's Day. No, wait, it was to see
Charley, no, wait, it was to have a
Perkin's omlette, no wait, it was to have
our McMeal cards punched, no wait . .
wait.
We finally got back. I had missed
work. Mike went to bed. I sat down
at the kitchen table to finish typing my
thesis. There was a Michigan Daily on
the table. On the bottom of the front
page was the headline, "ST. PATRICK'S
DAY SLIPS BY THE CITY QUIETLY."
Doc Kraik is the less than famous
author of a thesis on Jack Keronac.
1
obscenity
To The Daily:
TO THOSE who lived through
the ravages of World War II
and who are forced by the
weight of their experiences to
externally suffer the residual
effects of Nazi crimes against
humanity, the Daily's descrip-
tion of Ephraim Katzir "may
or may not be a Hitler" is an
S- r - if -anr fn in ttt -
Letters
is understandable from t h o s e
whose feelings for history are
warped beyond repair. That the
Daily should even hint that this
analogy may be correct is an
indication of the Daily's Editor-
ial perception.
-Joel Poupko
vegetarianism
To The Daily:
TT TTFR i_4 ;4ddr.-,-
to
The
or content of the workshop can
be improved. Your e oerience
can provide us with valuable in-
formation for projected future'
editions. Please take the time
to drop us a card or letter; we
need and will respect you: in-
put
Second, those of you who want
the workbook which was us ed
at the workshop can get it from
us if you send in fifty cents (tor
Daily
Taylor
To The Daily:
LIZ TAYLOR'S argumeits
against rent control are the big-
gest fabrications this side of
Ron Ziegler. Consider just two
of them: 1) She says that the
landlord may receive a ; per
cent monthly rent in-rease icr
each month of the year, nmean-
ing a possible 60 -,,r cet in-
rrmaq _Not goeLiz; '"he law
gages to secure larger tax shel-
ters, and then passing the in-
creased costs onto the tenants.
The law specifically allows in-
creases in maintenance and cap-
ital improvements (and yes,
HIRP does consider uion labor
as a reasonable cm t) t,$ be pas-
sed on as rent. Moreover, the
landlord must, have thehbuild-
ing up to code before he can
apply for any rent increase. Tne
Il I I I I LU \ARMES,\\I