The -Michigan Daily
Edited and managed by Students at the
University of Michigon
Thursday, August 12, 1976
News Phone: 764-0552
htnd isease and death
IT IS SAID THAT an ounce of protection is worth a
pound of cure, and the Congressional passing of the
swine flu immunization legislation last -Tuesday looms
as a smart, protepive measure.
We need not be confronted with a recap of the epi-
demics of 1918-1919, which proved deadly to hundreds
of thousands of Americans. And the recent series of biz-
arre "legionnaire" deaths in Pennsylvania provide ample
proof that medical science has not yet conquered the
possibility of dreaded outbreaks of disease.
The legislation, pending approval by President Ford,
will make the government responsible for defending any
lawsuit arising from vaccine-related injuries or deaths as
well as insurance costs, and also limits the amount of
profit the vaccine manufacturers may reap.
We hope Ford will speedily approve the legislation
so the immunization program can be promptly initiated.
Hopefully, the government will conduct this mass vac-
cination task with care and order.
But, for now, let us breathe a little easier knowing
that the legislation cleared its largest hurdles - the re-
cent confusion stemming from. insurance matters and,.
finally, scrutiny by the House. When the flu season
erupts, we hope the impact of this important measure
will be realived.
TODAY'S STAFF:
News-Jennifer Miller, Mike Norton, Ken Parsigion, Tim
Schick
Editoril-oav Levin
Art--Lois Jonsmovich
Photo Technicion--Stnt Frcker
Ed/i/orial S/ff-Sitier Tcrin
'TIM S CllC-K KEN PARSIGIAN
Co-Editr;;- in- Chief
JAY LEVIN JIM TOBIN
si!toi: Direttorns
ELAINE PTC.HER ANN MARIE LIPINSKI
Supplemnt 5Editors
J1E F SEI RT .)..,.. Arts Editor
lOIS JOSIMOVICH. . . Night Editor
(,O M-1:E tOESENZ sight Editor
MIKE NORTON:Night Editor
PHILLIP NOKOVOY. . . . .Assistant Night Editor
I AN CTJORDAN E Assitnt Night Editor
JENNY MLLER. . .. . Assistant Night Editor
EARNIA ........Assistant Night Editor
Siimmrt- Sports Staff

Fihting insani
/ in ani s teamy tx
In d tai

By MATTHEW BEAL
Last of two parts
EVERY TAXI-CAB dispatcher has his or her
way of doing and saying things. Dean Hos-
kins, the night dispatcher for Veterans Cabs,
is fun to work with because he tends to put
a little variety into the evening. He has a
nickname for seemingly every restaurant, bar,
hotel, store or otherwise physical entity in
the greater Ann Arbor area. His voice is very
soft and, because it stands apart from the
pandemonium of radio interference, posses-
ses a curiously soothing quality. This makes
the work a little less tedious and, at times,
genuinely relaxing. Believe me, when you're
dealing with something as basically routine as
cab-driving, you find it's necessary to come
up with a little craziness just to keep from
falling asleep.
'Oh, and one other thin
the driver.'

ment.
Driving a cab offers you a unique oppor-
tunity to catch a glimpse of what life is like
for people you would not normally have a
chance to talk to. You get to know where peo-
ple live, where they work and where they
go for entertainment. This is fairly personal
information, after all, and you can ,tell that
some people would, rather not talk about it.
In that case, you don't press the issue. But if
you can get people talking about themselves
or anything else, you can learn a lot about
the way this society is set up.
FOR INSTANCE, one night I was giving a
black lady a ride home to Gott St. and
I happened to mention that I didn't know the
northwest side very well because I'd always
been a student when I lived in Ann Arbor
ig: Please remember to tip


So when Dean wants you to pick up some-
one at the bus station, he'll say, "get the
hound" or "one at the dog." If someone wants
to be picked up at the Gandy Dancer, he'll
tell you to "go waltzing." or "go tap-dancing."
' You're told to "take a chance" if there's an
order at Second Chance, to "have it your
r way" if someone's at Burger King and to
"take a holiday." if a passenger is waiting
at the Holiday Inn. Similarly, the Golden Fal-
con is the "gilded bird", "the Jolly Tiger is
"the happy cat", the Blind Pig is the "Sight-
less Pork Chop," and so on, ad absurdium.
THE TAXI STANDS are not immune to the
same kind of treatment. For instance, the
Manchester rd. stand is affectionately dubbed
"The Chester", as in the phrase, "Five-six
is manning the Chester.'' A cab is said to be
"hospitable" when it's on the University Hos-
pital stand and, when acknowledging a cab on
he State stand, Dean has been known to
nquire, "Oh yeah? What kind of state?"
These and many other expressions, taken in
the proper context, help immensely with the
task of providing an element of much-needed
comic relief to the drudgery of being a cab-
driver in the summer.
The ultimate justification for driving a
cab, when all other rationalizations have fail-
ed, is the people you meet. Even this excuse
sometimes wears thin after two or three un-
pleasant encounters in a row, but a nice smile
from a pretty woman or an intriguing conver-
sation with anyone is usually enough to re-
store faith in your 'sanity, if not your -judg-

-and spent most of my time hanging around
campus. "Well this is hard-core , poverty,
mai." she said, "Take alook at it. I looked q
and agreed. "There sure are a lot of Cadillacs
parked out in front of these houses, though."
I said. This seemed to make her unhappy.
"Oh, man," she said, as she reached so her
purse for the money, "you don't understand.
You just don't know anything , about the cul-
ture. Listen. I take cabs all the time. We'll
talk about it." She was right. I don't know
much about black culture, but I know a lot
more now than when I first started driving a
cab.
In the back of every cab-driver'smn md
looms the possibility of being robbed. I read
in the paper the other day about a cab-driver
in 'Detroit who thwarted an attempted rob-
bery by knocking the gun out of the thief's
hand with his changer and then driving him
to a nearby police car. I often wonder how
I would react in .that situation. I doubt that
I'd be as dexterous with my changer as that
gy in Detroit, especially if a gun was in-
volved. But with bhtsiness so slow this stim-
mer, anyone who tries to rob me better cotnt
on receiving one or two viciols blows to the
head with a rolled-ii newsoaner before mak-
ing off with my lousy thirty dollars for the
night.
Oh, and one other thing: Please ret-emtber
to tip the driver.
-t
Ma//lew t-l, r 'i lo, ib)!es as as V A
senior.

RICH PERNER
ENID GOLDM AN
50B MILLER
MARK WHITNEY

E Sports Editor
Exrrstive sports Editor
......,Niht Editor
Night Editor
Night Editor

Mail: On gay
To The Daily: gay rights
Men might come to class in skirts, fantacized
one member of the all male, all white, all hetero-
sexual, University bargaining team during the GEO
contract negotiations on Aug. 3. This single example
served to justify the University's insistence that an
arbitrary code of conduct, defined vaguely as "ap-
propriate" public and private behavior, be appended
to the "sexual preference" clause of the next GEO
contract.
The University negotiator was quick to point out
that this code of conduct would not be arbitrarily
applied to gays, but to employes of all sexual pref-
erences. Interesting approach to equal rights. Instead
of extending heterosexual rights to gays, the Univer-
sity has chosen to achieve equality by trying to strip
heterosexuals of their rights to express their oien
peculiar form of sexual preference. -
If you think this suggestion is all too preposterous,
let me draw your attention to an incident that recent-
ly happened in Toronto. On July 13, a Toronto judge
decided that a public kiss is an indecent act, and
fined two men $50 each for kissing at a street cor-
ner. No, it wasn't because they were two men. The
judge agreed that the case couldn't be decided on

rights, 'working' demonstrations

those grounds. The act itself was found to be inde-
cent. Sure, and maybe it wasn't because they were
men that they were arrested. Maybe the police had
been arresting every set of kissers lately.
So, now, there's a precedent. Now every public
kiss is an indecent act in Toronto, every embrace
an offense. oon in Ann Arbor, will there be a GEO
contract violation being sent to binding arbitration
whenever two people kiss, or a male dare wear a
too-blousy shirt, or a pair of earrings (God forbid)?
I am reminded of the wisdom of Frederick Doug-
lass' words:
"Find out just what people will submit to,
and you Isave found gut the exact anount of in-
justice and wrong which will be imposed upon
them." (1857)
The struggle for gay rights tests the freedom of
each and everyone of us. The struggle for gay rights
is therefore everyone's concern.
Lionel A. Biron
August 3
working
To The Daily:
I am writing in regards to the July 4 demonstration
in Philadelphia "Let's Get the Rich Off Our Backs".

I had been very ambivalent about attending the
demonstration; however, after being unemployed for
fourteen months, I needed some way of expressing
my anger towards the system that has left me jobless
and hopeless.
I WAS DEEPLY impressed with the people and
the comradeship. This was not a group of young radi-
cals looking for excitement. It was working people
themselves, generating unity and purpose. Thousands
of people - Black, white, oriental, employed, unem-
ployed, veterans, auto workers, mine. workers and
others youth and college students were all joined to-
gether to demand decent safe employment or income,
freedom from exploitation by the wealthy, and the
ousting of the rich free-loaders prevalent in this sys-
tem.
The July 4 "Get the Rich Off Our Backs" Coalition
personally helped -me to cast aside the humiliation I
had suffered as a result of unemployment, and to
bring forth the anger I can righteously feel. It is not
only me that has been victimized; the system has
victimized all us working people and had succeeded
in dehumanizing us in the name of profit.
Name withheld
July 20