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OPINION
Page 4
Sunday, April 10, 1983
The Michigan Daily"
Sieges,
HE INSURGENTS were well-equipped and
thought their rear assault strategy would
serve them well. Indeed, they pulled off the fir-
st part of the manuevers without a hitch, sur-
prising the regime headquarters without suf-
fering a single casualty.
The war games took place in the University
administration building Thursday and Friday.
The insurgents were 35 members of the
Progressive Student Network who were
elections: Winners,
osers
The three other ballot proposals won easily.
The plans allow the city to raise property taxes
and use the funds for upgrading city
parks,convert two city dams into hydroelectric
power generators, and repair the Allen Creekp
drain system.
frustrating, but with finals at the Law School
I'm too busy to worry about results," said
Jamie Zimmerman, an unsuccessful indepen-
dent candidate.
Despite the delay, Goldman said the com-
puter will save up to $1,200 compared to the
cost of counting the ballots by hand. Who said
high tech wasn't worth it?
Mixed bag
protesting the University's budget redirection
process. Armed with granola, walkie-talkies,
and bail money, the group used the ad-
ministration building backrstairs to gain access
to Vice President for Academic Affairs and
Provost Billy Frye's outer office.
PSN members vowed to stay there until their
demands for a more open budget review
process were met. Frye took a hard line,
refusing to give an inch, so the group settled in
for a long siege.
When it became apparent the group would
spend the night, security officers locked the
building, not allowing in shipments of food or
fresh troops armed with guitars. The
telephones in Frye's third floor office were also
shut off. So PSN members had to make due
with the bread, fruit, and granola they brought
along and their contact with the outside world
was restricted to the sounds of WCBN.
Daily Photo by SCOTT ZOLTON
Frye: No longer lonely on the third floor.
The siege ended peacefully at noon Friday
when the infiltrators marched single file to
Michigan Student Assembly chambers for a
.much-needed meal. Frye, on the other hand,
sounded a little lonely when he said his office is
"like a vacuum" now that the battle is over.
IOU a computer
VOTERS CAME to the Michigan Student
Assembly polls in droves this year - at
least in comparison to the past few years - but
the announcement of the results was slowed by,
of all things, the computer assigned to count
the new-fangled ballots.
It took almost five days for Mary Rowland
and Jono Soglin of It's Our University (IOU) to
discover officially they had been elected
president and vice president of MSA. Can-
didates in the schools with only one elected
representative were luckier - they found out
the good or bad news Saturday night, only four
days after the polls closed.
The stubborn computer was to blame, accor-
ding to MSA Election Director Bruce Goldman.
It seems the computer only was able to count
the ballots at a rate ten times slower than
originally projected.
That didn't upset many of the candidates too
much, though. Most were happy the election
was over and proud to have been part of the
democratic process. "The wait was rather
E NOUGH STUDENTS and liberal types got
out and voted to save Ann Arbor's
progressive pot law, but not to dump the man
who started the campaign against it, Mayor
Louis Belcher, in Monday's city election. The
Republican incumbent won a narrow victory
over Democratic challenger Leslie Morris.
When the counting was over, tallies showed
the proposal to repeal the pot law was rejected
by a three to two margin. And despite Morris'
defeat, the Democrats picked up a seat in the
city council and now only trail their Republican
counterparts by a six to five seat margin.
Democrats Jeff Epton and Kathy Edgren
pulled off upsets in the 3rd and 5th wards
respectively by wiping out Republican incum-
bants. In the student-dominated 1st Ward,
Lowell Peterson rolled to an easy victory over
his 81 year-old Republican challenger Letty
Wickliffe to earn his second term on the coun-
cil.
Republicans Thomas Deem and Larry Hahn
coasted to victories in the 2nd and 4th wards,
respectively.
Of the four ballot proposals other than the pot
law repeal, the only one defeated was the
weatherization proposal. Ann Arbors destitute
landlords banded together to ensure student
utilities bills remain high by r.ejecting the plan
that would have forced them to install a
minimum level of insulation in their buildings.
Win with WIN
M AYOR BELCHER and the successful
MSA candidates weren't the only WIN-
ners this past week. University officials an-
nounced they would continue funding the
Women's Information Network (WIN) Bulletin
after all.
The WIN Bulletin's editor, Deeda Stanczak,
had charged the University was withholding
the publication's $1,100 budget because the
Bulletin had been critical of the University's
salary program. But Virginia Nordby, the
University affirmative action director, said the
money was withheld becuase the 14 year-old
publication dealing with women's issues did not
have publishing guidelines.
Nordby denied that the University executive
officers were upset with the editorial content of
the newsletter. "No one who has expressed
criticism (of the administration) has been
criticized back."
Stanzcak said she submitted the guidelines to
Nordby in Februaryand they had been ap-
proved last month. She now wants to c'ncen?
trate on increasing the Bulletin's circulation
and improving its distribution. Still, Stanczak
is not certain when the next issue of this week's
other WINner will be published.
The Week-in-Review was compiled by,
Daily staff writers Kent Redding, David
Spak, and Jim Sparks.
Edited and managed by students at The University of Michigan
Wasserman
Vol. XCIII, No. 151
420 Maynard St.
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
Editorials represent a majority opinion of the Daily's Editorial Board
Reagan goes to school
_,,,, G o r.J
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T APPEARS President Reagan has
yet to learn his lesson in
cooperation. Reagan failed another
test on the subject - this time on the
military budget.
Once again, Congress played
teacher, as Democrats and
Republicans of almost all political
backgrounds agreed that the president
had gone too far in requesting a 10 per-
cent increase in defense spending.
Despite warnings from fellow
Republicans, Reagan said 10 percent,
"take it or leave it." Now the House
and a key Senate committee have left
it, the House voting for a 4 percent in-
crease, the Senate committee a 5
percent hike.
If the story sounds familiar, that's
because it is. The president has lost
similar battles over the recently
passed multi-billion dollar jobs
program and the Social Security
bailout legislation. With the jobs bill,
Reagan wanted a much smaller plan
and would do little to compromise until
it was obvious he would lose the fight.
The pattern was much the same with
the Social Security legislation - the
demands, the conflict, and the
president finally giving in when the
obvious became apparent to him.
Reagan has been less fortunate in
the struggle at the Environmental
Protection Agency. For months he
stood firm behind Anne Burford, the
former director of the agency, despite
enormous political pressure and
allegations of wrongdoing. Even when
Burford resigned, Reagan lashed out
at the "extremists" - which included
just about everyone - who forced out
Burford.
The lesson is getting difficult to
teach. It appears that Reagan doesn't
understand that he can't win all the
time in Washington. Someday, maybe
the president will learn his lesson.
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LETTERS TO THE DAILY:
A response to the other side
Aet
To the Daily:
David Spak's "Petitioning the
other side of the story" (Daily,
April 8) does little to address the
major arguments of the current
petition, "A call for responsible
journalism." Throughout his
defense, the author does not ad-
dress all the specific contentions
of the petitioners, he merely
selects those he feels are "most
serious," leaving out the
strongest arguments of the
thousands of petition signers.
Accompanying each petition is
a fact sheet, copies of which were
delivered to the Daily, which
illustrates specifically why the
Daily's journalism has been
labeled irresponsible. Since Mr.
Spak had ample access to this
fact sheet, it appears he inten-
tionally ignores the petitioners'
"most serious" claims.
bers' "blacking up," except, in
this instance the entire
organization appears to have
been involved in the slur. Larry
Balber, of the Office of Minority
Student Services, the campus
Native American represen-
tative, states in the fact sheet,
"The same considerations of
stereotyping and prejudice can
be found in this issue which
displays the same insensitivity
by the Daily. Why is one code of
ethics applicable to one activity
but not to another activity?"
Apparently the Daily believes
that one party's theme was
humorous, the other "racist."
Rather than asking informed in-
dividuals like Mr. Balber about
minorities' problems, it appears
that the Daily feels it alone
should decide which acts are of-
fensive. The paper places itself
the victim often cries out. for at-
tention through some distorted
channels. When a bulimiac girl
approaches a newspaper wanting
her story told, we do not feel the
paper necessarily need indulge
her for the sake of a headline. The
story served only to attract atten-
tion and some condemnation to a
sorority which was unwittingly
thrown into a very difficult
position.
Finally, regarding the article
on "Jewish American Prin-
cesses," as the petition states, all
signers fully acknowledge the
right of the Daily to print
whatever it wants. However, just
as the Daily might not show
tasteless pictures of a suicide vic-
tim to explore this campus
problem, we feel that the presen-
tation of a group as fitting a
vicious stereotype is similarly
into marriage, she is denying a
place here to some guy who could
put a Michigan education to real
use." Furthermore, the author
later states that the "Jap"
stereotype is extremely valid.
The Daily defends this article
on the grounds that part of a
campus newspaper's purpose is
to expose issues that will foster
intelligent debate. However, this
story seems to have fostered only
two debatable questions, neither
of them particularly construc-
tive. First, many people asked if
the paper should have printed
such insensitive generalizations.
Second, given that the statements
were included in the article,
many now wonder if in fact the
Daily's editorial board is anti-
Semitic. If these questions con-
stitute intelligent debate,
perhaps the Daily is serving its
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