The Michigan Daily - Monday, January 23, 1995 -3
. Flint GM DRAGON DOWN MAIN STREET
workers "
Medstart brings
together students,
child advocates
to end 4-
0day strike
FLINT (AP) - Workers at a cru-
cial General Motors parts complex
voted yesterday on a deal that would
end a 4-day-old strike with a GM
agreement to hire 663 employees by
mid-1996, according to a union de-
scription of the terms.
"They were trying to take a lot of
your jobs to Mexico ... and we
stopped them," United Auto Workers
union negotiator Scott Campbell told
cheering workers as the ratification
meeting began.
The vote was expected to be
counted by late afternoon, and the
mood of the 3,000 people at the meet-
ing suggested they would endorse the
deal.
GM comment on the agreement
was not immediately available, but
the union said it included a company
commitment to spend more than $72
million on new product programs at
the AC Delco Flint East complex
through 1998.
"That's going to secure jobs out
into the future," said Don Beauchamp,
shop committee chairman of UAW
Local 651.
The local's 6,800 members went on
strike Wednesday at the complex, two
factories that make a variety of parts
used in many GM cars and trucks. As
the flow of parts stopped, the company
was forced to close all or parts of about
10 assembly plants in the United States
and Canada, idling more than 30,000
other workers.
" Kobe elif
returmng
to normal
Los Angeles Times
KOBE, Japan - January 23
(Monday) - With electricity avail-
able almost everywhere and water at
last reaching half the homes, this
earthquake-devastated city took a
first step toward normality today as
crowds of commuters headed to
work and children returned to
school.
"People bringing food from Osaka
are coming in by train, buses are
running to Nishinomiya (a nearby
city where direct trains to Osaka are
functioning), and boats are available
to Osaka. So I felt I had to go to
work," Masami Hamaguchi, 49, an
auto company executive, said on the
platform of a Kobe railway station.
"They didn't ask me. But today's
Monday, so anyway I should show
up.
Weekend rains passed without
triggering serious landslides, but skies
were still gray. As crews continued to
dig bodies out of the rubble and clear
away debris blocking streets, the at-
tention of many survivors began to
turn from the shock of last week's
tragedy to the arduous task of re-
building.
Classes even resumed in about
half the city, although in the worst-
hit districts plans were to immedi-
ately dismiss them after noting who
came.
"Yesterday was the first time I
had contact from my company,"
Yotaro Konishi, 56, said after leaving
the disaster relief center at the
Ninomiya Elementary School near
downtown Kobe. "Today we're all
gathering at 10 a.m. at the office.
They want to check who is OK."
Ann Arbor residents parade down Main Street on Saturday in celebration of the Chinese New Year.
Health care istitute director
deries medical insurane
By JORDAN LOWY
For the Daily
Dr. Patch Adams, director of the
Gesundheit Institute, believes health
care insurance and malpractice insur-
ance are to blame for skyrocketing
health care costs. His solution: free
health care.
Adams spoke for an hour Satur-
day to an receptive 40-member audi-
ence at the Quaker Friends Meeting
House on Hill Street. He talked about
the institute he founded 25 years ago,
which offers free health care to pa-
tients.
The institute, located in Virginia,
seeks to humanize health care and
build community by offering free
health care.
"By creating a sense of commu-
nity, healing is a natural outgrowth,"
Adams said.
Adams said he set up the institute
along with 20 other doctors because
of his dissatisfaction with the health
care system. "By taking the most ex-
pensive thing in America and giving
it away for free, we are a pie in the
face of greed."
' ... we are a pie in the face of greed.'
- Dr. Patch Adams
founder of the Gesundheit Institute
Adams boasted that he has never
seen an insurance form or paid for
malpractice insurance. Over the last
15 years, he has written more than
1,400 letters to foundations for money
with refusals from every single one, he
said. All doctors who have worked at
the institute have volunteered their
time.
The institute has an open-house
policy, never turning away anyone
who comes seeking healing. In the
first 12 years of the project, the insti-
tute treated more than 15,000 pa-
tients - 3,000 being mental health
patients.
Adams criticized the current medi-
cal establishment, saying the medical
community's dismal philosophies of
maintaining professionality and dis-
tance have created a tension between
doctors and patients.
Adams has often practiced his
medicine in a clown outfit because
he believes humor is one of the best
ways of fighting illness and to im-
prove patient-doctor relations.
The institute plans to build facili-
ties that will integrate arts and crafts,
social service, agro-environmental-
ism, nutritional education and enter-
tainment along with traditional medi-
cine and surgery.
"Art is medicine," Adams said,
and he hopes to see a full-size stage
running constant performances,
along with art and music facilities.
A recently published book, "Ge-
sundheit!" written by Adams, details
the history and philosophies of the
institute. Universal Studios has
bought the rights to turn the story
into a movie and has already spent $1
million to develop it.
The event was sponsored by St.
Joe's Health Educational Services.
By MICHELLE LEE THOMPSON
Daily Staff Reporter
Working to increase awareness of
children's health care and promote
children's rights, Detroit Mayor Den-
nis Archer joined forces with a coali-
tion of leading child advocates and
University students during Saturday's
Medstart conference.
The third annual conference, titled
"Opening Our Eyes Through the
Voice of Children," was held in the
Medical School's Towsley Center.
About 400 students, faculty and speak-
ers attended the conference which
focused on children's rights.
Archer, the keynote speaker, spoke
about community empowerment and
the need to educate children.
"Education is so important and
vital because if you get a good educa-
tion, chances are you'll get a good
job. And chances are if you get a good
job you won't wind up a statistic in
prison." Archer said. "When will we
learn? Perhaps after the next elec-
tion."
Archer spoke of his youth and the
trail he blazed from poverty to be-
coming one of the nation's most pow-
erful lawyers as recognized by the
National Law Journal. Audience
members said they were inspired by
Archer's plans for Detroit and its chil-
dren.
"Their future has been entrusted
to us. I'm determined not to fail them,"
Archer said. "It really does take a
whole village to raise a child."
Detroit's mayor also spoke about
his plans for the $2 billion in commit-
ments the city has received for its
recently approved empowerment
zone. Archer said he will raise tradi-
tionally accepted standards of educa-
tion and child wellness.
"(Archer's) goals were so in tune
with what we want to do," said
Medstart co-chair and second-year
Medical student Julie Carroll. "You
just realized that there are people out
there like hiin, and that's great."
The Medstart coalition includes Uni-
versity students in Engineering, Public
Health, Nursing, Business and Law.
"What (Archer) had to say was not
only pertinent to Detroit and the De-
troit area, it was pertinent to us," said
Medstart coalition co-chair and sec-
ond-year Medical student Vivek
Rajagopal. "This year we tried to em-
phasize community involvement and
I think we can definitely take that
further."
First-year Public Health student
Rachel Kogan said she was impressed
with Archer. "He seems like such a
capable and progressive leader."
Author-physician Dr. Perri Klass
opened the conference with a dia-
logue on the importance of children's
education, including tales from her
clinical work.
Klass initiated the Reach Out and
Read program that distributes books
to children who visit her clinic. She
argued that medical professionals hold
opposing views on many issues, but
that they agree on the importance of
reading to children.
"The only thing that everybody
agrees on is that being read to as 'a
child is very important," Klass said.
Dr. Patch Adams, founder of the
Gesundheit Institute in West Virginia,
spoke on "Joy: The Ultimate Cure."
The institute was founded on Adams'
motto: "That love and humor can truly
conquer all."
Other speakers included guest fac-
ulty member Jean Kilbourne and Dr.
Benjamin Carson, director of pediatric
surgery at Johns
Hopkins Hospital,
who spoke about
"S u cce ed in g
Against the
Odds."
Kilbourne de-
livered an address
'~ "'titled "Killing Us
Softly" in which
Archer the educator ati
former adviser fo
the surgeon general discussed the
media's impact on body image and
addiction. She connected the objectifi-
cation with women in advertising with
violence, child abuse and rape.
Although it used to be socially
forbidden for women to express their,
sexual appetites, Kilbourne said, now
it is forbidden for women to express
their appetites for food.
"The menage-a-trois that we're
all supposed to be afraid of is now
with Ben and Jerry," Kilbourne said,
alluding to the Vermont ice cream
makers.
Kilbourne presented a series of
statistics on violent crimes and said,
"You would have to conclude that:
we're a nation that hates our children.
"Our children are not brought up
by parents," Kilbourne asserted,
"They are brought up by the mass
media."
The Partnership for a Drug-Fre
America never advertises against al-
cohol and tobacco, Kilbourne said,
despite that the two drugs claim:
100,000 and 400,000 lives a year, com-.
pared to the 30,000 lives claimed by
heroin, crack, cocaine and other drugs.:
Kilbourne listed major contribu-:
tors to the partnership -the makers:
of Miller and Budweiser beers and
Lucky Strike, Marlboro and Camel:
cigarettes, who advertise in those'
same media through cartoons.
"I don't care what the industry
says - those ads are focused at teen-
agers if not younger (people)," said
second-year Medical student Lisa
Seyfried.
"They don't want a drug-free
America. They want an America on
their drugs," Kilbourne said. How-:
ever, due to the reliance on such ad-
vertisers, no media can express the'
true dangers of the products which
advertise in their publications and TV
shows, she asserted.
Kilbourne has rallied against this
"censorship" in op-ed in The New.
York Times and in appearences on
shows including NBC's "Today
Show" and ABC's "20/20".
"That's real freedom and it's worth
fighting for," Kilbourne said.
Apple to recall A2, 'Roommates'
By RACHEL LAWSON
For the Daily
When University graduate student
Max Apple invited a woman that he
met at an anti-war rally in the Michi-
gan Union to spend the night at his
house, he did not count on such strong
objections from his roommate.
Refusing to allow the woman to
stay in their house, Max's roommate
Rocky forced her to leave in the middle
of the night. The next morning 93-
year-old Rocky told Max, "You're
lucky that I woke up or she'd be here
right now with a policeman. ... You
bring a girl to your house ... and then
you don't marry her - they'll put you
in jail for breach of promise."
The need to enlighten his immi-
grant grandfather Rocky about dating
practices in the late 1960s was one of
the simpler challenges Max Apple
wrote about in his autobiographical
novel, "Roommates: My
Grandfather's Story."
"Max Apple is arguably one of the
best short story writers we have in this
country and one of the few who can be
serious and funny at the same time.
While only some of his stories touch
on Jewish subjects, all of them reflect
a Jewish appreciation for the rich com-
plexity of relationships and the deli-
cious ambiguity of life," said Hillel
Director Michael Brooks.
The book refers specifically to Ann
Arbor, detailing the wooden booths at
Drake's, baseball games in Burns Park
and Frisbee players in the Diag.
"It's very
much a Michigan
book in every
way, the writer,,
the publisher, the -
setting," Apple '
said in a telephone
interview Friday. " %
Originally,
Apple wrote
"Roommates" as a Apple
screenplay and
sold it to Disney which will release the
motion picture of the same name March
10 - staring Peter Falk as Rocky.
"Peter Falk is terrific. Although
he doesn't look anything like Rocky,
there were moments he had him ex-
actly," Apple said.
Apple added that there are many
differences between the film and the
book including the family's religion.
In the movie, Rocky, though still an
immigrant, is portrayed as a Polish
Catholic instead of a Lithuanian Jew.
The film's producers felt that this
change would give a more universal
appeal to "Roommates," he said.
When Apple first thought about
writing his story, he did not think it
would be received well. "I thought
my story was too small, too private.
I was completely wrong."
Seven months after the books re-
lease, Apple said he is still receiving
letters from people who tell him how
moving his characters are.
Bette Cotzin, an Ann Arbor resi-
dent who plans to attend Apple's
reading tonight, said, "Having read
the book 'Roommates,' I am really
looking forward to hearing Apple
speak. He has a fascinating perspec-
tive on issues of aging, life and death,
inter-generation relationships and
disability from which we can all learn
a great deal."
Hillel's Celebration of Jewish
Arts will bring Apple to speak and
read from his works tonight. In the
past this organization has brought
Dennis Miller, Adam Sandler and
Chaim Potok to campus.
Apple is currently a professor of
English and Creative Writing at Rice
University and recipient of a
Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship.
Max Apple will speak tonight
at 7:30 p.m. at Hillel, 1429 Hill
Street Tickets: $7 ($5 students).
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THE 1995 HOPWOOD
THE 1995 HOPWOOD UNDERCLASSMEN AWARDS
AND WINNERS OF:
Academy of American Poets
Bain-Swiggett Poetry prize
Roy W. Cowden Fellowship
Louise and George Piranian Scholarshiv
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