4 -- TheMichigan Daily - Wednesday, February 8, 1995 (Ihje Lidiigan & ilg I i i 1. 1 ........ __ r- DAVIDWARTOWSKI , STANDING ON THE 3 420 Maynard Ann Arbor, M! 48109 Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan I MICAEL ROSENBERG Editor in Chief JULIE BECKER JAMES NASH Editorial Page Editors Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of a majority of the Daily's editorial board. A/ other articles, letters, and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily. Taking responsibi Iity MSA behaves correctly in recalling Wright L ast week, the Michigan Student Assem- bly took the bold step of removing An- drew Wright as chair of the External Rela- tions Committee for misusing MSA money and acting improperly on behalf of the as- sembly. While Wright has proven to be a very effective MSA leader over the past year, improving University-city relations and fa- cilitating MSA's hiring of its own Lansing lobbyist, the assembly acted correctly in re- moving him from his chair position. As the representative government of all University students, MSA and all its mem- bers must uphold the highest ethical stan- dards. In the face of Wright's impropriety in his role as External Relations chair, MSA had no option but to remove him. Wright's ques- tionable actions include disinviting Mayor Ingrid Sheldon to an MSA meeting two weeks ago, soliciting money from Vice President for Student Affairs Maureen A. Hartford for a trip without MSA knowledge or approval and lavishly spending MSA money on a recent trip to a Big Ten student government conference. Additionally, even though there is no concrete proof, strong evidence exists that Wright is responsible -or at least knows who is responsible - for attempting to bribe MSA with $796 in cash a few weeks ago. Such behavior cannot be tolerated by an elected government. In the matter of overspending while on an MSA-funded trip, Wright and Andy Schorr (who also attended the conference and whose recall vote did not pass the Assembly) should have followed in the lead of MSA's Student General Counsel Paul Scublinsky, who of- fered to repay the assembly for any money he may have misused on unnecessary expenses. As a general rule - since it might not always be clear what is or is not a proper use of student money - funds later deemed inap- propriately spent should be reimbursed. This is the only appropriate and responsible ac- tion. Two weeks ago MSA formed an internal committee to investigate the origin of the anonymous $796 donation. Members of this committee must be commended for their ac- tions so far, even though they cannot yet identify the responsible party beyond doubt. Their work is what turned up the evidence of other improper action that was used to re- move Wright as chair, such as an $80 dinner for three uncovered by their internal audit of MSA appropriations. This committee must continue its diligent work to ensure that the sender of the money is identified. Now that MSA has successfully resolved one ethical dilemma and is actively pursuing the resolution of another, it can, once again, get back to its important business of improv- ing student life on campus. Additionally, MSA should carefully choose Wright's re- placeuient as External Relations chair, for MSA would greatly benefit from another chair who will work as diligently and suc- cessfully as Wright has. MSA has significant work to do, and one member's bad judgment must not damage the ability of the assembly to act in students' behalf. am perpetually amazed by people on this campus shar mon first name Hey. Listen for to class. It seems everybody kn one person, if not hundreds, s common first name. Amc crunched by feet and the occas squeak, there is a subtle murm stant buzz: "Hey ... hey ... every once in a while, you hea up." This is our version of con I am amazed even more, asi these Heys share a similar, if ni same, last name: Watsupdood. some with the surname Howe Watsgoingon, but I'd say mostc Watsupdoods. It really throws loop because I can find nar names in the phone book. I realized pretty soon in m year, though, that these were People were addressing people for a lack of something else t serious. This is what was goin oftentimes, they used these names because they didn't person's actual name. I caught on to the game pret finding it easier to remembe names if they wouldn't mind b Hey. And even better, if you ca body Hey Watsupdood and la enly called him by a different Howsitgoing, he wouldn't care wouldn't even notice. I stuck with this method for; Then I realized a flaw. Hey: Greetings from your friend watsupdood h!w many Society somehow made this rule that it tion be a e the com- is all right to address somebody as Hey, percent of it walkine hut you cannot introduce them as such: the best. Ows at least "Mike Tanner, this is Hey Howsitgoing. the wroni haing this Hle. this is Mike." The second sentence an A. Re )ng snow was normally fine when used alone, but eryone e) Tonal brake the first one drew funny looks. People like ally be ha nur, a con- being introduced by their given names, the you can u hey." And ones their parents gave them. Go figure. "hey" inl Lr: "What's But to appease this trivial desire, I Theys nversation, started memorizing true names only to (all of the it seems all find that it was a major pain in my rump. else tries, ot quite the The hard part is trying to figure out the old the way There are names I never bothered to remember in the many aI sitgoing or first place. offense, of them are I'm getting better at it, but I still slip named W me for a sometimes and call somebody Hey. Take I've si y of these no offense; it's usually because my mind tion to ti hasn't had enough time to register the their nam y freshman name. I've called my mother Hey before. with this: n't names. Got slapped for it by my dad, so usually I and dilige with terms don't do that anymore. My mind registers over in y o say. I'm "Mom" pretty quickly since then, espe- it with fu ig on. And cially when my dad is around. Maybe this never for particular is a good method of recall. Call me Hey tense foc know the and I'll slap you. Hard' "Hey!!" you'll yell. And I'll slap you just to ap ty quickly, again. Slap you until you get it right, suppose it r. peoples dammit. you care eing called Here on campus the pressure to re- a lot of v alled some- member names is something society has memberir ter mistak- called etiquette. (I find it ridiculous. We assortme last name, are in so many groups and attend so many Whatsgo ! Probably social functions, how are we to be respon- If wor sible for every name? If in a classroom ways fall1 some time. getting 90 percent of the answers is enough one willi for an A, then why should Name Recollec- you fit in any different? I say you get 90 & people's names right and you're So what if I of 10 times you use g name? That's still not bad. It's alistically, for some reason, ev- xpects 100 percent. I'd person- appy with a B. The nice thing is usually get partial credit for using place of a real name.) say it's polite to remember names im), so I do try. I know every'one too, but I hear a lot of slip-ups on to class. I've been called Hey time myself. But I never take because usually it's someone katsup who's addressing me. ince been trying to devise a solu- this problem of people wanting nes to be known.. I've come up Brute memorization. Hard work ence. Repeating a name over and our head until it hurts. Rhyming inny other words until you will get that name. Perhaps this in- us may be what it takes. work, granted, is a tough solution ppease a point of etiquette, but I t would make you seem as though about others. Either way, it's still work. A lot more work than re- ng just one name, Hey, and an nt of colorful last names like ingon. rse comes to worst, you can al- back on these terms. If you do, no notice. In fact, I'd bet it'll make 1. " Jim LASSER 1 YOU KNO~.. w FowDa4 . COULD END THE H'Do1T0AT? 9~NA'IONAL DEBT A"PVLP- ,IF WE COULI) FICTioN{ FINDA wAY FOR VrEWINL'C, EVERY AMEWf AN TO T1Ax? 61VE THE CIOVERNI4FNT FIFT-Y DOL LARS' NO...T HAVE A BETTER I DEA1I.. SHARP AS TOAST PAY-PER-VIEW! The Trial of OJ, Simnsolnl C 1ozit JL4DU , play-by-Spla y' coveJage of the trial of the ceiitaw Order now and receive a free O.J. hair samplel Skip work! Skip schooll Disregard all responsibilityl 'lus continual audio access to 1judge Ito, Ilc hit" grunt and groan along with the test of America! Only $50001 NOTABLE QUOTABLE "Whenever I need some drugs, I really don't have a hard time getting what I need." -- An anonymous LSA junior The Senate playground Anti-gay measure raises serious concerns W here does one go to see a group of people fool around, waste time and occasionally make cruel and dangerous state- ments? No, not the playground. Rather, it seems that some members of Congress have taken it upon themselves to provide this en- tertainment. Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) has introduced legislation that would limit the ability of homosexuals working for the fed- eral government to form employee associa- tions. This measure is not only flagrantly discriminatory, but also an embarrassment that may have dangerous consequences. This bill, if passed, would ban the spend- ing of federal money on any program for government employees that "would compel, instruct, encourage, urge or persuade em- ployees or officials to embrace, accept, con- done or celebrate homosexuality as a legiti- mate or normal lifestyle." It could be used to bar homosexual groups from meeting in fed- eral offices, using interoffice mail for com- munications or putting notices on bulletin boards, privileges currently conferred upon other employee groups in Congress. This Helms measure is a pointless and alarming attack upon a minority group. Congress has lately become even less accepting of the rights of gays, lesbians and bisexuals. The homophobic atmosphere in the legislature is evident in Rep. Dick Armey's (R-Texas) "slip of the tongue" --in which he called openly homosexual Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) "Barney Fag." Armey's statement and Helms' legislation are an embarrass- ment, both to Congress and to the country it represents. Helms' measure is a pathetic waste of congressional time and money. He has ar- How TO CONTAC THEM gued that such legislation is a way to save money - presumably under the theory thatj this bill will prohibit funds from being wasted on homosexual groups. Of course, Helms has neglected to mention that no money is cur- rently being given to any such groups. Helms' introduction of this bill under the guise of an attempt to achieve a balanced budget is an insult to the American people's intelligence. Far from worthy legislative action, Helms' and Armey's actions and words are reminis- cent of those seen and heard in schoolyards around the globe. Unfortunately, these ridiculous actions cannot be merely dismissed as childish - they also are extremely dangerous. Legisla- tors are the chosen representatives of this country. If they feel comfortable making such outlandish statements and proposals (and it seems that they do), their constituents - and people in other states - may be encouraged to act in the same manner. But the American public - unlike Helms and Armey - does not always confine itself to sheer childishness. Rather, its homophobia can manifest itself in the form of physical brutality to an extent as yet unseen. Helms' measure is a scary one. The fact that he feels safe writing such shamefully discriminatory legislation should serve as a wake-up call to the country. Members of Congress are representatives of the United States, and they should not be allowed to waste the country's time and money. But until such time as these actions are replaced by tolerance and advocacy of civil rights, they can be viewed as a sad form of entertain- ment. So check out the act while it lasts -it's on C-SPAN, and admission is free. VIEWPOINT Comm. overhaul ignores student needs By Jennifer Kay Jackson "Religion, morality, and knowledge being necessary to good government and the hap- piness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged." This statement, put forth in the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, was one of the founda- tions on which the University of Michigan was established in 1817. These same words are engraved above the main en- trance to Angell Hall on Central Campus, forever reminding stu- dents of the basis on which their education was determined. But today, this statement, in par- ticular the ending "education shall be forever encouraged," seemingly does not apply. Es- pecially to those students in the Communication Department. As announced in a decision last month, the Department of Communication is to receive a major overhaul. The department's new mission is to provide studies in the theories and processes of mass commu- nications. This sounds good on paper, but the bottom line is that telecommunications courses are to be relocated to the Program in Film and Video Studies and all journalism classes are to be applying their knowledge through hands-on experience. By dropping all of the classes providing focused training in journalism, the committee is ac- complishing one thing-chaos. In the committee's chaotic path, concentrators are left des- perately trying to complete classes that will soon be extinct, students new to the University who were hoping to pursue a journalism career but will not have the opportunity to do so and numerous talented faculty who will inevitably see their meeting with communications concentrators that "... students who really wanted a journalism degree shouldn't have been here in the first place" and went on to speculate that a master's degree in journalism was not as highly regarded as other masters' de- grees in areas such as business. It is this kind of language that has left journalism courses without a home at the Univer- sity, and has left many commu- nications concentrators feeling uprooted and discriminated against solely because of their was at the University that the Michigan Interscholastic Press Association was formed in 1921 and the University Press club was established. Past Univer- sity presidents, such as Marion Leroy Burton and James Burrill Angell, who himself was a news- paper editor, recognized the importance of journalistic in- tegrity and strove to instill those values into the University. It is disappointing that our current administrators do not see what those men saw. Although it seems that un- el By dropping all of the classes that provide focused training in journalism, the committee is accomplishing one thing - chaos. *I jobs perish. These factors do not appear to be ones that will "... sharpen the focus of the department and allow it to focus its energies more closely on a single mission" as Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs Gilbert R. Whitaker Jr. so eloquently stated in the Jan. 17 edition of the Michigan Daily ("Journalism left without home in comm. dept. shakeup"). Whitaker went on to say that undergraduates interested career goals. At a University that seem- ingly regards writing skills as valuable, as evident through mandatory writing proficiency assignments such as those re- quired by the English Composi- tion Board, students are left pondering the thought that the only writing skill the Univer- sity considers valuable is that of writing compositions. This is narrow-minded. Students should be allowed to participate in other forms of writing, such dergraduate journalism training at the University is gone for- ever, there may be hope yet for the journalism graduate program that is currently under review. I say to Committee Chair Robert Weisbuch, associate vice presi- dent for research and dean of the Rackham School of Gradu- ate Studies and any others who have a bearing on the future of the graduate program: Consider the impact this University could have in the field of journalism. You are presented with the rare University Regent Deane Baker (R-Ann Arbor) University Regent Laurence B. Deitch (D-Bloomfield Hills) °)f'fAlf' n PnntnrCt. .;+n4 Rnn