4 -- The Michigan Daily - Friday, March 10, 1995 US1w £idhiign lativg 420 Maynard MICHAEL ROSENBERG Ann Arbor, MI 48109 Editor in Chief Edited and managed by JULIE BECKER students at the JAMES NASH University of Michigan Editorial Page Editors Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of a majority of the Daily's editorial board. All other articles, letters, and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily. Gdetting out te vo Voter drive a good idea, but needs work MICHAEL ROSENBERG ROSES ARE READ Football and Thanksgiving: A tale of two Blue turkeys Last week, a proposal was raised to imple- ment a non-partisan effort to encourage students to vote in the upcoming Michigan Student Assembly elections. While a good start, the plan is insufficient if MSA is serious about increasing student participation. Few would argue that something needs to be done about the low level of participation in MSA elections. In the past several elections, voter turnout neverexceed 10 percent. Clearly, something must change. The MSA plan calls for each party to post 20 non-partisan flyers on campus encouraging students to vote. This might raise turnout some- what, and it is hardly an unreasonable demand on the parties. Also, the non-partisan nature of the plan would benefit MSA. Sadly, the impact of the plan on turnout would probably be negligible. The fliers might persuade a small number of students to vote, but the fact is that students already know that there is an election coming up - they are bombarded with partisan campaign fliers in nearly every campus building. In most cases, students still do not vote, because they know nothing about'the candidates and do not feel the outcome of the election affects them. Ac- tion must be taken to educate and involve the student body. Telling people to vote is fine, but giving people a reason to vote would be more successful. One way MSA could increase participation would be to distribute more literature. The assembly should publish a journal - to be distributed around campus just as other publi- cations are - that would serve as a forum for the different parties and officeholders to ex- press their views to the public. On a partisan basis, the individual parties and candidates should make their platforms available at the residence halls, perhaps via campus mail. This would help students - especially first-year students, who are least likely to know about MSA - to understand the differences be- tween candidates. If better information could be given to students about the issues, voter turnout might well increase. If students are to be more involved, MSA officials and candidates must also have greater visibility on campus. Too many students think MSA is a "club," not a vital part of the University community. Starting at Orienta- tion, officials should make their presence on campus felt. MSA members must make a concerted effort to talk to large numbers of students and student groups about the issues facing student government. MSA has the abil- ity to better assert its presence within the University community - if it did so, voter turnout would rise. In addition, MSA campaigns should put a higher emphasis on person-to-person contact. People would vote in higher numbers if they felt a personal stake in the election. MSA members should increase voter drive efforts all over campus, appearing in person to dis- cuss issues and voting without regard to personal philosophy. One roadblock to inter- action between the candidates and the voters is University policy. Solicitation is banned in the residence halls - and MSA falls under this ban. MSA should be exempt from this regulation for non-partisan, get-out-the-vote efforts. Admittedly, door-to-door activity would annoy some students. However, there is overwhelming evidence that such activity succeeds in mobilizing voters. The desire of some residents for privacy must be weighed against the benefits to all students of a suc- cessful student democracy. The most important democratic student institution on campus, MSA, needs to take steps to increase voter turnout. The proposal for a non-partisan flier drive is a small first step. However, MSA must involve the stu- dent body if participation is truly to rise. Michigan athletic boosters often talk about having a football team the University can be proud of. At this point, we'd settle for a football team the Univer- sity can see. That won't happen much next fall. Michigan's first game -the Pigskin Clas- sic against Virginia-is scheduled for Aug. 26, a full nine days before the start of classes in the fall term. Many first-year students probably won't come to Ann Arbor that early. As a result, if the Wolverines lose to the Cavaliers, some students will start their college careers al- ready out of the national title hunt. Talk about getting a jump-start on tradition. And that's not all. Next year Ohio State visits Michigan Stadium two days after Thanksgiving, when many students will be home for the holidays. That's like schedul- ing the Revolutionary War while the min- utemen are at Club Med. Not that the students won't get to see any games. Big Ten "rivals" Northwestern, Minnesota and Purdue are scheduled to play at Michigan. Those three teams are major threats any time they step on the field with the Wolverines. Last year, late in the season, one of them even made a first down. In addition to those conference gems, Michigan is slated to host Miami next sea- son. That might sound like a great game, except that the Miami in question is not Miami(Fla.) but Miami (Ohio), also known as Miami (the bad one). Scheduling the Redskins instead of the Hurricanes is like replacing Notre Dame (Ind.) with Notre Dame (France). To round out the home schedule, Michi- gan also hosts Memphis (formerly Mem- phis State). Not to insult the Tigers, but it took them until last year to realize that Memphis is not a state. It shouldn't take Michigan students long to figure out Mem- phis is also not much of a football team. Miami (Ohio) and Memphis (Tenn.) are the Spam and Spam Lite of college football - anybody could devour them, but who would want to? The Wolverines could go to Scorekeepers in the morning and still beat both teams in the afternoon. It's bad enough that Michigan's home football schedule is weaker than ballpark beer. What's worse is that the two games that should be interesting - Virginia and Ohio State - are scheduled when students are traditionally not in Ann Arbor. These scheduling injustices aren't lim- ited to football. Two weeks ago, the men's basketball team played its home games against Indiana and Illinois over spring break. The Hoosiers came to Ann Arbor two days after classes ended and the Illini made their appearance the last day of the break. Other than the obvious benefit of keeping Bobby Knight away from the student body, there seems to be no reason for this. Students could have stayed two extra days and watched the Michigan-Indiana game. Of course, students also could go to their 8 a.m. classes, but it's not exactly convenient. Students were forced to miss out on one of their school's great rivalries when they were out of town for the Michigan-Indiana game. Many students will also miss one of college football's greatest rivalries when they are home for the Michigan-Ohio State game next Thanksgiving. Last year, Michigan's. home football record was 3-3. What could be worse than watching your team lose three home games in one year? Reading about it the next day. Elt i JIM LASSER .51, CoULD ME C/OUR o A60UT fHIE CONT RA r . _ ,. _ . _. SHARP AS TOAST yOU I(VE HOLTD ON1.. PINION gUsk REPU52CA''$s LMBAU-)H T WTH AMERA?" f S ASQu T ,lop Ai T/TO/V REA $415ff,? 9 NOTABLE QUOTABLE "The young campus can pick up on these things. The bottom line is, white folks don't understand racism." - Western Michigan University Black Studies Prof Ben Wilson, o; racial tension at WMU LETTERS Civil wars Legal reform bill would hurt consumers n important issue in the minds of Ameri- A can voters, legal reform has recently caught the attention of Congress. With a sweeping civil litigation bill, some lawmakers hope to eliminate much of the corruption in the courts. Unfortunately, this legislation will deny the average American legal recourse when he or she is penalized by the actions of major corporations. Realizing this, earlier this week PresidentClinton warned House SpeakerNewt Gingrich (R-Ga.) and other supporters of the bill that it is extreme and will not have his support. Clinton's actions, however, may be too little too late. The political scene has lately been rife with criticisms of the legal system. Voters are upset by the numerous tales of frivolous lawsuits, corrupt attorneys, besieged corpo- rations and a flooded legal system that is unable to handle the pressure. Some of this criticism is deserved, and something clearly needs to be done. In response, Congress is now considering legislation to mandate fed- eral standards in all product injury lawsuits, including those decided by state courts; im- pose strict limits on punitive damages in all civil cases; and force the loser to pay the winner's legal fees in most instances. In its attempts to counteract corruption, however, Congress has oversteppedthebound- aries of the necessary, as well as the practical. Civil law has existed for years because there is a need for it. Corporations wield a great deal of economic and political power, and they are generally concerned with the bottom line - meaning they can and do shortchange the American people. Even with the high degree of corruption, there is an even higher degree of legitimacy. For every frivolous lawsuit, there are numerous others that are valid, both in the remedy they offer to injured parties and in the precedent they set. As it eliminates corruption, this legislation will effectively eliminate civil law. It will deny the average American the right to his or her day in court. Given the risks imposed by this legislation, how many people would be will- ing to bring a suit, even if they honestly be- lieved they were in the right? The legislation, as it now stands, clearly favors big business much more than the average person it is sup- posed to help. It trades legal corruption for that of large corporations. There are better ways to deal with the problem of civil law in this country. Other nations, such as England and Japan, have been able to create systems that preserve citizens' rights. Legislators should look elsewhere for solutions, rather than passing laws that will paralyze the American legal system. As for the president, he is to be applauded for using the power of his office to counteract this measure - but given the position of this bill on the congressional agenda, he could have opposed it more quickly and with more force. Congress must understand that America wants to see wrongdoing eliminated in civil law, not the principles of civil law itself. Cho descends into liberalism To the Daily: The procrastinator that I am, I hadn't gotten around to congratu- lating Mr. Cho for his fine col- umn appearing in the Feb. 27 issue of the Daily ("Agenda heads down the wrong path"). It shocked and amazed me that something conservative was written in the Daily,sand on the editorial page no less! Then came the disappoint- ment. The March 6 paper has another column by Mr. Cho ("Asian Americans and the model minority myth") and a letter from Ms. Eriksen ("Columnist misin- terprets gender issues"). First, Ms. Eriksen blasts the very article that I loved so much, and then Mr. Cho reverts to liberal views by scolding the University for not recruiting Asian Americans. I'll admit there are problems in society, and I also admit that I don't have all the answers. How- ever, I'll always refuse to admit that affirmative action is an op- tion. It simply makes a bad situ- ation worse. Heath Wehrman Engineering sophomore Republicans misunderstand civil rights To the Daily: Mark Fletcher's letter de- fending the GOP's crime bill as "not being an affront to civil liberty" (2/27/95) cries out for a response. According to Fletcher, ..4c .f the T- T ,Cnllecr tences, repressive laws and the destruction of citizens' rights. They do this not out of actual concern for crime victims, but to win elections. If politicians actually had con- cern for crime victims they would enact measures that would re- duce crime. Since crime is a product of a sick society that allows poverty to run rampant and education systems to rot while our "defense" (read ag- gression) budget soars billions higher, measures to reduce crime would include funding for social needs like education and decent environments, including housing and jobs. However, poli- ticians, especially Republicans, ignore the roots of crime and instead play on voters' fears by offering emotional non-solutions like capital punishment and more jails. But I digress. To respond di- rectly to Fletcher's main claim: There is a huge difference be- tween allowing evidence ob- tained with a warrant that later was deemed to be invalid, and not even having to bother to get one in the first place! Rather than a "technicality" protecting "criminals," the warrant is an extremely important barrier to police abuse and harassment by citizens of this country. Since in the United States, the last time I checked, people are innocent until proven guilty, the person that the warrant is served on is at most a suspected criminal, and has all the rights to due process that our constitution grants each and ev- ery citizen. Allowing police to proceed without warrants tramples on my rights and your rivhtc ntitm, cn-alle rii-a-._ crime." I suggest that Mr. Fletcher try and understand the real rea- sons for crime, and the actual ways to reduce it, reread the Bill of Rights, especially Amendment Four, and try and get at least a minor understanding of the con- cept of "civil rights" which few reactionary Republicans seem to understand. Hays Ellisen First-year law student Debate on homosexuality necessary to dispel myths To the Daily:. Free speech is a fundamen- tal right given to all citizens of the United States. The purpose of free speech is to educate people and make us think about the issues at hand. This is why I would truly like to thank Mr. Yob for his contribution con- cerning the Kiss-In ("Congress, 'U' shouldn't approve homo- sexual activity" 3/1/95). His let- ter has caused other people to write letters in response, causing a sort of debate which is how learn about each other and clear up misconceptions. I am writing in response to Mark Fletcher's letter "Letter writer showed bravery," (3/8/95). I appreciated Mr. Yob's letter. Mr. Fletcher tries to say that lib- erals resort to name calling when- everaconservative speaks, Idon't see that as the case. The letter written by Mr. Walsh was not a personal attack on Mr. Yob, but rthr on h isd Mr. Vobs some misconceptions on the part of Mr. Fletcher. "If people can change from gay to straight, is it unreasonable to suggest the op posite might happen." Let me address this by saying, why would somebody who is heterosexual all of a sudden decide that he or she wants to be gay? Gay, lesbian and bisexual people are faced with discrimination and hate ev- ery day. We fear being the butt of jokes and the victims of violent hate crimes. We fear showin affection to our significant oth- ers in public for these very rea- sons. Come one, come all, it's great! As for those homosexuals, who have "claimed" to change, you might consider what changes they have made. These people are still homosexual or bisexual, the only thing they have done is to deny who they are. Theg changed their lives in order to make society happy. No thank you. I lived in the closet for too long to go back. I have never known any other sexual orienta- tion, the only difference now is that I accept it and embrace it. The Kiss-In on the Diag was not to shock the straight people who innocently passed us. ThA point of the Kiss-In was to in- crease visibility of gay, lesbian and bisexual people-and to create a safe haven where we could show affectiontoward each other without fear. Something that so many straight people do not realize is that they interact with homosexual people ever# day. We are your family, friends, classmates and co-workers. We are all citizens of the United States, thereby we all have fundamental rights that gra.t..PMAM o 11c amnP HOW TO CONTACT THEM Michiga Julie t an Student Assembly Neenan, president