4A - The Michigan Daily - Thursday, October 8, 1998
ut iign ai
420 Maynard Street
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
Edited and managed by
students at the
University of Michigan
- :
roc rn
A.
2,
LAI RIE MAYKC
Editor in Chief
JACK SCIHILLACI
Editorial Page Editor
Unless otherwise nodte, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion ofthe majority of the Dailv .s editorial board.
All other articles, letters and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily.
FROM THE DAILY
Conduct unbn
'U' should impose standards on manufacturers
o Blue" earmuffs; 'M' comforters
with matching pillows; Wolverine
boxer shorts. When students decide to attend
the University, there tends to be a pretty dis-
tinct theme in the holiday and birthday gifts
they receive over the next couple of months or
years. With stores whose advertisements sug-
gest that if you buy one T-shirt, you will
receive enough merchandise to clothe your
immediate family for free, it is easy for stu-
dents to indulge themselves as well. The
Michigan logo is the No. 1 selling collegiate
label in the world. The University should
make absolutily sure that the irresistible 'M'
gear is not being produced under poor worker
conditions; depending on the company, it is a
reality that students could be inadvertently
supporting corporate abuse of workers. While
no official charges have been brought up
against companies that operate under the
guise of the body that manages collegiate
licensing, the University must ensure that
companies that utilize its logo do not employ
abusive labor practices.
Representatives from colleges and univer-
sities nationwide met this week with members
ofthe clothing industry and government labor
officials to discuss the use of sweatshops in
college apparel production. Secretary of
Labor Alexis Herman said that the forum will
focus on implementing a code of conduct for
companies making college apparel. This is
essential for maintaining high working stan-
dards in the United States and abroad.
Sweatshops exploit workers who lack govern-
mentally guarded rights to produce products
very cheaply. Nothing, including Michigan
Apparel, should be made there.
The University's contract with Nike is well
known for the criticism it has received from
activists and the "swoosh" on athletes' jerseys
that sports broadcasts always manage to zoom
in on during football games. The contract
between the University and Nike was signed
by then-Athletic Director Joe Roberson, who
completely overstepped his bounds in doing
so. The University Board of Regents - let
alone the students and the rest of the adminis-
tration -were not involved in the decision at
all. Roberson made a major decision affecting
how the world would view Michigan athletics
and the University. Elected officials, like the
regents, who are voted on by the state, must be
actively involved in such a contract that asso-
ciates the University with Nike - for better or
for worse.
The University needs to incorporate the
standards that Duke University follows and
carefully evaluate Nike's practices before
renewing their contract in the year 2000.
The University should follow Duke's exam-
ple by not dealing with businesses who use
sweatshops. Duke's contract with Nike
ended two years ago, at which time the
school decided to include a code of conduct
in its new contract dealing with the use of
sweatshops in production of materials.
Codes of conduct, while voluntary, can
compel companies to comply with high
standards if they want access to coveted
copywritten logos. Independent contractors,
not internal ones, should be hired by com-
panies to monitor and accurately report the
conditions that exist in factories. Duke set a
standard that the University could match -
and push the envelope further by actively
questioning companies with which it does
business.
NOTABLE QUOTABLE
'A student is a person in progress.'
- RickIHill, coordinator of inter/aith ministries at James Madison University,
on how students are susceptible to psychological manipulation by cults
THOMAS KUL JURGIS T FN ThXTVE SPE A ~
rSs T 1/4Vv dx,< Z1
W t A.utA tCup! Tws is
are un ea# M t er cep
drug test?" Aaore ;u n 6&
Sr ck time!
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
G E woother forums. Although Clarke chooses not
Clarke also states that we to be a member of GEO, he
GSIs' and send out "flyers on candi- reaps the benefits of the hard
dates" that he does not sup- work of CEO members every
GS SA' best port. This is simply incorrect. single day that he is an
GEO has a stated policy of employee. GEO will continue
interest not endorsing any political to work for improving the
candidate exactly because of conditions of GSIs and
To EDA people like Clarke. Every GSSAs, regardless of
TEv A sa right year, GEO is approached by whether they are GEO mem-
Steven Clarke hasarih a variety of candidates for bers or not.
to not like the Graduate different local and statewide
Employees Organization - I offices and asked to endorse SANDRA EYSTER
will not try to change his them in some way. Every RACKHAM
mind about that ("A proposal year. we decline the opportu- GEO SECRETARY
to make GEO fair," 10898). nity precisely because we
But I would like to suggest feel that our membership is
something for him to do if he too diverse to summarize No olikes
doesn't like the things that with a simple endorsement. o ne
GEO does. We feel that our membership the stad i urn Is
Participate in GEO. It's can make their own decisions
that simple. Speak your mind about who to vote for and ho
about the upcoming contract against. All we hope is that alo
negotiations. GEO will be people vote.
there, Stop by the office at Finally. I would like to TO THE DAILY:
527 S. Liberty St. and talk to tell Clarke that if he dis- I absolutely hate the new
one of the volunteers in the agrees with the idea of "halo" around the top of
office about what you would decent, working conditions Michigan Stadium. Judging
like to see GEO do in the for Graduate Student from what I have read in the
future. We would like to Instructors and Graduate Daily, it seems its staff would
know. There are many ways Student Staff Assistants, then agree. In fact, I have not met
to voice your opinion in we do disagree on issues. For one person who likes the
GEO, and I would strongly that matter, GEO has negoti- "halo." I have a suggestion.
encourage anyone who is ated successfully for pay rais- How about taking a poll of
interested to participate. es, tuition waivers, health students and see what they
in addition to this simple insurance, improved peda- think about the Stadium's
advice, I would like to correct gogical training, non-discrim- new look? I'd like to see what
a few misleading statements ination against international the results are.
by Clarke. The GEO bash is GSs and other benefits that If you recall, Athletic
not a chance to "drink all the make GSIs and GSSAs better Director Tom Goss said he
beer that you can." [Had able to do their jobs. Does was expanding the stadium
Clarke attended the bash, he Clarke opposerthese issues? "for the students" Well, if
would have seen GEO active- As a result of the volunteer that's the case, why not let
ly encouraging responsible work of GEO members, we Goss know what the students
drinking. For us, the bash is a have a strong contract and think about the "halo?"
chance to meet current and some of the best workingJAEMRCE
future CEO members who we conditions at anyuniversity JAMES MERCIER
would not necessarily meet in in the United States. RC FIRST-YEAR STUDENT
VIEWPOINT
mwpo ws allyna rate
Pemts words
make the Clinton
scandal even
more unbearable
T he nation should pause for a
moment and quietly give thanks for
the blood-freezing insanity of H. Ross
Perot.
This screeching. self-serving dema-
gogue resurfaced
over the past week, AINN
just when his coun-
try needed him
most,
Before Perot let
loose, it seemed
that national dis-
course was already
at an all-time low. It
seemed the Oval
Office was occu- JEFF
pied by the most ELDRIDGE
scurrilous creature S TIK( VI
possible. It seemed
Congressional
Republicans were trading crimes and
misdemeanors for heavy breathing and
badly written porn.
We were losing track of what the
meaning of "is" is,
No more. Without intending to,
Perot's recent comments give a new
appreciation for the sweetness and civil-
ity of the Clinton scandal.
The question of whether oral sex con-
stitutes sex has an inspiring aura of
Jeffersonian grandeur. I feel nostalgic for
the good old days, when pundits discussed
the significance of Paula Jones's nose job.
MSNBC commentators sneering at the
camera and demanding the right to finish
their sentence? Positively quaint.
Consider the comments Perot made
on "Meet the Press" this past Sunday:
A man that would normally/unction
rationally; if you get him high on
cocaine, will act like Clinton acts when
he e not functioning rationally. And I
know that because I spent a lot of time
in the war on drugs in Texas."
Soon after, Perot added a caveat, say-
ing that if the President is not on one
continuous cocaine rush, at least he has
been "taking something from time to
time to spin him out and that's terrible."
Perot's Sept. 30 performance on "Larry
King Live" included similar analysis,
plus a torrent of pseudoscientific babble
about the President's drug-addled
biopsychology.
The Texas billionaire made claims
that were far worse.
He compared Clinton to Adolf Hitler,
Josef Stalin, Fidel Castro and Saddam
Hussein. Lest his remarks be construed
as offensive, Perot quickly added that he
limits the analogy strictly to "lust for
power."
This noble patriot is not content to sit
back and let impeachment proceedings
play out. Oh, no. He's going to launch a
march on Washington, D.C. sometime
in early December, with hopes of gar-
nering enough of a turnout that the
President will be persuaded to step
down.
He dismisses the possibility that
there's not enough time to plan a peti-
tion drive or organize a march. After all,
Perot humbly reminds us, "God created
heavens and Earth in six days."
So the real hurricane hasn't even hit
yet. Perot appears intent on driving this
scandalto the lowest possible depths.
Granted, I'm no Clinton defender -
there's little doubt in my mind that res-
ignation is the best way out of this mine-
field.
But what Perot is doing is equally
reprehensible.
Daniel Patrick Moynihan coined a
phrase that's been bandied about for
years -"defining deviancy down." The
thinking goes that declining norms of
behavior form a self-perpetuating cycle,
until certain actions that were once
heavily stigmatized become an accepted
part of everyday life.
Clinton himself has defined deviancy
down to the point where intelligent people
dismiss perjury as merely lying about sex.
And in his effort to illustrate the indiscre-
tions of the President, Perot further trivial-
izes the amoral and grotesque. pa
There's no excuse for comparing
Clinton to the greatest mass-murderers
of the 20th Century. His offenses may
be impeachable; they're certainly not
Hitlerian.
The accusation that Clinton uses
cocaine is not especially new - Roger
Morris's 1996 book "Partners in Power"
devotes several pages to discussing an
alleged Clinton drug habit in Littlem
Rock. Evidence that it actually occurred
is dubious.
Now there's Ross Perot, the Sonny
Corleone of American politics, injecting
baseless accusations and harmful
rhetoric to a situation that's nearing crit-
ical mass. A situation already filled with
spite, half-truths and damning conse-
quences.
Can anyone credibly believe that
Perot is doing this for the welfare of
America's children? Can even the most
ardent opponents of the President shrug
off the accusations of drug addiction
Going nowhere
:House should put an end to impeachment issue
Since President Bill Clinton announced
that he had indeed engaged in "inappro-
priate relations" with Monica Lewinsky, the
Associated Press has moved hundreds of sto-
ries concerning the chief executive over the
niewswire. Headlines trumpeting the latest
action of the House Judiciary Committee have
become commonplace. What began as a tryst
involving the head of the U.S. government
became a national nightmare as spin doctors
and political pundits stood their ground and
defended or decried the president. But at its
heart, the scandal remains a matter of sex and
other issues unrelated to governmental opera-
lion. The threshold of "high Crimes and
Misdemeanors"- the constitutional require-
ment for impeachment of a president - has
not been met. When the House of
Representatives assembles to vote, either
today or tomorrow, on whether to initiate an
impeachment inquiry, it should hasten an end
to the questions surrounding Clinton's presi-
dency immediately.
Some might argue that Clinton's moral
ineptitude in committing adultery is sufficient
to remove him from office. Although it will
win him many fans, his adultery is a tale for
the tabloids, not congressional hearings. To
remove him from office for what boils down
to a value judgment amounts to moral main-
tenance by the government - a proposition
that is difficult to support without invoking a
Puritanicalism most of the nation threw out
decades ago.
One' of the primary charges against
Clinton that many cite as grounds for
impeachment is perjury in the Paula Jones
case. Determining whether or not Clinton
perjured himself relies on a legal definition
that produces a question much more com-
plicated than whether or not the president
simply lied. Just because Clinton acted eva-
sively or twisted the meaning of the phrases
Ci11Vlfl Y [lf' !11: , '1st I-t - tl 2_ _ l lt- A
deposition. The case was a civil suit against
him for actions that allegedly took place while
he was the governor of Arkansas. While the
president should have acted in good faith, his
actions outside of the realm of his political
office are just that and should not be the impe-
tus for impeachment. The content of Clinton's
alleged perjury would have been used to cover
up legal behavior. While Richard Nixon's
actions in the Watergate scandal involved cov-
ering up patently illegal activity intended to
continue his tenure in office, Clinton's actions
were not as malicious.
One thing is for certain, though: President
Clinton is no saint. He acted disingenuously
when he announced to the nation in January
that he did not have a sexual relationship with
Lewinsky In betraying the public trust, he hurt
the image of the government and of the presi-
dency. He may well have prevented people
from being able to trust the government in the
future. But his actions smack of bad judgment
and poor handling, not incompetence and cor-
ruption. While his handling of the matter
should not endear him to the public, it is not
grounds to oust him from office. The
impeachment process should not be used as a
weapon but must remain a tool for removing
those who take part in gross acts of corruption.
The investigation that led up to the disclo-
sure of the Lewinsky affair began by looking
into the Whitewater scandal. It then proceed-
ed to numerous other "scandals" before stum-
bling upon the nugget that was the Clinton
deposition. The Starr Report - filled with
graphic sexual details and one-sided supposi-
tions - provided more shock value than it did
substantive evidence. After spending $40 mil-
lion and numerous years in the search for dirt,
Kenneth Starr came up with a scandal that is
at best tangential to its original charge.
As members of the House vote on whether
to initiate a lengthy Republican-backed or a
a_ e e
By ETHAN JOHNSON
On Monday, The Michigan Daily printed a
viewpoint that attempted, using strong rhetoric
and half-truths, to describe the Palestinian-Israeli
conflict and assert that the Palestinian cause is
not receiving sufficient media attention. If
University students are not to be swayed by the
emotionally charged propaganda in this letter,
then it is critical to know the facts surrounding
this situation enveloping the Middle East.
Israel was established in 1948 as a democ-
ratic state approximately the size of New
Jersey. It is surrounded entirely by non-demo-
cratic Arab countries with vast lands and com-
bined populations more than 10 times that of
Israel. Almost every one ofathese countries is
hostile, and the dictators who lead them have
traditionally garnered support by proclaiming
two goals: destroying Israel and throwing Jews
into the Mediterranean Sea.
The Palestinian nationalist movement was
born as a response to Zionism, but nonetheless
the Palestinians, like the Jews, deserve the
Wilsonian right to self-determination. For this
reason, Israel has been negotiating the creation of
a Palestinian state seriously for the past decade.
The Arab countries, by contrast, have no gen-
uine interest in helping the Palestinians, because
as long as Palestinian "freedom fighters" are in
the news, Israel incurs negative media exposure,
thereby benefiting them politically. It is also
interesting to note that the Palestinians were
offered their own state in 1947 by the United
Nations but they rejected the offer because they
refused to live next to the much smaller state
offered to the Jews. This position remained
unyieldingly firm for more than 40 years, so it is
not surprising that the Palestinians have been
unahle to create their statehood.
Israel. The authors allege Israeli police brutality
and compare it to the way "Mississippi was in
1964." First, unlike black civil rights pioneers,
Palestinian protesters commonly throw rocks
and Molotov cocktails at Israeli police. Second,
Israelis are not, as the letter asserts, "machine-
gun-toting racists" This blatant use of propagan-
da writing style is both insulting and embarrass-
ing to all readers, not to mention that the state-
ment is flagrantly wrong. Palestinian citizens of
Israel lead infinitely better lives than
Palestinians living in Arab countries, have free-
dom of expression and participate freely in the
Israeli democratic election process. Moreover,
Israel is the only country in the Middle East with
the moral fortitude to help the Palestinians cre-
ate their own state. The Arab countries, on the
other hand, are mostly interested in fostering ter-
rorist attitudes in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Yet another complaint delineated in the let-
ter is that the authors' families "are not allowed
to go to work" because of Israeli blockades
along the borders of the West Bank and Gaza
Strip. In order to understand this phenomenon,
imagine that approximately every three weeks
an idle book bag exploded at a different com-
puting site of the University's campus. If stu-
dents faced this continuous threat, we would be
very apprehensive about who was entering our
computing sites. Similarly, when bombings on
buses and cafes disrupt the very sanity of life in
Israel, the government strives to ensure that ter-
rorists are not traveling freely across its borders.
While it is true that the economies of the West
Bank and Gaza Strip need aid in their develop-
ment -and there are many that want to help -
security considerations must be addressed.
Finally, the viewpoint asserts that the Daily's
lack of attentiveness to the authors' cause may