4 - The Michigan Daily - Wednesday, January 9, 2002 OP/ED ahbz 1Mkbigiuu &ti1g 420 MAYNARD STREET ANN ARBOR, MI 48109 daily. letters@umich.edu NOTABLE QUOTABLE EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN SINCE 1890 GEOFFREY GAGNON Editor in Chief MICHAEL GRASS NICHOLAS WOOMER Editorial Page Editors Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of the majority of the Daily's editorial board. All other articles, letters and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily. "He looks like America - jolly, happy and slightly overweight." -, - 1 t a , ' {j, J \C3 , I wNnhi l7: A TALE 't4$jP E'. tu t i A&~\G TU REST o *Ip r '4 '~\ - .4~ 0 s+ '4 1 0 - Marketing strategist Al Ries, on fast-food guru and Wendy's founder Dave Thomas, as quoted by the Associated Press. Thomas died yesterday of liver cancer. Collective safety trumps individual rights MANISH RAIJI NOTHING CATCHY rust us." antee vague notions of "rights" (such as ual, this question is largely unnecessary. T h a t' s due process) in the case of terrorism, But when that contract is violated by the the answer because of the fact that terrorists are capa- individual (or, in this case, a group of indi- given by the U.S. gov- ble of striking at speeds that the legal viduals), the entire social contract must eminent when justifying process is incapable of responding to. necessarily adapt - even if that means its force against America has quickly learned the rules relaxing the supposedly "inalienable" '. Afghanistan. "Osama of the club, but it has not, as yet, learned rights of the individual. After all, if the bin Laden is to blame, how to play along with its brethren. Just as individual is not playing by the same rules, the Taliban had been America responded to the felling of the then the game can no longer be played harboring and support- World Trade Center with full force, it fairly. ing him. Trust us." must allow - indeed, it must support - This dilemma between individual rights Evidence? "Trust us." India and Israel when they respond in kind versus collective security isn't as far- America has entered a fraternity of to similar attacks. fetched, nor as horrifying, as one would sorts; a brotherhood whose most knowl- A state's primary goal is to preserve imagine from reading my words. edgeable members are India and Israel. the lives of its citizens. The safety of the In 1861, the southern states decided Who would have thought that New York populous is far more important, since civil that they no longer wished to play the City would come to empathize with Kash- liberties mean nothing to a dead popula- same game as the northern states and mir and the West Bank? tion. When Israel loses 25 citizens to ter- seceded from the Union. Abraham Lincoln This isn't a club that America ever rorism, it must use whatever means-it has decided that the preservation of the collec- wanted to join. It quickly learned the rules to protect its citizens; when India's Parlia- tive was of utmost importance, above and of the game - a country suffering from ment building is attacked, it must do the beyond any individual southern citizen. terrorist attacks cannot sit on its hands and same. The Civil War was not a pretty war; inno- wait for the legal process to solve the Terrorism thrusts defenders of democ- cent people were slaughtered left and threat of terrorism. The basic premise of ratic institutions into an interesting dilem- right. But I am secure in saying that the the legal system rests on two things: A ma. On one hand, there is the seemingly greater good was secured by the unfortu- Yossarian-esque unwillingness to die (on intuitive, democratic notion of individual nate murder of countless people. the part of both the criminals and the sys- civil liberties. On the other hand, there is Furthermore, the individual today is tem as a whole), along with an explicit the notion of the protection of the whole. often subjugated by the state for the pur- understanding that the legal process will Democracy must thus question itself very poses of the collective - with full bless- not be threatened by the criminals. When seriously about which is more important: ing from democrats. Redistributive 'tax either of these suppositions degrade, the The individual or the society? schemes take money away from the rich legal process must adapt, or else it will be This moral dilemma was explored in (thus infringing on the individual's right to destroyed. the movie "Swordfish," when Gabriel keep his wealth) and give to the poor - A classic example of the degradation of Shear (John Travolta) asks Stanley Jobson assuming that social equality is more the second premise is organized crime, (Hugh Jackman) how many people Jobson important than individual property rights. where criminal syndicates subvert the would be willing to kill to save the lives of So too with terrorism, both here and legal process by bribing officials and/or a million people. One? Two? Ten? 100? abroad. In response to terrorism, the Unit- killing police officers. Whereas "normal" 1,000? ed States cracks down in order to secure criminals try to evade the law, organized Is it morally justified for the state to the greater good. The U.S. has quickly criminals attack the law. Russia is suffer- act, in the protection of its population, in learned something that India and Israel has ing from this problem right now, and its sometimes violent manner toward others, known for far too long: When a nation is inability or unwillingness to respond is even if innocent people suffer? Should the plagued by individuals who aren't playing doing untold damage to the country. state act with the preservation of the col- by the rules, the rules have to be aban- In the case of terrorism, both premises lective in mind, sometimes ignoring the doned. of the legal system are degraded: Not only freedoms of the individual? are terrorists intent upon destroying the During normal times, when the two Manish Raiji can be reached via entire system, but they are also uncon- basic tenets of the social contract are e-mail at mraiji@umich.edu. cerned with dying. It is impossible to guar- upheld by both the state and the individ- V LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 0 Students are the ones to thank for bringing fall break to 'U' TO THE DAILY: At their December meeting, the Uni- versity Board of Regents agreed to change the academic calendar to include a fall study break. There will be academ- ic benefits from this hiatus, and I think both faculty and students will put it to good use. But just as important is the fact that this change came about solely because of the efforts of students. There has been faculty and student interest in a fall break for years. This year, however, the Michi- gan Student Assembly proved that prepa- ration and perseverance can change the status quo. I congratulate MSA President Matt Nolan and the other MSA members who researched what other schools have done and evaluated the impact that a two-day break would have on the number of class meetings in future fall terms at the Uni- versity. They took their case to deans, regents and the Faculty Senate. Their approach was articulate and thorough. I am very impressed with how effectively these students worked within the system to bring constructive change. Good job! I hope the establishment of a fall break leads to greater confidence in stu- dent government and its ability to work collaboratively with the University's administration. LESTER MONTS University Senior Vice Provost for Academic Affairs Community High school lottery not classist Goodstein's column 'ludicrous': Spurrner out of Carr's league TO THE DAILY: I enjoy reading your paper but when I see an column like the one Raphael Goodstein wrote in Monday's edition ("Help is out there for Navarre and the offense,"), I am left to question the stan- dards the Daily uses when deciding what is suitable for print. For Goodstein to actually waste a col- umn suggesting Michigan hire'Steve Spurrier as the offensive coordinator is ludicrous. Spurrier will in all likelihood become the highest paid coach in the NFL next season - a far cry from playing second fiddle to Lloyd Carr. In addition, why would a coach from any major football program voluntarily accept a demotion? I just hope the Daily doesn't print a col- umn next week suggesting Bill Martin hire Coach K. to assist Tommy Amaker. NIRAJ PATEL LSA sophomore LETTERS POLICY The Michigan Daily welcomes letters from all of its readers. Letters from Uni- versity students, faculty, staff and administrators will be given priority over others. Letters must include the writer's name, phone number and school year or University affiliation. The Daily will not print any letter that cannot be verified. Ad hominem attacks will not be tolerated. Letters should be kept to approxi- mately 300 words. The Michigan Daily reserves the right to edit for length, clari- . a A TO THE DAILY: I agree that the Ann Arbor Public Schools should work to become more integrated, but your singling out of Community High School ("Money Matters," 1/7/01) is unwarranted and incorrect. Unlike Pioneer High School and Huron High School, Community does not have a designated district in Ann Arbor. Each year a lottery is held to fill some 100 spots for the entering ninth grade class. Having applied to and graduated from Community, I can tell you that no one is discouraged or prevented from tant to realize that Community has a much smaller student body than Pio- neer or Huron (about 450 compared to over 2,000 each), lacks a cafeteria (stu- dents bring food or eat at restaurants) and as I have stated earlier in this let- ter, Community does not have a district from which it forms its student body. Thus any disparities in the Community student body, statistical or otherwise, arise from the students themselves, who should in no way be subject to your disapproval for electing to enter a school where they all have an equal chance of acceptance. I strongly doubt the lottery computer program used in S * ' fit >: ;i« .. + _ .. j