4 - TheMichiganDaily-Tuesday,September_14,_2004
OPINION
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I I
EDITED AND MANAGED BY
STUDENTS AT THE
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
SINCE 1890
JORDAN SCHRADER
Editor in Chief
JASON Z. PESICK
Editorial Page Editor
Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of the majority of
the Daily's editorial board. All other pieces do not
necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily.
NOTABLE
QUOTABLE
We're calling
this our wildest dream
season, because this
year on the Oprah
show, no dream is too
wild ... "
- Talk show host Oprah Winfrey, after giv-
ing new cars to every member of her studio
audience, as reported yesterday by the Asso-
ciated Press
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COLIN DALY Ti K ;AN 1 2
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The science candidate
JASON Z. PESICK ONE SMAiL VOICE
h ough it may not be
a meat and potatoes
issue, science has
sprung to relative prominence
in the presidential campaign.
Actually, John Kerry and his
advisors have tried to force
the issue and make science
a political issue this year. It's
not hard to see why. The word
science doesn't threaten many
people, the Democratic base likes it and Kerry hopes
he can grab a few voters in favor of stem cell research
because they have family members with terminal,
debilitating diseases.
The overlapping interests between one of those
families, the Reagan family, and the Kerry campaign
motivated the former president's son to speak at the
Democrats' convention in Boston. But by deciding
to give a speech promoting stem cell research, Ron
Reagan not only inserted himself into the debate over
who should be the next president, but also added his
voice to the cultural debate Republicans have used
to their advantage every time they face a Democrat
too unwitting to see he can't connect to the Ameri-
can people. Kerry is such a Democrat - the proof
being his comment "Who among us does not love
NASCAR?"
At the convention, Reagan said, "Like all genera-
tions who have come before ours, we are motivated
by a thirst for knowledge...."
And it's easy to agree with liberal claims that
Republicans and conservatives don't believe in sci-
ence. The Democrats like to view themselves as the
party of the future, of progress, while Republicans
represent a backward-thinking past.
Just turn on the "700 Club" to see traditionalist,
fundamentalist Christians stressing the power of
God to heal. The hosts sit in a circle, healing viewers
from physical ailments, and they recount stories of
viewers whom God has healed. The implication is
that you can trust God to heal you, not doctors. This
is a very dangerous message, to say the least.
These same conservatives believe that being gay
is a sinful lifestyle - and a lifestyle people will-
ingly choose. Then, these individuals use what has
unfortunately become their de facto political arm, the
Republican Party, to write the nation's marriage laws
according to their irrational ideology.
And the president himself has shown a disdain for
the laws of science. He has of course refused to support
stem cell research, refused to support scientists' claims
regarding global warming and refused to listen to inde-
pendent economists' recommendations. The White
House even had its Medicare administrator threaten to
fire the program's top actuary if he revealed to Con-
gress the actual cost of the president's recent Medicare
legislation. Bush has an aversion to facts; for instance,
his claims that al-Qaida and Saddam were linked in
any sort of meaningful way just won't go away.
That's a pretty bad record indeed. And lucky
for us, John Kerry has said some pretty ratio-
nal, pro-science things. During his speech at the
Democratic convention this summer, he said,
"What if we have a president who believes in sci-
ence, so we can unleash the wonders of discovery
like stem cell research to treat illness and save
millions of lives?"
But Kerry and his running mate, John Edwards,
only believe in an uninhibited search for pure
knowledge in areas in which they see a political
advantage in speaking the truth. To exploit the
president's troubled and troubling economic stew-
ardship, Kerry and his party have decided to play
to the left of his party even though that requires
that they ignore the teachings of a legitimate field
of social science, economics.
When the noted economist and chairman of the
president's Council of Economic Advisers, Gregory
Mankiw, wrote thatoutsourcing"is probably a plus for
the economy in the-long run," Senate Minority Lead-
er Tom Daschle described the statement as "Alice in
Wonderland economics." Mankiw may have been
showing a lack of prowess on matters political, but
he was stating a fact that economic modernization is
a good thing. Surely Daschle wouldn't describe the
painful economic dislocations that took place when
the United States became an industrialized nation
after being an agricultural nation that way. It may
also be relevant that the New York Times columnist
and Princeton economist Paul Krugman, who rarely
misses an opportunity to criticize the administration,
didn't critique this comment.
Kerry has promised to create 10 million jobs in
his first term as president. He plans to do this by
changing the tax code so companies will not move
jobs overseas. But according to the U.S. Labor
Department, only 2.5 percent of major layoffs in the
first quarter of this year resulted from jobs going
overseas. That's about 4,600 jobs. If Kerry's plan is
100 percent effective in bringing back all of those
jobs - many of which were probably in manufac-
turing - he'll only have 9,995,400 jobs to go!
Kerry and Edwards are playing to a skepticism
of economics that exists in this country, especially
on the left - a skepticism reminiscent of funda-
mentalists' qualms with central tenets of biology,
like the theory of evolution. But to be the science
candidate, you can't choose which academic fields
you're going believe in and which you're going to
choose to ignore when it's convenient.
Correction: In my final column of last year's win-
ter term, I stated that many students stopped sup-
porting the fall 2002 Daily boycott when many of
the boycotters wanted press coverage of the confer-
ence promoting University divestment from Israel.
One of the boycott's leaders challenged my asser-
tion and while researching his claims, I discovered
I had no evidence to support my claim. I should not
have made it, although I believe that the column's
argument remains intact, with the most troubling
assertions left unchallenged.
Pesick can be reached at
jzpesick@umich.edu.
I
40
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Liberalism throughout
campus not a 'fad'
TO THE DAILY:
The only thing that polluted my education this
morning was the column The problem with fad liberalism
(09/13/04). Liberalism is a "fad" because prior to 2004
the majority of college students were conservative?
Ummm... yeah, I must have missed that Gallup poll.
I found two things Lee wrote to be particu-
larly revealing of the overall insulting nature o his
column. First, " ... comments polluting the educa-
tion discourse ... " if you believe that education
should be a discourse, then, fundamentally, political
comments whether they agree with your opinions or
not, whether they use sarcasm to illustrate a point, are
part of that discourse. Even if not necessarily on the
topic of the class (God forbid someone makes a spon-
taneous connection between U.S. politics and what
they are learning in class). I would much rather wel-
come a lively political debate any day over political
apathy. Second, "Were there any issues that actually
concerned them, or was it enough to put a 'War Is
Not The Answer' bumper sticker on their cars and
call it a day?"
So for me, over 1,000 dead U.S. soldiers in Iraq
is reason enough to grab a Kerry bumper sticker,
pin, T-shirt, and lawn sign. But for you that doesn't
even qualify as an "issue"? Certainly, as a woman
going into medicine, I have plenty of other issues to
get worked up about, but the betrayal, disgust and
outrage I feel over this war is easily reason enough to
want President Bush out of office.
You begin your article with a student concerned
about Bush's emphasis on the "sanctity of marriage"
and end it with a hypothetical of a "fad" liberal dis-
playing an anti-war bumper sticker. Hey, wait a min-
ute, according to you, us college-aged liberals aren't
even supposed to know what issues we care about!
DANIELLE WROBLEWSKI
Medical School
4
VIEWPOINT
John Kerry talks domestic policy
On Nov. 2, college students should not have a
difficult decision to make. If you're interested in
a robust economy, affordable education, a clean
environment, and secure borders, John Kerry is
your man. The purpose of this piece is to present
Kerry's greater domestic agenda, the very plans
that promise to benefit us as students, as educated
young adults ready and eager to enter the workforce
and as mothers and fathers of the next generation.
We all have a vested interest in a strong economy.
You need not be an economics major to realize that
everything in economics is interconnected. Let's
take the budget deficit as an example. In simple
terms, because the federal treasury cannot manage
such a large deficit, we must borrow from foreign
countries. This means that they draft the proposals
and set the interest rates. In simpler terms, we suf-
fer because the ball is not in our court. The United
States is not very popular, it's safe to say that we're
not going to experience favorable rates based on
past loyalties. So, how does the budget deficit affect
us? In the present day, companies must curtail hir-
ing or cut benefits to their employees because they
are not receiving the critical federal assistance they
need to stabilize their bottom lines. The federal
government is too busy paying off its long-term
rolt'h, ro--,- A- -alt - ..i ne1+mA tfiin
Let's talk about providing prescription drug ben-
efits to all our seniors, promoting equal educa-
tional opportunity by fully funding "No Child
Left Behind" and, dare we say, using this money
to provide a tax incentive for companies to keep
their operations in the United States so as to honor
our solemn commitment to equal job opportunity.
A vote for John Kerry in November is a vote for 10
million new jobs. Let's give him the chance.
Over the past three years, tuition has increased
by more than 35 percent, and 220,000 students
have been cheated out of college because they can-
not afford it. For those of us who are lucky enough
to make ends meet and attend college, however
difficult it may be, there are millions of Ameri-
cans who could only dream of the opportunity to
attend the University of Michigan. Whether these
children are academically or financially prohibited
from attending college, John Kerry has a plan to
send more children to college.
Most notably, John Kerry will offer a College
Tax Credit of $4,000 per-year for every child who
wishes to go to college.
We, the College Democrats, applaud President
Bush's willingness to sign No Child Left Behind
into law. The only problem is that Bush's rheto-
ric seems more sincere than his action. Since No
CiaA I .Pf ehainA r Plaw in 9MI Precident
The Bush administration fails to understand
that enforcing environmental standards need not
interfere with economic growth. In stark contrast,
John Kerry believes that protecting the environ-
ment is intimately connected to a strong economy.
The League of Conservation Voters, The Sierra
Club, Friends of Earth Action, and Defenders of
Wildlife Action Fund all agree that John Kerry is
the right choice for America. Here's why: First,
Kerry will reverse the Bush-Cheney rollbacks to
the "Clean Air Act" and plug the loopholes in envi-
ronmental policy to stop acid rain, to hold global
warming in check, and to make our waterways
"drinkable, swimmable, and fishable." In the pres-
ent day, only 45 percent of our waterways meet the
CWA standards. Second, John Kerry will renew
the "polluter pays tax," to hold reckless compa-
nies and persons accountable for their actions. He
will not sit by the wayside as companies trounce
our national treasures for profit. And, finally, John
Kerry will create environment empowerment
zones to make sure that the areas of greatest need
receive priority funding. A sound environmental
policy will protect our national treasures for our
children and, ultimately provide a springboard for
economic advancement by cleaning up contami-
nated areas whose job markets have suffered from
their onvernments' hortsiohhterneCs
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