0 4A - The Michigan Daily - Thursday, November 11, 2004 OPINION * 4**420 MAYNARD STREET ANN ARBOR, MI 48109 tothedaily@michigandaily.com 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 ''Senator, pistols or swords ?" - New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd, after U.S. Sen. Zell Miller (D- Ga.) strongly crit- icized her on the "Imus in the Morning" radio show, as reported yesterday in the New Yors Post. Dowd was referring to Miller's challenge at the Republican National Convention this sum- mer to TV host Chris Matthews that they duel Co0IN DALY .TiFh t :i ti A I- AI \NO I i P RL-FcT.l Faith-based voting JORDAN SCHRADER P(RT HI TA)TIEMENT ome of the people who turned out at the polls last week to do their civic duty are now asking: What's the point in voting? Not me. I'm asking: What's the point in writing? A more daring journal- ist might leave the rest of his column blank after asking that question, but let me instead give an example explaining my disillusionment. An LSA sophomore recently shared with the Daily a view that must be common to mil- lions across this country when she explained her faith in President Bush: "We as students need to realize that the government always knows more than we do, because we hear things from indirect sources and the media misconstrues things. We need to put faith in our government and intelli- gence agencies to make informed and proper decisions." Those words summed up for me why the election had left me questioning the value of the career I had chosen to pursue. Journalism, with its mission of "comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable," holds the promise of exposing wrongdoing and empow- ering readers. But what if the newspaper shines a light and readers shut their eyes? What if the media shout and no one hears? A partial list of things that the media have reported, and apparently "misconstrued," over the past four years would include: The sudden and overwhelming interest in a dictator the United States had disarmed and emasculated with years of sanctions; The tenuous connection between that dictator and the terrorists who attacked us on Sept. 11; The fruitless search for the weapons the dictator was supposed to have at his command based on the prognostications of those vaunted intelligence agencies; The torture chambers where U.S. sol- diers brutalized their prisoners, encouraged by official policy aimed at subverting the usual rules of war; The profits made from war by a com- pany whose former chief executive helped run the war. Each of these is a scandal that the main- stream media have - sometimes inaccurately, often belatedly, usually timidly - exposed. Take whatever positions you want on them, it shouldn't be denied that the debate on each issue was both relevant to the election and waged in the media. But voters overlooked all those things last week, preferring to focus on the candidates' moral values and toughness. They weighed what seemed to be an alcoholic turned born- again Christian crusader against what seemed to be a veteran and protester turned flip-flop- per. In the end, the electorate fell back on the same party identities that determined its votes in 2000. Perhaps voters believed that personalities, impressions and partisan loyalties were all they could consider, because the media had misconstrued all the real issues. So why should any of us go into journal- ism, if all the words in the world can't make a difference? It gets scarier. The media hear their readers and viewers. They listen to them and give them what they want. So you can expect less inves- tigation - which no one trusts anyway - and more of what we already have seen taking over political coverage. More personality assessments. Dean's screams mean he's a man on the edge. Bush's mangled speech means he's stupid. Kerry's drone means he's condescending. More wedge issues. Gays and abortions make great headlines. Above all, more about the process. Who has more money? What do the polls say? Who's win- ning over the coveted Hispanic Nascar uncles? It's a world I enter with a heavy heart and a profound uncertainty, trying to come to grips with a nation that may have more faith in its government than in its journalists. Schrader can be reached at jtschrad@umich.edu. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Adams correct, history is on liberals' side TO THE DAILY: Daniel Adams was spot-on in his column (The anger of a drowning man, 11/08/04), and his detractors in the paper seemed to have let the point of his column just whiz right over their heads. Put in the simplest terms, to those seeking to amend the constitution to ban same-sex mar- riages, the end result can be determined today, here, in this very newspaper: You will lose. Didn't sink in? Pause for dramatic effect, and try again. You will lose. This is simply not a fight you will win. Kick, scream, claw, for every inch along the way all you want, but I can predict the future. And I don't even need special powers to do it - a library will suffice. It has nothing to do with the Left, the Right, Christianity, ethics, Bush, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom or any one else who has weighed in his opinion on the issue - 230 years of precedence in U.S. legal history hold the answer. The U.S. Consti- tution, the very foundation of this country, establishes the United States as a democ- racy - in essence, rule by the majority. But, at the same time, there is a precedent of checking the inevitable tyranny of this majority over minorities. Dim memories of time spent in high school history courses should slowly come back, recalling the stories of various civil rights movements throughout history. Reminded of names like Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, most will recall some time spent studying the women's suffrage movement, these women's struggle to gain the right to vote and 80 years later, the eventual 19th Amendment to the Constitution. This amendment guaranteed women the right to vote - to have a voice and not be discrimi- nated against, as a "minority" in society. Similarly, blacks, as well as other minori- ties in society, were denied the right to vote, along with a slew of other basic human rights. They and their supporters stood up and fought, for decades. Despite decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court against their position, they eventually received what they wanted, what they needed. It took not one, not two, but three amendments to the Constitution, but they were guaranteed their rights, and 11/09/2004) seeks to trivialize by compar- ing amendments to taxation policies and codes. It may take 20, 30, 50 years or more, but the fact remains that history is on the side of same- sex marriage's proponents, as Adams asserts. The majority can fight over what is moral and what is ethical in this country and the petty definitions of words, but the final arbiter of the fate of all people in this society is not a god by any name or any form, but the words written in the U.S. Constitution. Ted Matherly LSA junior Letter writer defended discriminatory policy TO THE DAILY: I'd like to start off by saying that I, like many of the readers of The Michigan Daily, am opposed to the way the paper tend to generalize groups of people (especially conservatives). I am in agreement with Zachary Emig (Gay marriage opponents made reasonable choice, 11/09/2004) when he said that many people who cast conser- vative ballots were very informed and very intelligent. However, I am also sure that there were people on both sides of the political spectrum who were not educated about their votes, and I find it very hard to believe that the majority of people who voted for banning gay marriage did for reasons other than homophobia, and this is where I must disagree with Emig. First of all, I find it amazing that he could compare banning gay marriage to progressive taxes or mortgage interest tax deductions. Emig tried to make the following point; he tried to say that banning gay marriage was equally hateful to making higher-income families pay higher taxes than lower-income families. The part of this I find most disturbing of his argument is that he believes that the actual taking away of people's freedom is the same thing as making people with higher incomes pay more taxes. The progressive tax system is in place because even though the actual monetary values are different, the percentage of income is roughly the same. However, by banning gay marriage, we are taking away people's rights. In the Dec- laration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson wrote, "We hold these truths to be self-evident_ that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalien- the most is to "protect the sanctity of mar- riage;" however, no one has yet been able to give me a straight answer with compelling arguments as to how homosexual marriage will hurt marriage. As for the argument that gay marriage is un-Christian, just because homosexuality is looked down upon by the religion doesn't make it any less hateful. During the Spanish Inquisition, many Jews were killed by the Catholic Church in the name of religion, yet that didn't make the act any less hateful. And yes, I realize that was an extreme example. In conclusion, let me say this to Emig: I understand where you are coming from in your complaints about the newspapers on this campus. They are very quick to gen- eralize. I agree that people on both sides of the spectrum should start to look at the positives of the recent election. However, your arguments for choosing to eliminate gay marriage were discriminatory, and the examples you gave to defend your beliefs were irrelevant. I won't use the word hate- ful, but no matter how you phrase it, the tak- ing away of people's rights will always be discriminatory. Andrew Daar LSA freshman Conservatives should care about wood in nature TO THE DAILY: I feel I must take it upon myself to expose an inherent, not-so-implicit hole in Michael Vasell's argument published on Nov. 10 (Dem- ocrats need to clean up election materials) in response to Steve Cotner's column (When is a good time to start living?, 11/09/2004). Vasell writes in his letter that "politically active lib- erals have destroyed all the wooden trunks on campus," and "people are turned off by the Left's disrespect for public property." Is the air not public property? Are oceans and for- ests and, indeed, national wildlife reserves not public property? Your chosen party has a criminally bad history of exploiting, destroy- ing and manipulating massive amounts of "public property" to personal, economic advantage. Granted, the wildlife reserves in Alaska that your chosen president is attempt- ing to open up to oil drilling are not "in your backyard," and perhaps you do not see ugly Kerry stickers pasted on bears and pine trees creating the dreaded eyesores you speak of. 40