4A- The Michigan Daily - Thursday, April 13, 2006
OPINION
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KIMBERLY LEUNG'Ti T'E TAK-.-uiT iBox
DoNN M. FRESARD
Editor in Chief
EMILY BEAM
CHRISTOPHER ZBROZEK
Editorial Page Editors
ASHLEY DINGES
Managing Editor
EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS AT
THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN SINCE 1890
420 MAYNARD STREET
ANN ARBOR, MI 48109
tothedaily@michigandaily.com
NOTABLE
QUOTABLE
4 ' It is important for
candidates to heed all the
complaints and follow
election guidelines."
- Yale College Council Vice President Marissa
Brittenham, on the fact that all five candidates
for student council president violated cam-
paign rules or sent spam e-mails, as reported
Tuesday by yaledailynews.com. Perhaps
last month's Michigan Student Assembly
elections inspired the Yale candidates.
WHAT'S BETTER THAN A SUM-
MER mN A2? HANGNG our wim
DALY OPmOw.
E-MAIL GALAD@UMICHDU.
k$'"
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01
Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily's editorial board. All
other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their author.
Liberal nation
ALISON Go Wi Wio\ATV, ES THE WX'ATCHIMEN
f he were in a
grave, David
Horowitz would
be rolling over in it
by now. The whiny
conservative windbag,
whose list of the 100
most dangerous pro-
fessors in America is
really a list of the 100
most non-neoconser-
vative professors, would mourn the loss of
another victim to the wicked, liberal academic
machine. That victim: me.
Sometime between now and when I first
moved into Bursley Residence Hall freshman
year, I turned into a liberal. I caught the Bush-
hating, affirmative action-approving, Commu-
nist-loving bug - with all its shameful stigma.
And just like herpes or hepatitis, it is, as far as
I can tell, permanent.
How could this happen? How could all my par-
ents' warnings of "thinking like a liberal, but liv-
ing like a conservative" not gotten into my head?
How could tax cuts for the rich, strict tort reform
and a $423-billion deficit not convince me to slap
that "W '04" sticker on my BMW?
The first obvious answer is those danger-
ous professors I've been taking classes from;
I've been intimidated into liberal submission.
They've brainwashed me with their facts - fill-
ing my head with information that really won't
help me get into a useful field like medicine
or engineering. Instead I'm too busy worrying
about the inequalities in the world - worrying
about all the people who've been screwed over
and trampled on, then told to get up on their
own, unmarred.
And you know what's even worse? I'm a lib-
eral, and I'm one who wants to do something
about it. The latter problem is the Daily's fault.
Through subliminal messages in the crossword
puzzle, the Daily has made me think I can make
some change. It might be through journalism
- just look at what the sports section did with
the chop/claw - or it might be through hand-
dirtying work, but somehow I got some youth-
ful idealism that my parents hope I get over and
never get back - sort of like chicken pox.
When I first came to Ann Arbor, the Univer-
sity was embroiled in a couple big-deal Supreme
Court cases challenging the constitutionality
of its affirmative-action policies. If you haven't
picked up on this before, I come from a pretty
rich, pretty white Detroit suburb, where the sense
of entitlement hangs heavy in the air. Kids don't
dream of going to the University; they have it as
their back-up. And I was not immune to this feel-
ing of entitlement. I worked my ass off in high
school, and I took all the right tests - it's just not
fair that some unqualified black/Hispanic/Native
American kid should get a free ride. Right?
Well, shame on 18-year-old me and everyone
else who hasn't had their brains infected with the
horrors of history. I'm not talking about the obvi-
ous - the policies of segregation, the KKK or
Indian reservations, which are bad enough. But
I'm talking about the stuff they don't tell you about
on the History Channel or PBS - the stuff that
is complicated and not obvious and that doesn't
have interesting photos to go along with it. Stuff
like kicking blacks out of their homes to build a
white-friendly highway; or invading and occupy-
ing countries decades before Iraq under the guise
of "spreading democracy"; or trumpeting minor-
ity rights while setting the women's movement
back a half century in one fell swoop.
Living in this city has made me the cliche that
conservatives both fear and deride. The Univer-
sity hasn't just infected me with what to think,
but has also burdened me with the obligation to
think. In the meantime, I became a liberal - and
now serve as a cautionary tale.
For you wealthy conservatives ready to send
your impressionable kids into this well-known
liberal bastion: Watch out. If your sons and
daughters are careful - wearing masks and
avoiding truth - they might be able to stop it
before it starts. So far, I haven't heard of a cure.
But then again, I hope they never find one.
*1
Go can be reached at
aligo@umich.edu.
VIEWPOINT
Moving on from'Michigamua'
Fixing our immigration policy
AARON KAPLAN LIFE DOESN'T GET AN A
jsaw a protestor on
the Diag Monday
olding a sign that
read, "No Human Being
is Illegal." That's a nice
sentiment,but what does
it mean? That we should
end the legal immigra-
tion process and simply
allow all interested par-
ties to come to the Unit-
ed States? Is patrolling our borders inhumane?
If legal vs. illegal is a false distinction, shouldn't
undocumented immigrants receive public benefits
as a matter of human rights?
The answer to all these questions is no. Bor-
ders are not ephemeral. Determining who should
receive the rights of a citizen is a core function
of any sovereign nation's government. Globaliza-
tion notwithstanding, America is still a sovereign
nation, so determining who is an American is
the responsibility of the president and Congress
- not Vicente Fox, not the National Council of
La Raza, and, in light of recent nationwide dem-
onstrations, certainly not individuals who came to
this country outside legal channels.
This should not be considered a hard-line posi-
tion, but I'm still somewhat uneasy about it. I'm
uneasy because I like immigrants. I'm proud of
my own ancestors' journey to the United States, a
feeling shared by most Americans. I enjoy meet-
ing international students. I know that the vast
majority of immigrants are law-abiding, hard-
working strivers who see America as the land of
opportunity. I'm glad that with all our problems,
people still want to come here.
Plus, I understand why so many illegal immi-
grants cross the border. Making the minimum
wage is unattractive to most Americans, but it
is often many times what a laborer could earn in
the Mexican countryside. As long as immigration
laws are erratically enforced, the payoff for mak-
ing it is tremendous.
The recent marches for illegal immigrants,
however, leave me cold. The marchers, who want
citizenship for all illegal immigrants, have mobi-
lized to protest a recently passed House bill that
would strengthen border security and force busi-
nesses to verify their workers' legality, but would
not grant legal status to any of the 11 million
illegal immigrants currently in the United States.
grants who are worried that American citizens
might start enforcing their laws.
Successfully avoiding deportation for a few
years should not entitle one to citizenship and its
associated benefits, but some illegal immigrant
advocates want just that. In California, 62 percent
of voters opposed granting drivers' licenses to ille-
gal immigrants,and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger
vetoed a bill that would have allowed them. The
Senate recently considered a bill that would have
allowed illegal immigrants to pay in-state tuition
at public universities. The idea that a Mexican citi-
zen living illegally in Detroit could pay less at the
University of Michigan than an American citizen
from Bowling Green is ludicrous.
Still, I don't blame illegal immigrants them-
selves for the current problem; I blame business.
Employers often look the other way and accept a
mutually beneficial situation - the illegal worker
gets better wages than he'd receive outside the
country, and the employer doesn't have to pay the
even higher wage that would attract American
workers.
Anyone who says illegal immigrants are tak-
ing jobs Americans won't do is just looking for an
easy way out. Yes, Americans don't want to pick
fruit for $5.15 an hour, but being a garbage man
is just as undesirable. Sanitation departments,
though, fill their jobs by paying high wages. With-
out illegal immigrants, Florida oranges would be
more expensive, but claims that the economy
would collapse are frivolous.
We should already be forcing businesses to
verify that their workers are legal and increasing
the fines levied against those who don't comply.
Instead, the issuance of such fines has declined
sharply, from nearly a thousand in 1991 to 124 in
2003. This is absurd.
Since potential illegal immigrants have such a
strong incentive to cross the border, federal policy
must limit this incentive as much as possible to
curtail future illegal immigration. As for those
already here, mass deportation is impractical, and
a House bill provision that would make it a crime
to offer even humanitarian aid to illegal immi-
grants goes too far. But illegal immigrants are not
oppressed masses being denied their fundamental
rights. They're here voluntarily, and their Ameri-
can-born children will be citizens. That's good
enough.
By SAM WOLL
For more a century, members of the Mich-
igamua senior society have strived to leave
Michigan a better place than they found it. Stick-
ing to its core value of service to Michigan, the
group has played an important role in contribut-
ing to both the tangible and intangible aspects of
this campus, without calling for recognition or
reward. This organization has historically repre-
sented a diverse cross-section of student life and
leadership at Michigan; moreover, the organiza-
tion has arguably been more inclusive and more
representative of diversity at Michigan than any
other campus group.
Unfortunately, opposition by various campus
groups in recent years has painted a different
picture of Michigamua. Upon its founding in
1902, Michigamua adopted a symbolism that
- when viewed in retrospect today - is hurt-
ful to many in and out of the Native American
community. For this reason, the group replaced
Native American symbolism nearly two decades
ago with new traditions that more directly reflect
our common bond, Michigan. While discarding
more than 80 years of tradition was difficult, we
knew it was the right thing to do and appropri-
ately moved on.
Two decades on, however, it pushes the bound-
aries of fairness to deride the organization as
racist for .symbolism that had been historically
accepted by the University, the campus com-
munity and even Native American members
of Michigamua. However, we are aware that to
some this symbolism has caused pain, which is
very much regrettable and was never intended
as a defining attribute of the organization. Simi-
larly, though "Michigamua" is not of Native
American origin, the name now resonates with
earlier portions of the group's history. While this
issue has been used by many in today's commu-
nity to feign political outrage, we are aware that
there are those that have felt genuine hurt. As an
organization, we regret that this unintentional
consequence has occurred. Therefore, our orga-
nization continues to seek resolution and healing
with the affected community, and we hope that
a constructive dialogue can begin. Furthermore,
the issues surrounding the name have detracted
the campus community from working toward a
better Michigan, and therefore, it is time for us as
a group to move on from it.
In the time that has passed since 1989, Mich-
igamua has continued its tradition of leadership
for the University while honoring its agreements.
Sensationalized reporting and unjust conclu-
sions have replaced true understanding of what
has transpired over the last two decades; that, in
turn, has kept the entire campus away from deal-
ing with the real issues. With honest and open
dialogue, we are confident that many of the accu-
sations leveled against us through the years will
be recognized as misunderstandings or fabrica-
tions. Yet we also understand and are prepared
to hear the real hurt that is the underpinning of
those deeply involved. It is in good faith that we
have disclosed our membership in order to begin
this process. It is time that voices on all sides of
the issue make a real commitment to uncovering
truths and resolving our differences without the
biases still being harbored.
In the end, we feel that having a group commit-
ted to serving Michigan above all else is impor-
tant. Our past practices have shown that limiting
our membership to 25 seniors best effectuates
this mission; cultivating strong relationships and
dialogues among such varied campus leaders
allows us to build a better tomorrow. We repre-
sent a diverse cross-section of campus, and while
we certainly do not claim to be the only effective
student leaders on campus, we are proud to join
an organization that has completely dedicated
itself to our great institution.
None of us would have agreed to join any
organization that in any way demeans other
members of our community, nor could we
commit our time to an organization not dedi-
cated to enhancing the quality of life for the
entire University. We believe in the University
of Michigan and have faith that we can all,
with good will, move forward together in a
joint pursuit of a better Michigan for genera-
tions of Wolverines to come.
Woll is a LSA senior and a member of the last
class of "Michigamua."
0
0
VIEWPOINT
Independents will decide MCRI
01
BY ANDREw LASKowsK
As all of us know, this November affirmative
action will essentially go on trial, as Michigan vot-
ers will decide whether to continue these types of
programs in the future. In the past, conservative
ideas have hit home with Michigan voters, who
recently approved a gay marriage ban and defeat-
ed a measure to legalize euthanasia. Therefore, it
is clear opponents of the Michigan Civil Rights
Initiative will have to work to change minds
before November's elections or affirmative action
in Michigan will be no longer.
The current debate surrounding MCRI can
be pigeonholed into two arguments. The liberals
will tell you that the educational playing field is
unequal, that blacks are disadvantaged in compar-
ison to whites and that affirmative action will level
the playing field, fostering diversity and opportu-
nity , T'I-.crnar.,tvc will ~tall tvnn that nffirmn-
To begin: How can we even be sure that affirma-
tive action will work? Will it level the playing
field? How will we be able to measure its success?
Will it improve black high school test scores, lower
the black/white income gap, lower black poverty
numbers - and if so, by how much? How long
will it take to notice these improvements? These
questions must be answered, because independent
voters do not live in a world of rhetoric and theory,
but rather a practical world where everything can
be measured. If there is no way to measure affir-
mative action's impact on society, they will not
support it.
Assuming the above questions are answered
to the independent voter's satisfaction, others still
exist. Is the cost of the program worth its benefit?
Once admitted, how will the tuition bill of the
minority student be paid, assuming the student,
being disadvantaged, cannot afford it? Once on
r'a rnn. c therre a ire nnamnvinnrity nrrnramnQ
tions explicitly and define affirmative action for the
Michigan voter. So far, she has remained relatively
silent, allowing her opponents - namely MCRI
- to define the issue. When she does speak for
affirmative action, she uses rhetoric such as diver-
sity, opportunity and equality - words that sound
good in a speech, but that have no demonstrative
meaning to the independent voter. What do diver-
sity and equality really mean, and how can they
be measured?
At this point, one may ask why independent
voters seek specific answers and ignore politi-
cal rhetoric. Consider the following scenario:
Suppose affirmative action exists for another 15
years, but poverty levels, average black income
and black poverty remain the same. The same
theoretical arguments will still exist in liberal and
conservative circles,-but the true measuring stick
of affirmative action's success will be determined
by~ there Qtatiticrv In other wours-there miict he
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