The Michigan Daily - Monday, July 14, 2003 - 5 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Destination: Gilbert, AZ JOHN HONKALA I LOVE THE WHITE Sox Column ignores facts and is based on weak grounds TO THE DAILY: First, I want readers to take note of the 22nd word of Jason Pesick's column (Republican Party betrays America, 7/7/03). It says "Voters," not "The Republican Party." That means that voters decided to remove the politicians. If anyone had any inkling of the tendencies of South- ern states, it is the propensity to propagate and support the idea of states' rights. Do the South and the flag have a racist history? Undoubt- edly so. Do I abhor the symbol?You bet. But there are instances where intervention by the government is necessary (slavery, human rights abuses, etc.) and when the prefer- ence of the state presides. Second, the title "Republican Party betrays America" is so brazenly dishonest, considering the past decade. Unless Mr. Pesick has forgotten the '90s, it was the Dems. and Clinton and Co. that allowed scores of terrorist attacks, including the USS Cole and the embassy and army barracks bombings, to go rel- atively unchallenged. And lest any- one forget, it was former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and former President Jimmy Carter who "secured" a non-proliferation deal with North Korea. Kim Jong Il must have forgotten that, since he's been trying to blackmail the U.S. into giving him more money. Some blame this action on President Bush's "axis of evil" speech, but even if there wasn't North Korea's admittance that the 1994 deal was broken years ago, could anyone honestly believe that within less than a year of the speech a poverty- ridden country cooks up a nuclear weapon out of the blue? Maybe, but I doubt it. And while we're on the subject of betrayal, let us not neglect to mention formerAttorney General Janet Reno's little endeav- ors: namely Waco and sending Elian Gonzalez back to "oh-wait- it's-still-a-dictatorship" Cuba. Some final notes: First, I would never offer up some short pithy title saying, "Democratic Party betrays America." It's too simplistic and too childish. Second, I would advise Mr. Pesick that if he's going to charac- terize an entire party based on cer- tain people's' actions with which he has taken disagreement, he had bet- ter come armed with more than pea shooters and a swooning devotion to the Kennedys. RAHMAN WOODS Alumnus The letter writer is aformer staff writerfor The Michigan Review. Professor's article misleading and inaccurate TO THE DAILY: A grossly inaccurate article appeared in the recent "Spring LSA" on Social Security. The misiaorme. author was Profes- sor Saul Hymans of the Univer- sity's Economics Department. Professor Hymans stated, "The Federal Government is not spending the Social Security surplus. In fact, nobody is; it's setting there fully invested and earning interest ... " Completely untrue! All of the surplus has been spent for operations and non-negotiable Special Treasury Securities, nothing but IOUs, placed in the Trust Fund as an addition to the national debt, a taxpayer obligation. If there were a surplus, the national debt should have shown a decrease. This has not happened since 1960, which was the last year the Treasury Department records show federal income exceeding expenses with a decrease in the national debt. Professor Hymans adds to the above misinformation with the grossly inaccurate statement that Social Security is funded with a "5.3% tax levy matched by an employer." Again, com- pletely untrue! Social Security is funded completely by the employer when payment is made to "Employer's Quarterly Feder- al Tax" (line 6 & 7 Form 941). Again, the tax is not 5.3 per- cent but 12.4 percent of the employee's Social Security wages for O.A.S.I. and 2.9 per- cent for D.I. In addition, half of this amount is deducted from the employee's paycheck, thus mak- ing part of the payroll tax sub- ject to the employee's personal income tax. Whataxdeception! And from an economics professor at the University. ARTHUR ALLISON Alumnus LETTERS POLICY The Michigan Daily welcomes letters from all of its readers. Letters from University students, faculty, staff and administrators will be given priority over others. Letters should include the writer's name, college and school year or other University affilia- tion. The Daily will not print any letter containing statements that cannot be verified. Letters should be kept to approximately 300 words. The Michigan Daiy reserves the right to edit for length, clarity and accuracy. Longer "viewpoints" may be arranged with an editor. Letters will be run according to order received and the amount of space available. Letters should be sent over e- mail to letters@michigandaily.com or mailed to the Daily at - 420 Maynard St. Editors can be reached via e-mail at edipage.edi- tors@umich.edu. Letters e-mailed to the Daily will be given priority over those dropped off in person or sent via the U.S. Postal Service. I lost a bet (again!) a few weeks ago when the Chicago White Sox beat the Chicago Cubs (again!) to clinch the season series. The stakes of that bet are being served right now as you Sread this. I had to change my tagline from my usual trite phrase to what you see there now. It's not true at all. I loathe the Pale Hoes. Last week, the U.S. Census Bureau issued a report on the state of city populations across the country. Sur- prise, surprise, Detroit has lost more people since 2000 than any other major city in the country. Motown, which exactly 50 years ago boasted a population near 2.3 million, is now home to 925,000. Apparently the excitement generated by the 2006 Super Bowl, Compuware and river- front developments, isn't bringing permanent residents to the city. Or maybe they're on their way. Maybe 925,000 is as low as the city will go. Hard to say. The point is, it's 2003 and people are still abandoning the 20th century's great cities. Detroit was not the only loser. Cincin- nati, St. Louis and Cleveland all lost sizable chunks of their populations. Even San Fran- cisco - California's St. Joseph to Oakland's Benton Harbor - lost residents. Mostly, though, the hardest hit cities can be found in the Rust Belt and the Deep South, which means, of course, that the place to be these days is Gilbert, AZ. Yup, Gilbert, AZ, which along with Nevada's North Las Vegas and Henderson, rounded out the top three. I've never been to any of these cities, but I bet I know what they're like: Orange County, West Bloomfield, wherever. What does it all mean? Well, for one, it seems alot of people are really into that dry heat thing. It also means that that most ubiq- uitous of dreams - the American one - has changed very little since post-WWII fed- eral policy allowed it to become synonymous with cul de sacs and picket fences. Accompanying this news are recently released unemployment figures that put the national rate at 6.4 percent. In cities like Detroit the unemployment rate is much higher - into double digits - fur- ther evidence that most of the jobs to be had are no longer in our crumbling center cities. The New York Times reported last week that blacks are being disproportion- ately affected by the latest layoffs. So, the connection: As people continue to flood out of cities, they increasingly leave behind them the poorest blacks and failing infrastructure. And as they move farther out, they bring with them sprawling development and new, tax-funded infra- structure that very few people actually use. Jobs follow. New industry, business and residents further harm the environment. Americans have followed this wasteful pattern for years now. And - no question about it - the suburbs have been the win- ners and cities the losers. But it was not somehow foreordained that the suburbs would have better schools, less crime, more resources, et cetera. There is no Grand Blueprint that demar- cates the good life from the bad life with interstates and Rustling Pines Estates signs. This pattern emerged from specific and deliberate decisions. And it will con- tinue, sprawling and merely semi-con- scionable, unless we directly attack it. There are many, I suspect, who would argue passionately in defense of suburban life. But the issue here is not our own indi- vidual quality of life. It is the quality of life of the entire nation - all of us - and our children's children, et al. I will stop short of saying living in the suburbs is selfish, but that thought should give us pause. There are some positive signs, especially around Washington and a handful of Sunbelt cities, that Americans are slowly integrating themselves. But we should not hold our breath. Population trends are difficult to iden- tify as they occur. Politicians, for example, often point to a burgeoning black middle class and increased black presence in the sub- urbs as evidence that America is belatedly moving along anatural course of integration. But it is quickly becoming clear that those cities - without specific plans to uphold their newfound racial integrity - eventually reach a tipping point when enough black folks inove there (often near 20 percent), and they rapidly become mostly black/minority enclaves. This is not how we should desire to live. Everyone should be able to enjoy what sub- urbanites do. But in order for that to happen we have to make it so. Passivity will only lead us downroadswe've already laid. Honkala can be rached at jhonkala@umich.edu. Off the deep end DANIEL ADAMS ADVANTAGE? PUSH. After the U.S. C o u r t 3 released its opinions on the University's admission policies, I got the impression from the media that there had been no clear victory for either side - that the cases were a mixed result. Affirmative action would be allowed to continue, but was highly suspect and would be watched with strict scrutiny. So, you can imagine my surprise when I received a letter of congratulations in my e-mail box from none other than Universi- ty President Mary Sue Coleman. Appar- ently, Mary Sue was having a party, in celebration of the victory in court. Cele- bration? We lost the undergraduate case 6-3! Besides, it isn't like there is a clear student majority on the issue; in a poll compiled by the Michigan Student Assembly in March, only 40 percent of the student body agreed with the policies to begin with. Well, free punch is free punch. Give yourself a pat on the back Mary Sue, and thanks for the grub. Less appetizing was the response from BAMN or "The Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action and Integration and Fight for Equality By Any Means Neces- sary." I expected the results of the cases to lead to one of the following: BAMN would claim victory and fade into obliv- ion, or BAMN would burn the Union to the ground. But there was another possi- ble result that I had not expected. In a viewpoint published on June 24 in the Daily, Agnes Aleobua and Kate Stenvig, both BAMN organizers, not only claimed victory, but also maintained that BAMN would stick around to help "defend and expand this victory with the power of the new, militant, integrated, youth-led civil rights movement." Rambling on, "This victory would have been impossible if not for the 50,000-person national March on Washington on April 1, which was orga- nized and led by BAMN." How arrogant. You've got to be seriously ballsy or seriously delusional to make statements like those, weighing more on the side of delusional. Rest assured, this "victory" had nothing to do with anything remote- ly associated with BAMN. Podunk fringe groups like BAMN don't sway the highest court in the land. Sure, at first, BAMN seemed harmless - a group that in the excitement and reck- lessness of its youth had simply lost touch with its target audience. It was always oddly amusing watching its petitions pass through a 600-plus student lecture hall, only to emerge on the other side with no more than a handful of reluctant signa- tures. But organizations like BAMN demand far more than bleeding hearts have to offer; they need zealots - individ- uals so consumed by the righteousness of their cause that they lose touch. They certainly have that in Agnes Ale- obua. Most students just write her off, knowing full well that on a given night BAMN meetings draw fewer students than a frat party keg stand. Personally, I choose to take people like Agnes seriously - despite her tendency to make bold state- ments like, "The South has now been opened for integration again." Go ahead and laugh, but bear in mind that this is a woman whose problems run deeper than a lack ofpeople skills. This is a woman who promises the rise of a militant mass movement hell-bent on the protection of affirmative action. A woman delusional enough to believe what she wants to believe. In Agnes Land, if you oppose affirmative action, then you're a "segrega- tionist." In Agnes Land, the hundreds of Detroit-area high schoolers her own group buses into Ann Arbor for rallies, are all members of their broad-based movement. This woman, and the organization she represents is outof touch and over the line. Ignorant, vacuous and righteous to the point of arrogance, this group is a horrible stain on the University. It has proven to be well beyond reach of the diverse education that its members claim to defend so staunchly. It represents diversity of skin color, when the true promise of diversity lies in the tolerance and acceptance of many different points of view. How sad that a group who pro- fesses a love for the late Martin Luther King Jr. has so completely missed the fundamental idea of his message: integra- tion through tolerance and peace. Agnes and BAMN choose any means necessary. Adams can be reached at dnadams@umich.edu.