T

he White House was 
rocked 
last 
week 
following 
The 
New 
York 
Times’s 
publication 
of a critical Op-Ed from an 
anonymous senior official in 
President 
Donald 
Trump’s 
administration, 
eliciting 
a 
far-reaching 
array 
of 
reactions from all sides of 
the political spectrum. The 
Op-Ed, 
which 
praised 
the 
president’s 
conservative 
legislative achievements while 
condemning 
the 
president’s 
“anti-democratic” 
impulses 
and 
“amoral” 
disposition, 
publicly 
embarrassed 
the White House and left 
prominent 
administration 
officials scrambling to deny 
any role in the editorial’s 
authorship.
Arguably the most extreme 
reaction 
was 
from 
Steve 
Bannon, former White House 
chief 
strategist 
and 
“alt-
right” leader, who declared 
the Op-Ed a “coup” and part 
of 
a 
“broader 
conspiracy” 
against Trump, likening the 
author to George McClellan, 
the Civil War general who 
was punished for ignoring 
Abraham 
Lincoln’s 
orders. 
Bannon’s 
comments 
are 
characteristically hyperbolic 
and only loosely based in 
reality, 
but, 
ironically, 
he 
draws attention to one of the 
greatest dangers of the Trump 
presidency: the damage to our 
nation’s political system and 
institutions that could linger 
long after Trump leaves office.
Trump 
came 
to 
Washington, 
D.C., 
with 
a 
pledge to “drain the swamp,” 
but that vow has manifested 
itself as a bitter assault against 
anyone and any institution 
that resist Trump’s political 
narrative 
and 
proposed 
policies. Rather than root out 
corruption 
or 
inefficiency, 
the 
president 
has 
merely 
normalized the reckless and 
childish rhetoric that defined 
his campaign. At times it feels 
redundant, or even tiresome, 
to evaluate the president’s 
leadership and temperament, 
but 
let’s 
examine 
his 
interaction with the various 
actors and institutions in our 
political system.
Trump’s most acrimonious 
relationship is the combative 
rivalry 
he 
has 
cultivated 
with 
the 
media. 
Trump’s 
relationship 
with 
the 
mainstream media has been 
strained since his campaign 
began over three years ago. 

Trump’s penchant for lying 
led to countless news articles 
and hours of media coverage 
devoted to fact-checking his 
various tweets and speeches. 
Trump responded by deriding 
mainstream media outlets like 
The Washington Post, The 
New York Times and CNN as 
“fake news.”
One 
hoped 
Trump’s 
animosity toward the press 
would subside once he took 
office, but rather the president 
has attempted to use the office 
to legitimize his contempt of 
the media. From lying about 
the size of his inauguration 
crowd to euphemizing these 
false claims as “alternative 
facts,” to comically distorting 
his own statements at a summit 
with 
Russian 
President 
Vladimir Putin, frequent lies 
and attacks on the media have 
become a defining staple of the 

Trump White House.
The president’s assault on 
the press has worked, at least 
among his base. Over half of 
Republicans believe the press 
is the “enemy of the people” and 
43 percent say Trump should 
be allowed to shut down news 
organizations. These numbers 
are incredibly disconcerting, 
and 
symptomatic 
of 
an 
administration 
that 
has 
legitimized the notion that 
facts are subjective. When 
the facts don’t align with 
your beliefs, the appropriate 
response 
is 
to 
reevaluate 
your beliefs, not to get new 
“facts.” Unfortunately, Trump 
has normalized the baseless 
rejection of opposing evidence, 
exacerbating political divisions 
and impeding efforts to govern 
effectively. Furthermore, the 
deluge of falsehoods from the 
West Wing has degraded the 
credibility of the executive 
branch and created a mindset 
that White House statements 
are to be scrutinized rather 
than respected.
Another one of Trump’s 
favorite 
targets 
is 
the 
legal 
system. 
Trump 
has 

routinely disparaged special 
prosecutor Robert Mueller’s 
investigation 
into 
alleged 
Russian interference during 
the presidential election and 
publicly blasted judges whose 
decisions 
he 
disapproved. 
He either fails to understand 
or fails to appreciate the 
virtues of an independent 
justice 
system, 
evidenced 
by 
his 
frequent 
criticism 
of 
Attorney 
General 
Jeff 
Sessions’s decision to recuse 
himself 
from 
the 
Russia 
investigation and his firing 
of FBI Director James Comey 
— a decision Trump himself 
said was partly due to the way 
Comey handled the Russia 
investigation.
In a way, Steve Bannon 
is right — our ideal world is 
not one where the president 
is undermined by his own 
aides and allies. But our ideal 
world is also not one where the 
president starts trade wars, 
threatens to shut down news 
agencies, 
withdraws 
from 
multiple international treaties 
and muses about assassinating 
foreign rulers — often on a 
whim.
The reality is that our 
political institutions are under 
attack — not by whistleblowers 
or the Op-Ed’s author, but by 
the president. This is not to say 
that our political system cannot 
recover. 
Our 
Constitution 
is strong, the separation of 
powers 
is 
well-established 
and as The New York Times’s 
Op-Ed 
demonstrates, 
even 
many of those within the 
administration will resist the 
president’s worst ideas and 
impulses. Still, we must guard 
the health and integrity of 
our democratic institutions. A 
vibrant free press and strong, 
independent judicial system 
are both central pillars of 
democracy, 
which 
is 
why 
Trump’s incessant attacks on 
them are so irresponsible.
The 
fallout 
from 
these 
attacks threaten to remain 
long after he leaves office. 
Bad policies can be reversed, 
but it is far harder to repair 
a political system that has 
been 
continuously 
attacked 
by the most powerful man 
in 
the 
country. 
Likewise, 
the true threat of the Trump 
presidency lies not in his 
legislative agenda, but in his 
shameless disparagement of 
our democratic institutions.

Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4A — Monday, September 17, 2018

Emma Chang
Ben Charlson
Joel Danilewitz
Samantha Goldstein
Emily Huhman

Tara Jayaram
Jeremy Kaplan
Lucas Maiman
Magdalena Mihaylova
Ellery Rosenzweig
Jason Rowland

Anu Roy-Chaudhury
Alex Satola
Ali Safawi
Ashley Zhang
Sam Weinberger

DAYTON HARE
Managing Editor

420 Maynard St. 
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
 tothedaily@michigandaily.com

Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890.

ALEXA ST. JOHN
Editor in Chief
 ANU ROY-CHAUDHURY AND 
ASHLEY ZHANG
Editorial Page Editors

Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily’s Editorial Board. 
All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

REBECCA BROWN | WOLVERINES ABROAD

New hemisphere, new perspective
A

t the 5,000-foot summit 
of a mountain in Wanaka, 
New Zealand, I cried. I 
was sitting on the ground eating a 
peanut butter and jelly sandwich 
after having trekked up the nearly 
four miles of straight incline trail. 
There was salt on my face from the 
sweat, chilling against my skin in 
the breeze. As I looked out on the 
water and mountains surrounding 
me, I felt a sense of calm I had never 
known — so much so that I was 
overwhelmed and, before I knew 
it, I was actually, embarrassingly, 
crying.
Next to the sleepy town of 
Wanaka on the South Island of 
New Zealand lies Roy’s Peak, which 
offers a full-day zigzagging hike 
up the side of Mount Roy through 
grass and packed gravel, littered 
with sheep and the presents they 
leave behind. It was a difficult hike 
for a novice like me, especially 
considering I was ill-equipped with 
a pair of worn-in running sneakers 
 
and the same Jansport backpack 
that I use to carry my books to class. 
Once I reached the summit, I was 
forced to forget the pain in my legs 
and reckon with the panoramic, 
seemingly endless views across and 
beyond Lake Wanaka.
There are some places and 
moments that defy description. It’s 
cliché, trite and frankly groan-
inducing of me to say, but this was 
one of those moments. Not in terms 
of physical description — I could 
wax poetic about the rolling hills 
and cascading mountains, about the 
bluest blue of the water, about the 
eerie and comforting sound of only 
the wind and the footsteps of fellow 
hikers — but in terms of the feelings 
it inspired.

I traveled to New Zealand for 
10 days during my semester abroad 
in Sydney, Australia. The decision 
to study in Sydney was spurred 
by a desire to go to Australia for 
as long as I could remember. It’s 
where I was born and my family 
lived for five years in the mid-’90s 
before returning home to Boston. I 
spent four months in the Southern 
Hemisphere, kicked off with a trip 
to Southeast Asia and bookended 
by nearly two whole days sitting 
on a plane. To say I experienced 
more natural beauty abroad than I 
had seen in the last 21 years of my 
life would be a given. To say I saw 
the smallest and rarest dolphins 
in the world, had what is likely an 
increasingly rare chance to see the 
Great Barrier Reef and tasted the 
Australian delicacy that is a Tim 
Tam would be bragging. To say I 
experienced a change within me 
that can only come with travel 
would be more accurate, albeit 
nauseatingly cheesy.
On the other side of the world, 
in a place that I barely knew, I felt 
surer of myself than ever before. 
I felt more grounded and less 
anxious. I felt less worried about 
how I was being perceived and more 
concerned about the next item on 
my bucket list. I’m almost positive I 
blinked less, keeping my eyes open 
wide as much as possible to soak up 
everything around me. I watched 
more, I noticed more, I learned 
more.
A trip like this is few and far 
between. One where you focus 
on what is directly in front of you 
rather than the noise inside your 
head. One where you wake up and 
go to sleep when the sun does, rather 
than when your phone alarm tells 

you. One where you are overcome 
with emotion — on more than one 
occasion — from contemplating 
just how much bigger and more 
important the world is than you.
If you are young, have the 
physical ability and the financial 
means and are eager to be better, 
you should travel — as frequently 
and as widely as possible. Hop in a 
car, on a plane, on a bus. Plan, but not 
too much. Eat whatever you think 
you can stomach, even if it’s a bird 
embryo in Vietnam. Talk to people. 
Learn. Be open.
The more places I see and 
experience, the smaller I feel. The 
world is impossibly vast, and the 
more I explore it, the more I realize 
how little I know, how many places 
I have yet to go, how much more I 
have to learn. Traveling makes you 
feel insignificant in the good kind of 
way.
This 
specific, 
humbling 
insignificance, I have decided, is 
my favorite kind of feeling. I want 
to pocket it for times when I feel too 
self-assured, too smug, too caught 
up in my own minute troubles. I 
want to feel tiny and unwise and 
know I have places to go that will 
bring me, in the most literal sense, 
back down to earth. I want to hold 
on to this feeling for the rest of my 
life. When I set off for my return 
down Roy’s Peak — with a quiet 
brain, tired legs and a huge smile on 
my face — I set off in pursuit of that 
insignificance.

Institutions under attack

This case involved a male 
student, referred to as John 
Doe, and a female student, 
named Jane Roe, who were 
attending a fraternity party. 
Doe 
allegedly 
sexually 
assaulted Roe after serving 
her alcohol, and Roe went 
to the hospital to have a 
rape kit administered later 
that evening. No criminal 
charges were made against 
Doe; however, the University 
decided he was guilty of 
sexual misconduct, and he 
left 
school 
before 
being 
expelled. Doe then sued the 
University on the grounds 
that he was denied his right 
to a cross-examination of his 
accuser, and the circuit court 
eventually ruled in favor of 
Doe. In light of this ruling, 
we as the Editboard at The 
Michigan 
Daily 
encourage 
the 
University 
to 
stay 
committed to supporting and 
protecting all survivors of 
sexual assault.
The ruling declares those 
accused of sexual misconduct 
must be given the option to 
cross-examine their accuser. 
Researchers have shown that 
live cross-examination does 
little to find truth in legal 
proceedings, but rather it gives 
the defense an opportunity to 
intimidate and manipulate the 
victim. Cross-examination is, 
at its essence, combative and 
aggressive; 
Thapar 
himself 
characterizes 
the 
practice 
as 
“the 
back-and-forth 
of 
adversarial questioning” in 
the ruling. 
In 
cases 
of 
sexual 
misconduct, this process of 
adversarial 
questioning 
is 
gratuitously 
traumatizing 
for the accuser, as it requires 
them to face their alleged 
abuser and recall distressing 
events. Due to this effect, 
the ruling may discourage 
victims from coming forward 
to the University about the 
assault or misconduct they 
have experienced, in fear that 

they will be forced to relive it 
through 
cross-examination. 
Furthermore, 
it 
may 
also 
discourage 
witnesses 
from 
testifying 
on 
behalf 
of 
accusers, as they are also 
subject to cross-examination. 
There is reason for having 
separate 
University 
and 
legal proceedings in sexual 
assault cases, so as to provide 
the 
survivor 
with 
greater 
agency in handling the case. 
This ruling narrows the gap 
between these two kinds of 
proceedings, thus removing 
a substantial part of that 

agency.
This 
ruling 
also 
has 
implications beyond cross-
examination; 
it 
has 
been 
framed 
as 
a 
victory 
for 
the 
accused 
in 
cases 
of 
sexual assault, and also as a 
victory on behalf of men in 
general. In the ruling, the 
judge writes the University 
has “discredited all males, 
including Doe, and credited 
all females, including Roe, 
because 
of 
gender 
bias,” 
suggesting 
in 
the 
effort 
to 
support 
survivors, 
the 
University has in fact been 
discriminatory 
against 
all 
men. This rhetoric conflates 
“males” with “accused,” and 
“females” with “accusers,” 
which reinforces the idea 
that men cannot be victims to 
sexual assault. Furthermore, 
it paints an image of accusers 
as 
conniving 
or 
wrongly 
motivated in coming forward. 
Framing sexual assault in 

this way is dangerous and 
harmful to survivors of all 
genders.
The University has yet 
to 
announce 
if 
they 
will 
appeal this ruling to the 
Supreme 
Court. 
We 
hope 
regardless of their decision, 
they will stand ardently on 
the side of survivors and not 
succumb 
to 
rhetoric 
that 
seeks 
to 
intimidate 
them. 
Assuring that sexual assault 
proceedings are done in a 
manner that makes the victim 
as comfortable as possible 
is essential to this goal, as 
we want survivors to feel 
empowered to come forward, 
rather than discouraged by 
fear of intimidation. Moreover, 
we encourage the University 
to 
continue 
creating 
a 
process 
that 
encourages 
healing for survivors rather 
than 
disturbing 
traumatic 
memories.
In summary, we as an 
Editboard 
do 
not 
believe 
cross-examination 
will 
add anything beneficial to 
sexual assault cases at the 
University; moreover, it will 
unnecessarily upset survivors. 
The rhetoric surrounding the 
case has also been harmful and 
counterproductive. For these 
reasons, we do not support the 
circuit court’s ruling. Despite 
the University’s decision in 
this particular case, we hope 
they will continue to protect 
their students by supporting 
survivors in all future legal 
proceedings.

Noah Harrison can be reached at 

noahharr@umich.edu.

Rebecca Brown is an LSA senior.

To search for education abroad 
opportunities and register your travel 
visit global.umich.edu.

JILLIAN LI | CONTACT JILLIAN AT LIJILLI@UMICH.EDU

Do you love to debate today’s 

important issues? Do you want your 

voice heard? We hold twice-weekly 

Editorial Board meetings at our 

newsroom at 420 Maynard St. in Ann 

Arbor, where we discuss local, state 

and national issues relevant to campus. 

We meet Mondays and Wednesdays 

from 7:15 p.m. to 8:45 p.m.

Learn more about how to join 

Editboard here.

FROM THE DAILY

The problems with cross-examination
L

ast Friday, September 7th, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 
on a controversial sexual assault case against the University of 
Michigan. Judge Amul Thapar wrote the decision, ruling that 
“if a public university has to choose between competing narratives to 
resolve a case, the university must give the accused student or his agent 
an opportunity to cross-examine the accuser and adverse witnesses in 
the presence of a neutral fact-finder.”

Cross-
examination is, 
at its essence, 
combative and 
aggressive

The reality is 
that our political 
institutions are 
under attack...by 
the president

NOAH HARRISON | COLUMN

