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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (June 20, 1986)
Page 2/The Battalion/Friday, June 20, 1986 Playing games The almost unanimous approval of harsh sanctions against South Africa by the U.S. House of Representatives was too good to be true. The bill was designed to be a strong statement to Pre toria that the United States will not support government-sanc tioned racism. Instead, House Republicans turned it into a polit ical powerplay to ensure that sanctions of any kind are never passed. “This whole bill is dead,” said Rep. Mark Siljander, R-Mich. “Sanctions are dead.” The bill, proposed by Ronald Dellums, D-Calif., would end all U.S. business operations in South Africa, prohibit importing and exporting operations (except for strategic minerals), perma nently ban the importation of Krugerrand gold coins and with draw landing privileges for South African aircraft. If approved by the Senate and signed by the president, the measure would order all U.S. companies out of South Africa within 180 days. House Democrats were on the verge of passing less aggres sive sanctions, for fear the call for total and immediate disinvest ment would not gain the necessary support. But the Republi cans, most of whom support either more moderate sanctions or the Reagan charade of “constructive engagement” had other ideas. The passage of this extreme bill means a compromise with the Senate, after it passes its own sanction bill, will be nearly im possible. The United States has dragged its feet on the disinvestment issue long enough. The mosquito-bite-sized sanctions imposed by President Reagan last September do not have the teeth needed to encourage the South African government to dis mantle its system of apartheid. The Republicans, however, seem more concerned with play ing political games than with actually dealing with the apartheid issue. They have made a mockery of the earnest attempts of their colleagues who truly are concerned with ending the gov ernment-sanctioned racial oppression in South Africa. The Battalion Editorial Board Crosswalks aren’t just for the blind Motorists on the Texas A&M campus have more to gripe about than the campus police, al though the police are everybody’s favorite scape goats. Personally, I’m bothered by another pesky an imal. The pedestrian. Not your average, look-both-ways-be- fore-you-cross-the-street pedestrian. I’m talking about Texas A&M pedestri ans — kamikaze street-crossers who throw themselves without fear in front of moving vehicles, causing unsuspect ing motorists to put years on their tires (and lives) slamming on the brakes. It's common at most colleges and uni versities for pedestrians to have the right-of-way on campus streets. That’s fine, as long as the privilege is used with a little common sense and courtesy. But pedestrians on this campus use neither. If you’ve ever been caught in your car on campus between classes, you know what I’m talking about. You might as The Battalion (USPS 045 360) Member of Texas Press Association Southwest Journalism Conference The Battalion Editorial Board Michelle Poue, Editor Loren Steff v, Opinion P;ige Editor Scott Sutherland, City Editor Kay Mallett, Sews Editor Ken Surv, Sports Editor Editorial Policy llic Battalion K a nun-fyiolu. sclt-sui>i>auing nci\ spu- f)ci opcnitcd ,i' .i (ommunii\ savin' to Texas A&M and lit \ ,m-C(tllcirc Si.ninn. Opinions exf)!csscd in 1 Ik* Battalion me those at die Tditoii.il lio.ud oi die .inthoi. and do noi necessmih lep- lesent die oijinions ol Texas A&M adininistimois. t.unh\ oi the lioaid(d Ke^ents. I Ik- Battalion aTo sei \ es as a lalxnmoi \ new spapci tot students in teiiottiini. editing and photogiapln (lasses n it Inn the Dep.n tinent oT loin luilistn. I Ik- Battalion is published Mond;i\ through hi ida\ dining Jexas A&M legnl.n setncsteis. except tot holidas and examination periods Mail suhsi i iptions ate pei setnesiei. S.TTlU pet st hool veat and 5.0 pet hill \ eat \d\ a Using tales Ini nished on ret/nest. Out addiess: flu* Battalion. - lb Reed McDonald linilding. Texas \&M L ni\ et sitx. (.allege Station. 7 X 77N7.T Set and ( lass postage paid at (iollegc Station. TX 77S-4.I. TOS l MAS I TR: Send addiess changes to flu* Battal ion. '216 Reed \h Donald. Texas A&M I niversitx. College Station 7 A 77S-46. well turn off the car and pull out a good book, because you’re not going any where. It seems it’s too much to ask, say every two or three hundred students or so, for the wave of bodies to pause and let one car pass. But no. Instead you idle for 20 minutes until the masses have gotten to class. Then you can proceed. Carefully. The coast never is clear entirely because there are always a few stragglers lurking in the shadows, waiting to step in front of oncoming vehicles. If they would act alarmed — these daredevils on foot — and jump back in fear, I would be more understanding. I might even stop for them. Instead, they glance, unconcerned, at the car and keep walking. It’s maddening. It’s also dangerous — for them. Are these people being brainwashed at Fish Camp to ignore motor vehicles? Surely the parents of these students taught them at some point to watch out for cars. Where did those lessons of yes teryear go? What sort of rationale directs a per son to willfully step in front of 2,000 pounds of steel-on-wheels? Are these people confident that the motorists they challenge always will be compassionate or concerned about manslaughter charges? They shouldn’t expect such protection once they set feckless feet off campus; they’re fair game out there. I do my best while driving on campus to watch for Aggies wandering aimlessly into the streets, but I can’t be held re sponsible for the safety of Aggie pedes trians any longer. Someone has to re teach Aggies how to look both ways be fore crossing, before they are thrust into society and toward their own inevi table doom. Although it is difficult to prove, there is strong evidence that Aggies have the highest mortality rate in auto-pedes- trian accidents of any college graduates in the nation. I believe it. Even if administrators, health and public safety officials continue to ignore this problem, it won’t go away. Even if we motorists continue to outdo our selves protecting these pampered pe destrians, motorists outside of Aggie- land will not. So remember pedestrians, you may be safe on campus, but the crosswalks aren’t so candy-coated in the real world. Michelle Powe is a senior journalism major and editor for The Battalion. Michelle Powe Opinion r TUNYkKTKii; WAtfWM-'-lUlS w&swmY COONTR/ MltlKX? TO YOU'. By ( ■he Al iccaine t ommit i ite, buyii ent to Si itell east ■he fr une 5 fr and clevi ,y SVilliai nirjdied? I Station, Valiev res A 30-b )eeti des detjed as /ear. said Janima 1 'he fratei las guar /ear mort Pat Vk 3anima 1 inning di "ions the ,vith the \ ■he A :overs ap ■n for ©$S£> U TtEd FEtfUrtiW ABM treaty needs scrutinizini EDITOR ’S NOTE: This is the first in a three- part series on the ABM treaty. The Soviet Union was sud denly speaking, in Geneva, about how maybe we ought to just re- new the ABM William F. Buckley Jr. treaty for maybe 10, 15, 20 years. De fense secretary Casper Weinberger’s re action was: No; this is an ambush. But other voices have been heard, urging us to go ahead, and perhaps to use the for ward momentum to ax all those new missile systems. The president, meanwhile, had of course announced that he would no longer feel bound by the terms of SALT II, and the reaction to this was as ex pected from the disarmament lobby. But the feeling is that the the events of 1972 (SALT I and ABM) and 1979 (SALT II) are in flux. It is time to re view the ABM treaty, because the con text of what happened bears critically on good judgment in the days ahead. developing the safeguard program, given the technology of the day. The second factor was the Vietnam War: Congress was being fractious with re spect to anything that had to do with the military. Yet another was the spirit of detente. Nixon had just opened the door to China, and now he was traveling to Moscow to sign a treaty designed to cut drastically the inventory of nuclear weapons — indeed, one sometimes for gets that SALT stands for exactly that: Strategic Arms Limitation ( Treaty). There was a rosy glow in Washington- Moscow, and there were those who be lieved that true strategic disarmament was finally under way. Accordingly, Nixon signed not only SALT I, which spoke of limits in the number of launchers, but also the ABM treaty, which (as modified in 1974) lim ited to single site the use of no move than 100 interceptor missiles. During the period between the Sovi ets’ first atomic bomb (1949) and 1972, the United States was concerned with protecting itself from a nuclear enemy fusillade. The system went under the name of safeguard, and contemplated complex radar stations, fighter planes and missiles. Gradually, this evolved into what was called an anti-ballistic mis sile program. But by 1972, several factors came to gether to persuade the Nixon adminis tration to move in a dif ferent direction. One of these was the huge expense of What then happened, over the next dozen years, was that the Soviet Union continued to spend prodigious sums of money to reduce its exposure to nuclear weapons. More than 50 percent of its expenses on strategic weapons (which are huge) was spent on what one might call defense-oriented activity. Over the years, the Soviet Union has deployed 12,OOO surface-to-air missile (SAM) launchers at more than 1,200 sites. It has in place 1 (),()()() air defense radars and more than 1,200 interceptor air craft dedicated to the strategic air de fense mission. Greater Moscow is heav ily defended by anti-ballistic missiles, civil defense is in high gear, and com mand headquarters are protected deeply. The Soviet Union has become a mighty def ensive fortress. Meanwhile, the United States more or less gave up any thought of defense. Civil defense died completely. We al lowed, through obsolescence and attri tion, the v ii tual dissipation of owd git aii defense system, to quotfj Defense Department official. \'od was made to harden our ICBMsorltj ership facilities. We have noSAlli] strategic air defense warningradana a mere 500 aircraf t assigned loI tensive purposes. What hadbejM common commitment to muuiil suied vulnerability had evolvedH Soviet Union not by any means yd pregnable, but headed in that did at great speed, while in the id States we were king on the bl naked as a newborn babe, svlm,M ever, held in his hand a fearfulliiykt rod in case he was disturbed. Then, in Julv ol 1983, mn said revealed what was happening atH noyaixk. m Sibeiia. I here theM Union has built a pbased-array™ cility, 470 miles from its nearestIw but oriented toward a horde/ 5] miles away. The nature ol vkIw being built there was obviouslv- futablv — designed not to uans.. an impending attack, but loimemv lackers bv guiding missiles to I? them down. A very good idea,ft that it was in clear and explicitviri; of the ABM treaty, which liniiteifi installations of that character to pr 1 ery use — i.e., purelv for tliepttip detecting incoming eneim tuitb Tie. Krasnoyarsk was spotted by ns four months after Reagan atinoii- his Strategic Defense Initiative seek to insinuate that Krasi/orash response to Reagans aimmiiKf that vve would seek a space shill (fiat does not wash. Kra.s'nopmkJ the other projects aimed at delciK begun vent s eat lie) . Weludsyrf project well along toward complete What to do about theABMiii (Please stay tuned.) $TV\ mi rht a.r tin :OL: of his mm >k ? v Ra ret IBRY tvi: cat Dt cal TAM tw (SAIL Ov Fo jAGG §0 MSC m sh ON i re tm fit an dt Kt co Use of sh or Item 21 Copyright 1986. Universal Press Syndic^ Mail Call EDITOR: Mark Udeseems to think that perhaps AIDS should to be allowed to run its course and rid society of homosexuality once and for all. It’s easy to see how ridiculous that scenario is. About 10 percent of the population is homosexual, and that number is thought by many to be cross-cultural and constant over time. If all of the practicing male homosexuals were eradicated, they would simplv be replaced in a few years by a generation w Inch is now learning to read and write. Maybe even Ude’s future children will be among them. AIDS simply is not a practical way of exterminating a significant portion of our population (gas chambers would work a little better). There is no doubt that promiscuity has contributed greatly to the spread AIDS, but promiscuity is not a gay phenomenon. I think heterosexual men would be promiscuous if women stopped saying no. I don’t promote promiscuity. In fact, if AIDS has had any positive effects it has opened the eyes of many gay men to the joys of monagamy. Ude didn’t mention the other half of the gay community: women. It should be noted that gay women are often less promiscuous than heterosexuals, and as such run less risk of contracting AIDS. I don’t understand why Ude opposes gay marriages, since they are in essence monogamous, and would help slow t he spread of AIDS. But then, Ude wants us deal Kevin McLeod Baily Vice President, Gay Student Services EDITOR: Mark Ude’s Wednesday column makes his incrediM)' uncompassionate bigotry obvious. The AIDS virus runs rampant in Africa where it first began to infect humans, did not begin in the gay community in the United States Mark’s theory that AIDS is God’s way to take venganceo'l homosexuals, does it then follow that God is taking vengeance on black people in underdeveloped countriesl guess if they all died we wouldn’t have to worry about | famine relief, would we? Also, Ude’s proposal that AIDS be allowed torunitsj course and that the United States not spend money to I research treatments so as to kill off the homosexuals,“anI undesirable element of American Society,” is and ideal 1 is strangely reminiscent of Adolph Hiker’s attemptsatT elimination of undesirable races.” Besides, AIDS is a j potential threat to everyone. I think it a good idea if Ude would “reconsider liviiuf these United States”. Adolph I filter types are the most | undesirable of all types of people. Gregory Graybill Department of Biochemisty Letters to the editor should not exceed 300 words in length. TlieetiL' staff reserves the l ight to edit letters for style and length, but will!’ every effort to maintain the author’s intent. Each letter mustbtsi; and must include the address and telephone number of the writer. i %