Page 2/The Battalion/Monday, Movember 10,1986
Opinion
The Battalion
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Texas Press Association
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The Battalion Editorial Board
Cathie Anderson, Editor
Kirsten Dietz, Managing Editor
Loren Steffy. Opinion Page Editor
Frank Smith, Cit\ Editor
Sue Krenek, News Editor
Ken Sury, Sports Editor
Editorial Policy
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77.S4.T
Credit where it's due
Tei r\ Waite, emissary for the archbishop of Canterbury and hos
tage negotiator extraordinaire, deserves more credit as hero than
world opinion and particularly more than his native England seems
willing to give him.
Waite, acting on his own, already has secured the release of two
French hostages and one American hostage in Lebanon — a feat the
hostages’ governments have been trying in vain to accomplish.
The Anglican envoy has given the Reagan administration a
much-needed release valve to the high-pressure hostage situation.
The administration has been doggedly determined not to nego
tiate with terrorists. Although according to accusations hurled Sun
day by Congressional leaders at the Reagan administration, this pol
icy recently may have been scrapped in favor of a hostages-for-
weapons exchange with Iran. It is essential in deterring future kid-
napings. If one terrorist group finds such tactics work against the
United States, countless similar attacks would follow.
44 /Ip'! r
Searching for televised oasis
in multi-channeled wasteland
“H
But the policy also has restricted the ability to win the release of
those already captured. Waite has provided a unique solution to this
foreign policy dilemma. His theological background has given him
an understanding of Moslem perspectives and principles that other
Western diplomats have ignored. Waite is able to negotiate while re-
spec T g Ik se belief s, instead of trampling them. He lias become an
effective liaison between Free World governments and Third World
terrorists.
The recent charges by The Times of London that Waite has been
used as a decoy by the United States to focus public attention on the
hostages is absurd. The last thing the United States wants is to shine
an undue spotlight on the terrorists’ exploits.
The administration’s primary concern is the release of captured
• Ur >• Waite has made more progress in the last few weeks
.ue al government has made in the last few years.
just the other
night, I was sitting
around the house
wit It not li ing I o
do. "That might
seem strange since
it’s nearing crunch
time for tests and
other academically
related items, hut
I’m graduating in
December so I’m
apathetic toward
my studies.
I already had listened to my Pink
Floyd albums and wasn't really in the
mood for the Violent Femmes. So, I de-
Craig Renfro
It’s time Waite received credit for his altruism. He has shown us
that even the most dire situations can be resolved not with violence
but with skillf ul diplomacy. He is truly a hero of our times.
t ided to watch television for lack of any
thing better. Since m\ roommate and I
have never splurged for t able television
we only receive one channel. To resolve
this lac k of choice I decided to visit a
friend and see what was on his tele-
Nothing describes sudden rush
of freedom when opression lifts
It’s amazing how manv channels
there are it) chose from. What’s even
more amazing is that out of the 30 or so
channels there really isn't anything
worth watching. One of them is pureh
for advertising, one is just weather and
one even lists what is on all of the othei
channels. I here's a sports channel, icli-
gious channel. Spanish channel and.
worst of all. a pop music c hannel with
stupid looking hosts.
But I was determined to find some
thing entertaining, which automat ic alb
ruled out the “Big I hree” networks.
When your options are such wonder
ful shows as “The Fall Guy,” “Dynasty,”
“Hotel,” “Magnum P.I.,” “The Equali
zer ’ and “The New Mike Hammer,”
you 'havfc only one' choiceshoot the
television.
However, we decided to check out
“The New Mike Hammer.” We really
wanted to see if Stacey Reach was going
to snort any cocaine. Since he didn’t, at
least not on the show, we soon became
bored with this choice.
For a change of pace we deck
watch the Spanish network. Wear
make out much of the dialogue,
appeared that the leading maled
ter f ell in love, or maybe it was lust
a voluptuous female. But therewa
small catch. |ust as the action wa!
ting hot and heavy some other guv i
into the room and began shouting
vioush he was not pleased Ikc;iu>
shot them both. At that point uc
ized the show was too much like "Da
so the- search beiran anew.
reii
da
Lai
agi
tha
adi
ing
it tl
sav
I
can
say:
pie
One day, Yuri
Orlov, the Soviet
dissident, was in
bitter Si b e r i a n
exile, not knowing
when he would be
freed. A day later,
he was moved to a
Mosco w jail a n d
within a day he
was winging his
way to the United
States. He met
Richard
Cohen
with the president, made statements to
the press, hugged other exiled dissi
dents and, probably, fought for his san
ity. The next day, in the only way he
could, he tried to turn back the clock
just a bit. In the ways of Russia, he went
to pick mushrooms in the woods.
Anatolv Shcharansky also experi
enced psvchic G-forces for which there
is no parallel. One day he was in a KGB
jail nd a day later he was borne on the
sho Users of his new countrymen to the
Western Wall in Jerusalem. He even
had a new name — the Hebrew Natan
fen lie Russian Anatolv. And how about
1) avid Goldfarb? Old and sick, a leg lost
at Stalingrad and a toe to gangrene, he
was hisked out of Russia on the private
pla of industrialist Armand Hammer.
His son was at Newark Airport to greet
him..
Is there an\thing in the world to com-
’ re to these experiences? Men have
teed f rom prison before, exiled
their countr\ before, returned
♦ o i exile a cl, even, managed to keep
themselves alive as the liberating armies
approached the gates of places like
An twit/, the "corpse factory” of Han-
Wendt’s unforgettable phrase. But
vents, as disc ombobulating as
•' were, approached slowlv and with
uin ‘ ! Auschwitz, the guns could
•a he distance; the behavior of
giards changed. Even Noah in his
is tipped bv a non-ret in ning dove
that the waters of the flood were reced
ing.
But the contemporary world is unfor
giving in its abruptness. The dissidents
are rocketed out of the Soviet Union.
They can breakfast in jail, lunch on an
airplane and have dinner in the United
ue
irk
States. To the cameras, they fake sanity,
pretend they know what’s going on, but
they cannot. They have been moved
across time and place, from imprison
ment to freedom and from one culture
to another. The meaning of their life
has been altered, maybe obliterated. Is it
permissible to eat well when, just hours
ago, your fellow prisoners were maybe
not eating at all? Can you laugh in free
dom when, before, you could not laugh
at all? Can you yearn for creature com
forts, television sets, cars? Can you chase
a skirt? Nap? Do nothing?
Paradoxically, journalists who have
tasted similar disconnected experiences
write nothing about it. We simply do not
know how. Some of us know what it is
like to cover a w'ar one moment and
then, a day later, be back in Washing
ton. A colleague remembers going al
most directly from Vietnam to a Wash
ington Redskins game. He was stunned.
There were 50,000 people w ho seemed
to care only about the Redskins. The
place he left behind smelled of fear,
pain, anguish, death. The war raged in
my colleague’s head while, on the play
ing field, a bunch of men fought over a
football.
A journalist can cover African famine
and eat in Paris that night. In Vietnam,
it was possible to cover the fighting by
day and, only hours later, enjoy a
shower and a bed with clean sheets. The
journalist insulates his emotions by pro
fessional calling: Someone’s job is to
make war; someone’s job is to cover it.
Some of the world sits dow n to eat w hile
some of the world starves. That, of
course, alw'ays has been true. But not
until recently was it true for a single per
son in a single day. We hesitate to write
about it because we didn’t know quite
what to make of it: Are the thoughts
profound or are they banal?
After he won the Nobel Peace Prize,
Elie Wiesel said he still felt guilty for
having survived the concentration
camps while so many — his own family
included — did not. Why should he live
when all the others died? For more than
40 years, the guilt has clung to him like a
chill for which there is no blanket. He is
forever the disengaged observer at the
football game, the one who wonders
how so many can cheer when, just hours
away, so manv others are dying.
Liberation for Wiesel was no sudden
thing. But the sudden cascade of free
dom, the turning of a jail-house key that
opens a new land with a rush — that is
something that as vet has not been de
scribed. Time has been altered, space
diminished and the prisoner, suddenly
freed, is imprisoned in a wholly new ex
perience. He smiles, says thank you and,
after the strobe lights of photographers
have turned cold, locks himself in to
keep out what he cannot understand. It
is time to pick mushrooms.
Copyright 1986, Washington Post Writers Group
So we flipped through the guide to
see what other adventures television
had in store for us. We landed on “The
Green Berets.” This movie is guar
anteed to bring out the American in ev
eryone. John Wayne, portraying his
usual heroic character, killed hundreds
of Viet Cong and defied death at every
turn. I think this was Richard Nixon’s
favorite movie, at least until w r e lost the
war. Then he burned the home video
along with several hundred other tapes.
The movie was too “Hawkish” for me,
and we decided to push onward
through the televised fog.
Next we came upon a religious pro
gram. A lunatic preacher with a ton of
hair spray holding his brains together
was ranting and raving about how we
will all go to hell if we don’t change out
ways. However, w'e can avoid this eter
nal damnation if we make a tax-deduct
ible donation of $100 or more. At least
that’s what the preacher said, so it must
be right.
Next we came upon the “Dr.Si
Show,” that wonderful call-in (on
where vou. the viewer, can heart
West heimer s view s on anytliinjffe
oral sex to teenage masturbation.
One callef asked the tloTlhr How*
could persuade his wife to have sex
the dinner table. 1 he good doctors
that the man should tell his wifetlui
what he really wants to do, audit
really loves him she will oblige. If
didn’t work, Westheimer suggestedi
the couple pretend it was a game
c all it “meat and potatoes.”
The next callei . also male, asked |
he could get women into bed with
on the first date. I wanted to wail
see w hat she would say because noil
I’ve said ever worked. However,!
ran out and the show was over.Tool
lie
mil
Bv this time I realized the siiiialil
looked dim. We flipped through
channels a few more times just
we missed something, but of touts j
didn’t. My friend said it was likethisf
ery night. You search for someilt
worth watching, but you never f|
find it.
I’m fortunate not to have thispr i! J
lent with my one channel. It’st
stuff over and over so I don’t t'l
bother turning it on.
The Violent Femmes sound pit
good right now.
Craig Renfro is a senior journM
major and a columnist for The Baif
ion.
Mail Call
All for the T-E-A-M
EDITOR:
the State of Texas,” which was merely a glorified
Republican rally, we are questioning both the motives;
integrity of this program’s sponsors.
During the I 985-8b sc hool year, 1 wrote a letter to 1 he
Battalion direc ted toward the Aggie Football T-E-A-M. I
c] noted a verse of scripture from 1 Corinthians 9:24. This
verse says: “Do you not know that those who run in a race
all run, but only one rec eives the prize? Run in suc h a way
that you may w in.”
We feel thoroughly enlightened by Barton’s
perspec tives, which ranged from Mama Barton's first-tinifI
straight-ticket Republican vote to Joe’s old room in Legeii [
I fall. Then came Sen. Phil Gramm who public ly endorsed
Barton — in a non-partisan manner of course.
It seems this letter did some good. Maybe this letter
will remind everyone that this is a new year, and we all
must start a new race. This race includes the Cotton Bowl,
our school work and dedication and our walk with God
through thick and thin. Let’s keep up the good work this
year and in the years to come.
However, we were most impressed with Vice Presidenij
George Bush, who simply gave up being non-partisanasilf
proved to be too difficult. Of course, he was encouraged
by pal Bill Clements who was quite adamant about retiring
“of what’s his name.”
So student body and Coach Jackie Sherrill, let’s all
carry the Fightin Texas Aggie Football T-E-A-M to the
Cotton Bowl in 1986-87.
Gavin Jones ’87
Rally non-partisan?
EDITOR:
In effect, we wonder how this program could have
been anything but partisan. To the best of our knowledge !
we thought that political rallies were not allowed in
Rudder Auditorium. Are we sadly mistaken, or does an
invitation by Political Forum, to the vice president allow
the Republicans to do whatever they want?
Kristen Phillips ’89
Gina Russo ’89
Sara Wall ’89
T he purpose of MSC Political Forum is to increase
political awareness through non-partisan programs. After
attending the “Panorama of Republican Perspectives on
Letters to the editor should not exceed 300 words in length. The ediu) |lill l
staff reserves the right to edit letters for style and length, but willitwj
every effort to maintain the author’s intent. Each letter must be sign J
and must include the classification, address and telephone number ol il 1 '"
writer.