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Telegraph Avenue resembles a war zone The street is
littered with broken glass, rocks, bricks, and lengths of pipe
On every corner small clots of people battle the Berkeley
police The people surge forward — then scatter as the police
charge swinging their truncheons.
I run through a dense cloud of blue smoke, coughing
and blinded by tears
"Walk!1' they shout as the police wade into the crowd
I run.
I'm walking again en masse after so many years The
sun is out and it’s warm This time I'm marching for human
needs — demonstrating against the Reagan administration's
economic policies
A motley of odd factions gather on 12th Ave — elder
hipsters, old lefties, new lefties, part-time lefties, full-time
lefties — and ones like me — leftover lefties
"We’ll form lines six across — we ll march on the left
side, then on the right side of the street," an organizer says
over a loudspeaker
The marchers silently queue up
These are groups protesting nuclear weapons, sup
porting ERA, advocating abortion rights and denouncing the
draft I mingle Something’s not right The air smells wrong
A beat-up pick-up truck speeds by The driver leans out
the window and shouts, "Fuck off " That’s more like it
A speaker in an upstairs apartment blares rock through
the boom of shotguns, the crack of small arms, and the
occasional chatter of an automatic weapon.
“Everywhere I hear the sounds of marching, charging
feet. boy. "
“'Cause summer's here and the time is right,
“for fighting in the street, boy. ”
The splash of shattered plate glass resounds the street
— krystal tag
Tear gas rings the trees of Sprout Plaza
The gas masked police, in a column three deep, slowly
advances behind plastic shields
A barrage of rocks and bottles rains on them
“They say cut back, we say fight back," the marchers
chant almost in unison
It's sad to see the balding old men with haggard faces
carrying the red banner of the Communist Party It's like
seeing your grandfather lying-in-state
I amble along with the marchers noting how calm and
congenial everyone is Middle-age has slowed most of these
people They pull wagons with smiling kids inside They push
their bikes and walk the dog as they march and chant
“Marge, have you seen Betty and the kids9"
"She's up front with the EEA, Bill ”
Anachronistic day-glo freaks, in tie-dyed clothing, dance
like psychotic dervishes under a LOVE banner
A gray-haired woman elegantly climbs out of her Volks
wagon Her frowning teen-aged daughters, so preppie in
designer jeans, tag along with mom as she blends with the
marchers
I run from the burning police car A shotgun explodes
The man running next to me seems to gently rise, then
crashes to the pavement and skids into the gutter
I kneel beside him. His legs are flailing He s still running
The double O buckshot has shredded the tee shirt off his
back. It's a mess of blood, cloth and tattered flesh
“I can't believe it," he keeps saying
Blood runs down my arm. I think it's his. until I stand and
hear the drops smacking the street
“Chalk Chalk. "
I look back The Alameda County Sheriff is grinning by
the burning car Some images you can never forget.
I’d forgotten how long marches can be Everyone is
suffering mid-march doldrums The banners are drooping
The chants are weary sounds mouthed without emphasis
"Bunch of jerks," a bearded man says to me, thumbing
toward the marchers
YAF clusters in a tiny group on a rise overlooking the
rally site They wave an American flag and sheepishly hold
signs praising Pres Ronald Reagan Most of them have
acne. I listen to an interview with the leader I hear him tell a
reporter his age We re the same age
I fought and eluded capture into the night — fighting for a
square of land that became a parking lot.
The following morning Gov. Reagan said, “If there's
going to be a bloodbath, let's get it on. "
I'm so many miles from those days; and long past home
Yes — "still crazy after all these years,” to quote Paul
Simon. Yes — still crazy — and still accurate with a brick
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gabriel boehmer
editor’s note
On this campus today there is a sense
among students that we are passengers on a
sinking ship, a Titanic if you will, called the
University of Oregon
This fatalism fuels a kind of justified
hedonism — a belief that if we are doomed to
ride on the Titanic, we might as well make the
trip as pleasant as possible, go first class,
because we assume there is nothing better
It’s the lifeboat ethic
Students, looking out for themselves,
are investing their educations in glorified
trade schools that promise an instant payoff
upon graduation rather than in the liberal
arts where occupational opportunities are
more limited
While University students lose sleep
nights wondering if their academic depart
merit will still be there in the morning, they
are aware also that the financial malaise of
higher education is not limited to this
university
While the best of faculty and adminis
tration can escape to the private sector or to
other colleges and universities that are still
afloat, many students have no other option
than to attend a state-supported institution
The mystique of the Ivory Tower has
vanished
Despite enrollment limitations at some
state schools forced by budget reductions,
more students than ever are attending col
lege this fall — about 12.3 million, a 1.6
percent increase from a year ago
Despite reductions in financial assis
tance for students, college is now more
available to the public than ever before
Community colleges and part-time students
account for the largest share of the enroll
ment growth
The mass marketing of higher education
has made college more like Woolworth’s
than Bloomingdale's
The diploma is devaluating as fast as the
dollar Today's graduates learn that a di
ploma isn't a ticket to prestige, the job of
their dreams or an attractive income
Public confidence in higher education
declines as more attention is focused on the
decline of basic skills — holding colleges and
universities more accountable for the quality
of their graduates
But as colleges admit a more diverse
student population, in background and abili
ty, they must offer an even wider range of
educational opportunites to match the
students' needs — a seemingly impossible
stunt when government is reducing support
for higher education
The traditional college curriculum is
changing rapidly to ad|ust to this new "con
sumerism" in higher education The buzz
word Liberal Arts has been replaced on
college campuses by Vocation
Through its popularization, higher
education has been put on the Titanic with
other social service programs Should we be
surpised?
etters
Trickle down
I think it's getting clearer and
clearer that there is something
very wrong with Pres Ronald
Reagan and his whole approach
to running this country
You could see from the
beginning that his best friends
were the large corporations and
the super-rich, so it wasn't too
surprising when he gave those
people big tax cuts
It's becoming obvious now,
though, that the program of
Reagan and his corporate
companions is actually intend
ed to lower the standard of living
of most Americans Working
people and low-income people
(and often those are the same)
are expected to put up with
lower wages, layoffs, reduced
social services and a worse
quality of life Why? So that the
funds which would have gone
for wages and social programs
can instead by diverted to the
military and big business profits
The rest of us are supposed to
wait for the benefits to "trickle
down" to us from the wealthy
corporations Well friends, I can
see something trickling down all
right, but it's not money And
you'd best get a shovel if you
want to do anything useful with
it.
This administration is sup
posed to be all for "national
security " But genuine security
for the American people can't
come from an arms race or mili
tary intervention Instead, it
comes from a society that meets
our basic needs
Bob Guldin
Mayfair Lane, Eugene
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