Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012, April 16, 1991, Page 2, Image 2

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    EDITORIAL
Personal foul: 15 yards,
excessive lack of logic
Take your foot out of your mouth Victor Kiam. it's
National Football League Commissioner Paul
Tagliabue’s turn be lx: the NFL’s buffoon.
Tagliabue appeared before an Oregon legislative
panel last week, espousing the evils of the state's
Sports Action lottery game He said Sports Action un
dermines public confidence in the integrity of profes
sional football games.
Wake up ami smell the pigskin. Paul.
It would take a lot more money than the Oregon
game can offer for a player to risk his NFL career for
the peanuts offered by Sports Action
For $l. fans can wager on the outcome of up to 14
football games The biggest payoff to date was about
$80,000 when somebody correctly picked 14 games out
of 14.
According to Tagliabue. the integrity of the game
might be threatened because of a potential for point
fixing (when a player is bribed to try and affect the
score of the game) However, would someone who is
going to win a possible $80,000 prize be able to afford
to buy off NFL millionaires? To win the ultimate
Sports Action prize. !>etters would need to pick 14
games correctly. That means buying off at least 14
players assuming one player from each team would
be enough to control the game's outcome. After paying
off these players there wouldn't be much of th.it
$80,000 left over
If Tagliabue is so concerned about bolting on
games. ho should go to Nevada and talk to their legis
lature More money is bet on a single NTI. game in 30
se< onds in Vegas than in a whole week in Oregon
Hundreds ol millions of dollars changes hands in Ne
vada over NFL football during a weekend
The betting in Nevada has much more potential tor
corruption than that of Oregon's game In Nevada, a
person < an get rich by picking just one game and bet
ting a lot of money on it The chances of fixing one
game with a potentially huge payoff makes Ne
vada the bigger risk to the Nl l.'s integrity
When asked about this Tagliabue responded that
gambling is entrenched in Nevada, and gambling has
been leg.il for 50 years there Of course, if be planned
to talk to their stale legislature about the evils of gam
bling. he would be laughed out of town before he un
packed
Tagliabue gave good lip service to the reasoning
behind bis opposition to Sports Action. But the real
reason be and Nl'l. owners don’t like the game is that
somebody is making money off of their produc t and
they're not getting a slice.
However, that interpretation of the game is not
quite accurate College football provides the NFL with
an established minor league recruiting system And
now that the NFL. b\ just leaving games like Sports
Action alone*, can give back to the college programs
that have been training then plavers for vears
Tagliabue s,i\ s no
Oregon is the only I’ac III st.hool that does nut oi
ler state dollars to support universils athletics Sports
A( tion was the only solution the legislature i ould pro
dure to improve athletic funding without taking dol
lars (rom some other part ot the budget
\ hill which recently passed the Oregon House,
and is now before the Senate, would gise all Sports
Action funds to athletics. As it stands now revenue
from Sports Action is used to fill gaps in the general
fund After these gaps are filled, the leftover money
goes to ( ollege athlete s
it boils down to whether Oregon and Oregon State
will he able to afford to compete in tile l’ac-10 in the
future The was it stands now. these two schools are
struggling to keep up with state-supported schools
such as I SO. t'Ol.A. Arizona and Arizona State If
something doesn't happen soon, sin h as the passage of
the hill now before the Senate, the Dm ks and (leavers
are going to find themselves battling Idaho and Mon
tana in that all mights Itig Skv ('.onferencr
As tor Tagliahue and his million dollar salarv. loot
hall has been prettv good to him Hut until he can offer
((instructive (riticism and positive alternatives he
should sta\ out of Oregon’s funding problems.
Altei all. \se wouldn t want to deprive good of \ i<
of his deserved stature as the league's top public hu
miliation. oops that should he public relations prob
lem
" mTEN ID RUN A H1CR ,QU IET LITTLE TOWN. WE DON'T WANT 10 ATTRACT ANY KENNMSS’
LETTERS
Womxn
In response in l.ynn I.uc .is
letter ( Dili Apr H| concern
ing the spelling of vvom.in and
the reasons behind the ni|e<
lion of a ”v" for an "a"
It might be helpful for vou to
realize that vou mas he placing
a little bit of man in you every
time you spell vvomv n
Ilms vou ask'1 Well accord
ing to biological lavs a combi
nation of two X chromosomes
produi es a female offspring
while a combination of the \
and Y chromosomes produi es a
male offspring
So theoretic ally In using a
"s ' m the spelling of svomyn
she is mtrodui mg the [iresem e
ot maleness into herself
Due to this ness piei e of in
formation she mas ss ish to mu e
again < hange the spelling of
woman
Hill Ian mug
Tim Strauss
Students
Step down
The result ttl .r thorough in
vestigation icinduc ted by tlie
ASI'O president is tliat Mike
Colson is lielioved to lie guilts
ot the i hatge of note tamper
mg
kuk Hailey has rei ommeiHi
eii to tiie II ( tliat ( ailson resign
from his position as c hairman
a rei ommendation with whii h
four li t members agree The
11 1 budget hearings have come
to a halt due to ( lolson's refusal
to resign
As a student group whose
budget has not vet been heard
we at the Women's Center feel
that as an elec ted otfic nil l ail
son should not hold up the
budget hearing pror ess
IK refusing to resign he is
not representing our interests
.IS students We do not believe
tliat his resignation would be
an admission of guilt, but rath
it his resignation would ensure
that the budget process can
c ontmue effec lively
Sarah Y\ a> man
Women's Center
and 5 i o-signers
Good wyrk
As expected. virtually every
one missed m\ point In order
to "force prescription tranquil
i/eis on those whose politii s
(1) disagree with" 1 would need
an Ml) whii h I have no in
tention of getting
I urthermore If everyone
agreed with everything I said. 1
fear I would he hored to tears
Keep up the good work
g\rls 1 need the entertainment
Teresa Knezek
Psyi hologv
Ignorance out
Om i' again, mui I) to tin (In
ma\ 1 find you have given edi
tonal space to Kugene's resi
dent bigot Jon Wollander I
tmd it appalling tli.it you allow
this man the space to espouse
Ins negatives and lies about
g.n and lesbian people
It he were to write the same
sort of slanderous statements
about bl.uk people or Jewish
people or women. Ins letters
would not lie published I sin
cerels hope the choice to print
sui h offensiveness out e again
was done out of ignorance of
the dm rum nation fa< ed Iw gas
men and lesbians and is not an
endorsement of this pitiful lack
of hunmnits
Delira Ferguson
Kugene
Shift efforts
It frustrates me to hear peo
ple .ftguing over details while
the important issues are pushed
aside
The spelling of what we call
ourselves. as women or
woniyn. is not the issue, realiz
ing our full potential as indi
viduals and working to elimi
nate disi rimination is
let us worn a little less
about our titles or appearances
and instead put our full efforts
into enlightening those people
who still have a one sided dis
criminatory view of women
Declaring war on our lan
guage w ill onh alienate or con
fuse many of those who would
otherwise
rights
support women's
Kathleen I.arsen
Sociology
Unreasoning
Quoting from the April 'I is
sue of the Emerald regarding
the new police hill, "We see
tin1 film out of I,os Angeles and
we feel a little more cautious
about the power we’ve already
given the police,” said state
Rep |mi Ldmunson
1 am amazed at such reason
ing Were the police really giv
imi the authority to brutalize as
the\ did in LA' It they didn't
have the authority to do this,
then please explain to me the
relationship between the au
thorite police are given and the
actions that they take whit h go
beyond that authority
Is it not also possible that
making laws that restrit I polii e
authority ac tually frustrates po
lit e into violent ac tsv (No I am
not saving this has anything to
do v\ ith the LA beating)
One could spend much time
and money trying to research
these correlations, but it all
would y ield nothing No matter
how carefully you construct the
restraints on police- authority
there will still be cases where
hatreii motivates somebody to
go beyond the authority given
them
No matter how hard you tr\
to implement "psychologic ail
screening" techniques, you
can't predict future attitudes of
people
Here in Kugene 1 have been
ripped off. found the culprits,
and the Kugene police tidl me
"our hands are tied." If KI’D
was floating on the river I'd be
the first to cut the rope and
wave goodbye.
We either need to help them
do their joh or get rid of tins ex
pensive waste The public ofli
c i.ds are the servants of the tax
payers
Hob Weigel
l.ab Tech