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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 16, 1996)
MONDAY: Opinion TUESDAY: Politics WEDNESDAY: Opinion THURSDAY: Politics FRIDAY: Opinion ' J _1 \ - • editorials, letters, commentary and perspective BY MAIL: P.O.Box 3159, Eugene, OR 97403 BY PHONE: (541)346-5511 BY E-MAIL: ode@oregon. uoregon. edu IN PERSON: Suite 300, EMU Debate: Don’t expect enlightenment Tonights final verbal duel between Clinton and Dole will be as empty as the candidates. If you are already tired of hearing about targeted tax cuts, balanced budgets and bridges being built to the fu ture, it might be wise to skip the second presidential debate tonight in San Diego. And if you do plan to watch President Clin ton and Bob Dole duke it out again on national television, be OPINION prepared to listen to more of the same political rhetoric used in the Oct. 6 debate. Despite the fact that Dole is up to 20 points behind Clinton in the polls, don’t expect him to come out swinging tonight in an at tempt to make up ground. In stead the most vicious that Dole is bound to get with Clinton is to call him a “liberal” over and over in hopes that the label will conjure up nightmarish vi sions of communists, tax es and Jimmy Carter. The Republican headquarters in Oregon has stressed over and over that “Dole is going to win this one on the issues, period.” So any hopes viewers of the debate have of Dole snapping and calling Clinton a dope smoking hippie are probably not going to come true. Instead, each candidate will try to focus on the im portant “issues” at hand. While a debate focused on the issues sounds like a good way to inform the public of what these two presidential hopefuls stand for, people who watch the actual debate are likely to walk away with less knowledge than they came in with. Presidential candi dates often use the debates to try to make themselves look good, not to enlighten the public about the sues!*' And because most people don’t have a great amount of knowl edge about the issues being de bated, stretching or changing the truth is easy. For example, during the last debate Dole claimed that Clinton passed the largest tax increase in world history. While numerical ly Clinton’s $260 billion tax in crease is in fact the largest ever, these numbers are meaningless at face value. In order to under stand how much Clinton’s tax in crease really was compared with previous tax hikes, you have to account for inflation, rising in comes and population increases. When you look at the tax in crease with these factors in mind, it becomes apparent that a tax increase of $260 billion today is significantly less than a $260 billion increase ten years ago. In fact, it is even less than Bob Dole’s own $230 billion tax in crease in 1982. Of course, Dole doesn’t have a monopoly on mis leading facts; Clinton has a handful of his own. For in stance, pointed to his own crime bill as the reason crime has gone down during his administration. While crime rates did go down while Clinton was president, this does n’t necessarily imply that Clin ton’s crime bill was successful. A quick lesson in basic economics reveals that whenever the econo my is in a recovery (which it was during Clinton’s administration) crime rates always go down. Clinton could have slept through his whole presidency and pro duced similar crime rate results. Unfortunately, there is little reason to suspect Clinton or Dole will enlighten viewers with any substantial information tonight. We’re bound to hear some mildly amusing jokes, speeches about ■ bridges and visions of the future, buzz words like liberal and con servative and false or misleading boasts from both sides. It is sad that these debates, with such po tential to help voters decide who to vote for, are more misleading than informative. It’s no wonder Americans are becoming more and more cyni cal about the political process. Until our elected officials start giving us reason to trust in what they tell us, there is little reason to suspect this trend will end. If the debates are a way to measure the ability and \ character of our potential president, we all may be feeling a little bit uneasy about the future. / \ Brian Diamond, a sophomore majoring in journalism, is a columnist for the Emerald. His views do not necessarily represent those of the newspaper. CHRIS HUTCHINSON/E me raid P.0 BOX 3159. EUGENE. OREGON 97403 The Oregon Daily Emerald is published daily Monday through Fri day during the school year and Tuesday and Thursday during the sum mer by the Oregon Daily Emerald Publishing Co. Inc., at the University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon. A member of the Associated Press, the Emerald operates independently of the University with offices at Suite 300 of the Erb Memorial Union The Emerald is private property. The unlawful removal or use of pa pers is prosecutable by law Editor-in-Chiel: Steven Asbury Managing Editor Jennifer Carter Night Editor. Thom Schoenborn Community: Jennifer Schmitt, editor. Jean Bond Entertainment: Nicole Kreuger, editor Jesse Stephenson Higher Education: Kristine Sohnrey, editor Tamyra Howser, in depth. Benjamin Kwasney Opinion: Ashley Bach, editor Chris Hutchinson, illustrator Brian Diamond. Larry Haiti. Sonja Sherwood Politics: Shana Cohn, editor. Doug Irving Special Projects: Tiffany Smith Student Activities: Kristin Bailey, editor. Angie Suchy, Tom Potter Sports: Mark McTyre, editor. Andrea DeYoung, assistant editor. Chris Hansen, Ryan Frank, Ryan Halvorsen Copy Desk: Thom Schoenborn. copy chief. Sarah Kickler, Mike Schmierbach, Kendra Smith Presentation: Dennis Bolt, editor. Cosmos Corbin, Matt Garton Photography: Mathew Stiffler, editor Andrew Brackensick, Joe Bunik, Amanda Erickson, Shannon Kilduff, Chad Patteson Freelance: Lara Pittman, editor On-Line: Nicholas Stiffler, director General Manager Judy Riedl Advertising: Becky Merchant, director Anne Amador, Lee Yen Beh, Marco Chmg, Yujin Chi, Matt Johnson, Anne Miller, Trina Shanaman, Rose Soil, Matt Solomon, Greg Walsh Classified: Tara Sloan, manager. Natasha Lumpkin, Debbie Levy, Heather Moye Production: Michele Ross, manager. Ingrid White, coordinator Shawna Abele, Laura Daniel. Tara Knight, Melissa Lebahn, Molly Mc Canta, Allison Stormo, Mike Young Business: Kathy Carbone, supervisor. Judy Connolly Distribution: John Long, Jeff Johnson. Ferenc Rakoczi Newsroom.(541)346-5511 Oisplay Advertising.(541) 346-3712 Business Office.(541) 346-5512 Classified Advertising.(541) 346-4343 LETTERS Useless police Imagine this: You’re sitting on the porch of your house with a couple of buddies after the football game on Saturday night. Because you’re sitting on your porch listening to mu sic with a few friends, party goers walk by and infer you’re having a party. You’re a nice guy, so you let a few people come and hang out for a bit. You offer them a free beverage. You’re being a good host. Then, all of a sudden, one of the guys starts picking fights. Being the non-violent, nice person you are, you kindly ask these people to leave. These guys get offended by your mea ger request and for no reason, strike you over the head with a walking cane. They keep strik ing you until one of your friends tries to pull you out of the circle they have formed around you. Then the atten tion gets directed toward your friend, and they decide to strike him with 40-ounce bot tles of beer — four of them to be exact. So what do you do in this situation? Let me suggest buy ing a gun. Don’t bother calling the police department. We called the Eugene police de partment and when they final ly showed up, they were scared, disorganized and use less. They made no arrests, they got no names, and they acted like they had better things to do (Winchell’s closes at 2 a.m.). This happened at my friend’s house on Saturday, Oct. 5 at 1:30 a.m. Currently, they haven’t found these punks. Actually, they haven’t started looking for these punks. If the Eugene police de partment was a student and this was a test, I would fail that student ten times. Simon Austin Pre-Business Administration Details lacking First, I am not a party in Brennan Rounds v. OSBHE nor is the Commentator, but the Oct. 8 article written by Angie Suchy was insulting in two ways and bears response. Ms. Suchy first made the misinformed presumption that the Commentator would have any official statement about the case. Check the record — the Commentator and all but two of its staff members are not parties in the case. A little re search would have cleared this up. Ms. Suchy then failed to contact Don Corson or Thomas Nelson and Clarence Belnavis, the attorneys involved in this piece of litigation. Instead, po litical punditry passed for offi cial analysis of the legal process. The case is first taken to a magistrate for a summary judg ment based on existing prece dent. Judge Coffin, acting merely as a magistrate in this case, decided that existing precedent did not pertain pre cisely to the facts of this case and dismissed it for summary judgment. This only impedes the speed with which the case is decided. As any prior case like it shows you, however, the buck does not stop here. The case goes to Judge Hogan in a federal circuit court and then to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals for judgments. PIRGs nationwide in similar litiga tion typically win at the level of the summary judgment. Once taken to trial court or an appeals court, however, they typically lose. While a visit to the Law School and a couple of long distance calls would have been necessary, the additional research is well worth the cost for a well-researched story worthy of front page coverage. Farrah L. Bostic Publisher Oregon Commentator WHAT DO YOU THINK? The Oregon Daily Emerald welcomes your opinions on is sues concerning the University community. You may submit a letter no longer than 250 words to the Emerald offices at Suite 300 in the EMU or send us your thoughts via e-mail at ode@oregon.uoregon.edu
