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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 11, 2000)
Editor in chief: Laura Cadiz Editorial Editors: Bret Jacobson, Laura Lucas Newsroom: (541)346-5511 Room 300, Erb Memorial Union P.O. Box 3159, Eugene, OR 97403 E-mail: ode@oregon.uoregon.edu Friday February 11,2000 Volume 101, Issue 95 Emerald Election season is upon us again. Brace yourselves. Because if years past give us any indi cation, then elections can get pretty messy. Grievances. Accusations of unfair ness. And, of course, posters being put over other peoples’ posters in a most im mature fashion. It seems that no matter who the candi dates are—or even what the quality of their platforms are—that elections are showcases of rude behavior and finger pointing. New year. New century. New election. New attitude. Even though the gauntlet has been thrown down—one grievance filed, one campaign-spend ing challenge made—there’s still time to have a good, clean and fair election. The first order of business, then, is the grievances. While many grievances in the VOTE elections process are fair, the tone in which they are presented or the subjects of them are often quite petty. So what if someone postered over your posters? Their actions were wrong, but filing a for mal grievance really slows the elections * process. A better remedy would be to talk to the ASUO Elections Board or, better yet, to talk to the offending candidate or ticket. It seems a lot of problems like that can be solved through communication rather than through litigation. If serious candi dates want to run a serious election, and if students are paying attention to which candidates are following the rules, it’s in everyone’s best interest to follow the rules and to discuss problems that come up. Also, candidates can even discuss po tential problems in advance. Earlier this week, ASUO Executive candidate Au tumn De Poe announced that she and her running mate, Caitlin Upshaw, would be spending only $20 on their campaign. While there are no limits to what a candi date or tickets can spend — although lim its for donations by groups do exist —- the use of exorbitant amounts of money does unfairly taint an election. We’ve seen concern over campaign fi nance in the general presidential elections for the nation, and it’s true that money ^ can buy more advertising, more J y’-v campaign buttons and more >i posters. But deep pockets aren’t always successful. Just witness the exit of national presidential candidate Steve Forbes on Wednesday. His money, $66 million dollars of it, couldn’t buy him the vot ers’ attention to his message. While we don’t necessarily recommend limiting campaign spending to $20, the spirit of De Poe’s challenge was in keeping with a fair and equal election. And we know that quite serious prob lems or grievances could arise. Of Giovanni Salimena Emerald course, uiey snouiu ue laKen care ui wiui the utmost seriousness. The issue we are speaking to is when those grievances and problems get so out of control that the election is more about who is found guilty of wrongdoing than who is good for the students. That hurts everyone. Money doesn’t always bring success. And whining won’t generally get you anywhere. Keep those in mind when ob serving all the candidates this election season. And candidates, let’s see a clean, even election. Good luck to all. This editorial represents the opinion of the Emer ald editorial board. Responses may be sent to ode@oregon.uoregon.edu. Letters to the editor Emerald lacking material I would like to thank the Emerald for the won derful article by Sridevi Palanivelu (“Oregon springs pinpoint lava flow,” ODE Feb. 4). I have been dismayed with the lack of educational articles since I entered the University this winter. I read the Emerald often, and so far there have been little more than the stories involving ASUO or Programs Finance Committee squabbles and athletic events. Both of these I understand are important, but it of ten feels as though the newspaper is just filling space. (Who really cares that the student govern ment turned down plans for an on-campus beer garden?) If the Emerald is lacking material, just look around; I’m sure many of the departments could provide similar success stories as those mentioned by Palanivelu. There is great pride in learning about the academic accomplishments of my fellow stu dents in this place of higher learning. Seraph S. Cortez post baccalaureate Defining diversity How does a person measure diversity? And if di versity can be measured what elements are being taken into consideration? Does the University have a problem with diversity? What exactly does this mean? In recent Emerald articles, the University has been attacked for its lack of diversity. Is there a lack of ethnic representation on campus? By exam ining the last names of the two ASUO Executives, I can infer that they are of different ethnicities. Is this lack of representation? The University has many fine language departments. It has departments for the further exploration of different genders, sexual persuasion and ethnicity. The University sponsors numerous clubs that provide the opportunity to promote healthy interaction on campus. Do other major universities offer these same opportunities in such abundance for minority representation? I might suggest that we start praising the University for its efforts to allow everyone to have a forum to self-promote. Please, let the Emerald stop with these generalizations about the state of the Univer sity and write about something more specific and not so vague. Paul Horseil journalism/ business Candidates should be heard Admittedly, I don’t understand the specifics of election regulations. But, it seems ridiculous and not in the University’s best interests to penalize candidates for “attempting to influence the out come of an election” (ODE, Feb. 9). That, to me, could mean two things: bribing — and no bribes were taken at Coffee Hour since food is offered indiscriminately to anyone and talking about positions — and why shouldn’t candidates talk about their positions? Should they be silent? Don’t students need to be influenced by candi dates? Shouldn’t we, as voters, “influence the out come of the election” by voting for the candidates who are most qualified? And how do we voters know who is most qualified if candidates don’t at tempt to influence our decision by talking about their positions? I would like to penalize all candidates who are “not attempting to influence the outcome of the election.” C.J. Gabbe and Peter Larson seem*to be concerned that students hear about their positions — and also that international students are taken into consideration. I only found out about Gabbe’s and Larson’s posi tions at Coffee Hour — and I bet that was the first time for many international students too. I hope Jay Breslow and Holly Magner will come to Coffee Hour so we can hear from them as well. Gabbe and Larson ended their brief discussion at Coffee Hour by encouraging students to inform themselves about all candidates and to vote. Not to vote for them, but to vote, period. And that’s an in fluence that should definitely affect “the outcome of the election.” James Pippin University student Thumbs To a “queer* kind of diversity The University’s Queer Film,Festi val began Thurs day. Checkout movies that wouldr n’t necessarily show up on the big screen, and team a tittle about all kinds of different people. To free soda Kudos to the Bap tist Student Union, which gave away free soda in the EMU on Wednes day. They Just asked people to smile and then handed them a frosty beverage. The nice gesture brightened up a few people’s days and proved you can get something for nothing. To hack, hack, hacking away The same group of hackers apparent ly sabotaged the Web sites of Ebay, Yahoo, Buy,com, E Trade,Amazon and other top* namecompanies this week. TheU.S. Justice Depart ment still has not found a motive for the hacking, and thereare nosus pects. To carelessness The new Universe ty homepage de buted this week, and one of the new features is a "featured Web site of the day. "Unfor tunately, one of those first featured sites was that of the Collier House and Clancy Thurber’s Bistro, the campus restau rants that closed last term. Oops.
