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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 6, 2003)
Newsroom: (541) 346-5511 Suite 300, Erb Memorial Union P.O. Box 3159, Eugene, OR 97403 E-mail: editor@dailyemerald.com Online: www.dailyemerald.com Oregon Daily Emerald COMMENTARY Editor in Chief: Brad Schmidt Managing Editor: Jan Tobias Montry Editorial Editor: Travis Willse Thursday, November 6, 2003 EDITORIAL. DPS incident precipitates new policies In July, an event transpired that shook the Department of Public Safety at its foundation: Then-DPS officer Michael John Bonertz drove his vehicle onto a campus sidewalk and struck 26-year-old Eugene resident Donald Tean Gariepy, who Bonertz said was engaging in "suspicious activity" and attempting to flee via bicycle. A few weeks later an internal DPS report found miscon duct in the officer's actions and loosely cited vague direc tives regarding vehicle use. Administrative Lt. Joan Saylor, who conducted the report concluded that Bonertz danger ously pursued Gariepy despite "specific directions not to drive on the sidewalk." It became apparent through the sit uation and report that DPS policies regarding pursuits were non-existent aside from verbal directives. Last week DPS publicized its intention to develop a new policy detailing how officers should appropriately pursue suspects. The newfound policy will closely re semble that of the Eugene Police Department, DPS Inter im Director Tom Hicks said at a recent Public Safety Ad visory Group meeting. And the news couldn't have come at a better time. In the aftermath of the summer incident, the students at the University deserved a hint of accountability. It's good to see the time has finally come, and that DPS has stepped up and given students a sign the department is in fact tak ing the issue very seriously. It should be stated that officers serve a vital purpose on campus, and the environment simply wouldn't be as safe without them. Just two weeks ago, officers diffused a po tentially violent situation in the EMU Amphitheater when campus activists clashed. For these services and more, stu dents should be grateful. But the summer events did prove that officers can be prone to bad decisions, and as a result further analysis into policy obviously serves the greater public good, as is true with any public office granted any sort of policing powers. Thus, the new policy was the best decision that could be made. Another step would have been to fire the officer, but he had already resigned before the internal report was issued. Furthermore, although trust between students and DPS may have been damaged by the summer's incident, DPS has jusdy make amends and renewed perception of the de partment's professionalism. A mediation program for stu dents with grievances against officers has been proposed, and DPS has been active in the Public Safety Advisory Group, which allows ASUO and DPS to smooth out any student misgivings with the department. All in all, it seems DPS has learned from the incident and taken legitimate steps to curb future problems. EDITORIAL POLICY This editorial represents the opinion of the Emerald editorial board. Responses can be sent to letters @dailyemerald.com. Letters to the editor and guest commentaries are encouraged. Letters are limited to 250 words and guest commentaries to 550 words. Authors are limited to one submission per calendar month. Submission must include phone number and address for verification. The Emerald reserves the right to edit for space, grammar and style. EDITORIAL BOARD Brad Schmidt Editor in Chief Jan Tobias Montry Managing Editor Aimee Rudin Freelance Editor Ayisha Yahya News Editor Travis Willse Editorial Editor 'vjee-havVA REAL ’ DEMOCRATS, Steve Baggs Illustrator The Real, the new and the Kucinich I feel bad for Dennis Kucinich. According to a recent Washington Post ABC News poll, he would receive fewer votes than Carol Moseley Braun if the election were held today. He is losing in a presidential race to a black woman. How embarrassing! She has at least one good excuse for not getting votes; main ly, many white Americans would sooner vote for French President Jacques Chirac for president than a black person. What's Kucinich's excuse? He should change his campaign motto to, "Hey, I'm a white man over here!" Carol Moseley Braun must contend with a hallowed tradition in the media: treating black congresswomen poorly. If they mention her name — and that's a big if — it is usually in connection with her past failures and controversies. They rarely mention that she was the first and only black female U.S. senator in this nation's history, the first black demo cratic senator and the first female sena tor from Illinois. If anybody could break the White House's gender and color bar riers, it would be Braun. That's another big if, which is why she is fighting for not-last place with Kucinich and the other two bottom-feeders, John Edwards and Al Sharpton. That leaves a handful of white men who are still serious contenders with the election one year away and counting. They can be divided into two different groups: the so-called New Democrats and the so-called Real Democrats. The New Democrats scare me the most. Their true believer is Joseph Ueber man; John Kerry and Wesley Clark are honorary members. They rally under the corporate-funded Democratic Leadership Council (DLC), a group formed in the mid-80s for the purpose of pushing the Democratic Party further and further to the right, in much the same way the Christian Coalition pushed the Republi can Party to the right. On their Web site, the DLC claims to "believe in a Third Way that rejects the old left-right debate." Funny, this Third Way, summed up in the "Hyde Park Dec David Jagernauth Critical mass laration," reads exactly like the Republi can "Contract with America." The DLC couches their beliefs in thick rhetorical code designed to put conservative swing-voters at ease without upsetting their liberal base. Rather than say they are against affir mative action programs, they talk about "resisting identity politics," "promoting character education in public schools" and "shifting policies." Every time they mention equality (racial, sexual, etc.) they add the caveat, "special privileges for none." On abortion they use the troubling threesome: "Safe, legal, rare." And instead of talking about welfare re form, they talk about ending welfare "as we know it." Their social polices revolve around a traditional biblical worldview. "We be lieve that public policies should rein force marriage, promote family, de mand parental responsibility and discourage out-of-wedlock births," it says on the DLC Web site. This thinly veiled anti-gay marriage rhetoric sounds like it was lifted from a Christian Coali tion newsletter. The DLC is also rabidly pro-business, pro-globalization, anti-environment and anti-big government. They talk about "ex panding opportunity, not government;" they say the government's role is to pro mote growth in the private sector and that they believe in "creating wealth, not trans ferring wealth." I could not find a single clearly stated progressive goal on the DLC Web site. That is why it should be no surprise that DLC funds are coming from corpora tions that usually use their money to further Republican careers, like Philip Morris, Enron, Pfizer, Citigroup, DuPont and the ultra-ultra-ultra-ultra right-wing Koch Industries. In fact, two Koch executives are a part of the elite DLC Board of Trustees! The DLC represents the creation of what has been called the bipartisan right, a joining of white corporate America and those who believe the government should be in the business of forcing a Biblical moral system on the country. In the eyes of those with power and money, it matters little whether Lieberman or Bush is president. They stand for the same ideals — as Jon Stewart said on "The Daily Show," Lieberman is the can didate for those who like Bush but feel he isn't Jewish enough. Greens, liberal Democrats, libertarian leaning Republicans and Independents are forced out of the bipartisan right's agenda. The New Democrats are count ing on minorities, women and unionists — the traditional democratic core — to be unwilling to leave the party, even if it means voting against their conscience. It is a gamble that, unfortunately, I think the DLC will win. It remains to be seen whether Howard Dean and Richard Gephardt, the so called Real Democrats, can muster up a strong voice against the DLC. So far, I am not impressed. Gephardt ran in 1988 and lost to Michael Dukakis for crying out loud. And Dean's politicking leaves me less than satisfied: He is for gun control, but only in the context of states' rights; he is for civil unions, but against gay marriage. His rhetoric about the Iraqi war is strong, yet he has never had to back it up in Congress. Further more, he is an awkward man with a creepy smile who just does not strike me as presidential material. Then again, in the post-Dubya world, not being presidential material might be exactly the magic Dean needs to win next November. Contact the columnist at davidjagemauth@dailyemerald.com. His opinions do not necessarily represent those of the Emerald.
