Commentary
Oregon Daily Emerald
Thesday, October 19, 2004
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■ In my opinion
RCffy barely the lesser oftWO CVlls
For liberals who so desperately
want to see George W. Bush lose
the White House it’s easy to gloss
over John Kerry's faults. Starving
men don’t critique the menu. Mean
while, the Democratic Party has
closed ranks around Kerry, defend
ing him against every attack and re
fusing to admit the candidate may
have a few chinks in his armor. This
leaves voters few places to get
an honest assessment of Kerry — it
certainly won’t come from the Re
publican Party.
Almost no one backed Kerry from
the beginning of the Democratic
nomination process. Howard Dean
had many young liberals wrapped
around his finger, and organized la
bor threw its weight behind longtime
union champion Dick Gephardt. Af
ter Gephardt and Dean destroyed
each other in the Iowa caucus with a
nasty ad war, Kerry snuck to the top
and stayed. This left Democratic ac
tivists with a candidate they could
tolerate, but not love.
The Bush campaign has relentless
ly hammered Kerry as a flip-flopper,
a charge that has considerably dam
aged the senator’s campaign. Here’s
the rub: It’s true. Kerry has never
met a politically advantageous posi
tion he didn’t like. As Bush has re
peated ad nauseam, Kerry did indeed
vote for the $87 billion package for
Iraq before he voted against it. He
voted for the USA Patriot Act, then
criticized it repeatedly. The same
goes for the No Child Left Behind
Act, Bush’s clever attempt to subvert
public trust in the whole concept of
public education.
Kerry was once a principled oppo
nent of the death penalty, even for
terrorists. Now he says he supports
executing terrorists. Democrats have
always had a difficult dance with the
death penalty, a policy many of them
CHUCK SLOTHOWER
TAKING ISSUE
appose but can’t fight too hard
against because most Americans
support it. But instead of providing
leadership on the issue, Kerry has
taken a politically palatable but
morally nonsensical position. Why
does Osama bin Laden deserve the
death penalty but not a serial killer?
Kerry also undermined his claim
that he’s “fighting for us” when he
promised during last week’s debate
to lower corporate tax rates. Corpo
rations already pay a ludicrously
small portion of the national tax bur
den; the last thing America needs is
lower corporate taxes, especially
with a projected deficit in the tril
lions of dollars and Kerry’s expansive
new spending proposals. This is one
issue on which Ralph Nader has a
point: Corporate America has far too
much power, and neither party
wants to address it.
Kerry has also been less than
forthright with the American people
about the future of Iraq. He asserts
that he can persuade foreign nations
to contribute more troops and money
to Iraq, but nations such as France
and Germany have been burned so
badly that they aren’t eager to do
America any favors, regardless of
who wins the White House. Kerry
also says he will accelerate the train
ing of Iraqis to police their own
:ountry, but American soldiers in
Iraq have already tried that tactic
with mixed results. Whoever he
roines president will find it difficult
to turn the situation in Iraq around. I
fear the war in Iraq will be an issue
in the 2012 election.
The Kerry campaign has also done
a poor job of highlighting Kerry’s ac
complishments in the Senate. From
listening to his campaign, you
wouldn’t know Kerry led the Senate
investigation into Ronald Reagan’s
Iran-Contra machinations. Kerry has
also been a longtime defender of the
environment, but the Kerry cam
paign has only briefly touched on his
record or that of George W. Bush,
who has in some cases allowed pol
luting industries to actually write en
vironmental regulations.
In last week’s debate, Kerry threw
a few bones to the left, promising a
gradual increase in the federal mini
mum wage to $7 an hour and univer
sal health care. But liberals who
think Kerry is the second coming of
Franklin D. Roosevelt will be in for a
rude awakening should he win the
White House. Kerry would almost
certainly have to tangle with a Re
publican-controlled House of Repre
sentatives, a chamber that repeatedly
frustrated Bill Clinton’s best efforts.
Furthermore, despite his pledge to
the contrary, Kerry would eventually
have to raise taxes across the board.
Bush has run up the deficit so high
that the next president will have no
choice but to increase taxes. Just as
Reagan’s historic tax cut in his first
term was followed by a historic tax
hike in his second term, so will
Bush’s unaffordable tax cuts see a
significant reversal.
A Kerry presidency would repre
sent the best chance for liberals to
influence the White House since
Lyndon Johnson’s term in office.
Should he win, let’s hope he doesn’t
waste it.
chuckslothower@ daily emerald. com
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■ Editorial
Student
Senate: four
strikes...
who's out?
There is absolutely no doubt that the ASUO
Student Senate has violated Oregon Public
Meetings Law four times by failing to provide
the Emerald and the public with advanced no
tice of its intent to hold an executive session.
Colin Andries’ contention (ODE: “Violations
by ASUO senators debatable,” Oct. 18), that no
tice of an executive session is not required
when it is part of a general meeting, is simply
absurd.
The Oregon Attorney General’s Public
Records and Meetings Manual, which provides
general legal advice based on the attorney gen
eral’s interpretation of the Public Meetings Law,
states: “Notices for meetings that will include
both an executive session and a non-executive
session should give notice of both and state the
statutory authority for the executive session.”
We have yet to find someone willing to offer
a different interpretation of the law, except for
Andries, who ironically is a law student. When
asked if he had received outside legal advice,
Andries refused to comment.
We know what you are thinking: Why does
the Emerald keep harping on this? Why should
the average Joe and Jane care?
The answer is simple. It’s your money that
the senate is spending — you should care what
they do with it. It is the Emerald’s responsibility
as a campus newspaper to be at every meeting
on your behalf in order to inform you about
how the senate spends your money. But for us
to do our job properly, Public Meetings Law
must be followed. Advance notice of executive
sessions allows our reporters to ensure that
public matters are not discussed in private.
The media is allowed to observe an executive
session but not report on it, unless there is a vio
lation of the law. It is in the senators’ best interest
to follow both the spirit and the letter of the law,
because the Emerald vows to report on the con
tent of every executive session that is not properly
called. We have stopped short of filing a formal
complaint at this time, but any student on cam
pus has the right to do so on their own.
Our goal is to see the senate achieve full com
pliance with the law, which doesn’t seem like too
much to ask. Unfortunately, the senate has con
tinued to rationalize its behavior with an interpre
tation of the law that is dubious at best and goes
against the interpretation of every lawyer, profes
sor and journalist we have talked to, as well as
the interpretation of the attorney general himself.
The members of the ASUO Student Senate
are either ignorant of the law or are so arrogant
as to think they are above the law. Either way, it
is appalling.
What the Emerald originally saw as a mis
take has now turned into a flagrant disregard
for state law by the officials elected to represent
the University.
We again demand that the student senate
cease this illegal behavior, issue a formal apolo
gy and institute an orientation session so student
senators can be briefed on public meetings law.
The student senate’s best possible move at
this point would be to air this whole mess out,
take responsibility and get back to the business
of addressing student issues instead of going
through the whole “damage control” routine of
denying, rationalizing and making excuses.
Seriously, there ought to be a law...
EDITORIAL BOARD
Jennifer Sudick
Editor in Chief
David Jagernauth
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Steven R. Neuman
Managing Editor
Gabe Bradley
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