Thank you for running the ad on Oct. 11 acknowledging National Coming Out Day. I must admit to a mistake that I personally made - the ad text I submitted to you was the one from last year, although the names were current for 1996.
The 1996 ad should have read: "WE ARE YOUR PEERS, COLLEAGUES, INSTRUCTORS, CO-WORKERS, and FRIENDS. We are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender people or families and friends of LGBT people ..."
Not everyone in our 1996 list is lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender; some are dear allies and friends.
Ronni Sanlo
Director, LGBPO
I would like to respond to Zachary Raimi's column "Democracy and Demagoguery" (10/21/96), which claimed that President Clinton lied when he called a 7-percent per year increase in Medicare funding a cut.
A 7-percent per year increase in funding would result in a net decrease in real purchasing power if Medicare expenses increase by 10 percent per year as there are predicted to do according to the National Academy on Aging.
Some simple math can show that after seven years a 7-percent per year funding increase would result in the purchasing power of Medicare being 18-percent less than it is today. While this is not a cut in total dollar amount, it is most certainly a cut in services and coverage; i.e., it is a cut in what really matters.
To answer Raimi's question, a 7-percent increase is a cut if it fails to keep pace with inflation. I would hope that Raimi would get his facts straight before he claims that President Clinton "resorted to demagoguery."
Chris Fischer
Rackham
There is an issue in this election year that has yet to be discussed and which should be addressed head-on. The issue is mean-spiritedness.
As no other time, this election has been almost nothing but negative comments from one side in regards to the other. For almost the first time in history, people will be voting more often for someone because they don't like the alternatives, as opposed to liking the person who does get their vote.
This is absurd.
I hardly find it fair to blame either major party in this case for causing this mean spirit that prevails, but I do think it is necessary to point out some things that come to mind.
For the majority of the past 40 years the Democratic Party maintained the majority in Congress. Two years ago, that changed. The Republicans, never having been in a such a major power position, decided a bit hastily to try and institute major changes instantly. This caused serious friction in Congress as Democrats railed against this overthrow while Republicans sought to cram huge pieces of legislation down the congressional drain pipe in order to start boxing in the president. Both parties instantly became polarized.
For this, no one is to blame. However, it is important to look at where our country stands today. The conventions were a shining example. This year, the Democratic Convention had a platform that lay in the middle ground of the political spectrum and spelled out some of the things that the Democrats intend to do in the next four years should President Clinton be re-elected. Clearly, their platform showed that they are willing to compromise in order to work with their counterparts and create meaningful legislation.
The Republican Convention had the most extreme platform ever seen in the entire history of this country. It contained five proposals to amend the U.S. Constitution. More than that, a Russian journalist at the convention said he felt it was run stricter than anything the Communists of Russia had ever done. Clearly, the Republican message is one of unwillingness to compromise and work with Democrats.
It would seem that the Republican Revolution of 1994, as it is sometimes referred to, has led to a huge divide in the two major political parties. For this, both parties are equally responsible, and both parties should be working toward compromise. After all, compromise is absolutely essential to democracy, something that our great country should be all about.
In this current election year, it is the Democrats who are recognizing and working to meet this call. Clearly, they know that is only through cooperation that we can accomplish national goals in the interest of every person. Perhaps, Republicans can now follow suit.
When that happens, the mean-spiritedness of this campaign will no longer be anything more than a memory.
I believe this will happen soon, but perhaps it will take another election revolution, this time with the Democrats at the reins.
Luke H. Klipp
School of Music
Recently, while I was trying to print a program from a University computer, I received a window saying that I could no longer print because my funds had run out.
This came as a surprise because it had never happened to me last year. It was also a pain, because I had the program and some graphs due the next day and the professors wanted hard copies.
From running around campus trying to figure out what to do, I discovered the following:
Each month, students get $10 as a sort of printing allowance. This year, because the price per page was raised by 100 percent, it costs eight cents to print each page.
This means that every month you can only print 125 pages. This isn't really very much when you consider that, for example, the program I spoke of earlier (including all the junk that goes with it) is something like 20 to 30 pages, and that I have other classes with their own demands.
Also, if you are like me and dial in to the University to do e-mail or Netscape, you lose $4.40 from that account (flat rate) even if you call just once! If you dial in for more than 20 hours per month, then you lose more. Say you only do occasional e-mail, such that you're far from that 20 hour limit. In that case, you now have only $5.60 in your account. I haven't done the math, but it probably works out to something like 60 to 70 pages per month that you're down to after dial-in costs.
In my case, I could only print two programs per month, and I'd have to get them right on the first print. Also, I'd have to explain to my other teachers that from now on I just can't give them hard copies of any papers or projects and hope that they don't mind if I e-mail it to them.
Just from talking to other students in some of my classes, I've found I'm not alone on this. The solution? You have to set up a self-funded account with the Information Technology Division. I learned this from one of the computer consultants on campus.
What they didn't tell me was that the ITD office does not take cash, so I had to once again borrow a password from a friend so I could get my homework in on time, and I had to make another trip the next day. This was one huge and - if you ask me - unnecessary pain in the ass.
I think that with the kind of tuition that students pay, and with the kinds of demands teachers put on us, the University should show some respect and common sense and give us a reasonable printing allowance. Am I alone on this one?
Shahaf Abileah
Engineering junior