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Show ASUU vs. Athletics The ASUU Assembly's freezing of the $249,000 athletic allotment was perhaps the most responsible action they have taken since the last time they froze the athletic budget. It's about time. The freezing doesn't mean the assembly has turned against the athletic department and the mandatory $5 per student per quarter football tax. After all, this is still the assembly elected in a pro-athletics backlash last March. But it does show that, like its more liberal predecessor, this year's assembly remains deeply dissatisfied with the way the athletics program is run, how it spends student money (about one-fifth of its total funds), and the attitude of Bud Jack's athletic department towards students. The studentbody still hasn't had the public discussion of athletics we deserve. Last year the debate was clouded in emotional irrelevancies, hysterical exaggerations, and stereotyping. Rational discussion of the proper priorities of ASUU, of compulsory com-pulsory student subsidies for athletics, of the proper place of athletics in the University community, and of whether our teams (especially football) aren't really competing out of their league all were virtually ignored. Instead we argued about appreciating the hard work of football players, steak dinners, the "decline of school spirit," and the marching band. ASUU ought to keep last year's debate alive and steer it into non-emotional, constructive con-structive channels. The assembly vote Thursday, showing that more than a liberal "fringe" is unhappy with the program, is a good first step. O Institutional Council decided de-cided yesterday to rename Ute Stadium after Robert L. Rice, who donated $1 million worth of AstroTurf last June. It is unwise un-wise to name monuments after living men, and it is even more unwise to put the names of one's buildings up for sale to the welathy men needing petty ego thrills. Whether or not Mr. Rice made the renaming a condition of his gift, the fact still remains that the University postituted itself shamelessly. O Spiro Agnew, of all people, has said that Sargent Shriver "is a very inexperienced candidate and it's normal for people playing catch-up ball to make reckless statements." In 1968, Agnew called a reporter a "fat Jap," said if you've seen one slum you've seen 'em all, and accused Humphrey of being "soft on communism." Guess he speaks from experience on being inexperienced. I |