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Show Editorial Tuesday, May 8, 1990 eelhiDve The Daily Utah Chronicle - Page Five State shou Id stop trying to hit home run The response of many Utah Jazz fans to their team's failure to make it to the second round of the NBA playoffs is not disappointment. More often, it's unbridled seems Utahns are constantly searching for include the artificial heart and bids for the that home run that will put them on the map super collider and 1998 Olympics. in grand fashion. Each time, there has been a These failed attempts are the result of a Utahns swing and a miss. valley that is acutely The most famous attempt at national are very aware that much of the rest of the respect in recent memory is, of course, Pons nation, if they consider the Beehive State at agnd Fjeischmann's announcement of all, view it as an odd place with a. 1950s taMetbp fusion here at the UUtShns hailed view of the world. Apparently the logic is the announcement as an that one NBA championship or a self-consciou-s. resentment. How could Karl Malone and company let us down this way, they ask. Tljjs was, after all, a team that has supposedlymoved from the league's basement to one of its elite. It was a team that was supposed to make a run discovery that would have . earth-shatteri- ng blockbuster scientific discovery could at a world title. It was supposed to be scientific and economic benefits. Happy change all that. something to make this little desert Valley would be the new center of the The Chronicle believes that rather than continue looking for a knockout punch to community proud and give it national scientific universe. attention. Although it's still too early to be reading give them national respectability, Utahns1 far-rangi- ng n Now we're only left with some memories fusion's eulogy, the "discovery" and old game programs. has not delivered the results its proponents This isn't the first time this pleasant little initially presaged. Other desperate grasps at national notoriety valley has been disappointed, though. It cold-fusio- J. Ml Save Gorby? A resounding nyet stunning tableau received free-enterpri- outlying -- se republics soul-numbin- . have initiated their drives to break away from the economic stagnancy and political hegemony that is the g Soviet Disunion. Much like the British Empire's maintenance of into the depths of the Kremlin, manpower. Infrastructure damage to bridges and Minister Kazimiera Prunskiene has sardonically Mikhail characterized Gorbachev, Sergeyevich skulking like a spoiled boy shortly by his Politburo lackeys. Not that the Soviet dictator and his apparatchik henchmen had no reason to do so; it must be heartbreaking to discover that the Russian people and their client-stat- e neighbors have as little stomach for communist czars as they do for communist commissars. The May Day parade in Red Square, traditionally a staid and orchestrated event of soldiers, clattering tanks and Party g hirelings bearing banners of V.I. Lenin and Marx, had swiftly transformed itself into a torrent of public outrage over Gorbachev's ineffective domestic measures and bludgeoning of the Baltic independence movements. Placards depicting Boris Yeltsin and Andrei Sakharov replaced the traditional Supreme Soviet banners and were augmented with White and ' Lithuanian national flags. Russian Orthodox priests hoisted crucifixes, and citizens held aloft signs reading "Down With the Cult of Lenin!" and "Communists: Have No Illusions You Are Russian ot Bankrupt!" In the midst of a revolution SDrinetime Pact the Warsaw throughout celebrated on a day that suggests growth and renewal, the sight of the moribund . autonomy and "special economic zones," the from Moscow's Red Square. For there, the West was treated to the sight of "the world's darling," as Lithuanian Prime goose-steppin- for themselves. Spending a little more money on education or liberalizing some liquor laws might be a good place to start. Stephen Garrett May baskets, European lasses with flowers in their tresses capering around May Poles, and poems by Robert Herrick notwithstanding, the single most wonderful thing about May Day 1990 was the followed should concentrate on improving the state Soviet leadership standing mutely atop the cold Red Square tomb housing Lenin's corpse is tacit irony indeed. Gorbachev is a' catalyst, and like a catalyst he is a means to an end, not the end itself. He is merely ah unwitting transitional figure. The Soviet people have realized that, even if their erstwhile leader has not. While he "applies the to brakes" managerial colonial America in the 18th century, the Soviet Empire continues to leech away resources from its cowed republics, but fails to provide services in return for taxes, regional products nd young roadways incurred in WWII in the Ukrainian city of Lvov have yet to be repaired, lines for consumer goods grow longer in Moscow and Kiev, and the Red Army and the KGB have closed opposition newspapers in Lithuania. Gorbachev's tactics in that tiny Baltic republic have given lie to his glasnost, the policy of intellectual openness so similar to Mao's "one hundred flowers" campaign during the Letters McKinzie's ideas regarding rights mistaken early '60s, which simply earmarked participating dissidents for eventual imprisonment and "re- Editor: Several brief points on Bruce education" during the Cultural Revolution five years later. McKinzie's May 4 "editorial" titled "Rights activists overlook the notion of responsibility." , First, Mr. McKinzie's argument is hopelessly circular. He argues that, "rights are intimately connected with Perestroika, essentially drawing upon Lenin's New Economic Plan of the '20s, is shudderingly similar to economic Yugoslavia's embarked upon by policies responsibilities" and blithely concludes "that if we all acted responsibly, we wouldn't need Tito decades ago. Yugoslavia's economy, chides the National Review, is symbolized by "the Yugo, a tin can masquerading as a car. . . ." Read that as any Eastern country that clings to a command economy, however "demagogic," "authoritarian" rights activists telling us which rights should be protected. The question, of course, is now do we know when we acting "responsibly" or "irresponsibly"? Mr. McKinzie are tenuously, will suffer from inefficiency, low productivity and will simply not be able to compete in the aggressive World Market of the '90s. A Soviet commander on the USSR-Polis- h border was quoted as saying, "Why is the West so enthusiastic about. Gorbachev? What has he done for us in five years? I earn 500 rubles ($35) a month that's just enough for some food." But if Soviet "citizens" from St. Petersburg to Sevastopol, from Krakov to Kabul, themselves understand that Gorbachev, a Soviet premier with powers unheard ot since, Stalin's time, is a transitory for figure, then the question six see "Garrett" on page rhetorically slides over the difficult ; issue of what constitutes "responsible behavior" and leaves the reader with an imperative to "act responsibly." Mr. McKinzie's analysis begs the question. If you don't need rights to define the parameters of acceptable social behavior, then what possible meaning can "responsibility" possess? Your "responsibility" theory of rights takes us nowhere, Mr. McKinzie. Second, Mr. McKinzie's simplistic positivist notion that "rights are handed down from on high" is antithetical both to origins of any constitutional democracy and, ironically, to his own position. The "right" that Mr. McKinzie exercises in writing his column is protected under a constitution that grounds the freedom of speech firmly in the belief that every individual has the "right" to express himself or herself. Sorry, Mr. McKinzie, but few individuals have endorsed the divine rights of kings (or. government, as the case may be) since Locke's First Treatise of Government. I suggest you read that work. Third, Mr. McKinzie attacks the Americans with Disabilities Act as anther example of people asserting "rights" against government. Again, society Mr. confused the notion of distributive justice within a society with the Few assertion of a "right." handicapped persons would suggest that they are asserting rights against the rest of society, but rather that their position in society is unique and deserves recognition. The fact that such recognition comes in the form of assuring that handicapped persons are provided with access to the society the rest of us enjoy is hardly the assertion of some attenuated "right." Finally, Mr. McKinzie states that we all have the absolute right to remain ignorant. I would suggest that Mr. McKinzie has exercised that right with considerable dexterity in his sophomoric and conclusory approach to the complex realm of human rights and responsibilities. Understand before you condemn, Mr. McKinzie. and Justin Toth Student McKinzie has Chrony letters leave reader better informed Editor: In response to Wendy Burgess' letter ("Authors of letters to the ed should never run the world," May 7): Bravo! You have succeeded! I am words." completely confused. I've never opinion that is printed in the seen such a display of "Let's make people think we know what we're talking about by using really big You should be commended. My suggestion to you is stop reading something you don't enjoy. I certainly don't agree with every Chronicle, but so what? I'm more informed because of them. Besides, it's refreshing to know that our campus isn't composed of a bunch of narrow-minde- d, brainwashed bandwagoneers. Let every' person be heard! How else would we sort through the ' garbage? '.V ; Diana Campanella Communication |