1997_11 The Daily Collegian November 1997

              THE DAILY
COLLEGIAN
Wednesday, November 5,1997
Opinion
Telephone: (209) 278-5732
Jackson speeches
just liberal garbage
By Larry Famsworth
I can't believe some of the things
I've heard in the last week and a
half.
Depending on your views, I have
had the opportunity (or displeasure
as I look at it) to hear the Rev. Jesse
Jackson spout off his liberal blow¬
hole on two occasions, once on our
own campus, the other on our
state's capitol steps. Both times I
could not believe what I was hear¬
ing. These liberal bitch sessions
were not only poorly timed, but out
of order.
The speech that Mr. Jackson (I
refuse to call him by his self de¬
scribed title. Reverend) gave at
school was just like the one he gave
at the capitol. It was full of incon¬
sistencies and finger pointing. He
complained about two initiatives
passed by the majority of voters
within the last four years, and cur¬
rently is complaining about an ini¬
tiative that a majority of our elec-'
torates' support. It took him three
tries to get it right, but Mr. Jackson
has finally learned a basic rule
about politics, you campaign before
the vote.
As I stood in Capitol Park lis¬
tening to Mr. Jackson speak, I
couldn't believe what I was" hear¬
ing and seeing. Mr. Jackson started
his speech off with the typical lib¬
eral mating call, "Save our chil¬
dren,'" and there I stood, behind a
group of about 10 kids that were
approximately 14 years of age, who
were smoking marijuana. Mr. Jack¬
son kept talking about the initiatives
• that the Golden State has^ passed:
the minimum wage increase, the
banning of affirmative action, the
banning of assistance to illegal im¬
migrants, yet he failed to mention
our state's legalization of marijuana
and the ever growing drug problem
that faces not only those few kids
that stood in front of me, but every
other kid in a public school.
Another thing I could not be¬
lieve, what was supposed to be
overwhelming support for Mr.
Jackson. Yet, a majority of people
there were^being paid to be there
and being bussed in by unions,
some from as far as Pennsylvania.
So don't be fooled a second by what
was trumped up as "support" for
our nation's most prominent���whiner. That morning in Sacra¬
mento I heard a school teacher from
L.A. in a radio interview say affir¬
mative action being banned in pub¬
lic schools was going to make her
job as a teacher more difficult. Cor¬
rect me if I am wrong, but if that
teacher would have been in class
where she was supposed to be, her
job as a teacher might have been
easier.
Now going back to Mr. Jackson.
I really found it humorous listen¬
ing to him speak. Telling a crowd
that resembled the melting pot of
America that women and minori¬
ties have no opportunity in America
or California. That's funny, because
Mr. Jackson has a son who is a
member of Congress. That sounds
like a hell of an opportunity to me.
Not only that, Mr. Jackson had an
opportunity to stand up on our
state's capitol steps, where he is not
even a resident, and challenge the
laws that have been passed by the
registered electorate. There is a
thing called the Constitution, that
guarantees "certain inalienable
rights*' which includes Mr.
Jackson's right to speak out in ig¬
norance. So I say to him, there are
many opportunities to take advan¬
tage of.
Yet Mr. Jackson would rather go
about preaching state sanctioned
segregation and demanding certain
people have no rights while simul¬
taneously telling society that he
should be judged because he is of a
different skin color. He thinks he
should have preferential treatment,
along with everyone else who is not
a Caucasian, heterosexual male.
Just listen to Mr. Jackson speak, he
Please see LIBERAL, page 3.
Disabling affirmative action
hurts much more than it helps
By Linn Washington Jr.
During my freshman year at a
Midwestern university, an anthro¬
pology professor in her first lecture
declared black people have the rem¬
nants of monkey-like tails.
The professor matter-of-factly
told the class she would have or¬
dered me to drop my pants to dis¬
play my anthropoid anatomy but
she felt such a "show-and-tail"
might make some of the white fe¬
male students uncomfortable.
This professor's expression of
unrestrained racism impelled me to
excel in her course.    *
I earned the top scores on both
the mid-term and the final, but the
professor failed me in the course.
She accused me of cheating on the
final despite acknowledging she
had absolutely no proof I had. Her
only evidence was her belief blacks
were intellectually incapable of
scoring 100 percent on her test.
I appealed to the head ofthe an¬
thropology department, a Kenyan.
He said although he sympathized
with me, he couldn't do anything
since it would seem that he was sid¬
ing with me because wc both were
black. The failing grade stood.
A lawsuit filed recently seeking
to dismantle affirmative-action pro¬
grams at the University of Michi¬
gan reminded me of the bigotry I
confronted in college 28 years ago.
-The group, Center for Individual
Rights, that initiated the Michigan
lawsuit succeeded in getting a fed¬
eral appeals court to eliminate af¬
firmative-action admissions last
year at the University of Texas Law
School.
Numerous witnesses in the trial
preceding that 1996 appeals-court
ruling testified about a hostile ra¬
cial environment at the University
of Texas Law School. They cited
professors who make racist slurs
and proclaim their low expectations
of minority students.
Ironically, a pivotal 1950 U.S.
Supreme Court ruling, Sweat vs.
Painter, outlawing the racist exclu¬
sion of qualified blacks at the Uni-.
versity of Texas Law School laid
the foundation for*the seminal 1954
Brown vs. Board of Education de¬
cision ending legalized segregation
in America.
Two things have always amazed
me about the assaults on affirma¬
tive action in icademia: These as¬
saults never attack traditional pref¬
erential admissions, such as for the
children of alumni, and these as¬
saults ignore the history of racism.
In 1994, a federal appeals court
voided a minority-scholarship pro¬
gram at therUni versity of Maryland,
a school segregated by law until
1954 and by polic/Vntil 1970. The
appeals court stated the historic seg¬
regation at the University of Mary¬
land could not "justify a race-ex¬
clusive remedy." But why not? That
university has a long way to go to
go toward equality precisely be¬
cause of its history.
Far from promoting color-blind
admissions, the incessant assault on
affirmative action in the academy
Please see ACTION, page 4.
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