University of Texas Austin - Cactus Yearbook (Austin, TX)

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With two Texas candidates battling for the nation ' s highest offices, the election is driven home for students Politics, Texas style After two years and no less than 20 can- didates, America chose her leader. The new chief executive would lead us into the ' 90s. A huge trade deficit, mounting domestic debt and a renewed detente with the Soviet Union loomed ahead. Amid fierce campaigning, students found ways to exercise their political beliefs. Rallies with Lloyd Bentsen and Jesse Jackson, as well as protests against Iran-Contra figure Oliver North, highlighted a year of intense political activism. One of the biggest events of the year was a send-off rally for vice presidential candidate Senator Lloyd Bentsen from the State Cap- itol. Hundreds of people crowded the south steps to hear speeches by Bentsen and prom- inent Democrats from all over the state. But after the band stopped playing and the red, white and blue balloons had all floated away, some students were left with a hollow feeling. The entire speech was without sub- stance, Martin Prazak, business graduate student, said. It was the same old rhetoric. They all danced around like true Texas politicians. Eric Almgren, an MBA student who trans- ferred from the University of California- Santa Barbara in 1988, was surprised at the tone of Texas politics. At UCSB, the lib- erals are more vocal and more visible, and the conservatives are apathetic, he said. Here, the conservatives are more vocal. The next major rally came one week be- fore the November 8 election, when Jesse Jackson spoke to students on the West Mall and encouraged them to keep hope alive. The Daily Texan estimated the crowd at over 2000, and afterward Jackson led hundreds of students in a march to the Flawn Academic Center to vote on the absentee ballot. Not all of the political gatherings ended on such a positive note, however. On October 6, one man was arrested on charges of criminal mischief after he kicked a sprinkler over at a protest against Oliver North. North was speaking at the Doubletree Hotel to raise defense funds for his trial in the Iran-Contra affair. North supporters paid to attend the speech, and the money went to North ' s de- fense fund. Affluent people are spending $50 apiece to support Oliver North, and there ' s a lot of needy people here in Austin, Isolda Ortega, Plan II senior, said. Chicanos Against Military Intervention in Latin America, a University group, organ- ized the protest. We oppose aid to the Con- tras, Ortega said. He went beyond sup- porting administrative policies in Central America. He broke the law. The Young Conservatives of Texas dis- agreed, however. Several members attended the rally to provide moral as well as financial support for North. He was standing up for his country, Gretchen Wilson, nursing freshman, said. He did what he thought was best and I agree with him. Thus another election year was over. Once again, scandals surfaced concerning some of the candidates, but they were soon forgotten in the fervor of activity that accompanied last-minute campaigning. Many students vot- ed for the first time in a presidential election, and their participation would mark the be- ginning of yet another generation of political involvement. Barbara Neyens 26 Politics

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It ' s been said that experience is a hard teacher; she gives the test first, the lesson after. However, students were able to benefit from the experiences of authors, artists and politicians through the efforts of three or- ganizations that brought guest lecturers to campus. Two groups were lectureships, funded by a combination of student, University and pri- vate donations. These operated out of the College of Liberal Arts and were under the direction of Assistant Dean Barbara McFar- land. The Student Endowed Centennial Lec- tureship was created in 1983 during the Uni- versity ' s centennial year. It took three years to raise an initial amount of $54,000, which the University matched. During the fall of 1988, author Larry McMurtry came for two days of lectures, a workshop and a reception. The lectureship paid $6,000 for McMurtry, McFarland said. The purpose of the lectureship is to get speakers who will interact with students and Larry McMurtry really fit that bill, she said. The other lectureship was the Liz Car- penter Lectureship in the Humanities and Sciences which was funded by endowments of Liz Carpenter, who was press secretary to Lady Bird Johnson, and her friends. This lectureship attracted various speakers in- volved in politics and women ' s interests. During the fall of 1988, former President Gerald Ford came to the University, along with Pat Paulsen and Jim Morris to speak in a series entitled Is Politics a Laughing Mat- ter? Speakers were also brought to the Uni- versity by the Student Union under the Dis- tinguished Speakers Series. The speaker se- ries was run by a committee of students, headed by a chairperson. The Union financed the speakers series, like the rest of its organizations, mostly through retail sales, and actually relied very little on fees from students. The Union earns about 90 percent of its money through sales and about 1 percent is from the students, said Chairman John Hanke, Plan II senior, said. The budget for the series was determined after budgets from all areas in the Union were received, evaluated and usually hashed out Hanke said. In 1989 the series had an operating budget of about $2 1 ,000. The Union generated some controversy with the appearance of former UN ambas- sador Jeane Kirkpatrick. Some felt her $22,500 price tag was too high, while others disputed the timing of her visit so close to the 1988 presidential election. The controversy was a bit muddled since there were two issues involved: her views and what we paid for her, Hanke said. Kirkpatrick ' s original honorarium was $25,000. Although many students protested that this cost was too high, Hanke defended the Union ' s decision, saying that speakers of her caliber demanded a high price. Both the Centennial Lectureship and the Union speakers series used a detailed process to find speakers. The lectureship distributed ballots to students on the West Mall, while committee members of the Union series nominated and debated possible choices among themselves. McFarland and Hanke both said that schedule conflicts and high fees made some speakers hard to get. Nevertheless, the Un- ion ' s schedule for 1989 included Jeane Kirkpatrick, Mario Cuomo, Dith Pran (whose life was portrayed in The Killing Fields ) and Kurt Vonnegut Jr. Michelle Ross Guest lecturers share their wit and wisdom, but controversial speakers and topics have students voicing other opinions Author Larry McMurtry photo by Carrie Dawson Guest speakers 25

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tober6, riminal in was h Hd to raise Contra d the h ' s de- pnpc art spending ti, and fcpjkhtrt in Austin, liar. I Men liwrvtntion in IMI poup, orpn- L-fcwtbejondsup- K pok in Central i 4-. irsmg ; htwas some of AUSTIN-BOSTON CONNECTION: Austin Community College student Mi- chael Burlison and Wendy Boswell, ed- ucation junior, cheer for Senator Lloyd Bentsen at a rally on the st eps of the State Capitol. NATIVE SON: Senator Lloyd Bentsen speaks out on election issues of national and local concern while his wife B.A. listens. photos by Francis Teixeira Politics 27