Friday
Editor in chief: Jack Clifford
Managing Editor: Jessica Blanchard
Newsroom: (541) 346-5511
Room 300, Erb Memorial Union
P.O. box 3159, Eugene, OR 97403
E-mail: ode@oregon.uoregon.edu
EDITORIAL EDITOR: MICHAEL J. KLECKNER opededitor@journalist.com
Low voter turnout, apathy
killing campus democracy
Guest Commentary
Steven
o
ur country’s greatest and most
precious attribute is dying on
our college campus today. Our
^ forefathers fought for its survival
on the battlefields around the world, while
we forget. Other nations yearn and hope
for it, while we stand idly by.
This tradition I speak of is democracy. It
is democracy we are unconsciously bury
ing here on our campus. How are we com
mitting this disgrace to ourselves? By sim
ply not partaking in it.
One of the phrases I have heard over and
over again since my arrival at the Universi
ty of Oregon is “campus democracy.” Our
school’s democracy is thankfully based on
our country’s system of three separate-but
equal entities. The ASUO Senate, Execu
tive, and Constitution Court allow us to
express our voices or concerns in a system
of checks and balances. We are truly fortu
nate to have this.
However, from the recent primary elec
tion results for senate and executive it
seems that we might not understand the
importance of this freedom. Low voter
turnout and enthusiasm show that a good
portion of the majority doesn’t care or
have interest in an important right.
How can they not care? From these re
sults, we might conclude that it is a waste
of time to have elections. I wish to believe
that it’s not true. However, if this current
trend of apathy among students continues,
it will destroy our campus democracy and
mutilate our concept of democracy as a
whole.
Voting in our student elections is not
only important because we have an equal
voice, but also because it is our own mon
ey at stake. Forget political ideology and
all other barriers for a minute, and think
who would be in charge and where your
money would be going without your in
put.
A $500 student incidental fee is includ
ed in our tuition, and this generates rough
ly $8 million per year for the ASUO budg
et. This staggering sum goes to finance
Club Sports, the EMU and other student
run organizations. We should be aware of
what our hard-earned money is being used
for, and by refusing to vote, we are freely
throwing our cash away.
Those who'see this election as a high
school-style popularity contest are mistak
en. I believe that the candidates for every
position have all the best intentions and
sincerely want to provide the full repre
sentation that we should be asking for.
They will work to satisfy any pressing
wants or concerns. All they ask in return is
that students exercise their right to vote.
By voting, we will be benefiting ourselves
by providing valuable input on how we
want our money spent.
Voting in this upcoming election is so
fast and easy that it shouldn’t take more
than two minutes from our busy lives.
Having two days to use Duck Web to vote
from any computer is a luxury we should
not take for granted. We shouldn’t expect
to have a 90 percent turnout, but 30 per
cent to 50 percent would show that we
still want our campus democracy and ap
preciate our freedoms.
Go out and participate in campus
democracy and vote!
Steven Lockfield is a sophomore history major and a
candidate in this year’s ASUO election.
Letters to the editor
Kudos to Emerald
for anti-riot stance
I want to thank your staff at the Emerald
for your hard-hitting editorial against riot
ing.
It is so difficult these days to find people in
the media willing to take a firm stance on
such controversial issues like mindless prop
erty destruction. I have no doubt that your
strong anti-rioting opinion and associated ar
gument have turned more than a few people
around on the subject. Keep up the good
work. I mean that! •
Dustin Preuitt
graduate student
computer science
Allies are needed in
environmental battles
First, consider that oil drilling generates
an enormous amount of pollution. Sludge
from wells can contaminate the groundwa
ter for decades. Air pollution generated
from diesel emissions and methane (a
greenhouse gas contributing to global
warming) is also released into the environ
ment during drilling.
Consider that companies seeking to drill in
the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge have
terrible environmental records. BP, Exxon
Mobil, Phillips and Chevron have been fined
repeatedly for ignoring environmental laws
and are responsible for hazardous waste
dumps across the country.
Exxon was responsible for the worst envi
ronmental disaster in U.S. history, the Exxon
Valdez oil spill in 1989.
In 1987, Chevron was assessed the largest
fine in history — $1.2 million — for violating
the federal Outer Continental Shelf Lands
Act, but then in 1992 paid $8 million for 65
violations of the Clean Water Act.
In 1999, BP Amoco pleaded guilty to a fed
eral felony conviction connected to illegal
dumping of hazardous waste at its Endicott
Oil Field near Prudhoe Bay. In a plea agree
ment, BP Amoco agreed to pay $22 million
in criminal and civil penalties.
Finally, consider that groups like OSPIRG
are devoted to environmental conservation
in a nation that recently elected to its high
est office two former oil-company execu
tives with extremely strong ties to the in
dustry.
In the struggle to save the last area along
America’s Arctic that is closed to oil and
gas drilling, we can use all the allies we can
get. Support OSPIRG in next week’s elec
tions.
Jen Munson
freshman
political science
CORRECTION
In the story about state redistricting,
[“Redistricting may split up students,” ODE,
April 11], Rep. Phil Barnhart, D-Eugene, was
assigned to the wrong district. Barnhart
represents District 40.
In addition, the story should have reported that
Barnhart’s district needs to gain 9,000 voters in
order to meet the state average target
population of 57,000 voters per district. The
number of voters in Districts 39 and 41 needs to
be, reduced in order tq meet the average.
The Emerald regrets tiie error.
Election will be ignored
just as the real issues are
Guest Commentary
Farrah
I’ve been dodging Breezeway politics for
a few years now, but occasionally some
body involved in student politics e
mails me with a question or update, and
I invariably offer my sympathy.
But this time, they asked for money. It got
my attention. And here I am, reading the
Oregon Daily Emerald online, and it’s a little
like reading a scrapbook of three years ago.
All the same names are here. All the same
issues are repeated using all the same argu
ments. None of it gets to the larger issue.
Every year, 10 percent of the students at the
University vote in campus elections. Ten per
cent of those run around making posters and
phone calls and filing grievances against a
process that 90 percent of students ignore.
The Emerald and the Oregon Commenta
tor, faithful to that one percent, lionize that
process, making impassioned editorial
pleas to reason and duty. It’s very quaint.
The truth is, students get screwed every term
for a few hundred bucks, of which only a third
goes to about 150 student groups that do little.
Granted, magazines and newspapers publish,
the Student Senate meets and debates being
“proactive” or spending others’ money, and a
few ethnic student unions hold functions that
commemorate things secular yet still sacred.
Real corruption takes place with the rest
of the money in the Athletic Department
and EMU. But local major media outlets will
likely dedicate zero stories to the gross apa
thy that administrators of truly costly pro
grams exhibit every year.
While it is pathetic that the system has not
been able to mandate that all programs re
ceiving funding publish line item allocation
requests as part of their budgets, it is worse
that the'Oregon University System does not
make accountable deans and department
heads who spend millions.
While it is sad that OSPIRG gets $8 a year
from every student on campus and reallo
cates it nationwide so anti-OSPIRG forces
can properly (and probably illegally) be de
feated, it’s horrifying that no one cares.
There is a part of me that believes the
stage for civil servant behavior is set here, at
the University; student governors learn bad
behavior on a small stipend before they be
come real governors and engage in flagrant
and felonious behavior.
But there is a part of me that worries more
about students learning not to vote. All the
grievances and injunctions in the world will
not stop the average student from taking one
look at Scott Austin or Ben Unger and think
ing, “God, what a geek.”
We should tell the truth about what this stu
dent fee process is: It’s a joke. The ongoing
election debacles could be solved by common
sense and the faintly unsettling revelation that
no one cares. Everyone involved should gather
into a huddle to chant, “Get over yourself.”
If you want students to vote, tell them
why. If it sounds even the slightest bit ab
surd when you say it, imagine how it sounds
when they hear it.
Students should hear about real issues:
rising tuition costs, lack of available campus
parking, unnecessary and ill-conceived
construction, what scary people in the state
Legislature want to do to your education,
and what very frightening people in Con
gress want to do to your student loans.
Students should be able to expect that.
Farrah Bostic, Class of ’98, lives in Los Angeles. She
managed the Oregon Commentator from 1995 to 1998,
ran for the ASUO twice on joke tickets, and helped get
one injunction against the election in 1997.
Leftfield
Frank Silva
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