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E-mail: editor@dailyemerald.com
Online Edition:
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Thursday, May 23,2002
Editor in Chief:
Jessica Blanchard
Managing Editor:
Jeremy Lang
Editorial Editor:
Julie Lauderbaugh
Assistant Editorial Editor:
Jacquelyn Lewis
Letters to the editor
Think before you thump
All day Tuesday, I heard the
thumping bass emanating from
the EMU Amphitheater coupled
with loud screaming about giving
trucks away and how great Joe
Romania is.
It is annoying for me at work, let
alone in class, and I can’t imagine
what people closer to the noise felt
like. I hope no one was taking any
tests. Once I found out that it was
a Joe Romania “come try to win
your gas guzzler” event, I found
myself wondering why the Uni
versity, which prides itself on be
ing an environmentally friendly
campus, would allow a private,
for-profit company to come and
peddle its not-so-environmentally
friendly products.
These days there’s loud music
blasting from the amphitheater,
but hey, it’s spring and time to
celebrate, right? Okay, that’s fine.
However, when classrooms are
being abandoned because of con
struction noise, perhaps we
could give thought to the class
rooms and offices close to the am
phitheater and even more
thought concerning which mes
sages the University is sending.
Chris Holman
senior
international studies
Minority party members
deserve primary voice
Can we really choose our repre
sentatives and gubernatorial candi
dates? Not if we are members of a
“minority” political party, accord
ing to elections rules. Those regis
tered with a minority party, such as
the Pacific Greens, are only allowed
to vote for nonpartisan candidates
in primary elections if no Greens
are on the ballot. How absurd!
I am registered as a Green be
cause I believe the party stands for
environmental and political in
tegrity. Not because I want to be
excluded from doing my duty as a
voter to pare down the field of can
didates for the general election.
And to those who would suggest
minority party members would
simply do their best to manipulate
the outcome of a primary election,
you’re right! May the best candi
date always win, whether she or
he is a Democrat, Republican or
Constitutional Party candidate.
Eric Martin
junior
journalism
Bush family linked
to Nazis, terrorism
What’s all this talk likening the
Green Party to the Nazi “green po
lice” by conservative fanatics in the
May 14 Emerald (“Welcome to the
Stale Ideology Amateur Hour”)?
If one was interested in getting
to the truth of the matter, one
would have to look no further than
the shady past of the Bush family.
The Bush family fortune has been
derived from many crooked
schemes.
On October 20, 1942, the U.S.
government under the “Trading
with the Enemy Act,” seized the
shares of a company called Union
Banking Company, of which
Bush was a shareholder and di
rector. This company helped fi
nance the German Steel Trust,
which provided iron and explo
sives to the Nazis.
Another company, ran by
Prescott Bush and his father-in
law, George Walker Herbert, was
seized because it was a Nazi
front. “This company was called
the Silesian-American Corpora
tion and was vital in supplying
coal to the Nazi war machine,”
according to the Draheim Report
from the Dallas Libertarian Post.
How much Bush coal was used to
fire the incinerators at the Nazi
death camps?
The Bush past is filled with un
savory partnerships with some of
the world’s leading terrorists in
cluding Saddam Hussien, Manuel
Noriega and also bin Laden. Let’s
see — if the Nazis could be called
terrorists, the Bush family has
made a whole lot of money in
dealing with terrorists. A simple
Internet search query, “Bush
Nazi,” will yield results.
Andrew Vern Reed
junior
sociology
Take Back the Night needs
both sexes to succeed
We, as women, were proud to at
tend the Take Back the Night rally.
It was a wonderful opportunity to
gather with others and speak out
against sexual violence, sexism
and hatred. It was, however, dis
heartening that not all supporters
were given equal opportunities
during both the march and the cel
ebration that followed.
The crowd was instructed, in no
uncertain terms, that the front of
the march was reserved for
women, and the middle area was
to be reserved for “gender queers.”
We attended the march together, as
women, along with two of our
friends, both male, one gay. Given
the demographics of our group, we
were forced to the back of the
march, out of what the leaders des
ignated the “safe space.”
It is counterproductive to place
gender limits within a cause that
strives for total equality. We, as
women, need to embrace the men
that are fighting by our side for
equality, liberty and safety. By
telling these men that they can not
be on the front lines of the battle,
we send them the message that we,
as women, have been getting for
centuries — “You are not strong
enough. You are not good enough.
We do not need your help.”
Until we can accept that every
voice, regardless of gender, de
serves to be heard, we will never
be able to accomplish all that we,
as humans, are capable of.
Andrea Lipstein
junior, family and human services
Rachael Osofsky
sophomore, psychology
Letters to the Editor
and Guest Commentaries Policy
Letters to the editor and guest commentaries are encouraged. Letters are limited
to 250 words and guest commentaries to 550 wu."’lease include contact
information. The Emerald reserves the right to edit fori.: e. grammar and style.
Steve Baggs Emerald
Launching an idiot
offensive
In “The Godfather Part 2,” Michael Corleone
travels to Cuba on a money-making mission
right before the revolution jumps off.
In that last scene prior to the chaos, the sun
light seems like it’s been turned up to “11” as
Michael and his posse of capitalist cronies sit on a
rooftop, literally having their cake and eating it, too.
Everything seems just a little too perfect, which
is how things always seem right before you real
ize you’ve been walking around all night with a
giant chunk of parsley wedged between your two
front teeth.
President George W. Bush currently has a large
chunk of something stuck in his teeth, but none of
his top advisers seem to be telling him.
It’s called crow.
Perhaps they haven’t said anything because
they don’t notice. When you see a man walking
around with crow in his teeth day after day, you
tend to become desensitized to it. And for Bush,
crow has become a set of false teeth.
First it was tough talk about an American mili
tary plane and its crew held against their will in
China, followed directly by his statement.of desire
to keep trade channels open with Beijing. Then it
was maniacal ravings against the “axis of evil.”
Now, in a multi-faceted scheme to distract the
public from the fact that he and his administration
most definitely knew about the possibility of ter
rorist attacks taking the form of airborne suicide
bombers, Bush has once again launched an idiotic
offensive.
Against Cuba, one of the most impoverished
countries in the Americas.
Cuba isn’t our enemy. Their government is. Of
course, that’s exactly what Bush has been saying re
cently, in a blatant attempt to pander to Cuban
American voters in Florida.
Once again, however, what he’s saying and what
he’s doing seem to be in direct conflict with each
other.
Bush has demanded the release of political pris
oners, independently monitored elections, free
speech fdf opposition parties; arid b new govertf-‘
ment that is fully democratic.
I can’t fault him in theory. It really sounds like he
cares about the Cuban people.
The only problem with this little pipe-dream of
humanitarianism is that he’s making these demands
while at the same time squeezing the economic vise
grip of an embargo that’s been steadily draining the
wealth of the average Cuban for the past 40 years.
If Bush is so worried about the state of human
rights in the world, then what exactly is he think
ing continuing to do business with China, or
Malaysia, or Saudi Arabia for
TenPas
Columnist
For that matter,
that matter? All of those coun
tries have committed human
rights violations that make
Cuba’s look like one of Robert
Downey Jr.’s state-mandated
trips to a celebrity rehab center.
And if political prisoners are
causing the president to lose
sleep at night, then I suggest he
get off his high horse (I’m drop
ping clichds like Alan Houston
drops mid-range jumpers) and
pardon Leonard Peltier, a man
who is being held without one
shred of hard evidence that he
committed any murders,
if free and democratic elections
are such a point of contention for Senor Bush, why
did he seem so eager to wrap up the controversy
that surrounded the last presidential election, and
get into office?
Because it all comes down to the money and the
power.
It is impossible to punish Castro without pun
ishing the rest of the country. And even then, Cas
tro will still be in a position of power, and hence
capable of remaining relatively exempt from said
punishment.
End the embargo now.
E-mail columnist Jacob TenPas at jacobtenpas@dailyemerald.com
‘His opinibns'do not necessarily reflect those'of the Emerald.