LETTER: Minority Rights Coalition must make strides towards equality
To the Minority Rights Coalition,
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To the Minority Rights Coalition,
In cities, traffic is normal. Anyone driving up 29 during rush hour knows traffic. Anyone who has been to DC, New York, London, Rome, Tokyo or Jerusalem knows traffic. It takes hours to cross Jerusalem by car because of traffic. But during the Intifada, when suicide bombings struck buses and pizza parlors, there was no traffic. The roads were emptied out of fear. People did not want to wonder whether the bus in front of them, or G-d forbid the one they were on, would explode. There may have been a bomb strapped to a teen, who was taught the kind of things he needs to believe in order to strap a shrapnel filled vest around his heart. An explosion that left nothing of him, and launched the packed metal, like bullets in all directions. During the Intifada it took 15 minutes to cross a city that in today’s traffic would take hours.
Dear Editors,
When I say Iran is the most dangerous country in the world, many think I am trying to beat a war drum. Sam Carrigan wrote a month ago of "An escalating discussion" (March 21) which has been going on in the media. Apparently, "pro-war" forces are conspiring to start an armed conflict with the Islamic Republic. These voices in actuality are doing everything possible to avert a strike on Iran while still halting the regime's nuclear proliferation.
THERE is a country in the Middle East that lately has been flouting the will of the international community. This country has invaded one of its neighbors to the south and has carried out brutal strikes on the main minority group in the eastern part of its territory. This strong U.S. ally has been more than willing to cross international borders to pursue foes associated with that minority group. Most of you probably think you know who I am talking about, and most of you would be dead wrong. I am, in fact, talking about Turkey.
It is outrageously difficult to get a Jewish engineering student with unfinished problem sets to write something on the eve of one of the holiest days of Jewish calendar. Yet Michelle Sawwan's outrageously one-sided piece yesterday managed this feat.
On Friday, Sam Carrigan wrote a piece ("Accountability at the highest level") arguing that our legal system was not being applied to our leaders as it was to our citizens. I wholeheartedly agree with this premise, although not with the example he provided.
LIBERTARIANS have the clearest foreign policy of any group in the public sphere. This policy is derived from what Economics Prof. Lee Coppock describes as the "Night Watchman" role of government. Since the role of government is restricted solely to defending the nation from itself and others, hard core libertarians have no foreign policy.
Student Council hosted a debate Monday between Democratic incumbent Rep. Tom Perriello and independent Tea Party candidate Jeffrey Clark. Noticeably absent was Republican state Sen. Robert Hurt. Hurt's campaign manager, Sean Harrison, publicly stated months ago that Robert Hurt would be willing to debate Perriello "one on one, any time, any place." The obvious implication was made clear to all applicable organizations, from the Sorensen Institute to the League of Women Voters to the University's Student Council: Hurt would not debate Clark. In my opinion, this campaign policy was made for a number of well-thought-out reasons. I would be downright dishonest if I ignored the campaign calculus stemming from the fact that nearly all of Clark's supporters favor Hurt over Perriello. It is true that the self-declared Tea Party independent candidate draws nearly all of his support from Hurt's "Right Flank," so to speak. But a much more compelling reason for refusing to debate the independent is that Clark is a distraction, especially this late in the game. Hurt already won the contentious seven-way Republican primary in June, which - by my own count - had a minimum of four far-right Tea Party candidates: Ron Ferrin, Mike McPadden, Jim McKelvey, and Feda Morton. That was the right time for third-party views. A week before the election in a two-party system like ours, an independent polling at far below 10 percent is, for better or worse, an inconsequential voice as far as the election is concerned. Including such a voice in a debate now only takes time away from deciding who the better candidate is of those with a chance at victory. This leads to the question of why Clark was included in the debate in the first place, if it meant losing a major candidate in Hurt.
I admire The Cavalier Daily's Ombudsman, Tim Thornton, for unabashedly stumping for The Cavalier Daily ("Getting the message across," Oct. 14) as the "surest way to improve the 'common conversation of the whole University.'" I feel, however, that the inclusion of pamphlets in University discourse will do far more than equal efforts promoting The Cavalier Daily.
I was one of the many people who (for good reason) submitted a heated e-mail to The Cavalier Daily about its error in the April 16 issue of the paper. For those who missed it, a Nation & World article mistakenly was titled "Israel Executes Two Palestinians," when in fact the terrorist group Hamas executed two Gaza citizens for "collaborating" with Israel. In light of the correction and statements of regret made in the next issue of The Cavalier Daily, I believe some thanks and forgiveness are in order. I know that oversights such as this one made in the pre-dawn hours are less likely to occur in the future.
It is very easy to agree with one of the two underlying premises in Matt Cameron's column "Cyber Cents," which appeared in the Cavalier Daily on April 22. That premise is that businesses should be taxed equally. If a business has a store, it should not have to pay retail taxes while Amazon.com does not. (Property taxes are another matter.) Both businesses sell products to residents in specific states and it is unfair that physical stores have an extra burden on the same sale.
Apathy is the enemy of progress. Thus the political apathy that affects far too many Americans, and specifically university students, is disconcerting. I agree with Rex Young ("Rock the vote 2010," April 13) that the issues affecting every one of us cannot be ignored. With that in mind, let me look at some of the things Young ignored. The Healthcare and Education Affordability Reconciliation Act (aka ObamaCare) that Rex touted does a number of things. Each of the 'positives' stated in 'Rock the Vote 2010' can be argued one way or the other. However, one thing mentioned that cannot be stated is that the bill saves the federal government money. This is an outright lie, and I will explain why. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) which put out the statistics on savings is non-partisan. It is an organization that projects economic ramifications based on the information given to it. In other words: garbage in, garbage out. So if you give the CBO ten years worth of tax savings, but only five years of program costs to number crunch, then abra kadabra: a costly program suddenly saves money. This is the case with ObamaCare. The CBO report on Health care is an exercise in lying with statistics and hides the true costs of the leviathan program. Indeed, there were numerous money saving counterproposals given to ObamaCare (buying insurance across state lines, promoting state reforms, and nationwide medical malpractice reform among others). With the national debt at $12.8 trillion and growing, we as young Americans cannot afford to ignore the hefty costs of a program revamping one-seventh of the economy. To put the costs of the U.S. debt in perspective, each citizen's share of the debt is $41,445 and growing as of April 13 at 3 p.m.
On June 12 of last year, Iranians went to the polls with a message of change similar to the one that recently swept through America. That day, Iranians voted en masse in what was thought to be a relatively unimportant but close election for the weak office of Iranian president. Sitting President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad gained a sweeping 63 percent of the vote. The nearest challenger, Mir Hossein Mousavi, received a surprisingly low 33 percent, having apparently lost numerous districts in his voter heartland. This clearly rigged election surprised the entire world - not because it was rigged, but because it gave birth to Iran's Green movement. Since that day, the Green movement has challenged the Iranian government at every opportunity. As a result, Iran has seen its worst turmoil since the Iranian revolution four decades ago. National and religious holidays have been turned into days of protest. Students have been reprimanded and even banned from universities for participating in opposition activities, political prisoners have been reported tortured and several dissidents have been executed on trumped up charges. The Iran of today is one that is experiencing a changing political climate that must be encouraged. From across the world, America watches, hopes and waits. Unfortunately, waiting is not an option. The ever present nuclear issue prevents us from waiting.