Opinion

Opinion

HAYS: Kick this can to the curb

By Gregory Hays | October 29, 2013

So what is The Can Kicks Back? It’s an astroturf (fake grassroots) organization with close ties to an outfit called Fix The Debt. And what’s Fix The Debt? Glad you asked. It’s the pet project of a Wall Street billionaire named Pete Peterson, who’s spent recent decades pushing for cuts to Social Security and Medicare. Another Peterson-funded group is called “Up To Us.” It has similar goals — and a branch at U.Va.

---

Opinion

KABIR: Freedom to disagree

By Fariha Kabir | October 29, 2013

The idea of academic freedom is a concept that naturally developed in the West; therefore, we need to be careful in applying it to other countries.

---

Opinion

A Halloween history lesson

By Managing Board | October 28, 2013

The best colleges strive to prepare students to function in a pluralistic society, in which they will work and interact with people who are different from them. So censuring racist costumes is consistent with a college’s aim of preparing students for an increasingly globalized and multicultural world.

---

Opinion

KNAYSI: Work smart, play smart

By George Knaysi | October 28, 2013

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention cites several of the biggest mental health and safety challenges facing college students on a daily basis. These include “social and sexual pressures, the temptation of readily available alcohol [and] drugs,” as well as stress from managing classes, friends, athletics and leadership positions. “Work hard, play hard” as a college lifestyle not only fails to effectively combat these issues but also usually worsens them.

---

Opinion

BERNSTEIN: Pick one of the above

By Dani Bernstein | October 28, 2013

For the first time in the paper’s history, the Richmond Times-Dispatch has opted not to endorse a candidate in Virginia’s gubernatorial election. Not only is this a cop-out on the part of the paper’s editorial board, but the paper’s refusal to take a position on whom to vote for is irresponsible to its readers.

---

Opinion

KELLY: Sit down, you're rocking the vote

By Conor Kelly | October 28, 2013

If you’re registered to vote here in Virginia, you may want to check again. The statewide process of removing incorrectly registered voters from Virginia’s voting rolls has been anything but smooth; errors have abounded, removing many correctly registered voters from the rolls.

---

Opinion

The curious incident of the dog and the M.B.A.

By Managing Board | October 27, 2013

It’s hard to say what consultants do, exactly. (A Google search for “What do consultants do?” yields 217 million hits.) But friends who know Pete say that his consulting knowledge is limited, at least for someone with a graduate business degree. Although Pete’s views on ball sports, meat texture and cuddling are finely nuanced, he lacks expertise in a host of other areas. This is because Pete is a dog.

---

Opinion

BERGER: Running on faith

By Meredith Berger | October 27, 2013

Growing up, I was never very religious, even after going to a Catholic all-girls school. Once I took the initiative to join Chi Alpha, though, my faith grew immensely in a short time and I found myself feeling accepted by them, despite my faith background.

---

Opinion

SPINKS: Placing out of learning

By Ashley Spinks | October 27, 2013

Besides the fact that the skills necessary to succeed in AP classes differ from those necessary to succeed in introductory college classes, I found that the curriculums were not analogous. I covered a vast amount of material in AP Chemistry, but it simply was not the same as the information covered in general chemistry at the University. I have found time and time again that the understanding of historical events that I gathered from AP World History and AP Government is shallow or insufficient as well. My high school experience was not worthless — I obviously learned a lot and grew significantly as a person and a student. That said, I don’t think I learned the same information that introductory courses at the University have taught me. Thus, to grant me (or anyone else) credits would be misleading and undeserved.

---

Opinion

FINOCCHIO: The truth hurts

By Peter Finocchio | October 27, 2013

Last week second-year College student and Virginia Young Democrats Political Director Jarrod Nagurka authored an article published by The Cavalier Daily rebuking Charlottesville’s sitting Congressman Robert Hurt for voting against the compromise measure which ended a 16-day government shutdown and blaming the shutdown entirely on Republicans. Jarrod’s opinion reflects the common narrative portrayed by the media and every card-carrying member of the Democratic party, but it is not at all an accurate depiction of recent events.

---

Opinion

BROOM: Too little, too early

By Christopher Broom | October 27, 2013

Sometimes breaking news or news that is time-sensitive will require going to press with what is on hand in the moment. Then the charge is to build on that information and update the readers. When time allows, however, building the information should happen first.

---

Opinion

FETZER: Truth or conspiracy?

By James Fetzer | October 24, 2013

As a long-time student of the death of JFK and a former visiting member of the University faculty in the department of philosophy, I was fairly astonished to watch Larry Sabato, Ph.D., a prominent member of your faculty, maintain to a national television audience that, even though the Warren Commission’s investigation was bungled, it correctly identified Lee Oswald as the “lone, demented gunman.”

---

Opinion

BRIGHTWELL: Debt valley

By Elizabeth Brightwell | October 24, 2013

While students are concerned about their own debt and unemployment, but many don’t realize they should be even more concerned with the long-term national debt. The long-term national debt is the most important issue facing young people today because when combined with the economic challenges we already face, we are destined for a future more dire than our current situation.

---

Opinion

Relearning the ABC

By Managing Board | October 24, 2013

The incident seems farcical: the slapstick of the agents spinning off the car’s windshield as Daly sped away; the ludicrousness of the ABC thinking it needed six armed agents to handle some sorority girls buying LaCroix and cookie dough.

---

Opinion

ALJASSAR: Statistically speaking

By Nazar Aljassar | October 24, 2013

Statistics — the discipline of risk, variation and drawing conclusions from data — permeates our lives to a much greater extent than calculus. Making data-driven decisions and interpreting uncertainty are essential skills for every American. While calculus and statistics are not mutually exclusive, statistics deserves much more attention than it receives.

---

Opinion

FOGEL: Betting on the game

By Jared Fogel | October 24, 2013

Many writers have already stated that buying Arian Foster stock may be risky or flat-out dumb because of the numerous risks involved. I am going to have to agree with them. Even though people invest in stupid things sometimes, it’s better, for now, to stay away from Arian Foster stock, simply because it is a bad investment.

---

Opinion

BROWN: Scheduled spontaneity

By Forrest Brown | October 24, 2013

Computer science and English would seem to have little in common, but a logically constructed Java program actually can be constructed in a similar way to a persuasive or critical essay. Linguistics has enhanced my ability to trace the evolution of the English language. Understanding brain structure and chemistry has helped me improve my studying. Knowing psychological concepts has aided my analysis of characters’ thoughts and motivations in literature.

---

Opinion

Departmental dissidents

By Managing Board | October 24, 2013

Now is a time of transition: a period when we can negotiate the terms for how partnerships between U.S. and Chinese institutions ought to work. The American universities, including the University of Virginia, that collaborate with Chinese schools should take a hard line on academic freedom.

---

Opinion

CONNOLLY: Cruz control

By John Connolly | October 23, 2013

Without a doubt, you know him by now. Baby-faced, Canada-born, Texas-raised, Ivy-educated, Tea Party-backed Ted Cruz is the talk of the nation. His attempt to tie the Affordable Care Act to the U.S. debt ceiling captivated the U.S. and the world. His efforts, which included a long-winded, 21-hour filibuster on the Senate floor, led to a 16-day government shutdown, a multibillion dollar hit to the American economy and a fresh wave of populist vitriol aimed at Congress. And yet, incredible though it may seem, despite the havoc Cruz has created — not to mention the Civil War he has sparked within his own party — Cruz may profit politically from this fiasco.

---

Opinion

BOGUE: Asparagus or Brussels sprouts?

By Russell Bogue | October 23, 2013

We must recognize that “preferring” a candidate is necessarily relative. Hypothetically — and, given the current state of politics, this is purely hypothetical — there could be a race in which both candidates were so equally adored by the population that no one could definitely say he preferred one to the other. Advocates of voter abstention, if they were philosophically consistent, would say that voters should refrain from voting if they simply didn’t prefer any of the candidates, whether the lack of preference is due to equal approval or equal abhorrence. Few people would condone this logic; instead, we recognize that voters must find some way to differentiate the candidates, and then vote for the one whom they support a tad more.