Page 2/The Battalion/Tuesday, March 8, 1983 '
opinion
Slouch By Jim Earle
“Do you realize what an uproar it would have caused just
a few years ago if an Aggie kissed another Aggie?"
Acid rain movie gets
rating of triple-X
by Art Buchwald
We had just finished dinner when
Winslow said: “I have a surprise for
everyone. Come in the living room while
I lock the doors and pull down the win
dow shades.”
, We went in the living room. Winslow
had set up a 16mm projector and a movie
screen.
“What are you going to show us, Wins
low?” Someone asked. ‘Deep Throat’ or
‘Debbie Does Dallas’?”
“Something much worse. I managed
to get an illegal print of a Canadian
documentary on acid rain.”
A murmur ran through the crowd.
“Couldn’t we get in trouble watching a
dirty film from Canada?”
Winslow smiled. “You’re damn right
you could. The Justice Department has
declared all Canadian films on acid rain
pure propaganda, and they have to be
clearly marked as such. They also told the
Canadian Film Board it has to turn over
to Justice the names of those who asked
to see the films.
Martha Harrington said: “I’ve never
seen a documentary on acid rain. This is
going to be exciting.”
“How in the devil did you get the
film?” I asked Winslow.
“I smuggled it in from Toronto,” he*
replied.
“You really took a chance. What if you
had gotten caught?”
“I would have been fined and sent to
jail. U.S. Customs has strict orders to look
for Canadian Film Board movie prints.
They’re even training dogs now to sniff
for them. The Attorney General has
given it top priority.”
“Why are they uptight about films on
acid rain?”
Winslow said: “They’re afraid if
Americans see them, without them being
clearly marked as propaganda, we would
believe that acid rain is an environmental
problem.”
“You would think the Justice Depart
ment would have more to do then worry
about Canadian documentaries,” Ed
Harrington said.
“You don’t know much about the Jus
tice Department. They finally found a
legal issue they understand. They’ve
been so confused about civil rights, EPA
and antitrust cases, that they jumped at
the chance to sock it to Canada. The
Canadians are going to think twice the
next time they finance a film about pollu
tion,” Winslow told us.
“How long is it?” someone a^sked.
“It only runs 30 minutes. But it will
blow your mind.”
Bella Murphy said, “Suppose the FBI
breaks in while we’re watching it?”
“Don’t worry about it, Bella,” Winslow
said. “My kids are outside on the lookout.
If they ring the doorbell three times, I’ll
dump the print and substitute ‘The Devil
In Miss Jones.’ They can’t touch us for
watching a porno movie in our own
home.”
“Well, show it fast,” Bella said. “I’m
very nervous.”
“Okay lights out. Here we go.”
We all sat in rapt attention as we watch
ed fish and wildlife dying in the Cana
dian north. A few people got sick and had
to go to the bathroom. At the end of the
picture, Martha Harrington said, “What
kind of degenerate mind could make a
picture like that?”
“That’s what the Justice Department
would like to know. If this film is shown
throughout the United States it could
destroy the American way of life as we
know it.”
“How could Canada do it?”
“There are a lot of dangerous people
in the environmental movement up
there, and they have control of the film
industry. If you think that one was bad
wait until you see the other one I smug
gled in. It’s about the horror of nuclear
war.”
“You can’t show a Canadian picture
against nuclear war in the United States,”
Bella screamed. “It’s illegal.”
USPS 045 360
Member ot
Texas Press Association
Southwest Journalism Conference
The Battalion
Editor Diana Sultenfuss
Managing Editor Gary Barker
Associate Editor Denise Richter
City Editor Hope E. Paasch
Assistant City Editor Beverly Hamilton
Sports Editor John Wagner
Entertainment Editor Colette Hutchings
Assistant Entertainment Editor. . . . Diane Yount
News Editors Daran Bishop, Brian Boyer,
Jennifer Carr, Elaine Engstrom,
Shelley Hoekstra, Johna Jo Maurer,
Jan Werner, Rebeca Zimmermann
Staff Writers
Melissa Adair, Maureen Carmody,
Frank Christlieb, Connie Edelmon,
Patrice Koranek, John Lopez, Robert
McGlohon, Ann Ramsbottom, Kim
Schmidt, Patti Schwierzke, Kelley
Smith, Angel Stokes, Tracey Taylor,
Joe Tindel, Kathy Wiesepape
Copyeditors JanSwaner,
Chris Thayer
Cartoonist Scott McCullar
Graphic Artists Pam Starasinic
Sergio Galvez Thompson, Fernando
Andrade
Photographers . David Fisher, Dena Brown, Eric
Lee, Irene Mees, John
Makely, William Schulz
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Rebirth of public interest
by Maxwell Glen
and Cody Shearer
Public-interest law is dead in America:
right or wrong?
At first glance, a eulogy might seem in
order. Ronald Reagan has led a fiscal and
regulatory attack against those groups
that fight for the poor and powerless.
Meanwhile, ocean-size salaries seem to
have drowned or diluted compassionate
tendencies among thousands of Amer
ican law school graduates.
But, when several local universities
staged a “fair” for careers in public-
interest law last week, they offered a
chance to determine whether things real
ly are rotten. After a visit and a subse
quent survey of the public-interest com
munity, the answer is no. If anything,
public-interest advocacy has survived the
worst and will probably be better off as a
result.
Georgetown, George Washington and
Catholic Universities, among others
here, had invited several dozen “public
interest” offices and organizations to
make a pitch. A surprisingly large contin
gent from Reagan’s non-activist Justice
Department and a slew of agents from
environmental and civil rights groups
had crowded on a rainy day into a down
town student union hall. It was a regular
jobs baazar for the publicly-minded.
To the program had also come more
than a hundred undergraduates, law stu
dents and unemployed lawyers. Many of
the curious went away disappointed.
While jobs were available, most were for
second- or third-year law students: Non
profit groups offered little or nothing in
the way of competitive salaries; law gra
duates interested in permanent positions
seemed out of luck entirely.
Of course, Reagan-led cutbacks in two
key areas, government jobs and federal
grants to public-advocacy organizations,
have reduced opportunities for high-
minded lawyers and law students. Emas
culation of the Legal Services Corp. is
symbolic of retrenchment at Justice* the
Federal Trade Commission and federal
agency civil rights offices. With public
funds uncertain, most private groups
have been trying to hold on with static
numbers of employees.
If the turnout on both sides of the dis
play tables at last week’s fair provided
ample reason for optimism, students, for
example, have not entirely given up on
public-interest work. At a recent visit by
the director of the Massachusetts Public
Interest Group attracted a surprising 85
students at the University of North Caro
lina law school. The lawyer glut has
forced many to expand their career alter
natives (across the board, in fact, public-
interest groups reported a deluge of re
sumes from highly-qualified applicants).
Clinical law coruses are thriving, too,
points out former representative Robert
Drinan, now a law professor at George
town University. “There aren’t many
bleeding hearts in my classes ... but the
interest is no less intense
was,” he said.
Meanwhile, uublic-interest
longer a field for the starry
inexperienced. If staffs seem
*41C
« by C
Batti
they’re still more sophisticatedT^^ 1 ^^ 1
fore, a helpful development M n did a
increasingly complicated natiirtLcoverr
lie issues. “At least in the envii jdent Boc
area, public-interest lawyers Pearson,
powerful and better skilled tyPearson
said Jonathan Lasch, leading|P B 3 ' 311 c
with the Natural Resources yy{P res ' c *
Council. ■ nd ha :
Increased technical soph^r^.^''
moreover, has spawned acomr|B. r
independent specialists. Fir “The car
sprung up simply to litigateo ;e jthis p
about nuclear power plant coi use it se
or worker compensation issrfse. ’ Pea
attention to certain conimoni No one
likely to encourage such legale- ECirime in
across the U.S.
V| to be
pCrime,
, , ■, wall 1
I his isn t to suggest that a ue ;of the
public-interest law is immineiere is lim
hesitant to press its advantage,i wei nmen
of Management and Budget|itfconcei
preparing to reintroduce legisklj 16 probl
would limit awards for attompr e< 1
suits brought against federal, .,[. IS<>n s
local governments, discouragiiljfl 1 ".^ 1
firms from taking on such tax
same time, the jury is still ouiot4b|ems o
bar associations wall meet wdlp be probl
commitments to increase their|ir Studeni
work. Imii that
ms. But i
by z
Jzed
,pe, then
■al problei
Keith E.
for the
ptys enrolh
i another
idem off
Cannich.
lead week
lldijessed
by S
Bate
Meeting t
anagemer
id) skills
K ; ‘ s 'ho <
:nt Conns
To mee
tinseling
o|ne\v pr
otivation
FELDMAN, WHEN I SAID TO TAKE OUT A CONTRACT ON
THE ROLLINS STONES.,,I MEANT FOR A CONCERT,
unter gre
erage stu<
Tl ic care
m, head
hn >er, is
phomore
.2 grade
dents sc
led abort
at they w
It of sel
rough th
tn what
Letters: Hit-and-run witness wanted
portuniti
r offers a
tjor.
The i
Editor:
Hey Aggies, I need your help. Some
one played bumper cars with my brown
’76 Cutlass last Saturday night and de
clined to let me know about it before they
left.
My car was parked in front of Q-hut A
while I was attending an APO party in
Q-hut B. Between the hours of 12 a.m.
and 2 a.m. on March 6, someone con
verted the front end of my car into a
mod-art form. If anybody, anywhere saw
what happened, or knows something ab
out it, please give me a call and let me in
on it.
One note to the person(s) who did it:
You know you made a big mistake, but
why make a bigger one by not owning up
to the error in your ways?
had spent days constructing it instead of
being built by a group of students in one
afternoon. It already is holding its first
tenant — a stray Shetland Pony found
wandering loose with no apparent home.
He seemed to be enjoying having the big
place all to himself*
It’s amazing what you can do when you
have a large group of people working
towards the same goal. In one afternoon,
rain notwithstanding, this solid structure
was erected by the students with the Agri
cultural Engineering Society. All over the
county, other students were working on
equally fulfilling projects, helping those
pre
: tjie stuc
alls and p
leii inte
Wolff, hfoer sai
who needed their help.
Joe Nussbaum, Mike
Glimp and the others responsl^ , 11()
creating the Big Event, as welllj,,,j n th<
thousands of students who ga|t s j x to S(
time to help others deserve c ill meet Fi
and our thanks. ss anothe
I believe Texas A&M’s Big Effcanicip
destined to become as worthutA 3 hrst-cc
meaningful a tradition as Silver stutl
a tradition that we can all be pi lan anc
a iracuuon mat we can an oe pFig~ r r ,
one that truly has the right tob'’ 0 er " t
... „ 7 ° ncounterj
‘tradition
Chris P,
Phil Carter
260-5778
Big Event tradition
Editor:
The students of Texas A&M deserve a
vote of thanks for the wonderful job they
did in putting together and successfully
pulling off the tremendous undertaking
known as the Big Event. My husband and
I were down at the Brazos Animal Shel
ter, wanting to get a look at the large
animal holding pen that the students
with the Big Event had built on the land
behind the shelter. We were expecting
something half-finished and not very big,
so it was quite a shock to come upon the
masterpiece that was located there.
The large sturdy structure — consist
ing of two spacious buildings to provide
shelter for the animals with a generous,
well-constructed corral and chute —
looked like a building contracting firm
Berry s World
|he grot
x stude
e and bn
fany olde
ted becau
tch as fan:
1 are diff
Xmger <
reenwcKx
orking
Titer.
“It’s kin
d inforn
ing wit
ageme
or st
lid.
j he stu
e tng able
d have <
starting
| the ol<
'0d said.
The cou
j§ by Dr.
Ted by
Ul in ten
'ts worki
(<) 1983 by NE A, Inc
“I’ve set up a new high-tech company an' I’m
looking for venture capital. ’’