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Page 2/The Battalion/Wednesday, November 23, 1983
Thanksgiving:
Time to pig out
RONM-D REAfiAN
MUST REMW LOVE
THE POOR...
results in a dab of dressing strategically
placed on the nose.
The human race is programed to eat. I
will always remember Mom saying, “You
have to eat three meals a day. Otherwise
you’ll end up looking like Gumby.”
Mom also kept telling me, along with
the Cheerios commercials, that the most
important meal was breakfast. I believed
Mom, plus I’ll take any excuse to eat a
couple of donuts.
Juicy, golden, roasted turkey; steam
ing chestnut dressing made from fresh
croutons; smooth mashed potatoes made
from real Idaho spuds; cauliflower co
vered with creamy cheese sauce; cranber
ry sauce that doesn’t come from a can;
and pumpkin pie that melts in your
mouth.
I guess different types of people like
different types of breakfasts. Some enjoy
a breakfast that looks like it came off a
box of Wheaties while some prefer a
piece of toast and a cup of coffee or hash
browns and yougurt. Still there are those
who who like 15 more minutes of sleep
for breakfast.
Airlines should cut frills
i I love Thanksgiving. What other holi-
'day was invented for the sole purpose of
eating? It’s great.
Nothing is better than gorging oneself
then collapsing on a soft bed to digest for
two or three days.
Thanksgiving is my kind of holiday. I
love any excuse to eat. In fact, you could
probably say that I live for my next meal.
My least favorite meal is lunch. I think
the horrors of my public school meals in
junior high are still with me. One bright
day, the cafeteria at Crockett Junior High
served chili dogs. The next bright day,
half the students were sick.
by Dick West
United Press International
Eating is an important part of the
American lifestyle. To break away from
studying, you eat. When you’re bored,
you eat. When you’re nervous you eat.
When you’re on a date, you eat.
My favorite meal is the in-between
meal snack: Oreos, ice cream, candy bars.
I suppose we could probably blame
this obsession with eating on television.
Burger King and McDonald’s may be
fighting for the almighty dollar, but the
innocent eaters of America are caught in
between.
Eating while on a date can be really
embarrassing. I think restaurant owners
try to make it that way. Why else would
they cut the lettuce into such huge pieces?
It is kind of tough to resist the hot and
juicy hamburgers that are so readily dis
played during the commercials. It is even
tougher on the consumer when the com
mercials are shown late at night after all
of the hamburger places are closed.
At least once in his life, everyone has
tried to stuff a piece of lettuce half the
size of Rhode Island into his mouth while
trying to conduct a normal conversation.
Trying to accomplish such a task usually
Whatever the cause is, I am big enough
person to admit that I’m an eataholic.
Every year at Thanksgiving I end up
making Miss Piggy look svelte. The only
thing that is better than Thanksgiving is
Christmas. At Christmas, besides getting
to pig out, you also get presents.
WASHINGTON — With the 80th
anniversary of the Wright Brothers flight
coming up next month, it is difficult not
to agree with the conclusion reached by
Robert Orben, the former White House
speechwriter.
“If Cod had intended for us to fly,”
commented Orben, “He would never
have given us deregulation.”
Despite economic setbacks caused by
increased competition, however, there
still are ways the airlines can cut costs.
One way is to schedule more “no frills”
flights. The other is to ask the pilots un
ion for wage concessions.
Eventually, I suspect, some airline will
combine the two. Certainly the ultimate
in “no frills” commercial aviation would
be a passenger plane that had no pilot at
all.
If some way can be found to fly without
pilots, that palpably would make air
travel cheaper and go a long way toward
rescuing the carriers from red ink.
At this point, I doubt the state of the
aviation art is advanced enough for un
manned flying. But, as we know, technol
ogy no longer is growing by leaps and
bounds; its progress increments now are
the equivalent of cross-country hops.
While pilotless airplanes are being de
veloped, automation also could make it
possible to eliminate flight attendants
and most ground crew members as W'ell.
Hungry or thirsty passengers I
through the little windows to picb
viands and potables of theirdi
When the right coins are pokedi
slots, out comes microwaved card I"
on a tray, just like the stewardess
to bring.
Meat iwhile, up front at thee
I’m just thinking off the top of the
terminal here, but as I see it each seat in
the deregulated airliner of the future will
have a pay-as-you-fly device somewhat
resembling a parking meter.
Upon leaving the boarding gate, pas
sengers estimate the flying time to their
destinations and deposit the appropriate
amounts in the meters.
panel, is an new and improvedaum
pilot.
I low much contact do we pass
normally have with a human pilot' 1
none, save the friendly voice oftk bi
tain pointing out landmarks thaic
by
seen from the other side of thepB in P lor
Should a passenger fail to feed the
meter correctly, a reel flag appears on the
dial when time has expired, and the pas
senger is unceremoniously ejected —
without a parachute.
Just behind the first class cabin, in the
compartment now used for food and be
verage storage, there would be an
automat.
On no-frills flights of the futurt
information can be imparted overilj
ter-com by recorded announce^
There can even be a tape infon
that due to heavy congestion inthd
pattern it will be necessary to cirti
airport a couple of hours beforelai laces, n
In sum, I can’t think of anythin; pning s
man pilot does that an automat*Imfiec
couldn't do as well or better. Exct:| Kle U P.
dorse his paycheck. Which isthekB 1 ' 680 *
frill passengers can learn to do n(
Jackson’s speech has good and bad points
ervone
dentity,
xiild up
tyof exj
Christ
by Eric Marnell
Rev. Jackson’s speech was both en
couraging and discouraging. It was en
couraging for several reasons. First, he
pointed out that a war between the Un
ited States and the Soviet Union would
probably be the shortest, but most costly
in terms of human lives, of all wars. From
past experience, the horrors of nuclear
warfare are brought into our memory.
His idea about traveling to Geneva and
challenging Yuri Andropov to meet with
him to save mankind from itself is an
excellent idea whose time has come. Why
doesn’t our current administration con
sider this option?
Second, Rev. Jackson pointed out that
racism is a major problem in America and
that the work of Dr. Martin Luther King
represents only the initial work required
to eliminate racism.
Third, I agree completely with him in
that the mission of our Marines in Leba
non is rather ill-defined. Their mission
should be not as a “show of force” or a
target for Iranian suicide squads bent on
violent solutions to diplomatically negoti
able problems.
Consider what could happen if the
Russians simply ignore any treaty or if
another party outside of the accord (such
as Libya) acquires a nuclear weapon to
blackmail America. Even if Rev. Jackson
reader's forum
On the discouraging side, Rev. Jackson
left me wondering what he really said. On
nuclear disarmament, there are indi
viduals in this country who believe that
complete disarmament could be achieved
between America and the Soviet Union,
allowing the world to reach a state of nir
vana. This extremely naive-pacifist view
point could be dangerousl
their concern with what the West thinks
(i.e. KAL 007 being shot down, Afghanis
tan invasion, etc.). Certainly Mr. Andro
pov isn’t concerned with impressing the
average Russian back in Russia!
Racism is by no means a one-way street
and he should have made this clear. In
stead, he worked himself and the audi
ence into a racism frenzy. His approach
was counterproductive as he alienated a
good portion of the audience. Why must
it take a black presidential candidate to
address the problem of racism? Reverse
discrimination does exist.
'as in thi
'St of f
fam
anon
sing them. To make matters won
made several economic blunders
someone unable to think in anea
framework would make. How
pie in the audience picked theitiphrist
Probably a handfull of indiviri p m be
most. One common mistake hema®LS LUt
that trade deficits are bad. Onilit
trary, they are not bad.
The t
x in I!
re Air
iglish.
re we
swar
went to Geneva to meet with Andropov,
who is to say he would show up? Have the
Russians ever been overly concerned
with what the Western world thinks of
them? Past Soviet actions demonstrate
On a last note, I was discouraged about
Rev. Jackson’s lack of attention paid to
other issues. For example, economic
issues will probably be a major topic and
he spent about five minutes or less discus-
What the average American
ize is that we cannot count on thejfl
ment to solve all our problems.TE a ^ o " 11
typical democrat’s solution — toB as
more money at a problem as wpt 0 f m
toward the total welfare state, tfliito this
must help themselves, and wheBBChris
can’t, then there is a limited role frying v
ernment. jrP.hii
(emotion
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77843. .
Freshmen uppity in Washington
“Sonn
ihen wa:
■child
lep by
ming:
by Maxwell Glen
and Cody Shearer
WASHINGTON — It’s the bane of
every freshman to be treated like a child.
Freshmen are to be seen, not heard.
When called upon to do chores, they
y must deliver. Hazing by upperclassmen
must be suffered magnanimously.
In the House of Representatives, the
expectations for f reshmen are little diffe
rent. In the House, however, when the
kids become uppity, the reaction of older
members rates national attention.
So it was last week as Congress fussed
and grumbled its way to adjournment for
the Thanksgiving recess. Among the
most depressing issues on its last-minute
agenda was the federal deficit in general
and a vote to increase taxes by as much as
$73 billion in particular. Had it not been
for first-term House Democrats, Speaker
Tip O’Neill might never have let that vote
come to the floor.
One week earlier, about two dozen
Democratic representatives, many of
them liberal freshmen, voted against a
bill that would have kept the federal gov
ernment running under continuing re
solution. Their complaint was simple:
continuing appropriations would allow
election-conscious congressmen to avoid
the revenue-raising (i.e., tax increase) re
quirement inherent in the 1984 budget.
In protest, they were saying that even
liberals can be committed to chopping
the deficit.
House veterans responded with hostile
condescension. Speaking for many of his
fellow old-timers. Majority Leader Jim
Wright subsequently proclaimed that he
felt like a football player who, on his way
toward a certain touchdown, is blind
sided by a member of his own team.
Nonetheless, the new members’ action
may have done more than any other to
revive their colleagues’ commitment to a
vote on, if not passage of, a needed tax
increase last Friday.
Marcy Kaptur of Ohio, 37, and’
planning expert and Carter Whitel
aide. Like Morrison and others
long-struggling Northern cities,
contended that a jobs bill targeted S
to unemployed rates misses those
ers who had stopped looking for 1
Last week’s vote was only the latest in a
series of actions for which the freshman
Democrats can take partial responsibility.
For example, had it not been for their
cohesive efforts to make last spring’s jobs
bill more equitable, many chronically
poor districts might have gone without
relief. It was soon thereafter that they
threw themselves as a unit into the pits of
federal bugetry, succesfully lobbying for
a tax increase pledge in the eventual
budget resolution.
Out of 1982’s freshman class have
emerged several stalwarts who deserve
all-star mention for level-headedness in
their first year. Rising stars can fade as
quickly as Guy Vander Jagt (remember
the much-hearalded rhetorician who was
chosen to keynote the 1980 COP conven
tion and subsequently vanished?), but
among the unconventional Democrats to
watch are:
Bruce Morrison of Connecticut, 39, a
former chief of New Haven Legal Ser
vices. After serving as the first chairman
of his freshman caucus, Morrison has
continued to be one of its leading stateg-
ists.
Richard Durbin of Illinois, 39, a for
mer lieutenant governer and practicing
attorney. The freshman caucus’ current
chairman, he played a significant role in
delivering votes on the first budget re
solution.
“Forget the bowl invitatioi
What more could we wanttk
sixty minutes with the sip*
Kyle Field?”