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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (May 21, 1986)
.v Page 2n"he Battalion/Wednesday, May 21,1986 Time to cast ‘phony’ equal access votes In the next two months you will be partcipating in the greatest election of your life. You will be voting for the long-distance telephone com pany of your choice. This may be the most magnificent P" ballot you ever cast. Art Buchwald People in the United States tend to take their right to choose a long-distance service for granted. They don’t appreciate that in communist and socialist nations the phone service is run by the state. Sovi ets, Chinese, Cubans and Afghans have never heard the words, “Thank you for using AT&T.” Faceless bureaucrats dic tate what kinds of phones they will have. If they are overcharged or get a wrong number they are turned over to a conv munications commissar. If they com plain, he comes into their home and yanks the phone line out of the wall. In the United States the right to vote for your telephone company is the most precious gift you have. And to preserve this right, every citizen over the age of 18 must stand up and be counted. A large vote will send a message to our enemies around the globe that we in this country support our long-distance serv ices whether they are right or wrong. This year there are many long-dis tance services on the ballot. Some are spending millions of dollars to be elected. The incumbent, AT&T, is fa vored mainly because the company is running on Ma Bell’s coattails. Cliff Robertson, TV spokesman for AT&T, is promising faster station-to-station calls, clearer reception and the reform of the telephone tax. Burt Lancaster is spokesman for MCI. He is a firm, no-nonsense type who has challenged Cliff to a debate on who has the lowest long-distance prices. Lancaster has been pledging cheaper There are many other long-distance services to vote for. A few are: Western Union, ITT, ALLNET and U.S. Tele com. The important thing to know is that everyone has to have a long-distance line whether or not he or she wants it. Some of you may be saying, “Why should I vote? I have no control over my long-distance destiny.” The reason is that if you don’t send in your ballot, YOUR LOCAL PHONE COMPANY WILL CHOOSE A LONG DISTANCE CARRIER FOR YOU. Can you imagine someone coming up the walk, knocking on the door and say ing, “I’m from MCI and I have been as signed to make ALL your long-distance calls — whether you like it or not.” Or how would you feel about receiving a phone call at 2 a.m. from a Western Union man who says, “If you don’t call California immediately you will never see your Princess phone again.” Copyright 1986, Los Angeles Times Syndicate WTf YOU WANT A BIRTH CONTROL REVICE p / ARE YOU TWINS WANTON SIX WITH SOMEONE, MISS? ARENTYOIMUTUE WTJNS FOR THAT, YOU HUSSY? TWOIPAREYOU.YOU fERVERTS, SIXTEEN? MYOOR WRENT5 KNOW AOTTTHISTWHATS THEIR RHONE NUMBER? I ENJOY COUNSELING TEENAGERS / The Battalion (USPS 045 360) Member of Texas 1’ress Association Southwest journalism Confe.renci The Battalion Editorial Board 1 ‘J""' t.iliioi Opinion i •'.•A ( in Ed Yen s Editoi Sports Editor Michelle Powe Loren Steffi .Scott Sutherland Ka\ Mallett Ken Sun I lu- It.itiali 1 ’" I' •' Editorial Policy >e//-Mi/</«'/nit!i /ten i <»/« i.i/e</ .i> .< [tnnmtinn\ . YA W .111(1 lit \ .Si.ilP’fi- //, Tin- Baiuilion me ilwsc ni the hdinniul lln.ntl or ihe nuthoi and do not nece»;nil\ le/nesent the 0\>ini t,n> csl> iidniinisnmoi s. l;u tilt\ ot the lionnl ol Regents. "I'ilii, ,»!><»/ ‘ cs ' "' c,, set \es ns ;i IhIhhhioi\ newsimtiet lot students in iej)otting. editing and photoginjdn classes within the I) ' K 1 E hull lhtll>tn. ‘'Nwm’Hi ''d • published Mond;i\ tlnotigh hid;t\ dining I ex.is U' ^ r|/>f/n/J> <JU . sia p CI scnicstci. S.Vi.lV> />ei ""'Mii-t/ti/i -I fi Reed A/t Donald lluilding. I e\as \s paid at College Station. I X 77SCI. , I’( lVf\| \Sli:R- Send add less changes to l lie liall.ilinn. 2 Hi Reed iemestet s. except foi holida\ and exami- and S.la pet lull \eai. Advertising rates M i niversitv. College Station. I X 77S4d. McDonald. Texas AX .M L 'ni\ ersit\. College Station Opinion BUILP A BETTER MOUSETRAP AMP THE WORLD WILL BEAT A PATH TO YOUR POOR night rates, friendlier operators and no frill calls to Alaska. Burt should get the older vote, as most of the senior citizens remember seeing his movies. They perceive him as someone who can be trusted to tell them to do the right thing when selecting a telephone company. T hen there is Joan Rivers, whose campaign for GTE Sprint consists of making fun of other phone companies. Joan’s appeal is to those who don’t take their long-distance calls too seriously. While attracting a tremendous follow ing with her commercials, there is now a big question of whether she can keep her supporters after leaving the Johnny Carson show. A telephone election analyst with the brokerage firm of Dial, Buzzer & Hold said, “Johnny Carson has a loyal constit uency,. and if people switch their votes because of Rivers’ breakup with Johnny, you’re going to see one helluva horse ra ce.” United FeiturtS/Dint; Soviet schools teach peace with lack of understanding TBILISI, U.S.S.R. — Sa mantha Smith, dead in a New En gland plane crash, lives on here in So viet Georgia. There is a drawing of her, yellow hair and bright smile, on the wall of the where En- Richard Cohen room glish is taught in the first school, the city’s oldest. Samantha holds an Ameri can flag and says, “We want peace and friendship.” She is answered by the Rus sian girl who went to America, Katerina Lycheva. She wants peace and friendship, too. But down the block from the school, there are different drawings. They show a wooden and mean-looking Un cle Sam holding blacks in chains. Other Uncle Sams are kicking people, Third World peoples, for whom the Russians have a much declared and superficial sympathy. From the looks Africans and Asians get on the street, it’s clear many Soviets would much prefer the liberated peoples to stay precisely where they have been liberated. In the school, though, the message is only of peace. In the English class, the teacher begins by saying, “Now chil dren, the most important problem of the world is peace.” With that, a young man, dressed like all the others in a blue uniform, pops to his feet. He has mem orized a poem. It begins, “1 want to live and not die.” On a table are albums sent from the United States. From my chair in the classroom, I can see the color photos of American children who smile from Georgia. It is a bit corny, this affinity of one Georgia for the other, but it seems to work. The school is the Galloway in Atlanta and the album is called “Favo rite Topics of the Galloway School." The teacher hands it to me. “It shows well that we want to be friendly with America,” she says. On a wall is a dove of peace. There are others in the halllway. The word peace in English can be seen time and again, although it is two languages re moved for these kids. Their native tongue is Georgian, in which they are largely taught, but they have to know their Russian, too. One by one they rise to show their stuff. 1 am serendaded with Americana. The first song is “Row, Row, Row Your Boat,” originally taught, I am told, by yet another visiting American journalist. Then comes “John Brown’s Body” and then “T his Land Is Your Land.” 1 he room pulses with the lyrical words of Woody Guthrie (no surprise to Guth rie’s political enemies, I’m sure) and the words carry just a slight accent. Still, here in the exotic Gaucasus, we are in Galifornia and the New York island, the redwood forest and the gulf-stream wa ters . . . “this land was made for you and me.” What is to be made of this? Probably not much. Other rooms of the school are mini-museums — to the war, to ear lier history, to the revolution. It is not possible for even a Georgian not to know that the Soviet Union, Russia es pecially, has time and time again been attacked by enemies. The display down the street shows that the United States could be one of those enemies. Vigi lance is required. Still, kids are kids and they are learn ing something — more about my coun try than I ever knew of theirs at age 14. It is impossible to know what the conse quences are, though. When a boy recites a short description of how Bri governed, does he understandJ role of the political partieshejJ tioned? Does he know thatPii really governs and, if so, whau] think of his own country? In the kindergarten, they cuts* color paper butterflies, allthetiit ing along to phonograph recur teacher plays, one is a Georgia; tune. T his kids stop and doafoll^l Then the teacher puts on anott cord. It is 1970s style rock. A dor viet tots do the monkey. Later the butterflies is chosen as tkii disagree and, with a lot of gigP'lf presented with all of them. Back in the English room, dies, has turned to poetry. A boy walk f ront of the room. From niemon cites Longfellow’s “Hiawatha, words like “prairie” uttered with ■ cent, but also without intonatit ^ turn next to English literature, boy stands to tell of Byron am speare, Marlow and Dickens, b others, he recites from memon have the uneasy feeling that 1 ha the cause of much awful homen by myself, I may have given these good reason to hate America. BEA who o] busines state ! pleadec motion deliver State Daniel sentenc to 10 > totaling Park ocrat, v ent gra promot bution perjui later jury fa Par I Arthu i a real i he sol j April Jeffer [ney’s i Poli [rated Happ; [said. Toi Samantha Smith, deadinahe gland plane crash, lives on here,I less, some will say she is beingt death as she was in life—yetaii prop of Soviet propaganda. Cet that is the case. But she is looking Uncle Sam and that ij thing. Any girl in the first schft look at her and see just anodic I hat, Samantha might say, of whole idea. Th nsm \ T hex jaheac [tluit pear. To live i jieprt |mem Tli ■cord Iwho , IS 10 I: IT Imam land lu ilI g mark Copyright 1986, Washington Post Wriler Diploma wanted Call EDITOR. Last December when I graduated I received my diploma. However my name was spelled incorrectly. A note w ith my diploma assured me I would receive a new one in about six weeks. Unforeseen events since December have resulted in three address changes. I did notify the post master of each change of address and have received most of my mail. About two weeks ago I called admissions and records at Heaton Hall to find out what happened to my diploma and was told it had been mailed out “on the 22nd.” Up until the point when it was determined that my new diploma had been mailed out, the people I spoke with had been courteous and helpful, but that quickly changed. I had to question the person I was speaking with to find out it had been mailed out in February. Because the employee was seemingly unwilling to volunteer other information, I was forced to ask how I would go about getting another diploma. She cooly replied that the University would order another diploma but that I would have to pick it up in person. I calmly responded that that presented a problem as I now live in Indiana. In an even cooler tone the employee repeated I would have to pick up my diploma in person because the University would not mail it a second time. Perhaps I should be more upset with the U.S. Postal Service, but the cool indifference I met with in the quest for my diploma made it much easier and more convenient to be angry with Texas A&M. Perhaps part of the fault is mine for not letting admissions and records know of my new address each time I moved and for putting too much faith in the postal service to forward my mail correctly. On the other hand, maybe someone with a little understanding might realize how easy it was for me to be more concerned anhetitf with finding a job, transportation and a place to live, I can’t help but think of the millions of timesl heard people say A&M is different from anywhereelif about all the traditions and supposedly how the Uni- cares about its students. I guess bureaucracy is bureaucracy no matterwtT you go. So I’ll state my plea in terms best understood those who work in Heaton Hall. 7812934 (141486891 would like his diploma! John Hallett, Jr. Happy campers EDITOR: I would personally like to thank all the peoplewtd made the 1986 Exec-n-Rec Retreat what it was—mo the most fun-filled days that I’ve had in a while. We had a variety of people at Camp Olympia, had one goal in common — to learn from eachotheri apply what we learned to become better student bod' leaders. 1 see a desire in Off-Campus Aggies, hallofft 1 area coordinators and advisers to make a 1986-87aW Place (3 Che, All (I Sea 2 year Last, but not least, thank you Nyla Ptomey, David McDowell and the rest of the RHA officers for your support. Look out ’86-’87 — here we come! Arthur W. John RHA Chaplain Letters to the Editor should not exceed 300 words in length. The staff reserves the right to edit letters for style and length but will0 en effort to maintain the author's intent. Each letter must besif must include the address and telephone number of the writer. 0 F