The Battalion
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Southwest Journalism Conference
The Battalion Editorial Board
Loren Steffy, Editor
Marybeth Rohsner, Managing Editor
Mike Sullivan, Opinion Page Editor
Jens Koepke, City Editor
Sue Krenek, Jeanne Isenberg, News Editors
Homer Jacobs, Sports Editor
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Fundamentally wrong
fa Wound your teddy,
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I a tat tat tat...
hristir
Seven fundamentalist Christian families successfully have
slapped society with a $50,000 bill to pay for the private education of
their children because the families’ personal beliefs prohibit them
from educating their children in an environment that champions
reality.
The families believe their Christian children will be morally cor
rupted by books teaching evolution, the occult, secular humanism
and 13 other anti-religious themes.
Personal beliefs, which are prone to change over time, are a basic
right of all individuals. But should society bear the costs of personal
preferences?
A Tennessee federal judge says it should. And, following his
logic, every individual can demand some compensation for a cause
he holds dear but society does not.
Rather than allow their children the opportunity to discern be
tween two opposing viewpoints, the families have chosen to force
taxpayers to fund the indoctrination of children into their parents’
mindset.
No one is criticizing the fundamentalists’ views or denying them
their right to hold certain religious beliefs. Making the rest of society
pick up the tab for not holding similar beliefs is what we question.
It would be logical — and actually quite fair, according to the
Tennessee ruling — that all private education be funded by the state
because the personal beliefs of families’ of the students in these
schools don’t agree with public school curriculum. An example
would be Moslem children who are forced to sing Christian
Christmas carols.
For that matter, there are prisons around the nation full of peo
ple who don’t agree with society’s perception of reality. Should they
be monetarily compensated by the state for their individual beliefs?
The worst part about the ruling is that personal beliefs have a
tendency to change. If these seven fundamentalist families change
their ideology to that of the public school’s after their children are
educated, will the state get a refund?
Personal beliefs are the right of everyone. They deserve to be
pondered, communicated and revised. But they don’t deserve to be
financed by everybody else.
MARGUUES
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It’s that lame time
of year again for
college students.
The time when
nobody cares
about anything ex
cept final grades
and Friday. It’s
the time of the se
mester when few
people even
bother to pick up a
Battalion and even
fewer read it.
fended this week will have had ample
time to work off his frustration in some
socially acceptable way — like getting
drunk and driving, for instance.
Writing this column is sort of like
going into the now-empty room where
your most hated class was held all se
mester and yelling something obscene at
the professor. “Eat septic waste, Profes
sor Groinbuster!”
dential hall
“Actuall
two or thre
jpesays.
Each ye
weeks of D
g’s stude
columned
Ik to pr;
On the
ath, de
jen, with
11 thre
jUse, thei
Mike
Sullivan
I could say just about anything in this
column and not get one letter because
this is the last issue of the paper for the
year. By the time classes start up again
next semester, anybody I might have of-
It’s fun, but it does little good. The
newspaper is in its lame-duck phase, if
you will. Some people think it’s in this
phase all semester, but that’s another
column.
Breaking the law to help
kill commies is OK by Ron
For today’s lesson
in illogic and hy
pocrisy, let us turn
to the writings,
ramblings and
rantings of Patrick
J. Buchanan, who
shared the White
House bunker
with Richard M.
Nixon and now
occupies the same
place under his
Assumed a defensive position in con
gressional hearings behind the Fifth
Amendment.
The difference between North and
King, it seems, is that one broke laws for
i cause that Buchanan (not to mention
Reagan) opposed, while North’s possi-
)le criminality served the cause of anti-
rommunism.
Richard
Cohen
latest true love, Ronald Reagan. Bunker
Buchanan, with, he claims, the permis
sion of the president, says if Lt. Col. Oli
ver North broke the law, it was for a
good cause.
For this exercise in rationalization,
Buchanan assembles quite a case. In a
Washington Post essay, the White
House communications director com
pared North to abolitionists who “ran
escaped slaves up the Underground
Railroad;” to Franklin Roosevelt who,
before the war, “secretly ordered Amer
ican destroyers to hunt down German
submarines”; to Col. Billy Mitchell who
was court-martialed for insubordination
and to “Americans who ran guns to Pal
estine.” Missing from this list is any
mention of Martin Luther King, Jr.
But there are other differences and
they are telling. With the exception of
Roosevelt, none of the examples Bu
chanan cited were instances of the gov
ernment breaking the law. King, for
one, was a private citizen whose law
breaking was both public and symbolic
and for which he expected — and re
ceived — penalties. He was jailed, ha
rassed and, in the end, murdered.
pen to be a high government official
who has taken an oath to the Constitu
tion, but not if you are a mere private
citizen who cannot hide behind the veil
of national security? Is it permissible if
you do it in secret, with stealth and lies,
but not if you do it out in the open, be
fore the police who will arrest you, the
mob that would kill you, the press that
reports your every move and the FBI
which bugs your motel room?
But it was King whom Buchanan crit
icized even in death for — get this —
breaking the law. In a 1969 memo to
President Nixon, Buchanan warned the
president against visiting King’s widow,
Coretta, on the first anniversary of the
civil-rights leader’s assassination. How
could Nixon “possibly argue as a moral
leader against the doctrine of civil dis
obedience when he pays public homage
to its foremost practitioner of our
time?” Buchanan asked.
Americans who ran guns to Palestine
during the Israeli war of independence
also were private citizens. And so were
the abolitionists. At least one of them,
Elijah Lovejoy, was killed by a mob, and
others were beaten senseless. As for
Billy Mitchell, one wonders how he got
on Buchanan’s list. His public insubor
dination — he accused his military supe
riors of “incompetency, criminal neg
ligence and almost treasonable
administration of the national defense”
— was certainly a mouthful, but hardly
a criminal act.
These are good questions to put to
Buchanan but even better to pose to the
president. He is the one, Buchanan says,
who has — again probably with a wink
and nod — given permission for this
great speak-out — the essay, speeches
and network-TV interviews. He is the
one who has allowed Buchanan, a White
House aide, to argue that a government
official can decide for himself — in the
manner of North — which laws to break
and which to uphold. We can only as
sume that Reagan has given his commu
nications director permission to make
this case because he agrees with it. Or
hasn’t he been informed?
Copyright 1986, Washington Post Writers Group
Most students don’t have time to keep
up with the World this week because
they’re busy cramming for exams, por
ing a semester’s worth of notes into a
cogitatively tapped-out mind.
If you don’t have at least a GPR of
3.0, no self-respecting accounting firm
will even look at you. And you can kiss
goodbye that account executive job with
the big advertising agency if you can’t
show all A’s in your marketing classes.
It’s funny how so many people panic
and stay up nights during finals week
because they suddenly realize it’s their
last shot at a successful semester, how
ever hopeless it may be.
Finals week, or even dead week for
that matter, would be an excellent time
to test that Aggie spirit everybody’s so
proud of around here.
Midnight yell practice should be held
for the Cotton Bowl tonight. I bet at
least seven people would show up.
whoop.
O.K., that’s not fair. Exams are im
portant and it wouldn’t be right to force
loyal Aggies into making such a reveal
ing compromise. So let’s have yell prac
tice Friday night. There are no classes
Saturday and what a great way to kick
off the holiday season.
But the person who shows up will
have to clear the tumbleweeds out of
Kyle Field before the festivities can be
gin.
I can hear the excuses now. “Well,
sure, my blood is deep maroon, but it
was that color when I was born,” Joe Ag
gie says as he drives away in his maroon
car with his maroon-haired girlfriend.
So there’s a general lack of “whoops”
around campus during finals week, but
that’s to be expected. And besides,
Jackie Sherrill and Kevin Murray might
not even be at the Cotton Bowl.
Oh, it’s just a rumor,!
Post Southwest Conference
reported, “Jackie Sherrilki
headed home to . .
mater (Alabama).’’ Andoftcl
eryone read about therehai
old allegations against Mumil
i s Im.iK week, and
respond to stupid rumore. 5^Jr!L'
wunpN old \( AA "fjficiai i s
ANM on piobation. Thaibf|phceilinj
SMI'. I But the i
\ 11 \ I >od \ want to bin a nKl
ticket?
sents. Pine
1 hat's enough nastmo' feed plant
there are some good thingsi*display,
week. For example, it's easy^B™ e
parking space on campus
And the noise level at nit) - g
where 1 live, is almost suburta
are no blasting stereos, singit
or screaming women tocallitif
But the best thing aboutfe
that when it’s over, “school's*
as one of my more colorfulfi
likes to say.
Everyone can go homeii
about classes, grades andi
they promised to call over ikl
The approaching four-wee!
sion comes in second onlytoi®
the favorite time of year lot®
dents.
If you can convinceyourp®
four weeks isn’t enough ttn
job, and maybe get them tosS-l
little dough, Christmasbreabj
jolliest time of all.
Days can be lounged away
re-runs of Gilligan’s Island
beer, playing tiddlywinks and0
day. If you can find a friend
even do a little thumb-wrestlf
Being my last Christmasbrfi
sure to savor every momentof 1
ton way of life, but I feels® 11
December graduates.
Dad: “Merry Christmas,
find a job.
Son: “In Texas?”
Dad: “ fry 1-35 North.”
Most everyone reading
least one more semester
face the great unknown, soj]
mind at ease and get back to
After all, it’s that lame time
no serious student should
time reading this column.
Mike Sullivan is a senior
major and the Opinion Pif
The Battalion.
It can be assumed Buchanan has
penned no similar memo to Reagan re
garding North. Instead — like the presi
dent — Bunker Buchanan has lauded
him as a hero even after Reagan charac
terized North’s diversion of funds from
Iranian arms sales to the Nicaraguan
Contras as an impropriety and North
None of these historic shoes — in
cluding Roosevelt’s skirting of the Neu
trality Act — fit North. If we are to be-
lieve the Swiss-cheesy report of
Attorney General Edwin Meese III,
North took it on his own to violate Con
gress’ ban against lethal aid to the Nica
raguan Contras. He did so, we are told,
with a wink and nod from National Se
curity Director Adm. John M. Poin
dexter, and supposedly without the per
mission or knowledge of the president.
What is Buchanan’s standard when it
comes to law-breaking? Is it permissible
if the object is to kill commies but not to
bring justice to black Americans? Is it
OK if you are white and splendidly be-
medaled, but not if you are black and a
civilian? Is it fine and dandy if you hap-
Mail Call
Condoms for kids?
EDITOR:
Dr. Kenneth Matthews is an asset to this community. His
pitch for sex education in the schools is a fact in the Houston
area.
The January issue of Ms. magazine carries an ad for “Mentor
Condoms.” This type of advertising should be available in all
print matter.
Elza Gardner Tax
due mostly to the GTE phone company. KANM’ssignq
present, transmitted to McCaw cable via two telephone^
we rent from GTE on a monthly basis.
Plans are in the working to microwave thesignalWq
This requires a license from the FCC and about S4,50( |: j
equipment. KANM’s budget has almost enough toco' e,l l
and applications for the license are on the way. This |
improvement will put KANM’s sound quality on par" 11 'I
MTV and T he Movie Channel’s stereo broadcasts.
Good tunes on way
EDITOR:
In response to the letter in Dec. 10 Mail Call by Russ
Newsome, referring to the sound quality of KANM, 99.9 FM, I
would like to say, someone does care. I am a disc jockey at
KANM. The “ragged, fuzzy and distorted” sound of KANM is
Thank you for your concern and the compliments 01
personnel and their alternative musical tastes.
Steven M. Krebs
D.J. and assistant engineer of KANM
Letters to the editor should not exceed 300 words in length. Thf k
serves the right to edit letters for style and length, but will md'
maintain the author’s intent. Each letter must be signed and mustn
sification, address and telephone number of the writer.
i#