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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (June 18, 1987)
Page 2/The Battalion/Thursday, June 18, 1987 Opinion What happens when everybody shoots bad Bernhard Goetz: subway saint or sadistic shootist? Although a jury acquitted Goetz on charges of attempted murder Tuesday, the question has not been answered. Was Goetz protecting himself Karl Pallmeyer or did he gun down four innocent victims on that subway on Dec. 22, 1984? Goetz claims that four black youths, Barry Allen, Darrell Cabey, Troy Canty and James Ramseur, surrounded him and were about to beat him up and rob him. The four men said they werejust panhandling when Goetz drew his unlicensed .38 revolver and shot them. Either way, one of the men, Cabey, now suffers from paralysis and brain damage. New York is a dangerous city. In the words of a bag lady who asked me for money one morning in New York: “The idea behind New York is that you can kill somebody and then collect their insurance money.” I was there for just a few days when I saw what looked like a pick-pocket at work. Crime and violence is high in New York just as it is in any other large city. The police can’t be everywhere at once, so some people decide to take the law into their own hands. One night, while riding the subway to Brooklyn, I saw two Guardian Angels, self-appointed protectors of the people, burst through one subway car on their way to another. A few minutes later they were walking back congratulating each other and giving each other the high five. I didn’t even want to know what happened. Like most people in New York, I didn’t want to get involved. It’s not that the people don’t care and don’t want to help their fellow man, it’s just that they are afraid that their own lives will be in danger if they get involved. It’s nice that there are some people who want to protect others but sometimes you have to wonder. Are the people who beat up people in the name of the law committing violence in order to uphold the law or just because they like to beat up people? Do the Guardian Angels and vigilantes like Goetz use violence to maintain peace or to receive pleasure for themselves?Goetz himself admitted that while he was shooting, his intention was “to murder them, to hurt them, to make them suffer as much as possible.” A New York subway is a depressing place. The weight of the city’s seven million people can be felt pressing down on everyone. After a hard day of work and trying to deal with the city, tempers are on the edge. The threat of robbery and/or physical harm doesn’t set people’s minds at ease. It’s easy for someone to lose his cool under the intense tension and fear on the subways. When that person is carrying a weapon, especially a gun, someone is bound to get hurt. Goetz may have had the right to protect himself, but did he have the right to hurt others? Did he have to carry a gun? Did he have to shoot all four men? Wouldn’t a shot in the air have been enough to scare off his alleged attackers? They jury has made its decision and Goetz is acquitted of 12 charges, including second-degree attempted murder, first-degree assault and reckless endangerment. The jury did convict Goetz on one charge, a third- degree weapons possession charge for owning the gun he used on the four men. On Sept. 4, Goetz will be sentanced for the weapons charge. He could serve 2 and one-third to 7 years in prison. Or he could get off without serving any time in prison. If justice is to be upheld in this case, Goetz must serve for his crime. Maybe he was protecting himself and he shouldn’t, like the jury said, be punished. But he was carrying an illegal gun and harmed others with that gun. lei ByJ' If Cioetz is allowed to get off scoti: for the case, more and more scared people will start carrying guns.Thei will think that they need loproteci themselves and, if they have to used gun, they will be acquitted. If more; more scared people start carrying^ there are going to be more and moi shootings. Many of those shootings won’t be in self defense. Manyoftf shootings will be the result of someoBcurricu getting mad and dec i(ling to iTaib'tt)' dieir < gun instead of common sense. Increasing A person should have the rightJondary sc protect hmiM-li and oiliers. Butil>!^ 1k ‘ i < ’ <l ' . , . , . j .■Donna when that right is abused to the porL), U1 C( | that the r< si <>l the peopleimistprilthstnuiini themselves from those whoclaimt are protecting themselves andotlii Karl Pallmeyer is a journalism graduate and a columnist forTk Battalion. students ii now mine tain profe economy i ■The Me by Larke area mine A&M stuc Who needs college to moke mega bucks? ivailable t< JThe pr both the r As I turn the corner at 40 mph — a speed I’ve worked up to in just two days —the lights from my truck shine on the home of my first customer. Mike Sullivan Guest Columnist It’s 3 a.m. as I cruise past his driveway. Slap. First newspaper delivered, 349 to go. “What the hell am 1 doing here,” I asked myself the first night on the job. May 9th, I became a college-educated man. My grade point is respectable and I was involved in extracurricular activities while in school. I majored in journalism, but 1 never expected to be delivering newspapers — a job that reejuires none of the above qualifications and much less. So why am I doing it? Because I’ll clear $450 this week. And that ain’t bad for roughly 20 hours of work. I’m filling in for a carrier who’s on vacation, but the man in charge wants me to come to work for him full time. He’s guaranteed me $30,000 my first year with a promise to promote me within two years to a joo paying $50,000. He’s not just blowing smoke, either. This guy is making about $ 11,000 a month as a distributor. What would you do? I have other plans, but I must admit the offer is tempting. Here’s a job requiring almost nothing of the employee other than common sense, responsibility and a reliable vehicle. And it pays better than 95 percent of the jobs any of us members of the college-educated elite will have on graduation day. If throwing newspapers doesn’t do much for you — even at that price — maybe you’d be interested in something a little closer to home. How about a maintenence job at Texas A&M. I have it from a reliable source that those people who walk around picking up trash and painting campus parking lots start out at as much as $ 11.00 an hour, or roughly $22,000 a year. Don’t forget about benefits. You might even be able to sneak into football games wearing that uniform. How much pride — false pride at any rate — do you have? If you have a college degree and you’re interested in making blue-collar money, I guess that’s what it boils down to. While delivering papers in an apartment complex the other morning around 6 a.m., some of the people were beginning to leave for work. I even hand-delivered a few papers to nicely dressed young people. Most weren’t too friendly and some were even rude. To them, I was just a newspaper delivery man, ranking right above garbage men on the social scale. They probably thought me a real scum sucker. But they didn’t know me. They didn’t know I was probably making more i them. Ai wouldn’t have dreamed that I have a degree from the best University in Texas. I almost felt like telling them. There’s that false pride coming through. So why don’t I accept the generous offer and go to work full time for the newspaper? It’s not that I’m looking forward to office politics, incompetent superiors and fellow employees who like coffee better than work. No, I need a challenge, as, I hope, all college-educated people do.After a few nights throwing papers, the job isn’t much of a challenge. So, I’ve decided to continue to pursue a more mentally demanding line of work, a career in which all of my qualifications, experience and talent will be constantly called upon and tested. And if my chosen profession doesn’t provide any of that, I’m sure I’ll find it challenging to live on the salary. Mike Sullivan is a journalism graduate, guest columnist for The Battalion and one great guy. Public should be exempt from AIDS testirv Howard Phillips, chairman of the Conservative Caucus, is an important figure on the political right. He recently appeared on television to express a conservative position on AIDS Richard Cohen Next to Jim Bakker, Falwell loves homosexuals the most.In contrast, we have the language of President Reagan. In his recent speech calling for limited AIDS testing (of immigrants, federal prisoners, patients in VA hospitals, persons applying for marriage licenses and those attending sexual-disease clinics), the president sounded a cautionary note: “This is a battle against disease, not against our fellow Americans.” and, in passing, his views on homosexuality. He favors the widest- possible testing of almost everyone under any circumstances, including “prospective apartment renters.” Phillips apparently thinks you can get AIDS from a lease. As a minor (one apartment) landlord myself, I am appalled. I don’t know how to repair a toilet, much less administer an AIDS test. In my experience, just checking bank references is chore enough. Asking every prospective tenant to submit to an AIDS test (monthly? annually?) is enough to dampen my entrepreneurial spirit. I will not even mention the ever-increasing cost of fuel. Reagan is no bigot when it comes to homosexuals. As California governor, when some homosexuals were discovered on his staff, Reagan handled what could have been a nasty scandal with sensitivity. But he has failed to deal with the ugly homophobia infecting much of the American conservative movement. Along with Vice President Bush, he has kissed the ring of mudslingers such as Falwell and refused to slap down the likes of Phillips. Now the nation is paying a price. AIDS, which is a disease after all, has become a political issue. Where the nation should be united, it is divided. The administration has little credibility with homosexuals. For good reasons (its rhetoric, its associations and some appalling administrative decisions), it is not trusted by the gay community. Even some scientists suspect the White House is more interested in battling homosexuals than the disease that’s killing them.Maybe limited mandatory testing is the way to go. Coming from another administration, such a proposal —hardly Draconian, after all — might be met with some minor protest, discussion and, ultimately, compromise. But in the gay community, the Reagan administration is known by the company it keeps and the decisions it has made. Until the Supreme Court ruled otherwise, the Reagan Justice Department said AIDS victims could be legally fired whether the fear of contagion was “reasonable or not.” And, just recently, the White House refused to reserve a seat for a homosexual on the president’s AIDS commission move akin to denying Jews a place«| the Holocaust commission. (Aboul percent of all AIDS victims are In the Eisenhower era, thephrast “moral suasion” had a certaincurrti It referred to the president’spown set a certain moral tone, toleadW of character. Dwight D. Eisenhouerj faulted for failing to do precisely^ when it came to school desegregate and history has assigned him some j demerits as a result. The judgement of history isnot'1 on President Reagan. But surely it‘j have to take into account a preside! 1 ! AUST lupreme for the fi Ory of in :es such The tmptor” ijule “as as repair; ntly out rn servu “It doe the ordir but to th Couragir ’ shoddy v C opi "s sai I' The St ■arrant i Lonnie glgaiiist V turing Co The B modular they pure veloped ] Over the y ter movii a sin the drain alls. Ajury: ages, and eals at F ial cour ipheld th Cle AUST II eight bills good new; breakers. The leg whose own words, when it comes to sum thate AIDS and homosexuals, wereabo'* the hills wi reproach, but who was silentabotitl 1 waI1,1 reprehensible language °1 his ag/tha’/ha supporters. When it comes to Am- ‘-jj lcse | ultimate test may well he for moral l an( j sate principles. It should be administer! li es a nd p politicians, not apartment renters 1] bills are b; were, the Reagan administration^ form to tin flunk. ■ “The ef on our soci Copyright 1987, Washington Post WritW 1 His money than ind certainly they I start with Phillips for a reason, suggestion is typical of the demagoguery coming from some segments of the American conservative movement on the issue of AIDS and homosexuality. Others have made similar suggestions and, of course, Jerry Falwell, who precedes his attempts at character assassination with a “Sonnet From The Portuguese” (“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways?”), continues to employ ugly anti-gay language in his fund-raising appeals. The Battalion (USPS 045 360) Member of Texas Press Association Southwestjournalism Conference The Battalion Editorial Board Sondra Pickard, Editor Jerry Oslin, Opinion Page Editor Rodney Rather, City Editor John Jarvis, Robbyn L. Lister, News Editors Homer Jacobs, Sports Editor Robert W. Rizzo, Photo Editor Editorial Policy The Battalion is a non-profit, self-supporting newspaper oper- ~ :M and Br Iryan-College Sta- ated as a community service to Texas A&M ; tion. Opinions expressed in The Battalion are those of the editorial board or the author, and do not necessarily represent the opinions of Texas A&M administrators, faculty or the Board of Regents. The Battalion also serves as a laboratory newspaper for students in,reporting, editing and photography classes within the Depart ment of Journalism. The Battalion is published Monday through Friday during Texas A&M regular semesters, except for holiday and examination periods. Mail subscriptions are $17.44 per semester, $34.62 per school year and $36.44 per full year. Advertising rates furnished on re quest. Our address: The Battalion, 216 Reed McDonald, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843-4111. Second class postage paid at College Station, TX 77843. 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