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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 3, 1989)
OPINION Thursday, August 3,1989 Unpopular politician are hard to come by ir Every now and again it occurs to me that Sen. Phil Gramm might be just enough of an ideologue to prove useful: he’s such a pushy little squirrel he’s made himself thoroughly unpopular with his colleagues. But a politician will ing to be unpopular is hard to come by and a man ready to throw a spanner into the works occasionally can be worth his weight in awful legislation killed. Molly Ivins Syndicated Cote The trouble with Gramm is that so far he’s always been on the wrong side. And now he’s on the right side for the wrong reason, and what’s even more confusing is that he’s on the wrong side of his ar gument. Ispon 'and J Aug. Tr Then the junior senator fromTi took a fit and is now holding _ r whole works. Theoretically, Grant | c i ass SPtS&f)'/ One giant editor’s note Gramm is trying to stop the S&L bail out bill, and the immediate consequence of that move is to further stretch out the process and to cost everybody more money — $20 million a day. It would be worth the cost if Gramm had a good al ternative bill, and a chance to pass it. standing for fiscal responsibfc working against the effort toexem[)! S&L bailout from the provisk® Gramin-Rudman. Except even Gramm votes to exempt stuff Gramm-Rudman — he voted toea a $4.1 billion expenditure jusl Thursday. In ticipz Com Ch A&M Firen firefi part : ■ of tlx “T I "Man This summer has been a hot one, es pecially for The Battalion’s opinion page. Save the whales. Save the trees. Nuke the trees. Add a crossword puzzle to the page. Go to Iran and run ads for terror ists. I’ve heard it all this summer. We were bombarded with so many flag-bur ning letters that I had to abort (excuse me, I mean burn) some of them. But that’s OK, these are the controversial is sues and opposing viewpoints that make people turn to page two. [uliette <izzo Opinion Page Editor the page, let me say that letters to the editor are written by the readers for the readers. And to fill Mail Call, what some say is the most read section of the page, (and the paper for that matter), we need all the letters we can get. So don’t be afraid to write one. We don’t bite, and heck, we at The Battalion don’t even an swer them back. But nooooo, Gramm is supporting the original, truly dishonest bill pro posed by the Bush administration. In other words, he’s trying to stop a bad bill and replace it with a worse one, instead of a better one. The whole mess looks like a bad joke about Aggie economics. Gramm says he’s trying to stop:!::: plosion of the deficit — the onlyw| ’ here do that would be to raise taxestopatl lr the damn S&L bailout — and thaisl ^ s train what he wants to do. Rjteert Th As a practical matter, the Bush would make the deficit even worse Now that’s my opinion. Not the opin ion of the entire Battalion staff, not the opinion of the editorial board and cer tainly not the opinion of the entire Uni versity. It’s mine. All mine and, accord ing to the first amendment, I’m entitled to such opinions. And some of these be long on the page, after all, isn’t opinion the stuff page two is made of? I am writing this column to clear up some things for the readers of page two. In the past couple of weeks I’ve received several letters to the editor that have said basically the same things, namely that the “narrow-minded, emotional rather than reasonable” views of The Battalion staff and its editorial board are reflected in the columns and edito rial cartoons we run on the page. One letter clearly suggested that the entire editorial board is in favor of abortion on demand. This is a matter of opinion. Let me make it clear that I, as an editor, do not let my opinions appear on the page un less I express them in a column under my byline; nor do I let my personal views affect the daily decision of what to print. And as for the joint opinions of the editorial board, which is composed of eight editors, including myself, they are designated on the page as such and are not usually voiced daily, only when a situation arises about which we feel strongly enough to take a stance. To sum it all up, page two is a forum for individual expression about na tional, international and local events. It’s kind of a combination of every page of The Battalion including the sports page. (Hey, we even ran a Pete Rose col umn once.) To keep the page interest ing, we need your input. At issue is the $50 billion (ha-ha) the bill sets aside to close or merge about 600 failing thrifts. Numero uno, it’s going to cost a hell of a lot more than $50 billion to bail out that many S&Ls: the government has already spent $30 billion on the 200 thrifts it has bailed out so far, Numero Two-o, because of his “read my lips, no new taxes” pledge. To give you an idea of how bade whole bailout plan is, accordingtoi Dallas Times Herald, it is “a pieceofi [ islation that is regarded by banking perts as one of the most solid an sponsible bills ever to emerge Congress.” Does that give you anid how bad we’re getting the shaft-1 bankers are real happy. Now the rest of the page is kind of a random sampling of opinions from readers whose interest to respond is sparked by something on or off the page. Guest columns are just that — they’re written by someone other than a staff member. And Mail Call, our letters column, is, as Paul LaRocque of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram once said, the readers’ soapbox. To dispel the myth that we sometimes make up letters for Now I realize that the opinions on the page do not necessarily agree with those of others. But, expressing my one opin ion paves the way for others to do the same in the form of letters to the editor and guest columns. So, if you agree with the opinions on the page, tell us, and if you get hot under the collar from some thing on the page rather than the sum mer heat, don’t keep your opinions to yourself, let them be heard. EXPRESS YOURSELF! A common misconception is that a newspaper’s editorial page is used as a medium of expression for the opinion page editor only. Wrong. Page two is not mine, it’s yours. Bush refused back taxes to pay for even the $50 billion, and instead de cided to borrow the money over 30 years, which will cost $306 billion with interest. I propose again that we solve mess with the people’s favorite tax let’s don’t tax you, let’s don’t tax me, tax that fellow behind the tree,The low behind the tree* friends, is then who caused this mess to begin let’s tax the financial industry to paylf bailing out the financial industry. sions trol, dustr Paj Cl Juliette Rizzo is a junior journalism major and opinion page editor for The Battalion. You tell me why that’s smart. Bush’s plan was to set up a special agency to borrow the money so the sum wouldn’t show up in the deficit: like, he’d take us $306 billion further into hock and tell us it wasn’t even happening. That’s worse than dumb, that’s criminally irresponsi ble. The Senate voted for the Bush plan by a very narrow margin, but the House refused to go along. Meantime, Dallas continues, as2 ways, to astonish and delight its f) One of the odd bits of information surfaced during the recent flapol whether a lesbian who is openly lest can become a police officer (noting las is the answer) was DPD’s polio this regard. Revenge can be sweet A reader named Louise Penberthy of Atlanta, who described herself as a Northerner, was concerned about a re cent column in which it was my intent to get even with some dimwit in Chicago who circulated a bogus “Application to Live in North Carolina.” This putrid piece went the rounds among the em ployees of Sears in Chicago after it was rumored the company might be moving to Charlotte. The application dealt in numerous Southern stereotypes and in my of fended and wounded state, I decided to do the only sensible thing — take re venge. So I wrote a column dealing in North ern stereotypes (Northern women don’t shave their legs, etc.), and reader Pen berthy responded: “As a Northerner, I was appalled to read the nasty stereo types put forth by Northerners concern ing Southerners. Lewis Grizzard Syndicated Columnist Southerners have been called red necks, hicks, hillbillies, and worse. We’ve been humiliated in movies that depict us as one great collection of drawling, drooling, dregs of the earth. They bought the 30-year payback plan, but said it had to show up on the books, not be put “off-budget.” That way, the government borrows the money in its own name at lower rates, instand of this new quasi-governmental agency, and the taxpayers are saved as much as $40 billion interest over the 30 years. The Police Department person policy manual states that applied “must not have engaged in deviants 1 ual contact with “an animal or fowl® age 17.” Now, wait a minute. What is this? The Battalion (USPS 045 360) Member of Texas Press Association Southwest Journalism Conference The Battalion Editorial Board Ellen Hobbs, Editor Juliette Rizzo, Opinion Page Editor Fiona Soltes, City Editor Drew Leder, Chuck Squatriglia, News Editors Steven Merritt, Sports Editor Katny Haveman, Art Director Hal Hammons, Makeup Editor “However, there was no reason for you to turn around and do what you de cried so loudly and at such length.” Au contraire — which is French for an American word involving the horned bovine. In the first place, taking revenge is the best way I know of to get even, and getting even is one of life’s greasiest pleasures. After I wrote the aforementioned colum, my spirits lifted and I celebrated by burning a copy of The New York Times, which the Supreme Court re cently ruled was OK as long as you weren’t pregnant and thinking about having an abortion. Editorial Policy And I’m tired of all that, so no matter what Louise Penberthy has to say, I wasn’t about to miss out on the opportu nity to demonstrate two can play the game of peering-down-a-nose. Copyright1989, Cowles Syndicate But the House didn’t want to take the hickey for raising taxes either, so in stead of raising the $50 billion now, they decided to end-run the Gramm-Rud man deficit rduction law by exempting the S&Ls money from Gramm-Rud man. Why are animal lovers given a t'| year break over gays? Who wrote policy and why did they write it way? Who would think to ask sin question in the first place? How rtf sheep fondlers do we have on Friends, do you want someone who* 1 in love with a parakeet at 17 onyourfi lice force? A teen-age bunny lover? Write your city councilperson nf concerning this grave new threat 1 public safety. HO^ZN FtST The Battalion is a non-profit, self-supporting newspa per operated as a community service to Texas A&M and Bryan-College Station. Opinions expressed in The Battalion are those of the editorial board or the author, and do not necessarily rep resent the opinions of Texas A&M administrators, fac ulty or the Board of Regents. The Battalion also serves as a laboratory newspaper for students in reporting, editing and photography classes within the Department 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 request. Our address: The Battalion, 230 Reed McDonald, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843-1 111. Second class postage paid at College Station, TX 77843. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to The Battal ion, 216 Reed McDonald, Texas A&M University, Col lege Stadon TX 77843-4111.