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Tuesday, June 15,1993
The Battalion
Page 5
WHAT ARE Vou t>oiKia7
E CT ; rj C' ~VO EL K I ^ C> A y
• V A i-r e « A rJ E f V e R
The Battalion Editorial Board
Jason Loughman, editor in chief
Mark Evans, managing editor
Stephanie Pattillo, city editor Kyle Burnett, sports editor
Dave Thomas, night news editor Anas Ben-Musa, Aggielife editor
Mack Harrison, morning news editor Billy Moran, photo editor
The Battalion
100 years at
Texas A&M
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Editorial
Student loans
Senate revision improves NSI
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President Clinton announced his Na
tional Service Initiative on May 6 and
since that time it has been in committee.
Last week the Senate Labor and Re
sources Committee headed by Sen. Ed
ward Kennedy, D-Mass., approved a
revised plan. Both Clinton's and the
committee's plan have valid points but
the answer to the financial aid ques
tion lies somewhere between the
two.
As of now, the govern
ment's involvement in stu
dent loans is from a guar
antor position - they in
sure the investments
made by private financial
institutions.
Under Clinton's plan
the private sector would
be phased out by the
year 1997 and the gov
ernment's role would
drastically redefined,
moving them directly to
the investor position. Giv
en the government's history
of mismanaging money, a
full scale takeover may not be
the best solution.
Under the committee's plan,
however, there would be a cap placed
on government involvement. This cap
would be placed such that govern
ment's investment could not exceed 50
percent of the student loan volume.
Clinton's NSI consists of two pieces
of legislation that would offer students
several choices of loan repayment.
The first bill, the National Service
Trust Act, would allow students to pay
back loans with one or two years of
community service.
The second bill, the Student Loan Re
form Act, would allow students to bor
row money directly from their college.
While these are solid ideas, the com
mittee's plan expands on the first bill,
making it easier for students to obtain
these jobs.
The committee did not
change the second bill, which
as it stands would greatly
benefit students, but did
offer a unique plan that
would allow students to
repay loans through
fixed income payments
to the IRS.
Also, under the
committee's plan, stu
dent's would benefit
immediately from a 50
percent cut in first time
fees. It is estimated that
this alone will save stu
dents $2.4 billion over
five years.
While the existing stu-
“s* dent loan process is in need
of an overhaul, a complete
government takeover may not be
the answer - especially when the major
ity of America would rather see spend
ing cuts.
The best answer offered yet is the
Senate Resources and Labor Commit
tee's revised plan. Students would still
be insured loans and the government
would still be cutting expenses without
completely taking over the loan
process.
Friendship has gone to the dogs
Daschund roommates teach lesson to canine-hater
ROBERT
VASQUEZ
Columnist
I always considered myself a friend
ly sort — if not a sordid sort. But
lately Tve noticed a problem. I
can't bring myself to say the three
simple words: "I like you." Maybe
it's a guy thing.
"If you want friends, you should
show yourself friendly." I read that
somewhere. Though I always
thought I showed myself friendly,
Tve recently found myself trying to
appear aloof, as though I didn't care
about those around me.
I figured I was being friendly
when I told my roommate that I
would be happy to watch his three
dogs while he visited his wife in Dal
las.
He left me in charge. I hate dogs.
So, for the weekend my roommates were two
Daschunds ("weinie-dogs") and a Weimaraner (a breed of
dog which recently became popular when photographer,
William Wegman, caught one of the species secretly trying
on various articles of human clothing).
Now, these weinie-dogs and I -were not on the best of
terms to begin with. A few weeks ago, after a long, gruel
ing 86-hour work shift, I staggered home, dinner in hand,
ready to nourish my weary body, before collapsing into a
very deep slumber.
The dinner: Shrimp Primavera. Six dollars it cost me,
but it would be worth every penny. I LOVE Shrimp Pri
mavera.
I placed the dinner on the dining room table, on which
the dogs are not allowed — and they know that — and I
went upstairs to change my clothes.
I HATE dogs ... did I mention that?
Coming back down to eat my $8 meal, I noticed the
brown, furry culprits licking suspiciously close to a take
out box which was now on the floor. "Curses!" I thought
(well, not the generic word, "curses" but very specific, ap
propriate curses) ". . . my dinner! They almost ate my $12
dinner!" The box was still closed, so there was hope that
the little devils had not devised a way to open the sealed
container with their stinking, little, wet noses and get to my
$18 meal. I lunged for the box, fending for my dinner with
gritted teeth — I could swear I actually barked. I opened
the box to find it was spotless, methodically licked clean by
a cruel and very evil animal. Cujo.
Now, I was charged with Cujo's well-being. Yes, 1 was
to make sure that the animals were alive when my room
mate returned. But the shreds of life they would be cling
ing to was my decision entirely.
Yes, I fed them. And yes, I gave them water. But these
dogs, I determined, would feel the hatred they spawned in
me the day they ate my $30 Shrimp Primavera.
I should have known that even my efforts to hate them
would be thwarted by the beasts. For the rest of the week
end the dogs followed me around the apartment, as if each
moment together might be our last. I'd yell. I'd shove.
Couldn't the little dummies catch a clue? They never left
my side.
Finally, Casey, the smallest of the weinie-dogs pushed
me too far. Just as I was about to fall asleep, she barked. A
loud, piercing "yap" of a bark which she released just as
she found the hollow of my ear.
I jumped about 10 feet high. My apartment ceiling is
only eight feet high. When I landed, I picked up the bark
ing soprano and brought her face as close to mine as possi
ble without actually sticking her nose in my mouth and I
yelled, "Casey — !" I didn't know what to say, I was so
angry. I paused only for a second, aching to fling the dog
across my living room, to the wall where her blood stains
might easily be covered by a framed poster or a new coat of
paint. And in that moment of silence, the stupid dog began
to lick my face. I was stunned.
Not only was this dog coating my face with doggy drib
ble, her tail was wagging as if I had finally begun to play
her game. Her tail wagged so hard that her body began to
wiggle, showing her excitement at my excitement. How
pathetic. A wagging, wiggling weinie-dog. It was like a
bad joke but I couldn't help laughing. This dog couldn't
understand that she was overbearing. She just kept licking
and wagging, happy to be there.
It seems that no matter what you do to a dog, it always
comes back. It likes you and it's not afraid to show it. Like
a good friend. No wonder they say a dog is a man's best
friend. Thanks, Casey.
Vasqez is a senior journalism major
me p£cc#p
. new
New multiculturalism requirement educationally unsound
GUEST
COLUMN
MORGAN O.
REYNOLDS
W elcome to
the cul
ture war.
It finally hit Col
lege Station, with
quite a thud. On
June 9 the Univer
sity's Liberal Arts
Council voted to
force liberal arts
majors to take six
hours of courses in
multiculturalism.
At least three
hours must deal
with "racial, eth
nic, or gender is
sues in the United States."
Despite the proponent's rhetoric about
a world that is "increasingly globally
connected," no student under the re
quirement must take any course in a non-
American culture or region of the world.
This makes the real agenda pretty clear:
to force students to take the touchy-feely
pish posh that is covered by the Golden
Rule already.
One professor, speaking in favor of the
mandate, asserted that A&M needs "A
New Identity." I like that statement. It
doesn't hide much, in sharp contrast to
the image of moderation and freedom of
choice feigned by the Dean's Office. Oth
er speakers agreed that the requirement
would increase tensions on campus but
claimed that they would be "positive ten
sions," a proposition worth recalling on
down the road. I like that admission, too,
because it is more truthful about what's
afoot. A similar University-wide cultural
re-education proposal is on the fall agen
da of the A&M Faculty Senate.
Once upon a time, universities were
about the best that had been thought and
written, the open pursuit of the truth, the
critical sifting out of error and non-politi
cal scholarship and teaching. While these
traditions eroded badly at other universi
ties, or collapsed altogether, A&M re
mained a little different, reluctant to fol
low every fashionable liberal agenda.
I hold three degrees in economics from
the University of Wisconsin-Madison and
survived the 1960s tumult of that star-
crossed campus. I have been proud to
have been in the economics department
at A&M for 19 years. I have two sons
who graduated from A&M. And it's ex
cruciating watching A&M go down now.
If good Ags do nothing, A&M is about
to become irrevocably captured by the
politicized activists on the faculty and the
administration of the College of Liberal
Arts.
Can feminist physics be far behind, the
obvious answer to the white male-biased
physics now taught at the university?
Will A&M become better known across
the state and nation for its institutionally-
imposed social engineering instead of its
mechanical, chemical and electrical engi
neering?
How can this intellectual fraud be
stopped? And stopped it must be, be
cause collectivist-minded faculty and ad
ministrators understand only one thing:
insurmountable resistance.
Information is the number one
weapon to stop the aggressors. Former
students should express their distaste to
university officials, including the Board
of Regents, and hold up their financial
support for A&M. Both student and fac
ulty opponents of political correctness
must organize opposition. At the faculty
level, we must make the impending Uni
versity mandate an issue for a faculty
wide referendum.
At UT-Austin a diversity requirement
was defeated 2-1 in a faculty referendum
after winning by nearly 4-1 in the Faculty
Senate. Similarly, an A&M faculty-wide
vote on a cultural mandate would proba
bly lose 3-1 or 4-1.
The authors of the liberal arts resolu
tion claim that they spent two years re
searching programs elsewhere and came
up with the best ideas. Yet only one pro
gram was mentioned as the model,
namely Indiana University at Blooming
ton. Two hours in the library reveals that
the lU-Bloomington Culture Studies re
quirement in Arts and Sciences resembles
the proposal at A&M in only one dimen
sion: two courses are required.
lU-Bloomington divides cultures into
20 groups (e.g., eight in West Europe,
three in East Asia, two in the Middle
East, etc.) and requires each student to
take two courses in a single area like
France, Japan or Latin America. The fo
cus is clearly international. Only some of
the courses in the last two categories —
Indian Cultures of the Americas and
North American Minority Cultures —
may include the "racial, ethnic ... issues
in the United States" as their slant (but no
hint of A&M's "gender issues").
Of course, the Dean of Liberal Arts
says that the A&M courses were selected
"hurriedly" as examples, a surprising ad
mission after two years on the project.
A&M's liberal arts mandate is political
from start to finish, not motivated by
scholarship nor sound pedagogy. We
must remember that ultimately, Texas
A&M's livelihood depends on the good
will of the taxpayers of Texas. Are we
entitled to this goodwill?
Thomas Jefferson wrote, "That to com
pel a man to furnish contributions of
money for the propagation of opinions
which he disbelieves, is sinful and tyran
nical." Shouldn't we focus on the busi
ness of sound analysis in mathematics,
chemistry, economics and literature?
Reynolds is a professor of economics
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