Battalion
O PINION
how me the money
locum’s contract prioritizes athletics over academics
Page 5 • Monday, July 5, 1999
ionship
• Theju
“cond i.
leaders*
Beverly
MIRELES
.C. Slocum, the
winningest
.football coach
Texas A&M histo-
hasn’t just made
ireer out of win-
lg — he has made
feet ojffdition out of it.
tends to lEveryone at A&M
most cAw 8 h° w b oun d
pounds* school is to tradi-_
5 an offftoii and how willing it is to accept the
bert Cliffcrifices that can come from worshiping
Mition. No matter the consequences,
Blition marches on.
■One good example — last week,
r ALIER$'l° aiin cemented his position in one of
looking ft l ess acknowledged, but generally ac-
uard tradition of celebrating athletics
f (j.,), <; ler academics. This is not something
o the but it is definitely something well-
i of thedn |ien ched in the minds of all Aggies,
e hall tiftBy signing a new seven-year contract,
solid ri t has upped his income considerably,
periencftt only will he get $1 million over the
side h let 12 months, his base salary has been
shooter ft reased to $300,000 per year
il XIlhis is in addition to the endorsements,
Ihoe deal, a housing allowance, money
1m television appearances and cais.
\jc lat’s right, cars. As in, more than one.
Bender i Something to keep in mind the next
the Rrft ie y ou see y our exceptionally hard-
’man sSl )rkin 8 organic chemistry professor pull
the n- pp in his ’86 Nissan.
iina He ft To clarify, Slocum will be making a
3 He iol 3.1 million salaried dollars, and co -
Bting a whole lot of fringe benefits. All in
all, a fairly sweet deal for a football coach.
R.C. has made a lasting impression on
A&M, no one doubts that. But his contract
signing is just one more instance of how
the University has turned from making
knowledge its business to just plain mak
ing business.
Let there be no mistake about it —
when it comes to money, A&M is at its
most businesslike.
In fact, most of the time A&M is so
money-driven that the business of keeping
the alumni happy becomes the most im
portant task at hand, often at the cost of
the students.
This is the factor at the root of the ath
letics over academics problem.
Team sports are great for students and
alumni alike. They are something we can
all support. The feeling of fan unity can
reach a fever pitch at sporting events.
However, it seems those who graduate
tend to forget that they attended A&M for
intellectual reasons, not just for the foot
ball.
This leads to a backlash against current
students.
It may not matter to the alumni if stu
dents are getting the short end of the stick
when it comes to funding for liberal arts
departments, but it certainly does matter
if Texas wins the next clash on Kyle Field.
Unfortunately, this is something stu
dents have to deal with.
Compared to the alumni, many stu
dents feel they are only numbers in a
computer.
When the alumni come rushing back
into town, the students are often treated
like second-class citizens.
This is a problem not only when the
alumni are in town, but year-round.
Because there is so much pressure on
the administration to keep those alumni
donations flowing, sports become more
important than individual academic col
leges.
Sure, administrators could argue edu
cation is the main focus of A&M, but the
point seems moot when one compares the
dollar amounts thrown into The Zone,
Reed Arena or the new alumni building
on George Bush Drive compared to fund
ing for the journalism department, for ex
ample.
There are a total of 10 art classes at
A&M, but money goes to building plush
luxury boxes at Kyle Field for alumni.
That does not seem stupid so much as
it seems criminal.
Having a winning football team with a
winning coach is great. But how much
longer will we throw money at athletics
while academics and professors suffer?
Educators, whether they teach high
school or college, will never make mil
lions.
However, in a place that is supposed to
be a stronghold of intellectual excellence,
one would think that academics would
get the respect they deserve and not be
treated like a boring extension of A&M
athletics.
Beverly Mireles is a junior
microbiology major.
Mark McPherson/The Battalion
‘S in thee
iamentalii
i inconsis
passing
1 backcofT
tate tax
t poor policy
isponse to Jeff Beckers
129 column.
he estate tax was origi-
y established mainly to
jentthe concentration
/ealth within families
se fortunes could forev
mass, not, as Becker
,to redistribute wealth,
he tax was designed o
ent a tyranny of the mn
y.On this note, Beckers
irtion that the “tax in-
s savings and work an
urages consumption
spending" is also incor
mail call
Again, the wealth of one
family can’t continually go
untaxed under our current
system.
Besides, a little bit of tax
planning can all but elimi
nate the estate tax, even
for the “farmers and family-
owned businesses.”
Furthermore, the article
did not even mention the
unlimited marital deduction
for the deceased.
This is not an estate tax
planning tool that only the
“extremely wealthy can a
f0 t'is designed to only tax
the couple one hmeifone s
property is bequeathed to
his or her spouse.
To blame the tax on th
failure of farms in America
is a blatant overstatement.
Brian Oliver
Class of '99
Where is NOW now?
Women’s group values few issues over its core values
The Battalion encourages letters to
the editor. Letters must be 300 words
or less and include the author’s name,
class and phone number.
The opinion editor reserves the right
to edit letters for length, style, and ac
curacy. Letters may be submitted in
person at 013 Reed McDonald with a
valid student ID. Letters may also be
mailed to:
The Battalion - Mail Call
013 Reed McDonald
Texas A&M University
College Station, TX
77843-1111.
Campus Mail: 1111
Fax: (409) 845-2647
E-mail: batt@tamvml.tamu.edu
Mark
PASSWATERS
the arcs
■ and blit
he is a
lively.
LangdM
but even
contrite
iric
fors
consid'
i. Goodf
help
oints, r
last sei
ity Coll
his calf
ege bas
nited St
jrtheless
11 be gi
O n Thursday, June 24, Mary
Moran, wife
of U.S. Rep.
James P. Moran Jr.
(D-Va.) called police
to the couple’s
Alexandria, Virginia,
home and stated
that her husband
had grabbed her
and knocked her
down during an ar
gument.
The police did not file charges
against the congressman, but they did
take pictures of the bruises visible on
Mrs. Moran’s arms.
Later that day, Mrs. Mpran filed for
divorce, claiming her husband had en
gaged in conduct “detrimental to [her]
health and welfare. ”
Sounds like something the National
Organization for Women (NOW) should
comment on, considering the emphasis
they placed on domestic violence after
the O.J. Simpson fiasco.
Instead, Patricia Ireland, president of
NOW, said “given that this is not some
one who’s saying that she has been a
battered spouse, it may be less relevant
to Moran’s public office.’’
Really? So NOW no longer has any
interest in protecting women who are
threatened, verbally abused and pushed
around by their husbands?
Let us not be unfair to NOW. It only
turns a blind eye to individual women
whose husbands have voted with Presi
dent Clinton on issues which NOW’s
leadership deems important.
If someone does that, then NOW will
be more than happy to sell out any one
individual.
NOW’s track record during the Clin
ton Administration does not help them,
should they care to rebut this accusa
tion. The warm embrace of this nation’s
Chief Executive is a very clear example
of how this group has discarded many
of the more general rights of women in
exchange for the furthering of a couple
of issues.
NOW is strongly pro-choice; Clinton
has steadfastly opposed any attempt to
limit abortions in this country, including
vetoing the plan to ban “partial-birth”
abortions, which many Democrats sup
ported.
Clinton has also been a supporter of
extending the maternity leave a working
woman may take with pay, another pol
icy which NOW supports. Because of
Clinton’s support of these issues—most
notably the abortion issue—NOW has
been 100 percent behind Clinton in both
the 1992 and 1996 elections.
Since Clinton has coddled NOW
with his work on these issues, NOW
has, in turn, been more than happy to
ignore President Clinton’s abuse of far
more fundamental female rights.
The fact that NOW had very little to
say about how Clinton humiliated his
wife by allowing her to swing in the
wind for eight months during the Moni
ca Lewinsky affair is astounding. On top
of that, he destroyed the self-respect of
Lewinsky by denying their affair and al
lowing his staff to go on record calling
her “deluded” when what she was say
ing was factual.
On top of that, he used his White
House secretary, Betty Currie as a pawn
so his fingerprints would not be directly
on the coverup of his affair with Lewin
sky.
Also, remember that Bill Clinton set
tled a sexual harassment suit filed by
Paula Corbin-Jones, has been accused
of groping Kathleen Willey in the Oval
Office and has been accused of rape by
Juanita Broadderick. If even one of
these accusations is true, NOW’s charter
would direct it to act as if Clinton were
the Antichrist.
Instead, NOW has said nothing in
support of these women, whose most
fundamental rights may have been vio
lated. Instead, NOW stands by its
man—blatant philanderer and adulterer
that he is.
Not even Tammy Wynette would
take it this far. *
Apparently, NOW has decided that if
someone, like Clinton or Moran, backs
them on a few select issues that are po
litically “hot,” then they are free to do
what they please with women in other
situations. NOW has abandoned their
struggle to ensure that women are treat
ed with equality, decency or even basic
respect in order to ensure that a woman
may have an abortion.
There are no two ways about it—
NOW has sold out women on the sim
plest of issues. If it chooses to cuddle up
with people who say one thing in public
and then go on to prove they truly do
not believe in what they say, then this
group cannot retain any shred of credi
bility.
It is truly shameful that in its crusade
to make sure a woman retains a right to
choose, NOW has compromised all of
its other values and the integrity of the
organization.
If this continues, women seeking to
ensure they are treated with dignity or
respect will have to look elsewhere, as
NOW has allied itself with those who
have proven to have no personal respect
for women’s rights.
Mark Passwaters is a graduate
student in electrical engineering.
. murderer wrongly gets plaudits instead of punishment
>3 V tflj Marie Noe, a 70- After all, just because Noe new American hero. ly benefit from her ranting and the medical community will in-
/ u;*l_hAired woman killed eight innocent, defenseless Philadelphia District Attorney ravings of how “ungodlv” she is. stantlv know what motivates
s the
millen
nium
JIC
m when
m at Dt
is were^
ittle to 1
nts a
gette ct
hlkins
open-c (
rlando
s exp r %idly7p-
'-y^lroaches^ne
jtinot help
wonder
g?w the
erican
[ty of life
s become in
twisted and distorted
V ill tejst few decades. , pes
fall 1 Horrific murders aid ^ age
Banning both sexe. coV erage.
to leaii« 0l ips dominate ne PX ( r emist
1 The proliferation of «i (ed
ou Ps and cults has s (ir i SI n.
ttenca to domestic lisrn an d
Ploding mail, cann 5 an
cr ophili a are more atest
0u §h to get even th &
°Ptimists down. ^meri-
But take heart, fo l0gacy
cce- i n le §al system, wlt, ‘i it y, has
.HingCjO justice and of
us a m the
C£T1 this chaos.
to its
I chart
This month, Marie Noe, a 70-
T fa white-haired woman
year-old, w ^betes and
who suffe h r as f graciously accepted
arthritis, ha g ^ that will
a plea barg nr i S on and allow
keepheroutofPns ^ic ^
her to undergo psy wh y she
ment to det children over
f/fye^ perM beginning in
1949 - to Noe pleaded
On June 2 , , g ree murder
g uilty t0 Nation deaths of eight
in the su ^ c f n previously be-
0 f her chddr from Sudden
h eved l? h t a hSymlrome.
infant Death aVoide d prison
Amazingly, 8 to 20 years
and was s^tenc^^ for her co _
probationm x hiatnsts
operation wltl ] P y se ems lenient,
P If this 8 ent en ^ t o remember
the i m P° rta do esn’t have the
is that Noe d er, at le a St if
heart of a ^ ve her attorney,
We ^Rudenstein, whom should
David f m nlicitly-
be trusted imp
After all, just because Noe
killed eight innocent, defenseless
babies, ranging from 13 days to
14 months old, without so much
as flinching doesn’t qualify her
as a cold-blooded killer.
Indeed, Noe’s words dripped
with humanity when she said,
“Elizabeth was a lot stronger
than Richard was, and she was
fighting when the pillow was
over her face. I held the pillow
over her face until she stopped
moving.”
Of sterner stuff, few people
are made. Even Noe’s attorney
was choked up over her coura
geousness in agreeing to work
with psychiatrists rather than go
to prison.
“I don’t know any other per
son accused of this type of crime
in the history of the world who
has ever come forward to work
with doctors the way this
woman is willing to,” Ruden-
stein said.
Move over G.I. Joe, there’s a
new American hero.
Philadelphia District Attorney
Lynne Abraham said she
thought the sentence was appro
priate, and Deputy District Attor
ney Charles Gallagher said the
sentence was
not impor
tant, but the
fact that the
medical and
legal commu
nities realize
that mothers
do suffocate
their children
is important.
With the
logic inherent in Gallagher’s
statement, it’s easy to see how
such a fair and just plea bargain
originated. *
Lest readers begin to think
Noe’s psychiatric evaluations are
not a fair trade-off for her avoid
ing imprisonment, they should
take heart in the fact that the en
tertainment industries will great-
“Move over, G.I. Joe,
there's a new
American hero."
ly benefit from her ranting and
ravings of how “ungodly” she is.
A made-for-television movie
and several'book deals for Noe
and her doctors are sure to flood
a market suffering from a lack of
^ |iill|BBB||11 ^^ such perverse
topics.
A “Just Say
Noe” award
could be giv
en to honor
those who
have shown
extreme acts
of courage
and heroism.
In addi
tion, the amount of deranged
data that psychiatrists will inter
pret and then attempt to apply to
the greater deranged community
will prove invaluable because
everyone knows that generaliza
tion is the key to any quest for
knowledge.
By interpreting what one ob
viously sick individual espouses.
the medical community will in
stantly know what motivates
every mentally ill person.
By stepping up, Noe is bear
ing the cross for the betterment
of America.
So in an age where atrocities
happen at an hourly rate, it is
comforting to know one
Philadelphia courtroom has tak
en America’s well-being to heart
and transformed a violation of
our most sacred security - the
mother-child relationship - into
a “get out of jail free” card, cre
ating an American icon.
Alleged railroad killer Rafael
Resendez-Ramirez, who authori
ties have linked to a possible 18
deaths, would do well to learn
from this lesson in American jus
tice and turn himself in so he
can cash in and receive the lau
rels of American heroism.
Ryan Garcia is a senior
journalism major.