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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (June 28, 2001)
lay, June 28, 2001 d). This rate appl t an additional 5 d to end to quali C' r AND THE RURAL RURAL COLLEGE t’s amazing what can be overheard at the pool when people a couple of lounge chairs down think they are talk ing quietly. Mild bickering over how long is long enough before le^row'n Acade* J a cou P^ e can g et engaged, and the ve certification p-dlftininent, “girls want to get married and seated in greaterkids, that is why they are the moms,” °training d arrf me won der how many people are de ne world On-stsBrmined to find diat one person to spend seling student re st of their life nt available. Vist !■ ■ , , •, n with while in college. gtrainers.com ffBitrigued by their Our graduates iiB^versalion, I decid- n the industiy. ■, , , , — i to ( j e | vc in to the wy to goodh^M'orld of lifetime m/blakeythebea'poninu til 1C n t. Marriage. Bou- uets. Rice. Family. Vedding bells. Rings. IVait. Calm down. ne: playful, yea' mix, spayed i i _ ESTATE 2 BRAND NEW: EFT at the preire nts in College Sa .ACE CONDOM os left for Sale! To s make Universe n Student Hour: ants! Enjoybeafi* a pool, spa arc £■ 300 other fun-ltrs th. CALL or Stop S' Home TODAY arc Else Is A Cotitptn y, #101 InCofleptS 758 or Toll-f*: 'M MATES e. S-milesfencampo Is, cable iaw trm, 2bth. rw# st. S350+ W arage, backyar.* ra 696-8952. ided ASAP, » '. +1/3bills, Ain« K Graduation. Classes. Finals. My life. My money. My youth. B his scenario needs to be rewound, re versed and rethought. College is a time of discover)’ and freedom, right? [ In a town of 40 some odd thousand col lege students and an even less proportion ate few of dating prospects, is it really pos- ible or desirable to search for and claim to find die one you are going to spend die rest of your life with? “It is sad to see so many young and promising college students turn to an en gagement in a belief that it is genuine love before they even have a chance to get their feet wet. I have had a couple of friends ‘go .down’and it ended in divorce. Plus, if all these women are getting engaged, that is less for me to pick from when L graduate.” — Kevin Thurman, senior economics major eded 4-bdnt h:lve al ";fy s bought if you are going inutes from campus ||come to college to just find marriage you ire wasting money. If you want to get mar ried that badly, get your parents to arrange a marriage. So many people get married so that it ends in divorce so early. Get- 320/mo. +i/3biis jffug married early is not really a had thing, ft is the thought that you have to in order 1 feel whole. People getting married at ur age weirds me out anyway. Last sinn er 1 had friends that got married who had een together since high school, but it ems they cheated themselves of new ex- iriences college has to offer.” te needed, 3MrcS e townhomes, $4001 j (979)255-6885. as, 1 st month 214-908/41 cenergy.com eeded for 5/mo. +utilities, e info call Josh 3673. RVICES rnsive Driving. Ticket dismissal M-T(6pm-9pm j : ri,&Sat.- Fri(6pf| m), Sat(8am-2- nerica. Walk-ii* Lowest price alio 1 Dr., Ste.217. 84i early. (CP-0017) Test; Hope Prei Station 695-9193, bortion Peer Con- ^NTED to sell lawn bus** care. Call J.D. ^ iHT LOSS EIGHT? Increasf All Natural, Mon? /lary 979-778-86?! jj er J — Brooke Sikes, senior psychology major I Are you kidding? This is College Sta- §on, a town where a cultural and non-con- rmist barricade surrounds its perimeter, is time to break from diis town’s walls id believe diat you can find someone in a ty that houses more than one bowling al- y and adult video store. Some may argue that the reasons for at- nding A&M include group mentality, mily atmosphere and universal morality, Dwever, while that is very idealistic, the teer odds are against anyone finding their IduI mate. For those of you diat have found love, congratulations, revel in it. I But people should date different people ip college. It is healthy. Sow your wild oats, ftut try focusing on graduating from coL lege before focusing on a chapel. Maybe your wedding dress will not he white, but who wants to marry a virgin. So remem- when trying to locate that special someone in this town, do it because you are ady for it. Make sure you aren’t engaged iecause you feel pressure from friends or at stupid, drunken $50 bet you made last eek. Maturity comes with age, and if we k we are all mature enough to get mar ried now, I know why the world fears our jenerarion. (This column in no way has anything to do widi being jealous of those who are not lonely.) ed customers customers I to buy. JeffKempfis a senior rnanagement major PINION Page 5 o Glaring hypocrisy U.S. execution of Germans violates human rights THE BATTALION T he United States has long sought to assert itself as an international power and “a lighthouse of freedom” that the rest of the world could look to for protection, as well as an example of how gov ernment should work and justice should be served. However, the myth that the United States truly offers any of these things to the rest of the world was dispelled yesterday when the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the judicial arm of the Unit ed Nations, ruled that the U.S. government violated the civil and human rights of two German citi zens it executed in 1999. CNN reports that Karl La- Grand and his brother Walter La- Grand were executed after being convicted for a botched bank rob bery in which a bank manager was killed in 1982. Karl LaGrand was executed on Feb. 24, 1999. His brother was exe cuted March 3, 1999, the day after the International Court of Justice ordered the state of Arizona, in which the men were executed, to postpone the execution. This is the real affront of the case. The United States feels the need to impose its will on other nations and to force other nations to respect U.S. laws, but America will not bow to the ruling of an in ternational court. The United States was instrumental in the mpm# founding of the U.N., but it seems the United States all but ignores the organization except when it suits U.S. interests. Granted, in this case, the U. S. government did apologize to Ger many and promise to apprise its citizens of their rights in the future. But that does no good for the La- Grand brothers. There would have been no harm if the Arizona courts had stayed the execution until after the issue could be resolved before the ICJ. After all, the LaGrands had already been imprisoned for 17 years, it seems that one more night could not have caused much more trouble. The ICJ ordered Arizona courts to postpone the execution because the ICJ justices believed the Ger man citizens had been denied their right to due process. They were never informed that as foreigners, they could receive le gal advice from the German con sulate. Under the Vienna Conven tion on Human Rights, this is a violation of the accused prisoners’ civil rights. The ICJ ruled that the United States broke the Convention and committed a human rights offense against the LaGrand brothers and the German people as a whole. Despite foreign-born residents of this country not having the same access to legal representa tion as those born here, it is despi cable that the United States, of all ‘ nations, would so blatantly disre gard the laws it helped write. The •> ICJ is meant to be a moral body. Since it has no power to unilater- . ally enforce its rulings, it depends 1 on the honesty and goodwill of the United Nations’ members it serves. The United States should be above such petty actions — how > ‘ can the rest of the world ever re- ' • spect a country that ignores the rules it helped foster when they be- ' . come inconvenient? ^ < Jason Bennyhojf is ct. senior journalism major.'- \ Less confusion, please Nation needs to take less ambiguous stance on drugs, including alcohoT (U-WTRE) — The courts ordered me to go to a Mothers Against Drunk Driving meeting. But, I don’t drink and drive. About a year ago, I walked to a friend’s house and had beer. I was only 20 and, unfortunately, the police officer that asked me for my driver’s license could count that high. I had become a minor in possession of alcohol, not a drunken driver. But, I was ordered by the court to attend a A1ADD meeting. “If you are over the age of 21, go ahead and have a good time,” one of the speakers said, “Just don’t get behind the wheel.” It was a well-meaning phrase, but it tainted the otherwise extremely effective presentation. I think everyone should attend a A1ADD meet ing at least once, — but not everyone should drink. Some people in that room had been convicted of drinking and driving for the second time. That sort of behavior is indicative of alcoholism. A per son who has been pulled over twice while drunk should never use alcohol — ever. It struck me as odd when I heard someone en courage a room of drunken drivers to drink re sponsibly — a feat of which the audience had proven most incapable. To bring the arbitrary age of 21 into the equa tion just makes things more confusing. There are some people under the age of 21 who drink re sponsibly. And, there are people over the age of 21 who do not. It is a simple concept; some peo- CARTOON OF THE DAY pie can handle the responsible, recreational use of drugs, and some cannot. But, when it comes to this country and drug policy, logic is never a factor. Things are always confusing. One of the reasons alcohol is such a problem is the circumstance surrounding its le gality. Other drugs, some more harmful, some less harmful, are illegal — it is as if alcohol is some how a better drug. For this country to have a healthy attitude to ward drugs, it must choose prohibition or legali ty — not political ambiguity. All drugs are bad. The question is whether we should treat drug addiction as a disease or a crime. Instead of making this decision, America has cho sen to treat some drug addictions like a disease and some like a crime, and it has drawn these lines with politics, not logic. When decisions of health are based in politics, unhealthy results will come to bear. When I walked into a huge auditorium full of convicted drunken drivers, the unhealthy results of our twisted logic were readily apparent. Alcoholism is glorified in this country — so long as you are “over the age of 21Consumers of alcohol enjoy preferential treatment from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, which regulates the content of the drug. Other narcotics are not protected in such a way and, as a result, often result in overdoses. Forest Gump’s famous phrase might be changed to -;’*4 “Life’s like a needle full of heroin ... because, in T i the politics of drug prohibition, you really never,-A know what you’re going to get. In our paradoxical nation, marketing alcohol to children is, for all intents and purposes, accepted by society and, more importantly, the Federal Trade Commission. Yet, we tell our children not to drink. Beer ads that feature talking frogs and lizards do not miraculously float past the con sciousness of those under the age of 21. The me dia are no magic bullet, but the power of adver-- tising’s ubiquity is imquestionable. When mom and dad drink beer at Super Bowl’ parties and at the same time, three wacky guys ut-* ter “whassup” to each other while downing Bud- weiser, we are sending mixed messages to minors. We might as well allow drug cartels to place ads' that feature witty, marijuana-smoking cats. It is reprehensible that some drug addicts are treated like criminals. But it is equally disturbing that some drug deal ers are allowed to advertise on network television and attract children. All drugs should be legal and no drug should be advertised. Until we adopt a healthier attitude toward ad-? diction in this country, programs like MADD will unfortunately be necessary. Reed Albergotti The Daily Aztec San Diego State LL Mail Call 'TUS OUeft Kt6C>|s/\s+-© People are too easily offended by cartoons In response to all the whining about the Uncartoonist, I'd like to say that I think he's great. He draws well and his cartoons are actually funny. As far as his making fun of PITS, it is ridiculous to get angry about that. Our RTFS officers are generally obese, but more importantly, they are part of a corrupt system that exists solely to bilk the students out of more money. What's wrong with poking fun at that? Woufed people get mad if I poked fun at Hitler for being short? And about the Corps cartoon. I'm in the Corps and it didn't offend me. There is a running joke among both non-regs and CTs about how brainless Corps fish can be. What's wrong with putting that joke down on paper? The Uncartoonist is one of the few good things about our droll and er ror-ridden student paper. I think the Battalion should put him on the front page. ;; Nick Nethery Class of '03 The Battalion encourages letters to the editor. Letters must be 300 words or less and include the au thor's name, class and phone number. The opinion editor reserves the right to edit letters for length, style and accuracy. Letters may be sub mitted in person at 014 Reed Mc Donald with a valid student ID. Let ters may also be mailed to: The Battalion - Mail Call 014 Reed McDonald Texas A&M University College Station, TX 77843-1111 Campus Mail: 1111 Fax: (979) 845-2647 E-mail: battletters@hotmail.com