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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 8, 2002)
TH E BAil'd ier fu Opinion The Battalion Page 9 • Thursday, August 8, 2002 -'cording to The M ;in has been hit with, lints and lawsuits, j orldCom collapse >mon deny any wronp before the House Fr'- last month, said he^' xecutives hid $3.8 i •rs. nowledged remainij; too long. “I certainly ed that Grubman, the Democratic Scl, received the ven i stily before Congrey .'ited by the commit ibman, 48, was raJ His father, Izzy,was;J nicipal worker who J ic phone book in hal: ‘d in a dress shop. . nhealthy decisions Fust food restaurants not to blame for obesity iy a man custody ildren because heis; decision, issis iy, is a departure ypical procedure, a lower appeals tc. s the ruling first if Supreme Court ruled on the righi exual parents, m McGriff appei ille County Magist: Riddoch's decision all custody of his age children to hisi hawn. The magiste McGriff visitation rif. or) ■ r I A n estimated 61 percent of all Americans are classi fied as overweight and looking for someone or something to blame. Last week, a man in the Bronx filed a lawsuit against four fast food restaurants claiming the food they served him led to his obesi ty, heart attacks and diabetes. jamie duff .aesar Barbar, a 56-year-old naintenance worker, is suing McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Burger King and Kentucky Fried Chicken for causing him to be overweight. Overweight Americans cannot blame McDonald’s for their own lack of self-control. They can only blame themselves. According to CNN.com, Barbar claims the restaurants advertised “100 percent beef,” and he thought that meant it flvas good for him. He argues false advertising has caused him to be obese. Barbar, who weighs 272 pounds and is 5- teet-10-inches tall, has been eating fast food for decades because he did not know how to cook. After heart attacks in 1996 and 1999, his doctor told him fast food was bad. “I had no idea that I could be damaging my health,” he says. Today, absurd claims are rising against what is being called “Big Fat,” much like recent suits against “Big bbacco.” Just as tobacco companies had to pay for people ;etting lung cancer, fast food companies may have to pay or people getting fat. Steven Anderson, chief executive tnd president of the National Restaurant Association, ailed Barbar’s claim “senseless and baseless.” “Obviously the lawsuit is a blatant attempt to capitalize •n the recent publicity and new stories on the growing ates of obesity,” Anderson said. Statistics from the year 2000 on MSNBC’s Web site ;how 300,000 >eople die each 'ear because of )besity-related lillnesses, making pt the second- leading cause of leath behind imoking. About 15 percent of 'omen and 25 )ercent of men lare trying to lose [weight at any one Jtime, but just Jone-fifth are try ing the recom- Imended combina- ftion of fewer jcalories and increased exer- jcise. Americans plso spend more [than $33 billion jon weight loss ^products and services every [year. It is hard to believe anyone would be |unaware fried food is bad for them, but Richard Daynard, head of the Tobacco Products Liability Project at Northwestern University School of Law in Boston, says he is not surprised by Caesar Barbar’s nutritional naivete. He believes it is hard for people to take responsibility for their actions when they are not clear on what the risks are. He also argues people who give faulty nutritional information should be liable. For example, he says fast food companies are liable for making customers believe beef is as healthy as chicken. Increases in child obesity are not positive statistics for fast food companies’ defense either. “Fat kids are to the junk food industry what second hand smoke was in the war against tobacco,” said Yale University professor Kelly Brownell in a story on CNN.com. “Everyone can agree on personal responsibility until they realize they are passive victims.” Parents are starting to say kids are not sophisticated enough or mentally developed enough to know fast food is bad for them. It is up to parents to teach their children about what is healthy and what is not. If a child is severely overweight, then parents should not take them to McDonald’s for lunch every day. Barbar and the other plaintiffs in the lawsuit against fast food chains claim too many Whoppers and Big Macs have caused their obesity, heart disease, and high cholesterol. Along with monetary damages, they want fast food compa nies to put cigarette-style warning labels on their products. Fast food restaurants already offer healthier food alter natives such as salad and grilled chicken. They also pro vide nutritional information to anyone who is not too lazy to walk up to the chart and look. “Becoming overweight is a natural consequence in this society,” claims Dr. Robert Kushner, a weight loss special ist and medical director of the Wellness Institute at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago. “There’s too Jamie Duff is a senior English major. RUBEN DELUNA • THE BATTALION Embarrassing encounters F>elta correct for investigating vibrating luggage ish, . . I W hat was humiliat ing for one trav eler meant safety Iw another. According to CNN, while waiting to board a plane, Renee Koutsouradis claims she w as humiliated by Delta Airlines secu- nt y a ft e r she was forced to remove a vibrating sex toy from her baggage. Noutsouradis filed a lawsuit against . elta for negligence and intentional rtuliction of distress. Delta should not e at fault for humiliating Noutsouradis in an attempt to ensure e safety of the other passengers. Koutsouradis packed her toy into er c hecked luggage when the toy was Mistakenly turned on and began to vibrate. The toy was immediately seen as a threat. Koutsouradis was careless a °ut packing her personal items. She c ould easily have carried the toy in her carry-on luggage where she would ave had more control over it. outsouradis should actually be thank- n g the airline for being so rash and 0 ected about the situation, which ^asily could have caused more chaos an it did. Now more than ever, peo- ANDI BACA pie should be more con scious and aware of , what they pack. . Koutsouradis should claim responsibility for her possessions instead of blaming the airline for humiliating her. Delta security would have investigated any other sus picious baggage in the same manner, regardless of its contents. Also, Koutsouradis would have been treated the same way if she had been another passenger. Koutsouradis owned the toy; it was her personal property. If she did not want to risk other people knowing about it, she should have packed it differently or not brought it back at all. On top of that, the humiliation her lawsuit will bring is not very different from the humiliation she felt that day at the airport, both of which she brought upon herself. Every person believes in a certain level of respect and privacy, and your luggage and personal belong ings should be handled with respect. However, Delta made the best deci sion in the interest of its passengers to deal with the matter. Delta said it has an obligation to protect the safe ty and security of passengers. This includes the responsibility to investi gate any questionable baggage. Airlines take a risk shipping any pas senger’s baggage, but one that vibrates is an immediate safety con cern and should be treated as such. Airport security is always changing as new threats become apparent. Airports adapt in the best ways pos sible. Delta did not intentionally inflict distress on Koutsouradis. Its concern was not with her; it was what was in her baggage. Maybe Koutsouradis thought what they did was inappropriate, but she might have thought differently if it was another passenger threatening her safety with vibrating luggage. Delta Airlines acted in a manner any other airline would have in a similar situation. Delta’s security did exactly what is should have. It saw something questionable and investi gated it. Other passengers would not have expected less. Andi Baca is a senior journalism major. Former leader disgraces system F ormer Ohio congressman James Traficant was charged and con victed of 10 federal corruption charges, including bribery, tax evasion and racketeering. His sentence landed him an eight- year stay at a federal prison facil ity. Traficant, known more for his flamboyant demeanor and less than subtle hairpiece than his dealings in Congress, requested to be transferred to the only in state federal prison: The Federal Correctional Institution at Elkton. This facility is a low- or medium-security male correc tional institution located south of Traficant’s hometown of Youngstown. According to CNN.com, the locale of Traficant’s new living quarters could affect his political ambitions. Traficant still remains on the ballot for the 17th District of Ohio as an independent candi date. He pledged allegiance to his campaign and assured his untrusting constituents that he will continue to campaign from his prison cell. However, Traficant can only do this if he stays in Ohio. The U.S. Constitution says that to run, a candidate must be a resident of the state he is campaigning in on the day of the election to be eli gible for office. This will pose a problem if Traficant is trans ferred to an out-of-state facility. Although Traficant has requested to stay in state, there remains a possibility that he will be transported out of Ohio. One would assume that a^convicted felon would have reservations about speaking out against where he will be incarcerated, but Traficant makes no reservations in expressing his outrage with the possibility of being housed outside of his state. The idea that Traficant could be allowed to campaign from his jail cell is as outrageous as the ex-congress man’s preposterous toupee. Although it is not illegal to campaign from prison, this ren aissance man of less than legal practices and an off-the-cuff demeanor should not be allowed to play the system with his ambi tions, political or otherwise. It is an embarrassment to the Ohio state government, and the people of Ohio, to have Traficant flash his bombastic presence and toupee across national news after his trans gressions against the law. According to CNN.com, the local county board of elections could remove Traficant from the ballot, but legal analysts suggest he could challenge such a deci sion, thus troubling the court sys tem again with taxpayer time and money on this issue. Traficant, however, is not deterred. “Quite frankly, I expect to be re-elected,” Traficant told U.S. District Judge Lesley Wells after she imposed his eight-year sentence, according to The Associated Press. Even more surprising were the sentiments expressed by his court appeal representative Mark Colucci. “He’s going to be on the bal lot, and to him, quite frankly it’s kind of just another day and he’s moving down the road,” Colucci said. If Traficant is outraged at being moved out of state, the American people are outraged at watching him make a mock ery of the judicial system. If he claims this is merely “another day,” it suggests he would be more fitted to represent his fel low inmates than the citizens of Ohio. Traficant is moving “down the road” to senility and disbelief if he continues to believe his constituents will vote for a man who has shown no respect for the law. Traficant shows no remorse toward his conviction or his behavior on the matter and is a disgrace to the voting public. Teri Beene is a senior English major. MAIL CALL TexasNextStep beneficial to Texas In response to Matthew Maddox's August 7 column: Matthew Maddox's opinion pub lished on Wednesday has to be one of the most mean spirited columns I have read in this paper. To suggest that increasing the deficit between the educated and the uneducated would better serve the educational system is an insult to the basic principles behind education. While the TexasNextStep plan does not go far enough, it is a good step toward bettering the lives of all Texans, not as a way to diminish the standing of the elite as Mr. Maddox believes. First of all, the level of edu cation a person has is directly correlat ed to their social-economic standing in society. A better-educated populace is more conducive to creating a strong democracy than any military security would ever be. Education is also directly correlated with voter turnout and participation. It is the corrupt gov ernments that benefit form large class divides among its people. The easiest example is the monarchical England we broke away from to create this country. Mr. Maddox is correct however that it will be an expensive program. Education, much like national security, is grossly expensive, but it is this way because of the benefits it yields. This absolutely means higher taxes and larger bureaucracy. These, howev er. are not the evils Mr. Maddox believes them to be. Higher taxes pay for more government services, like education, health and national securi ty. Ms. Rylander's program is hopeful ly a step toward a better Texas. A Texas that does not lag behind the rest of the nation but leads to a more demo cratically secure future. Terrell Rabb Class of 2002
