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(08/04/03 9:00am)
Step into this race and I will consume you--the fires of hell will scorch you years before they torch Ashcroft's rotting carcass, and I'll sit there with my now finally legal 40 of Olde English watching." ("Done With Nader," July, 29 2003)
(06/10/03 9:00am)
I came to Dartmouth College in the fall of 1999 as a prospective engineering major. My entire college search was based around two needs: a robust engineering department and the mere existence of a jazz ensemble. For whatever reason, it took only about two or three days on campus for me to have abandoned the idea of majoring in engineering. Perhaps the prospect of taking physics and multivariable calculus in my first term at college finally became an unacceptable reality for me. Much to the shock of my parents, I decided fairly early on that I would be a government major despite not having taken any real government courses in high school. Such is life in college. Given infinite choices and seemingly unlimited freedom to do what I wanted, I changed my mind on a whim and basically altered the course of my life.
(05/27/03 9:00am)
I remember a conversation I had four years ago with one of my favorite high school teachers. She regarded my personality as being somewhat brash and my general outlook on life as being at odds with the majority of people on an Ivy League campus. In other words I was something of a loudmouthed conservative. Before I left for school she warned me that my attitudes would probably change in college. Presumably, she thought that the rapid and widespread exchange of ideas and experiences that take place at a prestigious university would make any resistance to change futile. Now that I think about it, several of my high school teachers said similar kinds of things to my classmates and me before we graduated.
(05/13/03 9:00am)
The Naderites who claim that there are no significant differences between the two major political parties need to pull their heads out from under the sand every now and then and take a look at what is actually going on. Contrary to the rhetoric of third-party candidates in the 2000 presidential election, Republicans and Democrats are presenting the American public with stark choices in virtually every realm of political discourse. Whether it is foreign, economic or social policy, finding people on the left who disagree with President Bush's stances is not difficult. What is difficult, however, is trying to get these critics to come up with a positive agenda for America's future.
(04/29/03 9:00am)
The nine Democratic presidential candidates will take part in the first debate this Saturday in South Carolina, an early primary state. Luckily for those of us who have nothing better to do, the debate will be broadcast live on ABC in other early primary states including New Hampshire. With well over a year to go before the Democrats even select their candidate, the following is a breakdown of what the top five candidates have to do both to win the primary and to beat President Bush next November.
(04/15/03 9:00am)
In just under nineteen months, Mr. President, you will face a Democratic challenger in the 2004 presidential election. After an inauspicious first nine months, your presidency was thrust into the spotlight by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The initial military success in Afghanistan helped you maintain high approval ratings even during an economic recession. In the 2002 midterm election, you were able to use your personal popularity to help congressional Republicans gain seats in the House and wrestle control of the Senate back from the Democrats in unprecedented fashion. You have rallied much of the country to support your war in Iraq, which has gone brilliantly thus far. Despite your successes, however, a prolonged and chaotic military presence in Iraq coupled with continued economic difficulties here at home could easily cost you your job come next November. Here are five things you need to do to hold onto it:
(04/01/03 10:00am)
When tens of thousands of anti-war protesters took to the streets of New York City last Saturday, I, like most Americans, took notice. Broadway was shut down and police officers in riot gear were dispatched to contain the demonstration. In addition to the usual "No War for Oil" signs and chants, there was a new and more alarming rhetoric. At least one group of protestors made their way downtown carrying a sign that said "We Support Our Troops, When They Shoot Their Officers." This may have been an explicit show of praise for the Muslim-American soldier who threw grenades into the tents of his commanders at a base in Kuwait, killing at least two servicemen. Just next door in Montpelier, Vermont, some students who had broken off from a recent anti-war demonstration threw rocks at a female soldier in uniform who was stationed at a nearby base. I hope that all Americans, regardless of their feeling on the war, will recognize the sacrifice that our fighting men and women make and show their appreciation to the troops once they are brought home.
(03/04/03 11:00am)
I am hard pressed to think of a reason why politicians would want to come to a college to give a speech. They certainly do not show up to court our votes. We young folk tend to stay home on Election Day, and many of us who take the time to vote do so in other states by absentee ballot. Politicians would also have difficulty arguing that they speak on campuses in order to engage in meaningful discussion with politically active students. After all, virtually every elected official whose views run contrary to those of campus activists are met with deaf protestors and disrespectful conduct. Perhaps the most infamous example came when Yale alumnus George W. Bush returned to his alma mater as president to deliver the commencement speech and many current Yalies saw fit to turn their chairs away from him when he spoke.
(02/18/03 11:00am)
The current anti-war demonstrations in several European capitals notwithstanding, America is on a path to war in Iraq. I say that we are going to war "in" Iraq rather than going to war "with" Iraq because President Bush has made it clear in his speeches that America's quarrel is not with the people of Iraq but with the head of their government. In saying this, the president knows that he must carefully toe the line between nurturing the good will of the Iraqi people and making this war explicitly about liberation rather than disarmament. Bush knows that the American people favor war when it makes them safer but not necessarily when it liberates an oppressed people. After all, if America decided to go to war with every country that denies basic human rights to its people, we would be fighting dozens of wars all over the world. Yet for me there is still a strange appeal to going into the very part of the world where we are most despised and showing the people there that we care enough for their well being to fight a war for them.
(02/04/03 11:00am)
Our nation is in the early stages of mourning over the tragedy of the Space Shuttle Columbia. The student body here at Dartmouth is too young to remember the Challenger explosion in 1986, so most of us have always taken the safety of space travel for granted. I for one had no idea that we even had a shuttle in orbit for the past two weeks. I doubt that most of us gave much thought at all to our space program before this disaster. The same could be said for airline security before Sept. 11 or mail delivery before the anthrax scares in the following months. As a country we are incredibly devastated by these massive breakdowns in our institutions, mostly because we are accustomed to having them work so well. The fact that we never become desensitized to these tragedies is a sign of just how great America is.
(01/20/03 11:00am)
I have sat down to write a column on race four or five times, and each time a voice in my head has persuaded me not to. No one is interested in what a white Republican has to say about race in America. Having never experienced discrimination and having come from a predominantly white high school, it would be condescending of me to think I could contribute something to the debate. The ideas espoused by my party run contrary to the best interests of the African-American community and Republican strategists would be best served by spending more time trying to assemble a winning coalition of white voters.
(01/07/03 11:00am)
Today is Jan. 7, 2003, a little early, one would guess, to start thinking about the November 2004 election. Well, Democrats don't seem to think so. In case you've missed it, the entire Democratic Party has announced its intention to run for the right to challenge President Bush next year. Perhaps I am exaggerating just a tad, but last week's announcements by North Carolina Senator John Edwards and former House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt increased the official number of candidates to four. Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean and Massachusetts Senator John Kerry both announced their candidacies late last year. Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle and Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman are both expected to announce before the end of the month. Connecticut Senator Christopher Dodd, Florida Senator Bob Graham and retired General Wesley Clark as well as political activist Al Sharpton are all seriously considering runs.
(11/19/02 11:00am)
We are now two weeks removed from the midterm elections, and everyone in the political world is still trying to figure out what to do next. Now a minority in both houses of Congress, the Democrats must provide a stronger opposition to Republicans than ever. Continuing simply to defer to the president on tough issues will hardly give voters a reason to vote for them over Republicans in 2004. The Republicans also must be careful not to overplay their hands and alienate mainstream America by cementing tax cuts for the wealthy, pushing through ultra-conservative judges and slashing social programs. Independent of their policy merits, these measures are just bad politics.
(11/05/02 11:00am)
Jumping the gun on election forecasting can earn a person eternal infamy, a spot in the Hall of Fame of political embarrassments. That is why this year, with possibly the closest midterm elections in the nation's history, even the most respected political analysts are loathe to put their predictions on the record. I, however, am able to make such predictions without fear of being humiliated on national television. My focus is the Senate, where there are at least eight races that are too close to call. No political prognosticator that I am aware of has been silly enough to think that he or she could pick all 34 winners, but as the great Homer Simpson once said, "Feeling stupid? I know I am!"
(10/22/02 9:00am)
What do Democrats say to each other to psych themselves up 18 days before an election? This was the question I had as I prepared for my first political fundraiser of 2002 last Friday, the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner held by the New Hampshire Democratic Party in Manchester every fall. The four Democrats running for either national or major statewide office were in attendance to give speeches but the main attraction, at least for your humble columnist, was presidential aspirant and North Carolina Sen. John Edwards (D).
(10/08/02 9:00am)
Tecmo Bowl" may have been the defining video game of our generation. It was the first sports video game to feature real-life players, paving the way for the amazing games we see today. When I was six years old, I was playing "Tecmo Bowl" with a close friend. As always, my team was the Los Angeles Raiders, that sported the single greatest video game football player of all time: Bo Jackson. Call it a glitch in the program or simply coincidence, but Bo was twice as fast as anyone else in the game and simply could not be tackled.
(09/25/02 9:00am)
Welcome back. It is always a treat to be able to write a column in the first issue of the term before there is a precedent to follow. The temptation to react to someone else's ideas does not get in the way like it usually does. I have done a lot of thinking about what I might be writing during the upcoming year, my final one at Dartmouth College. I hope you all will be able to relate to, if not enjoy, what I have to say. If not I guess I will end up as a lone voice crying out in the wilderness, which itself seems to have a comfortably familiar ring to it.
(05/21/02 9:00am)
It was just too good to last. The civil dialogue on the war against terrorism we had in this country for the past eight months has all but disintegrated, and both sides are to blame. Last week a story broke that the Republicans were using a controversial photograph of President Bush on Sept. 11 to raise money. More recently, some in Congress have gone public saying that our government may have been able to do more to prevent the Sept. 11 attacks. As usual, both sides are a little bit right and a little bit wrong, and the American people are left wondering whom, if anyone, they can trust.
(05/07/02 9:00am)
Week after week I try to write about issues of national or even global importance. Today I will attempt to outdo myself and write a column of intergalactic proportions
(04/23/02 9:00am)
It seems that as I forge my way through year after year of education, more and more people start to ask me what I plan to do after college. Admittedly this is expected. Attending and graduating from a prestigious institution of higher learning is supposed to yield immediate success in the real world. At a Christmas party my parents held this past December, I found myself having the same conversation over and over with many different people. It wasn't a horrible ordeal; in some ways it was flattering. The average conversation went something like this: