Opinion |

Idiots, bombs and cash

Some things to make you mad before Christmas

By Matt Shaer

Posted on Monday, December 8th, 2003, 12:00 am

E-mail

Tell us what you think!
Send a letter to the editor about this or any other article in The Maine Campus.

* On Ann Coulter’s Web site this week, the conservative pundit and best-selling author of “Slander” – a book, incidentally, available in paperback in time for the holidays – waxed poetic on the woes the right wing faced in fighting down Roe vs. Wade. All things considered, apparently, it’s not going well: “The first killing of an abortion doctor by an anti-abortion activist happened in 1993. Since then, six more people have been killed in attacks on abortion clinics, which is fewer people who ended up dead by being in the vicinity of recently released Weatherman Kathy Boudin.” Boudin is an infamous murderer; the implication here is that seven dead doctors are not enough. Without skipping a beat, Coulter added that “most of the abortionists were shot or, depending upon your point of view, had a procedure performed on them with a rifle.”

* A headline on CNN’s Web site yesterday morning read, simply: “Afghans understand deaths.” The deaths at hand – although the headline does not suggest it, and the article was unreflective of any real loss – were those of nine Afghani children; a bomb intended for a terrorist, fell instead on the tiny village of Hutala. It is the third incident of heavy civilian casualty in Afghanistan, and shortly, I imagine it will be the third incident of heavy civilian loss to be swept under the carpet. To make everyone involved feel a little better, Army Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty explained that “we looked down right before we hit the target, [and] we saw no children.” In case that wasn’t enough for the understandably concerned citizens of Hutala, Hilferty added that Afghanis “had been through years of war. They’re not happy, but I think it meant a great deal to them that my commander, Gen. [Lloyd] Austin, came out and personally expressed his condolences.”

* The Boston Globe may have jumped the gun with its double-deck headline proclaiming the legislation of gay marriage in Massachusetts. According to an informal poll last week, more than half the state’s lawmakers, including the state Senate president and the House majority leader, will vote against the constitutional amendment. Most of the state’s top officials are leaning toward creating a civil-union type statute modeled after Vermont’s recently revised law. Sadly, the reversal seems more or less a product of political pandering. Representative Phillip Travis, who is pushing the bill, admitted to The Globe that changing the language of the proposed amendment from marriage to civil-union is the only way to get it passed. “I am doing this in a political realm and the reality is that I want 101 votes,” Travis said. 101 votes are required for the bill to move to the next stage. “This is the most important vote I will participate in in my 21 years in the State House. If I have to amend it to keep the essence together that is within the latitude of my common sense.”

* As of Sunday evening, according to the Office of National Drug Control Policy, more than $36,011,202,905 had been spent on America’s “War on Drugs.” A majority of that money goes to the White House’s large-scale media campaign, which publishes ads that target, among other problems, the misconception that Asian kids don’t like pot: “It could happen to your kids. Do you really know what they’re up to after school and what they actually do with their friends? Do they trust you and seek out your advice? Realize that Asian kids are also susceptible to drug abuse and that you can keep them away from drugs.” In a related development, the number of drug law arrests, which rises every 20 seconds, was upped to 1,480,651. Money well spent.

Matt Shaer is a senior English major.