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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAS
MONDAY, JANUARY 27, 2014
opinion
Send your FFA submissions to 785-289-8351 or kansan.com
If I see you watching the X-games, I will judge you hardcore.
TEXT FREE FOR ALL
Y'all need to learn the difference between "apart" (separate) and "a part" (one piece).
"Have you heard of Wolfram Alpha?" asked the chemistry professor to the room full of snickering students who have all taken differential equations
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Some days i just want to put my Princess dress on and watch a Disney Princess movie.
How you know a pharmacist is living on the wild side; they formulate their gummy vitamins so they can take two instead of one... because they are just so good.
A squirrel stole my niece's pizza.
Free beer Friday was canceled. All the beer was frozen.
Whatever happened to
@SquirrelsofKU?
Trying to actively participate in discussion,but entirely focused on holding in farts.
I will learn how to hold two doors open at the same time smoothly, I swear it.
Gotta love getting hit by random gale force winds when you walk.
Camping the 6-8 a.m. shift then leaving and sleeping for two hours is like a dream. Sometimes I wonder if it really happened...
Why Christian Garrett? Why?
Nice to hear that engineering is killing brain tissue per the article on 7A. Only 2+ years of murdering my brain tissue left guys!!
If there are 4,000 people in the dorms, and they all eat on paper items, that's a lot of waste. How much? If they use 2 paper items that weigh .0257lbs at Mrs. E's for 5 days for an average of 1.6 meals a day, that's 1,644 lbs of trash. That is crazy.
I miss my gorgeous TA from last semester. :-)
Why are there so many places around campus with inadequate lighting? It's looks like an X-Files episode here sometimes.
Listening to Disney on Pandora makes walking to class better.
I'm a KU grad and I never tried to get into the FFA until now. And I used to be the FFA editor.
A Pikachu has been spotted on campus.
POLITICS
Meet me in outer space...
Hypocritical surrogacy bill infringes on family
Senator Mary Pilcher-Cook's recent stunt in the state capital is another sad reminder of how politicians frequently forget that America is, supposedly, the land of the free and the home of the brave, emphasis on the free. Pilcher-Cook, a Republican senator from Shawnee and chairman of the Senate Public Health and Welfare Committee, recently held a presentation in Topeka defending a controversial bill that would prohibit surrogate preeminence in Kansas.
According to an article in the Topeka Capital-Journal, Pilcher-Cook said, "Currently in Kansas, there are no laws regarding surrogacy. I'd like the committee to take a look at that."
people's lives often attributed to the political left, like abortion rights and insurance-covered birth control, yet are perfectly comfortable with prescribing unfair legislation that would do little more than prevent Kansas couples, who for one reason or another cannot conceive, from becoming parents.
Of course she would, because hypocritical politicians like her tend to think they have every reason to protest the so-called intrusions into
In a time when marital, sexual and conceptual freedoms are most valued and fought for through endless protests by supporters on both sides of the aisle, it is disappointing that a Kansas Republican, or any politician for that matter, would think it befitting to impose even more restrictions on conceptual decisions traditionally left to the particular couple and their respective surrogate mother, not the state legislature. Of course, the political power Pilcher-Cook wields always has the potential to corrupt, pervert
and or delude political ideologies from every sector of the political spectrum, even in red Kansas, making politicians like her particularly subject to hypocritical moves like this.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Not only did the senator refuse to describe the particulars of her bill because according to the Capital-Journal "she wasn't holding a draft of the legislation she wrote," she also had the audacity to follow the presentation of her bill with a full examination of two pregnant women on the floor of the senate, likely in an effort to appear sympathetic to pregnant women. For a so-called Republican concerned with the welfare of the unborn, as seen in her voting record for House Bill 2218 in which the senator voted for prohibiting the abortion of a "pain-capable unborn child." she seems more than happy to prevent the creation of life through more legitimate — and humanitarian — processes
Legislators watch as a sonographer performs a sonogram on Amanda Kennedy during the Kansas Senate Public Health Committee meeting in Topeka on Jan. 22.
like surrogate pregnancies. It seems infertility isn't the only thing preventing Kansans from bearing children. Pilcher-Cook may be contacted at (785) 296-7362, on her cell phone at (913) 396-9306 or by email to Mary. PilcherCook@senate.ks.gov.
Rob Pyatt is a junior
st. St Joseph, Mo.
studying journalism.
ECONOMICS
Divesting from fossil fuel doesn't harm the companies
I had the chance to visit my little sister at Duke this winter break. While on campus, a few students asked me to sign a climate change petition. The students were part of a group called Divest Duke, interested in divesting Duke's endowment from the top 200 fossil fuel companies and instead investing in green energy firms. I politely declined, citing my enrollment at the University of Kansas as my reason for being ineligible to sign the petition.
But upon investigation, I found that the University also has a similar group called KU Divest. While these groups are achieving varied success through videos, slogans, and other grassroots movement strategies across the country at many universities, the idea of divesting from fossil fuel companies and reinvesting in green energy firms is not so black and white.
Fundamentally, selling all your ExxonMobil shares is not equivalent to taking away cash from ExxonMobil. That's the difference between market capitalization (how much the company is "worth," meaning share price multiplied by number of shares) and earnings (how much money ExxonMobil makes by selling you
By Chris Ouyang opinion@kansan.com
gasoline). In the same way, if I hypothetically buy a share of First Solar for $50, I'm not necessarily giving First Solar a $50 bill. I'm buying a piece of the company that someone (most likely not First Solar) is selling to me, and now I'm a part owner.
Additionally, endowment investment portfolios aren't public and are incredibly complex. I'm staring at my E*Trade account right now (much simpler than, say, Harvard's $30 billion endowment) and every mutual fund I've bought invests, partly, in fossil fuel company stocks. Should I just sell the entire mutual fund because each bears the taint of evil-greenhouse-polar-bear-killing oil companies?
I feel as if the groups are simply taking a moral stand against fossil fuels, dragging "put your money where your mouth is" to the limit. The contraction serves as a persuasion tool; how can you
own shares of a fossil fuel firm (thereby a partial owner) and claim to be fighting climate change?
Maybe these divestiture groups hope to gain enough traction that mass selling of shares leads to catastrophic drops in share prices for fossil fuel firms. In all probability, this will never happen. "Divest (Your University Here)" groups have the great idea of hitting fossil fuel firms where it hurts — the wallet — but it's a shame that divesting isn't exactly that. Taxation, green subsidies, tariffs, permits and other forms of regulation do hurt fossil fuel firms' wallets, which happens to be why firms spend so much time worrying about and money lobbying against them. It's also why fossil fuel firms probably don't lose much sleep over universities mulling divestiture.
As redundant as it sounds, the truth is that a firm making profit will not close shop. And that remains true whether or not the endowment of the University of Kansas, or any university, owns its shares.
Chris Ouyang is a senior from Overland Park studying petroleum engineering and economics.
CAMPUS CHIRPS BACK
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First Monday of classes this semester. Are you ready?
FFA OF THE DAY I hope you step on a Lego... Jerk.
RELATIONSHIPS
'Facebook official not that important
Katie Kutsko, editor-in-chief kkutsko@kansan.com
Allison Kohn, managing editor akohn@kansan.com
Lauren Armendariz, managing editor larmendariz@kansan.com
I o you're finally official with your significant other. Is it soon to pop the question? And by question, I mean relationship request on Facebook. Do you bring it up or wait until the person you're involved with brings it up? Or does it even matter? Some of my friends and I used to think something was wrong with our relationships if they weren't listed on Facebook.
I'm not opposed to being "Facebook official," but I don't think it is as important as it may seem. As the months go by and I see more and more, "Sally is now in a relationship with John," I wonder if I should be showing off my relationship. But when I see updates like, "Justin is now single," with all of the comments and likes, I'm relieved knowing I won't ever have to do that if my current relationship does end.
Yet, I happen to be one of the 27 percent of Facebook users who choose the unlisted option, even though I am in a relationship. According to a Men's Health survey, half of those 27 percent of users who are unlisted are actually single.
There are 11 options for your relationship status on Facebook, covering nearly all of the statuses you may be in, but the real decision lies in whether you decide to click one of those options or to be unlisted. It took Mark Zuckerberg, a co-founder of Facebook, seven years of dating his girlfriend Priscilla Chan to change his relationship status online. If Zuckerberg didn't need Facebook to back-up his relationship, I think it is safe to say that we don't either.
Length: 300 words
The submission should include the author's name, grade and hometown. Find our full letter to the editor policy online at kansan.com/letters.
LETTÉR GUIDELINES
But why is being "Face
We can't deny that we do live in a generation that revolves around technology, and many people want Facebook to reflect their lives in the real world, including pictures depicting how much fun they're having and check-ins showing the cool places they're going. But where should that reflection stop? And where is the line between what we should and should not share with public? It is your choice to let technology be a part of your personal life. To be "Facebook official" or to not, the decision is yours, but take my advice and don't make the "About" section on your Facebook more important than it should.
HOW TO SUBMIT A LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Kayla Soper is a senior from Junction City studying journalism and political science.
book official" so important to some people? Your real friends already know, and by being "Facebook official" you're only confirming to people who you talk to once a year that you are in a relationship. It shouldn't be important that your great aunt's friend's daughter's boyfriend knows you are, in fact, taken. The more I think about it, the more I am convinced that having a relationship status on Facebook should not matter. If you and your significant other have made it clear to each other what you are then Facebook is not what makes it official.
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@KansanOpinion Ready? One is not simply "ready for Monday classes."
@Corev Fidori
@CrazyyySexyyCOOL
@KansanOpinion can I just hibernate instead?
Kolby Botts, sales manager kbotts@kansan.com
Anna Wenner, opinion editor
awenner@kzx.com
Sean Powers, business manager spowers@kansan.com
@MorganAideen
@KansanOpinion Nope, not even a little. More weekend please.
CONTACT US
Brett Akagi, media director and content strategist
bakagi@kansan.com
Jon Schlitt, sales and marketing adviser jschlitt@kansan.com
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THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Members of the Kansan Edition Board are Katie Kutauk, Allison Johnn, Lauren Armendariz, Anna Wenner, Sean Powers and Kolby Botts.
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