MONDAY,MAY 9,2011
PAGE 5A
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
opinion
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My interest in Facebook is relative to the number of girls who are online that I've seen naked.
Dear Rebecca Black, at least you had a choice on where to sit. Sincerely, Rosa Parks.
So since bin Laden is dead can we masturbate on airplanes again?
Killing flies with an electric fly swatter ... Let's just say things got a little sadistic and out of hand.
We're sitting in the fourth floor lobby in Templin and the smell of weed is coming through the window. We're almost as cool as Hashies
I read the Free For All (and YouTube comments) because it makes me feel intelligent and superior to everyone.
Please stop trying to get in my pants after you get kicked out of the bar on weekend nights. I will never let you get this. You will not get this.
Kanye: Yo, Osama, I'm let you finish but Waldo was the best hider of all time, of all time.
Not sure if it's the real Rebeca Black, but she posted a message on Twitter saying "guess what day it is?" and this dude said "Shut up. You're awful, and I hate you."
How the hell are you supposed to start talking to a girl? it's harder than math class, at least there are set formulas ...
Woke up in the backseat of my car, with the keys in the ignition on Mass Street at 7:45 a.m., I don't even have a witty comment to add.
Doctor's waiting rooms need some music. And better lighting. And more women. And a pole in the middle of the room. And a buffet.
Lost the flash drive to my brain. Goal for next Cinco de Mayo: remember what happened on Cinco de Mayo.
I like to say "insomnia" like Rihanna sings "Disturbia."
Guys, don't be afraid to tell a girl you're not interested. Yeah some girls will think you're a dick, but the ones like me will be grateful and quit wasting their time.
WHO BROKE STUMBLEUPON??!!!
This is BS. Do they know what class I'm in right now?
With the end of the school year fast approaching, my desire to get in the FFA overrides my desire to do well on my finals.
This girl texted me last night saying to come over. No one was home. I went over and no one was there.
Sleep, we need to talk. You keep showing up when I'm busy, and leaving when I have free time. This relationship is not working.
Wow, there is more sexual immaturity on FFA than there is at a Sexaholics Anonymous class.
Take it from me: never, EVER, let a chick blow you with a mouthful of Pop Rocks.
After the initial shock and subsequent jubilation a feeling of dread.
POLITICS
Despite the consequences, a terrorist is still a terrorist
As much symbol as mastermind, Osama bin Laden was the face of militant jihadism for legions of disaffected extremists around the world. Within hours of the Pakistan raid in which U.S. forces killed the al-Qaida leader, bin Laden's partisans began demanding reprisal attacks.
Dread came not from the knowledge that nihilist terrorists would seize on America's success to justify a new round of violence. That reaction was utterly predictable. I feared instead the response of many of my fellow liberals.
At its best, liberalism champions democratic institutions, minority rights and the peaceful airing of political grievances. Bin Laden spearheaded a movement calling for the installation of an Islamic caliphate, a notion incompatible with such liberal democratic principles as secular democracy, women's rights and respect for dissenters. That the al-Qaida vision is antithetical to liberalism — and
BY LUKE BRINKER
lbrinker@kansan.com
worthy of a vigorous, realistic and multilateral response — should be obvious enough.
But for a segment of the American left, criticism of U.S. foreign policy trumps other liberal values. America blundered, to be sure, in supporting some rather unsavory characters in the Cold War and in its foolish decision to invade Iraq. That doesn't mean, however, that the U.S. is an empire with malicious designs of plundering, looting and conquering. It's characteristic of the paranoid style to ascribe malevolent motives to those with whom
you simply disagree on a matter of practical policy.
Interviewed on Democracy Now this Monday, The Nation's Jeremy Scahill launched a vicious broadside against the war on terrorism.
many of them — but is it just possible that there is something inherent in the myopic, lethal worldview of bin Laden and his likl that leads them to bomb markets, use human shields and fly planes into American skyscrapers? Is there any point at which terrorists become responsible for their own reprehensible actions, or must we reconsider the merits of killing a terrorist mastermind out of fear that it may inflame radical youth?
For too many ostensible liberals, reflexive opposition to American foreign policy leads to moral relativism. Even as liberals denounce domestic fundamentalists who seek to defund Planned Parenthood, deny gays and lesbians the right to marry and maintain Jefferson's wall of separation between church and state, they seek to explain away the violence of foreign extremists.
"We have given a grand motivation to people around the world that want to do harm to Americans in our killing of civilians, our waging of war against countries that have no connection to al-Qaida and by staying in these countries long after the mission was accomplished," Scahill said.
Well. Say what you will about the strategic choices of Presidents Bush and Obama — and I have my qualms with
When Scott Roeder assassinated Dr. George Tiller in 2009, extremists within the anti-abortion movement asserted that by continuing to operate his abortion clinic in Wichita even after previous threats and attempts on his life, he invited his eventual murder. Liberals denounced such twisted thinking then, and they should do so now.
Brinker is a sophomore from Topeka studying history.
GUEST COLUMN: ALEX PUGH
Economic aid small step against terrorism
I was very disappointed in Hannah Sandals opinion piece on the role of UAV operations in Pakistan. Being that Ms. Sandal is a 3L I would much rather have read her take on the issue of legality in such strikes (a topic that certainly needs addressing), as her argument toward the counter-productivity of such drone strikes was, as a great genius once put it, "shallow and pedantic."
To paint the actions by the U.S. in Pakistan in as simple of terms as the military pursuit of al-Qeada operatives in the Federally Administered Tribal Area (FATA), all the while trying to win over the "hearts and minds" of the local populace through economic bribery is a gross misrepresentation of the Af-Pak situation. Before you proceed you must understand that I in no way condone the loss of innocent life toward the ends of security, but the world is a much more complex place than what Ms. Sandal presents it as.
It is necessary to first understand that U.S. military action in Pakistan's FATA is part of its COIN (counter-insurgency) doctrine, not counter-terrorism strategy, and thus is primarily aimed at disrupting the ability of the Taliban from using FATA as a staging area from which to launch attacks into Afghanistan.
Secondly, you'll have to realize that the Taliban is a pseudo Pashtun-tribal/nationalist movement born out of Saudi funded Deobandist religious madrassas. Guess where those madrassas were located? That's right, FATA! The Pashtun nation, to which the great majority of the Taliban belongs, straddles the Af-Pak border and entirely encompasses FATA, making the populace all but direct kinsmen to the very group of people the U.S. is attempting to make explode. Throwing some aid projects their way isn't just going to make them all of a sudden think that the U.S. is full of sunshine and butterflies.
in the '80s as part of Pakistan's drive for "strategic depth" in case of an Indian invasion. So yeah, you can forget about them just giving up the Haqqanis' any time soon.
Beyond this, the Taliban in Pakistan is not a stranger in a stranger land. They are actively assisted by and allied with the Haqqani network, a Pakistani insurgent group with close ties to the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI; Pakistani CIA). As it is, the ISI helped setup the Haqqani network
To top this off, as of last year when the Pakistani Army first attempted to step up and clamp down on the Taliban and Haqqani groups in the NWFP and Swat Valley it has lost more soldiers than in all its wars with India combined and has displaced millions more of its citizens. Ask the Pakistani Army which they would prefer, drone strikes to full-frontal assault and I think you'd know their answer.
Going further, to argue that easing up on the ol' UAV strikes and giving the economic route a turn is, to put it gently, naive at best.
First off, there is no one "cureall" for terrorism. There are many different theories as to the symptoms and causes of someone being brought into the terrorist fold, but economic development is probably lowest on the list.
Remember that guy the U.S. just found in Pakistan, the most deadly terrorist to date, Osama bin Laden? He was from one of the wealthiest families in Saudi Arabia. I think Col. Smart of the U.S. probably put it best in her paper on ideology formation by saying that it is "important to understand that global terrorism is not about Islam; it is about the social conditions connected with globalization." To say that by simply investing aid money into infrastructure and economic projects would at all benefit the goodwill felt toward the U.S. by the population of FATA (or anywhere for that matter) is the same kind of thinking that others like Greg Mortenson fell prey to. This also assumes that the U.S. is the master of its own public image within Pakistan, which it certainly is not. For a much better explication on this than I am able to give, check out Mosharraf Zaidis piece in Foreign Policy titled "The Lies They Tell Us." As it is, the situation is, and always will be, much more nuanced and complex than 'a little less of this' and 'a little more of this'.
Alex Pugh is a senior in political science from Stuttgart, Germany.
CARTOON
Nicholas Sambaluk
COMMENTARY
Chivalry should take a cue from the animal kingdom
A recent lecture in my evolutionary biology class sparked my attentiveness on modern courtship in humans: it does not exist.
It has compromised chivalry and devolved into dating. And this dating, for the most part, is tacky, lacking and boring.
Traditionally, courtship was meant for the male to actively court or "woo" the female. (Let's not focus on gender roles.) Suitors would woo their intended love interest with flowery poems and serenades. In the 17th century, Europe and America allowed courting couples to share a bed, fully clothed, to converse all night. It gives a new definition to pillow talk, or rather, archaic.
Chivalrous Englishmen in the 18th century gave their loved one a pair of gloves and if she wore it to Church that next Sunday, she had accepted the proposal. These acts have an element of excitement, suspense and passion.
Where did they go? It has amounted to dating. The term "date" roots back in the 1890s in terms of prostitution. Talk about romantic.
Today in our college setting, dating has either resulted through alcohol, "hooking up" or even worse, online. There is something very awkward about reading on an online profile: I enjoy badminton, Coldplay, and "wants kids in the future" in hopes someone will message you back stating they are interested. And anyone can digitally edit a profile picture.
I am not devaluing people that have online dating profiles. It is sad that we live in a society in which many students who attend a college with over 30,000 students feel the need to meet
BY MONICA SAHA msaha@kansan.com
someone on the Internet.
We could learn a thing or two from animals and courtship. Weedy Sea Dragons engage in a dance during their courtship by mirroring each other in delicate unison underwater. Robins and Cardinals prepare grub meals for the female. Bighorn Sheep prove their love for their gal with sweet competition. During mating season, rams butt heads with their giant horns in hopes to plow one to the ground. Even koalas, one of the laziest animals, sing for females Animals who are supposed to be less specialized and less mentally capable have the upper hand in the arena.
Modern courting consists of tight clothes, buying drinks, dirty dancing and then sex. Really? It is evident that the environment such as the bar setting or house party might not change, but spice it up! Maybe leave the archaic poem and gloves at home, but serenading with a nice freestyle would be refreshing. And instead of grinding, try a dance off in which "the Bernie" must be present. (YouTube it.) If the club isn't your scene, then why not something outdoors? Nothing says competitive like being served in badminton.
Saha is a junior from Overland Park studying neurobiology.
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