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Show OurView AboutUs Editor in Chief ASUSU restructuring a dangerous idea GET AKOTHtR HAIRCUT... • Another curiosity of this proposed bill is to eliminate the primaries. Why? One of the fears of candidates is the lesser-known competitor who will steal away votes. Eliminating the primary will leave a large number of candidates who will be splitting votes down to a hair. , ASUSU often bemoans the fact that voter turnout is so low. If that is really a concern, then shortening the election process surely won't help matters. The proposed plan would create a four-day election turnaround. Four days is too short for students to decide who they want to vote for. We don't need to turn into the U.S. presidential election madness, but there should be enough time to thoroughly examine the candidates and choose those who will best represent students. Primary elections help with this process. Students, if this election actually materializes, please shut down these proposed changes. If they pass, they will establish a slippery precedent. If nothing else, realize that with less representation accountable to you, the chance of tuition and fee hikes rises dramatically. Vote no on this ASUSU bill. Civil responsibilities important to know A s citizens of the United States, we have been given a great responsibility. We have been blessed to live in a land of freedom, and it is up to us to understand and defend the principles upon which freedom depends. We are indebted to those who have gone before us and those who are yet to come to preserve the freedom weahave been given. This freedom was bought by blood, tears and sacrifice, and we must be diligent in preserving it. The great safeguard of our freedom is the Constitution. Because of this, it is our duty to understand and uphold our Constitution, in the tradition of our Founding Fathers. That document was intended to direct our government, ensuring the government would carry out the duties necessary for the preservation of our freedom and restrict the government from engaging in activities that would limit that freedom. Our Founding Fathers understood the people would ultimately be the safeguard of the Constitution. Washington taught, "The power under the Constitution will always be in the people. It is entrusted for certain defined purposes, and for a certain limited period, to representatives of their own choosing; and whenever it is executed contrary to their interest, or not agreeable to their wishes, the servants can, and undoubtedly will, be recalled." Next month we have the opportunity to help decide who will be the candidates running for president in this year's election. In this election, as in any other, it is important we learn of the candidates and their positions, as well as their performance • I See CIVIL, page 10 Seth R. Hawkins! News Editor ! Arie Kirk. Assistant News Editor _ Alison Baugh A SUSU must have taken a page from the handbook of England's King George 111. No, they haven't changed the school colors from Aggie Blue to British red and they aren't mandating the quartering of ASUSU officers in the dorms of college students. They are proposing a plan that could lead to putting too much power in one person's hands - namely the president of ASUSU. ASUSU is currently working on setting a date to hold a special election that would give the president of ASUSU power to appoint vice president positions according to how he or she desires- This would throw the current system of electing certain vice presidents out the window and give the president of ASUSU a dangerous power. One of the greatest needs for the American colonists to declare independence from England was the principle of taxation without representation. If the ASUSU resolution is passed, the students of USU will face a similar problem. We elect our officials to represent us and our needs, including keeping tuition and fees to a minimal, providing meaningful activities and protecting the overall interest of all students. If these people are appointed rather than elected, we as students lose our representation and hand over power to the president of ASUSU and his or her appointed cabinet to do whatever they like. Sounds pretty un-American to us. Too much power in any one person's hands is extremely dangerous. Our country has established a series o f checks and balances to prevent something like this from happening. While it may not work perfectly all the time, if all politicians.lived to the guidelines contained in the Constitution, there would be fair representation and a balance of power. The current setup of ASUSU provides a similar balance and should not be changed. ;' ' But this isn't all, ASUSU has a bee in its bonnet and is '^trying to change other aspects of the election process. First up, the president wc/uld select a running mate to •campaign for office, this isn't a terrible idea. As ASUSlT President Peter McCnesney pointed out, if a president selects a running mate, there will be less conflicts and a better vision of where ASUSU should go. But that's also a great disservice to the students at ASUSU. Sometimes the best ideas come out of these conflicts. If everyone always agrees on every issue, it probably means one group of i: students at USU is not being represented. » Features Editor Assistant Features EdrtoT • DiteSvfs Sports Editor :ytz. Samuel Hi3op Assistant Sports Editor—^ y. David fakef Copy Editor '•= -• , - * • Rebekah BrgjjwayPhoto Editor [Edwards Assistant Photo Editor To the editor: Utah State Aggie basketball games are often one of the most exciting events to attend at USU. I recently attended the Utah State vs. Boise State basketball game. I arrived around 5:45 p.m. to get in line. 1 had about two dozen people in front of me in the line. After entering the Spectrum it quickly became clear that instead of sitting in the> bottom half of the Spectrum, 1 would be sitting in the upper half. This was due to the two dozen or so people that had all decided to save 10-20 seats all by themselves. Blankets, coats ' and hats were thrown all over the seats in an attempt to say, "These seats are saved, back off." At half time 1 looked down and realized that there were several open seats. Many people tend to save more seats than necessary. I have also noticed that the people that save seats are often the same people game after game. I would like to encour- Letters to the editor • A public forum age them to not only be courteous to other people that bothered to wait in line, but also that if people expect you to save seats for them game after game, they are not your true friends. One last comment, to those of you who rush in two minutes before the buzzer and expect front row seats, try doing your own dirty work for once. Basketball games at USU are amazing. We need to work to make it amazing for ALL of the students at USU. •'••;•- . Katie H o l m e s Ignore the pundits, the voting season is young L ast Saturday's Nevada caucus was painfully disappointing to the John Edwards campaign. Like Iowa, Nevada has a lot of working class and rural voters whose support Edwards thought he could count on for a strong showing. Indeed, just days before the caucus, several polls had Edwards in a statistical dead heat with Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. And yet, Edwards placed a distant third. He won a dismal four percent of the vote. Caucus rules are partly to blame—when candidates like Edwards don't pass the threshold of viability (15-25 percent depending on the precinct), their supporters have to caucus for another candidate. Notwithstanding these caucus oddities, Edwards graciously owned his defeat. "I got my butt kicked. That is what happened in Nevada/' he told Wolf Blitzer on CNN's "Late Edition." "And the job for me now is — I have learned this from my whole life experience, is when you get knocked down, you have got to get up. You have got to get up and start fighting again." Matthew T. Richardson, a long-time friend of Edwards, said, "He's still just as driven," despite his political losses. "He's lived through losing his son, his wife getting (breast cancer). I've heard him say one time he's been through the worst he's ever going to go through. He's been through it all." Since his defeats in New Hampshire and Nevada, there have been calls for Edwards to drop out of the race. There has even been some talk that Edwards, if he continues to campaign, will be this election cycle's Ralph Nader. The assumption here is that Edwards is pulling support away from Obama—that the two of them are splitting the "change" and "antiClinton" votes. It makes sense, but it's not true. More likely, Edwards is doing Obama a favor by staying in the race. Edwards attracts two core (and very different) constituencies: the liberal "blogosphere" and the more conservative older, white and working-class voters. The former group, to which I belong, would prefer Obama to Clinton. But the latter group, which makes up the bulk of Edwards' support, would actually shift to Clinton. Notice that when Edwards did well in Iowa, Obama won, but when Edwards did poorly in New Hampshire and Nevada, Clinton won. So Edwards is drawing votes from Clinton, not Obama. Another favor Edwards is doing Obama is his promise to stay in the race until the Democratic convention this summer. If there »i Cameron Peterson Forum Lette rs Don't save seats at Spectrum 'ZZ *• Tyler Larson' is no clear Democratic front-runner by the convention, Edwards will probably throw his delegates behind Obama (who ne's hinted at preferring over Clinton). That is, of course, unless John Edwards is the front-runner himself. Let's not write the Edwards campaign's obituary quite yet. There are 47 states that have yet to weigh in on the race, with South Carolina holding its Democratic primary this Saturday. Edwards is polling third in South Carolina, but he does have some marginal momentum and unique advantages going into the primary. First, Edwards won last Monday's debate by a wide margin. While Obama and Clinton were going at each others' throats, Edwards rose above petty politics and spoke to the issues most important to South Carolinians: health care, poverty, education, etc. CNN's Bill Schneider remarked, "John Edwards got himself back in it—he showcases his style and his key issues, and is clearly back in the game." Second, Edwards recently received the envied endorsement of Martin Luther King III, MLK, jr.'s son. In a state where half the Democratic primary-goers are black, this endorsement may give Edwards some traction. And third, South Carolina is where Edwards was born. He's the native son and is well-liked in the state. Still, Edwards and his supporters are under no delusion—it will take a miracle to even secure second-place in South Carolina this Saturday. Certainly, stranger things in politics have happened, but it's an uphill battle. At this point, though, I'm not supporting Edwards because I think he will win, I'm supporting him because I think he should win. And so long as he's running the most progressive campaign and offering the boldest solutions, he deserves to.be in this race and will have my vote, So please, ignore the pundits—this is not a two-person race between senators Obama and Clinton. Not yet, at least. Millions of Americans have yet to hear Edwards' vision for the country. I hope the media won't deprive them of that opportunity. jon Adams is a junior majoring in political science. Comments and questions can be sent to him at jonadams@cc.usu.edu. Editorial Board Seth R. 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