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Show DAILY THE CHRONICLE UTAH THE CHRONICLE'S VIEW HI trow Science Vacancies Need To Be Filled by Somebody-- 1 tvsK'T . Trhen Gov. Michael O. i Leavitt iatd: out his V V ambitious engineering initiative this fall, many people raised their eyebrows when they discovered the enormity of his goals. At the University of Utah in nhe next two years, construction will begin on a new engineering building. Hopefully Leavitt sec aside some money for plane tickets as well. graduate students a they pursue' higher academic interests. The United States benefits greatly from the pressure of talented visitors assuming they stay. But as the situations gradually improve in their native countries, many cf them will probably home with their prefer, to ht-abeads full of facts than to stay here. If the United States is to st?y on top of (or j$et bacj? on) economic boom, the high-tec- h 'and industrious talented, scientist? . and engineers should probably be in the ' The Wall Street Journal ras a story Thursday which outlined a rather interesting phenomenon in higher education. In the past few years, institutions, of higher education have witnessed an extraordinary ' ' : increase in the number of foreign country. students who ful the vacancies in - It's no mystery that the both graduate and undergraduate Sute$' lags 'far behind other science and engineering pro- - ind jstrialized countries in ensuring that, the masses oflts populaPeople from outside the United tion have access to the best eduStates are becomirg the teaching cations, especially in math ind weli-educai- . - stu- dents and the future of the hightech industry in the United .States: And we're lucky to have them. According to The Journal's story by David Wessel, Chinese h and Indian immigrants run of Silicon Valley's high-tec- h firms. Eight of the n U.S. residents who shared the Nobel prizes in physics and chemistry in the past three years were born outside the country. one-fort- ,: on. m&tmo.. V . ed J; Cow TlHK,s. ary from Mexico. He speaks in Spanish a bit more than I'm comfort able with. He tries to wheedle me into once again being a sunbeam for Jesus. And he tricks me into eating tortillas chucked with unspeakable cow parts. On a particularly interesting day this weekend, a particularly interesting girl happened to ask me why I am so particularly cynical. In a stupor I stuttered, unaware of why I was or how I had become as such. Oblivious to the answer and slightly vexed that I had so involuntarily revealed my cynicism I made a I J V ie iVm TO THE Editor: I believe you put together a professional, paper, however, I have a problem or two with James Seaman's narrow-mindehypocritical column in the g 1. March The column unapologetically paper Bush his President for to comprocastigated inability mise his right-win- g "extremism." Bush has proven himself more than capable of compromising with Democrats in Texas and factions within his own party during the election-H- e attacked "social crusaders who stubbornly refuse to budge on principle," but only conservative crusaders. Should homosexuals be criticized when they uncompromisingly demand the right to wed just as heterosexual couples do? Should suffragettes have been high-quali- d, left-win- A Stupid Fine, a Stupid Law brains, even when wrapped in old taste not unlike eight-da- y the best of even Nonetheless, friends duped me into eating "tacos de sesos" at a nearby Mexican dive. He also duped me into eating cow tongue. But, having informed me that cow tongue is a considerable delicacy, I am reluctant to compare it to decaying fish old (although between you and me, eight-da- y herring is chocolate in comparison). My good friend let's f" call him Mike, because tl fd ms name is a tnats . ( ir lUiCrn mission returned newly B 1 Vf-fc-j- Jf . , s EDITOR Easy to Preach Tough to Practice ets for all of the teaching assistants the U will need to attract. Opinion ii i LETTER ration. In fact, $9.9 million is probably just enough to buy the plane tick- Columnist Thkm ai&o d Although the governor's engineering initiative also provides $9.9 million in incentives to lure talented students into teaching math and science in public schools, it's far from the revolu.- -. tion needed to overhaul the schools and reverse their deterio- Chronicle ... jv vthiA Jr III . science. CHRIS YEATES I . rfi . Un-.'ce- assistants, the advanced grad I Even places as homogenous as the U depend on foreiga students to fill their graduate programs and therefore to teach under- ty reprimanded for demanding the right to vote? Even if I don't share the same beliefs as someone else, by attempting to understand that person and his or her perspective, I can develop tolerance and toward those beliefs. Liberals do a bang-u- p job preaching about tolerance, but only the rarest few manage to practice it. Mr. Lewis, you and your staff reliably assert your convictions every day. Perhaps Mr. Seaman should leave his bigotry in the closet open-mindedne- anti-religio- an daM iracle world that only a fool would remark poorly nice this week. Sure, I'd like to ask Mike to tone down his Jesus fever. But I won't say that; I'd rather he sat peacefully in a sheltered albeit boring bubble feeding me cow brains than ruin our friendship. So, for a few moments, allow me to suspend my unmitigated cynicism to say that, however rarely, something in the world happens that, like my friendship with the devout Jesus fiend, transcends opposing convictions and forges a fragment of hope the closest thing to a miracle in this mess we call mankind. ((Although it's likely the public will never Clinton for any affair remember aside from the Monica Lewinsky one, there are those of us who will miss not having a bullheaded Democrat in office. And while most think Clinton ended his term with a whimper, they may have neglected to overlook two words which are unlikely to be found in Bush's meager vocabulary: Justifiable Mercy. Before boarding a plane with his family last month, Clinton pardoned 140 Americans who, he felt, had been given unjust sentences. One of them was a Utahn. Cory Stringfellow had been given 16 years without parole for a drug charge. Even Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson stuck his head out to say, "There are a lot of people who at very young ages do very stupid things. But that doesn't mean their lives ought to be destroyed and their families ought to be torn asunder." Even to a disparaging bastard like myself, there are decent things that happen in the of. CHRONICLE OPINION EDITOR e, non-viole- nt SCOTT LEWIS us instead. And if you throw Alex Lee's stupidly prejudiced Feature article (Feb. 28) in there too, so much the better. GABRIEL REMMICK Senior, Anthropology point to say something, if not proper, at least first-offens- ss But I mention this only because I fear that, offenses will with Bush in office, first-tim- e soon be synonymous with capital crimes.. Everyone is aware of Texas' longstanding track record this is the state that somehow proudly executes criminals as quickly as guinea pigs propagate. And now with a Texan in office, the small fragments of hope that once graced even the notorious realm of politics are in jeopardy. All the incredible economic juggling and environmental laws that Clinton passed will soon be pissing against the Republican wind. But, as I intended to temper my cynicism, there is a bright side to having a cowboy in office. For one, we can theorize about whether or not there are, in' fact, eyeballs behind those slits, or how a human manages to resemble a slightly cute but inflexible pear, or, at the very least, we can theorize about what the hell happened to the man's lips. Furthermore, it's completely false but fun to report that Bush intends to donate cowboy boots and pro-lif- e pamphlets to charities across the country. Furthermore, unconfirmed reports show that any purchased guns, cowy action figures will be boy hats or Bush-famil- With a proof of purchase of two or more of the above, one can even get a free Uzi for deer hunting shipped next-da- y air. Forget it! Being objective is for news writers and scientists. My cynical senses smell Bush in the air. He's even making the police behave like assholes. t LETTERSCHRONICLE.UTAH.EDU We all know there are a billion bizarre ordinances out there. Riding in the back of a truck is legal, but falling out is illegal. Putting squirrels in one's pants is illegal. Oral sex is illegal. We even have one on the books stating that no building shall be taller than the Church Office Building. But no one pays attention to stupid ordinances, at least not until this week. Sarah McPhce, a senior in political science, was fined seventy dollars for honking her horn at a car that would not move at a green light. Apparently one cop, one day, decided to enforce one ordinance that isn't even taught in Driver's Ed. entitled "Use of Horn," Ordinance 1252-1states that it is illegal to use one's horn except during an emergency. For those of us who have ever honked at a friend or a jerk or a scantily-cla- d girl walking down the street we are all criminals, a litany of unwilling outlaws and, as such, I'd like to suggest we get orga7, nized. Let's create a fragment of hope in this mess and help Sarah McPhec pay a ridiculous fine. If a good Mormon kid can befriend a flaming agnostic like myself, and if I can, in turn, eat cow brains to sustain the friendship, then surely 70 students can pitch in one dollar each to help make the insignificant statement that....Wcll, I'm not sure what the statement is, but it will do a small dab of good, like an anarchist's special. Send me an email if you're interested. Chris welcomes feedback at: cycateschron-icle.utah.ed- u or send a letter to the editor to: after-scho- ol letterschronicle.utah.edu. 581-704- 1 |