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Show 4 Tuesday October 22, 2013 OPINION Tea party is racist and un-American www.dailyutahchronicle.cor ► Sidewalk violators should be penalized Columnist B reathing heavy sighs of relief, the American people bore witness to the end of the shameful spectacle that was the government's shutdown. The problem has not been dealt with, however — merely delayed. In a few short months, this ridiculous problem, which has been precariously postponed, will once again be taken up by both sides of the aisle in an attempt to win political victories. If there is to be hope for this issue of the debt ceiling and the continued functioning of the government to be resolved in any manner other than the debacle that this country beheld, then the systemic delinquency in Congress must be addressed. How can we expect a peaceful and rational solution to be arrived at when the tea party-approved ideologues that hide under the protective guise of being Republicans still wield villainous amounts of power? Let me speak to the issue with unabashed candor — the tea party is utterly and unequivocally un-American. I don't entirely blame the likes of Sen.Ted Cruz (R-Texas) or Mike Lee (R-Utah) for the spectacles that they produced on the Senate floor. They are, after all, merely reflections of the distorted will of the people. Elected as they were, it is their duty to fulfill the ambitions of their constituents. In this case, it is the borderline anarchist alliance known as the tea party. Since I believe that no ammunition is more dangerous in a discourse than an opponent's own words, allow me to present the antiAmerican rhetoric of the tea party. "Our nation was founded on violence. The option is on the table. I don't think that we should ever remove anything from the table as it relates to our liberties and our freedoms," said tea party-backed Texan congressional candidate Stephen Broden in 2010. Is this what the tea party wants from a candidate? Someone who is willing to support an armed insurrection against the very government he is elected to? Furthermore, the tea party consistently has a warped and revisionist version of history. Clearly, tea partiers have either collectively failed high school history courses or are ambivalent towards functional fact checking. Glen Urquhart, former candidate for a House seat in Delaware, "tea bagged" history when he misappropriated a quote about the separation of church and state. Urquhart ascribed the quote, normally attributed by historians and the literate to Thomas Jefferson, to Hitler, saying "So the next time your liberal friends talk about the separation of church and state, ask them why they're Nazis." The concluding nail in the proverbial coffin is possibly the most controversial — the tea party is, on the whole, racist. I write that unapologetically. Tea party heartthrob Joe the Plumber recently reposted an article from the website "The Black Sphere" onto his own page. The post, written by Kevin Jackson, is entitled "America Needs a White republican President," and begins with the line, "Wanting a white Republican president doesn't make you racist." I'm sorry Joe, but in this instance, it does. Sharron Angle, tea party sweetheart of the Nevada Assembly, was caught saying a group of Latino students looked Asian. She went so far as to call herself Asian in a miscarried attempt to prove her melting pot sentiments. So clearly, it comes to no surprise to say that they are utterly opposed to anything that comes out of President Barack Obama's mouth. If this is the rhetoric being supported by the tea party, what hope is there of a rational and informed answer to the debt ceiling problem? What can we expect from a political movement that wants to abolish government but then blame their political enemies when it does in fact shut down? They make claims about wanting the government out of their lives, but continue to draw on Medicare and Social Security. There is no pleasing, reasoning or debating with these hypocritical, hypersensitive, hyper-oppositional misanthropes. letters@chronicle.utah.edu LINDSAY SCHURLING/The Daily Utah Chronicle SAM PANNIER Columnist f oolishly, I thought we all left the danger of being mortally wounded by Razor scooters behind in the childhood culde-sac. But anyone that has walked the HPER Highway in the morning during class breaks knows better. Some days it seems as if you have stepped into a pedestrian version of Frogger (with a third dimension the amphibian hero did not have to contend with). As stories of near-misses and the occasional pedestrian clipping abound, it was only a matter of time before somebody got seriously hurt. Recent policy changes to university regulations aimed at curbing sidewalk dangers are smart and even-handed and should do a lot to restore a little rider-pedestrian harmony. Even before the first day of the semester, the university began addressing the problem aggressively. The changes the Sidewalk Safety Committee (the very existence of which should communicate the extent of the sidewalk trouble) made to University Policy 3-233 were approved by the Board of Trustees on Aug. 13th and the sandwich boards advertising the new rules were ready for the first day of fall classes. The boards have been placed in high-traffic areas and are a part of the informational campaign to let students know about the policy change, and man do you want to be informed because the penalties are steep. If found breaking the rules, riders can have their vehicles impounded or be fined sioo dollars, and if you're found to be a repeat offender, you can be "prohibited from riding or using non-motorized devices on university premises, permanently or for a designated period." No more riding in parking lots, "on or over landscaping [or] shrubbery" and riders must follow a strict io mph speed limit. Director of commuter services Alma Allred, a biker himself, said while no citations have been given yet, public safety officers on bikes have begun patrolling university sidewalks, educating riders and handing out pamphlets. Allred said the riders have been receptive so far, "and while most riders are respectful, some just tear through campus." Allred's department and campus security have received complaints in past years in regards to sidewalk safety and hope the policy changes will address their concerns. All kinds of two and even three-wheeled modes of transportation are popular here at the U, even some bemusing odd eggs — people who have had the joy of seeing the mythical Segway Man ride through the library know what I'm talking about. It will be a while before we know how the new safety measures impact the rider and pedestrian populations, but hopefully it will call a truce between the two groups. For now just remember to slow down and give your fellow students plenty of space. Oh yeah, and the shrubbery too. letters@chronicle.utah.edu Patience pays when it comes to new technology OK. 1.kikip ME -n-te iPhone G STAGE I 50-1EDuLtr: 11": a EW 4 PH 6 6IE • ZN: Ailw kw in* 3 Pm : MiAit, g • ; •. . ARASH TADJIKI/The Daily Utah Chronicle JORDAN VOGEL W Columnist ith the rapid pace that upgraded technology is being released, consumers seem to have gotten into the practice of testing products as they are released. Because of this, it may not be the best idea to wait in line for the newest thing. Marketing for technology companies do a great job of making technology look revolutionary — the most convincing of which have been Apple's grand, dramatic press conferences. However, the truth of new technology is that it tends to be overpriced and full of bugs that, with a little patience, will be fixed in the next model or by a different company. My family was always trying to be ahead of the technological curve. My dad bought a Qwest Pocket PC, a cellphone that was ahead of its time. It was a great vision and paved the path for the modern day smartphone, but the Pocket PC itself was basically worthless beyond making calls. It was several times thicker than the Samsung Galaxy and only worked through Bluetooth, which wasn't nearly as common in the early 2000s. Electric cars are showing the same developmental curve that cell phones did. The Nissan Leaf is one of the best fully electric cars around, but it would take four nights to travel from the U to Las Vegas including all the stops to recharge. Many problems with the battery have also already surfaced, which the first buyers did not expect to deal with. Now just a few years after its release, Bosch, a German manufacturer, plans to have a car that can go almost twice the distance before charging within the decade. The Microsoft Surface, riding the iPad's coattails as the next best thing, couldn't download programs in its original release. It wasn't until the Microsoft Surface Pro that the tablet could be treated more like an actual laptop than an oversized smartphone. Waiting on purchases also saves a lot of money. The iPhone 4s has the same camera and the same capabilities as the iPhone 5 (such as FaceTime and Sid). Beyond running slightly smoother, the newest iPhone is not going to enhance life any more or even look more im- pressive than the versions before it, or its competitors like HTC and Samsung. Many improvements to technology are software based and can be downloaded on to an older device anyway. Car dealers are the biggest culprit of selling "new." A test car that has only ever been driven around the lot is sold at a used price if the odometer reads io,000, and at the same time a car that has less than 100 miles drops in price the moment it is driven off the lot. The Nissan Leaf dropped in price by $6,000 between the 2012 and 2013 models after the electric revolution proved to be less innovative than predicted. Before long, anything that can be bought is going to be out of date. Being first in line will either give you an unpolished progressive idea, or an expensive version of every other model in a new color. A little patience can go a long way. letters@chronicle.utah.edu |