Herczog misplaces concern
I am writing in response to Stephanie Herczog’s letter “Homeless on campus a problem,” (Jan. 29). Herczog wrote that a homeless man found dead on campus is a sign that we have a homeless problem, and that “it is time for someone to take control of this issue.” Did Herczog miss that the man may have died because of “suspicious circumstances?” She only wrote, “Finding one of them dead on campus is the last straw,” in the same way she might describe finding a dead squirrel on Bruin Walk. It is more important to be concerned that there may be someone responsible for this man’s death roaming our campus than to worry about a homeless man sleeping on a public university’s campus.
Alison Dyer Fourth-year, history
Bush has harmful intentions
The editorial board is right when it claims Bush painted a “rosy picture” of his domestic policies during his State of the Union address. What struck me most was his claim that his environmental policies would preserve the beauty of our nation for future generations.
In reality, they will not preserve the environment, but instead will relax regulations on factories and power plants, open up millions of acres of forest land to corporate interests, and expose the national wildlife refuge to oil drilling.
By calling these plans the “Healthy Forest Initiative” and the “Clean Skies Initiative,” he hopes to dissuade people from knowing the programs’ real intentions.
If college is a time for activism and student participation, UCLA students need to raise awareness about these issues. The only people I have seen working on them while walking down Bruin Walk are CALPIRG members. Other students need to get involved and demand that Bush reveal the true intentions behind his plans. If students do not take action, his agenda will pass without the public’s knowledge of his real intentions
Alex Yu Third-year, MCDBio
End hostility over Empowerment!
The distortion of my intentions with the registration of the Center for Student Programming group Student Empowerment! has finally reached a level requiring a full clarification. There are two main allegations being thrown around which must be corrected.
First is that upholding current CSP policy leaves many venerable groups on campus vulnerable to losing their names to anyone who gets there first. In fact, I believe these groups, just like the Bruin Republicans have an intrinsic right to their names. I might even say that this right continues past the initial registration process in fall quarter.
In this case, Student Empowerment! was not a pre-existing CSP registered group.
The other false allegation is that we only got away with this registration by exploiting an alleged loophole preventing the Student Empowerment! political slate from registering as such. Technically, CSP doesn’t register student slates. But it does register groups – and a clear reading of CSP guidelines shows that a group can be anything, including a group of students composing a political slate. So, if that political slate had really wanted the name, three of its supporters or councilmembers could have at any time filed paperwork with CSP for the name, with the group purpose something along the lines of “We are dedicated to the re-election of Student Empowerment!” To say that the student slate was unable to register the name, leaving it open to our supposed underhanded trickery, is a blatant misreading of the situation.
It’s time to let the hostility go.
Andrew Jones Bruin Republicans president, Former Daily Bruin columnist Fourth-year, political science