Friday, December 5, 2008 The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Congress shall make no law respecting on establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging tne freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to Ld • assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. Charles M. Schulz had the right idea By .Jennifer Juneosa perspetlives 14061 O'rmi.cdu Thanksgiving hreak is user and now it's a era/ time. getting things finished in your classes and getting your sched ule together for studying for finals. But with all the hectic responsibilities one of the things we all remember is that in three short weeks we will he home again tOr Christmas break. if you haven't seen Merry Chncimas Charlie Bmivii, then go rent it. Obviously. it is specifically for By Christopher Brown confribming writer cmhs3 I 3(0 hu.edu With the hailotit dehated the. country and in Congress, conserva tive pundits are identifying a new set of scapegoats. During the debate over the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP). we heard all ahout the Communik Reinvestment Act of 1977 and how the financial crisis' roots lie at the feet of government regulators who. 'Under the ('RA... hirced hank to pro\ e they \\eren't - i.e.. di,— criminating again s t minotitic approving loans to minorities and vari ous left-w ing 'community group' shake down artists whether tho were had risks or not. at least according to eonser\ a tiN columnist (1 use the term loose) \ here) Jonah (ioldherg. This is a gross simplification of the prohlems this crisis has c posed and a conclusion unsup ported 1 . 1 . y data or logic. Now. with talk of alt.it ()I the Bi The bathroom I Reichert Wall illitli ecrsohB r.u.cdti Where is the hest bathroom on cam The Bathroom Project (BP). com posed ()I Catherine Frisina. Jamie Durfee and hulk Reichert. has set out to judge CN ery single bathroom on cam pus. Each week a different building 'sill he judged on a systematic scale. Cleanliness. inventor‘, room, mirror quality. baggage. smell. and technology will he measured on a scale of one to fine. one being the loss est quality and five being the highest. The scores will he added to 10011 a total score for that bathroom. Cleanliness refers to the general appearance of the room. If it is cluttered or untidy. it will take away from the overall score. Inventory concerns the toilet paper. soap, and paper towels. If they are all properly stocked then that will equal a perfect score. Room refers to the space inside and outside the stalls. How easy it is to maneuver oneself inside will determine this score. Mirror quality will cover the placement of the mirrors. Baggage is the convenience of the room in terms of easy backpack placement. If you have to resort to put ting your backpack on the floor, then that equals a had bathroom. The smell speaks for itself and technology covers Beacon Thumbs Up - Christmas - Chanukah - Kwanza - New Year's Christmas hut it still the hest Charlie Brow n holiday Wins le out there. It's about Charlie Brown realising that there is something more to Christmas: hut just doesn't know what it is. Lucy asks if Charlie \\ ould like to direct the Christmas play. thinking it will help him find the true meaning of Christmas. and he accepts. After everyone in the play has ohs ioush lost the idea of what the true meaning is. Charlie asks if anyone know what its about. Linus tells the store of Christmas and the hirth of Jesus. The problem Charlie Brown has with Bailout scapegoats Three amomakers, Ford. GM. and Chr\ sler. conservatives hav e identified the clear culprit. Unions. specifically the United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers-of America. or LAW. The argument is that the automakers can't compete with for eign companies because of the strangle hold unions have on the companies. One common claim is that the average hourly wage of an autoworker is $7O. a result from union negotiations. and a far higher wage than workers get paid for Honda or Ii ota. This claim has even mule its \,\ a\ to the mainstream media and nightly news programs. but no one bothered to actually assess its validity. T. he sure. the S7O or so per hour rate often quoted does come from numbers. hut their significance remains dubious. Felix Salmon of portfolio.com notes. "As of 2007. the UAW represented 180.651 members at Chrysler. Ford and General Nlotors: it also represented 419.621 retired members and 12(1,723 stirs sing spouses. 11 sou take the costs how \\ ell the todek. hand dr\ ers. sinks otc. vvOH. I his w eel.. the HP judged the REM' building. There arc four lavatories in the building: one on the ground floor. two on the first. and one on the second. The winner is Room 003 on the ground floor. the as erase score was 30/35. With top ratings for ins entorv, room. baggage. and technology. and almost perfect scores for the mirrors. this bath room is definitely the potty of choice for anyone heading to the RFDC. The lower scored areas were the smell and cleanliness. There was an odd smell that resembled burning. and at least two of the toilets were clogged. The BP will revisit this bathroom next week to see if it upholds its current standards, and if the prey ious violations have been cor rected. Second place goes to R I I on the second floor with an average score of 29/35. Inventory, room, mirrors, and baggage scored perfect, but the technol ogy and cleanliness caused the room to take a dive. Two out of four of the auto matic sinks did not work, and toilet paper could he found all over the floor. Clogged toilets also caused a cleanli- ness issue In third place. R 113 located on the Dint floor had an average score of 25/35. It only had one perfect score in the area of technology. Cleanliness. room, and baggage suffered low scores. Submission Guidelines: Letters should be limited to 350 words and commentaries 700 words. The more concise the submission, the less we will be forced to edit it for space concerns and the more likely we are to run it. The Beacon does not publish anonymous letters. Please include your major, faculty or administration position, and semester standing. Deadline for any submission is 3 p.m. Thursday afternoon for inclusion in the Friday issue. The Behrend Beacon reserves the right to edit any submissions prior to publication. Please keep complaints as spec& as possible' . Email submissions to jdjso6l@psu.edu or drop them off at the Beacon office. PERSPECTIVES Christmas is that it's all too commercial. His dog, Snoopy, enters a light and dec oration contest for his dog house. Charlie's baby sister writes to Santa say ing that he can just send money, tens and twenties (all she wants is what she has coming to her, all she wants is her fair share). Christmas has everything to do with religion but there is more. Now I love presents just as much as the next person hut I don't like how the "true - meaning of the season is lost. Religion aside, people call this season "the season of giving." Which means most find themselves volunteering at associated with 721,025 individuals and then divide those costs by the hours worked by 180,681 individuals, you're going to end up with a very large hourly rate. But it won't mean anything, unless you're trying to he deceptive." And it's not as if the UAW has sat idly. watching the collapse of the automakers with glee. After all, their primary concern is its members and pro tecting their jobs. They have already made concessions to help the automak ers. Jonathan Cohn. senior editor at The New Republic. points out that the oft cited 2007 numbers are unrepresentative because of UAW concessions. He writes. "In 2007. the Big Three signed a breakthrough contract with the United Auto Workers (UAW) designed, once and for all, to eliminate the compensa tion gap between domestic and foreign automakers in the U.S." Stephen Spruiell, writing for The Corner at The National Review Online, doesn't think this is enough; "Labor contracts have also burdened the Big project The other areas had around almost per fect scores. Notes about this bathroom was that there were various clogged toi lets, hair on the sink, a mold spot on the ceiling. and like R2ll, toilet paper all over the floor. Last place is awarded to R 176, also on the first floor. The average score was 19/35 and no area scored a perfect. Smell. technology, and room scored rel atively high scores but cleanliness, inventory, mirrors, and baggage all suf fered. For inventory, the paper towels were empty. which was the cause of this low score. The mirrors in that bathroom scored particularly low because their placement is not practical at all. The full length mirror is placed right beside the entrance so anyone who was using it would be in the way of anyone who wanted to leave or enter. One thing worth noting was the room inside the handicapped stall. Its space caused one of our judges to comment that "you could fit a bed" inside it, espe cially since the actual toilet apparatus is smooched into the top right corner of the stall. This is good for a dressing room, not a toilet stall. Tune in next week when the BP judges the Kochel building. If you have any comments about the bathrooms we have judged, or would like to submit a bathroom for judgment, write to The Behrend Beacon. soup kitchens, homeless shelters. and donating to charities. The problem is that this "season of giving" shouldn't only he in December. Every year you see volunteers sitting outside the mall and other stores ringing bells next to their red buckets. As much as it makes me mad that by Christmas. when I have no more money to spare. I get stares and violent rings in my direc tion for not donating. (You can't donate everyday but you can donate in February or March.) One year my friend and her family skipped Christmas and didn't give or Three with mounting buyout costs as they try to shrink their worktbrces to keep pace with falling demand. Product commitments and work rules have hin dered their efforts to adapt to the mar ket.- How dare unions look out for the interests of their members'? How dare they try and help workers who have lost their jobs for reasons out of their hands? How dare they look out in their own self-interests? Isn't that the point of cap italism, the beauty of the invisible hand. that a group of people who act in their own divergent self-interests somehow creates the most efficient economy'? Of all people who have commented on the crisis, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan made the best summation of what this economic crisis represents, saying in congression al testimony that he had found a "Flaw in the model that I perceived is the criti cal functioning structure that defines how the world works." That flaw, I believe, is that if everyone The Behrend Beacon I 5 accept gifts. They made sandwiches and walked around their nearest city and gave them out to those who looked homeless and hungry. She said that that was the hest Christmas, by far. It's not just December when people need help hut it's a great place to start. Make sandwiches and hand them out, spend Christmas Eve in a soup kitchen, offer to he one of those ringing the hells, or offer a friend a few dollars because her meal plan is out. The season of giv ing is year round and it can he some thing small or something big, just do it. tries to maximim their profit. no matter at what expense to others, the economy does not work out for the better of all. If someone truly believes in the philoso phy, represented by free-marketers. they have no right in criticising unions who were looking out for their own seif interest in their labor contracts. Let us not forget that it takes two to tango and those contracts wouldn't exist if the autoworkers did not agree to them. This flaw. highlighted by Greenspan. makes an important point about the role of government in the economy. Without government intervention. in regulating the pursuit of profits. OW world would he much worse off. This is why we have environmental regulutions, hecause there is no doubt that it would he cheap er for factories to produce goods without environmental regulations. hut the cost to the commonwealth. the health of the people, would he too great. I.et us not forget. the first and primary role of the government is to protect its citizens. not maximize profits. Beacon Thumbs Down ( J 914. (3 -1 . - Finals - Salt rings on jeans - Wet pant legs - Last minute homework
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers