The Daily Collegian The Duly Collegian Elizabeth Murphy Editor in Chief Kelsey Thompson Business Manager About the Collegian: The Daily Collegian and The Weekly Collegian are pub lished by Collegian Inc., an independent, nonprofit cor poration with a board of directors composed of stu dents, faculty and profes sionals. Pennsylvania State University students write and edit both papers and solicit advertising for them. During the fall and spring semes ters as well as the second six-week summer session, The Daily Collegian publish es Monday through Friday. Issues are distributed by mail to other Penn State campuses and individual subscribers. Complaints: News and edi torial complaints should be presented to the editor. Business and advertising complaints should be pre sented to the business man ager. Who we are The Daily Collegian's edito rial opinion is determined by its Board of Opinion, with the editor holding final responsibility. 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All writers should provide their address and phone number for verification. Letters should be signed by no more than two peo ple. Members of organiza tions must include their titles if the topic they write about is connected with the aim of their groups. The Collegian reserves the right to edit letters. The Collegian cannot guaran tee publication of all let ters it receives. Letters chosen also run on The Daily Collegian Online and may be selected for publi cation in The Weekly Colle gian. All letters become property of Collegian Inc. PSU should focus on positives The Princeton Review’s school rankings were released this week, and Penn State is no longer considered the No. 1 party school in America. After spending a year atop the party school rankings in The Princeton Review’s “The Best 373 Colleges,” Penn State dropped two spots to thircl, behind the Universi ty of Georgia and Ohio University. Though some Penn State students will be upset to see the tag go, this is a positive for Penn State as it tries to clean up the image and reputa tion the poll gave the school last year. The rank ing brought nothing but bad attention to the school HP gsKßasi@Mf SBJjNDTJBCESSioU BiKUGKToN Bt'TWO DIFS. NPA/sfofcVfc>U- *1 ■ I ‘ /A ' SiIEISd. ** « rmnm£» GAN COOKTH^NEWT? __ WHEN TOU. Legalizing marijuana would help California’s deficit By Andrew Metcalf We live in a representative democracy. We entrust our elected officials to make legislative decisions on our behalf that hopeful ly represents our views and best interests However, there are certainly some hot-button issues that I would like to have a direct vote on, which is why I find ballot initiatives so awesome Almost half of the states in this country including Pennsylvania support their own form of direct democracy in the form of ballot ini tiatives, but no state does this more famously than California. One measure on California’s bal lot this year, Proposition 19, legal izes and heavily taxes marijuana for recreational use by adults 21 and older. Driving while under the influence of marijuana would remain a crime, and employers would retain the ability to fire employees for showing up to work under the influ ence. Proposition 19 enjoys a lead in most polls. That lead is impre? given that both gubernatorial l. dates, both of California’s current senators, and a Senatorial candi- from administrators, par ents and students, those who attended Penn State and even those who didn’t. It was a black eye for the university. A number of leaders in the Penn State communi ty have already ques- tioned the merit of the rankings. Students who wish to complete the sur vey simply go to a web site, and on average only 325 students from each campus take the survey. And despite the rank ings’ lack of sufficient empirical evidence, they do hold social relevance among parents and stu dents when it comes to choosing a college. There is a lot of weight assigned to these rankings, and, SIiiNfcTHEneAPAHY IT&AWI-AWW ItttSn-WAAND deceptive j; date have all come out against the proposition. Like any early poll, however, the results are liable to change before Election Day depending on the advertising push each side makes. Still, I think Californians will and should pass Proposition 19. Marijuana use, when not driving or operating machinery, is essentially a victimless crime and is certainly no more dangerous than alcohol. Laws designed to protect us from ourselves always throw into ques tion our right to privacy, and mari juana’s legality is no exception. I don’t buy the argument that legalizing marijuana would increase the amount of child and teenage MY OPINION users. Those under 21 who want to obtain marijuana can already get it, and those who previously were dis couraged by marijuana’s illegality won’t have any new incentive to obtain it it will remain illegal for them. For a financially strapped state like California, legalizing marijuana makes even more sense. The enforcement of marijuana-related crimes cost California billions and saturates the state’s already over flowing prisons. Furthermore, though it’s hard to estimate an exact figure, the tax would likely bring in well over a bil lion dollars in new tax revenues. Fbr a state that has a $19.1 tnilion deficit this year, this new income coula fj^veinvaluable. overall, they are helpful. Students should be careful not to get hung up on just the party school rankings. There are 62 total Top 20 lists, nearly all of which carry more significance than the party rankings. More so than dropping in the party rankings, Penn State should be applauded for its rankings among many of the posi tive lists. Once again, the univer sity ranked No. 1 in the Students Pack the Stadi ums ranking. It also ranked No. 2 for Best Career Services, No. 4 for best athletic facilities, No. 6 for Best College News paper and No. 17 for Hap piest Students. WO WS4TIO COUES^- Since the law would allow individ uals to grow their own small amounts of the plant, this initiative could also potentially create a huge dent in drug traffic from Mexican cartels. Marijuana makes up an estimated 60 percent of the drugs smuggled across the United States- Mexico border. If Proposition 19 passes, we will enter into an interesting conun drum: Marijuana is a Schedule I Controlled Substance under federal law, making it illegal for virtually all purposes. California legalized mari juana for medical use in 1996 and 13 other states have followed since. After this passed, federal agents still prosecuted patients who were complying with their state’s mari juana laws. Finally in 2009, the Obama admin istration instructed federal agents not to bother prosecuting marijuana users complying within their state’s laws, calling these prosecutions a “waste of resources.” However, it’s unclear whether the attorney general will give a similar pass to legal recreational marijua na. If not, we could see federal agents continuing to make arrests, citing federal law above state law. My guess is that we’ll see the leg islation tied up in lawsuits long before the new law takes effect. It’s likely California’s Supreme Court will address the law, and because the law completely contradicts the national law, I wouldn’t be surprised Thursday, Aug. 5,2010 I 3 Kudos to Penn State fans for top student section ranking In response to the article “Penn State receives top ranking for student sports fans,” I would like to say congratulations. No, it does not come as a surprise to any one that Penn State fans are the best in the nation. We have so many incredible tradi tions like Patemoville, White House games and chest painting, it would be a surprise if we didn’t rank high among sports fans. While writing a research paper this semester in response to White House games at Penn State, I have found that fan support truly does influence the players, school and community. But I would also agree with the state ment in the article stating, “it’s mostly foot ball that wins Penn State this ranking.” I would like to challenge Penn State as a fan base to not just be known for its football fans but also support other Penn State teams. It will make our fans even higher ranked across the nation. Abby Kun sophomore-architectural engineering Case finding officer innocent unfair to rest of the country Earlier this week, in spite of evidence to the contrary, a State College police officer was found not guilty of driving at an unsafe speed. The article “Officer not guilty after hitting PSU student with car” states, “A crash reconstruction report issued by the Pennsylvania State Police indicated that Muse was driving 36 to 39 mph, Pennsylvania State Police at Rockview said.” Yet, if any other civilian hit a student while driving II to 14 mph over the limit, the police would have them in custody. On June 27, because the words of an individual did not please the delicate sensi bilities of the authorities, police officers with the aid of medical workers intro duced a chemical to a student’s body to stop his oration, 'freavor Gelsinger was sedated in an attempt to prevent him from continuing to yell obscenities. This certain ly seems like an “unusual punishment” that’s prohibited by the Constitution’s Eighth Amendment. At what point are we as citizens going to stand up and stop the ever encroaching police state that is shown to be growing ever more powerful in State College, as well as the rest of our United States? Christopher Snyder Class of 1995 Lower party school ranking of no concern to Penn State I grabbed Wednesday’s Collegian with eager anticipation, only to be horribly dis appointed that Penn State had dropped to the No. 3 party school, according to The Princeton Review. Except I wasn’t. I feel The Princeton Review’s ranking system is horribly inade quate to truly rank a statistic such as top party school. How could the review possibly measure this in a scientific matter? The review relies on a survey that states an average of 325 students per school filled it out. First, we must assume everyone fill ing this out is doing so in an honest man ner, not just to talk up the school’s party scene. Assuming this, than a poll of less than 0.8 percent of the student population, a horribly inadequate number, determined our ranking. I’m not saying that we would’ve stayed at No. 1 had more people filled out the survey perhaps quite the opposite. I’m saying who cares. Both the university and student population should put little stock into this overly hyped and insufficient survey. I say the students should just keep doing your thing; everyone knows we party hard er than the University of Georgia and Ohio University anyway. Jake Wiest junior-architectural engineering to see the federal Supreme Court or even Congress get involved. That chaos is an exciting prospect to me, since it would spur the media and the country into a real discussion of the issue. Like healthcare, you’ll likely see name calling and mudslinging, but you might also see some truly interest ing discussions and points on both sides of the issue. In the end, the legislation may be declared unconstitutional, but it will have at least been a valuable first step in the legalization of marijua na. A final note: Unlike California, Pennsylvania places far fewer propositions on its ballot. In the last Pennsylvania election, there was one statewide ballot measure deal ing with funding for municipal water and sewer facilities, which, though important, isn’t exactly a hot-button issue. On the topic of marijuana legal ization and so many other issues, I feel like making far more liberal use of ballot initiatives would be a great idea. Seeing popular and controver sial topics directly on the ballot would be a great way to energize voters, inspire increased political activism, and potentially restore our dwindling trust in the government. Andrew Metcalf Is a senior majoring In computer science and Is the Collegian's Thursday columnist. His e-mail address is admsl29@psu.edu.
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