Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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_ ONLINE POLL il 1 M / I 1/ \ V I f I ] L 1 Are you going to give money for 1-^ m/m/ I—"m 1 % II tsunami relief? Let us know at 'Jm/m/l IV m^lli www.dailygamecock.com. V V A f f V ^ ^ V Results posted Friday. AMECOCK EDITORIAL BOARD EDITOR Michael LaForgia NEWS EDITOR Jon Turner VIEWPOINTS EDITOR Wes Wolfe THE MIX EDITOR Jennifer Freeman ASST. VIEWPOINTS EDITOR Patrick Augustine SPORTS EDITOR Jonathan Hillyard DESIGN DIRECTOR Chas McCarthy COPY DESK CHIEF Steven Van Haren IN OUR OPINION Tsunami relief shows promise America’s response to the humanitarian crisis in the Indian Ocean caused by a tsunami Dec. 26 shows how the world’s only superpower can use its enormous military and financial resources to both make a difference in the lives of people halfway across the globe and protect U.S. interests. It is unfortunate that it took pressure from other countries and organizations like the United Nations to force the White House to raise the amount of aid promised to the eventual figure of $350 million, up from the initial contribution of $35 million, especially considering our nation is spending an estimated $1.5 billion per day in Iraq alone. Even though the demands of armed conflict and disaster relief are very different, they highlight ways in which the United States can use its global assets. Indonesia, which lost more than 100,000 people to the tsuna mi, is the world’s most populous Muslim nation and a hotbed for radical Islamic groups like al Qaeda. Instead of simply fight ing a “global war on terror” with brute force, our military reserves and Navy have been providing manpower, transporta tion and logistical resources to help countries affected by the dis aster, providing basic services to survivors. This immediate aid is helpful for those cut off (tom food and water, although it will be important that funding is available in the long term as infras tructure is rebuilt. Positive public relations must not be the only reason to pro vide international disaster aid; there is no doubt that Americans’ generosity is sure to win more allies around the globe and pro vide a surge of good will from people who might not otherwise have contact with the United States. Students also have the unique opportunity to display the qual ities for which Americans are known worldwide, qualities such as optimism and ingenuity in the face of adversity, by contributing to relief organizations like the Red Cross. Please give as you are able. It will be important that funding is available in the long term as infrastructure is rebuilt. IT’S YOUR RIGHT j Exercise your right to voice your opinion. Create message boards at www.dailygamecock.com or send letters to the editor to gamecockopinions@gwm.sc.edu GAMECOCK CORRECTIONS If you see an error in today’s paper, we want to know. E-mail us at gamecockopinions@gwm.sc.edu. ABOUT THE GAMECOCK EDITOR Michael LaForgia DESIGN DIRECTOR Chas McCarthy COPY DESK CHIEF Steven Van Haren NEWS EDITOR Jon Turner ASST. NEWS EDITOR Thomas Chandler VIEWPOINTS EDITOR Wes Wolfe ASST. VIEWPOINTS EDITOR Patrick Augustine THE MIX EDITOR Jennifer Freeman ASST. THE MIX EDITOR Carrie Givens SPORTS EDITOR Jonathan Hillyard ASST. SPORTS EDITOR Stephen Fastenau SENIOR WRITER Kevin Fellner PHOTO EDITOR Jason Steelman SPORTS PHOTO EDITOR Katie Kirkland PAGE DESIGNERS Erin Cline, Jessica Ann Nielsen, Staci Jordan COPY EDITORS Jessica Foster, Brindy McNair, Daniel Regenscheit, Jason Reynolds, Shana Till ONLINE EDITOR E.B. Davis PUBLIC AFFAIRS Jane Fielden, Katie Miles CONTACT INFORMATION Offices on third floor of the Russell House. The Editor’s office hours are Monday and Wednesday from 3-5 p.m. Editor: gamecockeditor@gwm.sc.edu News: gamecocknews@gwm.sc.edu Viewpoints: gamecockopinions@gwm.sc.edu The Mix: gamecockfeatures@gwm.sc.edu Sports: gamecocksports@gwm.sc.edu Public Affairs: gamecockPR@yahoo.com Online: www.dailygamecock.com Newsroom: 777-7726; Sports: 777-7182 Editor’s Office: 777-3914 STUDENT MEDIA DIRECTOR Scott Lindenberg FACULTY ADVISER Erik Collins CREATIVE DIRECTOR Susan King BUSINESS MANAGER Carolyn Griffin advertising manager Sarah Scarborough classified manager Sherry F. Holmes PRODUCTION MANAGER Garen Cansler CREATIVE SERVICES Burke Lauderdale, Chelsea Felder, Laura Gough, Joseph Dannelly ADVERTISING STAFF Robert Carli, Breanna Evans, Ryan Gorman, Caroline Love, Katie Stephens, McKenzie Welsh The Gamecock is the editorially independent student newspaper of the University of South Carolina. It is published Monday, Wednesday and Friday during the fall and spring semesters and nine times during the summer, with the exception of university holidays and exam periods. Opinions expressed in The Gamecock are those of the editors or author and not those of the University of South Carolina. The Board of Student Publications and Communications is the publisher of The Gamecock. The Department of Student Media is the newspaper's parent organization. The Gamecock is supported in part by student-activity fees. One free copy per reader. Additional copies may be purchased for $1 each from the Department of Student Media. TO PLACE AN AD The Gamecock Advertising: 777-3888 1400 Greene St. Classified: 777-1184 Columbia, S.C. 29208 Fax: 777-6482 , - ■ — VIHY SHOULD ' I READ fHE NEWS... .VIHNICAN VIRtTEIT? 22* CARTOON COURTESY OF KRT CAMPUS We must fix Social Security soon ■ If drastic measures aren’t taken, the system will totally collapse One of the biggest questions facing the nation and its government this year -— at least in the realm of domestic policy — is, “What is going to be done to fix Social Security’s impending insolvency?” President Bush has made it clear that he intends to reform Social Security in his second term instead of leaving it to future administrations to deal with. This should be extremely welcome news to college students getting ready to enter the work force and those who already have because, despite what the left and even some on the right have claimed, the Social Security issue is a crisis issue. The problem stems from the fact that people are living longer and are having fewer children than in the past. Also, the baby boomers are going to be retiring soon, which will dramatically increase the burden on Social Security. As a result, according to the Social Security Administration, starting in 2018, Social Security will begin to run a deficit (that is, it will pay more in benefits than it receives in tax revenue). A few years later, the annual shortfall will reach $100 billion, and it will increase steadily with every successive year. It will not get better with time — only worse. Whereas the worker-to beneficiary ratio was 16-to-l in 1950, in 2045 that ratio will be just 2-to-l. And this is key because it is the younger generations of workers who provide the tax revenue that pays retirees their benefits. In spite of the contention ALEX by 'b' HARPER oppositi°n »T reform that FIFTH-YEAR there is enough ENGLISH STUDENT money in the Social Security trust fund to last for decades, the truth is that there is no stockpiled money for future retirees. In 2003, Social Security took in well more than $100 billion more in tax revenue than it paid in benefits. But this money isn’t invested or saved. The Treasury Department borrows it, spends it, and, in return, issues government bonds of equal value to the “trust fund.” When it’s time for future retirees to receive their benefits checks, the government has to come up with the money to cover these bonds. So these bonds are essentially IOUs, or a loan from the government to itself. The government is still going to have to come up with huge sums of money to keep Social Security going in this form. Estimates are that the shortfall will total $25 trillion during the next 75 years. What that means is that for those of us who will be retiring 50 years from now, Social Security will have such little funding that taxes will have to steadily increase to keep pace, and our benefits will have to be cut drastically as well. Unfortunately, benefits will have to be scaled back in the future no matter what we do. But we can dramatically decrease the percentage by which they will have to be cut by introducing personal retirement accounts. Although there are other options available, PRAs are probably the best because they will allow workers to invest money in bonds and mutual funds that will yield a higher rate of return than the present system, which means more money when we retire. In fact, if people are allowed to invest enough in PRAs and the mutual funds do well enough, it’s possible that some individuals could retire rich. Federal employees already participate in such a program, the Thrift Savings Plan, which has been very successful. Most importantly, PRAs will allay the pressure on Social Security by reducing the amount of money it will have to pay out, thereby preventing the need for future tax increases or drastic benefits cuts. For us to be sure that the taxes we pay now and in the future to Social Security will be returned to us upon retirement, we have got to take advantage of the opportunity the president is offering us and support personal accounts. If we do not, our grandparents will be the last Americans to fully benefit from a Social Security nest egg. USC landscape plan for the birds ■ More grass and trees only invite more messy bird splays on my ride For about $1 million, construction workers are creating a tree-lined walkway between the Russell House and the Horseshoe, the most recent in a series of renovations designed to beautify the campus. When the project started, USC architect Charles Jeffcoat said the goal was to “create a more green environment.” But a greener campus means crappier cars. I discovered this for myself one day when I stuck my hand in a fresh splay on my door handle. For those of you unfamiliar with the term, “splay” is what a pair of enterprising authors refer to as bird crap splashed on your car. Burton Silver and Peter Hansard, authors of “What Bird Did That? A Driver’s Guide to Some Common Birds of North America,” coined the term by combining the words splat,” “spread” and “display.” It turns out that car windshields are perfect for displaying and preserving ornithological dejecta, a scientific term for bird crap. Ornithologists can learn a lot about birds by what they leave behind. And since 1994, birds have had plenty of opportunities to turn USC students’ cars into an ornithologist’s paradise. In 1994, the USC Board of Trustees adopted the master plan, a huge document oudining the goals of the university. One of the major threads of that document was the idea of beautifying ADAM USCs campus BEAM by creatm6 ^unl11 more green FOURTH-YEAR sPa“> i e- trees' PRINT grassy fields JOURNALISM 6 , ’ STUDENT and, apparently, brick signs with gold use emblems. And while a lot has changed since 1994, including a new president and provost, the attraction to greenness has not. In December 2002, officials did away with the parking meters on Sumter Street (yes freshmen, it’s not a myth; there was once parking by your dorms) as phase one of the Columbia Campus Streetscape Development project. The meters were replaced with the aforementioned brick signs as well as lots of trees, which birds are partial to. In December, the building and grounds committee of the USC Board of Trustees asked for $3.1 million to add two soccer-sized fields behind the Strom Thurmond Wellness & Fitness Center, as well as renovate the Bates House walkway, which would feature a fresh batch of trees lining the roads around those areas. About six years ago, the parking lot in front of the Thomas Cooper library was replaced with Davis Field, complete with trees that hang over into the street. But the true ornithologist’s paradise is in the parking lot of Bates House and Bates West. There is an unwritten rule among students who use the lot to not park under the trees, which are positioned about every 15 feet up and down the rows of cars. There was a car sitting in front of Bates House on Sunday night that had been completely splayed. It had to have been dangerous to drive. But, as with most things, there is a bright side. It seems a portion of the art community has taken a liking to splays, at least according to the Museum of Non-Primate Art. The museum hails the “art of ornithological dejecta” as characterized by the more than 8,000 species of flying birds, for which there are 600 diet combinations resulting in about 5 million types of splay just waiting for a windshield. The museum even has an online gallery of bird splays on its Web site, www.monpa.com. I’m not totally convinced that the site, or bird splay art, is legitimate. But while bird art hasn’t taken off yet, the museum did report that a 1983 bird splay sold in Dallas for $6,000. If that’s true, my crappy car is starting to look a lot better. Big-boned students clog gym jt arteries ■ Overweight kids need to leave equipment to those who will use it Three days into the semester and much to my chagrin, it is once again time for the annual “New Year’s Resolution Gym Invasion.” Last year, I posited that □ perhaps there could be a symbiosis; maybe the FATS (Fitness-Aspiring Tubby Students) and I could work out together in harmony under the mutually understood CHOW conventions of gym etiquette. FOURTH-YEAR V, , , ECONOMICS A^as’ 1 was “"V STUDENT mistaken, and my list of grievances runneth over. This year, I’ve decided to take a new approach. I’m not going to give a list of rules for the FATS to follow, but rather a list of reasons you should stay out of the gym this year. 1) You are doomed to failure. Sure, go ahead and delude yourself: “You can do anything once you resolve to do it.” But let me make this personal observation perfectly clear: Each year, around this time, the gym is full of people seeking to abide by their unrealistic and ephemeral resolutions; each year, within a matter of weeks, it’s back to the usual crowd, give or take a few. Unless you are a statistical anomaly, you’re simply going to quit anyway. By going to the gym, you’re only prolonging the inevitable. 2) You look silly. bure, 1 hnd it amusing to watch someone work his front delts and then over-exaggeratedly flex and rub his chest, but in all fairness, you should be warned. You’re not fooling anyone; we know you have no idea what you’re doing and that you’re merely pretending like you’re getting a good workout from what can only be described as silliness. And yes, you should feel self conscious. Everyone is watching and probably making fun of you behind your back. In fact, every time you exit the gym, we all stop our workout to engage in a group discussion in how ridiculous you look. 3) You’re wasting space. I mean this in two ways. For one, you’re fatting around the equipment, probably misusing it anyway and/or doing something dangerous with your nonsense and monkey business. For another, you’re using up already scarce parking resources. Working out for a couple weeks really isn’t going to do much for you. You should be considerate of those who make actual use of the parking and gym equipment and stop taking up our equipment and parking. h) I will give you a candy bar. 1 nat s right, a deliciously sweet and scrumptious bar of scrumptious deliciousness is waiting for you if you just go ahead and give us back our gym. Think about it: This is your dominant strategy. You can either quit in a few weeks, frustrated and depressed and find solace in said candy bar; or you can go ahead and quit now of your own accord, proudly determining your own destiny. Heck, you even got a candy bar out of it! Should anyone find this column to be inflammatory, then good: I hope it drives you to actually do something useful in the gym rather than to be another one of the stereotypical New Year’s FATS mentioned above. I’ll gladly take back what I said and maybe even treat you to a candy bar or two. WWW. dailygamecock ! ■ WINNERS AND SINNERS SOUTHERN CAL The Trojans blow out Oklahoma j to win the National Championship. SUSAN CUTTER use professor to assist in new national center on reducing terrorism. MAHMOUD ABBAS Newly elected Palestinian prime minister has a solid mandate for his peace proposals. ! BCS FORMULA So Auburn goes undefeated and doesn’t get a crack at the National Championship? NORFOLK SOUTHERN The railroad company failed to take precautions to avoid the Graniteville accident. CBS EXECUTIVES Four people were fired for letting excitement about a story get in the way of good journalism regarding President Bush’s National Guard service.