4A - Wednesday, January 25, 2012 The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com 4A. - ensaJaur 5.01.h.ihga al iciadiyo C4be1Iidhiown &Ut* Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890. 420 Maynard St. Ann Arbor, Mt 48109 tothedaily@michigandaily.com ASHLEY GRIESSHAMMER JOSEPH LICHTERMAN and ANDREW WEINER JOSH HEALY EDITOR IN CHIEF EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS MANAGING EDITOR Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily's editorial board. All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors. Imran Syed is the public editor. He can be reached at publiceditor@michigandaily.com. A little less conversation Obama and Congress need to work together ast night President Barack Obama gave a forward-looking State of the Union address that offered many worthwhile pro- posals in the face of major domestic issues, read: the economy. While he addressed a wide range of topics, the president specifically elaborated on issues relevant to students across the nation, including access to education and a grim employment outlook for many college graduates. In order to make his proposals a reality, however, Congress must not continue their inefficient trends and stalling tactics, but rather, work with all parts of government in creating a better future for the United States. That was the least funny milk-related thing since 'Milk.' #sotu" - Washington Post blogger Alexandra Petri tweeted after President Barack Obama's "Crying over spilled milk" joke received few laughs during the State of the Union address. - Taking America backward popular Internet meme House GOP colleagues are leaving cant problem, the reason for dis- nowadays is the Socially no stone unturned. Last year, they enfranchisement is clear. For Awk- introduced a bill that would ban African-Americans, the laws are ward Penguin, funding for all contraception. Talk particularly harmful because an focusing on about taking the country way back. estimated one-quarter don't have people who lack For reference on this bill's unpopu- a photo ID. The requirement is a de social skills and ', larity, the Guttmacher Institute facto poll tax. Still not convinced the do embarrass- found that more than 99 percent GOP wants to take the country back ing things, like of sexually active women aged to the 1950s? According to Public holding the door 15-44 have used contraception. Policy Polling, 46 percent of Missis- for someone too Also, doesn't contraception prevent sippi Republicans want to ban inter- far away. DAR-WEI unwanted pregnancies that might racial marriage, and an additional 14 I bring up the CHEN otherwise lead to abortions? percent are undecided onthe topic. meme because one of the worst things about I believe the these attacks on women's health is modern GOP is that theysuggest women aren't smart ,,. 0I The proposals put forth by Obama to improve access to higher education were fair- ly moderate, but were encouraging - a clear improvement over the status quo. He called on states to stop deftnding higher education as a means of addressing budget crises, the policies have a long-term impact of creat- ing an ill-prepared workforce. The Univer- sity has been significantly affected in recent years by Lansing's massive funding cuts, and tuition has risen at unprecedented levels in response to decreased public funding. Michi- gan's legislators must take Obama's message to heart and work toward more affordable higher education. Several ideas Obama detailed are especial- ly relevant to students, including doubling the number of work-study jobs over the next five years and extending federal tuition tax credits. He expressed his desire for Congress to stop interest rates on student loans from "doubling" within the next six months. Final- ly, he told colleges and universities that they must work hard to stop tuition increases, or risk losing public funds. Obama's proposals would offer some relief to the countless stu- dents struggling to pay for higher education despite universities' focus on maximizing endowment investments rather than increas- ing accessibility to eager students. As part of his plan to address unemploy- ment, which has decreased during his ten- ure, Obama called on Congress to take its responsibility seriously in funding essen- tial research and development projects. High-tech research jobs have the potential to become careers for many college gradu- ates and concurrently deliver incalculable benefits to society. Part of the president's proposal to protect and expand private and public research and development revolved around a call to shift multi-billion dollar sub- sidies from oil companies to the development of clean energy projects, which would benefit states like Michigan, where the advanced bat- tery industry is, thriving and only has room to grow. This proposal, in particular, would serve dual purposes by creating jobs and moving toward a more sustainable nation. Although many of Obama's proposals were a positive step forward, they can't be ana- lyzed ina vacuum. When all is said and done, the State of the Union is only a speech. A year's worth of detailed plans can't be deliv- ered in an hour-long address - especially one interrupted by what seemed like 59 minutes of clapping. It can't be ignored that over the past three years the Obama administration has fallen short of many of his fundamental campaign goals, including promises to imple- ment a public option for health care, closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay, and ending the Bush-era tax cuts. To assure that the pro- posals put forward last night positively affect students, and the entire country, Americans must avoid becoming apolitical bystanders expecting our government to benevolently work in the public's interest. socially awkward, especially with historically subjugated populations. However, the Republicans do some- thing the penguin doesn't - they mask the awkwardness through slo- gans like "take our country back," which charges voters emotionally so they don't have to vote logically. Who do the conservatives want to take the country back from and what time do they wantto go back to? Trust me, it's awkward. For women, the GOP wants to take the country back to pre-1960, before women were reproductively liber- ated by events like the FDA approval of birth control pills. Former Repub- lican presidential candidates Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann and current Republican presidential can- didates Newt Gingrich and Rick San- torum have all stated that abortion should be banned, even in cases of rape, incest or danger to the mother. Almost the entire field of candidates - the above group plus Mitt Romney and former Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman - wants to cut federal funding for services like Planned Parenthood and Women, Infants and Children. So, let's get this straight: All pregnancies - even pre- carious ones - should be carried to term. Then, the government should further deprive the baby of needed plantiing and sustenance. These guys aren't pro-life, they're pro-birth and apathetic about life. But that's not all. U.S. Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) and some of his enough to make decisions about their bodies. Even the ostensibly small- government supporter Ron Paul has said that he wants Roe v. Wade repealed. Why? So the government can monitor every woman's uterus? Women are now earning more col- lege degrees than men. If anything, maybe men - in male-dominated politics - aren't smart enough. For African-Americans, the GOP wants to go back even further to the early 1950s, before the Civil Rights Movement. As election season heats up, Republicans have been advocat- ing for tighter voter identification laws that require photo IDs in'several states to help places like Wisconsin, which Republican National Commit- tee Chairman Reince Priebus says is "riddled with voter fraud" as quoted in a Dec. 2 ThinkProgress.org article. However, a study at the Brennan Center for Justice found that a scant 0.0002 percent of Wisconsin votes were cast fraudulently during the 2004 elections. Maybe you're thinking, "What's wrong with improving election integrity, and how's this relevant to African-Americans?" First, the idea that the GOP wants accurate elec- tions is laughable - remember the 2000 presidential election when the Republicans tried to stop the Florida recount? Second, think about who these laws affect most - the young, the poor and African-Americans, all Democrat-heavy voting blocs. If voter fraud is not a signifi- The good ol'days weren't good for everyone. Examples of GOP social awkward- ness are everywhere. At a time when support for gay marriage is more than 50 percent for the first time according to Gallup, the Bachmanns are still running "cure the gay" clin- ics, and Santorum is comparing homosexuality to "man-on-dog" bes- tiality. Despite the progress Ameri- cans have made in religious tolerance post-9/ll, Gingrich is still saying that Sharia law is a "mortal threat" to our freedoms,, and former Republican presidential candidate'Herman Cain wouldn't consider appointing Mus- lims in his administration. "Take our country back" sounds nice because it brings back memo- ries of the "good ol' days," but the GOP doesn't acknowledge that those days weren't good for every- one. Undoing the progress made since that time would make Amer- ica a laughingstock to the Western world. But even worse than being awkward, undoing social progress would be devastating to many. Don't be fooled by the slogan. Dar-Wei Chen can be reached at dwchen@umich.edu. Follow him on Twitter at @DWChenMDaily. 0 EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS: Aida Ali, Laura Argintar, Kaan Avdan, Ashley Griesshammer, Nirbhay Jain, Jesse Klein' Patrick Maillet, Erika Mayer, Harsha Nahata, Timothy Rabb, Vanessa Rychlinski' Sarah Skaluba, Caroline Syms, Seth Soderborg, Andrew Weiner JULIA WALSH | The celebrity effect CONTRIBUTE TO THE COVERSATION Readers are encouraged to submit letters to the editor and viewpoints. Letters should be fewer than 300 words while viewpoints should be 550-850 words. Both must include the writer's full name and University affiliation. Send submissions to tothedaily@michigandaily.com MAX HELLER I Engage in productive discourse Watch out poison ivy, you've got some com- petition. On Jan. 7, proud parents Beyoncd and Jay-Z welcomed a joyful little cherub into the world and named her Blue Ivy. No, this ridic- ulous name isn't a joke. The couple forever branded their child with a color and plantas her identity. It could be worse, though. She could be named Apple, Maddox, Suri or Seraphina - all names of children who are blessed and cursed with having world-renowned celebrities as their parents. Why do celebrities think it's okay to give their children such bizarre names? Are they trying to make them feel special and unique? These children are already destined to have an off-beat and unusual upbringing, and giving them strange names is only going to add to the stresses of their lives. I honestly think that celebrities use their children's names as a competition. Let's play "Who can give their child the most horren- dous, embarrassing name?" They're using their child's birth certificate in order to gait fame and media coverage. If Beyonce had named her child Mary, do you think anyone would have cared? No. In true diva fashion, she made sure that her child's name reflected her career - flashy and showy. I know what you're thinking: "How does a celebrity naming their child something odd affect me at all?" Step outside the box. Maybe Tom Cruise naming his child Suri doesn't personally affect you, but it certainly affects society - though oftentimes this effect is unconscious. The naming of a child was once a beautiful, meaningful moment. Children were named after their great-grandpa Tom, who earned a medal of honor in World War I. They received the name of their aunt Sue who joined the nunnery and dedicated her life to God. And now? Children are being named after fruits, cars and plants. Once again, celeb- rities have taken control of another aspect of our lives. Whether you realize it or not, their deci- sion to give their children wacky names has an influence on all of us. Every year, thou- sands of people change their names. They're "too boring" or "too plain." Since when are Denim, Speck and Seven better names than Robert, Joseph and Thomas? Celebrities never fail to change and control society. We seem to be their little puppets, eagerly await- ing their next drastic move so we can attempt to imitate it. Celebrities give their children unusual names because they can. It makes them feel powerful and better than everyone else. Celebrities are constantly in competition with one another. They have to be the first to get married, the first to have twins and the first to name their child some ugly excuse for a name. They crave attention and are willing to accept it in any form - negative or positive. And we the public? We drink it all up. We love the hip, new, risky things celebrities do. We try to be just like them. Sure, maybe you haven't named your child Moses or Camera, but you can't deny that as a child, you once longed to change your name to match that of your favor- ite celebrity. Maybe our generation hasn't completely fallen into the dreaded whirlwind of exotic baby naming, but that doesn't mean the gener- ation following us won't. All I'm saying is this: don't be surprised if your grandson winds up with the name Rocket or Jermajesty. Julia Walsh is an LSA freshman. In the Dec. 11 viewpoint "It's time to talk about Pal- estine," co-authors Bayan Founas and Noor Haydar use inflammatory rhetoric and obscenely inaccurate myths about the Middle East in order to propagate the idea that Israelis are engaged in a systematic oppression of the Palestinian people. While both sides in the Arab-Israeli conflict are justifiably frustrated with the sluggish pace of the peacemaking process over the past several years, it's counterproductive and flat out dishonest to claim that the Israeli government is racist and expellingIsraeli Arabs from their homes. It is similarly troubling that the co-authors and their organization, Students Allied for Freedom and Equality seem to suggest that Israel is somehow not rightfully entitled to enjoy the same rights as any other sovereign nation when dealing with issues of national security. While it may seem admirable that SAFE "simply believes in the self-determination of the Palestinian people" and is committed to "promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes," some historical perspective can shed light on the underlying goals of these initiatives. The 1947 United Nations par- tition plan would have created two states side-by-side, but the Palestinians rejected it. When Isreal declared its independence, the Palestinians again were given an opportunity to live peacefully within the new state with- out leaving their homes. Some instead decided to vacate their properties, relying on Israel's Arab neighbors' promise to "drive the Jews into the sea." The 1978 Camp David Accords also presented an opportunity for a last- ing peace, which was again rejected by Palestinian lead- ers. Back in 2000, President Bill Clinton hosted a round of peace talks between the two camps again. In addition to spurning yet another opportunity for peace, Palestin- ian leadership afterword initiated the bloody Second Intifada against Israeli civilians More recently, the Palestinian-administered Gaza Strip fell into the hands of Hamas - a terrorist organi- zation steadfastly dedicated to the destruction of Israel - by way of democratic elections. While both parties desire a long-term peace, every Israeli effort to cede con- trol and sovereignty to Palestinian leadership has been met with hostility, escalated tensions and, in the cases of the Intifada and Hamas, gutless and cowardly violence targeted at defenseless Israeli civilians. Such radical tac- tics are embraced by Palestinian leaders like Mahmoud Abbas, who continually refuses to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, and Saeb Erekat, the Palestinian Liberation Organization's chief negotiator, who has suggested that any future Palestinian state must expel all Jews from within its borders. SAFE claims that its only cause is to advocate for the self-determination of the Palestinian people. They deny any association with the PLO as well as Hamas and Fatah, and decline to take a position on Palestinian state- hood. Such a form of advocacy is dangerous, for uncon- ditionally supporting the Palestinian people's right to self-determination implicitly supports the institutions and policy platforms of the very organizations the Pal- estinians have chosen to lead. Dating back to Israel's founding, history has demonstrated that Palestinian decisions made under the guise of "self-determination" have come at the expense of both public safety and long- term peace in the region. I take issue with SAFE's reasoning behind itswalk-out demonstration during Israeli diplomat Ishmael Khaldi's speech at the University last semester. Founas and Hay- dar's contention that Khaldi should not have been per- mitted to speak at the University runs counter to the very idea ofliberty that they advocate for the Palestinian peo- ple. Israel sent a diplomat to campus to give students an opportunity to question, and contribute to, the dialogue surrounding the negotiations in the Middle East. Given the opportunity to participate and determine their role in the peace process, SAFE chose to go for shock value and engage in destructive dialogue, something that their Palestinian counterparts have demonstrated time and time again. Should we really be surprised? Max Heller is a Business Junior. He is Michigan's campus fellow for the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America. 0 0 A 4 A