Opinion

Opinion

Fighting a war without sharing the sacrifice

December 7

In what was arguably the most important speech of his young presidency, President Obama took the stand at West Point last Tuesday to announce his plan to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan. Attempting to rally public support for the cause, the President reiterated his belief that the enemy we fight in Afghanistan poses "no idle danger, no hypothetical threat" and that the "security of the United States and the safety of the American people [are] at stake in Afghanistan."

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Editorial

Major election deserved more publicity

December 7

Unbeknownst to many Tufts students, primary elections will be held today in the race for the U.S. Senate seat vacated after the death of Sen. Edward Kennedy. Although publicity for the election has been sparse, its results could hardly be of greater import. Aside from assuming all the responsibilities characteristic of a U.S. senator, Massachusetts' new representative will enter Congress in the midst of the most important debate over health care reform in decades. Every Tufts student registered to vote in Massachusetts is urged to head to the polls today and again on Jan. 19 for the general election.

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Opinion

Composting at Tufts made easy

December 7

With knowledge of the huge benefits of composting under your belt, do you find yourself wishing every day that you, a Tufts student, had an easy and convenient way to compost your own organic waste? Or maybe you've heard about composting, but have never given it much thought? In either case, proceed on, dear reader, because I have news for you.

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Opinion

The market for humanitarianism

December 6

It is David vs. Goliath. It is corporate America vs. small business. It is the ongoing struggle between One Laptop per Child (OLPC) and Intel. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) professor Nicholas Negroponte founded OLPC as a non-profit organization in the hopes of expanding educational opportunities through the spread of personal computers to children in the world's poorest countries. Running operations out of its small MIT headquarters, OLPC managed to create a cheap, durable and effective computer, the XO-1. The goal was to distribute this computer to as many underprivileged children in the world as possible. Initially, the product proved to be a global success as orders were placed from Uruguay to Ghana. Seizing on OLPC success and an untapped market for sales, Intel introduced its own netbook. Its Classmate PC has become OLPC's largest competitor in these poorer countries and can now be considered the industry leader.

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Editorial

A mandate for no mandate

December 6

"Mandate" — it is a word that has been tossed around frequently as of late by everyone from pundits to politicians to news anchors and analysts. Every public opinion poll result, election or protest seems to somehow be a political mandate for one party or the other, justifying that party's actions and ideologies. While it is true that votes are one of the clearest ways to quantify support, one would be remiss to draw the conclusion that because people vote for a particular candidate or support certain aspects of an ideology, their views line up entirely with those of one political party.

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Opinion

From the Public Editor

December 6

The cover story of the Nov. 9 issue of the Tufts Observer was a feature called the "Future of Health Care in America." The article was three pages long. On the table of contents, the next four stories were slugged "national" or "international," and save one article, the page numbers to the left of the titles for the rest of the issue incremented by no more than two at a time.

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Opinion

Jacob Kreimer | The Salvador

December 2

If I ever work for the people who own Walt Disney World, there is no doubt I'd score a bonus big enough to make former JPMorgan Chase execs sick. The plan is simple: Create the ultimate theme park ride simply and appropriately titled Driving at Night in the Third World (DNTW). It doesn't sound that catchy, but anyone who has had this experience will feel their sphincters tense a little when they hear about the most terrifying, bada** ride ever to grace America.

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Editorial

Medical school costs affect more than just students

December 2

$157,607: That's the average debt owed by graduating medical students in 2008, according the American Medical Association (AMA). That's enough for roughly 300 flights to the Caribbean, a small apartment in the Boston suburbs or one very nice car.

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Opinion

Teddy Minch | Off Mic

December 1

Next week, President Obama will attend the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, during which he will also squeeze in a quick trip to Oslo to pick up his Nobel Peace Prize and deliver the laureate's lecture. Two weeks ago, Obama made his first visit to Asia, stopping in Japan, Singapore, China and South Korea. In Singapore, Obama met with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in a side session, during which he announced that negotiators would almost certainly not make the deadline to agree to a replacement of START II, the nuclear disarmament treaty signed by the United States and Russia initially in 1993. After that minor announcement, Obama was off to China for press conferences and photo-ops.

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Opinion

Letters to the Editor

December 1

Dear Editor, Increasing veterans' participation in Veterans Day events on campus, as called for by the recent Tufts Community Union resolution, should begin with increasing the overall number of veterans on campus. And in fact, the Tufts administration has recently taken steps toward doing just that.

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Opinion

Holiday book drive

December 1

The Task Force on Immigration at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Medford, along with several members of the Department of Romance Languages at Tufts, are cooperating to launch a holiday book drive to benefit Spanish-speaking inmates of the Suffolk County House of Correction. Collection boxes have been placed outside the Department of Romance Languages office on the second floor of Olin Center.

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Opinion

Obama on the right track with education policy

December 1

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, passed in February, allocated over $100 billion in federal funds toward reforming public education. In addition, since the United States has continued to perform poorly on international-comparison examinations in math and science, President Obama has announced the Educate to Innovate plan, a campaign to push science and math education. The campaign will focus on furthering science and math education outside the classroom and will seek funds from private companies and non-profit groups.

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Editorial

Climate talks could produce no more than hot air

November 30

World leaders from 192 countries will convene in Copenhagen next week for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). President Barack Obama has promised to attend the conference and has set out definitive emissions-reduction goals. However, a deadlocked U.S. Senate and a cooperation stalemate with China threaten to make any agreement reached in Copenhagen a mere political charade.

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Editorial

More holistic approach key to health education

November 30

Lincoln University is about to graduate its first crop of students to have gone through college under what may be the school's most singular requirement: Students who have a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or higher must complete a fitness course in order to graduate.

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Opinion

From the public editor | A window into the newsroom: part two

November 29

Credibility is all that a news organization has. It is a common misconception that professional news media sell information; they, in fact, sell audiences to advertisers. If readers question the credibility of a newspaper, they will not read it, and the company will not survive. The editing and fact-checking process is essential to making money.

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Opinion

The crisis of scientific illiteracy

November 29

Today the United States is faced with a serious crisis in scientific literacy and education. In the midst of debate over the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, health care reform and the economy, this issue has receded further and further into the background. And yet the topic remains as salient as it has ever been. Our world is driven by scientific innovation and technology. Twenty-first century economies will be knowledge-based, science-oriented and dependent on workers in sectors like energy, biological sciences and information technology. The early by-products of this paradigm shift are already evident with the advent of personalized genetic testing, pharmacogenomic research, hybrid vehicles, advanced power sources and hundreds of other innovations and discoveries.

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Opinion

Extolling free speech -- and limiting it

November 29

The Board of Trustees last week adopted a new Declaration on Freedom of Expression, which purports to simultaneously uphold free expression on campus while ensuring that such expression stays in line with Tufts' "community values." But the new policy is marked by hypocrisy, as it tries to accomplish the impossible task of promoting "the freedom of other community members to inquire and express themselves fully" while making sure that all community members "exercise freedom of expression and inquiry in ways that respect the human dignity of others."

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Opinion

Letter to the Editor

November 29

Dear Editor, I wish to correct some misperceptions and faulty reasoning in your editorial published Thursday, Nov. 19, entitled "MBTA needs to get back on track." First of all, the MBTA is not "refusing to address" the safety issues in the system highlighted by the recent report. The MBTA has also not, in your words, committed "a glaring oversight." It is aware that the problems exist, and I doubt that executives are simply ignoring the issue. The MBTA system is much larger than the few pieces which Tufts students use or know to exist. Likewise, the T's finances are far more complicated than fares in, trains out.

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Opinion

Letter to the Editor

November 23

Dear Editor, In the Oct. 19 edition of The Tufts Daily, an editorial about the recent campus power failure reported incorrect information about safety and security systems in university residence halls. Regrettably, efforts to have the Daily correct those errors have been unsuccessful.

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Editorial

Paying premium for less-than-premium health care

November 23

Student health care plans are exempt from the rules that regulate insurance coverage to the general public. Insurance companies do not have to abide by a minimum coverage percentage for people in school. This allows Aetna Student Health, the company that provides Tufts' student health coverage, to put only 63 percent of insurance premiums towards medical coverage. The coverage that students on the Tufts plan receive has a capped limit on prescription drugs and mental health care, and is not enough to fund preventive care and dental procedures. State reform of student health care is necessary to ensure that students are receiving the maximum coverage that their premium can provide and that there are multiple premiums available for students with different health care needs.

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