Blah. That's how this week has been. We're all hitting that mid-semester slump. Midterms have turned us into hermits. Papers have us gnawing our pencils. Starbucks has probably sold more cups of coffee this week than all the previous weeks of this semester combined. And sleep? What's sleep? Maybe we'll finally find out this weekend. Hopefully your exams are coming to a close and you can clear those textbooks off your bed so you can, you know, sleep on it. But for now, take a five-minute study break for this week's high-stress edition of…
Darts & Laurels
To start it all off, we throw a nothing-causes-stress-like-money DART at the Student Government Elections Commission, which fined the Gator Party ,75 for breaking two campaigning rules. Don't get us wrong. We're not darting them for fining them. We're darting them because ,75 wasn't much for the Gator Party, which ran its campaign on a budget of about ,3,500. To put things into perspective, the ,75 fine was equal to what each senator was encouraged to donate to the party.
But just about every candidate wore the campaign T-shirt, which violated the election codes by not including the phrase "Paid Pol. Ad."
Perhaps more serious, several party members were campaigning outside Matherly Hall during voting, which broke another rule - but that garnered only a warning.
A paltry ,75 fine doesn't seem like much incentive for future SG parties to follow all the rules. If SG wants us to take it more seriously, it should start by showing that it's taking itself more seriously.
This week, a new Student Senate president and president pro-tempore were elected. So we've got to give a what-do-you-guys-do-again? DART to Kevin Reilly and Kellie Dale, respectively. Neither has really done much as senators even though both have been in the system for a few semesters. Hopefully that will change and they'll start making names for themselves. Not just on committees and on the third floor of the Reitz Union, but by showing students those "tangible benefits" the Gator Party keeps promising.
While our Student Senate does absolutely nothing, here's a XXXXXXXXXXXXXX DART for the Florida Legislature, which will probably vote today whether to approve the bill that would create a technology fee and raise tuition every year based on inflation. Let's just say we're not thrilled with this political stunt. If approved, it could actually decrease the amount of money Florida schools receive from tuition. The Legislature could say, "Why do you need more tuition increases? We already increased it to match inflation."
But without this automatic increase, tuition increases could actually be bigger. If the state wants to use this as a jumping-off point for other increases, that's great. But we have the sinking feeling that's not how it will work out.
Finally, we have a nothing-relieves-stress-like-a-good-read LAUREL for the Friends of the Library Book Sale, which opens its doors early Saturday morning - hey, 9 a.m. is early to us, especially since we usually use Saturdays for sleeping in. The sale isn't just books, though. It's CDs, magazines, records, games, puzzles … the list goes on. But even more, it's a Gainesville tradition. Devoted buyers will camp out tonight. The über-thrifty of us will wait until Tuesday and Wednesday, when items go down to half-price and 10 cents, respectively. If you want to build your personal library, there's no cheaper way to do it. And having worn, well-loved copies of "Great Expectations" and "Jane Eyre" will make you look oh-so-educated - even if you don't have time to actually read them because of all your schoolwork.
