I can’t help but wonder how Monday’s poll results asking how many of us have donated blood will inevitably be skewed by the number of potential respondents who felt too ashamed to answer one way or another.
Hours before President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address, the National Assessment of Educational Progress published an assessment of science proficiency among the country’s fourth-, eighth- and twelfth-graders. The results were disconcerting: Only 34 percent of the fourth-graders, 30 percent of the eighth-graders and 21 percent of the 12th-graders studied qualified as proficient. This might be the “Sputnik moment” the president described in his speech that night.
Don’t get us wrong, we love orange. Supposedly, we bleed it.
Suppose you’re a hungry student speed-walking across campus, looking for something to shove down your gullet while you rush to your next class. If you’re low on dough, you might be stuck eating food from the intestinal house of horrors known as Taco Bell.
Within the next week, I will hear the phrase “the book was better.” While I usually agree if it’s a book I have read, I’ll be honest and say that unless it’s a hyped-up children’s series not involving vampires, or a trilogy directed by Peter Jackson, there are few books I’ve ever read that have film adaptations. I suppose that’s why some books get made into movies — so the stories they tell can be digested in less than two hours and I can get back to more important things, like choosing what combination of outerwear I want to lug around as the Florida weather covers every temperature and humidity level in the span of a day.
We anticipated most of the talking points and even the tone of the State of the Union address Tuesday night. Two things have caught us off guard, however.
I commend Sarah Poser for a balanced article on the allowing guns on campus in the Monday issue of the Alligator. However, Brian Malte’s quote, “The more outrage there is, the more the gun lobby starts to retreat.” The gun lobby is composed of the NRA and Second Amendment supporters. And, “Without a lot of protest, there is a chance the gun lobby could shove it through,” Malte said.
There are few things on which I regularly spend an exorbitant amount of money. These items include gasoline, sushi, phone accessories and Starbucks coffee. I cannot recall when or where, but some blessed person once introduced me to those deliciously handcrafted beverages, and I have been hooked — and thus shelling out the big bucks — ever since. I’m such a sucker for their overpriced products that they took pity and issued me a fancy gold card with my name on it that may as well scream, “I have spent a ridiculous amount of money here and am powerless to stop.”
Matthew Christ should be ashamed of himself, but instinct tells me he is probably rather proud. In the space of three sentences in yesterday’s guest column, he managed to label the Tucson shooter as ideologically conservative and try to weasel away from the fallout.
Welcome back to Gainesville, coach.
In Monday’s guest column, Mr. Christ claims progressive ideas have fared well in every intellectual arena, boasting of such stallions as higher educational standards, social safety net programs and business regulations.
Bob Minchin claims “liberalism is an emotive ideology. By nature, it relies more on feelings than intellect.”
We got a little preview of the State of the Union address this weekend, but for now we’re more intrigued that the White House is embracing technology in the lead-up to the speech Tuesday night.
“Give [us] your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” For more than a century, these words have been America’s call to the world, and the world has answered eagerly.
Maybe a little struggling does the mind good.
Regarding Bob Minchin’s Friday column, a few things need to be cleared up.
I’m guessing that Bob Minchin is one of those closed-minded individuals who thinks “The Colbert Report” is conservative.
UF Student Senate President Ben Meyers’ committee to curb free enterprise shows just how far today’s young leaders have gone in rejecting the American free-market system.
Facts don’t faze the right in teen pregnancy debate.
Four-day weeks just aren’t conducive to getting work done.
Solutions by The State News
