The protest against Operation Iraqi Freedom has rapidly spread across the globe, emboldening an unprecedented hatred and resentment towards the US. Not since Vietnam have such a varied juxtaposition of activists united against military action. Suburban housewives, millionaire actors, shoeless hippies, ultra-liberal college students, radical leftists and Arabs misperceiving the war as an Anglo-Zionist crusade against all Muslims have passionately participated in civil disobedience and not-always-peaceful organized protest. With no other feasible way to overthrow Hussein and confiscate his WMD, a protest against war equates to a protest supporting the perpetuation of the worst crimes against humanity.
According to Fox News, those financially sponsoring the large anti-war demonstrations include The Interreligious Foundation for Community Organization, a nonprofit group supporting terrorists such as Fidel Castro, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the World Workers Party, a strong backer of North Korea’s despotic Communist regime.
There is a great and sad irony that those protesting in the purported interests of peace and justice naively acquiesce to Saddam Hussein’s terrorist regime, which Human Rights Watch estimates has murdered up to one million Iraqis. According to the U.S. Army’s Lt. General John Abizaid, “No person has murdered more Muslims than Saddam Hussein.” If the world needed any more evidence demonstrating the outlaw, terrorist nature of the regime, on March 23rd Al-Jazeera broadcast American POW’s in Iraqi custody with close range bullet holes in their foreheads, undoubtedly executed. The Iraqi military has burned oil wells and moved troops and equipment into civilian areas, using the Iraqi people as human shields.
The protestors are detached from the Iraqis’ plight of tyranny and torture, many ignorant to the horrors of rape rooms, acid baths and summary execution. Many simply deplore capitalism, Bush and the United States, idiotically assuming a just US war to be impossible. Through inaction against despotic regimes, free nations drift perilously close to legitimizing oppression. No country possesses sovereign immunity against terrorism and tyranny. No one disputes the horrors and tragedies of war, but Operation Iraqi Freedom will deliver democratic reforms, rights and freedoms to the Iraqi people, ultimately save countless Iraqi lives and take WMD out of a brutal terrorist’s hands. As Iraqis continue welcoming the US into their nation as liberators and not “conquerors,” protestors worldwide witness the enormity of their error.

Pete Trombadore can be contacted at petetrombadore@hotmail.com.

“Living next door to the United States,” former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau once remarked, “is like sleeping with an elephant. You are affected by every twitch and grunt.” Mr. Trudeau was right, except for the fact that you don’t have to be America’s neighbor to feel the strength of the United States.
The United States of America is the most powerful force this world has ever known. No one state or empire has ever held more influence or had more effect on the shape of global affairs than has America. Our influence is worldwide.
Yet, many deem our presence in the world a mixed blessing. Quick to scorn U.S. policies if they are unpopular and speedy in demanding for American assistance, the resources and the influence of the United States are called on from all corners of the globe. It is small wonder why the American government and media do not inform the public of all the many foreign policy details that our country undertakes on a daily basis. And why the American public remains insular and isolationist en masse.
France, one of our closest allies, has long been the chief advocate for seeking to downplay the role of the “hyper-power.” It started with American-installed French President Charles deGaulle who pointed to the arms race in the 1960s between the Soviet Union and the United States as a danger to the world and that Western and Eastern countries should join together in fighting the superpowers’ influences. His remarks, while appreciated by his audiences in the Soviet Bloc, were not acted upon.
Today, the case remains roughly the same. Europe, the far second most influential region of the world, wishes to see a multilateral world order. However, realists in the United States would insist that that is not what they really want. Realists say a multi-lateral world order was the world of the 1940s where there were fascist, communist, and democratic states all wielding equivalent power, competing for dominance with devastating consequences. With one superpower, the boundary lines are clear, and the world order remains more or less stable.
My uncle over in Great Britain has a Victorian map in his house that shows all the territories of the British Empire during Britain’s height of power. At the top it reads: “The British Empire, never has the world known an empire so mighty.” Today, for better, for worse, and at the expense of multilateralism, America holds the title.

Gunnar Heinrich is a visiting 3rd year Politics & International Relations major from the University of Aberdeen, King’s College in Scotland. He can be contacted at gunnarheinrich@hotmail.com.

Why does it seem like our government always acts like a hypocrite? Apparently, if you have enough power you can accuse others of the same dirt you are doing.
The government is using terrorism as its strongest suite for war against Iraq. It is so quick to tie terrorism, especially Al-Qaeda, with Iraq. However, if we really want to go to war with terrorism, should we not instead get rid of actual institutions that train terrorists outside of our country as well as within? If we look hard enough into our own country and its funds, we will see that we actually have a school to train assassins for governments in Latin American countries. How is this paid for? The lovely portion of our tax dollars is sent to the Pentagon, which then transfers part of that money to fund the school.
Historically known as the School of the Americas, the school “trains Latin American Soldiers in combat, counter-insurgency, and counter-narcotics” (School of the Americas
Watch web page). With this training, many of the 60,000 graduates have continued to terrorize and kill the citizens of various countries in Latin America. In El Salvador for example, graduates kidnapped, raped, and killed hundreds of women, shot men in the head, assassinated Arch Bishop Romero and conducted the massacre that killed over nine hundred civilians in El Mozote.
Although there has been no factually complete link found between Al-Qaeda and Iraq, or that Iraq is funding Al-Qaeda for training and weapons, it is a fact that the United States Government runs a school now called the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation that teaches Latin Americans how to violate the human rights of citizens by torturing and killing them. Why do we not hear more about this school and the damage it has done around the world? It is the government’s job to inform the American citizens where our tax dollars go. However, most Americans do not know about the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation because it is rarely in the news and almost never mentioned when the government addresses the press. I have a good feeling that if more Americans knew about the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation and all the harm it has caused around the world, there would be even more protests against it and people may think twice before going to war with Iraq supposedly in the name of terrorism, and stress focusing on fixing the problems within the United States.

Erin Wright can be contacted at ewright@umsis.miami.edu.

Letter to the Editor:

I was rather amused to read R.S. Jolly’s piece on India’s bid for a Security Council seat. The author has, to say the least, missed the point completely. One must remember that as President Bush and his Administration do not constitute the entire United States of America where the saner, peace-loving rational majority has been protesting against the unjust war on Iraq, similarly Narendra Modi and his cronies are not India. India is a multicultural, pluralistic society where less than 40% of the population believe in practicing Hinduism, 2% of which may be fanatics (as there are fanatics in every society) and the remaining 60% consists of Muslims, Sikhs, Jains, Christians, Buddhists, Zoroastrians and others. India, after Indonesia, has the second largest Muslim population in the world. To date India has had two Muslims and one Sikh as our Heads of State and even now the BJP Central leadership (i.e. Narendra Modi’s party) has one Muslim leader as the spokesman and another important Muslim as the Minister in the Central cabinet. The Indian government, media and people have unequivocally condemned Narendra Modi’s actions. L.K. Advani, the then Minister of Home Affairs (and presently the Deputy Prime Minister) has condemned the actions of Narendra Modi before the world media.
This proves that a few shortsighted politicos cannot be equated with Indian psyche that is far more tolerant, secular and democratic. India’s record in working towards world peace for more than five decades is for all rational beings to see. If the USA, with its not-so-old record of Pearl Harbor, discrimination against blacks, war in Vietnam and the current Iraq war can talk of world peace as a permanent member of the Security Council, then India, being a major player in all regional and international fora can logically seek a permanent seat in the UN Security Council. India is one of the founders of the Non Aligned Movement that taught the developing world to live in dignity and self-respect.
Finally my humble suggestion to the author of the piece is not to be swayed by adhoc understanding of events of a nation’s history but to cultivate a perspective based on reason and value.

Sincerely,
Vikas Johari, Freshman, Business

The intentional murder of any individual, whether in a civil situation or in the atmosphere of war, is unjustifiable in any case because of the inherent violation of the right to life of the murdered individual. Call it what you want-revenge, battle, assassination, or execution-the murder of one sentient being by direct and concerted action of another is not within the rights of the murderer, but sadly, it is within his power.
That power to kill, the power to violate the life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness that every human should enjoy, grows stronger with time and developing technology. Man’s power to kill has evolved from sabers and daggers to handheld pistols to ultimately smart bombs and high-powered sniper rifles, and his thirst for blood has grown seemingly more unquenchable through the millennia.
Murder can be dichotomized into divisions determined by society and the ruling class. There’s the “unjustifiable,” for example, when a jealous lover slaughters the cheating partner and confidante in an emotional rage; and the “justifiable,” for example, assassinations of political figures and executions of criminals (moral decisions handed down by those on high and carried out by subordinates with the belief that the deaths are within reason). In sad, harsh reality, neither division of murder is justifiable; the right to life, granted by whatever, cannot be ethically denied by another equal being.
Judges and juries decide the mortal fate of a convicted criminal and immorally violate the right to life of the victim/criminal. These judges and juries are murderers in the plainest sense, but the blame for capital punishment extends further into the hypocritical, ironic depths of society.
Similarly, assassination of “troublesome” political or military figures or murder in war are no less immoral-they are simply converted into more impersonal murder through the convenience of chain of command.
The point is that murder, the denial to right of life of another, is completely without justification, and tragically commonplace. At this moment, husbands are unjustifiably battering their spouses to death, a mugger is unjustifiably shooting his most recent victim, a judge is unjustifiably holding up the death sentence of a convicted criminal, a dictator is unjustifiably killing his own citizens, and a nation’s armed forces are unjustifiably violating the rights to life of an entire nation, most specifically its ruler.
Saddam Hussein’s death sentence was never approved by a deliberative trial, and an unbiased judge and jury of his peers. It was never even publicly clarified until it was obviously and irreversibly in effect, and now, the front page of every major periodical carries some information concerning the bloody, bombed-out hunt for the life of Saddam Hussein. “We know we hit him; we know he was wounded,” repeat the intelligence officials desperate to find some evidence that their mission of murder was completed.
War is inevitable, assassination is necessary, and both are justifiable, most will argue, especially those with vested interests in the murderous consequences. True, war is tragically unavoidable
history attests to that), and murder enjoys the ironic paradox of being unjustifiable and inevitable. Yet, it is a certainty that by the time this article is published, or soon after, the priority assassination mission of the US armed forces will have succeeded. The outcome is certain, the president has been heard to say, and only the wait is incalculable.

Basketball Playoffs Champions are as follows:

Co-Rec Champions
The Team

Women Champions
Delta Phi Epsilon

Men Champions
Team Cubano

Basketball Playoffs
*Delta Phi Epsilon – 26 (*Champs)
Wahine – 24

Pi Kappa Alpha – 54
Alpha Epsilon Pi – 51

Team Cubano – 61
Diaper Dandies – 43

*Team Cubano – 58
(*Champs)
Pi Kappa Alpha – 51

Volleyball
The Dirty Kneepads – 2
Alpha Q – 1

Biohazards – 2
Intimidators – 0

Cremasteria – 2
Team Shock – 0

Wahine – 2
Micro-orchidism – 1

Law – 2
Free Agentz – 0

Horse Pen 15 – 2
GBSA – 0

Kane – 2
Liquid Courage – 0

Killing You Softly – 2
Invincible – 0

Da Kine – 2
Free Ballin’ – 0

Delta Gamma – 2
Kappa Kappa Gamma – 1

Sigma Alpha Mu – 2
Kappa Sigma – 1

Sigma Phi Epsilon – 2
Lambda Chi Alpha – 0

Pi Kappa Alpha – 2
Phi Delta Theta – 0

Team Shock – 2
Penetrators – 0

Commandos – 2
Micro-orchidsm – 0

Free Agentz -2
Latin Kids – 0

Horse Pen 15 – 2
Kane – 0

Killing You Softly – 2
Bump Set Spike – 0

Invincible – 2
PT Playaz – 0

Da Kine – 2
Free Ballin’ – 0

Delta Phi Epsilon – 2
Kappa Kappa Gamma – 0

Sigma Alpha Epsilon – 2
Pi Kappa Alpha – 1

Sigma Phi Epsilon – 2
Phi Delta Theta – 0

Lambda Chi Alpha – 2
Sigma Alpha Mu – 0

Arena Football:
Air Show – 32
Regulators – 19

Andy Frain Services – 34
2 Fat 2 Handle – 13

Wasps – 35
Free Agents – 20

Fuzzy Furze – 28
Field of Cream -21

Schizophrenic – 50
Co-macro-orchidism- 18

Softball
High Balls – 4
Cunning Linguists – 3

Montana Realty Co. – 8
GBSA – 1

Phi Delta Theta – 19
Zeta Beta Tau – 7

Sigma Phi Epsilon – 3
Alpha Epsilon Pi – 2

Delta Phi Epsilon – 12
Zeta Tau Alpha – 0

86’ers – 35
Gusman Grace – 2

Couldn’t Think of 1 – 6
The Gentlemen – 4

No Glove, No Love – 14
2L Scrubs – 2

Indoor Soccer:
Oasis – 9
Scrubs – 3

Meat & Potatoes – 8
Inter 43 – 2

Desporados – 5 (ot)
Hot Carls – 4

Chess Club – 13
Cherry Poppers – 3

Kamikazees – 9
Tenacity – 1

Team Billiards:
Smooth Balls – 3
Chalk My Cue – 0

Showtime – 3
The High Ballers – 0

Pi Kappa Alpha – 3
Sigma Chi – 0

Alpha Sigma Phi – 3
Phi Delta Theta – 0