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Saturday, November 30, 2024

Opinion | Letters To The Editor

Florida Alligator
OPINION  |  LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Student Government endorsements were fair, bipartisan

By Casey Eckberg | Feb. 23, 2010

I, like many students, am shocked at the Alligator’s choice of endorsements.  I’ve been here for a few years now and I’ve seen the Alligator side with the “indie” party far more times than not. Therefore, when I see that the Editorial Board has chosen to make no endorsement between the presidential candidates, I consider that a major victory for the Unite Party.

Florida Alligator
OPINION  |  LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Reitz Union doesn’t need revamp

By Jordon Kalilich | Feb. 23, 2010

By now, many students have probably seen the green signs that list the university’s reasons for wanting to expand the Reitz Union. I can’t be the only one who is outraged by some of the so-called problems with the current building, particularly the claim that there is “no place to study.”

Florida Alligator
OPINION  |  LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Student Alliance to improve Senate if elected for some seats

By Neil Gundavda | Feb. 22, 2010

Recently, the Alligator published an endorsement of various executive candidates and certain referenda. However, the newspaper failed to mention the other group of students running for election. Forty-seven Senate seats are being contested during the spring election, and the Student Alliance party has a slate worth an endorsement from the Alligator. Amalgamating a diverse group of students, the Student Alliance Senate slate can be credited with many of the “70 Platform Points” of the Student Alliance. The Student Alliance slate, if given a chance at a Senate majority, will quickly act to annul more than $1 million in waste in Student Government. We will swiftly post our voting records online, mitigate the lack of transparency at the legislative level, pass legislation to encourage ethics at all levels of SG, expand free printing, promote sustainable practices and enact many other of the Student Alliance party’s published initiatives. The current Senate, thoroughly dominated by a Unite Party majority, has been relegated to a lackluster rubber stamp. Never contradicting the executive, the Senate has continually refused to invoke its powers of investiture and its right to check the other branches of SG. If elected to Senate, we will reinvigorate the legislative prerogatives lost to autocratic history. Fight for your rights as students and vote for the Student Alliance Tuesday and Wednesday.

Florida Alligator
OPINION  |  LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Frank Walch’s comparison of Unite Party to Nazi leaders is offensive, shameful

By Dara Schopp | Feb. 22, 2010

As a Jew and as a decent human being, I was thoroughly offended by Frank Walch’s letter to the editor Monday that compared certain leaders of the Unite Party to Nazi leaders. Though Walch specified that he did not feel as though a Student Government politician could be described as being as evil as a Nazi figure (thankfully he was willing to grant that at the least), his letter is a blatant character-assassination attempt. Tell me, Mr. Walch, how on Earth one could possibly equate a few thousand dollars spent on alleged perks with a “fascist agenda”? How could you possibly insinuate that the hundreds of volunteers for Unite have been “coerced” into giving their time? How could you ignore the accomplishments made in the past year and instead credit the administration?

Florida Alligator
OPINION  |  LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Reitz Union renovation is unreasonable

By Jordan Dominy | Feb. 22, 2010

Monday’s editorial endorsing the Reitz Union fee is indicative of the shortsightedness of the Alligator’s editorial staff. Yes, supporting the fee so long as graduate assistants are exempted from it seems like a good idea. I’m a teaching assistant, and I, too, find the logic that leads to this enticing because I stand to benefit from it. However, there is nothing that Student Government can do to assure us that this fee will be waived for graduate assistants. The Student Body President — Jordan Johnson now, and whoever his successor may be — is merely one member of the board of trustees and can only propose such a waiver. Moreover, as it stands on the day of an election that puts such an important matter to vote, a waiver of the Reitz Union fee for graduate assistants has not even been officially presented to the trustees. A vote in favor of this fee is a vote based merely on the fleeting hope that UF’s administration and trustees will have the goodness in their hearts to cut some slack to those who work the hardest to keep this university running.

Florida Alligator
OPINION  |  LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Benefits of Reitz renovation will outweigh costs

By Laura Brancheau | Feb. 22, 2010

The Alligator’s endorsement of the Reitz Union referendum has me at the edge of my seat. I read the Alligator daily and recognize it as the primary and most knowledgeable source for everything going on  on campus. For weeks, I have read about the proposed student fee to repair and renovate the Reitz Union. I heard the potential price but wasn’t aware of the potential results. The Alligator Editorial Board has pulled the rug out from under my feet and made me think twice about this issue.

Florida Alligator
OPINION  |  LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Dove World Outreach Center should be forced off campus

By DAVID HANAN | Feb. 21, 2010

Members of the Dove World Outreach Center should be forced off campus by students and faculty alike. Gainesville residents should not tolerate blatant prejudice, whether it be on billboards or T-shirts. The message needs to be simple and direct: The Dove World Outreach Center does not belong on campus and does not belong on the streets. The hateful messages should be kept inside their festering warehouse of Bibles and screen-printing presses. When citizens become indifferent to religiously or culturally incendiary messages, evil will triumph. Everyone needs to know that genocide begins when lay people tolerate bigotry. If members of the Dove Center can walk freely though campus, student and faculty silence is directly condoning their message. When did the Holocaust begin? Did it begin when the first victims died? When they were put on trains? The Holocaust began when a whole people became desensitized to violence and apathetic to racism. The Dove Center is using religious text to try to label and isolate Islamic people. If this sounds familiar, join me and force the members of this wretched group off our campus and off our streets.

Florida Alligator
OPINION  |  LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Students should take a stand against hate act

By Jonathan Ossip | Feb. 21, 2010

I hope that I am joined by the entire university community in condemning the most recent incident of hate speech on our campus. For those of you who do not know, fliers were distributed across campus and around Gainesville that said, “Student Alliance party is the Nazi Party,” printing our logo and a swastika with an equal sign between them.

Florida Alligator
OPINION  |  LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Student Body candidate broke regulation

By Hayley Plant | Feb. 16, 2010

I am fairly new to Student Government, having served as a student senator representing Beaty Towers for merely a semester. Yet I’ve taken it upon myself to learn the necessary rules and regulations when it comes to elections and campaigning. Evidently, Ben Cavataro has not. A couple days ago, Ben Cavataro went door-to-door in The Estates apartment complex. Going door-to-door is not only an inconvenience to those who live in the complexes, but it is also a clear violation of election codes. Ben Cavataro should know this. Such a blatant disregard for the rules is probably why he was recommended for disqualification by the Election Commission when he first ran for office. Anyone who chronically violates the rules that guarantee the fairness of our democratic process, as Ben Cavataro did, should not be running for office.

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