Letters to the Editor

Intelligence valid reason to hold Bush accountable

Dear Editor,

After years of denying that the United States has secret prisons and permits the use of torture, President Bush now proudly admits that we actually do. He insists that we are safer, but the current wizards within the White House can make virtually any claim they like while hiding behind “national security.”

The American public hears about the internal dissent and faulty intelligence only after the administration has used voodoo to make selective tidbits of information appear to be the truth. If we can’t trust our president, then who can we trust? Apparently, this administration would have us believe that we can trust whatever these terror suspects tell us, or can we?

One of the prisoners in those secret prisons was Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, a senior al-Qaida operative captured in Pakistan in November 2001. He was shipped off to Cairo, tortured and predictably told the CIA what they wanted to hear – that two al-Qaida operatives were sent to Iraq for chemical and biological weapons training. This “intelligence” was used by the Bush administration as “proof” of a connection between Iraq and al-Qaida before going to war.

Of course, al-Libi later recanted once back in U.S. custody, and now the CIA disavows the accuracy of the intelligence. How convenient. Yet as further events have revealed, the above example is only the tip of the pre-war fairy tale iceberg.

By every measure, including the CIA’s own assessment, terrorism is on the rise all around the globe. So, presuming that the United States is still on the planet Earth, it is sheer delusion to believe that we are safer. Some will insist that critics are “blaming America first,” but I didn’t write the National Security Strategy of the United States September 2002, the Bush administration did.

Read the brief document and it will be clear that only through smoke and mirrors might Iraq become the primary concern when Iran, Israel vs. Palestine, North Korea, and the continuing war in Afghanistan (remember that?) pose much greater threats based on the administration’s own criteria!

Our military men and women are not over in Iraq to fight against the greatest threat our country faces, but for the sake of fulfilling this administration’s pet project. It is precisely because the threat is real, and the stakes so high, that this president must be held accountable.

Tim Quigley

Senior history major

Students need more on-campus weekend options

Dear Editor,

I am a freshman at Kent State University, and so far I love the campus and the various activities (i.e. the Black Squirrel Festival and the Week of Welcome). Everyone is friendly, my teachers are very helpful, and I’m having a lot of fun. The only problems I’ve really run into occur on the weekends.

I try to be one of those students who actually stays on campus over the weekends, and it’s working out pretty well. Last night, however, a few of my friends and I ran into some problems. We planned a movie night with a few other girls, so rather than going out to party we could just sit, talk and relax. We wanted to go out and grab some dinner or ice cream beforehand, and walked over to Eastway.

Well, it turns out that everything closes extremely early on weekends, which I found a little ironic because weekends are when people stay up the latest. There was hardly any place for us to eat: Eastway was closed, as was Rathskeller, and most of the shops in the Hub. We couldn’t even get ice cream to bring back to the room. What kind of ice cream place closes at 6 p.m. on weekends?

Everyone wants ice cream at night on weekends! I understand that a lot of the workers are students and would refuse to work Friday or Saturday nights, but couldn’t the campus hire a few adults to work those hours? All my friends and I really want is to get some food on a Saturday night somewhere besides Rosie’s.

Is that so much to ask? Something needs to be changed.

Stacey Mahony

Freshman art education major