Editorial misses the mark on tuition

Despite many of us in the Wolfpack family making resolutions to improve ourselves as we started the new year, Technician and its Viewpoint section have apparently decided to continue its habit of using stale news as a foundation for the paper’s opinions.

Today’s unsigned editorial ‘Now they stand up for us,’ curiously attacks the tuition petition being circulated by N.C. State’s Student Government, while calling on the UNC Association of Student Governments ‘to make a more concerted, multi-pronged effort’ that includes ‘an extensive phone or e-mail campaign and have people directly speak to the legislators.’

Yet that multi-phase approach is precisely what UNCASG has been doing since July, with the tuition petition only comprising one piece of the puzzle. At every single meeting over the past six months, delegates from all 17 UNC institutions have been thoroughly briefed on both the timeline and activities for the comprehensive approach we’ve taken to opposing the tax on students.

Maybe Technician just got tripped up when we called it ‘multi-phase’ instead of ‘multi-prong.’

Your editorial is particularly shameful when student newspapers with far fewer resources than Technician have reported on these efforts throughout the semester, while Technician has been unable to spare a single reporter or columnist to attend any meetings of the Association or the UNC Board of Governors.

As if to highlight the embarrassment this paper has become, the UNC-CH Daily Tar Heel Monday had a front-page story detailing the very efforts we’ve been undertaking, efforts that your Editorial Board has only now been kind enough to recommend to us.

I recognize Technician has spent this year working aggressively to shred its already-limited credibility with the Student Body and I recognize finding every conceivable opportunity to complain about the Talley fee – no matter how unrelated the complaints to the underlying news story – is the paper’s best option to rehabilitate its image with readers.

But if you’re unwilling to even make an effort at proactively seeking accurate information for your editorials, at the very least you should consider reading your competitors’ papers before writing those editorials.

T. Greg Doucette

alumnus, class of 2009

president, UNC Association of Student Governments

McCauley’s conclusions are flawed

Regarding Paul McCauley’s Thursday column, I disagree with his conclusion to the article when he said that the recent election in Massachusetts and the change that is going to be coming to Washington had nothing to do with being too liberal. I argue that that being too liberal is precisely the reason why this change is going to take place. The democrats in Congress, instead of focusing on our floundering economy decided to push their ‘Hallmark ‘liberal’ issue,’ health care. Almost the entirety of President Barack Obama’s first term has been devoted to health care, which is an issue that would appease his base. But health care has stalled, partly due to the success of the way the GOP has framed the issue and kept in mind that the American people are not the most patient people in the world. They are tired of the same old Washington.

During the 2008 campaign, President Obama promised a new age of transparency descend upon Washington but why then do we hear news of backroom deals in which some states are promised no tax increases in exchange for their vote? That is same old backroom Washington politics.

So being too liberal is the reason why the election in Massachusetts was won by Scott Brown and why change will be coming to Washington. It is the American People’s way of saying that they are tired of waiting for the ‘Change We Can Believe In.’

Andrew Dworznicki

junior, political science

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