It was the best I could do. Hate to crowd in on Olly’s turf, but this can’t sit out there too long:

There is one stretch where I can see river and highway adjacent to one another. The first time I was there, I thought how much the freeway of cars was really like a river of water.

Wow. This man is miles above us.

But even the great thinkers err from time to time:

Listening for the sake of itself isn’t a value that this culture cherishes.

This would be a compelling point, if you turned a blind eye to the stubborn popularity of live and recorded music.

Also, as to Shakra’s point about political poetry cutting too close to a writer’s “core,” how can some half-baked eco-femmy rant possibly expose the poet’s inner what-nots more than, say, a poem about one’s inability to love, or one’s fear of death, or the fact that as a child, one’s uncle made one get naked and watch snuff films with him?

Oh wait, I’m actually trying to debate Shakra. Damn, the Shakra Beat is treacherous. Sorry, Olly, I’ll leave you to it.

Ian Crosswhite knows the score:

In the Pac-10, at the four position, you can guard anybody like Amit Tamir — who’s 6-foot-10, 6-foot-11 — to Hassan Adams, who’s 6-foot-4, 6-foot-5. Each night, you know who you’re going to be guarding, but it’s going to be a different type of guy. You can guard a guard-like forward or a big man. It just changes.

And that’s why the ability to adjust your height using only the power of your mind is such an advantage in this league!

(Apologies to anyone who’s already sick of the “Ian Crosswhite HeightWatch” joke.)

The first [missed point] is the statement referring to the American military, “You can go off to war and kill at age 18, but you can’t have a drink.” This statement is, in fact, untrue. The drinking age on American military bases is 18, and if you hold a military ID, many bars will serve you despite your age.

– Junior physics major Eric Mann waxes abstinent in today’s ODE. OK, Eric: you’re reaching a little bit here.

If you thought that the Ol’ Dirty’s Steven Baggs was batshit crazy, take a look at this political cartoon from The Broadside, a student publication from NC State. I’m not the most politically correct guy in the world, nor am I very receptive to insipid declarations of racism from people who take offense at humor, but that cartoon struck me as a little… I don’t know, tasteless. And I don’t mean funny tasteless, like a John Waters movie (okay, his movies aren’t funny either. So what?), I mean just dumb. Stupid and dumb.

Go ahead and read the article, too. It’s filled with with insightful journalistic nuggets like:

There was [sic] approximately one hundred people present at the McKimmon Center listening to his [Farrakhan’s] speech, many of them sporting turbans and various other head dresses. Everyone in the staff of people running the conference (which lasted all day with an assortment of events and speakers) were [sic] wearing a uniform white tunic-like outfit with matching turban. There was a through [sic] weapons frisk and pocket/purse check at the door for weapons and contraband materials.

And the author seems legitimately perplexed by the lack of spear-chucking and tribal warfare that he expected the speech to engender. I mean, after all, they were wearing (gasp) turbans.

His supporters, although dressed more radically, did not hang form [sic] the ceiling, shoot guns in the air, nor did any other action that was extreme in nature.

Okay, you could make the argument that Farrakhan preaches a brand of black empowerment predicated on divisiveness, but nobody takes the guy seriously. It’s not like Washington DC waits with baited breath for the next Farrakhan-espoused dynamo of political rhetoric. He’s no Jesse Jackson. He’s no Al Sharpton. He’s no one-man Black Panthers. He’s just a guy in a bow tie who severely overestimates his own power.

But I’m being too verbose. The author basically speaks for himself. Can somebody say DOUCHEBAG?

I found something odd while looking up student group contact information last night. If you type in http://greenparty.uoregon.edu into the address bar of your browser you’ll be taken to an unexpected, but familiar, website. What’s the deal, yo?

This is going to be the first in a series of posts that will examine the numerous other conservative student publications out there. Why would I want to do such a thing? Because these other publications are so goddamn bad, that’s why. Seriously, some of these guys need to get a class B license so they can drive the semi out of their tightly clenched asses.

First on the list is the North Carolina Review. Usually I find it distasteful to simply make fun of southerners for the oft-spoken perception of them being nothing more than moonshine-swilling, Confederate-flag-saluting, NASCAR-watching inbreds. But then I met these guys in Chicago, and I learned that my stereotypical view of North Carolinans was accurate. These crackers be crazy!

Take a look at their blog. It’s nothing but Lincoln bashing. They even go so far as to call the Great Emancipator a dictator. They even link the wellfare state to Lincoln. Ouch.

Also of interest is the fact that the entire webpage seems reminiscent of another Collegiate Network funded publication … ours. Don’t believe me? Take a look at their mission statement. Does it look familiar?

I can’t get too upset, though. Take a look at who works for them. Go to the bottom and check out Adam Herring. He’s the guy they lock in the closet and bring out to scare the liberals. Apparently every publication has its Chrittner.

The new issue of the Oregon Commentator, The Mini Issue, is now available on this here website. It, like, totally rocks dude. And I’m not just saying that because I’m in charge. Okay, maybe I am. But, man, what about that killer editorial? OH YEAH!

How come we never get letters like this? Here we have a man whose gut aches as he begins to comprehend things. Not just things like “I shouldn’t have eaten that entire plate of jalapeno poppers,” but actual deep truths about society, dude. It’s riveting. And, for the most part, unintentionally hilarious:

Each class has something to offer me as I begin to take part in the sculpting of not only my future, but the future of every generation to come. With that I find that I am directing my studies more towards the good of humanity than personal success as defined in our current materialistic media. I had hope that others who have graduated from colleges all over the United States have discovered this same attempt at generosity, at directing individual efforts towards the community, city and nation as a whole.

Oh, the humanity. Altogether now: shut up, Nicholas Wilbur. And if a sophomore pre-journalism student thinks he’s “directing his studies towards the good of humanity”, I fear he has much to learn about the great profession of journalism.

Dan, I thought “distatesful” was a deliberate pun. Would that all our typos were that felicitous.

Speaking of orgasmi-comic potential, Wonkette links to Allahpundit’s collection of Edwards ’04 promotional material. I think the one she picked is the best, but they’re all worth a look.

Well, the Vagitators outside the Vagina Monologues proved themselves imbecilic enough to come in for a Volokh mockery–“Where’s that safe and welcoming space? All cunts should be represented”–here.

Yes, I have been reading the Volokh Conspiracy all day.

Further note–Volokh and David Kaufman are doing our job for us. “Tensions explode at ‘Vagina’ Discussion” is a headline quivering with orgasmi-comic potential.

For anyone still interested in the federalism/gay marriage issue, this article from Volokher Jacob Levy is a must-read. Money quote:

[The FMA] does not merely limit and constrain state laws. It dictates a rule about how state laws and state constitutions will be construed and interpreted by the state’s own courts. That is an unprecedented intrusion into the autonomy of the states’ legal systems. Instead of limiting state law with federal law, from the outside, it would distort state law from within.

Great. For those of you just joining our legal system (as I assume FMA supporters are), there are a few simple rules:

1. The U.S. Constitution and federal law are supreme to state laws.

2. State courts don’t tell federal courts how to interpret federal law.

3. Federal courts do tell state courts how to interpret federal law.

4. State courts do tell federal courts how to interpret state law.

5. Federal courts don’t tell state courts how to interpret state law.

Never has anything in the U.S. Constitution, federal laws, or the decisions of federal courts dictated to state courts how to apply state constitutions and laws. In the words of the estimable Tim Dreier, “This is just stupid. Just plain dumb. I can’t even express in words how utterly distasteful and wrong this idea is.”

By the way, in my opinion, every marriage should be a gay marriage. Who wants to be miserable?

UPDATE. I now know how to spell “distasteful.” No more snickering remarks.

I’m not quite sure what this says about me as a smoker. I know that I am prone to barroom outbursts of “it licks balls! No, man, IT LICKS BALLS!” at the slightest provocation, but I’m not really sure if I can link that to my filthy smoking habit. I’ll let you guys be the judge.

This is just stupid. Just plain dumb. I can’t even express in words how utterly distasteful and wrong this idea is.

Last word on Scott Austin for a while, at least from me. The guy’s an unbelievable bigot, a haphazard writer at the very best of times, and he’s been a walking punchline on this campus for longer than any of us have even been here. He doesn’t come across as being very bright, and his debating style consists of nothing more than poorly-phrased insults and bloviation. We’re all guilty of that from time to time, obviously, but for him it really does seem to be the entire package.

I’m sure he’s perfectly charming in person, though.

Time to revive the old OC catchphrase for campus political matters: Something Really Stupid this way comes. This is a fantastic display of petulance by the Executive, and they deserve nothing but ridicule for it. The ODE is one of a very, very few student groups that actually operates at a more or less professional level and produces a tangible end product that is of interest to a majority of the student body. (Even when they end up running five pages of wire-service stories, I will grudgingly concede.)

The ODE isn’t distributed that widely. What’s more, to assume that students are not the paper’s “target audience” just because it isn’t being left in bundles outside Suite 4 is absurd. Let me say that slowly and clearly, for any members of the ASUO who may be reading: not all students live in the dorms. Why, some of them live as far as half a mile away from campus!

Also, as has been pointed out, some 90% (correct me if I’m wrong, please) of the ODE’s budget comes from advertising revenue. Wider distribution means more advertising. More advertising means they need less of an incidental-fee subsidy. This is a good thing, one would think.

What’s most striking, though, is the sheer chutzpah of the quote Tim mentioned. The same people who wanted to spend twenty thousand dollars of other people’s money last month sending themselves to USSA conferences are now concerned about paying a guy in a van to drop off newspapers at the Baker Downtown Center. Oh, my aching sides. It’s almost enough to make you think that the Executive has some kind of personal grudge against the ODE and their tendency to report on things like, I don’t know, prominent campus figures physically assaulting women at bars.