Here‘s a copy of the Iran resolution that will be proposed at tonight’s Student Senate meeting. Attached to the resolution (but not included in our scan) are the names of 78 people who support the resolution. The addition of these signatures is apparantly an effort to show that the resolution enjoys broad support amongst the student base. A few notes:

• Rather than directly addressing Pres. Ahmadinejad, the resolution “urges our Representatives in the United States Congress and our national leaders to support current and future initiatives to put further diplomatic pressure on Iran as well as any other state sponsor of terror to cease all support of international terror organizations and to cease the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.” Here’s the question: what in the hell do they think the United States is already doing? Do Jared Axelrod and Sara Hamilton believe that the Bush administration is ignoring Iran’s nuclear ambitions and ties to terrorist organizations? Even if we pretend for a moment that this resolution will be influential if passed, it proposes nothing different from what is already being done.
• The vast majority of those who signed on to the petition attached to the resolution belong to student groups. Indeed, only fourteen of those petitioned to support the resolution did not specify their student group (and a number of them I recognize from groups and one is Adam Petkun, who isn’t even a student anymore.) Of course, most students aren’t– those of you in student government will be shocked to hear this– members of organized ASUO student groups.
• The first Whereas statement contains the line “we unequivocally support the right of all people in the world to have interests and ambitions which are independent and separate of their respective governments.” Oh, how generous of you. The only question is, why are you asking the Senate, a body which is supposed to represent all UO students, to express an opinion on international politics on behalf of the entire student body?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 26th, 2006 at 18:19 by Ian and is filed under ASUO, World. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.