The Rice Thresher, Vol. 96, No. 3, Ed. 1 Friday, September 5, 2008 Page: 3 of 24
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Op-Ed
VP selection resembles reality television
A couple of years ago, the movie
American Dreamz merrily imagined
a world in which a thinly disguised
President Bush, attempting to boost
his popularity ratings, becomes a
guest judge on American Idol. Last
month, something similar occurred in
Brian Reinhart
real life, and I think I might have been
the only observer to notice it. Senator
Barack Obama turned the selection
of his running mate into a weird real-
ity TV show, dropping hints, secretly
naming finalists and eliminating the
lowest-ranked contestants.
Two days before Joseph Biden
joined the Democratic ticket, CNN
and other news sources reported
that Obama was telephoning vari-
ous important politicians to let them
know "they had not been selected"
to become "finalists" for the vice-
presidential nomination. Mean-
while, Texas Congressman Chet
Edwards was able to confirm to the
media that he was a "finalist" to be-
come Obama's vice president.
The night before Obama an-
nounced his vice-presidential
nominee, suspense began to flag.
As MSNBC reported at the time,
"Sen. Joe Biden emerged as a lead-
ing contender Friday to become Ba-
rack Obama's vice-presidential pick
as two running-mate rivals learned
they had been eliminated."
What interests me here is not how
Senator Obama chose his running
mate, but the language in which he,
and everybody else, couched the
process. Eliminations, finalists — it
all sounds like a reality show.
As I read of more and more politi-
cians who had been "eliminated from
contention," or who had entered
"the final round" of the VP sweep-
stakes, it started to sound more and
more like a bad show on Fox. Obama
played the host, the judges and the
prize, gleefully naming finalists, and
eventually a winner, in the race to
accompany him to the White House.
Meanwhile, Virginia Governor
Tim Kaine was telling reporters that
he had not been one of the last con-
testants standing. I imagined Obama
calling to say, "I'm sorry, Mr. Kaine,
but you are not a finalist in this sea-
son of Who Wants to Be a Vice Presi-
dent?" Or perhaps a Democratic ar-
biter would inform Hillary Clinton,
"Well, Hillary, the judges do not
think you have what it takes to be
Vice Presidential Idol."
Donot think I am criticizing Obama
for being childish or immature about
the nomination process. No, I actu-
ally think there is serious potential
here for improving our elections. For
one thing, we could speedily get rid
of the lunatic fringe. Imagine if Tom
Bergeron, host of Dancing with the
Stars, called up Ron Paul and said,
"Congressman Paul, the judges were
impressed by your debating prowess,
but did the viewers agree? We'll find
out if you've been eliminated ... right
after this commercial break." Also,
Simon Cowell could host the presi-
dential debates.
For that matter, we could also
have viewer phone-ins to determine
the winners of each party's presiden-
tial nomination. That would elimi-
nate pesky primaries, putting the
entire nation on an equal plane for
initial voting. No longer would Iowa
hold an unfair advantage. Now any-
body with a telephone could ensure
that their favorite candidate would
triumph in the final round.
Of course, the debates would
not be about policy issues. It would
make bad television. Candidates
would be judged on their looks and
charisma, as they have been since
John F. Kennedy defeated sweaty
Richard Nixon in i960. We should
also have our prospective presi-
dents sing, dance and juggle for
the judges. At least then we would
know the candidates have some
modicum of talent, which is more
than I can say for Dick Cheney or
John Kerry.
What I am getting at here is that
Barack Obama, in publicizing his
vice-presidential nomination as if
it were a game show, has only be-
gun to explore the possibilities.
Based on what we now know about
him, we can bet he will find more
ways to attract more attention in
the next election. He could put all
his potential running mates on a
small island, where they would
have to compete to survive. That
would draw better ratings, and I bet
it would greatly increase the Ameri-
can people's respect for the winner.
He could summon Tim Kaine and
Hillary Clinton to his office and
said, "When we combined advisers'
scores and my fan base's votes, you
were in the bottom two. One of you
is going home — right now."
And his campaign slogan could
be, "John Sidney McCain III, you are
the weakest link!"
Brian Reinhart is a Wiess
College sophomore.
Economic woes ripple into student lives
Some had internships, some
sought adventure abroad, some
bummed around the house, some
spent the summer looking for a job,
and a few found employment. After
sitting in classrooms for a good nine
months, the majority of American
Caroline May
youth need a new scene. Summer is
a time for — as John Cleese would
say — "something completely dif-
ferent." Having torn free from the
bonds of professorial dictates and sti-
fling schedules, the ability to choose
one's activities for the following three
months is a luxury of epic proportion.
And some do have great opportuni-
ties: wealthy parents or a generous
relative may finance a trip to Europe.
Numerous applications painstakingly
written months in advance may have
provided one with the opportunity
to work as an intern or lab assistant.
Others may return to their hometown
community swimming pool to re-
claim their lifetime gig as the beloved
lifeguard. Yet for each trip to Europe
or invaluable experience at a top or-
ganization there are many wholly
unable to set their own summertime
agenda. The economic woes of the
past year served only to intensify this
unfortunate reality.
The precise definition of an eco-
nomic recession is two consecu-
tive quarters of negative growth.
Although the country did not fall
victim to even one quarter of such
anemic figures, Americans did feel
the pressure of a slowing economy,
as (among other things) the housing
bubble burst, the dollar weakened
and gas prices soared. In the midst
of the economic malaise, students
throughout the country finished
school and ventured out in search of
a job — for a bit of spending money,
resume enhancement and good old-
fashioned character building.
Despite the moxie exhibited by a
great many teens on the path to gain-
ful employment, the statistics were
not in their favor. At the beginning
of the summer Kristen Lopez East-
lick, in an article published by the
Washington Examiner, provided the
distressing news: "According to [the
Department of Labor's] data, only
about one-third of Americans 16 to
19 years old will have a job this sum-
mer, and vulnerable low-income and
minority teens are going to fare even
worse. The percentage of teens clas-
sified as 'unemployed' — those who
are actively seeking a job but can't get
one — is more than three times high-
er than the national unemployment
rate, according to the most recent De-
partment of Labor statistics."
At the heart of this mass increase
in teenage unemployment was the
July 24 increase in the federal mini-
mum wage, mandated by the Fair Pay
Act of 2007 — one of Nancy Pelosi's
early boondoggles as House Majority
leader. Indeed, far from proving to be
an economic boon, the increase in the
minimum wage contributed to a teen
unemployment rate of 20.3 percent,
the highest such rate in over 10 years.
This is a number made even more
dramatic when compared with the
percentage of total unemployment,
5.7 percent (a figure many consider to
be full employment).
On its face, the minimum wage
sounds like a benevolent policy,
proffering nothing but excellent
results — a course of action sure to
shower all who promote it with good
karma for years to come. Though
appearing to be benign, this sum-
mer's unemployed teens can attest
that this is naught but an illusion.
The minimum wage artificially
raises the cost of unskilled labor,
which, as any first-year economics
major can confirm, results in a de-
crease in the demand for such labor.
In this way the government's ac-
tions encourage employers to seek
alternatives like machines or new
production methods rather than
hire employees to provide labor not
worth the price mandated by the
government. It is an empirical fact
that as the minimum wage rises so,
too, does the unemployment rate.
In addition to the negatives result-
ing from this form of price control, it
is important to note the demographic
makeup of minimum wage earners.
The U.S. Census reveals that the ma-
jority of minimum wage recipients are
teens and young adults just starting
off in the job market. Only seven per-
cent were heads of households, and
as a study by the Employment Poli-
cies Institute revealed, two-thirds of
minimum wage workers move above
the minimum wage in one year or
less. Although a seemingly virtuous
endeavor, raising the minimum wage
in the majority of cases results not
from constituent service but rather
legislative pandering to special inter-
est groups, namely labor unions. Sup
porters of a higher minimum wage
might fool themselves into believing
their own assertions of moral superi-
ority, but the results of their actions
speak louder than their intentions.
Caroline May is a Will Rice
College senior.
'Three Cups of Tea' tastes
like opportunities at Rice
Like many of the incoming fresh-
men, I did not want to read Three
Cups of Tea. I had even less of a
reason to do so as well: I am a
mechanical engineering senior, and
I had absolutely no involvement
with O-Week.
Claire Krebs
I will confess: It took me the
better part of two weeks to finish
the book. Not because I did not
like it, or thought it was idealistic
or sappy, but because I have had
a glimpse into the main character
Greg Mortenson's world.
For those not in-the-know, Three
Cups of Tea was this year's freshman
summer reading book, co-written
by Mortenson and David Oliver
Relin (co-author). It is the story of
Mortenson, a mountaineer who sees
firsthand the poverty of a Pakistani
village during a failed mountain as-
cent, which starts him on his lifelong
mission to bring education to thou-
sands of rural children by building
schools across Pakistan.
Mortenson quickly learns that
the only way to accomplish a project
of this scale is to build relationships
with Pakistanis on the ground, us-
ing their firsthand knowledge. While
the story itself is overwhelming, the
real value of the book comes from
the lessons he learns along the way
of what will and will not work in
humanitarian projects.
Books and lectures like this seem
to find me without my active effort.
Usually I hear about such things
through the international service
group at Rice that I have been in-
volved with since my freshman year.
We work on long-term engineering
projects in Latin America, collabo-
rating with the people in the com-
munities we serve; like Mortenson,
we have learned the hard way a
sustainable project must be built on
these relationships.
I suppose I should not have been
so shocked by the numerous parallels
between Mortenson's experience and
my own, but I was. He has had the
same problems, felt the same frustra-
tions and faced the same language
barriers that we have dealt with in our
projects, except Mortenson speaks
Urdu instead of Spanish.
While the parallels seem endless,
what resonated most deeply with me
were the relationships Mortenson
develops in Pakistan. Not only do
these people help him achieve his
material goals, but they themselves
reflect fundamental truths about the
world. It is here that I see the deep-
est symmetry with our work in Latin
America. For every Jahan, Haji Ali
or Faisal Baig, inspiring and guid-
ing Mortenson in his work, there is
a corresponding person living in the
communities we visit.
There is Ciamara, the adorable lit-
tle girl from El Salvador who stole our
hearts with her wide eyes and mis-
chievous smile. Her grandfather calls
her Mentirosa, "little liar," as she,
one by one, denounced every guy on
our team as intolerably ugly.
There is Don Mercedes and his
24-year-old son, Juan Carlos, also
from El Salvador. Don Mercedes re-
minds you of your grandfather with
his mannerisms, wry sense of hu-
mor and loving devotion to his dog,
except 1 doubt your grandfather
can break up boulders with a barra
before breakfast. His son Juan Car-
los could be the Salvadoran every-
man, perpetually joking and wield-
ing a machete, except he has been
diagnosed with diabetes and has
failing kidneys. Despite his ever
worsening condition, he is always
with us to help in any way he can, a
constant reminder of both our own
mortality and the resilience of the
human spirit.
These characters are just a few of
the ones we have met. They are very
different than us in their origins, na-
tive tongues and daily habits, but
by getting to know them, we have
seen that they are just like us in core
values and everyday cares. Like in
Mortenson's tale, these people have
molded our lives and our under-
standing of ourselves.
Although all of the people I have
met are dear to me, it is a girl named
Marina in a tiny town in northern
El Salvador who means the most
to me. Eighteen years of age, with
long black hair and a pallor uncom-
mon to most in the village, Marina
seems to see through the serious-
ness of life to the humor around it,
perpetually sharing an inside joke
with existence.
I met her on my second trip to El
Salvador, but with my limited Span-
ish, we had little contact. Unfortu-
nately, with travel dates limited to
vacations and the beginning or end
of summer, it is difficult to finish
our project-related tasks, much less
form relationships with more than
just the most involved community
members. Of course, we would love
to, but we can only make do with the
time we have.
It was not until my fourth trip that
I was able to connect with Marina.
The technical aspects of our project
completed and the rest of the team
wandering the village, I was prepar-
ing to take a well-earned siesta when
she walked by. With the requisite
"buenas tardes," I invited her to stop
on our porch.
For 45 minutes we shared more
silence than conversation. Normally
my test of a friendship is the amount
of silence that it can sustain before
it is broken. With Marina, I felt like I
had known her all my life.
Later that evening, sitting alone
on our porch under the sky, I realized
that the reason she feels so familiar to
me is that with her mannerisms and
nature, she is me.
This tall, skinny, uniform-clad
teenage girl who has never been fur-
ther away from home than the neigh-
boring town is the girl I would have
been, had I grown up in a small Sal-
vadoran village. And maybe instead
of me traveling from a faraway land
to help her, it would have been her
flying to help me.
Obviously, the material benefit of
humanitarian projects can be huge.
But 1 would argue that the relation-
ships built along the way are more
important. Similar to Mortenson's ex-
perience, all of the people I have met
in El Salvador will be with me the rest
of my life, and I know I am a better
person for having known them. I can
only hope I have had a similar effect
on them.
Of course, I am not the only Rice
student to have had this experience.
There are many of us, of every major
and class, all trying to be, as Gandhi
would put it, "the change [we] wish
to see in the world."
There are so many opportunities
at Rice in which to contribute and
from which to grow. You don't just
have to settle for reading about it.
Claire Krebs is a Hanszen senior and
co-leader of the Engineers Without
Borders project in El Salvador.
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Chun, Lily & Farmer, Dylan. The Rice Thresher, Vol. 96, No. 3, Ed. 1 Friday, September 5, 2008, newspaper, September 5, 2008; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth443112/m1/3/?rotate=90: accessed June 21, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.