America is the clear loser in presidential debates

Well, George and Al took time out of their busy schedules to stop by the ol’ Town Hall on Tuesday night. The podiums made Bush look stupid and Gore look pedantic. The sit-down conversation made Bush seem affable and Gore appear inaccessible. Now our two champions would face the audience all around them, no podiums, no table, just two men squaring off, exposed before a world watching with anxious eyes, and may the best man win.

Sounds exciting, huh? Well, I wish I could say it was. This clash of the titans should have been a chance for each nominee to elucidate exactly why we should vote for them. Instead, it became yet another series of muddled exchanges where each candidate tried the sneakiest way to misrepresent his opponent’s proposals.

So who are Gore and Bush, really?

Well, I don’t claim to know for sure. But I do think I’ve gotten a pretty good picture of who they are trying to make us think they are, and who they are trying to make us think the other is.

Bush is apparently some new breed of Republican. A state’s rights populist, Junior would have us believe that the presidency is merely some slightly advanced form of governorship. Bush wants us to believe that’s why he’s the best man for the job, because he was a governor.

A la Jimmy Carter, Bush wants us to think of him as a “Washington outsider” who’s going to go in there and clean up all the mess that’s been going on. The problem is, though he’s got limited experience in the District, he’s no stranger to the type of “good ol’ boy’s club,” that he attacks it for being. Bush is the quintessential good ol’ boy, and that attitude is going to perpetuate the system of corporate welfare and special interest domination of policy.

Gore, on the other hand, is seemingly a latter day Lyndon B. Johnson, a True Believer in the federal government’s ability to micro-manage our lives effectively if only we hook them up with some tax money. In contrast to Bush, Gore is vocal in his opposition to the power of special interests, and yet therein lies the problem. Gore is very “vocal” about campaign finance reform, but he’s not enough opposed to it to take action in this campaign. If Bush is in the pocket of the Big Oil industry, Gore is owned by all the trendy celebrities that inhabit nearly every Democrat fundraiser.

This may be a simplification of the issues, but the issue is pretty simple — if either of these men are “fortunate enough to win your confidence,” neither of them can be trusted to do what they say they will. Both men’s promises and proposals represent extreme conflicts of interest with what their biggest campaign contributors would like to see happen.

If there were any hope that corporate welfare and pork-belly projects were on the endangered species list, then both candidates would have a hard time scrounging together enough money to throw a keg party, much less a convention. But instead, we are witnessing two of the most expensive campaigns in history, which means, regardless of who wins, that man’s strings are going to be pulled even tighter.

It’s hard to say who really won any of the debates, but the clear losers are the American people. Due to scare campaigns from the Democrats and stifling indifference by the Republicans, most of us will go to the booth on Nov. 7 and vote for the candidate lucky enough to be chosen to debate that we dislike the least. I could try to convince you that voting for third or fourth party candidates is not really “wasting your vote,” but why bother?

Everyday, I try to talk about these issues with friends and co-workers, and all I hear is the same old crap. One particularly unenlightened guy at work actually told me “those guys from the smaller parties aren’t any good because they can’t get on TV.”

How do I argue with such a claustrophobic lack of intelligence?

It’s no secret that I am a big supporter of Ralph Nader, and the funniest thing is that anytime someone is arguing with me about Nader, the only attack they can ever make on him is not on policy, but rather on the “fact” that he “can’t win.” Nevermind that he would be the best person for the job, I guess ... I’m generally an optimistic guy, and I’m not predicting doom and destruction based on the outcome of a presidential race, but this election has finally brought out the defeatist in me.

I’ve lost my faith in the American people’s ability to see what’s right for themselves. For now, I’m predicting that Georgie-Porgie will be smilin’ on Election Day, and that for yet another four years our lives will be good, but not as great as they could be. In the meantime, I’ll pray for a miracle.

Daniel Bramlette is a senior radio-TV-film major from Ogden, Utah.
He can be reached at (d.c.bramleette@yahoo.com).

Sitting in a room down the hall, I watched with my friends Stephanie and Kate as some nameless boy-band came on TV to perform. It was ... astounding.

The guys were all off-key and failed completely to work together in harmony, but they danced all right. The three of us were amused, but Kate shook her head, saying, “I don’t understand the entertainment industry — it finds performers who fit a mold and turns them into something mechanical; talent doesn’t matter because it’s all about the look.”

Her words stuck in my mind and I began to wonder: just how important is spectacle in the entertainment industry today?

In Aristotle’s “Poetics,” “spectacle” is listed as the sixth and least important element of dramatic action. Because of current technical ability and the audience appreciation for visual quality, however, spectacle ranks higher on the list of valued qualities for performances — whether it be musical or dramatic.

This is not necessarily bad, since today we have the capability to create realistic and awesome visual performances. It is important, though, that in movies or music the spectacle works to bolster the talent of the performance.

Spectacle should not replace the necessity for talented actors, musicians and singers. In most cases, I think directors understand that visual aspects can’t be the sole base of engrossment; films such as “The Matrix” and “Saving Private Ryan”, for example, make use of special effects and intense visuals in order to create the atmosphere for the action between characters. They do not rely on special effects to be the movie.

Why, then, does the pop-music industry not understand this concept?

I watch Britney Spears — the poster-girl for mechanical performance — and marvel; she makes millions of dollars based on her image. I have read in magazines where her own mother admits that Britney’s voice in real life doesn’t even resemble the studio-altered voice used on compact discs. She doesn’t make money off of talent because it isn’t there. She makes money because she fits the image desired by the industry that produced her.

I don’t know how many other people noticed, but at the Video Music Awards, she sang very little, and all attention went to her lack of dress. She can dance around scantily clad, much to the enjoyment of pre-teen boys and the amazement of young girls who want to be just like her, and that seems to be enough.

However, the music industry must recognize that society will not be happy simply with the way the product looks; the industry, after all, is supposed to create music, not models and dancers!

A return must be made to the value of talent before spectacle can even be designed for a performance.

Miranda Nesler is a freshman English major from Houston.
She can be reached at (m.g.nesler @student.tcu. edu).

Within the past year, the City of Fort Worth and the TCU administration have taken steps toward making University and Stadium drives safer streets for pedestrians.

After two members of the TCU community were struck on University Drive by passing vehicles within a two-year span, the committee that dealt with the parking situation added pedestrian safety to its list of responsibilities, making it the Parking and Pedestrian Safety Committee.

The improvements made to University include a 25-mph pedestrian speed zone, right-turn restrictions from Bowie and Princeton streets onto University, advanced pedestrian warnings and more visible crosswalks.
Since that time, the Fort Worth Traffic and Public Works Department has evaluated both Stadium and University drives and has taken much-needed safety measures.

On Stadium, traffic engineers added four-way stops and placed a crosswalk between Bellaire and West Cantey drives.

Last year, Chancellor Michael Ferrari promised to make pedestrian safety on University a priority of the administration. By forming a committee to oversee improvements on University, campus officials have made it clear that students’ safety is one of their top interests.

But more could be done.

Just Tuesday, a student was hit by a car while walking to the Rickel Building on the crosswalk of Stadium Drive. The woman was taken to Harris Methodist Hospital and was later released.

We all know we were taught to look both ways while crossing the street, so obviously it is not the administration’s job to hold our hands. But, it is their duty to assess potentially hazardous crossing zones.
The injuries were minor this time, but next time they could be more severe.