PAGE 2 — THE DECREE — OCTOBER 15,1993
OFFICIAL STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF
NOmt CAROltm WESIBYAN COUUSGE
W* Keanefli Leonard
Assbtant Editor Tiffany Page
Staff-- Beemi^r, Fatriclt Brannan, Cecilia Lynn
Casey ^IQmbefly Car seen, JohnFeatress^
MaHe L«nane^ Rossmt
Advisor >— Chris l>aLandc
ThtDeome Is tocated la the Spojjjl Nortft Carolida Wes-
Je;aaCottege^34€9 We^yao Blvd.^ Rocky Mount, NC 27S01. Poticy is
ijetemioed t>y tJte Editorial Board of The Decree, Ke-puUlcatiou of any
matter lierdtt wltbottt the express cotisetti of ttie i^itoriat Board t$
i^rtctfy forbidden. TheDeeree is composed and printed by the ^ring
B^e l^ierprisev OpinloD$ pabllsbed do »oi necessarily reflect those of
Nortli Carolhia We^yaa College.
Library vandals
nothing but selfish
There is yet another ex
ample of how many people
have decided that their own
selfish interests are above
anyone else’s—even above
everyone else’s.
The library of North
Carolina Wesleyan College
reports that a great many
books and magazines have
pages tom out by students
who are apparently too lazy
or too greedy to photocopy
or use in the library the en
cyclopedias and other ref
erence material.
It’s certainly sad that
these people have such a
conscience as to be able to
rest easily knowing that they
are making it impossible for
others to use materials. Re
placing destroyed items
costs money, which could
have been spent expanding
the library’s collection in
order to give students more
resources rather than replac
ing old ones. Such matters,
though, might never occur
to these people. Maybe they
figure that as long as they
get their papers out of the
way, nothing is wrong with
the world.
This might seem to be a
trivial matter, but there are
more and more complaints
coming in about students
trying to find sources and
having the pages they need
tom out.
The selfishness of these
people is astounding, that
they would be willing to de
stroy books so that others
cannot use them. It’s a
shame to think about it
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UK
Driving in England traumatic
Trip is a jumble of memories
By DR. STEVE FEREBEE
Fragments of time become
memories of my trip to England.
At the Tower of London, a
Polish couple tried four languages
before they communicated with a
young British woman. In West
minster Abbey, I stared at the
most horrific funerary sculpture
of a rotting corpse and listened to
chattering Italian tourists.
A young Japanese woman
asked me to snap her photo at the
Holyrood Palace in E^burgh. A
friendly Scottish man on the train
assured me that Glasgow was un
derrated as a tourist attraction and
then asked me why aU Ameri
cans carried guns.
I hesitated at cash registers,
trying to remember what the val
ues of different coins are. I won
dered why chips (french fries) are
served even with lasagna. I no
ticed the number of newsp^rs
still being loudly hawked all over
the cities.
But driving in England! I had
maps and directions from people
who had preceded me. I had read
the official driving manual'. I had
a sign for the dashboard: ‘To the
Left, Stupid.”
I even had a navigator. I gave
her the maps and directions, found
the steering wheel, and took off.
Because the passenger side of
the car was on my left instead of
my right, I ran up the curb sev
eral times on the way out of the
airport. Then I hurled into an
eight-lane road and missed my
exit because I couldn’t adapt to
exiting from the wrong side.
We wobbled off finally, try
ing to find a road on the map
which would get us back where
we wanted to be. Then suddenly
I was in a roundabout. This is the
U.K.’s intersection: instead of
right-angle comers with traffic
(Continued on Page 3)
U.S. has no business being in Somalia
By KEN LEONARD
Once again, the United States
is sending more reinforcements
into Somalia in order to restore
order, according to the White
House. This policy is failing, and
failing quickly. It has been for
some time.
The idea in intervening in So
malia was to provide relief from
the drought in the area. The prob
lem is that the nation had more
than a drought — it had a war. A
mere relief effort was impossible
until after the U.S. secured peace
in the nation.
Solving another country’s civil
war so that we can then provide
them with charity is ill-conceived.
The U.S. military has American
interests to protect, and should
not be made to fight people so
that we can then watch out for
theirs.
Presidents Bush and Clinton
have allowed this to become the
disaster that it is now by subvert
ing the U.S. command of the mili
tary in favor of the United Na
tions Security Council. When the
U.N. sends troops, they are aU
too often our men and women
sent into the zones of fire, with
out our deciding to do so.
Now, Clinton has promised to
pull out of the nation, but only
after it can be done reasonably.
He has set a date for withdrawal,
meanwhile sending more soldiers
into harm’s way.
Here we see what happens
when we have a President with
utter contempt for the military.
No one among his Cabinet or staff
is a real expert in military policy,
strategy, or methods. He declines
advice from the Joint Chiefs of
Staff. The result is a gradual es
calation of force to pursue un
clear objectives, a lack of public
support for policies, and deaths
for no gain.
Solving a foreign country’s
food crisis is surely a noble ob
jective, and may even be justified
at times despite my inclination to
take care of Americans first.
However, breaking into their war
so that we can force them to take
relief can only result in more and
more Americans dying. Expect no
real relief to come through the
effort.
The U.S. should pull out of
Somalia immediately. If the U.N.
wants to keep some kind of pres
ence in the quagmire, that is the
business of other nations. Periiaps
Greece, Italy, France, and other
nations that are so quick to lay
demands againk the U.S. and so
slow to help us might like to send
their soldiers to be the main force
for change. Perhaps they might
even rethink what wars warrant
intervention.
It has been argued that the U.S.
should either step up the action
and set objectives or pull out as if
it makes no difference. That
makes no sense. The matter at
hand is that the U.S. has no inter-
(Continued on Page 3)