Opinion - The Daily Lobo

Opinion

Column: It's high time New Mexico legalized pot

Jason Darensburg | March 6

New Mexico should be next in line to legalize marijuana for recreational use. We can’t afford not to do it: Full legalization would provide tens of millions of dollars in economic benefits for the state at a time when the dwindling local economy needs a major boost. Colorado and Washington State legalized recreational use of marijuana in 2012. Oregon voters approved legalization in July 2014, and in February Alaska became the fourth U.S. state to legalize recreational marijuana.

Opinion

Letter: People must address addiction issues before legalizing cannabis

March 5

Your cartoon on March 4 exemplifies how complicated the issue of cannabis legalization has become. To unravel the resulting confusion among users of this drug, there must first be broad agreement among all levels of government that cannabis is physically addictive, with serious consequences such as loss of working memory, cognitive impairment, even schizophrenia, and dangerous withdrawal symptoms like physical aggression.

Opinion

Do not erase Christopher Columbus' legacy, importance to history

March 4

Editor, It has come to my attention that some history revisionist types are once again trying to stir up trouble where there should be none.

Opinion

Women's center should not be misued

March 4

Editor, I was disappointed on Monday when I found that the lactation center was being used for student testing in one of the departments.

Opinion

New Mexico panders to religion yet again by nixing Darwin Day

March 3

Editor, By cancelling Darwin Day at our state-run Museum of Natural History, the New Mexico government has capitulated one more time to its base of religionists, this time running interference in the guise of Intelligent Design. But what did you expect?

Opinion

Snow delay, cancellation decisions poorly handled

March 3

Editor, I received an email from the University at 5:15 a.m. on Friday alerting me that campus was to have a two-hour weather delay and that classes would start at 10 a.m.

Opinion

Recycle bins need more, better labeling

Katie Orndorff | March 3

Groups of students throughout the UNM campus have decided that they want to promote recycling and reduce the amount of recyclable items that end up in the trash. Every day, trash cans on campus are filled with things such as plastic water bottles or soda cups that could instead be recycled. An increasingly large issue is that many people want to throw their trash into the first bin available, regardless of whether the item is trash or a recyclable.

Opinion

GOP has no room to talk when attacking the president

February 27

Editor, Inflation has absolutely devoured American wages for the last three decades. If Obama was really a socialist, wouldn’t the ACA include a single payer public option? Republicans seem to have forgotten that we live in a republic.

Opinion

Letter: Shine light on the secrets keeping us in the dark

February 26

Secrecy is largely about shame, fear and guilt. I refuse to live that way. My beloved longtime friend told me in our deep, last conversation two days before his sudden death that he wanted to have first-time sex with me, but not a relationship. He said if I told anyone, he would kill me and maybe kill himself. I did not have sex with him. I want to celebrate sex with a friend, not hide it as a poisonous secret to keep him from killing me or himself. As he left my home that day, he told me “I love you” – maybe the only time since he and I met 39 years earlier. Several days later, I was devastated to hear that he was dead. This was my most heart-wrenching experience of 2011.

Opinion

Letter: Motorcyclists should use helmets, no exceptions

February 26

Editor, There are two helmet laws under consideration in the Legislature. One mandates motorcycle helmets for all.

Opinion

Letter: Music isn't necessarily bad just because it's new

February 26

Jason Darensburg, you recently claimed in your column “Today’s youth are bombarded with bad music” that music today is an implicative mess. I wish to address you on these matters and hopefully change your mind. Your claim falsely implies that because today’s youth has bad music, yesterday’s youth must have had good music. Is it truly honest to think that, for reasons you had not pointed out, music today must be automatically worse than music in the past? Why is it that the use of auto-tune automatically implies that one isn’t fit to sing? What you’re essentially saying is that music in the past is the only means of music, and that if music today does not emulate such archaic music, then it must be implicitly bad. This is stupendously ridiculous.

Opinion

Letter: U.S. does not stand for freedom, justice or democracy

February 23

The United States strongly supports many bloody regimes now: Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Pakistan and Mexico. The United States strongly supported many bloody past regimes: El Salvador, Philippines, Guatemala, Haiti, Chile, Iran, South Africa, Argentina and Indonesia. The main goal — worldwide — of the U.S. government is grabbing more wealth, resources and cheap labor by any means necessary, regardless of how many millions are robbed, tortured, starved, imprisoned and murdered.

Opinion

Letter: Employment precarious for University staff

February 23

Although the administration is perpetually exhorting the UNM community to buy more corn dogs at the ball game, or to buy them a new gym that will photograph better in brochures, I would like to direct the reader’s attention toward another matter. UNM (or is it WisePies? Or, as former President David Schmidly maintained, Wal-Mart?) is most properly understood as a tax-exempt corporation operating a sports franchise and an academic theme park. Accordingly, the actual management of UNM employees is by the Wal-Mart corporate model: every employee is seen as a black mark against departmental management. At the Center for High Technology Materials, staff was laid off with just four weeks’ notice after decades of documented excellent service.

Opinion

Column: as 1 percent is coddled, time for new tea party

Jason Darensburg | February 20

“No taxation without representation!” That was the motto of the original Tea Partiers in pre-Revolutionary War Boston. The phrase encapsulated one of the primary grievances the American colonists had with King George’s government: Parliament kept imposing new taxes and tariffs without their knowledge or consent, and the revenue was being used for purposes at odds with the immediate needs of the settlers in the 13 colonies. The colonists argued that they had no representatives in Parliament and therefore their concerns weren’t being addressed. The British claimed they were being “virtually” represented. Tensions rose. In 1773, colonists violently rejected a proposed tax on tea imports at the so-called Boston Tea Party. What exactly transpired that night is under dispute, but the end result was that Britain retaliated in an escalating chain of events that ultimately led to the American Revolution.

Opinion

Letter: Reactions to recent killings could be positive development

February 19

The recent execution-style killing of three Muslim American students in North Carolina by a man who had posted anti-Islamic and anti-religious messages on social media could hopefully be the catalyst for some positive change in this country. While some stupid, racist people with low self-esteem have actually praised suspected killer Craig Stephen Hicks on social media for what he did, the overall reaction of many ordinary non-Muslim Americans has been horror and rejection of this cowardly act of terrorism. Average non-Muslim Americans need to understand that the mainstream media has corporate sponsorship which makes money from invading and taking the natural resources of Muslim countries.

Opinion

Column: Students should utilize the SHAC

Dr. Peggy Spencer | February 19

You know that feeling you get when you’re up on stage accepting your Oscar and you forget to thank your director? Neither do I. How about the feeling when you have a party and you forget to invite your best friend? You make all the arrangements and are careful to invite your other friends, but somehow you just assume that your best friend knows because, well, they’re your best friend. I’ve been there; in fact quite recently and right here in this column. My last article was about sexual assault and resources to tap into if it happens to you. Yet I somehow managed to not mention the resource most near and dear to me and most convenient and immediate to you on campus: our very own SHAC. I guess I figured SHAC was a given. My grown children know all about this. They are always the last ones to hear plans for a family reunion. I just assume they know by osmosis or something. Chalk it up to my middle-aged brain.

Opinion

Letter: Jail should be option for threatening individuals

February 19

The individual who shot three innocent Muslims in cold blood showed himself as a nut when he first approached two of the individuals in a parking lot in what apparently was a hostile posture with a gun in his possession.

Opinion

Letter: Slain Muslims should have called police first

February 17

The unprovoked and opportunistic murder of three young Arab-American college students in Chapel Hill, North Carolina could well have been avoided if the victims had brought in the police earlier. When the white, middle-aged gun nut who eventually executed them had threatened them, and walked up to their door with a gun – had they warned him they had told the police, this could have made him back off.

Opinion

Letter: A loving god would not allow religious massacres or Hell

February 16

Would a loving human parent slam and lock the door forever against a son or daughter regardless what evil they have done? Would a loving parent-God sentence billions of people, or even one person, to never-ending torture with no pardon, no parole? To all who believe in God, do you believe in hell? I would never want to spend eternity with such a cruel monster God.

Opinion

Letter: Community solutions needed after recent sexual assaults

February 16

On Thursday evening, as I was working on homework and having a cup of coffee, my partner informed me that there had been a sexual assault at Zimmerman. I’ve spent countless hours studying at that library. It always felt safer than Parish, even though Parish is open later. When I was younger, I used to play hide-and-seek in the stacks. I’ve shown up, like many other UNM students, in pajamas during Finals Week.