Newspaper Page Text
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♦ THURSDAY, AUGUST 3, 2006
3Suustott |mmtal
OPINION
Daniel F. Evans
Editor and Publisher
Julie B. Evans
Vice President
Don Moncrief
Managing Editor
Will this be the answer?
Scientists in California have devel
oped a vaccine that allegedly will
control weight gain.
It has been used successfully on rats.
That’s good news.
The bad news is that years may go by
before the vaccine is tested on human
beings.
Is this just another meaningless prom
ise for the overweight or will this vaccine
turn out to be the panacea that weight
conscious people have been waiting for?
In past years there have been many
announcements by scientists and drug
companies that they are on the verge
of offering
the public
some form
of medica
tion that will
help them
lose weight
or keep their
weight down
without
enduring a
near starva
tion diet.
All of them
have wilt
ed away as
they failed to
perform as
promised.
Is it a different story this time?
We will have to wait and see. A few years
from now this vaccine may appear on
the market to the delight of everyone
with a weight problem. Or a few years
from now this vaccine will be forgotten
because it did not make the grade.
Toothless UN resolution
Hooray! The United Nations has
made a decision. It has issued a
warning to Iran to come to the
table and stop efforts to create weapons
grade uranium to make a bomb and Iran
has been given one month to comply.
At the end a month the United Nations is
going to act. Yes it is. It is going to meet
again and discuss the problem with Iran
and issue another ultimatum.
That’s the kind of problem solving we
have come to expect from the United
Nations, which is impotent when it comes
to dealing with rogue nations or follow
ing up on its resolutions.
United Nations peacekeepers have been
guilty of raping people they were sup
posed to protect and have been ineffec
tive in roles assigned to them.
So there is no reason to believe that Iran
will quake in its boots because of a threat
issued this week. Iranians will just wait
out the 30-day period, doing what they
want to do, and wait for another mean
ingless ultimatum from the UN.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Time to elect Brasswell
It’s time to elect to our county commission Maurice
Brasswell to replace long-term Commissioner Jay walker.
Maurice has attended countless commission meetings
over the years and has a great knowledge of the workings
of this important body.
He will stand up for the common man and not
just for the special interests and wealthy developers.
Maurice believes in impact fees, SPLOSTs and making
newcomers pay their fair share of all the costs that their
arrival brings for new infrastructure, schools and roads,
that come with growth.
He believes in planning our growth and improving our
quality of life.
Maurice is a retired , concerned citizen who wants to
give back to our community for all the blessings that he
has received.
He is a kind, intelligent, informed citizen who will look
after the interests of all of us! And make our quality of
life better!
Frank W. Gadbois, Warner Robins
Foy S. Evans
Editor Emeritus
In past years there
have been many
announcements by
scientists and drug
companies that they are
on the verge of offering
the public some form of
medication that wiN help
them lose weight or
keep their weight down
without enduring a near
starvation diet.
Parents welcome start of school
Children return to school tomor
row. I doubt there are many
parents who do not welcome it.
It has been a relatively brief but very
hot summer.
It seems nowadays that just about
everything is “for the children.” And
if you want to get support for any pro
gram, all you have to do is somehow
connect it with being for the children.
Our country is hung up on this one
purpose in life. What else is impor
tant?
It is easy to raise taxes if politicians
can tie the tax increase with something
for the children.
It is almost as if nothing else is
important.
Our children are important. I won
der if everything in life should revolve
around them and their wants.
All this actually came into vogue
after World War 11.
In pre-World War II days children
were an integral part of families, too.
But the world did not revolve around
them.
Parents cared for their children.
They loved them. They nurtured them.
But children were kept in their place,
as a member of the family. The family
did not revolve around them 24 hours
a day.
Children ate their meals with the
family. They ate what was put before
them. Children did not dictate what
was served. They ate or could go to bed
hungry. They were not pampered.
When there were guests the adults
ate first and the children waited. Little
Jimmy Dickens had a hit record titled
/ If you want a good yield in \
( weather like this, you've got ]
\ to plant the right crop! J
Everybody's on the 'raids - me too
The world’s fastest man may mere
ly be pedestrian. The world’s
fastest cyclist may just have a
bum hip after all.
The world’s greatest home-run hit
ter may be a fly-ball swatter soaked
in medicinal disguise. And the world’s
greatest mustache may be peach fuzz
in reality.
Where have you gone, Mario
Mendoza?
This week, the sports pages brought
us two more “champions” with posi
tive tests for performance-enhancing
drugs.
The “world’s fastest man,” Justin
Gatlin, an American Olympic gold
medal winner, tested positive for tes
tosterone or other steroids recently.
A week prior to that revelation, it
was reported that this year’s Tour de
France champ, American Floyd Landis,
tested for an abnormally high testos
terone level. Add those to baseball’s
ongoing steroid scandals. Barry Bonds
is closing in on Hank Aaron’s career
home run mark while prosecutors are
closing in on him for his involvement
in an alleged illegal steroid scheme.
And a year ago this week, baseball’s
Rafael Palmeiro, and his dense, jungle
like mustache, was busted for steroid
use.
These headlines beg the question:
When is football season going to get
here? They also call into question any
athletic feat accomplished in this era.
OPINION
Foy
Evans
Columnist
foyevansl9@cox.net
“Take A Tater and Wait.” He didn’t
invent the phrase. He just took one
that applied to children before World
War II and turned it into a song.
Children knew their place. They were
not head of the family. They were not
catered to. They were loved but not put
on a pedestal.
Things are different today. It is our
fault. My generation, which had so lit
tle during the Great Depression, came
home from the war and benefited from
this country’s greatest boom. We gave
our children all the things we never
had and we spoiled them.
The generation that we pampered
continued this trend and, in most
instances, we now have children who
do not appreciate what they have,
because they have so much. Everything
is “for the children” and they are smart
enough to know it.
They pull our strings and because
“my friends do it” we capitulate and
give in, whatever the subject may be.
We don’t want to hurt their feelings.
Keeping up with the Joneses was
almost a joke when people started talk
ing about it. Now it is a necessity of
life or our children will be “deprived”
and we will be scorned as adults who
Len
Robbins
Columnist
airpub@planttel.net
Skeptics, these are your times.
Of course, there are explanations/
excuses.
Gatlin’s coach, Trevor Graham,
claims that Gatlin is a victim of a
setup by a massage therapist who held
a grudge against him. In a Washington
Post story, Graham said the massage
therapist rubbed a testosterone cream
into Gatlin’s legs, unbeknownst to the
sprinter. He thought it was anoth
er type of cream - perhaps shaving
cream.
Bonds reportedly also claims he was
a victim of the same kind of steroid
cream hoodwink.
Apparently, rubbing unfamiliar
creams on a person is as common as
hand-shaking in the world of profes
sional athletics.
A word to all you kids out there:
Don’t get naked and let people that
hold a grudge against you rub foreign
objects on your person. It may sound
like fun, and it probably is, but you
could also lose your job if your employ-
'
L.„ JL
HOUSTON DAILY JOURNAL
just don’t understand that everything
should be “for the children.”
Some parents rule their homes. Not
many. Children are smart enough to
see what is going on around them and
they play their parents like a violin.
As I said, it is our fault.
We are not doing the children favors
by making them the center of the uni
verse. They would be better served if
taught humility and appreciation for
being part of a family. Doing without
something they want might be a shock
and it might help them, too.
Materialism is at the heart of most
parents’ dealings with their children.
It is easier to give in than to deny them
something they cry and scream about
and demand to their last breath.
Just because someone says that
something is “for the children” does
not mean that it is good for the chil
dren. We have come a long way since
my generation made the first mistake
of overloading children with so many
material things and allowed them to
believe that what they want is the most
important thing in the world.
Generations that followed us have
perfected the mistake.
We are not doing our children a favor
when we forget the place they should
have in the family and permit them
to be'dictators (young and small or
teenagers).
If we want to really do something
“for the children” we will let them
know that parents rule and parents
will not cater to their every whim. After
all, parents hold the purse strings and
should use this power.
ee tests for steroids or testosterone
levels. So, in summary, if you plan on
being an accountant, go ahead.
Landis, who came from behind to
win the Tour de France despite hav
ing a degenerative hip condition that
causes him to walk with a limp, said
he has “a naturally high testosterone
level” and will prove he wasn’t doping.
That, I hope, is an explanation rather
than an excuse.
We’ll see.
The reason I think everyone is on
steroids is because I’m on steroids.
A couple of weeks ago, I went to the
doctor to be treated for a harsh cold
and found out I had a bronchial infec
tion.
My treatment included a shot of
steroids to my butt. No wonder I made
a C in ninth-grade Physical Science. I
had no idea my bronchi were located in
my booty.
Anyway, all ‘“roided up,” I went
home and found out that performance
enhancing drugs indeed do make you
stronger and full of pep. I did four
push-ups - in a row.
Then I tried to call the phone com
pany and went into a ‘“roid rage” when
their automated system hung up on me
after 25 minutes of navigating through
their robotic obstacle course.
That’s proof enough for me - every
one’s on the juice. I knew there was no
way a guy named Floyd could win any
athletic contest.