ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, December 11, 1995 TAG: 9512110018
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: LETTERS
IT DOESN'T matter about your social status, education level or any other variable when you volunteer and sign on the dotted line to serve Uncle Sam. You're now a GI - government issue, in other words.
You do what you're told, when you're told, and go wherever you're ordered to go. You have a name, rank and serial number. You don't have an opinion on what you're ordered to do; you just do it. You chose to be where you are and are being paid to do as you're ordered. And you will, or you're out.
Parents, wives, etc., of U.S. servicemen should accept this and not whine about the dangers. Soldiers are trained well, but accidents do happen and fatalities will occur. Some will die in Bosnia and other areas where service people must serve.
When I enlisted in the all-volunteer Army in 1976, I knew of the danger that might come my way.
My good friend, Davis Harvey, died for his country trying to rescue hostages in Iran. He knew the risks involved, and so did I.
Take a good look at the military now and the state of the world before you sign on the dotted line and agree to give the country your entire being.
Please remember that when you sign up, you put your life on the line and you could pay the ultimate price.
PHILIP COLLINS FERGUSON I
ROANOKE
GOP attempts to rescue the nation
IN NOVEMBER 1994, this country's voters gave the Republicans a mandate to change things in the U.S. Congress under the leadership of Newt Gingrich and Bob Dole. That's exactly what the GOP is doing today, and exactly what it promised. It's called a ``Contract with America.'' Here are some of the salient points:
A balanced-budget amendment. The line-item veto. Welfare reform. Tax cuts. A strong national defense. The rollback of government regulations. Term limits.
Now who in their right mind wouldn't agree with this? If your IQ is 75 or higher, surely you can grasp this: It will save this country from ruination. Yes, it will even save the liberals and Democrats. If we don't get fiscal integrity, we will go bankrupt.
Yet, in spite of overwhelming evidence in favor of the Republicans' plan, the liberals and Democrats can do nothing but whine, gripe, moan, groan, lie and distort the best legislation to come along since the Magna Charter.
Gingrich is taking all the static for doing things that are mandatory if we are to survive. You must give him credit. Not so incidentally, he's one of the sharpest members of Congress. You should support and back the Republicans 100 percent. To do so, you'll save your own neck.
R. KEITH WHITLEY
BEDFORD
Torgersen made the right decision
CONCERNING President Paul Torgersen's decision to merge the College of Education:
Torgersen was surely right to act as he did. Here are some relevant remarks from President Emeritus Donald Kennedy of Stanford:
A university president ``is up against enormous inertia ... in dealing with the faculty.'' He noted that at Princeton, Berkeley, Columbia and Yale, when threats to eliminate a department were made, an enormous furor resulted, including major stories in the national news.
Facing the necessity to make harsh budget cuts, Kennedy asked a distinguished faculty group representing many fields to advise him. They recognized that across-the-board cuts were not an optimum procedure. However, they could not develop a consensus on which programs should be axed. When individual members of the faculty committee spoke privately to Kennedy, they suggested deletion of disciplines far removed from their own.
When I was dean of arts and sciences at Virginia Tech in the budget-cutting days of the early '80s, I asked department heads whether cuts should be made across the board or selectively. They were unanimous that it ought to be selective. Then I asked them whether specific decisions should be made by a group of department heads, faculty or by the dean. Again unanimously, they agreed it shouldn't be a committee.
When there isn't enough money to go around, something has to suffer. It's better that some quality be maintained somewhere than for poverty and mediocrity to reign everywhere. I wholeheartedly agree that the president, the provost and the board need to make such decisions, with whatever input seems useful to them.
Let me also point out that I support such decision-making, even though I now teach in a unit that was merged with other units against the expressed wishes of all our unit's full-time and adjunct members.
HENRY H. BAUER
BLACKSBURG
LENGTH: Medium: 89 linesby CNB