Don't be the problem

I find it interesting that you choose to chastise the ASUAF Student Government for not having more candidates for the upcoming election, and yet your supposedly valuable opinion is not that people should run (or that you yourself should dare add to the solution and run yourself), but instead that people should keep their negative attitude and "not give a shit anyway." If you have a problem with low voter turnout, why not encourage more people to vote? Have you forgotten that you yourself are a member of the Associated Students of the University of Alaska Fairbanks? Or have you secretly realized that being a part of the problem will help you sell newspapers later in your career as a businessman-I mean journalist? Ah, maybe you've realized that being a part of the problem will get people like me to send you letters so that you can giddily display them in your next issue! Diabolical! You've cracked the code of readership - BE the problem and people will be your friend!

At least you've kept the Sun Star Editor tradition alive by doing nothing to generate solutions and scapegoat the problems to justify your opinions.

Pat Frymark

ASUAF Senate Chair

OK, here's an idea: Do something proactive, something like getting the glass recycling back in operation or that daycare program I remember hearing about, that tells students ASUAF has an impact on their lives. –Ed.

A tasteless shit list

I am writing in response to your editorial "The shit list," which appeared in last week's edition of the Sun Star. Not only did I find this a tasteless editorial, but its factual content was largely inaccurate.

Of particular concern, your comments regarding the supposed ASUAF photo shoot for the election candidates. The most blatant error, that this was not a photo shoot for the elections candidates, should not have been overlooked. Miscommunication is understandable, but it appears those basic questions of "Who? When? Where? WHAT? Why? And How?" were overlooked in this instance.

While it's easy to play the blame game on ASUAF, I'd like to point to some relevant facts. Since the fall of 2003 (when I started attending UAF) ASUAF has made many strides to control frivolous spending, enhance and expand student-benefiting services, and yes, even to improve elections. So there are still some blatant problems, such as low voter turnout and not enough candidates. Well Mr. Grove, I would like to hear your suggestions, "constructive criticism" perhaps? Just because you have freedom of press doesn't mean that you should use it to trash the student government that provides subsidies for the Sun Star because it cannot raise enough advertising revenue or, heaven forbid, charge a newsstand price to generate the needed revenue to be self-sufficient.

Tasteless and fact-less editorials such as this are most likely what caused Aldona Jonaitis to reject the possibility of installing a newspaper rack in the Museum.

Gavin M. Northey

Student

Tobacco means money

Thank you for your story regarding cigarette sales in the Wood Center. I quit smoking years ago and almost let this issue pass without concern. But if Chancellor Jones wants to talk about symbolic messages, how about the message of fiscal responsibility? How can anyone in UAF administration advocate a position that any issue, in which thousands of dollars are involved, is "beside the point?"  How will this loss of revenue be made up, yet again, another across the board fee? These people must really believe that I pay my way through this place (along with my graduate student wife) by pulling dollar bills off my personal money tree. The only people who think that money is "beside the point" are people who already have too much of it.

J. Brian Horton

Student