Senate lacks student representation

What happens when the student Senate no longer represents the students? Do they rule out the rest of their terms as virtual dictators? Can a recall vote be made?
 
The vast majority of Cal State Long Beach students oppose the war against Iraq but the student Senate on Feb. 19 voted down a resolution that would have declared CSULB against a unilaterally U.S.-led war against Iraq.
 
U.N. inspectors have said Iraq has begun to cooperate more while at the same time the U.S. argument for war points to Saddam Hussein’s oppression of his people. For example, the United States refers to when Saddam’s regime gassed the Kurds in the ’80s. What the government has failed to mention is that Saddam was a U.S. ally at the time and actually bought the weapons used for that massacre from U.S. arms companies. It is interesting that these key details are always ignored by the corporate media and our lovable little friends the Young Republicans.
 
Young Republican Jason Garthoffner spoke in favor of the war in which hundreds of thousands of innocent women and children would be maimed and slaughtered. He compared the opposition to the war as the opposition to the war on Hitler’s Germany in the 1930s. I would now like to take this opportunity to show the total ignorance of that comparison.
 
In the late ’30s Hitler was gobbling up central Europe. He went into Austria, the Rhineland and the Czech Republic. The French and British finally declared war after Poland was invaded in 1939. Is this comparable to the current day Middle East? Saddam’s military is in shambles and he would not dare to attack another country. Numerous Washington think tanks have pointed out that Saddam has always acted out of self-preservation. The United States should support democratic movements but to bring our military up against the civilian population of another country is wrong. Millions will die and we will create more terrorism against us. Saddam cannot be compared with Hitler, who was responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of people and posed a clear danger to Europe.
 
I should also take the time to mention that George Bush’s grandfather was one of the key U.S. politicians during the ’30s who got loans for German industry. This was used by Hitler to build up his war industry. Also I might point out that George Bush Sr.’s first oil company in the ’80s was partially financed by Osama bin Laden’s family.
 
Just like with our government, the CSULB student Senate has become a mouthpiece for the wealthy and the elite of our campus — from the corporations who get their names on our classroom doors to the land developers who push our school to build insane recreation centers which have no point (luckily that attempt failed even when the USU tried to override student democracy and form biased student informative groups).
 
One only has to go into the University bookstore and make a quick Internet search to see that all of the CSULB clothing is made in third world countries under sweatshop conditions. Who exactly controls our school and its policies? It sure isn’t the students.
 
Jeb Sprague is a graduate student of history at Cal State Long Beach. He can be contacted at pauseclause@yahoo.com.

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