News & features | _X marks the spot

A report on off-campus news

by Andrew MacPherson his is anew weekly supplement in which r I hope to give you a student slant on today’s news stories. Believe it or not, there are a lot of things which happen off this campus. I hope you read this and enjoy it.

President Bill

Since the last publication of the X-Press Bill Clinton was inaugurated as the President of the United States. He represents a great change in that he is the first second world war-born presi- dent. What does that mean to you and me? It means that our parent’s generation is now in power instead of our grand-parents. It is encour- aging to see that these positions of power do eventually pass to the youngsters. Bill Clinton represents something that the United States has been missing since 1980, social awareness. Ronald Reagan and George Bush cared more about their rich, conservative party members and very little for poorer, working class people. President Clinton is an advocate of social pro- grams such as those we have here in Canada and his choice of environmentalist Al Gore as his Vice-president provides hope that there will be Some positive efforts to diminish pollution. There are high expectations for Bill Clinton, expectations which he cannot even hope to live up to. Any president who plays the saxophone onthe Arsenio Hall showis at least in touch with the public and this is a big step in the right direction,

Adventures of the U.N. Things have definitely been hopping at the United Nations of late with mounting pressure M many places around the globe. The current Wave of conflict seems to be more intense than Usual. In December peacekeepers were sent to famine stricken Somalia. Since then there has been trouble in Israel, Iraq, Bosnia and Croatia. ly last month the Israeli government de- Ported about four hundred Palestinians for their alleged involvement in terrorist groups. These pitgees are still in a state of limbo outside the rite and Israel’s Supreme Court handed down = More than a slap on the wrist by saying ~ deportee deserves a hearing before being Pelled, Many Arab countries have threatened . Pull out of the Middle East peace talks if the 8ees are not allowed to return. The second Wi was in Iraq, where George Bush and i ‘4m Hussein took their final shots at each ii T. Iraq had moved some surface-to-air mis- ‘ into position to shoot down allied planes

enforcing the no-fly zone over the southern part of the country. The U.N. forces then issued an ultimatum to Iraq, and Saddam subsequently retreated. This is something that keeps happen- ing again and again. Over the past week things have heated up in what used to be Yugoslavia. Over the past few months major concerns have been with Serbia and Bosnia, then Croatia be- gan attacking Serbia. I would not want to have U.N. Secretary-General Boutros Boutros- Ghali’s job right now.

Oily surf

There has been another major disaster at sea. This time the fragile ecosystem of the Shetland islands was damaged by light crude oil from the Braer, an oil tanker en route from Norway to Quebec. The Shetland Islands are located about 150 miles northeast of the Scottish mainland and are among the most isolated regions in that part of the world. It was originally feared that the disaster would be much more serious than it actually turned out to be. The Braer proved to be very resilient, remaining intact with a large part of its cargo remaining inside. The fact that the crude oil was light instead of the heavy crude spilled by the Exxon Valdez in Alaska meant that it would evaporate and disperse much more quickly. Finally, the time of year also played a significant role in preventing this from becom- ing a full-scale crisis, as it would have if the spill had occurred on March or April when large bird populations usually arrive for their breed- ing season. It is truly unfortunate that the oil industry allows these atrocities to continue. One of these times something really irrevocable will happen, then it will be too late.

Premier (Queen) Catherine

Our province’s fearless leader, Joe Ghiz, has departed from the political scene. In his place we now have only the second female Premier in Canadian history, Catherine Callbeck. Ms. Callbeck is a former MLA, a private business- woman, and was, until the leadership conven- tion, the MP for Malpeque. Callbeck over- whelmed her two competitors for the leadership bya five to one margin. Larry Creed of Sturgeon finished a distant second but doubled the number of votes received by the third candidate, Bill Campbell. Now that she has earned her posi- tion, Ms. Callbeck must start to deal with the issues left to her by her outgoing predessor. The foremost of these are the high unemployment rate, funding for post-secondary education, and the fixed link. ‘‘I welcome challenge,”’ says

Callbeck: We all hope that she is equal to it.

More than just a fair lady

Last week saw the passing of one of film’s greatest stars and a devoted humanitarian, Audrey Hepburn. A native of Belgium, Ms. Hepburn starred in such great films as ‘‘My Fair Lady,’’ ‘‘Roman Holiday,”’ and ‘‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’’. She brought a certain air of almost royalty to the films she acted in and was re- spected throughout the entertainment business. Having spent World War II in Holland, Hepburn understood what it was like to be hungry and persecuted. This was perhaps what spurred her to become active in UNICEF. She travelled throughout the world, most recently to Somalia, where she gave some of the earliest pleas for aid to that country. Ms. Hepburn’s final role was as an angel in Steven Spielberg’s film, ‘‘Always.’’ This is perhaps a fitting way to remember her.

Super blowout

This weekend saw the contesting of the world’s most over-hyped game, the Super Bowl. In the 27th version of this annual event, the Dallas Cowboys played the Buffalo Bills at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California; in addition, Michael Jackson performed at half-time and there were new commercials from Nike and McDonald’s both featuring Michael Jordan and two other well known stars with animals for last names (Bugs Bunny and Larry Bird, respec- tively). The two teams came into this game from very different directions. The Bills faced the pressure of appearing in their third consecu- tive Super Bowl after being unsuccessful in their previous two attempts. The Cowboys had less pressure having risen from the worst team in the entire NFL just four years ago. The game got off to a good start with the score 14-10 in favor of Dallas half-way through the second quarter. After this, things just fell apart for Buffalo beginning with quarterback Jim Kelly re-injuring his knee and nine turnovers. Dallas went on to win the game convincingly by a margin of 52-17. Congratulations go out to the Dallas owner, Jerry Jones, and head coach Jimmy Johnson for building this great young team in such a short time period. Standouts for the Cowboys included game MVP Troy Aikman and NFL rushing leader Emmitt Smith. One must feel sorry for Marv Levy, former Toronto Argonaut head coach and now with the Bills. It gets hard to keep saying wait until next year. In any event the Dallas Cowboys are once again ‘*America’s Team.’’ @

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