How to fix Duke parking in one fell swoop

18 Feb 2009, Posted by Jacob Wolff in Backpages, Jacob Wolff, 3 Comments

I’ve done it.  I figured out how to fix our Duke parking woes.  It’s really simple, and I know you’re all going to be kicking yourselves for not realizing it sooner.  In fact, the solution is so obvious, I just can’t believe it hasn’t already been done:

Ban Mini Coopers and VW Beetles from campus.

Confused?  Well, it’s really simple actually.  You see, I was thinking about the complaints brought against the Duke parking system, and I realized all of them would be no more if we just resigned ourselves to the fact that we have to make that long trek from the back of the Blue Zone, and that’s just the way it has to be.  You see our problem is hope.   If we had no hope, we would have nothing to yearn for with our many complaints.

This is where the ban of Mini Coopers and VW Beetles comes in. I never realized just how big of a menace these tiny vehicles were until I got a car down here this past semester.  It only took a few laps around the Blue Zone for me to encounter a problem I think anyone who has had to park there faces; it’s a problem I’ve named The Subcompact Providing False Hope That There Is An Open Spot Near the Front of The Blue Zone When Really There Isn’t Conundrum.

I think the title is pretty self-explanatory.  We’ve all experienced it.  You’re cruising around the Blue Zone, and you think you see a really awesome spot near the front of the first lot!  You race up to it, start to turn your wheel, and instead of an open space you find an obnoxiously adorable Mini Cooper.

For that one-second you thought there was a spot there, life was great.  You daydream about how this could lead to bigger things, if you can get a good parking space, maybe you can get that ‘A’ in Econ, maybe you can land that internship at JP Morgan, and maybe you’ll even get the girl.  But no… when that tiny menace that is the VW Beetle enters your sight, it simultaneously runs over all your dreams.  In short, Mini Coopers and VW Beetles are nothing but parking space teases.

Now admittedly getting rid of all of the gas guzzling behemoths that block the Mini Coopers from sight would also get the job done, but pardon me if I take my anger out on these little devils.

In all reality, I think there are some logistical changes that could make Duke parking less of an irritant for most people, like building a new parking garage. But although I hate the walk to the back of the Blue Zone as much as anyone else, do we really want another huge parking garage? It’s tough to build a parking deck that wouldn’t be an eyesore on our otherwise beautiful campus, and Duke really doesn’t have the money to be doing that anyway.

So for now at least, I think it’s either stick with the Blue Zone as it is (which isn’t that bad), or get rid of the cute cars.  You know my vote.

Yakuza in need of a bailout?

17 Feb 2009, Posted by Braden Hendricks in Backpages, Braden Hendricks, 0 Comments

It turns out that even illegal investments in the stock market fluctuate, and crime bosses are just as vulnerable as we are to corporate greed and irresponsible fiscal policies.  According to this article, members of Japanese organized crime syndicates, commonly known as the yakuza, are turning to the Japanese government for relief from the global recession.

Wait, come again?

Real gangsters (not this kind)—real life racketeering, prostitution ring operating, whacking-you-in-the-middle-of-the-day gangsters—are filing for unemployment benefits? Even if it’s Japan we’re talking about, that is still somewhat hard to believe. I had always held the yakuza in high regard in terms of toughness when compared to other international outfits, but this is ruining everything for me!

I mean, even compared to the Russian mafia, these guys were hard

Now tell me, who would you rather mess with? Yeah, that’s what I thought. Yakuza gangsters defined what it really meant to be a gangster. With assistance from Lucy Liu, the yakuza stood unparalleled also in sexiness.

No more. Now the once-mighty yakuza is like GM with guns. It’s laying off members who have put in decades simply because its finances are crumbling. Could you imagine the American mafia scene had guys like Al Capone turned to the federal government? The mafia would have lost its hold decades ago. I mean, there would have been a lot less crime I suppose, but would we have Goodfellas? What about The Godfather trilogy? What I’m saying is that Japanese culture might be damaged by this new development!

That last might be an overstatement—I mean, Japan can always rely on its samurai legacy— but really, who would have thought?

As much as the withering of Japanese organized crime distresses me, I must admit I’m surprised the Japanese government is completely okay with this. In fact, yakuza membership is not even illegal. Some Japanese are actually somewhat tolerant of the gangs, because the yakuza plays a role in labor union enforcement and trades information with the police. So it’s only right when the victims of yakuza shake downs can’t afford to pay up and turn to welfare, the yakuza itself follows suit. Right?.

Either way, I hope the yakuza can recover from this, lest they become the laughing stock of the underworld.  Since they hail from the nation that industrialized in like eight months (where it took America 50 years), and came up with this, I have no doubt they will.

Why I never cried over Obama

13 Feb 2009, Posted by Ade Sawyer in Ade Sawyer, Backpages, 0 Comments

Let me start by saying, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with crying over Barack Obama’s election or his inauguration.  In fact I tried to muster up a few manly tears of my own while I watched his inaugural address, but no dice.  At first I thought maybe I was too icy-hearted.  Then I figured maybe it just hadn’t hit me.  But finally, today I realized it’s because I was—and am at the end of the day—a huge cynic.

Like many others, I felt that some of the sights that were set for his presidency—between him, the media and the public—were just too high for any real, savvy politician to achieve.  So as much as I wanted to see him do things like reduce the influence of corporate lobbyists in Washington, I wasn’t ready to bet on it.

Fast forward to this week.  Weeks after (re)taking the oath of office, Obama bumped his head as he boarded Marine One (the president’s helicopter).  It’s a pretty fitting metaphor for his admittedly young presidency.  He strode confidently and briskly up to the helicopter, seeming a bit self-conscious about the cameras’ watching him.  He walked up the staircase and began to look back and wave, when the pesky door frame blindsided him.  Likewise a brilliant, disciplined, but self-conscious Obama deliberately moved toward the presidency, and as he crossed the threshold, Bam.  A contentious stimulus, a few tax problems for the cabinet, some resignations (including Republican Judd Gregg yesterday) hit him over the head, even after meticulous planning for a smooth transition.

It’s probably worth noting that Bush bumped his head on the chopper as well, not to mention his door trouble.  However, unlike President George W. Bush in his encounter with the door, Obama quickly recovered and moved on as if nothing had happened.  An opportunity to extend the metaphor?  I think so.

You see, I imagine two other presidents in the same situation aboard Marine One: Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan.  Jimmy Carter probably would’ve hit his head and tumbled down the steps, fractured a rib and limped back to the White House in full view of the cameras.  Reagan probably would’ve felt the aura of the door when it was six inches away and deftly used mind control to bend it upward so it would avoid his head.  I figure Obama was closer to Reagan than Carter.  Let’s hope the metaphor stands.

Lay off the 1930s

12 Feb 2009, Posted by Jordan Rice in Backpages, 0 Comments

“Since the 1930s” is the hot new phrase of our time. The banking system is “in a state of peril not seen since the early 1930s.” The housing market is in its worst condition since the 1930s. As President Barack Obama has traveled the country in recent days to promote the bailout plan—which calls for the greatest government involvement in the markets since the 1930s—he has repeatedly reminded Americans that we are in the middle of the largest financial crisis since the 1930s.

With all of these negative comparisons to the 1930s, people are beginning to think that the decade was some sort of disaster. Add reminders about the rise of fascism during the decade, and move over 1860s, the 1930s is now number one on the list of worst decades in American history.

But I say enough of this 1930s bashing. Sure, there was the Great Depression, the outbreak of World War II, the Hindenburg disaster and the Dust Bowl, but let us not forget the charms of the 1930s.

The 30s were banner years for Duke. The Duke Chapel was completed, and prohibition ended, thus making Duke what it is today. Head football coach Wallace Wade’s “Iron Dukes” team of 1938 went undefeated and unscored upon. Unfortunately, unlike free-flowing booze, this success is no longer a fixture of the Duke experience.

The 1930s could be perhaps the greatest decade in the history of film. The Wizard of Oz, Gone with the Wind, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Frankenstein, Dracula, King Kong and All Quiet on the Western Front are all 1930s films. If only we could say the same about the supposedly great films of this decade (that is to you people who do not yet realize that Crash is manipulative and contrived, and anyone who likes any movie with Matt Damon).

Jesse Owens stuck it to Hitler in Berlin in 1936, and the New York Yankees could—for a brief moment in time—legitimately connect the name of their franchise with the word “pride.”

Golf fashion was forever improved by plus fours, Cab Calloway set the standard for vocal performance and the invention of nylon changed women’s and drag queen’s fashion forever.

Despite all these gifts of the 1930s, we today only hear how it compares with the worst of our present situation. The 30s may have had its road bumps, but let us not slander a decade that has few defenders left. After all, the Great Depression in the long run was just the economy feelin’ a little blue.

To UNC, with love

11 Feb 2009, Posted by Vijai Atal in Backpages, Cartoon, 0 Comments

Feb. 11, 2009