Conceal-Publish Worse Than Conceal-Carry

Seeing that Mizzou allegedly houses one of the more prestigious Journalism schools in the nation, you’d think that the student newspaper would be able to put together an editorial board that isn’t complete horse-squeeze.

The Editorial Board uses their twice-weekly column to consistently vent their ill-informed and highly inaccurate “concerns”. Editorials can only be effective if the Editorial Board is credible and accountable, of which, the Maneater’s staff is neither. They are however, full of themselves and hold their misinformed opinions in the highest regard.

Take last Friday’s editorial, Conceal, carry laws endanger students.

Missouri recently passed a bill to lower the age for concealed weapon carry in Missouri from 23 to 21 and permit concealed carry on college campuses. The age thing is somewhat irrelevant as an 18-year old can obtain a Maine permit which is valid in Missouri.

The concealed carry portion of the bill was tacked on in an amendment – likely so it would pass more easily…

If their point here is that somehow this makes it a less valid or even a bad idea, they’re wrong. Look up the term “genetic fallacy”.

Turning universities into potential battlegrounds by deputizing the students is not an effective measure against campus violence…

I have a problem with this because clearly, the Editorial Board is speaking on a subject on which they clearly have no knowledge. They equate having a permit to carry concealed weapon with “deputize”. A deputy, in the law enforcement sense is one charged with upholding the law, serving warrants and guarding prisoners, none of which apply to a student carrying a concealed weapon. If a student were to brandish his or her weapon in order to apprehend a graffiti artist, they would lose their weapon permit and most likely face jail time. Having a conceal-carry permit doesn’t magically make you a law enforcer, but rather grants you a better ability to what people are already entitled to do: defend yourself and others from a deadly threat. Look up the term “straw-man fallacy”.

We couldn’t imagine allowing people to carry and conceal weapons on campuses doing anything but harm…

That’s cool, but who cares about your imagination? First, you’re the Editorial Board of a liberal trash-rag student publication, secondly, no one knows who exactly you are. If you say “we”, especially when referring to your personal imagination, you should let people know who you are. Lastly, liberals are known to have little-to-no imagination when it comes to constructive advancement.

The fact that legislators are putting people who will be required to take an eight hour class with two hours of practiced shooting on the same level as officers who undergo 24 hours of training annually is appalling

Kind of a run-on from #2. MU Police officers are sworn with full powers of arrest provided to them by Missouri Revised Statutes. MU Police officers carry mace and a baton, they carry handcuffs and open display a weapon. They drive police interceptors, and are charged with intervention on even minor infractions. They wear a uniform and are Columbia Police Special Police Officers, Special Deputies of the Boone County Sheriff, and are Peace Officers commissioned by the Curators of the University of Missouri. They respond to calls for law enforcement and general service, take reports of criminal incidents, respond to fire and intrusion alarms, assist in medical emergencies and handle traffic accidents. They patrol not just the MU campus, but are the primary if not only law enforcement on MU dozens of remote facilities and farms, and they provide security at many university events. On exactly which of these things would a student with a concealed weapon be “on the same level”. (text in this paragraph from the MUPD website).

Some college campuses around the state don’t even have armed police officers…

So because some students are even more vulnerable than MU students, we don’t need more protection?

To make campus safer, the state should instead be making provisions to provide support for more support and resources for mental health care…

I agree we need more provisions for mental health care. But that wouldn’t have prevented the muggings that have taken place on campus this past year. Why can’t we have conceal-carry AND better mental health care?

This bill needs to be stopped, and we’re hoping that the Senate can exercise some restraint by not focusing on gathering votes…

Here, they make an unsupported assertion as to the motive of legislators. Most likely, it is completely untrue, and is another prime example of genetic fallacy.

A fact completely overlooked by the Editorial Board is that conceal-carry gun owners are documented to be the most responsible with their weapons. Someone who goes through hours of training to obtain their firearm is less likely to rampage a college campus than a punk or a thug that bought his or her gun through some black market dealer. When’s the last time you read a news story about a conceal-carry permit holder shooting up Virginia Tech or NIU?

The most likely outcome of this legislation would be the prevention or control of these types of tragedies.

Journalism used to be a field that interested me, and it’s situations like these that turned me off from it. The simple fact that these types of uneducated and improperly informed people can print whatever they want, regardless of inaccuracy and bias is appalling.

March Madness at Mizzou

For the first time in 6 years, Missouri’s basketball team is dancing in March. The Tigers would have received an at-large bid even if they didn’t wrap up an automatic bid by winning the Big 12 championship.

I don’t care how my brackets turn out, I’m picking Missouri to win everything, upsetting Memphis, Connecticut, Louisville and Syracuse along the way.

And I felt I’d match the blog to the times. Enjoy DeMarre Carroll and Wheeler graduate JT Tiller for the next few weeks.

Up first, No. 14 Cornell!

Gender Identity & FOCA

On an additional note, a “big” movement around campus recently has centered around adding “gender identity” to Missouri’s non-discrimination clause.

While I certainly don’t advocate discrimination against anybody (okay, probably not entirely true) there are MUCH more important things that our university (student governments in general) can allocate our time and resources towards.

Last week in The Maneater (our student newspaper) ran a column by Marcus Bowen entitled Student Leaders Lack Maturity To Be Curators.

Now typically, the columnists employed by the Maneater are complete rubbish, but Marcus Bowen has impressed me. He writes about issues that are (read, should be) important to college students while other columnists write about sororities and the Jonas Brothers. Exactly what I want to read about when I open my paper (end sarcasm).

You can read over the responses The Maneater received from “tolerant” students. I emailed Bowen commending him for his public stance against this frivolity and we exchanged a few emails and eventually became Facebook friends. For those of you unaware, that now constitutes a serious friendship.

Bowen’s new column quickly addresses last week’s before criticizing FOCA.

Now, I’m not named explicitly in Bowen’s new column, but some of our conversation is used in it. See if you can find it, pretend it’s a game!

Torgos Basketball: Game 5

TORGOS —– 25 33 – 58
ADMIRALS — 27 19 – 46

With both teams already eliminated from the playoffs, the first half resembled a matchup of two teams fighting for the dignity of finishing off the season with a win. But the second half was all Torgos.

After Jaryd and Nate scored all 25 of the Torgos first-half points, the Torgos finally received some solid play from the rest of the team. Logan went 3-for-5 from the field in the second half for six points and Kyle scored five points and hit a fadeaway three. Paul and Mike added ten points as the Torgos finished off their season on a high note.

The Torgos played their best half of the season in the second half, playing hard and unselfish. They had eight of their ten assists in the second half, including a baseline pass from Jaryd to a wide-open Kyle who buried a three. Mike backed off a rebound in the waning minutes, allowing Nate to grab his tenth rebound, completing the teams first double-double with 20 points and 10 rebounds.

Mike hit Paul on three pick-and-roll baskets in the second half and the Torgos shot fourteen free throws, a season high. The Torgos finish their first season of competitive-league play on a high note and with a record of 2-3, having won their last two games.

TEAM LEADERS
Points: Nate (12.8 PPG)
Rebounds: Jaryd (7.0 RPG)
Assists: Jaryd (2.2 APG)
FG%: Nate (69.0%)
3P%: Nate (81.0%)
FT%: Nate (11-11), Paul (4-4), Kyle (1-1) (100%)
Turnovers: Mike (6.4 TPG)

Torgos Basketball: Game 4

TORGOS (1-3) 20 23 – 43
FRIDAYS (0-4) 20 21 – 41

The Torgos managed their first win of the season by scoring eleven of the last 13 points in the game. Making his first start of the season, Nate took a bounce pass from Jaryd and hit a mid-range jumper with 5.9 seconds left to give the Torgos their first lead of the game.

The Fridays managed to get off a wild three-point attempt as time expired, but it banged harmlessly off the backboard.

Nate and Jaryd again carried the team, scoring 33 of the team’s 43 points by shooting a combined 12 of 18 from the field, four of five from beyond the arc. Despite being out-rebounded 31-18, the Torgos managed to win by outshooting the Fridays 41.7% to 25%. The Torgos also held ad thirteen to six advantage in free throw attempts.

The Torgos will finish off their season taking on the 1-3 Admirals next week.

SEASON STATISTICS

JARYD: 9 PPG, 6.75 RPG, 2 APG, 50% FG, 36% 3PT, 50% FT
LOGAN: 4 PPG, 4 RPG, 0 APG, 20% FG, 0% 3PT, 57% FT
NATE: 11 PPG, 3.5 RPG, 1 APG, 71.4% FG, 89% 3PT, 100% FT
MIKE: 1.25 PPG, 2.75 RPG, 1 APG, 5.6% FG, 0% 3PT, 75% FT
PAUL: 1 PPG, 0.25 RPG, 0 APG, 0% FG, 0% 3PT, 100% FT
ROBERTO: 2 PPG, 2.75 RPG, 0.25 APG, 33.3% FG, 0% 3PT, 0% FT
KYLE: 1.5 PPG, 1.5 RPG, 0.25 APG, 60% FG, 0% 3PT, 0% FT
CARL: 0 PPG, 1 RPG, 0.25 APG, 0% FG, 0% 3PT, 0%FT

2009 RHA Ball

Friday night saw the Upper Crust host the 2009 RHA Ball. We dropped the “Inaugural” from the name because the new President and Vice President aren’t sworn in until May under the new Constitutional amendments.

Tanner Tucker, former Speaker of Congress and current Director of STRIPES, delivered the keynote address, and was very good. As the Board of Elections Chair, I was tabbed to announce the election results and did so admirably.

The election had a very good student turnout and saw three slates run for the first time since 1997. Rachael Feuerborn and Lauren Thomas won the election, capturing 49% of the vote. The slate of Blake Lawrence and Jon Cleair finished second with 32% and Bobby Wood and Michael Crawford managed 19%.

J, Tanner and myself

My date, Stacy, and I

I perform Marc Cohn’s Walking In Memphis

Justin & I, the only two RHA men to win re-election

2009 Mizzou Iron Chef

On Thursday, February 26 RHA hosted the third annual Mizzou Iron Chef competition. However, the 2009 installment of Iron Chef was the first since the event won the MACURH Program of the Year Award.

Five teams of three student chefs (paired with a CDS sous-chef) competed for the title. Each team was required to prepare two dishes, with one required to incorporate something from another culture’s cuisine. Each dish must use the featured ingredient, which this year was rice.

Patrick & I check in with Vice Chancellor Cathy Scroggs

Alicia models the featured ingredient, RICE

I pose with the MACURH Program of the Year Award

One of the teams prepares their dish

Jim’s guide-dog helped clean up any dropped food!

All of the competitors pose for a photo after the event

A Fact-Finding Poll

I’ve been fortunate to be able to blog for nearly two years now. My first post was January 29, 2007. So in the spirit of blog anniversaries, I figured I’d see where all my readers found out about me.

After all, since that first post, there have been 13,441 page views. That’s about 18 page views a day with my posts on Gay Marriage, Obama’s Experience, and Carl Pavano’s Time In New York leading the way with 205, 198 and 191 views respectively.

Unsurprisingly, of my Today’s Idiot series, the highest viewed of those entries were the ones on Barack Obama (145 views) and more surprisingly, the one on The Lady In Front Of Me At Arby’s (123 views).

So go ahead and weigh in where you came from. Hope you enjoy reading along because I sure enjoy writing. Whether you agree or disagree with me, you’ve all come here 13,441 times in the past two years!

How Did You Find Out About Nathaniel’s Blog?
( surveys)

Andy’s 23rd & Alyssa’s 21st

I drove out to Athens to help two of my friends celebrate their birthdays. Andy turned 23 and Alyssa turned 21. We drank a little, played some games but really just hung out and caught up with each other one last time before we all head back to our respective colleges and jobs. Garrett Shadoan was there as well, a buddy I hadn’t seen in probably over a year and he and I had a great time catching up.

Me and Alyssa

Me and Garrett

Tanner’s Birthday Weekend

Tanner turned 21 this weekend.

On Friday, a bunch of us went out to the Heidelberg to buy him drinks and it didn’t take too much to inebriate Tanner. He bought his first drink himself (Tom Collins) and then I bought him and myself a shot that he picked out (something grapey) and the bartender bought him a shot. He was pretty tipsy by now and ordered a Coke and Greg ordered him Jack on the rocks to go with it. Some of it ended up in Tanner’s Coke, but not a lot.

And this is when Tanner provides some gold nuggets of drunk behavior. First, he and I went to play darts. I had given him a dollar earlier in the night for when we got around to darts and asked him for it now to put it in the machine. He proceeded to hand me his folded up work schedule. When I told him I couldn’t pay with that he was stunned. I stuck a dollar in the machine and he found the dollar halfway through the game. But my favorite was when we were outside waiting for STRIPES to come get us, Tanner proceeded to type his phone number into the ATM outside the Berg. He pulled out his own cell phone and informed us that the ATM was broken.

We got home around two in the morning or so, and Tanner and I left at nine to go into St. Louis for his birthday. We spent a half hour at the license office renewing his ID, and then met up with his dad and dad’s girlfriend for lunch at Chili’s. After that we went back to his mom’s house and watched football for awhile with Bipperboobles (cat).

We went out for dinner with his mom’s side at a small steakhouse before going to the casinos. Tanner likes lottery tickets and is enthralled by the casino. Even though they’re not really my thing, I went with him, like a good friend.

We went to Ameristar Casino in St. Charles first with his mom and step-dad where Tanner quickly lost $60 at Blackjack and $20 at slots but then won about $15 in roulette.

I just kind of followed Tanner around for awhile before buying into a Blackjack table with $40 and left the table with $65. Tanner and I cashed out after about two hours on the floor, most of it spent watching and looking.

Our friend worked at HOME Nightclub and he had gotten us on the guest list for that night so we went in for free with special passes. Neither of us much like nightclubs and it was very loud and very dark. We met up with our friend for a few minutes, checked the place out, scoffed at the insane prices of drinks and left.

We made our way to the brand-spankin’ new Lumiere Place on the Mississippi River. Tanner lost $10 on slots in about five minutes and quickly lost his fascination with slot machines. We both joined in a blackjack table after that, him with $50 and me with $40. There was an older couple at the table and another middle-aged woman already at the table and over the course the five of us struck up a table friendship.

Everybody at a blackjack table wants you to win, even the dealer. Everyone is willing to throw their opinion out there for you to consider. Tanner and I had a really good time at this table and we were at it for a good two hours or so.

Tanner left the table at $250 and I was at $155. We took our chips over to the cashier and got the heck out of there. At the end of the night, Tanner had $125 more than he went in with and I left with $140 more.

I’m certainly not planning on going back to a casino in the near future, or ever. But we both had a great time and made some money. I’m not a huge fan of casinos, but if you’re smart, they’re not horrible. If you’re drunk and pumping money into slots all night, hoping to line up three ovals for a million dollars, you’re going to lose a lot of money, as Tanner found out. But if you stay sober and play the right stuff, you can come out in the black.

Tanner and I had a lot of fun and most of the people there were friendly and a lot of fun. We came back to Columbia on Sunday and went to Mizzou’s basketball game against the 6-1 California Bears as part of the Big 12/Pac 10 challenge. A 20-1 Mizzou run in the first half pretty much set the tone of the game and Mizzou won by almost 30 points.