Mirror - Vol. 34, No. 09 - October 30, 2008

              ^^WEWEEEK OF OCTOBER 30,2008
Vol. 34, Iss. 9 -16 pages
FREE - Take one
INSIDE:
SpidiD
HasAirtwd
Your guide to die 2008 election season
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"What my tour guide
never told me"
p. 5
Campus Life
"Making a pimped out
pumpkin"
P. 7
Eife Jnment
"Raul Midon rocks out
Quick Center with
eyes shut"
p. 9
"Still chasing the big one"
p. 16
Schooling
politicians:
Fairfield junior runs for
state representative
BY MEGAN GRIFFIN
Only 20 years old, Amanda Parks '10 has
taken the skills learned in her communications
classes and put together a campaign to get a
new generation into the legislature, as she runs
against 39-year-old Democratic incumbent Kim
Fawcett.
Parks is running for
state representative in the
133rd Assembly District
in Fairfield and Westport,
which includes the Fairfield
University campus.
"We are the future, so
why not start making prog-ress
now?" Parks asked,
disputing her critics, who
have questioned why a
20-year-old would even
want to run for state government.
Parks, a junior at the University and life-long
town resident, is trying to change the face
of Connecticut politics. She is a non-traditional
candidate running a non-traditional campaign
and emphasizes green technology. Parks is not
the typical Republican, traditionally the party of
older white men.
"I think this is quite the stereotype," said Parks.
"There are many intelligent women in this par-
PARKS
INSIDE:
EDITORIAL
P. 5
ty, on a local and nation-al
level. Just look at Sar-ah
Palin!"
Wayne Parks, Amanda's
father and campaign man-ager,
believes his daughter's motivation for running
for office started around the family dinner table,
when Amanda was in elementary school.
"How to make the world a better place is the
main dinner table discussion that Amanda was
brought up on," he said. He also noted that his
terms on Fairfield's legislative body strongly influ-enced
Amanda's interest in politics as well.
Parks' desire to run stems from her conviction
that the Connecticut economy could prosper as in
years past if the legislature would refocus its ap-
SEE "PARKS" ON P. 2
Voting for murder?
Catholics struggle to reconcile political
agendas with moral beliefs
BY LILY NORTON
What would you do if someone told you
that if you vote for Barack Obama, you are
a murderer? And, what if this person was
your priest?
As the 2008 election draws near, certain
members of the Catholic Church have been
attracting attention by making their staunch
pro-life stand known to all members of the
Catholic faith.
In Scranton, Pa., Catholics who have
attended church in recent weeks have heard
homilies in mass reminding them to think
about pro-life issues in the upcoming elec-tion,
according to The New York Times.
Following the orders of Bishop Joseph
Martino, every priest in the diocese told
their congregation last week that voting
for the Democratic presidential candidate
Barack Obama is synonymous with com-mitting
homicide because he holds a pro-choice
platform.
Martino's actions, however, are enrag-ing
many of the members of the Catholic
faith, who say that the church's role is
to guide its people, rather than instilling
hostile orders.
"To say that any person who votes
for a pro-choice candidate is complicit in
suicide is stupid," said Fr. Michael Doody,
Fairfield's director of campus ministry. "That
has nothing to do with the gospel, and it
doesn't address the real issues."
Scranton is the childhood home of
Sen. Joe Biden. As Obama's chosen vice-president,
Biden brings serious attention
to these people as he is a Roman Catholic,
and pro-choice. Now his hometown, a
working-class Catholic city, has become
a battleground for the continuing debates
about the right to abortion.
In past elections, abortion rights have
sparked worldwide debates. Besides Marti-no,
others have spoken out against voting for
pro-choice candidates like Bishop Raymond
Leo Burke, former Archbishop of St. Louis
and now Prefect of the Apostolic Signatura,
who has said that Catholics who support
abortion should not receive Communion.
Paul Lakeland, professor of Catholic
Studies, says that the people who hold these
stark beliefs are "loose cannons" and are not
representative of the Catholic Church de-mographic
who, like the general American
population, are mostly anti-abortion, but do
not want to overturn Roe v. Wade.
Lakeland continued to say that abor-tion
is only one pro-life issue of concern to
Catholics, who make up about a quarter of
SEE "VON ARX" ON P. 3
Initiative prompts scorn from state educators
BY LOUIS BUCCHERI
The Amethyst Initiative
popped the cork on the drinking age
discussion when it surfaced in July,
but opponents of the movement are
emerging and they want to put the
argument back on ice.
The Connecticut Association
of Schools (CAS) is among the
most recent groups to speak out
against the initiative. The organiza-tion
stated in a press release that it
is "firmly opposed" to lowering the
drinking age, countering the coali-tion
of 130 college and university
presidents calling for debate on
the topic. University president Fr.
Jeffrey von Arx was among the
first of these administrators to join
the movement, which CAS states
is rooted in a "desire" to
lower the drinking age.
Critics of the
Amethyst Initiative
have argued that
the culture of high-risk
drinking on
college campuses
would be inherited
by high schools
if a change to the
drinking age were
implemented. CAS
holds that lowering
the drinking age to
18 would exacer-bate
the alcohol-related
problems
already plaguing
the state's second-ary
schools. Ph0t0 "lustration
"Middle school and high
school educators across Connecti-cut
are dealing on a daily basis
with the devastating results
of the underage drinking
that now occurs with the
minimum legal drink-ing
age of 21,"
the organization
said in a writ-ten
statement.
"There is clear
and convincing
evidence that,
when the drink-ing
age is low-ered,
the degree
of teenage drinking
increases and so, too,
does the incidence of sui-talities,
alcohol-related injuries,
and school drop-outs."
The press release cites statis-tics
from the National Highway
Traffic Administration, pointing to
alcohol-related crashes involving
drivers less than 21 years of age. It
also refers to research on the risks
of underage drinking, including the
effects of alcohol consumption on
the development of the brain. The
Connecticut Association of Schools
was unavailable for comment on
the release.
Tom Pellegrino, associate vice
president and dean of students,
said Fairfield's administration is
"vigorous" in addressing the prob-lem
of alcohol abuse, and that it is
by Jon Ollwerther cide, automobile fa- SEE "FAIRFIELD" ON P. 3
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