Gone Up In Smoke

     January 2, 2012. That is the date all Austin Community College campuses and facilities will be smoke-free. I found out the news through an article of the Accent paper at one of their many campuses I attend. It has already been over a month since the board of trustees had come to this decision. Personally, I don’t smoke and I have never had a real issue with choking on clouds of smoke while running to class so I could care less whether this ban will be followed through with or lifted later on down the line. Yet, I learned that these trustees had not initially come to the students with this idea in the first place. So, for the people addicted to the cancer stick, a move like that was “uncool”. Sam Rios, an ACC student, disproved of the action they took saying “they’re taking our rights away from us. Even if the results turned out the same way, I’d be a hundred times happier if they had just asked the students.” I hear that, but like I mentioned earlier, I’m not on the stick so I stand unchanged by this restriction.

     Of course the main purpose of the ban was for health and safety reasons because second-hand smoke has been known to kill, but along with that ACC genuinely wants to help people stop smoking. There are resources out there to help people quit such as cessation programs (ex: Nicotine Anonymous) and making nicotine patches available to new non smokers. I think that’s great all they have going on to create cleaner campuses and healthier lives, but for cigarette smokers it’s going to difficult finding a new stress reliever as strong as you’re old, reliable cancer stick.   

Please Don't Elect Perry

If it is okay, I would like to start off by saying "Mean Rachel" is blunt, sarcastic, and seriously hilarious. I must also forewarn any Perry fans not to read her posting on a woman's America under Perry. That is, unless you’re in search of a truth that you weren’t willing to accept when it was initially right in front of you. (That truth being a Texan with good hair doesn’t equal good government for the people.) However, if you are a Perry fan and you are a woman, you should read her posting anyway. It foretells our futures’ underneath “republican of the year” as looking a little grim… and full of babies.

Perry is one of the many “God-fearing Americans” believing closed legs means no diseases and no babes. That is very true but when you see your state has the 3^rd highest amount of kids having kids in America; you have to do a little more to insure the protection of the rest of the kids that also don’t happen to fear God enough. In addition to that, in the process of promoting abstinence, there will be a cut in birth control coverage. So you are then limited to marriage or rubbers. Confusion then sets in because if they’re only promoting no sex, then that means they’re definitely not showing you how to use a condom. If you’re not using a condom correctly, then you may be making babies. Well wait. You can always abort the child, but that’s after the mandatory transvaginal sonogram you have to go through in an attempt to get you to keep the child.

Another fun fact you may not have known: Texas is 1^st in the nation to have kids stuck without health insurance, as well as 1^st to have the most “workers employed in minimum-wage jobs”. That means if you have sex, get pregnant, and are convinced to do the right thing and keep the child, there’s a high chance you still won’t be able to adequately care for the child anyway. All of this reform through the election of the beautiful Rick Perry.

Because I am a young woman, I look to "Mean Rachel" as a source that has my back. She sees what's going on in the government, but knows the times well enough to figure out what may or may not work for today's people. Right now, Perry does not work. Please don't elect him.