This new policy of "test optional" admissions is an end run around a recent court decision banning race-based preferences in student admissions, specifically the controversy that surrounded the University of Michigan. (See "Scrubbing Bubbles," River Cities' Reader Issue 659, November 14-20, 2007.) Augustana simply wants to discriminate against whites and males without civil liability and has found a way to do so.
Reverend Jim Richter
Via the Reader Web site
Clinton's Free Trade Program
Senator Hillary Clinton claims experience in presidential matters by way of her assistant presidency during her husband's tenure. Their failure to include tough labor and environmental enforcement provisions into NAFTA is a harbinger of the trade and environmental programs she will implement as president of the United States.
The New River that flows between Mexicali, Mexico, and the Salton Sea in California is the most polluted river in the United States. NAFTA has done nothing to reclaim the river. The river begins at a golf course and is fed by farm-irrigation runoff. During its 12-mile course to the international border, municipal and industrial concerns dump wastes into the waterway. The pollution has become so hazardous that the Mexican government has buried the river. Burial has not solved the problem. The waste dumpers continue and NAFTA provides no official means to correct the problem.
In 2003, the Mexican Supreme Court issued two damaging rulings against Halliburton. The court ruled that Halliburton was violating the civil and labor rights of documented Americans working legally in Mexico. Furthermore the court ruled Halliburton was responsible for injuries befalling American workers on the job in Mexico. That American workers had to seek redress by exposing themselves to the corrupt Mexican legal system is unconscionable. Halliburton is not the only U.S. corporation in Mexico, nor are their unfair payroll and fiscal policies regarding Americans working in Mexico unique. The rulings are indicative of the evils that befall many Americans working in Mexico. NAFTA fails to provide any means for Americans to seek redress for labor violations occurring in Mexico.
The Clintons failed to provide the most basic and secure means for Americans to seek redress for the immoral and unethical labor and environmental acts of U.S. and Mexican companies. This is a portent of Senator Hillary Clinton's principles if she were to become president of the United States.
James Sieglitz
San Diego, California
