Bush’s due apology

I don’t believe Senator John Kerry’s dumb, so-called joke was funny at all. But if anyone should apologize to our troops, it is President George W. Bush who unnecessarily put our brave men and women soldiers in harm’s way in Iraq (“Iraq: John Kerry’s last stand” Nov. 2).

With their lives, the troops and their families are paying for Bush’s misleading us into invading and occupying Iraq. The Bush administration should pay for their huge mistake at the polls. Republicans like to believe they are better than Democrats on national security. The GOP-led debacle in Iraq proves they are not better.

Paul L. Whiteley Sr.

Louisville, Kentucky

Illini loyalty, even in football

For the most part I agree with Jason Grodsky’s column (“No excuse good enough to miss chance at history” Nov. 3). I look at the fan sections at Wisconsin, Penn State and Ohio State with envy. I wish Illini fans were that loyal, that enthusiastic and had that much fun at games. The fact that we cannot have a full Block-I section against our biggest rivals is a travesty. But the fact remains that this University is a basketball campus and the only reason for that is winning.

The football team won two games last year and is staring another two- or three-win season right in the eyes. I love watching Illini football, and I will continue to go to every game no matter what. But few feel this way. We want to see winners and recently Illini football has been far from calling themselves winners.

The Illini lost heartbreaking games to Indiana, Ohio, Penn State and Wisconsin. All games where the Illini held a lead and let it slip away late. And while losing seasons do not excuse poor fan loyalty, it is much easier to cheer and watch a winning football team. As a loyal fan, I was disheartened at being so close to victory and then leaving the stadium with nothing but another loss.

If the football team wants to see a full stadium they need to win more than two games a season. This campus would go nuts for Illini football if only they could put a few more ‘Ws’ in the win column.

There is no doubt basketball is the sport of choice here, but I believe that could change. A Big Ten championship in football would ignite this campus and then I do not believe we would have any trouble filling the stands. But I doubt little will change until that happens.

Jeff Rauch

Freshamn in LAS

Acknowledging white privilege

I wasn’t too surprised when I read about Brian Glickman’s attempt to have two professors fired for their opposition to the chief mascot (‘Petition calls for resignation of professor who calls Chief racist’ Nov. 3 issue of The Daily Illini). After all, if there’s one certainty in this country, it’s that idiocy is gaining ground in our universities (He couldn’t even construct a grammatically correct sentence!).

However, his reactionary program does bring to light some important problems. Above all else it illustrates the values we as a nation have come to hold most dear: Sports.

Athletics have come to overshadow everything that a university was originally meant for; namely, education, scholarship, academics, and intellectual pursuit. The vehement holding onto of the Chief is grounded in an irrational desire to worship athletes and their games.

This has lead to a complete lack of interest in questioning the ideology inherent in the symbolism of a decapitated Indian head, only ever reanimated by a white boy prancing around a basketball court, being cheered on mainly by white faces.

This issue gets to the heart of a much bigger problem; white America’s refusal to acknowledge the privilege they have been born into. Of course there’s only small opposition to the Chief on this campus! How else could it be when the majority of its students are over-privileged white suburbanites, who have never had to deal with the consequences of racial insensitivity?

One thing is absolutely certain on this issue, someday we will all have to come to the realization that it is wrong to use the stolen symbol of a people we nearly murdered to extinction. I hopefully await that day.

Jack Hutchens

Graduate student