Column: Keep Dope Alive?

Hail to the Redskins, hail V-I-C-T-O-R-Y. Braves on the warpath, fight for all D.C. I'll let you guys hum the rest. Even though I am from Memphis, Tennessee, I have lived in Washington, D.C. for the last several years and, thus, have adopted the 'Skins as my football team. And because I am a Redskins fan and have lived and worked with countless New York natives and fans since being at the University, I take great pride in boasting about the defending Super Bowl Champion New York Giants dismal season. Even with your beloved Phil at the helm, you guys couldn't even beat the Bengals. You might as well face it. · Now back to your regularly scheduled column: We have a tremendous void in leadership in America. I know that President Bush thinks that John Sununu's resignation symbolizes all the change that he (and America for that matter) needs to tackle the tough domestic problems and the campaign that lie ahead, but Sununu's departure alone won't cut it. What is wrong with the politicos in this country that we have school superintendents and city administrators categorically endorsing plans to distribute condoms in public junior high schools as a mechanism to battle teenage pregnancy, AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases? After months of blue-chip panels and committees investigating the social danger of teen-age pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, the best solution these idiots could come up with after spending all this money "to isolate and study the problem" was to hand condoms out randomly to 13-, 14- and 15-year olds. Now I am not saying that the distribution of condoms is not a decent idea considering the enormity of the problem, but distributing condoms to junior high school kids seems a bit problematic and insane to me. But hell, if we're going to distribute condoms why not also just have a class on how to put them on, how to actually use them and then how to properly remove them without causing pain? Two weeks ago, a mayor of a big eastern city, that is presently being held hostage by the drug culture, unveiled a crime plan to escalate the war on drugs and all its side effects. The plan included, among other things, a call for more police on the streets and a lowering of the age -- from 15 to 14 -- in which minors could be tried as adults in a court of law. Now there's a plan that'll get right at the heart of the problem if I've ever heard one. We have a Justice Department, formerly headed by Dick "damn I got waxed, what I'm I gonna do now, maybe I'll call John Sununu" Thornburgh, that is basing its entire crime plan on building more prisons. Now here's another idea bleeding with innovation and potential. Can't these idiots see that none of this has, or will, work. America needs ideas that will attack crime and teen-age pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases and the rest of the menu of social ills head on and not at the periphery. We need leadership. Lowering the age in which minors can be tried as adults will do nothing to curtail the gross number of killings and drug dealing in the streets. But decreasing the size of junior high and high school classrooms from 40 to 15 might have a more systematic impact. If we had real leadership, we might get some proposals calling for guaranteed summer or year round jobs for any teenager, particularly 14- and 15- year olds, who wants one. With real leadership, we might finally get programs aimed at city youth that are tailored for humans and not re-election campaigns. Why can't we get a program from our President, congressmen, state legislatures, mayors, city councilmen and school superintendents that calls for a combination of government and private money that guarantees the financing of any eligible student's college education. We could literally use the money that we would otherwise spend to send people to jail and build more prisons. Real leadership, instead of calling for a capital-gains tax cut, would call for a complete elimination of taxes for those earning minimum wage. Then, maybe we could reinstitute a progressive tax code. America is in desperate need of leadership. We can ill afford any more band-aid solutions to cancerous and infectious societal ills. Just recently, I read an article that implied that the trend of teen-age girls having babies isn't really that bad because their teenage bodies are fit, and are, thus, able to bear the brunt of carrying and delivering the baby more so than an older woman. I guess the battle against teen-age pregnancy has overwhelmed us so that we are now crafting justifications for our surrender. At the rate leader(surrender-)ship is going in America, we just might see the day when Jesse Jackson might actually utter, "Keep Hope and Dope Alive." Harold Ford is a senior History major from Memphis, Tennessee. Say it Loud has appeared alternate Thursdays.

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