The War is finally over. Let the healing begin

If this commentary is the first thing you read in this week's Loquitur, then, well, thanks. I appreciate it. But first, take a gander at page 12, and then we'll talk.

Okay, good to have you back. Isn't it a happy day?

We've won baby! Viva La Resistance! And we didn't even have to camp out on a Saturday morning.

So what happens now? I guess we should sit back and reflect on the events of the past few weeks. We'll go back to our dorm rooms and reminisce on our heady days of rebellion, when no policy was too strict, no mansion was too impenetrable, and no dean was too big. Maybe someone will pull a fire alarm, just for old times sake. After all, this is a cause for celebration.

What did we all learn about ourselves from this?

Well, we are a temperamental group. And we are very territorial. Like any good gang, we know how to protect our own.

The spirit of the l 960s may be alive after all, it was just in hiding. Over the past few weeks I have heard rumors of numerous protests, sit-ins and even a camp out, which would have been downright groovy, man.

Of course, the hippies and flower children were protesting against the loss of lives in an unjust war and a corrupt president. We were protesting against the loss of housing to students within jogging distance and a diminutive, misguided president who used to be a nun. But why nitpick?

This whole thing has had an air of familiarity to it that I couldn't quire put my finger on. I just figured it out. This has been the "Deep Impact" scenario. Remember that movie, the one about the asteroids about to destroy Earth? No, not the one with Bruce Willis, the other one.

Well, anyway, in the movie Morgan Freeman is the President of the United States. The asteroid will inevitably hit, but fortunately there is an underground bunker ready for such an event. The president decides that the best and brightest scientists, politicians, accountants and even a journalist are selected for survival. It would have been interesting if Freeman had denied survival to everyone who grew up close to the bunker, but the Hollywood writers would never make up anything that silly.

Life imitated art this time. Like in "Deep Impact" the asteroid has missed, and life will go on.

So what next? What else will the student body, now hungry with power, protest against? Mike 80s Butler, who had a devious plan for a class action lawsuit against the school, just made the point that "We need a new enemy." We all found an issue to fight for. There was something resembling student unity for a good couple of weeks. The Student Government Association actually became relevant for the first time that anyone can remember.

I have come to really believe that everything does happen for a reason. One Cabrini guidebook states that "The best college is the one that makes the biggest difference to the student." Well, Cabrini has almost absent-mindedly made a huge difference in the lives of its students, and not in a completely bad way.

We have learned to distrust authority, which is always a good quality. Naive trust in upper management never helped anybody.

We learned that there is strength in numbers. It wasn't just the students who were in the most immediate danger of losing housing who were concerned. Students from New Jersey, New York and even California came out and fought the good fight, not so much for themselves but for their friends and classmates.

These are heady times we are living in. Someday, we will look back on the housing lottery, the apartment lockout and the parking situation and we just might have a good laugh over 1t. It's been a trip, man.

And one more thing. It wouldn't hurt anybody to say something nice to the big man once in a while. The public hating that was called a housing meeting last Friday could have driven a lesser man to a nervous breakdown. So, Paul, you 're getting props from the Loquitur. Just don't get used to it.

Loquitur is established as a forum for student expression and as a voice in the uninhibited, robust, free and open discussion of issue5.

Editor in chid' Ben Lunn

News edlton

LinseyHelser

Joe Holden

Photography editor

Jim Snook

Photography and Graphic DesignAdviser

Don Dempsey

Staff Writers

Tony Barrett

Alison Briant

Terry Clpollini

Beth Conahan

Matt Coughlin

Linda Cylc

Crystal Davis

Amy Gassen

Kristina Geerken

Melissa Lepouski

Nick Luchko

Kate Pelusl

Bernadette Smith

AllisonWebb

Managing editor Janice Funk

A&E and Futures editor

Shanna Fanelli

Penpectives editor Chris Nielsen Adviser Dr.Jerry Zurek

Copy editor

Cynthia Taura

Megan Zustra

Sports edilon

Jessica Snow

Kendra Clark

Sports columnist

Brian O'Connell

Design assistant

Charles LaCourte

Editorlal Board

Chris Nielsen Ben Lunn

Shanna Fanelli Matt Tholey

Jessi Snow

Assistant Editon

Kristina