TECHNICIAN
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Raleigh, North Carolina
Clinton calls for community action FORMER PRESIDENT ASKS STUDENTS TO BECOME INVOLVED IN SOLVING WORLD’S PROBLEMS James Cox
OVERHEARD
Staff Writer
Students, faculty and local citizens visited Reynolds Coliseum Monday morning to hear former President Bill Clinton speak as part of the Millennium Seminar Series, a collection of presentations designed to engage and inspire students. Clinton’s speech, entitled “The Way Forward,” focused on getting students and citizens to act on topics such as climate change, health care, recycling, and hunger. Retta Clemons, an executive assistant for Provost Larry Nielsen, said a crowd of 6,000 gathered to listen to the former president’s speech. Clinton urged students to take action in his speech. “We need doers,” he said. The president also asked students to think about this moment in history. “What kind of world are we in and what can we do to make it better?” he asked. Clinton called interdependence the fundamental fact of the 21st century. “We should be trying to build up the positive forces of national and international interdepence,” he said. Clinton explained the interdependent economy of the U.S. took more people out of poverty in the last 20 years than had before in history. “Then, in five months, we saw $27 trillion in wealth disappear,” he said. Clinton reiterated America’s importance in the interdependent economy. “That [$27 trillion] is twice America’s annual GDP and since we are 22 to 24 percent of the world’s income, that means that the world lost about half of it entire annual income,” the president said. He explained instability in the world as well. Clinton told the audience the worlds largest democracy, India, shares the sub-continent with Pakistan. “You have the terrorist attack in Mumbi, and you sit and hold your breath hoping these two nuclear powers don’t fight each other over what happened,” Clinton said. In his speech, he also touched on the closing of the U.S. pris-
insidetechnician
The Focused section concentrates on budget cuts. See page 3.
Mays grows into Wolfpack role
Point guard learned to play the game from four older sisters. See page 8.
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BY PEGGY BOONE
“I wish there were more people in his position saying that [we should be active].” William Henderson sophomore, engineering
PEGGY BOONE/TECHNICIAN
Former President Bill Clinton challenges the audience and students to aid John Coggin, a senior in communication, in his efforts to fight world hunger. Coggin was the first to receive the newly created President William Jefferson Clinton Hunger Leadership Award, which will become an annual presentation to an N.C. State student who is dedicated to promoting global awareness and support through action. Coggin has been involved with community programs such as Stop Hunger Now during his time at the University.
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be easily retaliated against and can make this unstable system more unstable,” Clinton said. The former president adRead more of James Cox’s story about dressed the cost of education in former President Bill Clinton’s visit to Reynold’s Coliseum Monday online at America. www.technicianonline.com. “The cost of education is above inflation, and the median wage is on in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, below inflation,” he said. something President Barack Clinton spoke about climate Obama has pledged to do early change. in his administration. “Most people recognize that “We le a r n we put enough now t h at a g r e e n h ou s e very high pergases in the air centage of the and we need to people released do something after being deabout it,” he tained as sussaid. pected terrorClinton said ists turn out he spent a lot of Former President Bill Clinton time thinking to have been terrorists, and about this topic. they have gone back signed up “We just can’t keep doing this and put themselves in countries folks,” he said. of operation in the hope of blowClinton said the health care ing up innocent civilians,” Clin- crisis needs a solution. ton said. “The President is going to have He stressed terrorists pose a the chance to solve the problem very real threat to stability. that American citizens have run “These faithless actors cannot away from, and that other coun-
“ I had a Congress that denied there was a health care crisis quote.”
SIGHTS AND SOUNDS: MILLENNIUM SEMINAR WITH FORMER PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON “Go State!”
The Pep Band played the Fight Song just before Chancellor James Oblinger introduced formerPresident Bill Clinton.
Can you hear me now?
Seeing spots
Pink shirts and sweaters dotted the crowd, in memory of the late women’s basketball coach Kay Yow.
Genevieve Pike junior, paper science and engineering
A pin drop
Oblinger asked the crowd to take a moment of silence to honor Yow.
Good choice!
Clinton said he approved President Barack Obama’s pick for secretary of state who is Clinton’s wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Mary Easley stood up to ask the crowd to turn off their cell phones.
tries have already figured out: how to provide affordable health care to all Americans,” he said. The president said Obama won’t face the same problems he did. “I had a Congress that denied there was a health care crisis,” Clinton said. He said the American people are spending 16 percent of our income on health care, and no other country we compete with spends more than 11, and they have better care than we do. “So what will we do? Cover ev-
“He made me think, ‘How?’ And why we should [act] instead of sitting on our butts and playing video games.”
erybody and spend 19 per cent? Getting this right is very important,” he said. The former president has a lofty goal: to close every landfill in every major city in the world. “Landfills should be a relic of the past, there should be no more of them in North Carolina anywhere in the world,” he said. After Clinton’s speech, John Coggin, a senior in communication, received Stop Hunger Now’s President William Jefferson Clinton Hunger Leadership Award.
“I thought [the speech] was really informative. He’s a really good speaker. I made me wan to look into [food organizations]. I’m glad I skipped two classes to go.” Ed Mason sophomore, biology
“It’s our job, Clinton says it’s up to us to fix things,” Coggin said. After Coggin’s acceptance speech, Clinton took the stage again to talk about hunger. “Sixty-five percent of all people eligible for food stamps don’t use them,” he said.
Hate crime commission continues talks
Cutting the budget
focused arts & entertainment classifieds sports
What did you think of former President Bill Clinton’s speech at Reynold’s Coliseum Monday?
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Commission to analyze UNC system’s policy on hate speech met Monday
HATE CRIME COMMISSION
Jonathan B. Laughrun
Next meeting: Feb. 9, open to the public to solicit more opinions and feedback on the policy
Senior Staff Writer
The 11-member commission investigating further hate speech legislation for UNC system schools held its third meeting Monday to continue the discussion on the policies. The commission met for the first time on Dec. 17, 2008. The idea of placing restrictions on speech has some students worried about the future and what will be restricted. “It is a real dangerous road to go down. You can restrict one thing like the [Ku Klux]
Klan or any kind of hate speech and the next thing you know you are restricting another kind of speech, and then another kind of speech. Then eventually you don’t have free speech anymore,” Ches McDowell, a sophomore in political science, said. “The University restricting [speech]. that is just dangerous. It is walking up the same path as George Orwell’s ‘1984’ when you have the thought police that run around and every time they think you are thinking something racist or something stupid you’re going to
be in trouble for it.” rent policies of the 16 universities At the same time, other stu- and the polices in effect in other dents said they feel strongly that states. something needs to be done to “For the most part, we went limit the hate speech on campus. deeper in each school’s code of “I think certain steps are nec- conduct,” Hunter said. “And [we] essar y,” Brad also looked at Frenier, a senior examples from in business adother states.” ministration The amount said. “Anything of money and really threatenother resources ing — actually that have been threatening funneled into somebody’s this commissafety is where I s ion i s u n Brad Frenier, senior in could visualize k now n a s a business administration actually drawrepresentative ing the line.” refused to comAccording to Geoffrey Hunter, ment on the subject. Regardless a member of the commission and of the amount, McDowell said N.C. State University alumnus, in the current economic state, a the commission used Monday’s commission like this should not meeting to investigate the cur- be a priority.
“Certain steps are necessary [to prevent hate speech].”
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“[The North Carolina government] could care less about economic times, they could care less about what the North Carolina tax payer is going through, they could care less about what they are spending our tax dollars on,” McDowell said. “Nine times out of ten when they spend our money on stupid crap like this, it is just to make the people think they are actually doing something when they’re really not.” McDowell also said that the current budget crisis facing the UNC system is more important than the potential changed the commission could recommend. “When we’re facing a really large deficit the University [has] to cut classes, cut professors’ salaries, do all kinds of crap like this because we don’t have enough money.”
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