Commentary

Your student newspaper tackles 'the big one'

John T. Bennett

I have had conversations with professors and other students since the tragic events of Sept. 11 who were oblivious as to how the staff of this publication puts a newspaper together and how a major crisis can alter the process. That said, in an attempt to offer readers a glimpse of how The Appalachian handled ‘the big one,’ the following is a chronological narrative of what I assure you are two days I will never forget.

Tuesday, Sept. 11

8:45 a.m.: American Airlines Flight 11 crashes into North World Trade Center (WTC) Tower. All broadcast and cable news networks immediately break into regular programming.

9:03 a.m.: With black smoke billowing from the north tower, American Airlines Flight 175 crashes into the South WTC Tower as the world watches with horror on television.

9:15 a.m.: Turning on the car radio after an early-morning errand, I am immediately alerted by the very stern-sounding voice of President George W. Bush. After hearing Bush use the words “New York City” and “apparent terrorist attacks,” I break several traffic laws en route to my spot alongside most of America in front of a television screen.

9:50 a.m.: With my mind racing in a myriad of directions, I set out on the short walk to the Student Publications Office in Plemmons Student Union, passing by a TV monitor being tuned to the tragedy unfolding on CNN. Just minutes later academic affairs beat reporter Kristin Davis, business office manager Mark Saunders and I gather with other students around a TV monitor in the second-floor lobby of the union as the South WTC Tower collapses.

10 a.m.: Realizing the nation is in the midst of the worst terrorist attack in its history, I return to the newspaper office to begin calling reporters, copy editors and photographers to start working on locally oriented coverage of the attacks.

11 a.m.: A team of staffers including associate editor Adam Bennett, copy editor Bobby Hite and staff reporters Davis, Anthony DeBetta and Robyn Dailey scurry around the student union for four hours gathering student, faculty and staff response to the attacks.

Noon: Associate editor Catherine Quill arrives after a full morning of classes and joins Davis and me in determining which faculty members would have the proper expertise to offer insight into the unfolding assault on America. After receiving repeated busy signals, the duo abandons efforts by 12:30 p.m. to reach faculty members via telephone and frantically head out to conduct face-to-face interviews.

3:15 p.m.: I return to the newspaper office and begin pulling together the student responses gathered by our team of reporters while Davis and Quill discuss what angles to take based on the information given them by faculty members in the Department of Political Science/Criminal Justice. Also, I first learn that Sarah Bursley, chief copy editor, is working on a feature-story based around an Appalachian State alumna who witnessed the attack on the Pentagon, whose father witnessed the Pennsylvania crash, and
whose sister is a current Appalachian student.

4 p.m.: Deadline for stories and photos previously assigned for Sept. 13 issue arrives.

4:45 p.m.: Adam Bennett begins an inquiry into
the possible purchase of several photographs taken from the attack sites in New York and Washington, D.C., a luxury not usually available to The Appalachian. Within minutes, he informs me the photos will be available for our locally oriented coverage of the attacks.

6 p.m.: Final plans for the Sept. 13 issue are made. Bursley, Davis, Quill and I begin crafting the five stories that will eventually appear on the front page as well as in the editorial.

Wednesday, Sept. 12

8:45 a.m.: After a night in front of a computer screen surrounded by a stack of notes, I arrive at the office to begin the final editing and production process of the Sept. 13 edition.

12:30 p.m.: Deadline arrives for the six attack- coverage pieces with the arrival of copy editors Bethel Barefoot and Bobby Hite.

2 p.m.: With all stories ready to be placed on the page, the production department begins crafting the final version of the Sept. 13 edition of The Appalachian.

7:30 p.m.: Copy editor Matt Tate arrives to begin proofing the final product and is joined by Bursley an hour later.

11:45 p.m.: After an extended proofreading marathon, The Appalachian is ready to be sent to the press.

Putting together the final version was truly a team effort. It is in times of crisis that a news organization’s staff is truly tested. The staff of The Appalachian passed with flying colors.

Our Perspective ...

Street crossing paradox

Drivers, students share blame in recent string of traffic incidents

Heavy traffic and hoards of pedestrians are a volatile mix on campus.

A 19-year-old student was hit by a car last week while walking to class, making her the fourth victim of a traffic accident only five weeks into the academic year.

Although numerous academic and student support buildings are located on Rivers Street, it is used as a main thoroughfare through Boone to avoid the congested downtown area. The four-lane road often entertains large amounts of vehicles steered by drivers ignoring the 25-mph speed limit, running red lights and erratically switching lanes to avoid following the AppalCART.

Such unsafe driving is unacceptable on a college campus.
The police will be obtaining speed radar trailing devices to place on Rivers Street in order to monitor drivers’ speeds, said Chief Gunther Doerr. He feels this measure will be effective in preventing future traffic accidents.

The responsibility of making campus safer for pedestrians, however, must be a shared effort among the police, drivers and students themselves.

Pedestrians legally have the right-of-way only when in a crosswalk, but drivers utilizing Appalachian State University roads must be more attentive to student pedestrians.

Students, in turn, should cross the street only when it is clear of traffic and at a crosswalk, since if a pedestrian is not using a crosswalk, drivers are not legally at fault.

The placement of some crosswalks, however, makes them inefficient for students to use.

Students walking from the east side of campus to the Kerr-Scott Building do not have a crosswalk that directly leads to the most logical location – Kerr-Scott.

Most resort to darting across Rivers Street, a task especially risky during peak traffic hours.

The reality is that most students also do not have the allotted time between tight classes on opposite sides of campus to re-route their travel plans to tunnels and crosswalks that may be blocks away.

Any solution to this emerging problem is a very complex one. We feel our crosswalks are needed at better-situated locations but recognize the need to place them in locations that would not disrupt the flow of automobile traffic on Rivers Street and other thoroughfares adjacent to academic buildings.

Before such decisions are made, we feel two pieces of advice will contribute significantly to the reversal of this trend.

Drivers need to slow down and remember they are driving through a college campus, not on an interstate highway.

We realize students are sometimes in a hurry to make it to class on time, but the ability to cross the street safely should not become a prerequisite for admission to this university.

Lack of empathy on both sides shocking

Anthony DeBetta

In wake of the recent attacks on the United States, it shocks me to see an incredible lack of empathy on both sides of the conflict. People all over the country are screaming for blood and rushing headlong into a conflict that will never have a decisive victory and only result in more human loss on both sides.

Terrorism is an ancient tactic used by the powerless against the powerful.

President George W. Bush and other government officials have called the perpetrators of these heinous acts “cowards” and rightly so, but America engages in acts of terror on a regular basis that are just as cowardly.

The United Nations Children Emergency Fund (UNICEF) reports 6,000 infants and children die every month from the sanctions imposed on Iraq after the Gulf War.

The agency also reports over 1.5 million civilians in Iraq have died since the war, from easily preventable diseases and dehydration.
America is in full support of Nazi-esque genocide in the Middle East, clearly another Holocaust.

Are these sanctions supported by the United States not acts of terror?

Are these abominable figures not just as staggering as the civilian losses suffered by the terrorist acts against the United States?

Is this blatant disregard of innocent civilian loss not as deplorable as the recent attacks on our own soil?

If you don’t think so, then why?

Because these people are Arabic or Islamic?

The mainstream media constantly paints the people in this region as anti-American warmongers. Those people represent a minuscule part of the population.

The pictures of Palestinians celebrating on the West Bank were an attempt by the mainstream media to whip our population up into a jingoistic fervor.

The international community supports us in our time of need, but the more extreme our international actions become, the more alone and isolated our nation will stand.

Saddam Hussein is still in power and the economic sanctions are not affecting him in any manner, except ensuring that a starving population will not have the strength to rebel and overthrow his dictatorship.

It may shock you, but the United States does not want Saddam Hussein out of power.

Our government needs people like him in power so that our corrupt officials have an enemy to point to when they increase our already bloated defense budget.

The United States accounted for one-third of world military expenditures in 2000, and we only account for 5 percent of the world’s population.

The Pentagon is asking for more money to pursue missile defense that has proven time and time again to not work.

Would missile defense have prevented those men with box cutters from hijacking those planes?

Would it have stopped the attack on the U.S.S. Cole?

Would it have stopped the bombings of our embassies overseas? The real threat our nation faces is terrorism, and it will never go away as long as people feel like they are being oppressed and have any means to combat their oppressors.

America has more poor people than any other Western democracy, and we have a prison population over 2 million people, 25 percent of the world prison-population.

We have millions of our own citizens that are poor and cannot afford adequate housing and healthcare, and our government’s first priority is defense and getting involved in foreign conflicts.

The losses in a ground war against Afghanistan would be horrendous. If you don’t believe me, go to Whitener Hall and ask any history professor what happened the last time a super power tried to invade that country.

I support the fact that if Osama bin Laden is the mastermind of terror attacks against the United States, he must be brought to justice.

Once again, I would implore that the students at this university get active in politics and become aware of what acts our government commits and what it is capable of.

There are members of the U.S. Congress asking for an increase in our defense budget and misspending it while our servicemen and their families live in poverty.

There are others screaming for a declaration of war and licking their lips at the prospect of stealing our diminishing civil liberties.
William O. Douglas, associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, once said, “Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom.”

Vigilance not only includes being aware of threats from abroad, but also from within our own government and country. America must remember that until Sept. 11, the most brutal terrorist attack on American soil was by a white, Christian, former American soldier named Timothy McVeigh.

So let’s look at the facts before we start pointing at enemies and sending more innocent Americans and foreign civilians to their deaths.