In city politics which are nonpartisan, I have never been one that looks forward to saying “I told you so.” It doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that I’m worried about any sort of unity within the city government or their constituents, but that these people control quite a bit of control over our pocketbooks and our city’s wellbeing. Recently, the newly elected mayor and the Lubbock city council with the exception of two council members voted to raise property taxes in Lubbock again. They also decided to set aside $1.5 million dollars for red light cameras when the terrible ordinance passes.

I can see how many Texas Tech students wouldn’t be interested in Lubbock city politics, at least until an issue here affected them. The red light camera situation would affect everyone in the city. Instead of looking out for our citizens’ safety, the council saw a projected number of extra revenue from these cameras and immediately fell in love with the idea of having big brother watching over our traffic systems instead of having police do their jobs. They might not be in the mood to, since the city council also decided to cut city employees’ health benefits due to the so-called lack of money. They were, however able to set aside 1.5 million dollars for these cameras when the ordinance passes. I wouldn’t be happy even if the council tried to make it sound like they were worried about the safety of their constituents, but they’ve made it blatantly clear that all they want is to suck more money out of our wallets, so they can waste more of the city’s money on things we don’t necessarily need.

With all things considered, including the annexation of the strip and the red light cameras, Lubbock is looking to pull a projected 8-12 million dollars in extra revenue which apparently is still not enough. Last Wednesday, the council voted to increase property taxes, while cutting city employees’ health benefits. They did decide to give the employees a raise however, which is negated by the fact that their health benefits were cut“

While all this was going on, one city councilwoman was surprised when the media was holding all this under close scrutiny. “I think it’s really bad when people grandstand in the news media, when we have given our utmost, and I have depended on the Supreme Being for guidance and that’s why I’m supporting this budget,” piously spouted Councilwoman Linda DeLeon last Wednesday. However, when KCBD Vice President Dan Jackson contacted DeLeon about how she would vote, she told him that it was illegal for him to even ask that. She’s wrong again, because it’s not. Who’s grandstanding now?

Mayor David Miller said on Wednesday that he considers himself a “conservative redneck republican” but was still voting to raise taxes because he considers the budget that they’ve laid out to be a responsible budget. On the other side, Councilman John Leonard, one of the two real conservatives on the city council disagreed with the council’s budget. "We ought to live within our means and with the $8-12 million revenue coming next year, I disagree with raising taxes,” Leonard said Wednesday. Councilman Gary Boren also voted against the tax hike.

While Miller fancies himself a conservative for media’s sake, he’s shown us that it’s not true. Not only has he outright lied about what he would fight for in his campaign, but he’s making the life of Lubbock citizens more difficult. These people are trying to price Lubbockites out of their own homes because most of the council lets the city manager, Lee Ann Dumbauld tell them what to set the taxes at, and not the other way around like it should be. Miller hasn’t kept his campaign promises, and chalks it up to that he didn’t know then what he knows now. I don’t think that’s the case. I think he’ll say anything to get elected, and then do what he wants for the rest of his term. Lubbock is a nice city, and it used to be quite affordable to live in. Now, these people who actually have the money readily available to pay for these increases don’t seem to care about those who have a more difficult time paying all the bills. They’re only one vote, right? The next city elections may be quite a while away, but don’t vote for someone because their campaign ads make them seem nice. Look at their voting records, and see who actually fights for us. This is the same for state and national politics as well. We elect these officials to work for their constituents, and if we hold them to it, things like this won’t happen again.

Video games have been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. When I got my Sega Genesis, games like Street Fighter, Road Rash and WWF Royal Rumble began occupying a great deal of my time after school everyday. Since I kept my grades up and didn’t have any ill behavioral effects from these games, my collection grew. I then gained a Nintendo 64 and Starfox. From there, I gained Goldeneye and Perfect Dark. Having moved on with a PC, a Gamecube and XBOX, I’ve gained a whole slew of new games such as Mafia, Fable, and all of the notorious Grand Theft Auto games. What do these all have in common? They’re all violent!

Despite my long history of violent games, I’ve never killed anyone. I’ve never shot up a school, and I haven’t driven my truck into a police blockade. While I still may be young, I don’t foresee doing any of those. Jack Thompson, a notable Florida attorney seems to think differently. Thompson has made headlines recently due to his crusades to keep violent video games off the shelves, and has never relented in his bashing of those of us that play games in general. Thompson issued his “challenge” to the gaming industry entitled “A Modest Video Game Proposal” for someone to make a game in which the CEO of Take-Two Interactive, the parent company of the creators of the Grand Theft Auto series, is to be killed in an “disturbingly violent manner.” If this were to occur, Thompson said he would donate $10,000 dollars to the charity of Take-Two CEO Paul Eibeler’s favorite charity. The game was created, and not surprisingly, Thompson declined to make the donation, claiming his proposal was satire.

Soon thereafter, the creators of the popular webcomic Penny Arcade made the donation to the Entertainment Software Association Foundation in Thompson’s name. Thompson then called the Seattle police department claiming that the two artists were leading a “campaign of harassment” against him. The charges were ignored. These are fairly normal actions from the man who is leading the crusade against games. Instead of having a real argument against games, Thompson must resort to threats to seem credible due to the lack of information defending his cases.

On the political front, Senators Hillary Clinton (D-NY), Joe Lieberman (D?-CT), and Evan Bayh (D-IN) have introduced “The Family Entertainment Protection Act” which would pass the regulation of video games to the United States Government instead of the separate and definitely sufficient Entertainment Software Ratings Board, an independent ratings board. Amazingly enough, the Family Entertainment Protection Act offers no regulation for other forms of entertainment such as movies, television, and the like. According to the Video Game Voters Network website (www.videogamevoters.org), the ESRB would continue to rate games as they have in the past, but the United States government will have federally mandated reviews of their ratings at taxpayer expense, of course. States like Illinois, California, and Michigan have been working to legislate even harsher restrictions against games.

I don’t have a problem with people being required to show identification to buy these games, because it’s not really that big of a deal. An elementary school kid probably shouldn’t be playing San Andreas, but being an advocate of smaller government, we don’t need to blow more federal dollars on this issue to make sure that little Timmy won’t try to run his school chums over with a tank. The burden of monitoring what their kids do should fall on the parents and not the government. People like Jack Thompson and Hillary Clinton are trying to pull all aspects of personal responsibility out of our lives by throwing more money at these problems. Kids who go into their schools to kill their classmates have many more issues than a mere video game can bring, and terrorists don’t decide to bomb places because a game built up their rage.

Contrary to popular belief, there are plenty of gamers who can hold an argument without “UR RONG K THX OMG ROFL.” We need to make sure that people like Jack Thompson and Hillary Clinton don’t become the end of our entertainment as we know it. If you’re a parent, take responsibility for your kids and watch what they play, and that they know it’s only fantasy. Many people our age love to sit back and enjoy a game, be it sports, RPG, or anything else. Thompson and Clinton’s generation didn’t have games like we do, and it’s important that they be led to understand that our generation votes, and we deserve our freedoms as much as they do.