NEWS!
2012: Obama vs. ?
By Sara Swann
Currently there are ten G.O.P., or Republican, Presidential Candidates running in the 2012 Election against President
Obama, nine men and one woman with ages ranging in age from 51 to 76. The candidates seemingly have diverse opinions, political
experience, and campaign platforms. Here are basic summaries of each candidate in order of youngest to oldest:
· Jon Huntsman (51 years old) is the former Governor of Utah with billionaire roots.
He can speak fluent Mandarin thanks to his Mormon missions in Taiwan. He is more moderate on social issues than other candidates
and his religion could cost him votes.
· Rick Santorum (53 years old) is the former United States Senator of Pennsylvania
with considerate amounts of political experience. He addresses issues such as same-sex marriages and wars in Iraq during debates.
He has worked as a Fox News commentator and has also written columns for the Philadelphia Inquirer.
· Michele Bachman (55 years old) is the United States Representative of Minnesota.
She is consistently conservative on social issues. She heavily supports and is active in the Tea Party movement. While this
is an advantage in some ways, it may also cost her votes.
· Gary E. Johnson (58 years old) is the former Governor of New Mexico and a libertarian,
which means conservative on monetary reasons and liberal on social issues. He is well known for trying to legalize marijuana.
He supports same-sex marriages, abortion, and looser immigration rules; however, he also opposes the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
· Rick Perry (61 years old) is the longest serving Governor of Texas and is also the
Chairman of the Republican Governors Association. He is popular with both the social conservatives and the Tea Party movement.
His timing hurts his chances because it’s only been a few years since a Republican former Governor of Texas was in office
for eight years.
· Mitt Romney (64 years old) is the former Governor of Massachusetts who has focused
mainly on creating jobs and the economy throughout his campaign. He is the son of a former politician. He has moderate stances
on gay rights and abortion which concerns conservatives.
· Herman Cain (65 years old) is the former CEO of Godfather’s Pizza. He is currently
traveling across America to gain support. According to primary voters he is not very well known although he ran for a Senate
seat in 1994.
· Buddy Roemer (68 years old) is the former Governor of Louisiana. He first ran for
Congress as a Democrat but switched to Republican about eight years later. He has been out of politics for two decades and
has not been invited to join any debates or candidate forums.
· Newt Gingrich (68 years old) is a former House Speaker who is known for his creative
thinking skills. Unfortunately he is also known for his sexual affairs which led to his two divorces. Lack of religious association
may also cause him to lose votes.
· Ron Paul (76 years old) is the United States Representative of Texas with 20 years
of political experience in Congress. He is an outspoken critic and has been called the “intellectual godfather of the
Tea Party.” Nonetheless, many Tea Party conservatives are not onboard with his beliefs, and this may cause him to struggle
with his campaign.
SPORTS CORNER
By Brennan Smith, Sports Editor
Cross Country: On October 12, Cross Country competed at the MSAC tournament. Five girls—Tiffany Mosely, Hampton Zobrist, Sydney McManus, and Isabelle Rogner—placed
in the top fifty. Two boys—Trey Cochran and Levi Snedegar—placed
in the top fifty. On October 5, the Cross Country team competed at Charleston
Catholic. At that race, six girls placed in the top fifty and two finished in
the top twenty. Shay Gadomski placed fourteenth and Tiffany Mosely placed twentieth.
Football: The Football team won its first game this season against Spring
Valley on September 23 with a score of 17-14. The team then won games at Mingo
and in its home game against Nitro. This made the first time in ten years that
the Football team had won three games in a row. The Mingo game score was 33 to
17. At the home game, East beat Nitro 64 to 6.
In addition, Josh Grubbs was fifty yards short of breaking Jason Hoke’s all-time rushing record for a single
game.
Golf: On September 15, the Golf team traveled to Covington where it finished
in first and second place with totals of 166 and 176, respectively. At States’,
Walker Dent was the only finalist from East and shot 106 and 93.
Soccer: Girls’ Soccer stats are 11-7-1 and are ranked twentieth in
the state. Girls’ beat Riverside 4 to 2 on October 8. The team also beat Spring Valley 2 to 1 on October 6. The
Girls’ beat Princeton 2-1 in the first round of the Sectional tournament. The
Boys’ Soccer team stats are 5-10-2. On October 8, Boys’ soccer defeated
Oak Hill 3 to 1 at East’s Senior Night. Boys’ also beat Princeton
2 to 1 on October 11. The team lost 0 to 4 to Woodrow Wilson. Boys’ lost again to Woodrow Wilson in the first round of the sectionals 0-2.
Volleyball: On September 23 and 24 Varsity competed in its home tournament. The team made it to the semifinals out of twelve teams. On October 1, Varsity also made it to the semifinals in the “Queen of the Hill” Tournament
at George Washington. Varsity’s stats are 17-7-6 and ranked as the sixth
in the state out of thirty-nine teams. The individual players are having a strong
season as well. Laura Baker has sixty-two aces, Abby Brown has 243 kills, Ashlee
Seldomridge has 546 assists, Katie Shaver has thirty-two blocks, and Cassie Ford has 246 digs.
In addition, October 4 was Volleyball’s “Dig Pink” night, where it raised $450 for the Susan G. Komen
Breast Cancer Research Foundation. JV’s stats are 21-7-1.
YOU’RE A GOOD MAN...
By Eric Graves
What do you get when
you mix a dog, five elementary school children, a blanket, a kite, a piano, musical theatre, and an airplane? You get “You’re
a Good Man, Charlie Brown,” East’s entry in this year’s West Virginia Theatre Conference at West Virginia
Wesleyan College in Buckhannon.
For the past four years
the school’s award-winning theatre department has attended the all-state competition. Three out of four attendances
have ended in victory for East. These results have moved them to at the regional South Eastern Theatre Conferences in Lexington,
KY, Atlanta, and Chattanooga.
“You’re a
Good Man, Charlie Brown,” follows a day in the life of the infamous “Peanuts” characters created by Charles
Schulz. The musical centers on Charlie Brown (played by Garrett Sheppard) as he tries to make it through lunch-hour, inspire
his baseball team to victory, and successfully fly a kite for the first time.
Along the way, he is
harassed by the overtly crabby Lucy van Pelt (Olivia Hancock) and receives advice from her baby-blanket totting brother Linus
(Cal Stroud). He receives encouragement from his baby sister Sally (Emily Arthur) and intellectually stimulating remarks from
his friend Schroeder (Andrew Adams). Yet, perhaps one of the most daunting tasks, however, is remembering to bring supper
to his pet dog Snoopy (Eric Graves).
All-star choreographer
Michael Sharp returns to East to provide movement and guidance. Mr. Samuel Yates and senior Brennan Smith oversee the musical
as director and stage manager.
Performances
are November 1st and 2nd at Eastern Greenbrier Middle School. East travels to the West Virginia Theatre
Conference will be November 4th – 6th.
OPINIONAL EDITORIALS!
AUTO-FAKE!
Opinion/Editorial
By Maty Swartz
You click on iTunes, just to see if your favorite song happens to
be at the top of the charts. For those of us who actually have good musical taste, this is usually not the case. A vast majority of the top-downloaded “songs” aren’t even songs to begin with—they’re
just synthesized, auto-tuned pieces of garbage.
Today’s music industry requires absolutely zero talent. Just prance around the
stage, “sing” about partying, sex, or drugs, and—BOOM! You, my friend, have just landed yourself a contract
with one of the top recording agencies.
Ke$ha, for instance, basically just talks in a nasally, irritating voice about her adventures
in partying. In her infamous song, “Tik-Tok,” she clearly states, “I brush my teeth with a bottle of Jack.”
That’s both classy and attractive!
Most of the artists who do not sell their souls (and dignity) to the music industry make up
for their morality in lack of talent. For example, America has fallen head-over-heels in love with the wholesome, sweet girl-next-door,
Taylor Swift. Her first self-titled album seemed to have a common theme: I like this
boy, but he doesn’t like me because he’s with this other girl. I’m
the only one who really gets him…You get the point. At first, we all felt bad for poor Taylor. As “Fearless”
dropped, however, we all began to notice a melodic pattern: everything from the lyrics that came straight from Taylor’s
heart to the similar chord sequences seemed like a duplication of her previous album. Naturally, it was no surprise that her
latest album, Speak Now was sculpted from the same mold. I applaud her efforts,
but it goes without saying that she is in desperate need of some new material.
Thankfully, the music world is not completely dominated by Ke$has, Miley Cyruses, Taylor
Swifts, and Pitbulls. My hat goes off to artists such as Adele, Mumford and Sons, and Florence and the Machine. They are among
the true musicians who actually possess talent. Adele, for example, has a gorgeous, resonating voice that soulfully projects
her fierce and truthful lyrics. Her performances never fail to leave her audience breathless. What sets Adele apart from the
rest of her competition is pure, raw talent.
IT’S NANOWRIMO TIME!
Optional/Editorial By Rebecca Hilyard
It’s November and
that means that NaNoWriMo has started yet again! November is National Novel Writing Month, or Nanowrimo for short. The Challenge?
Write a 50,000 word novel in the month of November. The Prize? Warm fuzzy feelings, self-confidence, and bragging rights.
Sounds hard, maybe even impossible, right? Well, it is hard, but not impossible.
Nanowrimo, was founded
by Chris Baty, a resident of Berkley, California, started the project as a fun challenge between for Bay Area residents in
1999. Some Nanowrimo writers have even been published. Among the first to publish a Wrimo book was Sarah Gruen, one of her
later Nanowrimo publications is better known as the bestseller Water for Elephants.
The group moved to host
a site in 2000 as news spread, and in 2007 Baty founded the Offices of Letters and Light, a non-profit that promotes reading
and writing for people of all ages from around the world.
OLL also hosts several
other writing challenges, including Script Frenzy, which basically a Nano for screenplays, and Young Writers’ Program,
which promotes writing goals for K-12 students.
Nanowrimo promotes reading,
as well as writing. Six years after the original Nano idea was born, Baty and colleges partnered with Room to Read, and began
donating 50% of its net profits help build children’s libraries in areas such as Cambodia and Laos.
Nanowrimo is a great
tool for getting started on a novel or continuing one that has already been started. Several Nano winners have gone on to
get publishing deals with their Wrimos; November is for getting the story out, not editing every sentence.
Many have completed their
novels, and in 2009 the site had a 19.2% win rate, and over 2.4 billion words were written.
Some of the bonuses of going
to the site and becoming a member are motivational talks, funny pod cast, advice from other Wrimoers, the shared angst of
with over a million other amateur writers, and the purple word meter with a star on your profile if you meet the 50,000 word
goal.
If you’re interested
in signing up at the Nonawrimo website and becoming an ‘official’ winner, here are a few guidelines:
·
Go to www.nanowrimo.org and make an account
so you can get your words counted by the robotic word counting program
·
Write a 50,000 word novel, not just random
gibberish
·
Be the sole author of your novel; they
don’t count co-writes
·
Submit the BEFORE 12:00 a.m. Dec. 1st;
the program starts counting offerings Nov. 25th.
ETHICS VS. RELIGION
Opinion/Editorial By Karessa
McClung
There are respectable Christians and vile Christians. Martin Luther King, Jr. was, and still is, a highly
respected religious man. Some people look at him more for what he fought for and accomplished opposed to his religion. Adolf
Hitler claimed himself to be a Christian, and in society today we view him as a rejected and repulsive mark on history.
Peace Muslims such as Malcolm X is one of the history’s “most well known human activists” and foul Muslims
such as Osama Bin Laden is viewed as a monster.
Alternatively, there are ethical people who live without religion, such as Bill Gates, and bigoted people
who live without religion, such as Joseph Stalin. Religion does not always correlate with ethics, which brings me back
to the question—should and does it matter if society knows your religion?
At the beginning of the year a “bell ringer” was presented to me asking, “What are ethics, and where
do we learn them?” According to dictionary.com the word ethics means, “A system of moral principles: the ethics of a culture.”
The teacher proceeded while clearly expressing his
own religion, Christianity. The class agreed that moral principles originated from family, society, and media. Though the
students have different backgrounds a consensus emerged that ethics are not formed by religion. We live with the high pride
that is freedom of religion; it’s what our nation was formed upon, but maybe today we have forgotten respect in all
this freedom. Today, I see, unfortunately, people disrespecting other human beings simply on the grounds of their religious
beliefs.
Making decisions based on respect for others should
be what is socially correct. Every person is one’s self. No single person is controlled by what is told to one’s
self.
Have a brain, even more so, have a heart. Start respecting
people. Throw out your religion. Just think about what the world would be like without religion.
