The ethics of eggs
How nice it is to be able to write with praise for everyone! Kudos to UDS for switching to cage-free eggs! Good for the University for absorbing the costs! And well done to the Daily for continuing its excellent coverage on the topic!

Of course, as a philosopher, I can't resist one critical comment: it was reported that according to an animal science professor at the University, "chickens are actually bred to live in the battery-cage facilities." This is true in just the same sense as pigs - that are as smart and social as our pet dogs - are bred to be slaughtered and eaten. We breed animals for our purposes, and the industry deems our treatment of them acceptable when it doesn't cause adverse affects to us, the consumers.

The ethical standpoint is different from the standpoint of players in the market, and it demands greater compassion and reflection.

Valerie Tiberius
associate professor
department of philosophy

A little late
I respect the April 26 letter arguing for a continued

U.S. presence in Iraq, but it begs the question: if Iraq was bound to be less stable after the "ruthless dictator was deposed," and our ultimate goal is to avoid "genocide and a state in the center of the Middle East dominated by Islamo-Fascism," maybe we picked the absolute worst time to start a pre-emptive war there? Especially considering the most recent of

Saddam's atrocities cited by the letter writer occurred in 1991? Certainly the patience he advocates now would have been better spent prior to the invasion.

I'd be much more comfortable going forward with this troop surge if it came from different Washington minds than those behind the invasion in the first place.

Jim Sustacek
University employee

Broken promises
I'm not surprised by the efforts DFL House members in St. Paul are taking to make sure Minnesotans forget about what they were told last fall. They were told a vote for the Democrats was a vote for fiscal responsibility, a vote for lower college tuition and a vote for efficient government. Today, we couldn't be looking at a more opposite situation. The governor has threatened a veto on the more than $900 billion dollars in tax increases that the DFL has proposed.

What's funny is that the Democrats pride themselves on bills to lower property taxes, while there are 20 bills on the same calendar to raise taxes on cars, gas, homes, gifts, paint, alcohol, cosmetic surgery, even death; you name it, they want it. Tuition will continue to rise at the University, but guess which party was the first to offer tuition assistance to students once they were elected? The Republicans!

I'm not fooled by the broken promises from last fall's election, when citizens went to the polls angry about the war and mistakenly elected a group of crooks to represent us in St. Paul. All of us need to wake up and smell the tax-and-spend coffee beans.

Andy Post
University undergraduate

The insurgency
An important question not many people seem to be asking is: what is the "insurgency" in Iraq? The very word has been muddled into the equivalent of terrorism, yet, just as realistically, it signifies citizens of a state resisting the current rule. I am not advocating murder and fighting, yet by branding insurgents as simply "those who hate freedom," we misrepresent the formation of our own country.

What was our legitimacy for invading another state? Security? Spreading "democracy"? Do others have a legitimate right to resist imposition (and exploitation of resources) by a foreign country even if it is in the name of freedom?

Clumping vastly disparate groups fighting the occupancy under the same vague term is a powerful maneuver to dehumanize the Other; blanket-labeling the entire opposition as "Islamo-Fascists." Such binary thinking (good vs. evil) breeds the farce that American victory in Iraq can be measured with bullets and bombs, thus muting necessary questions regarding the true roots of the problem.

The most horrendous aspect of this war is the price Iraqi civilians have had to pay, and it is absurd to believe this troop surge will end sectarian fighting or "win hearts and minds."

Since there is no wishing (or bombing) such an amorphous enemy away, Mr. Bush must accept that opponents can have legitimate objections, and there is no solution through the perpetuation of violence.

Danny Margoles
University undergraduate