Opinion

Maulana Fazlullah; Hillary Clinton talks North Korea succession; Taro Aso; California budget signed, but 'financial situation remains precarious'.

This February, UC Irvine lost an esteemed professor. After his passing, Dr. Richard Kroll was lauded by colleagues and students alike for not only his excellence as an educator but also for his dedication to the written word. Professor Kroll's influential reputation also stems from one of the hallmarks of his teaching: tough-love grading that awarded student work with realistic grades, often to the dismay of surprised students.

It includes a $12.5 billion increase in taxes, a $14.8 billion cut to education, public transportation, health care and the judiciary system and $5.4 billion in new borrowing. It offers less child credit and higher tuition to the tune of 9 percent. The 2009-10 California state budget has something for everyone, though not in a way that most Californians, Republican or Democrat, will like.

California is in shambles. I am currently looking for paid work in the Sacramento area and wherever I apply, the advice is the same: stay away from the government. The situation is so bad that people are taking unpaid, forced vacations to keep their jobs. With the world economy the way it is, relief is almost entirely out of the question. Still, some people want to come to our aid.

The regents' Committee on Educational Policy voted unanimously for a controversial change in freshman admission standards that would take effect for fall 2012. On Wednesday, Feb. 4, the University of California regents gave preliminary approval to drop the requirement for two SAT subject exams, which would allow more students to be eligible for a review of their applications. Students would still need to take the main SAT or ACT entrance tests.

Picture this: You wake up each morning in a dirty cell and are hung by your wrists and interrogated while a government operative holds a gun to your head. This same operative takes a scalpel to your body, makes incisions and then pours stinging liquid into your open wounds.

All the heroes are dead. Their bodies lay strewn about cyberspace after being pulled apart by Internet jackals and our own curiosity. Our thirst to know more has driven us to slay the very people we admire, and the Internet lies in our hands like a bloody murder weapon. Modern media has made the idea of a hero impossible, thanks to overexposure.

Retired DEA: Writer Misunderstands View of Police; Gunless Students are Legally Defenseless on Campus; Myths Persist About Concealed Weapons on Campuses.

Things are now so bad here in California that it seems we can't even do what we're best at anymore: locking people up. Boy, do we know how to pack them in. Not only has California been sending prisoners to other states due to a lack of facilities, but it is also housing prisoners in our state's jails that are somewhere near 200 percent capacity, according to CNN.

While displaying your firm handshake, flex some muscles. In regard to his attempts at bipartisanship, President Barack Obama's White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel was quoted in The Wall Street Journal stating that Obama "has an open hand, but he has a very firm handshake."

I was intrigued by the proposal to make public students' evaluations of their UC Irvine instructors in the "Motion to Release Teacher Evaluations" article on Feb. 9. It would be a nice way to end the misguided dependence some have on RateMyProfessors.com (RMP), where anyone, student or not, can post an evaluation, and there is no control over sample sizes or bias of participants. A number of assertions made by interviewees in the New University article, however, need context and consideration before they serve as a basis for a new policy.

Ticketmaster and Live Nation, the largest ticket broker and the largest concert promoter, respectively, intend to merge, according to The New York Times. Barring anti-trust regulation, the merger would create the largest concert conglomerate worldwide.