Thursday, September 25, 2003
ASUC it up
As far as the ASUC circus goes, take these two quotes to realize just how deluded/selfish/arrogant/vain some people can be:
Anu Joshi: "... (ASUC External Affairs Vice President Anu) Joshi claimed that the ASUC has full jurisdiction over its funds, which she said are not part of the university."
Jessica Quindel: "Quindel defended the spending, saying the Graduate Assembly has a right to make its own financial decisions."
Me: Summary of how the ASUC and GA get money:
The authority of the ASUC and GA come entirely from their coffers. They have no police authority, or democratic authority, or actual government authority. The only reason anyone gives a damn what they say and do is because they have money which can be used for things. Otherwise, they're meaningless
The money doesn't grow on trees, though. It comes from student fees. Mandatory student fees. We pay the mandatory student fees not because the ASUC and GA are our government (which they are not, i.e. they don't have any authority to collect taxes) but because it's part of the tuition that is paid to the UC Regents because the UC Regents requires students/sponsors to pay it in order for students to get educated here.
Thus, the money of the ASUC and GA, and consequently, the authority of both bodies, belong to the UC Regents, not some student coalition, and certainly not to individuals within the bodies. Since it's Regent money, it's bound by the same restrictions the Regents are bound by.
If the ASUC wants "full jurisdiction over its funds," or the GA wants to "the right to make its own financial decisions," said bodies had better start doing some serious fundraising so that they no longer have to rely on student fees. Until they no longer receive Regent money (i.e. student fees), though, they are bound by the restrictions which are attached to all Regent money.
On a more moralistic note, the money isn't there for the personal political goals of the officeholders. It's there so that the ASUC and GA can provide services to the students. Quindel has made something of a case for GA spending (Graduate student research is frequently based on things which would be banned for Prop 54, even if it is wuss research), but Joshi certainly hasn't made one for ASUC spending, other than "We cannot allow it to pass because... because.... it's progressive... and we're progressive... and... and... yeah."
And regardless of the legitimacy of Quindel's claim that the failure of Prop 54 is important to the Graduate community, it's still bloody illegal. Quindel has yet to abstract herself from her own personal framework of "how right and wrong should be defined according to my own personal beliefs" to "how right and wrong are legally defined because no one trusts my own personal beliefs."
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