With Congress’s repeal late last year of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, the chief obstacle keeping the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) program off of Harvard’s campus was removed. On March 4 of this year, Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust signed an agreement with Navy Secretary Ray Mabus to formally re-establish the Naval ROTC’s presence on campus, presumably paving the way for agreements with the ROTC programs of the other branches of America’s armed services in the near future.

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was a discriminatory and unfair policy whose repeal should be praised. There are still relevant issues that need to be addressed immediately, such as the United States military’s refusal to allow transgender people to serve. Nonetheless, the American military and the American people are now better off for Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’s repeal. But why has Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell been the only thing keeping the military off Harvard’s campus? Who decided that this one policy was the only thing keeping ROTC away? Certainly, it served as an incentive to get Congress to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. But Harvard was using Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell merely as an excuse to avoid confronting the real issues informing Harvard’s longstanding and valid opposition to ROTC.

When Harvard objected to ROTC’s presence on its campus during the Vietnam War, it was not because of a discriminatory policy toward homosexuals, but rather because its role had changed from a means of ensuring the availability a large body of reserve soldiers in the event of war to a vocational program to train career officers. As the Crimson wrote in 1969: “The basic fact behind the growing opposition to ROTC is the increasingly inescapable realization that ROTC now wants to recruit college students for mainly military careers. The implication of this is that the presence of ROTC can no longer be justified by the old arguments about the need to maintain a civilian army. As the emphasis of ROTC shifts from training reserves to recruiting career officers, the view that ROTC ‘civilianizes’ the military–the rationale by which educators have long justified their uneasy relationship with the armed service–becomes untenable.”

While Harvard gave Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell as its reason for de-funding their ROTC program program entirely in 1995, the rationale cited in 1969 for keeping ROTC off campus is no less valid today than it was during the Vietnam War. Though it is unlikely that Harvard will see the protests, riots, and building occupations of the late 1960s again, there is still strong opposition to ROTC’s having more than an extra-curricular role in campus life. And as in the 1960s, ROTC is still a vocational program that gives credit for military training; this does not have a place on Harvard’s campus. Perhaps an alternative to the complete reacceptance of the ROTC program could be instead giving it extra-curricular status, though it is highly unlikely that this remedy would be acceptable to ROTC, particularly as ROTC objected to this alternative forty years ago.

This stance does not aim to disparage the military or its importance to our nation and its security in any way. Persisting discriminatory policies and questionable foreign interventions aside, every American owes an enormous debt to our servicemen and -women in every branch of the military. But while we should certainly accord our military the respect and gratitude it deserves, and while we should continue to laud its progress (however slow) toward equal rights and the repeal of discriminatory policies, Harvard should not feel as though it is under any type of obligation to allow ROTC to return to its campus. And, because a military presence on campus does not further the university’s educational mission—in fact, the military’s presence is felt by many to be detrimental to the educational mission—Harvard should not allow ROTC to return to campus. Moreover, the idea that Harvard will use its own resources to support ROTC, when the American military already has ample funds of its own, and when Harvard could better devote its resources toward its workers’ salaries and its building projects in Allston, is simply unacceptable.

Harvard certainly has the right to allow ROTC to return to campus. ROTC is a program that benefits the students that participate in it and our nation as a whole, and the decision to welcome ROTC back is ultimately Harvard’s prerogative. But allowing ROTC to return to campus represents a betrayal of the campus’ progress of the past forty years, even if it does at the same time represent a recognition of the university’s appreciation for the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.

By Channing Spencer

Phusion Projects, a beverage company based in Chicago, announced the launch of Four Loko on January 4, 2011 and the drink quickly gained a cult following, especially on college campuses and among younger drinkers. This was largely due to Phusion Project’s marketing strategy, which utilized colorfully eye-catching can designs that were clearly intended to tap into a younger consumer base. A favorite among college students, Four Loko contained 12% alcohol and high amounts of caffeine in each 23.5 ounce can; each can contains roughly as much alcohol as six beers. With the combined effects of caffeine and other stimulants, some have argued that the beverage also has the equivalent of five cups of coffee.  Four Loko’s popularity on campuses drew alarm, as various colleges reported cases of alcohol poisoning that were directly caused by consuming the drink. Harvard itself even issued a statement that advised students against the consumption of Four Loko. The frequency of alcohol poisoning cases earned the drink the notorious but not altogether discouraging nickname “blackout-in-a-can.”

Due to widespread health concerns, Four Loko and other caffeinated alcoholic drinks came under fire for the potent and dangerous mixture of alcohol and caffeine. On November 18, less than a year after the January launch of Four Loko, the Massachusetts Alcoholic Beverages Control Commission (MABCC) decided to restrict the sale of Four Loko and other caffeinated alcoholic beverages, which it described as “alcohol energy drinks” (AED). The decision was made a day after the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a statement concluding that alcoholic drinks that contain caffeine pose serious health risks that include binge drinking and alcohol poisoning.  As such, Massachusetts joined four other states—Michigan, Oklahoma, Utah, and Washington—in banning the caffeinated alcohol beverage.

The FDA urged Phusion Projects and the manufacturers of other AEDs to remove caffeine from their products on the grounds that the FDA had never previously approved such an addition. Although they adamantly denied claims that Four Loko was dangerous, Phusion Projects recently acquiesced to demands to remove caffeine from its product. Now caffeine-free, Four Loko is back on some store shelves.

While some agree with the FDA’s decision to ban Four Loko and other caffeinated alcohol drinks, others argue that the government had no right to intervene in the matter.

They view the government’s interference in this issue as another attempt to meddle in private matters. However, such a stance neglects the valid health concerns that were  observed, and moreover unjustly maligns the FDA. What is the role of the FDA, if not to protect consumers and to regulate food and drug products? Certainly, because the product was sold in stores to anybody of legal drinking age (and possibly many below it) and contained a combination of ingredients that had not previously been approved by the FDA, the government was well within its rights to investigate the issue and implement measures to protect consumers.

Interesting to note, however, is that despite Phusion Project’s compliance with the FDA’s request to make its product caffeine free, Four Loko remains a banned item in some states—including Massachusetts, which means Harvard students will now have to travel farther afield for their blackout-in-a-can.

By Bliss Leonard

The New York Times has long been the standard-bearer for quality journalism; its stories are well-researched, its access unparalleled, its influence unquestioned. All of these superlatives, however, cost a great deal of money; money that online ad revenue cannot provide. Thus, on March 28, 2011, the Times announced that it would be imposing a paywall for its online content. Just as previous readers paid for the Times to be delivered to their door, we too must now pay for the same content to be delivered to our computer screens or smartphone apps.

You may read up to twenty articles per month—and as many articles as you like that are linked from Google searches or external sites—before you have to start paying for what you read. The cheapest plan offered, which gives full access to the paper’s website (nytimes.com) and to an unlimited smartphone application, costs $15 for four weeks of access. A full year of access would then cost $190.

I will not argue that all news ought to be free; on the contrary, I do believe that the Times ought to be charging for its online content. An in-depth investigative piece posted online costs no less to produce than its print equivalent (save perhaps in the cost of the actual printing itself). Yet, as technology moves us further and further away from the physical, the smeary broadsheets of yore are swiftly giving way to the swift click of a smartphone. There is great value in having an institution dedicated to producing reliable and accurate information about the world we live in today. For many, however, $190 will seem too high a price to pay.

College students, in particular, would seem least able or willing to pay such an exorbitant fee for information that is mostly available elsewhere, though rarely so fluently expressed. The Times has in fact promised a discount for university affiliates of “eligible universities” (i.e., “those that purchase a qualifying number of copies of The New York Times as part of their newspaper readership program”). As always, “Restrictions apply.” The discount, however, would have to be truly massive to entice most students, who are accustomed to (illegally) getting almost everything ephemeral for free. There are already emails circulating lines of evasive codes and websites offering to “clear your New York Times history” for you. The current uncertainty of the particulars of this pricing plan compounds this confusion.

Furthermore, this policy disadvantages the very students least able to afford it. While purchasing mass subscriptions to the Times is undoubtedly common practice at Harvard and other elite institutions, public universities trying to make budget cuts will likely not choose to purchase enough subscriptions to make their students eligible for this discount. Substantive journalism ought to be paid for, but $190 (or anything close to it) is extraordinarily unreasonable for young people who may still be struggling to pay for their own education.

The Times ought to offer all readers with a valid “.edu” address a subscription at the rate of $12 per calendar year. By allowing students and other educational workers inexpensive access, the Times will not only help to create a knowledgeable and engaged young citizenry, but also likely create a large future base of full-price subscribers. Students who might otherwise try to manipulate the system to stiff the Times will likely be willing to pay such a nominal charge (the rough equivalent of three lattes). These same students, used to having the amazing breadth and depth of the Times literally at their fingertips, will be far more likely to pay for continued access once they graduate.

Obviously, as a private corporation, The New York Times can charge whatever it likes or thinks the market would tolerate. Yet for an organization dedicated to promoting informed global engagement, the Times’ current proposal seems somewhat draconian. To reach as many readers as possible and to sustain its impressive population of online readers into future decades, the Times needs to attract students. Should the Grey Lady fail to tweak this subscription plan enough, the outlook looks dire.  A world informed by Gawker or Huffington Post would be more entertaining, but appallingly shallow. For its own sake and for ours, the New York Times must alter its pricing plan.