Editor’s Note: Simos Farrell is currently sailing across the Atlantic Ocean, miles away from all contact with civilization and The Minaret. Since our newspaper wouldn’t be the same without an appearance from our esteemed commentary editor, we offer the following Farrell favorite from the archives. Loyal readers who remember this classic from a year ago will no doubt be glad to see its return, while new readers are in for a genuinely Farrellian treat.

After a whole issue dedicated to Student Government, it is incumbent on us at The Minaret to talk about something that more than six percent of the population cares about. I was thinking about writing on the subject of fraternities and how, given the fact that they tend to vote as a bloc, they might account for 95 percent of SG voters this year. But then I realized ‘mdash; hey, good for them. Like elderly gun nuts and billionaire oil tycoons, they have the passion to make themselves heard. But what, one may ask, will bring the voters out of Ybor and the Spartan Club and inspire them to vote full-force?

To be fair, is not easy to galvanize the population. Much to my chagrin, the multitudes have not flocked to join the Taco Salad Restoration Committee, a revolutionary guerilla front aimed at redistributing the wealth of Sodexho to the starving people of UT. Larger measures must be taken in order to ensure participation in the campus’ political process. I have pondered the possibilities with some of the greatest philosophers of our day ‘mdash; Steve Knauss, etc. ‘mdash; and I think I know just the thing to make it happen. Ladies and gentlemen ‘- we must take up arms and annex the University of South Florida.

Now, some of you may think this idea preposterous. However, I would like to point out that, once USF is bulldozed to the ground, the land can be used for thousands upon thousands of parking spaces. This may seem impractical now, but with things going as they are, there will be a line of UT residence halls stretching from the current bounds of our campus to the former site of USF sometime in fall of 2008.

For those who do not have cars, the hearty, but shiftless, population of USF can be trained to pull rickshaws. If we act quickly, we can launch a pre-emptive strike, liberating Hillsborough Community College (Ybor City campus, naturally), and overwhelm our enemies from there before they know what hit them.

A full-scale assault on USF will give our ROTC population the chance to earn much-needed real-world experience in infantry maneuvers and counter-insurgency. It is only right that we should expand our domain this way: after all, the forefathers of our university chose not to name us ‘the Athenians,’ calling to mind obnoxious old men in sheets who wandered about all day, discussing useless concepts like the so-called ‘meaning of life.’ No: we are named after the Spartans, trained from birth in the arts of war; a people who, if you asked them to compare and contrast the Expressionist and Impressionist movements in art, would probably stab you in the eye.

But, most importantly, the struggle against USF will give the UT student body the chance to unite for one purpose like never before. Campus politics will be carried on with true vitality as we discuss how to divvy up the plunder of our new conquest. There will finally be debates conducted and action taken that will inspire the student body to participate. No doubt there will be disagreements, and factions will form. But that’s the spirit of politics.

If we are not careful, of course, one faction will shout down the others with sensationalist rhetoric and self-serving appeals to morality. They will twist the will of the people to their own ends, and apathy will again crush the democratic process while a few well-connected aristocrats become more and more powerful, eventually changing the rules so that only their agenda is acceptable in public discourse. But I trust that the UT student body would not allow such a terrifying fate to come to pass.

And if it does, we can always go visit Adam at the pub.