Last week in New Hampshire, Sen. Barack Obama openly addressed a crowd about his drug and alcohol experimentation while in high school. Of course, any politician openly admitting to the use of illegal substances is bound to experience a backlash, and the question became: How many details are too many when you're a presidential hopeful?

You've got to love this time of the semester. We're past midterms, but finals are looming closer than we realized. Research papers and projects remain untouched while their deadlines quickly approach. Registration has put you in the mindset of next semester before this one is over and the workload seems larger every time you look at it.

Two weeks ago, anyone walking around campus and staring at their shoes would have noticed an abundance of information chalked on the sidewalks.

Last Thursday, I desperately rushed into the computer lab in the basement of the Union to print off a last-minute assignment. There, I found the floor completely covered in water. The pipes had sprung a leak, and I can only assume that the nearby bathrooms, blocked off with yellow caution tape, had something to do with the same problem. When I returned to my dorm later that night, after swiping myself in without being asked for my G00 number, I learned that a tile in one of the study lounges in my building had disintegrated. As a result, the lounge was covered in rainwater.

This week, New York State officials decided not to reapply for Title V funding, which has funded abstinence-only sex education throughout the state since 1998. Joining at least eleven other states, New York will instead allocate state funding to safe-sex education programs. All programs will be medically accurate and will teach public school students to make healthy choices by offering accessible options.

On Thursday, Sept. 13, President Bush announced that he will remove 30,000 troops from Iraq by the summer of 2008, a relatively small percentage of the estimated 168,000 U.S. troops that are currently in Iraq.

For many people, one of the most attractive aspects of Geneseo is its quaint, small, college-town atmosphere. Undoubtedly, it was the ingrained idea of Geneseo as a largely conflict-free environment that made it such a surprise to many in the community last year when the student group Fighting Against Racial Injustice formed and made the courageous statement that Geneseo is, for many minority students, not the nurturing environment many of us consider it to be. The group proclaimed their message that in fact, minority students, particularly blacks, feel alienated and oppressed on this campus.