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Kicking Brass and Taking Names
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Farrell is victorious in four of its first five competitions
By Thom Whalen
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Summertime Politics
By Kevin Semler
Many high school students spend their summers either at the beach, on vacations, or working summer jobs to help buy that wonderful 1980s used car they will be driving around in this year. I vowed that I wanted my last summer as a high school student to be one I would never forget. I certainly achieved my goal; I spent June through August traveling around the country, attending a series of leadership seminars ranging in location from Colorado Springs to Morrisville, New York.
In all there were four stops this summer; the first was The United States Naval Academy Summer Seminar in Annapolis, Maryland. The second trip was to Colorado Springs and the U.S. Air Force Academy. Stop number three was the American Legion Boy's State at SUNY Morrisville; finally, my last trip was to Washington D.C. and the National Student Leadership Conference. Of these four different programs, the most rewarding was Boy's State.
Boy's State is the annual gathering of the top 1100 high school seniors from around New York State. It took place this year at the SUNY Morrisville campus in upstate New York. We learned the inner workings of state and local governments and were given the opportunity to achieve our political ambitions. I arrived there with four of my Farrell classmates, Anthony Portelli, Daniel Mulhall, Matthew Stark, and Tommy Mazzaro. Soon after we arrived we were separated and we each became citizens of various different "cities" and "counties."
My political goal was to become a senator, where I would be able to have an effect on the happenings of this year's state. However, upon…
See 'Politics' on page 5
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Secrets From The Insider
By Andrew Winslow
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` On Friday, October 12th, the sophomore class met Dr. Jeffrey Wigand in a special assembly sponsored by Councilman James Oddo. Dr. Wigand was the subject of the movie The Insider, starring Russell Crowe. He was a top scientist for Brown and Williamson, the world's second largest tobacco company. Dr. Wigand became known around the nation because he exposed the true intentions of the tobacco companies around the world. He spoke to sophomores about the dangers of smoking. A few days before, many students were treated to a show starring Dr. Wigand, called "Secrets Through Smoke."
When Dr. Wigand learned of the dangers of smoking, he sued the company he worked for because it had withheld knowledge from the general public. Smoking kills 430,000 Americans annually, which the companies knew but denied. He also stated that 80% of
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the main points that struck the sophomores was that more people die from tobacco related than any other disease combined. Another key point was the amount of advertising used to influence the youth of America. The tobacco companies spend an average of 6.7 billion dollars in advertising each year, much of it directed towards teenagers.
After Dr. Wigand's oration, he played a brief clip from the movie made about him. He also took the time to answer questions that the students had. After the assembly, I asked many of the students about their opinions on smoking. Many students became more aware of the hazards of smoking. Although there are countless commercials and magazines ads telling us what not to do when it comes to cigarettes, I realized all that was needed was someone to tell us how disturbing reality is.
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