In these times, nothing is permanent. I’m going to say it again for dramatic purposes: Nothing is permanent. Nobody is forced to stick with any decision they make.

You can have a tattoo removed. You are encouraged to repent for your sins. Abortion cures pregnancy. People can remain forever anonymous on the Internet so they never have to be held accountable for what they say. There is a pill you can take after a night of drinking when you decide that tomorrow’s hangover won’t be worth tonight’s debauchery. White lies are commonplace.

None of those things are bad in their entirety. It is the accountability for those things that I have issues with.

Convicted murderers can change their minds. We’ve all heard it at some point: “I didn’t mean to do it. I didn’t want to. It was an accident.” Even if clear guilt and intent have been established, they can change their minds. Sure, they may be proven guilty, but they changed their mind about what they have already done.

The only permanent decision a person has left to make and have no opportunity to change his or her mind about is suicide. Now, before everyone flies off the deep end at me, let me say that I only advocate taking one’s own life strictly in the utmost Darwinian of circumstances.

I said in the beginning that nothing is permanent. And some days, I take some comfort in that. I believe someone once said “A dishonest man you can always trust to be dishonest.”

Notice I said some days. The rest of the days, I wonder what half-truths and whole lies are flying past me as the time trickles by. I have reached a point where I don’t know who I can trust to listen to.

Once again, before the hate mail pours in, allow me to say that I am, by no means, claiming to be the most honest man on the block. Quite often, I’m just as guilty as the next guy. But I have improved.

In recent years, I have made a commitment to myself not to lie about the things that don’t matter, and to do my best to not lie about the things that do. I have decided that when I make a decision, I am going to stand behind it 100 percent. That doesn’t mean that I won’t admit when I’m wrong. It means that I will admit that I took an incorrect stance on a subject, instead of trying to reword my position to make myself sound ‘less wrong.’

If you think that there is a shred of truth to anything that I have said, then please, take the time to think about what you do as a person. If you tell someone that you will call them next weekend, call them. If you broke your neighbor’s lawn gnome, let them know about it. If you get drunk and have “Bubba” tattooed on your cheek … go ahead and get it fixed. But don’t lie about it when your buddies ask who “Barbara” is. If you make a decision, stand behind it and accept the consequences, good or bad. You’ll be doing us all, including yourself, a favor.

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This season of the Most Extreme Elimination Challenge, or MXC, promises to be the most absurd, over-the-top, jaw-dropping, laughter-inducing season to date.

For those of you who have never taken the time to watch this late-night Spike TV original, think “Jackass” meets “Mystery Science Theater 3000.” A hit Japanese game show has been re-voiced by seedy Americans and the laughs reach epic proportions.

Vic Romano and Kenny Blankenship are back for Season Five, and they have pulled out all the stops. Captain Teneal and Guy Le Douche have also returned to ensure that everyone gets their fair share of tongue-in-cheek laughs. If you have ever watched “MXC” and felt that the suggestive innuendo went too far, you haven’t seen anything yet.

In the season opener, the gang invites the religious right to take on gay rights, and all hell breaks loose. From a cross-dressing Vic to a mock crucifixion, this first show is guaranteed to make half of you pass out from laughter and the other half write to your congressman.

The hits are worse than ever, and the “Most Painful Eliminations of the Day” segment will have you firing up your TiVos to make sure you don’t miss a second.

This season begins on Friday, Nov. 10, at 11 p.m., so stock up on beer and pizza, invite your friends over, lock your doors and don’t miss a second of this action-packed, hilarious show.

George Washington once warned the nation of the inherent dangers involved with becoming a two-party political system. Here we are, 200 years later, stewing in the mess we’ve created.

The masses are compelled to blindly label themselves as a Democrat or a Republican. Elections are close, so of course I’m ravaged daily by the zoo crews of political activists desperately trying to recruit me for their party.

Sorry, gang. I’m not going to RSVP to that little get-together. The other day, I was almost able to refuse joining the College Democrats and Republicans simultaneously. I was approached by one, then moments later by the other. I passed out an abrupt “No” to each person and was on my way.

What seemed strange to me was my accompanying crowd. I received looks of confusion, frustration and even a hint of anger. The first comment was “Why aren’t you joining either party?” It was followed with “Looks like we’ve lost another person to apathy.” The icing on the cake came in the form of “I can’t believe people like you don’t care about politics!”

Are you kidding me? Apparently, some of you have become so numb to the two-party system that an independent boggles the mind. I don’t need a label to tell me how I should vote. I am a rational, intelligent human being who is capable of making decisions on my own. Unfortunately, our politicians seem to struggle with that.

Almost every politician limits his or her perspective on important issues down to whether or not they’re following the respective ‘liberal’ or ‘conservative’ definitions. They think it will help win votes. And because of our brainwashed society, it does. The masses vote for the politician that best suits their values without ever taking the time to truly think about what their values are anymore.

The only people left to take individual stances on individual issues are the independents. But, because of our dedication to this pointless system, an independent never becomes empowered. We make ourselves vote for a person that may agree with us on one issue but takes an opposing stance on another issue.

But wait! Nobody is forcing you to vote for that person! Six presidential candidates made it to the ballots in 2004. Yet, the only two anyone bothered to talk about were Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum. Nothing stopped anyone from voting for any of the other four candidates. Polls indicated that the majority of the population was just trying to vote for one of the ‘lesser of two evils’. In reality, they were voting for one of the lesser of the two evils that had the most common two labels in our political system.

When voting comes around this fall, please don’t vote for or against an issue because “that’s just how Democrats are voting” or “this is too liberal for my Republican tastes”. Vote for or against an issue because that is truly what you believe is right for yourself, not because some group told you to.

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I would never try to hinder somebody’s rights to free speech. But, I will say that I prefer intelligent free speech over talking just to be heard.

Many people bore witness to the anti-homosexuality display outside of the student union last week. I had a moment of weakness in which I thought that I would be able to actually talk some sense into these self-righteous, arrogant jerks. I was dead wrong.

The mouth of the group had apparently trained himself not to be cornered by silly things such as logic and critical thinking. No, he had obviously been through it all before, and he would not fall into any of my argumentative traps. He swore that the Bible was an inch for inch, pound for pound, factual decree of what had occurred on Earth.

I am not here to debate truth in religion, but I think that even the most Christian of us all can agree that there may be tiny parts of the Bible that endured a hint of exaggeration over the past dozen or so centuries.

Throughout the day, this meager group of five or six people shouted their blind hatred of homosexuals to whoever was unfortunate enough to pass by. Their commitment was undaunted by anyone offering an opposing standpoint.

I have come to realize that there are people on this Earth crazy enough to believe whatever they want for no reason, whatsoever. I’m over that. You can believe that a ball of yarn is the creator of the universe for all I care. But what I don’t understand is choosing to air your grievances through a medium that brings no benefit to anyone.

This is what ultimately puzzles me. I refuse to think that there is someone out there that truly believes shouting hate speech will benefit anyone. There had to be an alternate motive.

I would be relieved to hear that this whole ploy was merely a social experiment designed to test the reactions of a group in this situation. It would satisfy my curiosity to know that these people had lost a bar bet and the wager was offending as many people as possible in the shortest amount of time.

I don’t believe I’ll ever find out what the group’s intention really was. But I do take comfort in the fact that the people of this campus were open-minded enough to show their discontent with these people instead of just walking by.

Many students and professors alike showed this group that if they want to take a stance in a public medium, they had better be prepared for a rebuttal. Also, don’t think for one second that blindly quoting irrelevant passages from a book passes for an intelligent answer to every question that comes your way.

And to those demonstrators, you didn’t fool anyone. Your methods most likely didn’t change anyone’s minds about homosexuality. All you did was cement the notion that open bigotry and blind hatred will not thrive on this campus.

You certainly have shown all of us your stance on homosexuality. In doing so, you also proved a lack of intelligence, reasoning, logic and tolerance. I guess you are better at getting messages across than I originally gave you credit for.

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By now, some of you may have heard about the Dawson County shootings in Montreal, Canada. I would like to start by stating that nothing I am about to say is meant to take away from the pain and suffering currently being felt in that community. My heart goes out to the mourners and the injured.

For those of you that are unaware, a shooting occurred on a campus in Montreal on the 13th of September. A lone gunman, 25-year-old Kimveer Gill, killed one woman and injured 19 before he turned the gun on himself. All Gill left behind for us to decipher was an online blog, which was unfortunately filled with video game references.

The media has already provided the usually ridiculous spin on the subject by saying that Gill was able to learn from the games and hone his skills to be able to pull off a shooting of this proportion. Let’s be honest. Games don’t cause things like this. Moving a set of crosshairs with your thumbs is not the same as taking the time to gather the resources, plan the events, and actually load a gun and shoot with precision.

Correlation does not equal causation! I have played video games of all genres since I was able to hold a controller and I have never committed a violent crime. In contrast, the Xbox did not exist during a single act of violence before the turn of the millennium. However, violent crimes have been around since the dawn of man. What could be the cause?

Nobody seems to care a whole lot about the fact that this person came in possession of a weapon. Nobody concerns themselves about how he physically became good at shooting his weapon. Nobody noticed the entry in his blog discussing the fact that he wished that people would stop picking on him! But everybody noticed the fact that he enjoyed violent video games! Why? Because we are a nation thriving on the fact that we would rather accept an easy lie than a hard truth.

We are looking at an individual with deep-seeded emotional problems that were planted long before he picked up a video game controller. One glance at his blog shows that he was a troubled young man. In the five minutes that I spent glancing through, I noticed references to insanity, masturbation, bullies, and yes, heavy metal and video games.

The media has taken this event as a means of further promoting their anti-violent video game agenda, and raising more concern about the upcoming Rockstar video game entitled “Bully.” Florida lawyer Jack Thompson has gone so far as to say that “Bully” is “nothing more than Columbine remade.” Apparently, Jack hasn’t read much into the game, which is centered on stopping bullies via non lethal means, rather than shooting them.

It is a sad week for gaming, as this will no doubt further the stereotype that fans of violent games are potentially violent themselves.

If anyone needs me, I’ll be in my room, playing Pong.

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I always thought that I was born later than I should have been. As I look back to my childhood, I think of the music I listened to, the television programs I watched and the games I played. At 22, I have a newfound perspective on life, and have come to the conclusion that I was indeed born in the wrong decade.

You see, I am the youngest of three children. My two older sisters (whose ages will not be listed, due to the inherent threats involved when one tells others the age of his 28- and 31-year-old siblings … oops) were my caretakers when I was a child. Now, anyone with an older sister knows how demanding she can get. Take that times two, and you have my situation. I watched what they wanted to watch, went where they wanted to go, and Mousercized when they wanted to, well, Mousercise.

At the time, I did not know that there was more to the world than watching Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” video, discovering the hidden warp zones in Super Mario, and trying to memorize the cheesy musical dancing montages from great film hits such as “Grease” and “Footloose.” While others, without the luxury of significantly older siblings, came into their own Marble Works worlds, I was still hanging with the Lincoln Log generation.

Do not get me wrong. I eventually left the Daisy Duke era and evolved into a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle connoisseur. My final collection ended at 127 action figures, the entire collection until they released the stupid wind-up versions. I mean, really. Who wants a wind-up Ninja Turtle with awesome wrist twirling action? But I digress.

You see, I was one of the lucky few born at that magic time between dusk and twilight; too young to remember Macintosh’s revolutionary commercial, “1984″, yet old enough to know how to sing out in exuberance the theme song to “The Facts of Life” before it found eternal destiny via Nick at Nite reruns.

My sisters taught me the way through “old school” traditions, toys and entertainment and for that, I am eternally grateful. I have come to realize that I was not so much born in the wrong decade as I was “held back,” so to speak.

So, the next time some of you young pups walk into a living room and see an original Nintendo sitting on the television and an original copy of “Ghostbusters” on VHS sitting in a rack, do not make the mistake of making us feel old by crying out, “Wow! I didn’t know these even existed anymore!” Instead, smile and ask them how their sisters are doing.

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When I walked into Rotunda A last Tuesday evening with the intention of listening to a lecture by Lt. Col. Robert Fausti, I turned into an unintended participant in a debate that, if left unsupervised, would surely have turned into a massacre in its own right.

Lt. Col. Fausti spoke about a government program known as WHINSEC, which has loose ties to a now debunked program, know as the School of the Americas, or SOA.

For some of you that are unfamiliar with the SOA, here is a brief synopsis: the SOA issued military training to elected participants from other countries. Some former graduates of the SOA were held partially accountable for a massacre, among other things, in South America. The SOA was dismantled and rebuilt from the ground up in 2000, after which the program had changed to the current incarnation, WHINSEC.

A lecture was presented by Fausti, and a debate ensued afterward in which certain members of the audience felt it to be their civic duty to call out, so to speak, the lieutenant on the issues surrounding the SOA, even though he had no connections with the organization. The debate was followed with what appeared to be a propaganda film depicting mass graves and slaughtered humans with the apparent intention of turning the crowd against WHINSEC, and henceforth, Lt. Col. Fausti. The presenter of the film tried to reassure the crowd that the video’s intentions were to comment on the United States’ foreign policy, but I failed to see the connection.

I know that living in South Dakota means limited access to asking questions and pursuing truths, but what did some of you expect to happen? This was a presentation by a guest to the school that was attended by roughly 50 people. Did anyone really expect to witness some revolutionary confession? Were people actually assuming that a high-ranking Army official was going to start speaking openly and honestly about possibly classified government policies while in Brookings?

The lieutenant was open and honest about WHINSEC, the program which he is associated with, and did his best to cope with interrogation about a program in which he had no involvement.

I can only wonder if some of these people sit around and wait for whatever potentially controversial topic presents itself to start crucifying everything and everyone in sight. Or maybe worse. Maybe these people have been waiting for this particular issue to bring itself to SDSU and this was their only chance for answers. If the latter is the case, it is a shame that your questions were not answered to their fullest extent. Maybe next year you will have better luck and a top member of the FBI will come to give a presentation and tell us all who shot JFK.

The Brookings City Council gathered on March 14 to discuss future options to expand the Brookings community.

A recent purchase of 26 acres east of Interstate 29, totaling roughly $4 million, has been made for the development of the retail industry.

Some council members agree that Brookings is lacking in retail and that expanding the choices available for shopping is a necessity to the city.

The two areas being focused on are clothing and restaurants, said Councilman Tim Reed. Increasing the number of options for consumers to attain their goods would attract people from surrounding areas and help the city of Brookings to grow.

Councilman Mike Bartley said that there are currently two areas of proposed development: the land east of Interstate 29 and downtown Brookings. The city is still searching for a third site for expansion.

One option proposed to the council to help develop Brookings is hiring an outside firm to gather information and assess the city.

Buxton, a company based in Texas, specializes in consumer analytics and retail site selection. The company already outlined a proposal for analyzing Brookings to determine which businesses would be most sustainable in the community. The analysis will cost $36,000.

Bartley said that using Buxton’s services would provide useful information that cannot be attained elsewhere. City Manager Alan Lanning contacted the people in Sioux Falls who have used Buxton’s services in the past. The Sioux Falls group claimed that the company has been very helpful and worth the money that was spent.

Reed said bringing Buxton in is a good thing, but he is afraid that making the company’s findings public would have a “free-rider” effect in which surrounding communities would use the information paid for by Brookings for their own benefit.

Bartley disagrees. He said, “Information provided by the company is site specific and would prove irrelevant to nearby areas.”

Tom Bezdichek said bringing the company in for research may be a waste of money, he said. Brookings recently spent more than $3.3 million to bring home-improvement store Lowe’s into the community.

Bezdichek says reports show that business opportunities typically present themselves after Lowe’s enters a new city, rendering the proposed research unnecessary.

He added that the city is responsible for building the infrastructure, such as roads, water and power lines that would allow new businesses to come into town and is not responsible for conducting the market research to decide which businesses should come.

Geoffrey Grant, an SDSU professor, conducts a class on urban sociology. He said he agrees that expanding the retail selection in Brookings is a positive thing. He said Brookings has lost a considerable number of stores throughout the years, possibly due to the addition of Wal-Mart. The community stands to benefit from added shopping opportunities.

Some students around campus feel that expanding Brookings’ retail industry would prove a positive move.

Jack Nicholson, a senior in business economics, said that Brookings is lacking in selection and an increase in the number of stores would provide a higher quality product than can be found in other local choices.

Jordan Bauer, a third-year SDSU student, said an increase in businesses would provide job opportunities for students.

Bauer spent last summer working in the Minneapolis area and said, “Coming back to Brookings was a real change. The convenience is gone and you either have to settle for what is available, or travel to another city to find what you are looking for.”

The City Council plans to meet again to discuss further options for expansion.

Three SDSU employees are running for public office within the city of Brookings. Political science professor Gary Aguiar is campaigning for city mayor, while SDSU’s chief financial officer Wes Tschetter and English professor Catherine Twitero are running for two available seats on the Brookings School Board.

Aguiar said that he is not happy with some of the decisions the City Council has made in the past. He said he feels that more fiscal responsibility needs to be established within the community’s elected board and more time needs to be spent when making decisions.

Tschetter is no stranger to Brookings politics. Having been on the School Board for twelve years, he wishes to maintain his position and have a say in what involves grade-school children.

He said he feels that his experience with the School Board is a necessity in the big decisions that are to be made in the upcoming year.

Twitero, with no previous experience on the School Board, said she also wishes to have a say in subjects that affect her children, and feels that her teaching background will help her to make decisions involving the school’s curriculum.

Brookings residents are encouraged to participate in this year’s April 11 election.