The week before Spring Break is always hectic, filled with exams and projects and the occasional coffee bomb scare. But while we’re ordering venti-triple-espressos and rushing to the UREC to put the finishing touches on our beach bodies, the world keeps turning.
And this week, the things people are doing will make you wonder what’s wrong with the world.
1. Bill O’Reilly responded to criticism from Stephen Colbert, insisting he doesn’t believe in governmentally-imposed equality because every person is different.
“There will never be equality in this world,” O’Reilly said. “It’s impossible. An opium-laced dream.”
The push for equality is misunderstood as a push for handouts. In fact, Bill O’Reilly said it best. Equality activists like Martin Luther King Jr. fought for the equality of opportunity and wanted people to be judged by the quality of their character.
He then went on to reassure his viewers Colbert’s progressive comments were nothing more than lies and America is not intentionally oppressing poor minorities for the rich majority to triumph over them.
“America is not perfect, but we set the gold standard for opportunity in this world.”
In other news, the Republican Senate shut down the Pay Equity Bill, which would have ensured equal pay for equal work in American businesses.
2. The staff member who Congressman Vance McAllister was caught on video kissing was “taken off payroll,” possibly forced to resign, but McAllister shows no sign of dropping out of the race for re-election.
McAllister couldn’t even try to say he did not have relations with this woman — he was caught on a surveillance camera the Ouachita Citizen then posted online.
“I’m asking for forgiveness from God, my wife, my kids, my staff and my constituents who elected me to serve,” McAllister said in a statement to the press in regard to kissing his district scheduler, Melissa Peacock.
Peacock, of course, isn’t included in this apology because she no longer works on the staff. They’re both responsible, but only one political career died.
And, no doubt, this will follow both of them. But McAllister can look to our very own scandalous but political office-seeking Edwin Edwards for proof that the public forgives the leader who is tempted by a woman in a moment of weakness.
Meanwhile, Peacock will wear her scarlet letter into each and every interview she has for a political campaign.
3. Missouri State Representative Chuck Gatschenberger told his colleagues that he thinks women should have to wait longer before abortions because when he makes the decision to purchase a car he “puts research in there to find out what to do.”
The obvious flaw here is the government does not insist that you “do some research,” — listen to an ultrasound and have the surgical procedure described to you — before purchasing a car.
Women do not want abortions like Gatschenberger wants a car. They want an abortion like an animal caught in a trap — an economic, political and emotional trap.
I will agree that research is necessary before deciding how to proceed with a pregnancy. And the best way to do that isn’t to make sure the person has plenty of time to stress over the next nine months to eighteen years of their life. It’s to make the resources available in an informative, non-judgmental environment so each mother can choose to do what is best for them.
It is no coincidence that these three WTF news stories are circulating in the same week. The world is full of humans who say and do strange, illogical things every single day. And we look to some of them for information and leadership.
It’s a frightening world we live in, but at least we have Spring Break to look forward to. 
Jana King is a 19-year-old communication studies sophomore from Ponchatoula, La.