Editorial voices from elsewhere
Editorial voices from newspapers around the United States as compiled by the Associated Press:
The Republicans Ohioans have sent to Congress – Sen. Rob Portman and 12 of the state’s 16 U.S. House members, including House Speaker John Boehner – are demanding the Obama administration reverse its decision to restore the historical name Mount Denali to the Alaska mountain long called Mount McKinley.
Denali is the highest mountain in North America. On Aug. 28, Interior Secretary Sally Jewell, an Obama appointee, changed the peak’s name to Denali. State officials in Alaska had requested the name change as long ago as 1975, Jewell said in her order.
Then again, thanks to Portman, Boehner and their allies, maybe America’s major challenges are behind us. Maybe the federal budget is balanced. Maybe the nearly 10,000 uniformed Americans posted in Afghanistan are no longer in harm’s way.
If so, have at it, gentlemen: Having solved so many of our other problems, the name of a mountain, thousands of miles from Ohio, deserves to be at the top of your agendas.
A University of Michigan survey of full-time college students revealed a surprising fact: More students are smoking pot either every day or at least 20 times in the previous 30 days than are smoking cigarettes daily.
Now, granted, the percentage of students who said they smoke pot daily is relatively low – just under 6 percent. Ditto for the percentage of students who smoked cigarettes daily – 5 percent.
But the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research has surveyed a nationally representative sample of full-time college students every year since 1980 and this is the first time marijuana use was higher than cigarette use.
The U-M survey also showed fewer college students are binge drinking, defined as drinking 15 or more drinks in a row at least once in the past two weeks.
That’s a positive trend, as is the percentage of students smoking cigarettes, which is down from 19 percent in 1999. But the rising marijuana numbers should be a concern. More needs to be done to raise awareness about both the legal and health consequences associated with smoking pot.
It’s hard to overestimate the power of marketing. The same magic that made a 10-cent cup of coffee with milk into something millions of Americans would gladly spend $5 for also has changed the way Americans think about water.
The average person in this country drinks 35 gallons of bottled water per year, more than twice the amount that people drank 15 years ago. This is good news from a public health perspective. Sugar-sweetened soda loaded up Americans, especially children, with thousands of empty calories. Water, on the other hand, is the perfect way to quench your thirst, and is essential for survival. The news Americans are drinking more water is good news, but there is one problem.
Bottled water might be good for you but not so good for the environment. It takes energy to manufacture the billions of bottles Americans consume each year, and energy to truck them to market, adding to the greenhouse gases that cause climate change.
Fortunately, there is an alternative. The heavily regulated municipal water systems of the United States deliver potable water from taps in every state. All it takes is a little foresight to bring a refillable bottle with you and stay refreshed and healthy where ever you go.
Bottled water is not any better for you than tap water. In fact, some leading brands of bottled water are tap water. The only thing that separates the water that comes out of a plastic bottle from the kind that comes out of a kitchen sink is a name, a label and dedicated space in a vending machine or convenience store cooler.
Americans spend billions in tax money each year to ensure that water from municipal systems is safe to drink, and we shouldn’t let some slick marketing make us forget it.