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thebattalion

2012

Cold WeatherDrought Lack of Milkweed

3 Primary Causes of Population Decline

30 Types of Milkweed in Texas

DECREASE IN NUMBERS

It is one of North America’s longest natural migrations, and it could be in danger of vanishing.

Millions of monarch butterflies trek across the United States on a migration from Central Mexico to Canada every year, but a mixture of changing agri-cultural practices and climate change have reduced the number of butterflies to a fraction of what it used to be. The losses in recent years have been espe-cially severe, and researchers at Texas A&M and elsewhere say the migration is in danger of disappearing altogether.

“The monarch [butterfly] is found worldwide,” said Craig Wilson, a se-nior research associate at Texas A&M’s Center for Mathematics and Science Education and longtime butterfly en-thusiast. “It’s not going to die out in North America, but the migration is what’s under threat, and that’s the mi-raculous thing about them.”

Monarch butterflies migrate en masse from Canada to Mexico and back

John Rangel The Battalion

Borlaug statue to be placed in Capitol

Nobel prize winner well known for perfecting strain of wheat

agriculture

Norman Borlaug, the A&M pro-fessor of international agricul-

ture credited with saving millions of lives, will be honored posthumously Tuesday when a statue of Borlaug is installed in the U.S. Capitol to coin-cide with what would have been his 100th birthday.

Borlaug is best known for per-fecting a high-yield variety of wheat that has fed millions in impoverished areas of Mexico, India and Africa. The breakthrough earned Borlaug the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970, as well as the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal.

William Dugas, acting vice chancellor and dean of the Depart-ment of Agriculture, said Borlaug is unique in his worldwide influence as he took on one of agriculture’s greatest challenges.

“Quite simply, Norman Borlaug’s revolutionary work saved millions of people from starvation,” Dugas said. “Even today, one of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences’ grand challenges is to feed our world. The work of Dr. Borlaug still inspires us today to take action for better and more plentiful food worldwide.”

Homer Segovia The Battalion

Remington May — Special to THE BATTALION

A&M preps for final home game of seasonw. basketball

Corps group to celebrate 50 years of inclusion Event to host panelists who played role in integration

diversity

The celebration of the 50th year of Texas A&M integration will

continue with “Fifty years of Inclu-sion: A Cultural Infusion,” an inter-active panel that will bring former and current students together to dis-cuss A&M’s progress in diversity — and the work it has ahead.

The Thursday event is presented by the Cultural Awareness and Diver-sity Expansion Team, CADET, and will host panelists who had a hand in making campus more inclusive, in-cluding Malcom Hall, Class of 1963 student body president, who worked with other campus leaders and for-mer University President James Earl Rudder to integrate African Americans and women into campus.

Kadie McDougald The Battalion

Texas A&M head coach Gary Blair’s teams haven’t always had premier women’s bas-

ketball talent. As his 3-seed Aggies — in their ninth straight NCAA tournament — prepare for 11-seed James Madison, Blair said Monday that talent goes beyond recruiting recognition.

“When I first started, I didn’t have a lot of McDonald’s All-Americans,” Blair said. “I had a lot of Burger Kings and Wendys, but those kids turned into damned good players for me.”

With a 70-55 victory over 14-seed North Dakota on Sunday at Reed Arena, Texas A&M advanced to the second round of the NCAA tournament and will face James Madi-son at 8:25 p.m. Tuesday in Reed Arena.

JMU (29-5, 15-1 CAA) blew out two-time defending champion Delaware 70-45 in the Colonial Athletic Association championship game to secure a bid to the NCAA tourna-ment and its seventh tournament title in pro-gram history.

JMU upset 6-seed Gonzaga 72-63 Sunday before A&M took the court for its win over UND. Although JMU is a lower seed on pa-per, Blair said he does not want his team to take them lightly.

“Throw the seeds out the window,” Blair said. “You throw the teams in there. I study coaches and tendencies and what [JMU head coach Kenny Brooks] has done in the last 11 years there. He’s been just as successful as Tex-as A&M on getting to the playoffs, whether the NIT or the NCAA tournament. He’s one of the best young coaches in the game.”

PLIGHT OF THE

Graphic by William Guerra, Photo by John Benson — THE BATTALION

Millions of monarch butterflies migrate across the United States from Central Mexico to Canada every year.

See Monarch on page 6

(11) JAMES MADISON

(3) TEXAS A&M

(7) DEPAUL - 74

(2) DUKE - 65

2ND ROUND SWEET 16

Aggies look to redeem last season’s early NCAA tournament exit

Tyler Stafford — THE BATTALION

Sophomore guard Courtney Walker has scored in double figures 10 straight games and 28 times total this season.

COURTESY

Norman Borlaug, a former A&M professor of international agriculture, will be honored with a statue in Washington D.C.

You have millions of acres that would have supported wildflowers and milkweed, but now when the farmer goes to spray pesticides, the corn and soybeans survive, but no other weeds.

So that habitat is lost.”— Craig Wilson, senior research associate at Texas A&M’s Center for Mathematics

and Science Education

See Tournament on page 4 See Cadet on page 4

Tyler StaffordThe Battalion

Researchers reflect on Texas’ role in butterfly migration

(7) DEPAUL

MONARCH

BAT_03-25-14_A1.indd 1 3/24/14 10:00 PM

Amid the scattered beer cans and live music at

Chilifest is an unofficial con-test, one that rivals the event’s official chili contest.

The rows of themed struc-tures, or builds, are construct-ed and erected at the festival by various Texas A&M fra-ternity chapters for use during the event.

From inspiration to cre-ation, Joseph Birdsall, member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon and sophomore computer engi-neering major, said the work that goes into a build is time intensive.

“These builds are the fra-ternities’ expression of the themes that are chosen for that year,” Birdsall said. “With most being done with wooden material, these are elaborately put together, painted and checked for sturdiness before being taken to Snook. Each build can vary greatly in style and brings its own character.”

There is no official award for the best build at Chilifest, but Tyler Vara, build chair for Kappa Alpha and sophomore recreation, park and tourism sciences major, said the crowd “just knows” who wins.

“It’s not really a legit com-petition, most people just kind of know who has the best build,” Vara said. “Each fra-ternity wants people to come to their Chilifest, so they want to have a good build.”

Birdsall said one of the best parts of Chilifest is the great reveal.

“Seeing the 40,000-plus people that see our build is something we take pride in,” Birdsall said. “It really gives us a chance to put our name out there, more than just a Greek life.”

Sigma Alpha Epsilon’s build will be designed as a pi-rate ship for this year’s Chil-ifest. Birdsall said in order to ensure many people “Set Sail with SAE,” they started on their build at the beginning of the semester.

“From the start of the se-mester we start planning it and acquiring supplies,” Birdsall

said. “We have a build plan laid out and start working on it very far in advance. A big part of it is meeting the finan-cial needs to put it all together and make it all work out for everyone.”

Vara said Kappa Alpha would try to incorporate its build’s entrance to illustrate its “Land Down Under” theme for this year.

“Well right now, we’re currently trying to make the opening like a crocodile’s mouth,” Vara said. “So it will seem like you are walk-ing through the mouth of a crocodile when you walk in our build.”

Israel Michael, one of Kap-pa Sigma’s chief officers for Chilifest and senior mechani-cal engineering major, said although many fraternities de-cided on a foreign theme for this year, his fraternity decided to stay true to its roots.

“This year we thought,

‘What better way to do it than a Texas theme?’ I mean, Chil-ifest is all about the epitome of Texas — Texans and coun-try music — so we wanted to keep it home, hit everyone where they really like it with a ‘Don’t Mess With Texas’ theme,” Michael said. “We are going to have huge art-work and craftsmanship from every major city in the state and have one pin-pointed-out object from every city as well.”

The project is an intense time commitment, Michael said, with construction taking about 50 to 60 hours. Benton Mahaffey, president of Sigma Epsilon and senior chemistry major, said footing the bill for build is a serious commitment as well. The money needed to make their western-themed “Sig Ep Saloon” build is taken from their semester dues and is anything but cheap.

“A build usually ranges

from $2,000 to $3,000 and that is just for the wood and paint we use,” Mahaffey said.

To combat the costs, Sigma Alpha Epsilon has found a so-lution to save money while constructing their builds.

“We actually do not spend that much money on our sup-plies because a lot of the ma-terial used for previous builds can be used for the next build,” Birdsall said. “It is more of just a time commitment to put the build together.”

While creating the build can present a challenge, Bird-sall said that setting it up at Chilifest is the most difficult part.

“Getting the build out to Snook after it is completed is the hardest part,” Birdsall said. “The build starts out in one piece and we then have to take it apart piece by piece and rearrange it back together like a puzzle once we get to Snook.”

Vara said when it comes to supplies for the build, they re-ceive donations for tools from familiar faces.

“Between everyone in our fraternity, we have guys whose parents are in construc-tion, so they will donate sup-plies,” Vara said. “We pool all of our tools together and then head to Home Depot to buy all the lumber and stuff.”

Mahaffey said only those with experience handle the tools while working on the build to avoid any injuries.

“There is the usual hammer to finger, but we have never had anything serious hap-pen, thankfully,” Bridsall said. “Usually because the older guys work with the power tools or teach the younger guys how to use them properly.”

With around 10,000 peo-ple attending Chilifest every year, Michael said the event is a great way to bring everyone together.

“It really doesn’t matter what fraternity, sorority, team or other organizations you are a part of,” Michael said. “Ev-eryone is there for one pur-pose and that is to enjoy Texas and have fun.”

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THE BATTALION is published daily, Monday through Friday during the fall and spring semesters and Tuesday and Thursday during the summer session (except University holidays and exam periods) at Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843. Offices are in Suite L400 of the Memorial Student Center.News: The Battalion news department is managed by students at Texas A&M University in Student Media, a unit of the Division of Student Affairs. Newsroom phone: 979-845-3315; E-mail: editor@thebatt.com; website: http://www.thebatt.com.Advertising: Publication of advertising does not imply sponsorship or endorsement by The Battalion. For campus, local, and national display advertising, call 979-845-2687. For classified advertising, call 979-845-0569. Office hours are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. Email: battads@thebatt.com.Subscriptions: A part of the Student Services Fee entitles each Texas A&M student to pick up a single copy of The Battalion. First copy free, additional copies $1.

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Creative, time-intensive builds serve as Chilifest icons Caroline Corrigan The Battalion

greek life

Jenna Rabel— THE BATTALION

Sam Weidig, sophomore industrial distribution major, helps Tim Word, junior engineering technology major, make a frame for their Chilifest build.

BAT_03-25-14_A2.indd 1 3/24/14 9:59 PM

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Olsen Magic made another ap-pearance for A&M in Sunday’s

11th inning victory, and the Aggies will look for that magic to continue as they host the Sam Houston State Bearkats on Tuesday in the first of a five-game homestand.

The Bearkats (16-8) will try to shake a four-game losing streak, including a loss to UT Arlington on March 18 that was followed by a weekend sweep at the hands of Central Arkansas, which dropped Sam Houston out of the Baseball America poll, where they had been ranked No. 16.

A&M is 15-3 in home games, in-cluding walk-off wins off the bats of Logan Nottebrok and Cole Lankford. The team has nine players with batting averages of more than .300 at home.

Offensive standouts to this point have been Mitchell Nau and Jace Statum — both batting .357 — with Patrick McLendon trailing at .356. Lankford has recorded five doubles and 17 RBIs in 17 home games played.

McLendon and outfielder J.B. Moss have both scored 14 runs at Olsen.

Sam Houston hopes to combat A&M’s offense with a combined team ERA of 2.83 and a pitching staff that holds opponents to a .241 batting av-erage. When balls are put into play, however, the defense has allowed 20 unearned runs in 24 games.

A&M head coach Rob Childress will give Ryan Hendrix his first start on the mound Tuesday night. The freshman has compiled 4.1 innings this

season and allowed just one run.

The A&M pitching staff sports a 2.25 ERA at Olsen, holding opponents to a .216 batting average. The Bearkats enter Tuesday’s match with a team average of .297, includ-ing a .376 on-base percentage.

Offensive leaders for the Bearkats include Colt Atwood and Ryan O’Hearn. Atwood bats .394 and has scored 21 runs and driven in 21 batters in 24 games. O’Hearn is bat-ting .327 with four home runs and 22 RBIs.

The Aggies are 86-38-2 against Sam Houston State. Last season resulted in a 4-1 win in College Station for the Aggies, while

the Bearkats claimed an 8-7 victory in Huntsville against A&M. First pitch is at 6:35 p.m.

Bearkats next up for A&M

Brandon WheelandSpecial to The Battalion

baseball

Sam Houston State visits Tuesday amid 4-game losing streak

Photos by Tanner Garza — THE BATTALION

(Left) First baseman Cole Lankford is one of nine Aggies to hit .300 at home, including Mitchell Nau (below).

Spring football continues for the Texas A&M football

team, as the team held practice Monday in wake of Saturday’s scrimmage.

Texas A&M head coach Kevin Sumlin said the objec-tive of a scrimmage is to let the coaching staff evaluate players’ progress while simulating the stress of an actual game. It also gives players the opportunity to translate what they’ve learned on the practice field into a live situation.

“We’re trying to get the quarterbacks around 30 to 37 plays and a lot of the other players up in the 30s and 40s,” Sumlin said. “You’re trying to get them a half of football basi-cally, and we did that. There was some good and some bad.”

With the departure of Ben Malena from starting running back, a competition to fill the hole is underway between ju-niors Tra Carson, Brandon Williams and Trey Williams, as well as redshirt freshman James White.

“Halfway through spring football I think Tra Carson has been very, very solid,” Sum-lin said. “I think James White

has progressed and is probably a little bit further ahead than I thought he would be. Brandon Williams was doing well, Trey Williams, they’re all good backs — it just depends on what you want to do. That competition will continue and it’s good for all of them to compete for playing time, and that’s what happens in a real program.”

Sumlin said former A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel showed up in his office Mon-day morning unexpectedly.

“I walked in my office this morning, and he’s sitting there. It’s like old times,” Sumlin said. “Obviously he feels at home.”

The two held a conversa-tion covering many topics, in-cluding Manziel’s private NFL workout scheduled for Thurs-day in College Station.

“I’m not going to be shocked when he does well,” Sumlin said. “Some other people may, but he won’t shock me at all.”

Spring practice position battles continue

Patrick Crank The Battalion

football

Manziel’s pro day approaches

m. basketballA&M falls in CBI, 62-55Texas A&M lost to Illinois State in the CBI tournament Monday, ending its season. Story at thebatt.com.

BAT_03-25-14_A3.indd 1 3/24/14 10:00 PM

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A&M was also the No. 3 seed in 2013, but its season ended at Reed Arena in the second round with a 74-63 loss to 6-seed Nebraska. Senior center Karla Gilbert — one of two re-maining members of A&M’s 2011 National Championship team — said she remembers last season’s loss well.

“I think every year we go to the NCAA tournament it’s used as motivation,” Gilbert said. “From freshman year winning a cham-pionship to now, especially since last year was such a let down, mostly for ourselves getting knocked out at our own place in the second round. That’s definitely going to be in the back of our minds.”

Sophomore point guard Jordan Jones — who broke A&M’s single season assists record Sunday — said she knows how important it is to not turn the ball over.

“We’ve got to take care of the ball,” Jones

said. “[JMU] is a scrappy team. We don’t want to let their scrappiness and their intensity af-fect what we do and how we handle the ball on offense.”

JMU is led by senior guard Kirby Burk-holder. In her team’s victory Sunday, Bur-kholder totaled 28 points and 18 rebounds — numbers Blair said were “ungodly.” Burk-holder averaged 18.3 points and 8.6 rebounds a game during the season.

The official attendance of Sunday’s game was 6,075, but Blair said he wanted to see more students at Tuesday’s matchup.

“I’d sure rather be playing here than at James Madison,” Blair said. “Hopefully our 12th Man will show up [Tuesday] night and get me 8,000 in there and make a difference. They helped us in the second half Sunday.”

Any A&M student is eligible for free tickets to the game, and can register for the tickets at AggieAthletics.com

The winner Tuesday advances to the Sweet Sixteen and will play 7-seed DePaul, which beat 2-seed Duke, Saturday in Lincoln, Neb.

TournamentContinued from page 1

Keltin Jordan, senior sup-ply chain management major and CADET program direc-tor, said CADET is a special

unit within the Corps of Ca-dets that focuses on diver-sity and education to increase minority enrollment in the Corps. He said the panelists were chosen based on who he felt could provide a variety of thoughts and opinions.

“[The event will give a] better understanding of A&M history, progression over the last 50 years and where we want A&M to be in the next 50 years,” Jordan said. “We realize that we’re not really where we want to be right now but we’ve made great strides and maybe we’ll get where we want to be in next 50 [years].”

Jordan said he understands just how important inclu-sion at A&M was and still is, especially because of the era in which the 1963 referen-dum that opened campus was passed.

“Just because of the time frame that this happened and society’s viewpoint at that time, for it to pass, we’re able to have the advantages that we have today,” Jordan said. “I’m just so privileged to have access to the Aggie network. [Without the referendum], maybe I wouldn’t have been here.”

Dennis Richard, senior engineering technology ma-

jor and commanding officer of CADET, said he realizes how important Hall’s work has been for the history of the University.

“[Inclusion was] a tre-mendous feat,” Richard said. “We’re 50 years in and peo-ple won’t forget all the work all those involved did. [Hall] wanted to do the right thing. Keeping his work recognized and making sure that people know about the work those men and women did [is im-portant] and they can always be remembered here at Texas A&M.”

Cleveland Jones, senior bioenvironmental sciences major and executive officer of CADET, said he wanted the audience of the event to get a deeper understanding of A&M’s history and the im-portance of diversity.

“I really want people to take away that unity and in-clusion really helps this Uni-versity and the world,” Jones said. “You can’t really get anywhere if you have one type of person with one train of thought, doing the same thing.”

The event will be at 6:30 p.m. Thursday in MSC 2300. Admission is free and open to the public.

CADETContinued from page 1

Combining the human ele-ment and technology, Jeff

Morris and his former and cur-rent students have been work-ing for months on a show that he said defies description. And that is exactly the way they want it to be.

InterMedia, which is being produced by members of the performance studies depart-ment, will incorporate multiple forms of media in unique ways, said Morris, director of under-graduate studies for the perfor-mance studies department.

“InterMedia on the surface is very similar to what people mean when they say multi-media, but it stresses the in-tertwining of multiple modes of expression or experience,” Morris said.

Morris said multimedia can be experienced by simply viewing a car commercial. He said in a commercial there are several elements that get the point across — visuals, text and voiceover. If one of these elements were taken away, the message of the advertisement would still be received, but Morris said this is not the case with InterMedia.

“In InterMedia, if one ele-ment is taken out the message is lost,” Morris said.

The performance will fea-ture at least three student works, the first of which will be called a “Hacktet.” This involves stu-dents “hacking” technological devices to manipulate them as a musical instrument, a purpose each device was not intended for. The second act can be

compared to the art of “turnta-blism” and will feature the live sampling of sounds and the im-promptu collaboration of these sounds into a piece of musical artistic expression.

The third performance will incorporate the visual element of sound and motion in a large group collaboration, and Mor-ris said it essentially will be a motion-based piece.

Miguel Espinel, Class of 2013, has worked with Mor-ris in this performance. Espinel will be using an instrument he created in his time here at Tex-as A&M in his performance.

“It’s a great opportunity to see what the department was doing and an opportunity to connect with current students, to see how the department has grown,” Espinel said.

Though Morris said the per-formance couldn’t be described in simple terms, he used the phrase “genre-bending art” to partially encompass the show.

Justin Payne, senior music major, said he is excited to not only apply the work he has put into the InterMedia perfor-mance, but also to share it with

the larger community. “Working on these projects

and performances is what re-ally solidifies the InterMedia experience,” Payne said. “It’s quite inspiring to see our re-search topics applied and how everyone involved brings their unique skill set to the perfor-mance to create an entire work. The process has been extremely rewarding and I cannot wait to share it with others from the scholastic community. I’ve en-joyed taking on the extra time required to complete this piece and I believe my colleagues would say the same.”

Morris said the performance incorporates students from across campus.

“They come from all over,” Morris said. “We stress in-terdisciplinary collaboration. We’ve incorporated econom-ics and business majors before and created a piece based on the piece on the game Monopoly”

The performance is at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in the Black Box Theater of the Liberal Arts and Art and Humanities Building.

InterMedia experience ‘defies description’

Nina Smith Special to The Battalion

performance studies

Performance to weave art and technology

PROVIDED

Luis D’Louhy, medical student, performs at a past iteration of InterMedia.

BAT_03-25-14_A4.indd 1 3/24/14 9:34 PM

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Six months ago, Chance Ste-phens left Santa Monica,

Calif., on foot with a mission to speak to as many churches, col-leges and towns as possible about ending human trafficking. One stop on his cross-country trek was College Station, where he has continued his mission over the past week on and around the Texas A&M campus.

Stephens served in the U.S. military for six years before re-turning to civilian life. He said the idea to walk across America and raise awareness for eliminat-ing sex trafficking came to him after an encounter with some-one from Tiny Hands Inter-national, a nonprofit Christian organization dedicated to serv-ing the poor and eliminating sex-trafficking.

Stephens is the driving force behind #WALKAMERICA and “ACHANCEFOR,” a blog and movement that chronicles his journey and raises awareness

Anti-trafficking advocates make pit stop on campusJohn RangelThe Battalion

activism

Jenna Rabel— THE BATTALION

Jacob Leonard (from left) and Chance Stephens are walking from California to Florida then to Virginia to raise awareness for elliminating sex trafficking.

for Tiny Hands.Stephens left Santa Monica in

September and has been travel-ing largely by foot ever since. He sells merchandise items such as T-shirts and wristbands wher-ever he stops to raise money for Tiny Hands, and has collected around $3,900 from sales and online donations.

Stephens said everything fell into place to make his trip pos-sible once the decision to walk across America was made.

“Everything lined up,” Ste-phens said. “I asked God and said, ‘Hey, I need to do some-thing.’ I ended up buying a plane ticket for $30. [Every-thing] worked in my favor.”

Stephens’ solo trip turned into a partnership in January when Jacob Leonard joined him while he was stopped in Lamesa, Texas.

Injured and weary from sev-eral months on the road, Ste-phens was taken in by Leon-ard’s family to rest. The quick stop turned into a month’s stay, and the two men formed a fast

friendship. When Stephens was again road-ready, Leonard left with him.

“I actually dropped out of college and was home for about two months, and he came along and I was moved by his story and I was like, ‘I want to go with you,’” Leonard said.

The two have been staying in College Station with Jacob Smith, sophomore political sci-ence major and Leonard’s high school friend. Leonard and Smith have kept in close con-tact since high school, and Smith immediately offered his house as a place for the two to stay if their trip took them through College Station.

“As soon as he joined with Chance, he told me about it and he told me that they would probably come through College Station,” Smith said. “I’m really passionate about Tiny Hands and ending human trafficking, and it was just a small gesture I could do to open my doors to them.”

Stephens and Leonard have

spent the past week touring campus, giving interviews and talking to students wherever possible about ending human trafficking. The two attended Breakaway and set up a booth at Mugwalls Cafe to talk to stu-dents and sell merchandise.

Smith said students were skeptical of Stephens’ and Leon-ard’s actions at first, but became interested once they heard more about the cause the two men advocate.

“[People] ask, ‘Why? Why are they doing this?’ But once you explain the message to them, especially to people here in College Station where college kids are especially pas-sionate about ending human trafficking, they completely un-derstand,” Smith said.

Stephens’ and Leonard’s trip has taken many turns and is only halfway finished. The two plan to make it to Florida before piv-oting north and walking to Vir-ginia, where they hope to finish before the year is out.

The two carry everything

they need on their backs and push a cart that contains sleeping bags, a tent and other outdoor gear. They each carry comput-ers, and Leonard has a solar char-ger to blog about their experi-ences over weekends.

They sleep on the side of the

road or under a roof when a lo-cal family or friend is generous enough to open their home to them.

Stephens and Leonard left College Station Monday. Their story can be followed online at achancefor.com.

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What are the facts?The P5 + 1 group of world powers—the U.S., China,

Russia, France, Great Britain and Germany—celebrated when Iran recently agreed to a six-monthinterim agreement calling for the Islamic Republic tosuspend enrichment of 20% uranium. In return, theP5 + 1 agreed to allow Iran toaccess $4.2 billion in previouslyblocked funds, and the U.S. agreedto apply no new economicsanctions for six months. YetIranian foreign ministerMohammed Javad Zarif says, “We did not agree todismantle anything,” and its president Hassan Rouhanipromises Iran will absolutely retain its enrichmentcapability.

U.S. President Barack Obama has pledged that if Iranfails to abide by the interim agreement or to dismantleits nuclear weapons development, he would seekadditional economic sanctions and possibly resort tomilitary action. A bill currently before Congress—theNuclear Weapons Free Iran Act—would impose justsuch additional sanctions on Iran if it breaks theinterim agreement or does not cease its nuclearweapons program following expiration of thisagreement. In other words, the bill formalizes exactlythe diplomatic consequences the President hasthreatened. No wonder the Nuclear Weapons Free IranAct is currently supported by at least 59 U.S. Senators,a clear majority.

Distressingly, the President has threatened to vetothis act if passed by the Senate. The White House fearsthat the threat of new sanctions—even though theywould not go into effect unless Iran fails to comply—could derail current nuclear disarmament talks.

What are the stakes? The primary targets of theIranian ayatollahs’ fanatical zeal are the U.S. (the“great Satan”) and Israel (the “little Satan”), perceivedas being America’s agent in the Middle East. Since Irannow possesses long-range ballistic missiles, the UnitedStates, Europe and many Arab nations are in mortaldanger of attack by that country. Indeed, as SenateForeign Relations Committee member Sen. RichardDurbin notes, “If these [current] negotiations fail,there are two grim alternatives—a nuclear Iran, orwar, or perhaps both.”

Even short of such a war, a nuclear-armed Iranwould be in unquestioned dominance of the MiddleEast and of its oil supply, the energy life blood of theentire world. It would surely cause intolerabledisruption of the U.S. and international economies.

Israel, however, is the most immediate target ofIran’s fury. Iran’s unquenchablehatred of Israel is based on theconviction that “nonbelievers”have no legitimate place in theMiddle East. Iran’s leaders haverepeatedly threatened Israel with

destruction once they come into possession of nuclearweapons.

Israel is such a small country that one or twonuclear weapons strategically dropped on its narrowcoastal territory would destroy it. Indeed, the effects ofa nuclear attack on Israel are too horrible to consider.There can be little doubt, for example, that such anattack would turn the entire Middle East into a warzone, leaving wide-spread destruction and a worldwideeconomic disaster in its wake. Clearly this outcomemust be prevented at all cost, and no effort should bespared to keep the hands of the ayatollahs off thenuclear trigger.

What is the solution? Of course, most Americansshare the President’s hopes that Iran can be persuadedto set aside its nuclear ambitions—and its vendettaagainst Israel—through diplomacy and other peacefulmeans. But one thing is certain: It is cripplingWestern economic sanctions, backed by the threat offorce, that have recently driven Iran to the negotiatingtable.

Above all, Iran must decommission its nuclearweapons infrastructure. Yet with Iran’s nuclearcapability still intact and moving forward and itsleaders vigorously asserting that the Islamic Republicwill never reduce its 20,000 centrifuges or shut downits Arak heavy-water nuclear reactor or its Fordowenrichment facility, does it make sense to reduce thepressure of economic sanctions now? Sen. RobertMenendez, chairman of the Senate Foreign RelationsCommittee believes it’s a mistake to relax sanctions: “Iam convinced that we should only relieve pressure onIran in return for verifiable concessions that willfundamentally dismantle Iran’s nuclear program.”

To receive free FLAME updates, visit our website: www.factsandlogic.org

You deserve a factual look at . . .

Iran, Nuclear Weapons and the “Interim Agreement”

Is this the time to relax—or rather increase—economic sanctions on the Islamic Republic?

Despite evasions, denials and equivocations, it is clear that Iran continues to pursue the holy grail of nuclearweapons. A temporary agreement recently struck between Iran and Western powers does nothing to disable Iran’snuclear weapons development, yet it does loosen hard-won economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic. Infact, Iranian diplomats brag that the agreement fails to inhibit them in the least and that their nuclear programwill not be stopped. Does it really make sense to relax pressure on Iran, or should the U.S. and Western powersline up additional sanctions should Iran fail to discontinue nuclear weapons development?

Since sanctions brought the Iranians to the table, sanctions are clearly the most powerful, peaceful means at ourdisposal for convincing the Iranians to abandon hopes of acquiring nuclear weapons. But because the Iranianscontinue to declare themselves steadfastly committed to nuclear development, it’s time to ratchet up the economicpressure. The Nuclear Weapons Free Iran Act should be passed now. The survival of the world is at stake.

FLAME is a tax-exempt, non-profit educational 501 (c)(3) organization. Itspurpose is the research and publication of the facts regarding developments inthe Middle East and exposing false propaganda that might harm the interestsof the United States and its allies in that area of the world. Your tax-deductiblecontributions are welcome. They enable us to pursue these goals and topublish these messages in national newspapers and magazines. We havevirtually no overhead. Almost all of our revenue pays for our educational work,for these clarifying messages, and for related direct mail.

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Gerardo Joffe, President139

“We did not agree todismantle anything.”

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thebattalion

newspage 6

tuesday 3.25.2014

every year because they can-not survive the colder north-ern winters. This spring marks the start of the monarch’s re-turn north, a journey that be-gins in the mountains of Cen-tral Mexico before sweeping through Texas and the Mid-west on its way to Canada.

Wilson said the migrat-ing butterflies will face severe challenges on their journey north because of the scar-city of an all-important plant necessary to their survival — milkweed.

“Because of the extended cold spells and the longer winter, there is very little milkweed available at the mo-ment, so when they do get here, unless things get a move on, they will be limited as to where they lay their eggs,” Wilson said.

Monarch butterflies only lay their eggs on milkweed, a type of wildflower common to the Great Plains that can often be spotted on the side of interstates. Besides the recent cold, Wilson said the intro-duction of herbicide resistant cash crops, and the farming in-dustry’s emphasis on growing corn to meet ethanol’s rising demand, are factors that have made milkweed scarce.

“You have millions of acres that would have supported wildflowers and milkweeds but now when the farmer goes to spray pesticides, the corn and soybeans survive but no other weeds, so that habitat is lost,” Wilson said. “The price of corn is so valuable now that people aren’t going to stop us-ing it, so we’re just going to have to find ways of mitigat-ing it.”

Wilson is one of several

voices in the scientific com-munity trying to bring at-tention to the monarch but-terfly’s plight. Orley Taylor, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Kansas, founded monarchwatch.org, an or-ganization concerned with monarch conservation. He said the role Texas plays in re-ducing or expanding its milk-weed growth is pivotal to the overall migration.

“Texas is clearly the most important state for monarchs for two reasons,” Taylor said. “The butterflies now coming out of Mexico need the milk-weed in Texas to get that first generation going. If there are no milkweeds in Texas, be-lieve me, there aren’t going to be very many monarchs in the United States.”

Taylor said milkweed is poisonous to many of the monarch’s predators, and the butterfly’s evolution took ad-vantage of this toxicity as an-other way to protect its vul-nerable larva. This advantage however ties the monarch’s ability to reproduce to the amount of milkweed avail-able, a relationship that en-dangers the butterfly when milkweed becomes scarce.

Neither Wilson or Taylor expect a reversal of current farming techniques to pro-mote milkweed growth, but Wilson said there is a differ-ent common practice that can be modified in order to make Texas and other U.S. states more monarch friendly — mowing grass.

Wilson said many cit-ies mow the vegetation that grows alongside highways be-fore the wildflowers that grow there, including milkweed, have a chance to seed.

“If they would hold off until all the wildflowers have

seeded, including the milk-weed, then those would come back again next spring,” Wil-son said. “There’s a tendency to just cut it when they stop flowering, and they don’t leave enough time for the flowers to go to seed. If we could arrange for cities to do that, we’d be good.”

A more direct approach would be to plant milkweed alongside much of the inter-state highway system. Wilson said such an initiative would mirror Lady Bird Johnson’s highway beautification pro-gram, and would give the monarch migration a better chance at survival.

“If [the interstates] could be planted with milkweeds, it would perhaps provide some corridors where the monarchs could survive,” Wilson said. “But it would take a huge co-operation between the states.”

Wilson is also responsible for the creation of several mon-arch “waystations” through-out Bryan-College Station. Waystations are gardens cer-tified by monarchwatch.org that contain milkweed, nectar plants and other traits favor-able to monarch migration.

Four Bryan-College Sta-tion elementary schools are home to waystations, and the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Gar-den is a waystation with more than 400 milkweed plants.

Karen Kaspar, principal of Mitchell Elementary in Bryan, said the monarch waystation has drawn butterflies and local wildlife to the school garden ever since its creation three springs ago.

“We do notice some [but-terflies], and we do get a lot of really neat birds and rabbits that come in [to the garden],” Kaspar said.

ButterflyContinued from page 1

John Bensen — THE BATTALION

Gardens that contain favorable plants for butterflies are important to monarch migration.

BAT_03-25-14_A6.indd 1 3/24/14 8:37 PM