Amidst a hundred candidates, waving their large placards and thrusting sheets of meaningless paper into the unwilling hands of the students of this campus, there stood a dedicated bunch. Parking themselves 30 or 40 feet in front of Sather Gate, this group pleaded with the voting public to take a new route. Don’t fall for the bribes of candy, key chains, stolen Unocal 76 antenna balls, or short skirts, they said. Don’t succumb to the brainwashing efforts of Student Action’s swirling dervishes. And for goodness sakes, don’t stick your face in a working blender. Who were these fine folk, who decided to hand out small little flyers and walk around with green inflatable aliens’? These, my friends, were the members of the Squelch! Party.
It all began so innocently, when the Squelch editors glanced over a roomful of staff members and asked, “Ok, who wants to be an ASUC senator?” Interestingly enough, the Democratic Party was begun the same way. When people had finished laughing, gagging, and crying, they realized we were serious. We had a dream, and for the most part that dream was fulfilled. No. not the one with Martha Stewart dressed as a dominatrix. At the beginning of the year, the editors dreamed of once again establishing the Squelch and its militant political wing as a force to be reckoned with, as it had been in years past. Like the phoenix of mythical fame, we arose out of the ashes, born anew. And like the Phoenix of Arizona fame, we offer many wonderful shops and hotels.
Squelch! Party candidates spent no more than $22 on their campaigns. Honest. Who will forget the look of fear from many candidates when we approached Sproul Plaza for our first day of campaigning armed with 6 green aliens and two balloons? Who could possibly count the number of times we were asked where we got the aliens (by the way people, a little lesson here-the aliens have been on window display at the Rexhall/Blue Heaven/ Mos Eisley drug store on Telegraph for about a year now, don’t tell me you’ve never seen them)? We suffered our slights, but we survived being called a “fringe” party. Considering that our executive office candidates were not notified of their debate, despite the fact that they both own phones, they showed up anyway and performed wonderfully. Finally, who could forget not having our candidacy mentioned by the conservative overlords at the Daily Cal (or as we affectionately call it, The Daily Gut-Wrencliing-Piece-Of-Crup-Ass-Rag) Is it not irony that the famed UC Berkeley School of Journalism is located at Northgate Hall on north side, as far away from the offices of the Daily Cal as is possible without relocating to Sacramento?
So where do we go from here? This year, the Squelch has accomplished many of its goals. Our once depleted staff of, oh, 3, has grown to over 60 people. Once again, we are an established student group. We actually have an office… with a window! We put out 6 issues this year, including 4 in the second semester alone. Some of our material was read on the radio and they didn’t even have to censor all of it. The Squelch survived Joe Eskenazi-gate, Guy Branum-gate, and Sig-Ep-gate, all without physical violence… so far. We got to be on TV (I personally got to rant and rave about a bitter personal relationship experience in front of an audience of tens), but better than that we got to meet the Sex On Tuesday girls. Score! Add on top of that our newly acquired political capital, and you’ve got one nifty thingamajig. As the newly crowned Editor-In-Chief, I can’t help but to smile, and hope that you will grant us this small bit of self-indulgence. Enjoy our final issue for this school year, and don’t let the sun catch you crying.
