Wednesday, March 17, 2004

W E D N E S D A Y MARCH 17, 2004

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD Volume CXXXIX, No. 33

An independent newspaper serving the Brown community since 1891

www.browndailyherald.com

Peer counselor program will be reexamined for 2005-2006

Gay marriage debate draws range of opinions

BY LISA MANDLE

BY BRIAN SCHMALZBACH

One year after the traditional first-year unit system was reorganized to distribute counselors’ workloads more evenly, administrators are considering revamping the peer counseling program.

The Office of Student Life plans to review the entire peer counseling program and look at issues of staffing and compensation once a permanent Vice President of Campus Life and Student Services has been found, according to Director of Student Life Jean JoyceBrady. The University is considering changing the responsibilities of minority peer counselors and possibly not housing MPCs within first-year units, she said.

Counselors and organizers have “seriously discussed” whether living in dorms facilitates minority peer counseling, Joyce-Brady said. MPCs have historically had both residential and campus-programming responsibilities, she said.

Most MPCs agree they need direct interaction with first-years, said Brian Lee ’06, an MPC in Andrews Hall, but some counselors question whether the MPC program should be part of the cocounselor structure in conjunction with residential and women’s peer counseling, he said.

MPCs are working to more clearly differentiate their roles from those of other peer counselors, he said. MPCs will continue to live in dorms but will be less involved with planning birthday

“There is a growing movement, a growing number of people in the U.S. who believe that the war on drugs is doing more harm than good,” he said.

“Building a powerful national advocacy organization is fundamental to our success.”

Nadelmann compared marijuana legalization efforts to the gay rights movement, saying “cultural transformation” can result in acceptance for drug users. Media images of drug users as moral, successful people are crucial to the effort, he said.

Nathaniel Lepp ’06, vice president of Students for Sensible Drug Policy, which organized the lecture, said Nadelmann’s message begins with awareness of current drug policy.

“We’re hoping that people understand the importance of opposing the drug war as it’s currently being waged,” Lepp said.

Opinions on gay marriage varied widely at a debate that drew a diversity of campus groups.

“Marriage is changing, and that’s OK,” said Seth Magaziner ’06, representing the College Democrats. Thousands of gay couples have married in the past month, yet the institution of marriage has not collapsed, he said.

Groups including the Brown College Democrats, College Republicans, Brown ACLU and Students for Liberty came together last night in Salomon 001 for “Gay Marriage: A Debate.”

Arguing against the inevitability of gay marriage in the United States, Herald opinions columnist Stephen Beale ’04, representing the Brown Spectator, said such an idea precludes debate. “We should be able to choose our future,” he said.

Eric Neuman ’04, of Students for Liberty, began the debate for the pro-gay marriage side by stating that “privileges must be equally applied by the government.”

There is no traditional definition of marriage, so the way one defines marriage determines how one feels about the issue, Neuman said.

Beale said the issue of gay marriage is about culture and tradition, not rights.

“There is no right to marry in the Constitution. People claim rights that aren’t rights,” he said.

“Tradition is self-justifying,” and the traditional definition of marriage in our society is “the union of one man and one woman for the purpose of begetting children,” Beale said.

Later, he added that his definition of marriage could be justified without reference to tradition through moral philosophy.

Ethan Ris ’05, president of the College Democrats, asked why the benefits conservatives see in marriage could not be expanded to the LGBT population. Beale said when a previously limited group of privileges is expanded, “it loses appeal.”

Herald comic artist Will Newman ’04, of the Brown Debating Union, redirected the issue to the role of government.

Marriage is not a right, and “the government won’t provide me a spouse,” he said. He also warned of the danger of enacting progressive change and spending political capital before the majority is ready to accept an issue.

Newman said he supported civil unions for gay couples. When asked by Brian McGuirk ’06 if “separate could ever be equal,” Newman and Beale disagreed.

“If you’re going to give everyone the privileges of marriage, just call it marriage,” Beale said.

Newman disagreed and favored extending those privileges but said, “We call the tradition for creation of children marriage.”

see SSDP, page 6

see MARRIAGE, page 4

see COUNSELORS, page 4

Nick Neely / Herald

At a Tuesday night debate on gay marriage, representatives of several campus groups defended their views. Clockwise from top left, Eric Neuman ’04,Will Newman ’04, Stephen Beale ’04 and Seth Magaziner ’06 all debated.

Nadelmann puts drug policy reform in historical perspective

BY ZACH BARTER

The fight to reform drug policy parallels other movements in United States history, according to a national leader of the effort.

“We see ourselves standing on the shoulders of and learning from other movements for political and social justice in American history,” said Ethan Nadelmann, founder and executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, in a Tuesday night lecture in C.V. Starr Auditorium.

The lecture, which drew about 80 students and community members, began with Nadelmann asking how many people in attendance supported the war on drugs. One student raised his hand.

Nadelmann provided a litany of reasons for his opposition to the war on drugs, including its creation of a violence-ridden black market, its effect on HIV transmission and its incarceration of millions of Americans.

But he said the core principle driving his work is his belief in people’s sovereignty over their own bodies.

“No one deserves to lose what’s precious to them — their freedom, their families, their livelihood — because of what they choose to put in their body,” Nadelmann said.

The anti-drug camp in the United States has taken on a fanatical character, he said, calling the war on drugs “the dark side of the American psyche.”

“It’s a quasi-religious feeling,” he said.

“It’s this conviction that there’s something viscerally, morally, biblically wrong” with putting drugs in one’s body, he said.

Nadelmann, who taught at Princeton University before moving into drug policy, also spoke about the origins and future of the movement. He stressed the importance of building coalitions with a wide range of communities and keeping a long-term focus.

W E AT H E R F O R E C A S T

I N S I D E W E D N E S D AY, M A RC H 1 7 , 2 0 0 4 Students at other universities face different types of housing woes campus watch, page 3

Northeastern University cancels annual spring concert, citing Super Bowl riot campus watch, page 3

Ellen Hunter ’04 writes that Iraq’s history must be considered when planning its future column, page 11

W. tennis has successful weekend, despite star player’s injury sports, page 12

Doubles teams key to m. tennis team’s success in weekend tournament sports, page 12

WEDNESDAY

snow high 33 low 20

THURSDAY

snow high 34 low 20

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

THIS MORNING WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 2004 · PAGE 2 Coup de Grace Grace Farris

TO D AY ’ S E V E N TS ACACIA ALEVAR WARREN—A MARINE SHRIMP INITIATIVE: MONITORING ECOSYSTEM, ANIMAL, AND PUBLIC HEALTH 12 p.m. (McKinney Conference Room,Watson Institute) — with Acacia Alevar Warren,Tufts University.

Presented by the International Environmental Health Colloquium.

ALL POLITICS IS LOCAL 6 p.m. (Chancellor's Dining Room (In the Ratty)— M. Charles Bakst, lead political columnist for the Providence Journal, will speak about the current state of Rhode Island politics - scandals and all. Dinner will be provided.

Four Years Eddie Ahn

MENU SHARPE REFECTORY

VERNEY-WOOLLEY DINING HALL

LUNCH — Vegetarian Corn Chowder, Italian Sausage Soup with Tortellini, Beef Tacos, Vegetarian Tacos, Refried Beans, Spinach with Toasted Sesame Seeds, Swiss Fudge Cookies, New York Style Cheesecake, Key Lime Pie.

LUNCH — Vegetarian Mushroom Barley Soup, Split Pea and Ham Soup, Beef Enchiladas, Vegan Burrito, Vegan Refried Beans, Corn and Sweet Pepper Saute, Swiss Fudge Cookies.

DINNER — Vegetarian Corn Chowder, Italian Sausage Soup with Tortellini, Irish Lamb Stew, Corned Beef, Potato Pepper Casserole Colcannon Potatoes, Braised Cabbage, Carrots Vichy, Irish Soda Bread, Swiss Fudge Cookies, New York Style Cheesecake, Key Lime Pie.

DINNER — Vegetarian Mushroom Barley Soup, Split Pea and Ham Soup, Corned Beef, Potato Pepper Casserole, Colcannon Potatoes, Braised Cabbage, Carrots Vichy, Irish Soda Bread, Key Lime Pie.

My Best Effort Will Newman & Nate Goralnik

PUZZLES Each of these words has something to do with celebration, but which one is not like the others?

Beer Liberate Create Late Celebrate (see bottom for answer)

By Veer Bhavnagri

ACROSS 1 Kind of offering 6 NYC nightclub 10 Medical ending 14 “Lulu” composer Berg 15 Café lightener 16 Show concern 17 Jersey decoration 19 Greenish blue 20 How reliever Dan Quisenberry pitched 21 Quieted 23 Go kaput 24 Peanuts or chips 25 Sopping 28 Music to a busy doctor’s ears 34 There oughta be one 36 Turn black 37 Planter 38 Punjab sect member 39 Saginaw Bay’s lake 41 “__ lay me...”

42 Meeting input 44 Poor dog’s portion 45 Sp. title 46 Quality-check broadcast 49 Alternative to dial-up, briefly 50 Teen follower?

51 Kid-__ 53 Extreme 56 Kind of map or code 60 Colgate, e.g.: Abbr.

61 Way through the woods 63 Golfer Ballesteros 64 Tummy trouble 65 Troy trap 66 Cote girls 67 Bout shorteners 68 Theme of this puzzle (hidden in four other answers)

DOWN 1 D.C. fundraisers 2 Text publishing category 3 Laid up 4 Examined before a job 5 Involve 6 Chowder item 7 Cereal grain 8 Snaps 9 Zeus’ daughter 10 They may be festive 11 “Tell me when” 12 Wrath, in old Rome 13 Mail 18 Take the pulpit 22 Pointillism features 25 “__ a Dream?”: 1928 hit song 26 Slur over 27 Throws the fight 29 Electrical bypass 30 Deck with Swords 31 Lying flat 1

2

3

4

A L E E

S C O L D

I H A T E

P R E P

E A V E

R N S P O E L D D U A R E T R O C K E N A O S R R S F A R P I N I O N I N N E T E S E R S R S E

6

7

8

L A N D

27 35

29

30

10

11

E L L E

D E E S

S L I M E

S A S E S

I N D O

M E S H

12

13

32

33

58

59

Hopeless Edwin Chang

22

31

36

37

39 43

46

W I L D E O A O T R E A S L A Y R E N P O

24 28

38 42

O M E N S

19 21

26

B O R G E

C A B A E R N E O T S C C E A L S E T B E S

03/17/04

9

18

34

40

41

44

45

47

48

50

66

P I N T O

G R E E T I N G S

Jero Matt Vascellaro

16

23

63

P I S T A C H I O

A I N T

15

20

60

L A N E D

xwordeditor@aol.com

5

17

53

Stop on a line Subterfuge From the top Combination __ 56 Many C-notes 57 Ballpark cover 58 “__ boy!”

59 Newsman Huntley 62 17th Greek letter

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:

14

25

52 53 54 55

32 Small salamanders 33 Experiment 35 “Is there a problem?”

40 Jitteriness 43 Builder’s detail, briefly 47 Middle East leader 48 Tic-tac-toe boxes, e.g.

D A W N

Blocks Charlie Beresford

51

54

55 61 64 67

By Kristin Tapac (c)2004 Tribune Media Services, Inc.

49 52

56

57

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD, INC.

62 65 68

03/17/04

Editorial Phone: 401.351.3372

The Brown Daily Herald (USPS 067.740) is published Monday through Friday during the aca-

Business Phone: 401.351.3260

demic year, excluding vacations, once during Commencement, once during Orientation and

Juliette Wallack, President

once in July by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. POSTMASTER please send corrections to P.O. Box

Carla Blumenkranz, Vice President 2538, Providence, RI 02906. Periodicals postage paid at Providence, R.I. Offices are located at 195 Lawrence Hester, Treasurer

Angell St., Providence, R.I. E-mail herald@browndailyherald.com. World Wide Web:

John Carrere, Secretary

http://www.browndailyherald.com. Subscription prices: $179 one year daily, $139 one semester daily. Copyright 2003 by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. All rights reserved.

Answer: Celebrate. The other words are created from the letters in the word “celebration.”

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

CAMPUS WATCH WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 2004 · PAGE 3

Bigger housing crunch, computerized Northeastern U. lottery common at other colleges cancels Ludacris concert after Super Bowl riot

BY SHEELA RAMAN

BY ZACH BARTER

A decision by the president of Northeastern University to cancel the school’s spring concert — headlined by Ludacris and Jurassic 5 — has provoked outrage and protest among students.

The move comes as part of the administration’s response to post-Super Bowl rioting near the school’s Boston campus, which resulted in the death of a student’s brother. Northeastern officials have used the riots as a starting point to reexamine campus culture and the school’s often-strained relations with its neighbors.

“A lot of people on campus felt that this wasn’t the time to host a gigantic, riotous concert,” said Christine Phelan, assistant director of communications at Northeastern.

Lawyers for the school have said Northeastern will not lose any of the $195,000 it had budgeted for the April 2 event. Phelan said administrators are hoping to schedule a big-name speaker — possibly former President Bill Clinton — in place of the concert.

Administrators understand that students are upset by the decision, but hope students see the need to strengthen their relationship with the outside community, Phelan said.

“It’s certainly not the average Northeastern student who’s out there rioting after a football win,” Phelan said.

“It’s unfortunate that everyone has to be punished for the actions of a few.”

But some students say administrators went too far by see CONCERT, page 4

Brown students might gripe about the housing lottery every spring, but they are all guaranteed a place to live. At other colleges, students are sometimes forced off campus and into scarce, expensive housing by their sophomore years.

At Harvard and Yale universities, students do not go through a campus-wide housing lottery because they are assigned to particular residential houses, where they eat and live until graduation.

But at many public universities and other Ivy League Schools — including Princeton University, the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia University and Dartmouth College — only first-years are guaranteed on-campus housing.

Upperclassmen at these schools must either move off campus or participate in a competitive Web-based room lottery based on seniority, according to the schools’ Web sites.

At Dartmouth, the lottery is held every 10 weeks due to the university’s trimester system, according to Gwen Williams, assistant to the director of housing for the college.

Students complete an online application, designating their preferred building and room types, and then attend a seniority-based lottery to select their rooms. After their first year, students can opt to live off campus, and they are encouraged to do so, Williams said.

But since it is often difficult to find adequate off-campus living in the small town of Hanover, N.H., sophomores most often decide to stay on campus, Williams said. This tendency creates an intense housing crunch every fall, in which 180 to 200 rising sophomores are placed on a summer waitlist, not knowing whether they will have rooms until late August or early September, she said.

“This uncertainty makes both students and parents really nervous, but no system will be perfect,” Williams said. “I know that most other schools face this type of crunch.”

The University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, with an

undergraduate population of about 16,000 students, faces a similar housing crunch on a much larger scale.

“We guarantee space for our 2,800 to 3,000 incoming freshmen, but beyond that there is always a housing crunch. We can rarely provide housing for transfers or students who wish to return to residential housing after living off campus. As rents continue to rise, there have been more student complaints about this,” said Rick Bradley, UNC director of housing.

Bradley said UNC has begun allowing first-year students to live off campus in an effort to open up more space on campus. Still, most students have elected to live in the dorms.

At Brown, the situation is different — instead of a waitlist to gain access to dorm rooms, there is a waitlist to obtain off-campus permission.

“Since Brown considers itself a residential college, our system takes care of student needs pretty well in terms of housing,” said Jesse Goodman ’06, president of Residential Council. “Hardly anyone is left sleeping on friend’s couches for lack of a place to live,” he said.

Unlike at many other schools, Brown has not computerized its housing lottery, and this year, for the first time, it did not allow rooms to be squatted, Goodman said.

To improve the housing situation for Brown students, Goodman said ResCouncil is currently considering implementing an online application process and reinstating squatting. ResCouncil is also looking into increasing the number of coed suites, according to Goodman. “We’re currently researching our options, and hopefully next year we will work something out with (the Office of) Residential Life that will be even better for Brown students,” he said.

Herald staff writer Sheela Raman ’06 can be reached at sraman@browndailyherald.com.

PAGE 4 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 2004

Counselors continued from page 1 parties and other social events.

Attendance at events such as the Black History Month Convocation and MPC committee group meetings will no longer be mandatory for MPCs. “We’ve got enough meetings as is,” he said.

The examination of MPCs’ roles will be part of the Office of Student Life’s review in the next year, Joyce-Brady said.

Last spring, the University restructured the peer counseling program to equalize the studentcounselor ratio across first-year units after peer counselors complained about unbalanced workloads. In the past, there were between eight and 25 first-years per counselor, Joyce-Brady said.

The restructuring — implemented this fall — led to fewer firstyear units and a ratio of between 16 and 21 first-years per counselor, she said.

“Feedback in general has been positive,” Joyce-Brady said. But “we fell short in terms of training peer counselors to think strategically” about working in larger units, she said. Counselors began the year expecting to get to know all the first-years in their units, an impossible task when some units have up to 80 students across multiple floors.

Joyce-Brady said counselors need to think about “carving up units” so that every student knows at least one counselor.

“There is still disagreement about whether that’s a reasonable approach,” she said.

“You hear different things about not having enough RCs or units being too big, but in general it’s a pretty good system,” said Maureen Suhendra ’07, who will be an RC in Unit 4 next year.

But Suhendra said she doesn’t know how counselors will unify the 75 to 80 students who will be in her unit next year. “It’s going to be a challenge,” she said. This year’s Unit 4, which spans two

Concert continued from page 3

i feel pretty, oh so pretty

canceling the show.

“It’s ridiculous,” said sophomore Brian Driscoll. “If they can cancel our Springfest for some ridiculous, trumped-up reason, what can’t they take away from us?”

Driscoll said the decision shows the school cares more about its image than its students.

“They took something that a lot of people worked hard for and got rid of it,” Driscoll said. “Honestly, if it was a Neil Diamond show, I doubt they would have canceled it.”

Students had voted to triple their annual activities fee in hopes of drawing a big-name act.

Previous Springfests have featured the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, the Roots and They Might Be Giants.

Michael Romano, president of Northeastern’s Student Government Association, said the concert represented major progress in student life since the school’s days as a predominantly commuter campus.

“The Ludacris show was less about the concert than about what it represented, about the level of student activity on this campus,” he said.

floors, has struggled to make unit members known to each other, she said.

Nick Bauer ’07 will be an RC next year for an 80-person unit.

This year, his unit in Keeney has 54 first-years. “It seems like a lot more,” he said. “It’ll be more difficult to get around and get to know everybody,” he said.

Counselors will have to work as a team and balance their desire to get know as many students as possible with the geography of their unit, Joyce-Brady said.

Some room changes will be made next year to place counselors in more centrally located rooms within their units, JoyceBrady said. But these changes will be constrained by the locations of singles within first-year buildings. She cited parts of Keeney Quadrangle, Emery-Woolley Hall and Morriss-Champlin Hall as particularly challenging areas.

Though initially unable to attract enough qualified applicants, the peer counseling program has filled all 79 positions for RCs, MPCs and WPCs after accepting a second round of applications, Joyce-Brady said.

Peer counseling programs were able to fill only 70 of the 79 positions available from the first batch of applicants, she said. The programs received more than 70 applications but felt that only 70 applicants met the qualifications, she said.

With nine positions open, the programs accepted a second round of applicants to fill the remaining spots, Joyce-Brady said. Between 40 and 50 students applied during the second wave, and the programs had to turn away many qualified applicants, she said.

“We’re feeling great” about the final selection of peer counselors, Joyce-Brady said. There will be 26 RCs, 31 MPCs and 22 WPCs next year, Joyce-Brady wrote in an email. Because many students applied to more than one program, it is not possible to say whether one program was partic-

But Romano also recognized that the campus climate needs significant change.

“We have a lot of repairing to do and a lot of serious issues to address with the community,” he said.

Student leaders are planning a day of community service and outreach in place of the concert.

Romano said he hopes the day will mark “the first step of many in sending the message that we care about the community.”

David Margolius ’06, administrative chair of the Brown Concert Agency, said he was not surprised that Northeastern students were upset by the decision.

Although Margolius said he doubted Brown administrators would ever cancel a Spring Weekend show, he was unsure whether BCA would be able to recover fees from bands if a concert were canceled.

“The worst thing that could happen to us is a rain-out on Saturday,” Margolius said. “I don’t think the University would (cancel the show) with all the money on the line.”

Herald staff writer Zach Barter ’06 edits the Campus Watch section.

He can be reached at zbarter@browndailyherald.com.

ularly short of applicants, JoyceBrady wrote.

Students cited several reasons why qualified applicants were scarce during the first round.

Suhendra said the first round was not well publicized. Some students also decided to apply to the program after learning more about the housing lottery, she said.

Bauer applied during the second round and was accepted to the RC program. The deadline for the first round was at a point in the semester when he was still adjusting to Brown and “overwhelmed with work,” he said. But once the deadline had passed, Bauer said he regretted not applying and was pleased to have a second chance.

A 25-percent pay increase for all of next year’s peer counselors has also been approved, according to Joyce-Brady. Next year’s counselors will receive $1,250 for the year, she said.

The pay raise was instituted after a meeting between the Office of Student Life and a group of peer counselors earlier in the semester. The peer counselors came to the meeting with three main concerns: compensation, unit size and the fact that some peer counselors in Perkins were housed in doubles, Joyce-Brady said.

In addition to receiving increased pay, next year’s counselors will all be housed in singles, Joyce-Brady said.

“The pay raise is especially important for MPCs, because a lot of people of color are on financial aid,” Lee said.

The coming review might also look at the possibility of a LGBT peer counseling program, according to Joyce-Brady, who said she was aware that discussions about such a program have occurred but has not received a formal proposal.

Lisa Mandle ’06 is The Herald’s design editor. She can be reached at lmandle@browndailyherald.com.

Marriage continued from page 1 Neuman concluded the affirmative position by arguing that “we should be attacking every problem in our society.”

Proponents of gay marriage should work to convince skeptics that a change in policy is the right course of action, he said.

Beale encouraged the audience to “try to understand the issue from my perspective, so that you can better understand your own.”

“When Stephen (Beale) looks at America, he thinks some traditions should be indefinite,” Magaziner told The Herald after the debate.

“I think change is America’s greatest tradition.”

Beale told The Herald he was satisfied with the debate although the opposed sides speak “two separate languages.” While most debates are founded on shared moral values, the gay marriage debate is a “clash of orthodoxies,” he said.

Rob Montz ’05, president of the Brown Debating Union, moderated the debate.

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

WORLD & NATION WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 2004 · PAGE 5

Subsidy cut planned for student loans WASHINGTON (Washington Post) —House Republicans are considering legislation aimed at reducing government subsidies for a federally supported student-loan program, a step that critics say could lead to sharp increases in the long-term cost of going to college.

The Republican proposals, which are in draft form and have not been circulated, could shake up the $35billion-a-year student-loan industry. Among the ideas being considered, according to lobbyists for both sides, is a major revamp of the present system of permitting recent graduates to consolidate student loans at fixed interest rates.

Because it is widely believed that a rise in interest rates is inevitable, a move to variable interest rates would likely mean higher bills for millions of college graduates over the next few years. But it could permit the government to use the money saved from subsidizing artificially low interest rates to help low-income students.

As a prelude to a formal debate on the changes, the House Committee on Education and the Workforce will hear arguments for and against fixed-rate student loans Wednesday.

Supporters and opponents of loan consolidation have submitted widely divergent estimates of the costs of keeping the present system for the student and the taxpayer.

A spokesman for the committee, David Schnittger, said Republican leaders are crafting a bill to reauthorize student-aid components of the Higher Education Act, which is due to expire in September. He said the Republican majority is opposed to “runaway entitlement spending” and wants to produce a bill that is “fiscally responsible.”

The Republican emphasis, Schnittger said, will be on “expanding college access for low-and middleincome students who are currently aspiring to attain a higher education” rather than on providing long-term benefits to “people who aren’t even students.”

Under the present system, which has been in place since the mid-1980s, graduates are permitted to consolidate several different student loans into a single long-term package at a favorable interest rate.

Graduates have been rushing to lock in governmentguaranteed 30-year interest rates of between 3.5 percent and 4.1 percent, well below the rate offered for home mortgages.

As long as interest rates are low, the program costs taxpayers nothing and may even be profitable, because the government charges lenders a service fee of about 1 percent a year for guaranteeing the loans.

But if interest rates rise over the next 10 years, as many economists predict, the government would have to make up the difference between the market rate and the fixed, consolidated rate, and costs could soar.

The student-loan industry is split on how to deal with the looming budget crunch. Most big lenders, including Sallie Mae, which claims a 29 percent share of all outstanding loans, would like to do away with consolidation on the grounds that it is becoming far too costly over the long run for taxpayers. Small loanconsolidation companies are fiercely opposed to any changes, fearing that they could be driven out of business.

Sallie Mae recently commissioned a study that predicted the consolidated-loan program will cost taxpayers at least $35 billion over the next eight years.

“The nightmare scenario is that the student-loan program will hemorrhage money as interest rates go up, and Congress will be obliged to make cuts in other areas in order to pay for it,” said Kevin Hassett, director of economic policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute and one of the authors of the Sallie Mae study.

Henry Howard, president of the U.S. Education Finance Group, a leading loan-consolidation company, said college graduates could end up paying twice as much in interest if the fixed-rate system is abandoned.

Most Democrats are strongly opposed to any attempt to abolish fixed-interest-rate student loans, said Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), the ranking Democrat on the House Education Committee. But another Democrat, Rep. Robert Andrews (D-N.J.), said he would support a cutback in the program if the money saved would go to low-income students.

U.S. image abroad is on decline, Pew poll finds WASHINGTON (L.A. Times) — A year after the start of the Iraq war, mistrust of the United States abroad has intensified, and ill will toward America has begun to erode support for the U.S.-led war on terrorism, according to a global attitude survey released Tuesday.

The ongoing study of public opinion in nine countries was conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press in February and March — before last week’s bombings in Madrid, Spain, and the subsequent defeat of the Spanish government that had contributed troops to the Iraq war. Spain was not included in the survey.

But the study illuminates the widening gulf between the American public’s beliefs and those of key U.S. allies — a divide that thrust itself into the public eye Sunday with the surprise defeat of one of the Bush administration’s staunchest allies on Iraq and the war on terrorism, Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar.

While most Americans say they believe the war to oust Saddam Hussein helped in the global fight against terrorism, majorities in Germany, France and Turkey, and half of those surveyed in Britain and Russia, said they thought the U.S.-led Iraq war undermined the struggle against terrorism.

Large majorities in Britain, Russia, France, Germany, Morocco, Turkey, Pakistan and Jordan said the war had left them with less trust in the United States. But 58 percent of Americans said the opposite.

Large numbers in every country surveyed — besides the United States and Britain — said they believed that American and British leaders lied when they claimed Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and that the United States is not sincere in its motives for the war on terrorism. Only Americans said they had more confidence than before the war that the United States wanted to promote democracy around the world.

“It is disturbing that Americans are the only ones surveyed who believe the war in Iraq helped, rather than

see U.S. IMAGE, page 6

PAGE 6 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 2004

Opposition gathers against ‘cap-and-trade’ mercury rule WASHINGTON (L.A. Times) — A

bipartisan group of senators, a former head of the Environmental Protection Agency, and health, labor and religious groups urged the Bush administration Tuesday to withdraw its controversial proposal to curb mercury emissions from power plants.

They said the plan was too weak to protect public health and that the internal process that produced it was so slanted toward industry that the final rule would not survive legal challenge.

In a letter to EPA Administrator Michael Leavitt, Sen. James Jefford (I-Vt.), the ranking minority member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, said the EPA had violated requirements calling for agencies to review alternatives and disclose their analysis when proposing a major regulation.

Jeffords also referred to the “proposal’s gross inadequacies in controlling mercury.” In addition, he called on Leavitt to request an investigation by the agency’s inspector general “into the allegations of undue industry influence in the rulemaking process.” He said it appeared that EPA political appointees and White House officials had “worked to skirt, if not directly violate, the law and rules of ethical behavior.”

An agency spokeswoman said Tuesday that work on the mercury rule is ongoing and no judgment “should be made until the rule is finalized in December.”

EPA officials said, at this point, they stand by their “cap-andtrade” approach to regulating mercury, which creates marketoriented incentives for coal-fired utilities to clean their emissions or instead buy “credits” from those that do.

“Our goal and our commitment remains the same: to

reduce mercury emissions by 70 percent,” said Cynthia Bergman, the spokeswoman.

Leavitt said this week that he was directing his staff to undertake additional studies and analysis of the mercury proposal, which was announced in December, shortly after he took office. He said he considered this part of the “normal process,” which he suggested could result in changes to the proposal. He emphasized that the administration was the first to propose regulations that would limit mercury emissions from power plants.

President Bill Clinton’s EPA administrator, Carol Browner, said the Bush proposal “is fundamentally flawed. It can’t withstand a legal test. And it must be withdrawn.” Speaking at a news conference hosted by Physicians for Social Responsibility, she said Bush administration officials “decided where they wanted to go before they completed the analysis, and then they cooked the analysis to get to where the industry was willing to be. That is not the way a regulatory process should operate.”

Jeffords and Browner said they were largely responding to a story in the Los Angeles Times on Tuesday that disclosed that EPA political appointees had bypassed agency professional staff and a federal advisory committee last year to develop a mercury-emissions rule preferred by the White House and industry.

The Times also reported that EPA staffers said they were told not to undertake routine economic and technical studies called for under an executive order and requested by the advisory panel.

Significant verbatim language from utility lobbyists was included in the proposal.

Also Tuesday, senators Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) reiterated an

earlier plea to scrap the EPA’s proposed rule. They have collected nearly three dozen signatures on a letter urging Leavitt to submit a new proposal.

Critics say the EPA should regulate mercury under the provisions of the Clean Air Act, which call for much steeper and earlier emissions reductions than the agency has proposed.

Christie Whitman, who headed the agency last spring when EPA staffers said they were told to forego the normal analysis of the mercury proposal, said Tuesday that she supported Leavitt’s decision to order new studies. She said he had the option of publishing the findings before the deadline for public comment and well before the final rule was enacted.

Still, Whitman said, “Ideally you have the underlying analysis when you go out with a rule.” She reiterated that she never requested that her staff not produce its normal analysis or skew the data and, had she known that was happening, “I would have stepped in.”

In support of Leavitt’s approach, Sen. James Inhofe (ROkla.), the chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, believes, according to a spokesman, that “this controversy is testament to the length environmentalists will go to politicize the normal workings of government.”

A recent study found that about 60,000 children a year could suffer learning disabilities from mercury exposure before birth. This can happen when pregnant women eat fish from waters contaminated by the mercury emitted from power plants.

But coal and utility executives warn that overly aggressive regulation of the nation’s 1,100 coalfired plants could seriously damage those industries as well as the national economy.

U.S. image continued from page 5 hurt, in fighting al-Qaida,” said Madeleine Albright, who served as secretary of state under President Clinton. “It is also troubling that the Iraqi conflict has caused each of the other countries polled to lose confidence in America’s honesty and commitment to democracy.”

The Pew poll has been carefully studied in the past by the Bush administration and various government and private commissions grappling with America’s declining standing abroad and growing antiAmerican sentiment in much of the Muslim world. An alarmed State Department also has commissioned its own polls, which have found trends similar to those cited by Pew, according to officials who have seen the data.

U.S. officials had argued that, while the plummeting popularity of the United States was cause for deep concern, it had reached its likely low point during the last Pew survey conducted in May 2003, shortly after the end of major combat in Iraq, and that it would likely rebound.

The new poll did show some bright spots, such as less apparent hostility in some nations with Muslim majorities. For example, the percentage expressing a very unfavorable view of the United States dropped in Turkey from 68 percent in May 2003 to 45 percent in this survey; in Pakistan from 71 percent to 50 percent; in Jordan from 83 percent to 67 percent; and in Morocco from 53 percent to 46 percent.

However, large majorities still viewed the United States unfavorably. And while the United States and Europe share a horror of Osama bin Laden, President George W. Bush was rated even less favorably than bin Laden in Jordan, Morocco and Pakistan — a key ally in the war on terrorism and the hunt for the most-wanted terrorist.

Moreover, nearly half of

Pakistanis, as well as 70 percent of Jordanians and 66 percent of Moroccans, said suicide attacks against Americans in Iraq were justified. Even 31 percent of Turks surveyed agreed.

Complete results can be found online at www.peoplepress.org.

The survey found a significant erosion of U.S. standing in Britain, a development that, together with the Spanish election results, could prove threatening to Bush’s most important ally, British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Only 43 percent of Britons surveyed said they believed Blair made the right decision in using force against Iraq, down from 61 percent last May. Support for the war among Americans fell from 74 percent to 60 percent in the same period.

Although European leaders have stressed their desire to improve ties with the United States — and argued that success in rebuilding and democratizing Iraq is in every nation’s interest — trans-Atlantic tensions in public opinion are unabated. Growing majorities in Britain, France and Germany want the European Union to be as powerful as the United States and want their foreign policy and security arrangements to be independent from Washington, the survey found.

“It’s a fact, whether we like it or not, that there’s a huge problem with the credibility of America in Europe and beyond,” a senior European diplomat said Tuesday.

The problem is due not simply to the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the diplomat said, but also to what he called the “Guantanamo element” — the view, especially among European youth, that the United States is not the defender of freedom, civil liberties and other ideals that it purports to be. The United States has been holding hundreds of terrorism suspects, including European citizens, at its base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, without access to lawyers or formal charges — some for more than two years.

“The negative fallout among the public, especially the young, idealistic public, may be more extensive than those in the Bush administration think,” the diplomat warned.

SSDP continued from page 1 Earlier in the day, Nadelmann delivered a speech to students in PS40: “Conflict and Cooperation in International Politics.”

Nadelmann also spoke before the medical community at Memorial Hospital and took part in a local talk-radio show.

SSDP hosted a reception with Nadelmann for faculty, legislators, doctors and students Monday night.

Lepp said he was pleased with the turnout at the event.

“I’m thrilled to see a lot of new faces here,” he said.

Herald staff writer Zach Barter ’06 edits the Campus Watch section. He can be reached at zbarter@browndailyherald.com.

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 2004 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD PAGE 7

U.S., Dominicans agree on trade terms WASHINGTON (Washington Post) —

President George W. Bush’s administration and the Dominican Republic agreed this week to remove almost all trade restrictions between them over the next decade, while keeping a lid on how much sugar the Caribbean island nation can export to the United States.

The agreement would allow Dominicans to gradually boost their sugar exports to the U.S. market, but limits the amount of the increase and maintains stiff tariffs for exceeding those caps.

The pact would essentially add the Dominican Republic to the proposed Central American Free Trade Agreement, or CAFTA, which would reduce commercial barriers between the United States and Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua, “expanding the circle of friends and neighbors who have agreed to tear down the tariff walls that block trade,” U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick said in a written statement.

While the Dominican Republic’s economy is small compared with the U.S. economy, the Bush administration has pursued such agreements with several individual countries in hopes of prodding others to continue negotiating a proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas that would include most of the nations in the Western Hemisphere, and to provide a push to the stalled World Trade Organization global trade talks.

Jack Roney, director of economics and policy analysis for the American Sugar Alliance, an industry trade group, called the change in Dominican sugar exports “a very, very modest increase indeed,” adding, “We’re pleased it’s not greater.”

Critics of sugar quotas say the trade limits prop up the prices paid by American businesses and consumers while hurting poor

sugar exporting countries trying to compete in global agriculture markets.

The increase in the Dominican Republic’s sugar cap is “not significant,” said Dale Hathaway, a senior fellow at the National Center for Food and Agriculture Policy, and a former undersecretary of agriculture in the Carter administration. “It’s fairly clear this administration is absolutely under the control of the sugar people and not going to upset them in an election year.”

Zoellick’s spokesman, Richard Mills, responded that “tough compromises were made in a few areas” to seize “the chance to open markets and expand opportunities for our workers, farmers and exporters.”

The Dominican Republic became the eighth country to reach a free-trade pact with the United States since December — joining the Central Americans, Australia and Morocco — and the Bush administration has said it plans to continue negotiating more such agreements this year, even as trade heats up as an election year issue.

Democrats have blamed the Bush administration’s economic policies for the loss of U.S. jobs to global competition. Republicans have responded by decrying proposed new trade restraints as “economic isolationism.”

Some Democratic lawmakers have said CAFTA will not win congressional approval because it lacks sufficient protection for the rights of workers in the Central American countries. Zoellick responded to one such comment last week on Capitol Hill, saying, “The reason CAFTA can’t pass is because we have a bunch of economic isolationists using labor as an excuse.”

The administration is consulting with Congress on when it will send the agreements to Capitol Hill for approval, Zoellick said.

PAGE 8 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 2004

Clinton launches $1-million-aday drive for Kerry (Los Angeles Times) — Former

President Bill Clinton, who despite his enormous popularity among Democrats played little part in the 2000 campaign, on Tuesday launched a 10-day effort to raise money for Sen. John Kerry’s (D-Mass.) White House bid.

In an e-mail sent out to 2.3 million Democrats — the combined mailing lists of the Kerry campaign and the Democratic National Committee — Clinton called upon party faithful to respond to Republican attacks by “flooding” Kerry headquarters with donations.

Clinton beseeched Democrats to raise $10 million in 10 days to help the Massachusetts senator battle President George W. Bush, who has collected more than $150 million for his re-election bid.

Clinton will also appear at a fundraising gala on March 25 in Washington, along with former President Jimmy Carter and many of Kerry’s one-time rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Clinton never endorsed a candidate in the race, and, until Tuesday, had largely remained on the sidelines in the 2004 cam-

paign until Tuesday.

“Today, you and I can send a powerful message to John Kerry,” Clinton said in his e-mail. “We can promise him that we will never let him stand alone in the face of Republican attacks. ... But, don’t wait to act. Join me in making March 16, 2004, a day you and I will always remember — and one Republicans will never forget.”

Experts on the presidency said Clinton’s fundraising prowess should prove a boon for Kerry and that he could help the presumed nominee increase turnout among minority voters in the November election.

But the experts also said Kerry needs to make sure he is not overshadowed by the former president or too closely linked to him.

Clinton “will help energize the base and loosen the dollars from the donors. That’s what he’s being brought in to do,” said Stephen Wayne, professor of government at Georgetown University in Washington and author of “The Road to the White House.”

Wayne said that in the fall, Clinton’s campaign skills “can bring in a large AfricanAmerican and Hispanic voter turnout” for Kerry.

Wayne also said that among some voters, “It may very well be that when people think of Clinton now ... they’ll think of the economy under Clinton compared with the economy under Bush, foreign policy under Clinton compared with foreign policy under Bush,” and that Kerry will benefit from that comparison.

Still, Clinton remains one of the most polarizing figures across the nation’s political landscape. A Gallup survey late last year asked 1,006 adults to rank their feelings about the former president on a spectrum from negative to positive; while the majority viewed Clinton favorably, sentiment was bunched at the two extremes of the scale — very positive and very negative.

One worry for Kerry is that

W. tennis continued from page 12 Bears this season.

Beck said the doubles point was a “convincing” confidence boost for the team.

Daisy Ames ’07 and Amanda Saiontz ’07 were unable to close out the third doubles match, falling to Nadia Dellarciprete and Samrin Tanzeem.

Singles once again proved to be Bruno’s strength, as the team dropped only two sets in winning all six matches.

Arlak once again used a fastmoving game to make quick work of her opponent, beating de Boer at the No. 1 position, 62, 6-1. Meath’s impressive play carried over from her doubles win, allowing her to post a straight-set win over Elsholz at No. 2, 6-3, 6-0.

Singer had a dominating win at No. 3 in what Taylor called an “outstanding” match. The 6-0, 6-1 win over Jansma gave her the “Team Bear Award” for the day, Taylor said.

Singer was effective in closing

extensive reliance on Clinton could energize those voters who still vilify him.

A former senior adviser to Clinton, who asked not to be identified, also warned that he “sucks up so much of the oxygen in a room” that Kerry’s campaign advisers need to “strike an appropriate balance” in using him.

The adviser added that “at the end of the day, you have to make your own sale” as a presidential candidate.

Charles Jones, a retired political scientist at the University of Wisconsin, said, “You certainly don’t want it to appear that Kerry is somehow not his own man.

That’s always a tricky thing. You don’t want it to appear that, ‘Gee, I’ve got to call in Bill Clinton to help myself.’”

Clinton was kept at arm’s length during the 2000 presidential campaign by Democratic nominee Al Gore, who was seeking to replace the man who had made him vice president. Gore was concerned that voter anger over the Monica Lewinsky scandal, which led to Clinton’s impeachment would hurt the Democratic ticket in several key states.

But after he lost the tight and controversial election, Gore was criticized for not tapping Clinton to help rally minority voters in Florida and Arkansas, the former president’s home state. Bush carried both those states.

“The way Gore handled Clinton in 2000 is inexplicable,” said the former Clinton adviser.

“He ended up with the worst of both worlds. For people who didn’t like Clinton, he got tagged with that baggage. For those who liked Clinton, he got none of the credit” for the successes of the previous eight years.

Kerry aides welcomed Clinton’s efforts Tuesday and immediately plastered the former president’s visage across the campaign’s Web site. But it remained unclear what Clinton would be doing for Kerry in coming months.

off points and coming in off of short balls, something that she has been trying to improve, she said.

“I just stayed really aggressive and I was really focused,” Singer said.

The Class of 2007 made several major contributions, as Saiontz, Ames and Pautler added straight-set wins at the No. 4, 5 and 6 singles positions, respectively.

“I think we were a much stronger team than them,” Beck said. “Even without our No. 1 player we managed to beat them.”

The team’s schedule toughens considerably from here, beginning with next Sunday’s road match against No. 66 Boston College. The Bears will practice hard this week in preparation for the BC match, as well as for an upcoming tournament at the University of California-Irvine, Taylor said.

Herald staff writer Robbie CoreyBoulet ’07 covers women’s tennis.

He can be reached at rcoreyboulet@browndailyherald.com.

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 2004 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD PAGE 9

Klonick continued from page 12 Continuing and widespread steroid use has the potential to destroy the integrity of baseball as much as Pete Rose’s betting did.

The negative effects of both steroids and gambling on baseball are undisputed — but why one is currently considered worse than the other could lie only in MLB’s indecisive stance on performance-enhancing drug use.

Where Major League Baseball differs from most professional sports is in its failure, until recently, to test for steroid use, and in its unwillingness to penalize players for steroid use. The current rumors of widespread steroid use and its implicit acceptability in the public eye can be compared to the days of heavy gambling in baseball at the turn of the 20th century.

In 1918 and 1919, multiple incidents of betting on baseball arose, most notably the eight Chicago “Black” Sox who threw the World Series for a few thousand dollars. Until that time, betting on baseball had been tacitly

M. tennis continued from page 12 “It was a bit shocking for us how well we played doubles all weekend,” said Head Coach Jay Harris.

Against 11th-ranked VCU Thursday, Brown doubles came out blazing. The Bears swept the doubles point, dominating the VCU teams. Brown’s first doubles team, the seventh-ranked duo of co-captain Jamie Cerretani ’04 and Adil Shamasdin ’05, controlled the 39th-ranked team of Florian Marquardt and Arnoud Lecloerec, handing the VCU team an 8-4 loss.

Brown’s other doubles teams followed the lead of Cerretani and Shamasdin. Co-captain Kris Goddard ’04 teamed with Zach Pasanen ’06 to defeat Pedro Nieto and Marton Ott 8-5, and Brier and Nick Goldberg ’06 came out ahead of Fransesc Lleal and Sergi Arumi 8-3.

Despite Brown’s excellent doubles play, VCU justified its number-one seed with standout singles performances. In singles play, only Brier won his match, defeating Marquardt 6-2, 6-4. Cerretani, ranked No. 100 in the nation, suffered a 6-1, 2-6, 6-0 defeat at the hands of 84th-ranked Nieto.

Brier played excellent tennis throughout the entire weekend, winning all three of his singles matches and teaming with Goldberg for three doubles victories. In singles, Brier did not drop a single set in his three matches against VCU, Fresno State and NC State. “(Brier) could have easily been on the All-Tournament team. It’s huge to have one of our captains come out and play that well,” Harris said.

Brown came back in the consolation bracket Friday with something to prove. Matched against a team ranked over 20 places higher than theirs, the Bears knew they were in for a challenge. What they did not expect was a 4-0 victory.

Doubles once again came out on fire for Brown. Goddard and Pasanen dominated their opponents in 8-2 victories, and Brier got another of his six wins by teaming with Goldberg to defeat Alex Krohn and Andy Sinn 8-2.

accepted. Cap Anson, a baseball legend (and Hall of Famer) at the turn of the century, reportedly openly bet on his team on a regular basis.

Not only was this behavior tolerated, it was deemed understandable and even honest to bet on yourself and your team. This all changed with the Black Sox scandal, which forced baseball to take a resolute anti-gambling stance once it became evident just how damaging betting was to the integrity of the game.

This is what needs to happen for steroids and baseball at this turn of the century. Maybe it will take a heartbreaking scandal that rocks the foundations of the game to teach the association that something needs to be done.

The only real difference between what doped-up players are doing to the game of baseball and what Charlie Hustle did is that only Hustle’s action is reflected in a rule painted in large print on the wall of every major league clubhouse in America. It’s time for a new rule to be written. It’s time for MLB and the union to admit that steroids can ruin baseball.

With the doubles point clinched, Cerretani and Shamasdin did not finish their match.

In singles, Brown needed to win only three matches to secure the victory. The Bears took the first set in all six singles matches, and Brier quickly added his fourth win of the tournament over Sergui Modoc 7-6, 6-3. Eric Thomas ’07 added a huge win at number four singles, defeating Charles Irie 7-6, 6-3, and Shamasdin closed out the match with a 7-6, 4-6, 6-2 victory over Stefan Suta. Though he did not finish his match, Cerretani was leading 51st-ranked Greg Shearer 7-6, 6-5 when play was stopped.

Pasanen and Goldberg also did not finish their matches.

Saturday brought Brown’s final match of the tournament, one that had special meaning for the juniors and seniors on the team.

Jon Choboy, currently the head coach at NC State, was the coached at Brown until the summer of 2002 and coached all of the juniors and seniors currently playing for Brown.

Nostalgia aside, Brown doubles once again began on the attack.

As in the match against Fresno State, Brown’s top doubles team of Cerretani and Shamasdin was unable to finish its match due to the extremely strong play of the other two teams. Goddard and Pasanen dominated Val Banada and Dennis Myers 8-3 while Brier and Goldberg defeated Conor Taylor and Andre Iriarte 8-3.

Again, Brown needed only three singles matches to clinch the win. Brier won his sixth match of the weekend, defeating Jon Davis 6-4, 6-0. Pasanen earned his first singles win of the weekend, coming out ahead of Myers 6-1, 64. For the second match in a row, Shamasdin clinched the win by defeating Banada 6-2, 6-2.

Cerretani, Thomas and Goldberg did not finish their matches.

Brown returns to the courts to play the University of MarylandBaltimore County Friday at the Pizzitola Sports Center.

Herald staff writer Craig McGowan ’07 covers men’s tennis. He can be reached at cmcgowan@browndailyherald.com.

Baseball continued from page 12 Bruno took its first lead of the season by scoring three runs in the fourth. Lowe led off by showing his wheels, making it all the way to third on a throwing error. Outfielder Paul Christian ’06 plated Lowe with a double, and Hughes scored Christian and outfielder Devin Thomas ’07, a Gainesville native, with a double of his own three batters later.

The bottom half of the inning proved to be McNamara’s last, as the Gators took the lead back with three runs of their own. But Clint Dykehouse ’07 was able to come in and put the fire out, keeping the score 4-3. Brown tied the score at the top of the fifth, as Christian’s sacrifice fly brought in Chris Contrino ’05.

Dykehouse held Florida scoreless in the sixth, and Sam Jennings ’04 came in to throw three more scoreless innings. In the first extra frame, Florida was able to get a runner across on Mike Mahan ’07, who took

the loss. The loss of closer Dan Spring ’03 to graduation and the MLB draft hurt the Bears’ late-inning performance.

Co-captain Bobby Deeb ’04 had two hits to go with two stolen bases on the day.

Christian and Hughes had two RBI apiece, and Contrino added the fifth.

The third and final game of the series was not pretty for Bruno, as Florida scored early and often on its way to a 14-1 victory.

Starter James Cramphin ’06 gave up 13 of the Florida runs in five innings, but only five of them were earned.

Hughes went two for three on the day, bringing his average to .440 for the series. Contrino drove in Christian for the Bears’ only run.

After seeing modest amounts of playing time last season, Hughes remained humble about his breakout weekend. “I got some pitches to hit,” he said. “When you get pitches like that, hopefully you get a good swing in and it falls, and that’s what was happening.”

This weekend the Bears con-

Dykehouse held Florida scoreless in the sixth, and Sam Jennings ’04 came in to throw three more scoreless innings. In the first extra frame, Florida was able to get a runner across on Mike Mahan ’07, who took the loss. tinue their road swing when they head down to Boone, N.C., to play twin doubleheaders against Appalachian State University (2-15).

Herald staff writer Chris Hatfield ’06 edits the sports section and covers baseball. He can be reached at chatfield@browndailyherald.com.

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

EDITORIAL/LETTERS WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 2004 · PAGE 10 S T A F F

E D I T O R I A L

Measuring units During the first weeks of the fall semester, it’s common to see enormous groups of first-years in the Sharpe Refectory and around campus, under the homemade banners of their residential units. This year, those groups got even bigger, as the Office of Student Life’s reorganization of units enlarged some to include up to 80 students.

The intention was to even out residential counselors’ workload, measured by the ratio of first-years per counselor.

That ratio currently ranges between 16 and 21 first-years per counselor, whereas previously RCs might be responsible for as few as eight or as many as 25 first-years.

Counselors have responded positively to the new system, Director Jean Joyce-Brady told The Herald. But Joyce-Brady did not mention the reactions of first-years, whose wellbeing is the goal of the counseling program.

The problem with unwieldy units is not just that firstyears have difficulty getting to know their counselors. It is that they have difficulty getting to know their unitmates.

Units are crucial for first-years during orientation and throughout the year. But when units swell to encompass as many as 80 students, they seem likely to lose the sense of a cohesive community.

This cost does not seem worth the benefit of evening out RCs’ workloads. Counselors in the largest units are still responsible for 21 first-years each — not much of a reduction from 25. And the strict breakdown of students per counselor does not reflect the quantity and quality of counseling individual first-years receive. Certainly, it does not justify changing unit size, a number with a more direct relevance to the first-year experience.

There is still time for OSL to rework units for the Class of 2008. The 79 counselors selected could be distributed over 29 units, rather than 22, reducing average unit size from about 65 to about 50 first-years. Under this reorganization, no unit would have fewer than three counselors. The only tradeoff would be an increased disparity in counselors’ workload. But we trust that rising upperclassmen who choose the responsibilities of counseling are mature enough to accept an uneven counselor-student ratio to keep the unit experience meaningful.

114

LETTERS Registrar not at fault for Brown’s unenforced writing requirement To the Editor: I was glad to see Gabriella Doob’s story about our efforts to enforce the English Requirement and to help students improve their writing (“Writing requirement, previously ignored, is now enforced,” March 15). I am also grateful for your editorial support of this effort. I am writing to correct the impression the story may inadvertently have created, however, that the Registrar was somehow responsible for the neglect that the requirement had fallen into. The Faculty has delegated the

responsibility for enforcing the writing requirement to the Office of Dean of the College, so any lack of clear direction about this requirement in the past originated from and must be addressed by this office. The Registrar’s Office has indeed been most helpful in working with my office to get us the information we need so that we can contact the students who need assistance.

Paul Armstrong Dean of the College March 16

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD EDITORIAL Juliette Wallack, Editor-in-Chief Carla Blumenkranz, Executive Editor Philissa Cramer, Executive Editor Julia Zuckerman, Senior Editor Danielle Cerny, Arts & Culture Editor Meryl Rothstein, Arts & Culture Editor Zachary Barter, Campus Watch Editor Monique Meneses, Features Editor Sara Perkins, Metro Editor Dana Goldstein, RISD News Editor Alex Carnevale, Opinions Editor Ben Yaster, Opinions Editor Christopher Hatfield, Sports Editor PRODUCTION Lisa Mandle, Design Editor George Haws, Copy Desk Chief Eddie Ahn, Graphics Editor Judy He, Photo Editor Nick Neely, Photo Editor

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OPINIONS WEDNESDAY, MARCH 17, 2004 · PAGE 11

ELLEN HUNTER

Taking Iraq’s borders for granted Without the American public’s awareness, the discourse on the future of Iraq has been constrained by political correctness. Imagine the senator who argues that Iraqis are incapable of self-governance. The senator would be derided as racist for suggesting that uneducated, barbarian Iraqis cannot peaceably exist absent of the United States’ paternalistic watch. Or consider a hypothetical State Department memo proposing that the United States dissolve Iraq into two or three new states. Such a proposition would be called undemocratic for questioning the strength and universality of democratic ideals. Furthermore, it would reek of the underlying U.S. interest in controlling the region’s resources.

The problem here is that the boldest ideas never receive due consideration. The American government has framed a limited range of options for Iraqi reconstruction that the public uncritically accepts.

Two widely accepted givens are particularly disturbing. First, we grant that the quickest peaceful turnover to the Iraqi people is most desirable, under the assurance of President George W. Bush’s firm June 30 deadline. Second, we view the nation of Iraq as a geographically defined, sovereign entity whose borders must be preserved. Both of these assumptions preclude solutions that might ultimately lead to more stable democracy and lasting peace in the region.

The public accepts that a handover of Iraq is desirable as soon as a democratic government is in place and the country is stabilized. This idea is powerful because many Americans, including me, believe that democracy is the most just and most ideal system of government. Furthermore, after World War II, we have learned that democracy can thrive in formerly authoritarian countries.

But Iraq is different. In “Ethnic Groups in Conflict,” Duke University political scientist Donald Horowitz identifies factors contributing to patterns of ethnically motivated violence, genocide and secessionist movements. For these factors democracy is no cure.

Kurdish separatism dates back to the 16th century.

The Kurds have recent experience with self-rule (recall that the Kurds essentially ruled themselves under the protection of the no-fly zone), a geographically defined region of Kurdistan and demand political sovereignty. At the very least, ethnic tensions in Iraq will not fade overnight.

The United States, unable to manage election

President Bush accepts the reconstruction of an arbitrary state line. booths or protect American lives in ethnic crossfire, is finally paying notice to the strength of ethnic tensions in Iraq. The most recent proposals for managing ethnic tensions in Iraq have been quite clever: a hardly democratic caucus structure, proportional expansion of the existing governing council and/or so-called partial elections to take place in Iraq’s “secure” regions.

Last week’s interim constitution contains a threeperson presidency and de facto veto power for Kurds and Sunni Arabs which will impede any government

action, angering any or all of the country’s three major ethnic groups. Even if we arm Iraqis with the most creatively constructed “democracy,” it’s not likely that any future government will peacefully manage ethnic tensions.

Undue regard for Iraq’s sovereignty and national borders precludes consideration of broader options such as dividing the country into more stable regions.

We preserve current borders with respect for Iraq’s history and people, for international bodies committed to current borders and for the restraint with which big powerful countries should address weaker nations. Does it seem to you that the United States’ recent primary principles of foreign policy are restraint and respect for international bodies?

The hypocrisy and absurdity of this rationale is just as comic. Iraq’s national borders are not the result of some sensible act of God. Instead, the British carved Iraq, an arbitrary, flawed and unstable territory from the Ottoman Empire’s leftovers in 1920. They then left the state independent in 1932, only 72 years ago.

At least one foreign policy expert, Leslie Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, has dared to consider a three-state solution. She proposes dividing Iraq among Kurds in the north, Sunnis in the center and Shiites in the south. This solution would be difficult, considering U.S. interests in Turkey and the lack of resources in the Sunni region. But perhaps dissolving Iraq would bring greater peace and stability down the line. To that end, U.S. foreign policy options cannot be hamstrung by political correctness.

Ellen Hunter ’04 is not hamstrung by political correctness either.

El pueblo unido GUEST COLUMN BY MARISA HERNANDEZ-STERN

The Know Nothing anti-immigrant nativists are at it again. Writing in the journal Foreign Policy, Harvard University Professor Samuel Huntington warns that the American way of life is threatened by the menace of the brown peril. The harried, scared professor predicts a scenario of Latinos flooding the United States and dragging it to the lowest levels.

With sweeping generalizations and no supporting empirical data, Huntington foretells the degradation of civilization as we know it, caused by Latino hordes sneaking into the United States and refusing to assimilate with the dominate Anglo culture. As Huntington sees it, Latinos are uninterested in the upward mobility characteristic of other ethnic groups and shun middle-class American values.

Insulated in his Harvard office, Huntington has missed the rapid rush of Latinos into the mainstream during the past 25 years in every corner of the country. Latinos are voting, spending, and participating in every aspect of American society — more so every day.

We have heard the dire prophesies of the antiimmigrant negativists before. For all his erudition, Huntington too easily rests his arguments for immigrant exclusion policies on the same flawed premises that blinded previous Chicken Little, anti-foreigner doomsayers.

Gloomy predictions of the end of civilization as we know it led to a 100 years of successive laws and practices with racist intent and horrendous tolls in human suffering. Among them are the raciallymotivated Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the harsh exclusionary quotas of the Immigration Act of 1924, the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II and the refusal to grant asylum to European Jews fleeing Nazi genocide. These proclamations

were based on flawed assumptions, inflamed rhetoric and racial stereotyping.

We have learned that we should have known better when confronted with the challenge of new or different people seeking the protections of democracy in this country. But Huntington does not seem to have learned much from his study of history. He has learned even less about contemporary Latinos.

Huntington and a rapidly growing anti-immigrant America First coterie propose measures to halt the flow of Latinos, Asians and other non-

Anti-immigrant nativists should give the Latino-bashing a rest.

Anglos into the United States. These neo-nativist, wall-and-moat advocates ignore the contributions generation after generation of immigrants have made to the United States since its founding.

Germans, Irish, Italians, Jews, Asians and others each have assimilated and shared their heritages and energies — notwithstanding hard resistance to their arrivals and intense discrimination at every step.

Latinos are but the latest group adding to the American mix, although many have been here for

generations. While Huntington insists that Latinos are different from past immigrants, he fails to note the rapidly expanding Latino middle-class, rising numbers of college-educated Latinos in a variety of fields, melding of Latino business people into the mainstream or the surprising rate of intermarriage between Latinos and others in this country.

Huntington makes a huge error when he writes, “As their numbers increase, Mexican Americans feel increasingly comfortable with their own culture and often contemptuous of American culture.”

From coast to coast, Latinos are working hard in kitchens, households, gardens, slaughter houses and fields, opening and managing businesses of every kind, joining our armed services in disproportionate numbers and participating in government, volunteer and civic affairs at every level.

Huntington writes that Mexican immigration “could consolidate the Mexican-dominant areas of the United States into an autonomous, culturally and linguistically distinct, and economically self-reliant bloc within the United States.”

No, Professor Huntington, American civilization is not going to collapse under the weight of Latino immigrants. Latinos will continue to provide vitality and productivity to all aspects of American life, just as past immigrant groups have bestowed benefits on their adopted nation. The sooner negativist antiimmigrants comprehend that our national and global economies demand recognition of the reality that Latinos are here to stay and want to participate, the easier it will be for us to embrace and appreciate the differences that make America a strong and vibrant democracy.

Marisa Hernandez-Stern ’05 brings the pain.

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

SPORTS WEDNESDAY MARCH 17, 2004 · PAGE 12

UAB no match for w. tennis, even without injured Falconi

Why Pete Rose still matters

BY ROBBIE COREY-BOULET

The 75th-ranked women’s tennis team (5-2) cruised to its fifth victory in a row on Sunday, sweeping unranked University of Alabama-Birmingham 70. But the victory was dampened by the news that No. 1 player Stephanie Falconi ’06 will be out for the rest of the season with a knee injury.

Head Coach Norma Taylor said Falconi tore her ACL during Thursday’s practice, and the team received word Tuesday that the injury will sideline her for the remainder of the spring season.

Captain Victoria Beck ’04 expressed disappointment about Falconi’s injury.

“We’re going to have to make all new teams,” she said.

Kim Singer ’06 agreed Falconi’s injury will have a major impact on the Bears’ lineup and performance.

“It’s going to be really hard for our team,” she said. “Not having her is definitely going to show against the tougher schools.”

As has been the case throughout the team’s injury-plagued winning streak, players rose to the challenge of the altered line-up and put in several convincing performances.

“I am very proud of the team’s performance Sunday and their ability to adjust,” Taylor said. “It’s great to win at 7-0 and to see all of the singles players step up after (Falconi’s) injury.”

Kerry Meath ’05 had a strong day in both her matches, winning straightset matches at No. 1 doubles and No. 2 singles.

At the No. 1 doubles position, Meath and Beck combined their solid net skills to pull out a tiebreak win, 9-8 (7-3) against Femke de Boer and Marrit Jansma. The match marked Beck’s return from oral surgery, which forced her to sit out both matches two weeks ago.

Alexandra Arlak ’05 and Michelle Pautler ’07 continued their impressive doubles play with an 8-4 victory over Annemieke Elsholz and Julia von Samson, securing what was only the second doubles point win for the see W. TENNIS, page 8

Judy He / Herald

Jamie Cerratani ’04 and the rest of the men’s tennis team turned in an outstanding performance at the Blue/Gray Classic this weekend, taking two of three games.

Superb doubles play for m. tennis at Blue/Gray

BY CRAIG MCGOWAN

The men’s tennis team headed south last weekend for the Blue/Gray Collegiate Invitational in Montgomery, Ala. The 52nd-ranked Bears posted a record of 2-1 for the weekend, extending their record to 10-2.

The tournament featured 16 of the nation’s top college teams, and though the Bears were unseeded, they were determined to do well. In the first round, Brown was drawn into the bracket against the No. 1 seed, Virginia Commonwealth University. Despite the bad luck, Brown fought hard before falling 4-2.

In the consolation bracket, the Bears

rebounded, dominating 30th-ranked Fresno State University 4-0. Led by co-captain Ben Brier ’04, who went 6-0 on the weekend, Brown kept the momentum rolling, blanking North Carolina State University 4-0.

“The whole team played on a different level than it had the whole season,” said Brier.

Doubles, the team’s strength all year, continued to be a major force on the court.

Brown did not lose a doubles point all weekend and in fact did not lose a doubles match against any team. see M. TENNIS, page 9

Baseball opens season with three losses to seasoned U. of Florida squad

BY CHRIS HATFIELD

The baseball team (0-3) started its season this past weekend against the best competition it will face this season, dropping three games to the University of Florida (18-3).

The 16th-ranked Gators brought their winning streak to 14 in a row with the victories, but they were not the blowout wins that might have been expected from the uneven match-up. The Bears dropped the first game 14-8 on Friday, fell 6-5 in extra innings in the second game Saturday and dropped the series finale on Sunday, 14-1.

Heading into the weekend, the Bears’ lineup took a major hit as captain Matt Kutler ’04 was lost for the season after

tearing ligaments in his right hand. The two-time First Team All-Ivy leftfielder had just been named Baseball America’s Pre-season Ivy League Player of the Year and would certainly have broken the Brown records this season for career hits and runs batted in.

Despite the loss of its best player, the team headed down to Gainesville, Fla., to take on the red-hot Gators. The first game got off to a bad start for Brown, as Florida’s 18-game experience advantage showed. Starting pitcher Chris Davidson ’05 was knocked around for 12 runs in three innings. The Bears managed to rally, starting with a three-run fourth, but they had dug themselves too deep a hole in the early innings and eventually

fell 14-8.

The Bears were led by shortstop Jeff Nichols ’05, who went 2 for 5 with two RBI and one run. Designated hitter Danny Hughes ’06 had Brown’s only home run of the weekend, a two-run bomb to left that followed an RBI ground out by co-captain James Lowe ’05. Davidson took the loss.

The next day was a different story, as the Bears and starting pitcher Shaun McNamara ’06 came out with renewed energy. Florida got on the board with a run in the first inning, but then McNamara settled down, holding the Gators scoreless for two innings. see BASEBALL, page 9

A little over two months ago, after more than a decade of lies, Pete Rose finally came clean about betting on baseball. The reasons behind the admission were undoubtedly selfmotivated — he KATE KLONICK had only two years SPORTS COLUMNIST left before he could be reinstated into baseball and then voted into the Hall of Fame by sports writers, and the only way Commissioner Bud Selig would ever consider reinstating him was if he issued a full confession. Confess he did, and simultaneously lined his pockets with profits from interviews, articles and most notably a book, “My Prison Without Bars.”

Rose was on all major news channels for a week in January. It seemed that every sports writer and journalist from Poughkeepsie, N.Y., to Santa Cruz, Calif., had something to say about Charlie Hustle.

The same issues were brought up over and over, in countless articles and message boards: Rose’s timing was terrible, he profited from his admission and he just didn’t seem sorry. In the end there was nothing left but, “We’re glad you said it, Pete, but it wasn’t good enough.” And then just as quickly as he had appeared, he vanished.

Two months later, Pete Rose is not even a blip on the “SportsCenter” ticker. But maybe it is now, in light of rumors and allegations of steroid use among the leagues’ top players, that Rose needs to be remembered most. His mistakes should serve as a reminder of how easily the integrity of baseball can be shattered, and how important it has become that every player does his part to keep it intact.

Last summer Jose Canseco, among others, estimated that 45 to 85 percent of ball players were using steroids. In response to these allegations and complaints from within the baseball community, Selig stepped up to the plate this fall and instituted steroid tests. A steroid-use rate of 5 to 7 percent was found, although the accuracy of this figure was questionable. Wary of stepping on the toes of the all-powerful players’ union, the MLB organization held tests under conditions that left many doubtful of their reliability.

Because the tests were conducted anonymously and in the period before spring training, it is rumored that many players simply opted to wait to start their steroid cycle until after testing was finished. Several team trainers reported a loss in body weight of 25 to 30 pounds from a few All-Stars, and one player was reportedly seriously injured after a significant loss in muscle mass. In addition, under the proposed testing guidelines, anonymity is maintained until the second positive test is registered, and no serious action such as suspension is taken until the athlete has tested positive five times.

Recently, Barry Bonds’ trainer has been indicted on federal charges of providing steroids to athletes. Though Bonds has denied charges that he himself has taken steroids, the possibility that one of the greatest hitters in baseball could be under the influence demonstrates the fragility of the game and the importance of a level playing field. see KLONICK, page 9

SPORTS SCHEDULE Wednesday, March 17 Women’s Lacrosse: vs. Boston College, 4 p.m. (rain date Thursday)