Thursday, November 8, 2007

The Brown Daily Herald T hursday, N ovember 8, 2007

Volume CXLII, No. 106

Simmons speaks frankly at UCS meeting

Since 1866, Daily Since 1891

Pataki stresses the need for political common ground

By Irene Chen Senior Staff Writer

Tai Ho Shin / Herald

Former New York Gov. George Pataki seemed right at home Wednesday when he spoke to a half-full Salomon 101 audience that responded enthusiastically when the former governor asked how many people were from his home state.

He then jokingly asked the Yankees fans in the crowd if he had missed the World Series this year. (The Yankees have won more World Series championships than any other baseball franchise but were not featured in this year’s match-up).

Pataki also referred to his slight discomfort of speaking at Brown as a member of the Republican Party. But he was comforted, he said, when he stepped into Blue State Coffee and found common ground simply with a good cup of coffee.

“I was a little nervous because I was a conservative Republican from New York ... and I was told that when Hilary Clinton spoke here, she was booed because she wasn’t liberal enough.”

In March 2006, about a half-dozen activists protested Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., before she delivered a speech in Meehan Auditorium.

Pataki served three terms as governor of New York, beginning in 1994 and stepping down in 2006.

Pataki’s speech, a part of the Noah

Former New York Gov. George Pataki delivered the annual Krieger Lecture in Salomon 101 Wednesday, addressing “A House Divided: A Look at Politics at the State and National Level.”

continued on page 5

By Sam Byker Staff Writer

President Ruth Simmons addressed a general body meeting of the Undergraduate Council of Students in Leung Gallery Wednesday night, taking questions on the Plan for Academic Enrichment in an open forum that touched on several contentious issues.

The plan was approved by the Corporation in 2004 as the University’s blueprint for improving campus infrastructure and strengthening Brown’s academic profile. University officials have committed to releasing status reports approximately every six months. Feedback received at last night’s forum will be incorporated into the next report, due in January.

Assistant to the President Marisa Quinn spoke first, citing several milestones the plan has already reached — Brown’s student-faculty ratio has decreased from 10-to-1 to 9-to-1, its need-blind financial aid policy now provides funds to 43 percent of Brown’s freshman class and applications to the Graduate School have jumped by 75 percent.

“If you look back at the plan, all of this was aspirational,” Quinn said. “Now we’ve achieved so much of it.”

Before opening the floor to questions, Simmons offered a brief statement praising UCS for its role in shaping the plan.

UCS Corporation Liaison Martin Bell ’10 spoke first. “I had two friends who have now transferred from Brown” due to the closure of the Smith Swim Center, Bell said. A new facility isn’t expected to open until 2010. “I have to wonder, would it take this long at Princeton or Harvard?”

“It would take longer there,” continued on page 6

UCS votes to increase student activities fee by $54

By Franklin Kanin Senior Staff Writer

After a heated dispute over parliamentary procedure, the Undergraduate Council of Students voted last night to recommend that the University Resources Committee increase the student activities fee by $54.

The increase would bring the total fee from $146 to $200 per year.

The resolution also requested that the URC and Interim Vice President for Campus Life and Student Services Russell Carey ’91 MA’06 advocate the increase and that if the URC elects not to fully fund the requested increase, the committee present UCS with a written explanation.

The body also resolved to change the name of the Social Fund — allocated to Category II and III groups

— to Baseline Funding.

UCS Student Activities Chair Drew Madden ’10 proposed the resolution, which other council members sponsored and co-sponsored.

While many members supported raising the fee, the council began its debate after Corporation Liaison Martin Bell ’10, a co-sponsor of the resolution, objected to passing the resolution in order to force a roll call vote.

During the debate, members questioned whether raising the student activities fee would be the best way to raise money for student groups and whether UCS had adequately solicited student reaction to the proposal.

UCS Vice President Lauren Kolodny ’08 implored the council to vote in favor of the increase. “I continued on page 6

Too skinny for Brown?

When eating disorders weigh students down, deans intervene

By Elif Ince Contributing Writer

Rahul Keerthi / Herald

Eating disorders and disordered eating are major risks to students, affecting their academic, social and personal lives.

INSIDE: www.browndailyherald.com

post- blogs post- gets d’s, d-listed and drugged, in an epic quest for winter break and glory

3

METRO

Yana had always been a perfectionist.

She was the valedictorian of her high school, a straight-A student at Brown and one of the few students who did all of her reading before class. When fear of gaining the infamous freshman 15 crept in during her first semester on College Hill , her reaction, like most of her freshmen girlfriends, was to start dieting.

As the semester went by, while her friends complained about the soft-serve they couldn’t avoid after dinner at the Ratty, Yana (her name has been changed in this article for privacy) found herself restricting more and more of what she ate. By the spring semester, Yana was waking up before class every morning to go to the Keeney gym. By the time bumpin’ teach Providence City Council considers the ethics of firing and rehiring, or bumping, local teachers.

summer came, she was throwing the slice of bread she had grabbed for breakfast into the trash after taking a bite out of it.

CHECK-UP Last in a series on the state of health at Brown “I recall thinking: ‘I wanted to be a doctor before I came to Brown, now I don’t. I used to be the smartest in my class, now I’m not. I had so many friends in high school, now I don’t,’ ” she said, remembering the transition from high school to college. “So many things were changing. I was changing. Eating was the only thing I still had control of.”

When she came back to Brown for

11

OPINIONS

195 Angell Street, Providence, Rhode Island

dumbledore adore Lily Shield ’09 celebrates Dumbledore’s sexuality but wonders why the revelation didn’t come sooner.

her sophomore year, Yana weighed exactly 24 pounds less than she had the year before. Her friends were talking about her dramatic weight loss and her suite mates were tired of answering questions about her health, when her mother finally persuaded her to try day-treatment at a Providence psychotherapy clinic.

“I accepted just to make my mom happy,” Yana said. “I didn’t think I had a problem.”

After three days of sitting in group therapy with drug addicts and alcoholics, Yana told her doctor she wanted to leave. The doctor proposed calling Brown Health Services so Yana could schedule a monthly checkup to make sure she didn’t lose more weight.

Yana took the phone and asked for a “weigh-in.” continued on page 4

12 SPORTS

lunge at the big one The men’s and women’s fencing teams brought home 11 medals from Saturday’s tournament.

News tips: herald@browndailyherald.com

T oday Page 2

Thursday, November 8, 2007

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

But Seriously | Charlie Custer and Stephen Barlow

We a t h e r Today

TOMORROW

partly cloudy 46 / 30

partly cloudy 48 / 33

Menu Sharpe Refectory

Verney-Woolley Dining Hall

Lunch — Cajun Fettuccine, Mashed Potatoes, Mandarin Blend Vegetables, Pepperoni Spinach Feta Calzone, Hot Turkey Sandwich with Sauce, Sushi

Lunch — Chicken Caesar Salad in Pita, Eggplant Parmesan, Zucchini and Summer Squash, Baked Potato Bar, Molasses Cookies

Dinner — Basil Shrimp, Roast Sirloin, Vegetarian Toasted Raviolis, Vegan Stuffed Acorn Squash

Dinner — Basil Shrimp, Roast Sirloin, Vegetarian Toasted Raviolis, Vegan Stuffed Acorn Squash

Aibohphobia | Roxanne Palmer

Sudoku Octopus on Hallucinogens | Toni Liu and Stephanie Le

Fill in the grid so that every row, every column and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 through 9.

Classic Deep-Fried Kittens | Cara FitzGibbon

RELEASE DATE– Thursday, November 8,Pappocom 2007 © Puzzles by

Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle

C

o s and sw or d Lewis Edited by RichrNorris Joyce Nichols

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51 Refuse 38 Actress 6 Bet 52 Place for a king Thompson 7 RR schedule and queen 39 First name in column 53 Bank takeback, daredeviltry 8 Island gift for short 42 Site of a 1953 9 Doesn’t fade 54 Fútbol cheers conquest 10 Arthur Ashe’s 55 Pitching statistic 46 Publicity alma mater 47 Decide to use, as 59 3.2 million11 “Chinatown” member U.S. a policy genre union 48 Conflict 12 March time?

60 Mercury or 49 Former TV host 13 A costar of Saturn Stewart Felicity 62 Sounds of relief 50 Ran into again 15 Exorcist’s foe 21 Morning ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE: container 24 Do lunch?

25 Hindu titles 26 Benefit program giving workers a chance to buy co. shares 28 Caricatured Leno feature 29 Mideast honcho 30 Its insignia includes an orbiting spacecraft 31 Pale 32 It may be a lot 33 “What a relief!”

34 Gofer 36 Dreadlocks 11/8/07 xwordeditor@aol.com wearer

DOWN 1 City destroyed in Genesis 2 Met tragedy, maybe?

3 Secondgeneration Japanese American 4 Burger side

By David J. Kahn 5 Helpin’ git elected (c)2007 Tribune Media Services, Inc.

Classic How To Get Down | Nate Saunders

Classic Deo | Daniel Perez

T he B rown D aily H erald Editorial Phone: 401.351.3372 Business Phone: 401.351.3260

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M etro Page 3

Thursday, November 8, 2007

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Rhody primary to stay put after Carcieri ’65 vetoes bill

City Council, residents discuss ‘bumping’ RI teachers

By Jenna Stark Contributing Writer

Gov. Donald Carcieri ’65 vetoed a bill Monday to advance the Rhode Island Presidential Preference Primary up a month from March 4 to Feb. 5.

In his veto message, Carcieri stated he would have supported the bill if lawmakers had acted earlier in the year, but that moving the date would “place an undue hardship on local communities who have planned fiscally and otherwise for the upcoming 2008 election cycle.”

Carcieri received numerous requests from canvassers and town clerks to veto the bill due to the lack of time the bill’s passage would have given canvassers to prepare for the upcoming primaries. In a Nov. 1 letter, Sandra Giovanelli, a Cumberland town clerk, wrote, “Moving up the date of the Presidential Preference Primar y will create an unnecessary burden on all the local boards of canvassers because of its late action and impact crucial deadlines that are already set in place.”

The bill to move the primary’s date was intended to give Rhode Island citizens a greater say in the

nominating process, said Darrell West, professor of political science and director of the Taubman Center for Public Policy. “Most people expect the parties to have chosen their candidate by March,” he said.

“Rhode Island voters will have no say in the nominating process.

People are expecting there to be a nominee by mid-February.”

Another concern for Rhode Island voters is that presidential candidates will ignore the small state.

“Rhode Island means we might as well be a foreign countr y,” said David Talan, a local Republican organizer. “Unfortunately, Rhode Island is so small and it tends to vote Democratic,” he said. “Generally, the candidates only campaign in the states they feel are wide-open, so we never get to see the candidates.”

West agreed that the veto won’t help Rhode Island voters. “We’re not going to get much attention from the candidates other than fundraising,” he said. “I don’t think Rhode Island is going to get a lot of attention at any point in time, but the race is almost certainly going to be over by March so our votes are not going to count for much.” continued on page 8

New council plans to boost arts in Providence

By Joanna Wohlmuth Staf f Writer

Providence Mayor David Cicilline ’83 announced details of the newly formed Arts Investment Advisory Council Oct. 30 at the Renaissance Providence Hotel. The mayor created the council after a study released in June by Americans for the Arts found that in 2005 over $111.8 million in economic activity was generated by the arts in Providence.

“The study puts arts on an equal plank with other industries in the city,” said Lynne McCormack, director of the city’s Department of Arts, Culture and Tourism.

The council has 12 members who represent many of the Providence’s large businesses. “Members of the task force were solicited strategically for the role they play in the arts and culture community,” said Jim DeRentis, chairman of the council and executive vice president and chief business officer of BankRI, “not only for the businesses they represent.”

The council hopes to create a Web site which will include an online calendar, online ticket-purchasing capabilities and a donation tool for arts and cultural events in Providence. The Web site will allow visitors to access information about hotel and restaurant reservations in order to make “arts and culture more consumer-friendly,” McCormack said.

The council plans to star t a publicity campaign to promote the arts as an economic force in Providence by distributing information about the study’s results to local businesses. “The idea is to provide a standardized platform

which quantifies and makes the case for the importance of investment in the arts,” DeRentis said. “(The study by Americans for the Arts) demonstrated that output from the arts and culture community is in the economic sector, not a philanthropic endeavor.”

“Business is up at Bravo (Brasserie) and Gracie’s when Trinity (Repertory) has a performance,” said John Palumbo, president and publisher of Rhode Island Monthly and council member.

The council hopes to eventually gain legislative support for the funding of the arts.

Newfound emphasis on the relationship between arts and the economy is not unique to Providence, said Peter Bramante, executive director of the Arts and Business Council of Rhode Island and task force member.

Last week’s luncheon featured a keynote address from author, consultant and cultural analyst Patricia Martin. Her book, “Renaissance Generation: The Rise of the Cultural Consumer — and What It Means to Your Business,” features Providence as one of seven cities with great potential for economic gain from promotion of the arts, McCormack said.

“Arts, businesses and culture have a dynamic interplay,” Bramante said. “If businesses are not aware they will lose out.”

The council will begin to work on the Web site and publicity campaign, DeRentis said.

Local arts organizations, such as Trinity Repertory, Festival Ballet and Perishable Theater, will present their resource needs to the council in the next few months, Palumbo said.

By Simon van Zuylen-Wood Staf f Writer

City councilmen and members of the Providence Public School District discussed the practice of “bumping” Rhode Island teachers out of jobs with state legislators, parents and teachers Monday night at City Hall. The meeting was run by the City Council’s new special committee on education.

In March, Rhode Island schools issue pink slips to teachers, terminating their contracts to save money, often intending to rehire them. All teachers in Rhode Island are hired on one-year contracts, regardless of tenure, according to Tomas Hanna, the Providence school district’s deputy superintendent for operations.

Currently, teachers are laid off in reverse seniority, so the most junior teachers get fired first.

Ward 2 Councilman Cliff Wood, chair of the education committee, called the meeting a research effort. Presenters included Hanna and attorney Samuel Zurier, who compared Rhode Island’s education policies to Massachusetts’.

Speakers agreed that laying off teachers based on seniority was flawed, and many complained about Rhode Island’s lack of comprehensive teacher evaluations.

But without good knowledge of teachers’ merits, seniority is the best way to evaluate teachers, members of the committee and audience said. Hanna said that “people used to make judgments based on those “-isms:” nepotism, favoritism, racism,” before conceding “we also suffer from not having a fair ... evaluation process.”

Rhode Island teachers are evaluated ever y five years once they are tenured. Non-tenured

teachers, or those with fewer than three years of teaching experience, are evaluated ever y year, Hanna said.

Committee and audience members also addressed teacher job security. This year, about 700 teachers received pink slips, but only about 100 lost their jobs permanently, Hanna said. Most teachers who receive pink slips are reinstated over the summer, once funding becomes available.

Schools can only employ teachcontinued on page 8

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Thursday, November 8, 2007

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

With eating disorders, U. struggles to balance autonomy and safety continued from page 1 The scale at Brown Health Services said Yana weighed 98 pounds.

The yardstick said she was 5 feet 7 inches. The doctor said she had to call her parents. “This is unhealthy,” the doctor told her. “You can’t stay in school.”

Her mother flew to Providence the next morning. Yana cried as she searched her closet for an outfit that would hide her thinness when she went to see the deans. All her jeans

fell off her bony hips. She used bobby pins to hold her skirt up, finally deciding on a long skirt and lots of layers on top.

The long skirt did not fool the dean — her Body Mass Index was dangerously low. She would have to take a medical leave. The dean said most students who were this underweight usually failed to gain back the weight at school.

Her mother stayed strong and calm, searching for a compromise.

She and the dean agreed to sign a

contract with Yana: To stay in school she would have to put on a pound every week, attend weekly meetings with University Nutritionist Heather Bell and see a therapist off campus.

“It was not about me, it was about them,” Yana said of University officials. “They did not want the liability.”

Yana signed the contract, unaware of the stress the weekly weigh-in sessions would cause her. “Emotionally, I was the worst I had ever been that semester,” she said. “Now that I look back, I should have taken a medical leave.”

The fall semester would end in eight weeks — and eight pounds.

Ankle weights bought at City Sports on Thayer Street were taped to her chest under her bra, getting heavier each time she stepped on the scale at Health Services. Liters of water filled her tiny stomach and lies flowed out of her lips during the meetings with the nutritionist. “I started loving peanut butter,” she told her. “I’ve found great friends to go to Ben and Jerry’s with.”

“It is very easy to deceive these people unless you want their help,” Yana said. “I bullshitted during my nutritionist meetings. I never opened up to my therapist. She would ask me what could be causing my problems and I would say ‘Shut the f*ck up’ in my head.”

Eight weeks passed by. Yana started eating less and less at the Ratty because she felt everyone was watching what she ate. She started taking out food for every meal, listening to her iPod and reading a book while nibbling on her salad in the white Ratty take-out boxes.

On her last weigh-in of the semester, the scale pointed to 122 pounds.

Next morning, Yana weighed herself in her room. She was actually 110.

“Basically, I got no help,” she said.

“I was in complete denial. I don’t know what I was thinking. I wasn’t thinking.”

Weighing the protocol The clinical guidelines for the eating disorder protocol were developed

by Psychological Services, the Office of Student Life and Health Services in the early part of this decade, according to Bell.

Belinda Johnson, the director of Psychological Services, said these guidelines describe the course of action the University suggests for students with unhealthy Body Mass Indexes (a metric where weight in kilograms is divided by the square of one’s height in meters) while “leaving enough room for an individual evaluation of every student’s situation.”

Each year Psych Services sees about 75 students with “diagnosable eating disorders,” Johnson said.

Diagnosable eating disorders manifest themselves primarily as anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder, which affect both men and women. Because denial often clouds the students’ condition, whether they are suffering from anorexia, bulimia, binge eating or other types of eating disorders, diagnosis is a complicated process.

Director of Health Services Edward Wheeler agreed in an e-mail to The Herald that, along with BMI, factors such as medical status, behavioral patterns and psychiatric status play into the University’s decision about a student.

“Medical leave is never decided based on weight or BMI alone,” he wrote in an e-mail. For example, one student told The Herald she consulted deans about taking a medical leave for binge eating disorder because it was disrupting her life at Brown, even though her BMI was within normal

range.

If the University were to set a specific BMI under which students would be required to leave, Wheeler wrote, some students might be aware of the cutoff and would work to maintain that minimal BMI. If they reached it, they would be unlikely to even come to Health Services, he wrote.

Health Services physician Marsha Miller said most guidelines suggest that patients with a BMI below 15 should be hospitalized. According to the American Psychiatric Association, patients at or below 75 percent of healthy weight meet the requirement for immediate hospitalization, even if the patient displays no other clinical problems. The World Health Organization classifies a BMI of 18.5 to 25 as “optimal weight” and below 16 as “severe thinness.”

Yana, having lost 20 percent of her original weight between freshman and sophomore year, had a BMI of 15.6 when she was first weighed at Health Services and was told by the provider to put on a pound a week if she wanted to stay at Brown.

Miller said she is usually pretty certain if someone has an eating disorder. “It’s a disease we see so often that we’re familiar with it,” she said.

Miller said disorders are apparent in assessments of the student’s BMI, exercise habits and, for women, regularity of menstruation.

“There’s not one recipe,” Miller said. “It’s a medical judgment.” Health Services physicians like Miller cannot enforce a leave but can put a student on a pound-per-week program without notifying the deans.

Because of medical confidentiality, it’s possible for students to see a physician and agree to a recovery plan without the Office of Student Life even knowing about it, said Mary Greineder, assistant dean in the Office of Student Life.

Even though students can agree to take a medical leave with only a physician’s consent, when students are unwilling to take a leave and resist Health Services’ diagnosis, they end up in the deans’ offices.

“The University has the right to place the student on medical leave if she (or he) is a danger to herself or to others,” said Associate Dean of Student Life Carla Hansen. Student life deans generally make these decisions based on the recommendation of the provider.

Yana’s case was rare, Johnson said, as the University does not typically sign contracts obliging a student to gain weight on a consistent basis.

“It must have been that she was at a point where the administrators were willing to work with her to keep her on campus.”

According to Hansen, the poundper-week rule is recommended when the student’s situation is “not at a point to force” leave but close enough.

Many students react negatively when the University imposes these policies on their behavior, Hansen said. “As a Brown student, they want to run their own show. We are dealing with students who are saying ‘No, I can’t leave. I succeeded at everything, I can’t fail at this.’ ” Johnson said the University is well aware that students can be deceptive if, like Yana, they are determined to stay on campus. Student life officials learn more and more about the lengths students will go to stay on campus, Hansen said, but there is nothing they can do to prevent it.

Such denial requires full-time supervision away from campus, where a student can be closely monitored.

Johnson agreed. “Sometimes you just have to say, I’m sorry, whether you like or not you’re taking a leave,” she said. “It’s very unpleasant for

everyone but that’s what needs to happen.”

Taking a medical leave to undergo more intense treatment increases an individual’s chances of recovery, Wheeler said. The University’s guidelines on medical leaves for eating disorders are supported by the American Psychiatric Association’s findings that patients who lose more than 15 percent of their healthy body weight have trouble gaining weight without a highly structured program, he added.

Health Services is re-evaluating its guidelines as research shows that the likelihood of recovery is greater when patients are given intense treatment at the early stages of a disorder. In an e-mail, Wheeler wrote that Health Services is examining whether “they should be advocating leaves earlier and more forcefully,” as well as the requirements for students before their return from leave.

Bell likened treating an eating disorder to chemotherapy. “Nobody wants to have chemo,” she said. “But it’s the only thing that will give cancer patients a chance to be cured.”

Taking the campus’ pulse While the University is busy “revamping” the eating disorder protocol, a group of students have begun questioning the resources available to those dealing with disordered eating.

One of these students is Leslie Roos ’09. A psychology and visual arts double concentrator, Roos has organized a group independent study project titled “Eating Disorders at Brown,” advised by Adjunct Professor of Psychology Brian Hayden, who teaches PSYC 1330: “Abnormal Psychology” and PSYC 0300: “Personality.”

Roos and the other GISP members, Mollie West ’09, Sandhya Dhir ’08, Sarah Goodman ’09 and Helena Sullivan ’09, hope to assess available resources for students with eating disorders and then recommend how the University could improve its policies.

West is currently working with the Office of Residential Life to post permanent signs on the back of bathroom doors that would inform students of available resources.

The group is working with Brown’s nutritionist on the project and is in frequent touch with deans, administrators and Health Services and Psych Services staff about the GISP. The students have met with President Ruth Simmons and voiced their interest in a new dean’s position,dedicated solely to eating disorders.

Researching resources at universities such as Dartmouth, Duke, Harvard, Notre Dame and the University of California-Davis has helped the girls evaluate what could be improved at Brown. Each week, group members conduct about two interviews and then discuss their findings with Hayden.

Still, what the group needs most is Brown students’ first-hand experiences. “In order to do that, we decided to send out a private message to all of our friends through the Facebook,” Roos said.

During a meeting in the first floor lobby of the Sciences Library, the five girls sat around a round table, composing the message. “Hey girls, hope your semesters are going well,” Roos read out loud. “We are doing an independent study on disordered eating, eating disorders and body image at Brown. Basically, we think the University has a pretty poor institutional approach to addressing these issues. continued on page 7

C ampus n ews Thursday, November 8, 2007

Page 5

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Pataki stresses Americans’ unity As election nears, campus continued from page 1 Krieger ’93 Memorial Lecture series, was entitled “A House Divided: An Insider’s View of the State of National Politics” and was sponsored by the Taubman Center for Public Policy. According to Pataki, the current issue facing national politics is polarization, and his anecdote about Blue State Coffee seemed to serve as an analogy for the larger themes in his speech — finding commonalities across party lines to address the issues facing the nation today.

His experiences as governor of New York shaped most of his lecture. One of the central themes of his speech revolved around public reaction in the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, which Pataki said he thinks is characteristic of the American public as a whole.

“You think of Americans — we’re from every corner of the globe. There’s no racial, religious, geographic terms that define Americans,” Pataki said. “What defines us is our character.”

He credited Americans’ optimism and pragmatism with moving the country forward throughout its history. A third and final characteristic of Americans, he said, is the ability to stand together after a crisis such as 9/11.

Pataki described one anecdote to exemplify American unity. Pataki said that three days after 9/11, when President Bush visited Ground Zero, Pataki, along with Bush and New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani traveled to the west side of Manhattan and were greeted by waving flags and posters saying “God Bless You, President Bush.” Pataki turned

to Bush and said to the president, “Take a look — Greenwich Village, the west side of Manhattan — thousands of people, they love you. Not one of them voted for you this year.”

Giuliani then turned to Pataki and said, “Not one of them voted for you either.”

Pataki told the Salomon 101 audience this was the general feeling present at the time — that politics didn’t matter and Bush was America’s leader. Fast-forward to today, Pataki said, and that cohesion and optimism is missing, which makes it unclear who is the strongest candidate for president.

“There isn’t such a clear delineation as to who is the most likely next president for the country. ...

No one has really connected to the American people yet,” Pataki said.

“What the candidates have failed to do is step back and think about the nature of our country and what makes the United States unique. ...

The first is the nature of our government; the second is the character of the people. I think it is profoundly important that our country was a unique experiment where the power came from the people.”

“So who’s going to win in 2008?

I think the American people want someone who understands and is going to be consistent with the American character,” Pataki said.

“They want that optimism, they don’t want polarization. … And people want pragmatic solutions, they don’t want someone saying, ‘Let me check my ideology before I decide if we’re going to attack this problem.’ ” The nation faces challenges to national security, and the economic

challenges due to increased globalization, but Pataki thinks pollution and the threat of climate change challenges the promise of a better life for future generations. Pataki thinks the one major issue facing the nation is its reliance on foreign oil and fossil fuels, but no one has laid down an optimistic and pragmatic solution to these issues, he said.

Pataki also said the government should support research in alternative energies by protecting the rights to explore and utilize renewable sources. The government could also make a difference with small changes. One such change, he said, is that the government could guarantee to buy vehicles that use clean and renewable fuel, which would create a market for such vehicles “overnight.” Some initiatives have been undertaken in New York already, and Pataki believes that there must be a nationwide initiative, as well as new means for physically transporting alternative forms of energy across the country.

Pataki drew a parallel between the Soviet launch of Sputnik and the environmental issues facing the nation today.

“It was a crisis, and the United States responded to the crisis, and in the process created technology which is still used today,” Pataki said. “In my mind, this is every bit as serious a crisis, and we need every bit as strong a leader laying out a pragmatic, optimistic solution that can bring the American people together, so we have that unity that we had when we confronted the Sputnik challenge, and we had that unity that we had for so short a period of time after September 11.”

In a question-and-answer session following his lecture, one audience member asked about the response to 9/11 in comparison to the response to Hurricane Katrina.

Pataki responded that the difference in the responses to those incidents depended on the leadership at the time. On 9/11, Guiliani created a command center in Manhattan, and Pataki decided that he would not have a separate center from the mayor’s.

“We were going to have one unified command, we would speak as one voice, we would act as one body,” Pataki said. “So I think it depends on the leadership at the time, and their willingness to work together.”

conservatives organize

By Caroline Sedano Contributing Writer

As the presidential campaign gains momentum, campus groups supporting three of the Democratic candidates — Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) and former Sen. John Edwards (DN.C.) — are working hard to engage students and raise support for their candidates.

But according to Marc Frank ’09, the Republican Party liaison for the Brown Spectator and president of the College Republicans, no groups have formed around individual Republican candidates. Most of the right-wing political energy on campus is channeling through the College Republicans, which wants to be active in the primaries even though the group is not yet endorsing a specific candidate.

“Our group is pretty divided over who to support,” said Sean Quigley ’10, treasurer of the College Republicans and Herald Opinions Columnist. “The largest contingent is for Romney. But we don’t want to leave a few people out to the wayside because they don’t support our candidate, so we aren’t supporting anyone.”

Quigley said he personally supports John McCain. “I like that he doesn’t pander as much as the others. I admire his campaign and the fire he has in him,” Quigley said.

Even though the group is not fully supporting any one candidate, the members are planning to get involved in next year’s presidential election, according to Frank.

Besides bringing more speakers to campus, members of the group hope to spend a weekend in New Hampshire canvassing for Republican candidates. The College Republicans estimate about 20 students will go on the trip, which will take place on an undetermined date after Thanksgiving break. Frank said each student who makes the trek will be at liberty to support the candidate of his or her choice. He said he thinks that four or five different candidates will be represented.

The participants will pay their own expenses for the drive up to New Hampshire — and Frank said they can only hope that, once they arrive, the established campaign groups will help them find hous-

FEATURE ing. He said they would sleep on the floor at campaign headquarters, if necessary.

“For the upcoming election, our goal is to just be bodies on the ground and get as many people doing whatever work needs to be done,” Frank said. He said he tends to lean conservative on economic issues and hasn’t decided whether he prefers former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani and or Romney.

“Giuliani is strong on continuing the war on terror, on strong, smaller government — he’s very electable.

I think Romney is the most intelligent, well spoken and informed,” said Frank, who interned for former Sen. Lincoln Chafee’s ’75 (R-R.I.) Senate campaign last year.

“I like working on campaigns,” he said. “There’s a lot of grunt work — folding envelopes and making calls.

But it’s a very exciting experience and you really get a feel for how a campaign is actually going.”

Frank said he would like to see the College Republicans become more involved with the upcoming election and thinks their task will be easier once the primaries are over.

“We can have a more unified front working,” he said. “Rhode Island may not be competitive but because we are close to New Hampshire, we will really be up there and working for our candidate. That’s the one place I think, as college students, we can really do some good work.”

Aside from their involvement in the elections, campus Republicans say they enjoy being in the minority on Brown’s liberal campus.

“I have to say I’ve enjoyed being a conservative at Brown,” said Pratik Chougule ’08, former editor-in-chief of the Brown Spectator. “The people are really interested in ideas, and if you engage people respectfully everyone appreciates it. I’ve become more confident in my views because they are always being challenged.”

Indeed, because College Republicans isn’t specifically geared toward campaigning, the members have also been able to engage in other forms of activism.

Last month, several members held counter-protests to the weekly anti-war protests held on the corner of Waterman and Thayer streets.

“We had signs saying ‘Honk to support the war’ and ‘Honk to bomb Iran,’ ” Chougule said. “It was obviously done to mock their protest — but we got more support than you might think.”

“We really do have to make sure we stay active and have a response to things that are going on,” Quigley said.

But the Republicans on Brown’s campus are not all about shock factor.

“We really want to bring in speakers that add a more balanced dialogue. We would like to get politicians to come in and talk about why they support specific candidates,” Frank said.

The College Republicans brought Robert Spencer to talk about Islamofacism and other speakers involved with the Chafee’s 2006 Senate campaign. They don’t have any definite plans for upcoming speakers but would like to have Gov. Donald Carcieri ’65 or Kenneth Starr MA’69 speak at the University.

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Thursday, November 8, 2007

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

UCS hosts the president UCS supports $54 student activities fee increase continued from page 1 Simmons replied, drawing laughter from the audience. “It takes a long time to build a building like this one.”

Other students focused on broader issues. Jane Zhang ’10, admission and student services chair for UCS, cited a March story in The Herald that found that financial aid awards often decrease substantially after freshman year. Zhang also protested the plan’s lack of aid for middle-income families.

“We’re almost certainly going to be debating how we can ease the pain that students and families are experiencing,” Simmons replied.

“Brown needs to be a diverse campus, and that means it should never be a place that only the very rich and the very poor can attend.”

Academic and Administrative Affairs Chair Rakim Brooks ’09 voiced concern that the Grad School’s growth has threatened undergraduate teaching. Simmons said that at its inception, the plan had focused on increasing funds for research but that more teaching-related grants could be coming soon.

“Very strong graduate students bring up the quality of education at a university,” she told The Herald after the meeting. “Because faculty — excellent faculty — require excellent grad students. So the better the graduate students, the better the faculty, and those are the faculty who are teaching

(undergraduates).”

The 16 attendees unaffiliated with UCS were outnumbered by council members, but several stood to ask Simmons questions of their own.

Nina Ridhibhinyo ’07.5, an environmental studies concentrator, protested the likely demolition of the Urban Environmental Lab. “We weren’t told by staff, nor were we told by administration,” she said.

“I’d like to know how there can be greater transparency in the future.”

“Let me say, first of all, that I apologize,” Simmons said. “I can imagine, if I learned the building I was in was being changed or eliminated, I would feel pretty bad about that.”

“The planning process, though, is a matter of using scarce resources to the best effect,” added Richard Spies, executive vice president for planning and senior adviser to the president. But “it’s being studied now what we should do,” and it’s possible the building will be moved, he said.

Simmons told The Herald she was satisfied with the event as a whole. “We made a concerted effort in the plan to build into it this kind of involvement and feedback, so, frankly, that we would make better decisions,” she said. “This is kind of the roadshow, so we’re going out to try to raise awareness and encourage people to really provide that feedback.”

continued from page 1 think it’s ridiculous that tuition is raising with inflation, and the student activities fee is not,” she said. “The important thing here is that we’re advocating for a raise.”

Communications Chair Gabe Kussin ’09 spoke to the urgency of raising the fee, noting that funding for student groups has “gotten really bad.”

“I think this is an essential resolution that has to be passed immediately and with almost unanimous support,” said Kussin, who is also president of the Brown Democrats.

The UCS representative to the Undergraduate Finance Board, Stefan Smith ’09, said he did not oppose an increase to the fee but was uncomfortable with giving UFB funds without oversight.

“I do have misgivings about writing such a large check to UFB without the idea that this will go to student groups in a more abundant fashion,” Smith said. “My only concern is not with raising the fee, my problem is that there is no check or balance to look at this on the other end.”

Smith then suggested that UCS create a committee to periodically look into UFB and its procedures.

Academic and Administrative Affairs Chair Rakim Brooks ’09 spoke in favor of such a committee. “We all would feel much better, I think, if we knew there was a regimented process in place that actually demonstrated that UFB was following a set of guidelines,” he said.

Madden urged the council to focus on the fee increase resolution and return to UFB discussion at a later date, calling it “irrelevant to the debate.”

“We’re facing a crunch now, and the fee needs to be raised this year,” Madden said.

After much discussion on the fee increase, the council voted to end debate about the issue — before all speakers had expressed their concerns. The decision drew ire from some council members.

Heated debate and broken decorum ensued, especially between Brooks and Madden, before Kolodny was able to regain order.

“I think it is highly irresponsible if you voted yes to end debate because you are tired,” Brooks said to the

council after order had been attained.

“You should have walked out of the room and not voted at all.”

Brooks, enraged by what he felt was an inappropriate end to the debate, voted against the resolution.

Toward the meeting’s close, Kolodny said the members were so supportive of the fee increase after two weeks’ consideration that additional speakers were unlikely to sway debate. “There wasn’t a whole lot that could be said that could have swayed people’s opinion on this issue,” she said.

“The point is I don’t think it’s appropriate to go and berate everyone,” Kolodny added. “It’s also important to give every council member the benefit of the doubt. Sure, there are some people who just want to go home, but you have no evidence.”

Last year a resolution to increase the fee by $13 fell one vote short of the two-thirds majority it needed to pass.

In 2005, UCS approved a $54 increase in the fee, but the Corporation instead increased the fee by $10 after the University decided to make the Department of Athletics responsible for funding club sports.

Judge postpones lethal injection hearings

By Henry Weinstein Los Angeles Times

A federal judge in San Jose, Calif., has postponed two key hearings in the legal battle over lethal injection, meaning that the state’s 21-month moratorium on the death penalty is likely to extend well into next year.

U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel issued an order this week calling off

a formal site review of the state’s new death chamber at San Quentin State Prison later this month and postponing hearings on the case scheduled for December.

Fogel had planned those steps as part of his review of the state’s lethal injection protocols, which have been challenged in the courts as cruel and unusual punishment. His delay signals that it will take even longer for a deci-

sion on the state’s ability to legally conduct executions.

Fogel’s decision comes in the wake of an injunction issued last week by a Superior Court judge that barred the state from implementing a new plan to execute inmates using lethal injections. Fogel said he was taking this action at the request of lawyers for the state attorney general’s office and death row inmate Michael Morales.

Thursday, November 8, 2007

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

A look at eating disorders at Brown continued from page 4 We want to improve the way Brown deals with eating disorders and the way disordered eating is perceived on campus.”

In the Office of Student Life, Hansen said she would be happy to see the GISP’s proposals and talk over what they should be improving. “The students’ common perception (is) that we are iron-clad,” she said. “But I hope that I am open to criticism.”

“This is not an easy part of our job, and we don’t think it’s finished at any point. That’s why the protocols are revised,” Hansen added. “We’re not hell-bent on sticking to something.”

Nearly half a year ago, Roos was already questioning how the University handles eating disorders, taking the first steps toward the GISP. She sent a similar message to all of her Facebook friends, inviting them to discuss eating disorders at Brown.

“Please don’t laugh at the corny first few lines of it,” she said about the message. “It was 3 a.m. when I wrote it.”

“So tonight, I had this ‘Revelation,’ and it is physically impossible for me to fall asleep unless I send this out,” the message read. Roos wrote that she wanted to create a clinic for young people to get help, information and counseling for eating disorders, but first she wanted to spark discussion at Brown. She explained that her motivation sprang “from a number of experiences including personal eating issues, friends’ eating issues and living with boys.”

Though Roos is now embarrassed by what she wrote in the message, she was excited when more than 40 people showed up at 7 p.m. on a Wednesday night to watch the HBO documentary “Thin” in her suite’s common room.

What seemed like a casual line in her message, “living with boys,” was actually one of the main reasons Roos found herself immersed in the issue of body image. Social life at Brown, Roos explained, “led me to see how girls viewed their bodies and how their bodies were viewed and judged by guys.”

“I would be sitting at the Ratty with eight boys, and one of them would say ‘Damn, check her out. She has hot hip bones,’ or ‘Yeah, that whole group used to be the hot girls on campus, but over the summer they all got fat,’ ” she said.

“I knew this group of girls who got so stuck in a dieting routine together that their ‘have a diet/workout buddy’ system turned into eating the same thing together, every day, asking for permission to take a bite out of a cookie and then going to a two-hour workout,” Roos said.

To find out whether other Brown students had similar experiences, the GISP surveyed Hayden’s “Abnormal Psychology” students about their personal experience with eating disorders. Though the survey didn’t provide them with reliable data, it was a first attempt at figuring out how Brown’s population is affected by eating disorders.

National studies, like the 2006 National Eating Disorders Association poll, have found that eating disorders disproportionately affect college students. Nearly 20 percent of students polled on American college campuses reported believing that at some point they had suffered from an eating disorder, though previous research shows lifetime prevalence rates are as low as 0.05 to 4 percent, according to the NEDA poll. Nearly 75 percent of those who reported having dealt with an eating disorder were never treated.

A band-aid on an open wound Elizabeth’s disordered eating began during her freshman year at Brown. With the stress of leaving her home and family, the fear of gaining the freshman 15 and the overwhelming all-you-care-to-eat of the dining halls, Elizabeth (her name has been changed in this article for privacy) started limiting her diet and eventually went for days without eating.

Suffering from malnourishment, she would stay up all night reading a single chapter. She had no patience for schoolwork, much less making new friends.

Especially for freshmen who are dealing with the transition, Elizabeth said, developing an eating disorder on a college campus can be unfortunately easy. “Everybody is somebody you can compare yourself to,” she said.

“The comparison game is dangerous in eating disorders.” When she realized she was having a nervous breakdown, Elizabeth saw a therapist at Psych Services.

Elizabeth’s eating disorder came out one day when she hadn’t eaten and was feeling unwell during a Psych Services session. “I kind of went through what I had eaten that day, and she said it wasn’t normal. I had convinced myself that it was fine,” she said. The therapist referred her to a physician at Health Services.

Elizabeth said she was honest with the physician, telling the doctor what she was — and was not — eating. After weighing her and checking her vital signs, the physician told Elizabeth she had an eating disorder. “It was obvious that I was not healthy,” Elizabeth said. “My pulse was between 45 and 50, while it was supposed to be 75.”

The physician told Elizabeth she wanted her to stay at Brown, but not in this condition. “She told me if I gained a pound per week, I would be able to stay,” Elizabeth said. Upon hearing the doctor’s ultimatum, Elizabeth burst into tears. “I hated her at the time,” she said. “I despised her.”

But Elizabeth tried to cooperate with the program. She started to see an off-campus therapist and the University nutritionist and attempted to

eat foods with high caloric content.

“I would put cheese on my veggie burger and put peanut butter on my banana, but I would end up taking out the cheese and avoiding the peanut butter,” she said. “I was trying, but not hard enough.”

When Elizabeth failed to gain weight, she agreed with the physician that taking a medical leave was the only option left. After only a month at Brown, she headed home to recover, without even seeing the deans. She didn’t come back for a year.

Though the pound-a-week program didn’t work for Elizabeth or Yana, Greineder said lack of success with two students does not suggest the program is ineffective. Hansen said she believed other students can successfully gain a pound each week and recover at Brown. “It is for them,” she said, “that we have the opportunity for all students to do it.”

Elizabeth criticized the approach for not teaching students how to cope with the triggers of the disease.“It’s just a temporary fix, like putting a band aid on an open wound,” she said.

“You have to devote yourself to healing without doing anything else.”

Hansen said it was possible to see the pound-per-week rule as a bandaid on an open wound. But, she said, the alternative is to say “ ‘We’re not going to put on a band-aid on an open wound — you’re going to the hospital this afternoon.’ ” To keep students at a critical level on campus, weight gain must start immediately, she said. “We’re talking about a student whose body is about to shut down and make changes that are very hard to reverse.”

Now back at Brown as a sophomore, Elizabeth said she felt “much better” being on campus.

Elizabeth’s sentiments are not unusual, according to Hansen. “I have never had a student come back and say, ‘I can’t believe you put me on medical leave, it ruined my life.’ ” Instead, she added, students have always told her upon returning to Brown, “I’m so glad I had to leave.”

“I am so grateful to (the doctor) for making me do it,” Elizabeth said.

“I couldn’t have made that decision myself.”

Page 7

Page 8

Thursday, November 8, 2007

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Carcieri ’65 vetoes moving R.I. primary date continued from page 3 Talan said the veto of the bill could cause a problem for Republican voters. Democratic voters assuming that Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., has the primar y “sewed up” could choose to vote in the Republican primar y rather than the Democratic primary and vote for the most liberal Republican candidate, consequently skewing the Republican vote.

But Republicans will benefit from having additional time to place candidates on the ballot. “Rhode Island is one of the two most difficult states for candidates to get on the ballot. In Rhode Island, candidates

have to go through a really bizarre process,” Talan said. This process involves filing a declaration and getting 1,000 signatures of registered voters, he said.

“Since (state legislators) waited until the last minute, they compressed all the dates,” Talan said.

“So it would’ve made things difficult,” he added.

The later primary date also helps non-mainstream candidates, said Gabriel Kussin ’09, president of the Brown Democrats. “I think as a country we are moving towards a national primary day, but having the primaries spread out helps the smaller, lesser-known candidates because it helps spread their re-

sources.”

Had the bill been signed, the College Republicans would have been pressed for time to canvass for their candidates, said Marc Frank ’09, president of the College Republicans. “Nationally, what is happening on the primaries is a very bad thing. The fact that everyone keeps pushing up these primaries. ... It just seems a little silly,” he said.

Kussin agreed that the proposed bill was rushed. “This could have been done a lot earlier — by trying to get it moved up so close to the date, it puts an undue burden on the canvassers and the election officers,” he said.

The Brown Democrats will not change their upcoming plans due to the veto of the bill. “We are going to encourage people to vote no matter the date of the primaries,” Kussin said.

State Senator Leo Raptakis, the Democrat who sponsored the bill, said there will likely not be an attempt to override the veto due to lack of time, according to the Associated Press article.

R.I. teachers may be ‘bumped’ continued from page 3 ers if state funding is available upfront.

When money is not available up-front, the cause is a lack of organization, according to Hanna.

“A key strategy is better planning, strong planning, better infrastructure within departments, having a sense of what’s going to go on,” Hanna said.

“We don’t know what a budget is,” said Tomas Ramirez ’86, assistant superintendant of human resources and labor relations in the school district’s human resources department.

Sending teachers pink slips in the spring could show budgetary disorganization, Hanna said. The pink slips may protect schools from being overstaffed, Hanna said. “You can look at it that way — rather err on that side (of caution),” he said.

Rhode Island House of Representatives Majority Leader Gordon Fox, D-Dist. 4, urged audience members to consider amending existing legislation instead of throwing it out. “Why do we send out 700 notices (to teachers)? That’s practice, that’s not law,” he said.

“Some of (the problems are) not based upon state law or local ordinance,” he added.

House Rep. Steven Smith, DDist. 13, echoed Fox’s optimism but said it was unclear what measures the state could undertake without changing legislation. “There’s some things that can happen immediately,” said Smith, president of the Providence Teachers Union.

“If we’re going to be doing what’s best for kids, it can’t just be a math problem.” Setting up a “predictable funding” system could help solve the “bumping” problem, Smith said.

Though Wood said he was optimistic, he didn’t promise any immediate solutions and emphasized the research-based nature of his committee. Wood said, “This state law — I don’t know what it is, I don’t know what its repercussions are. When we figure out that, we’re going to go over it,” he said, adding he was “trying to find out what’s up.”

Thursday, November 8, 2007

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Fencers take home 11 medals at The Big One continued from page 12 season, I was fencing pretty well,” Bartholomew said. “I can still improve, but it was a good start.”

Behind a dominant trio of Gartenberg, Deborah Gorth ’09 and Randy Alevi ’10, the women’s saber team earned three medals. En route to a third-place finish, Gartenberg squared off with Alevi, an honorable mention All-American last year, and defeated her 15-13 in the quarterfinals. It “kind of sucked that the

saber girls had to face each other,” Bartholomew said. Gorth and Alevi finished in sixth and seventh place, respectively.

On the men’s side, saber fencer and tricaptain Sam Levine ’08 took down two higher-seeded fencers en route to the quarterfinals and finished eighth, while Adam Yarnell ’10 took home an eighth-place finish of his own in men’s epee. In women’s epee, tricaptain Christine Livoti ’08 tied for third with teammate Christina Salvatore ’09. Both Livoti and

Salvatore went 6-0 in pools and reached the semifinals.

The Bears’ next match is on Nov. 17, at the first of two Northeast Fencing Conference competitions.

Between now and then, they hope to improve their outlook toward matches.

“A lot of fencing is working on your approach,” Gartenberg said. “(If) you miss the touch then, okay, you don’t think about it and just move on. Hopefully we’ll be mentally strong in our next competition.”

$300 million for A-Rod? Guaranteed continued from page 12 of dollars.

Finally, there’s inflation and the weak dollar — $350 million just ain’t what it used to be. Just ask supermodel Giselle, who refuses to be paid in U.S. currency, how weak the dollar is. If A-Rod signed a 10-year, $350 million contract with someone today, it would be worth about $297 million when he signed his 10-year, $250 million contract with Texas back in 2001. While the current market

M. tennis wraps up fall season continued from page 12 work has paid off. I was definitely proud.”

Although Au lost his semifinal match 6-2, 6-4 to Dartmouth’s Mark Brodie, the eventual winner of the flight, Harris was pleased with how Au performed.

“Even that match (against Brodie) showed how (Au) has really developed,” Harris said. “It was really great to see.”

Posner, also competing in the A singles flight, fell to Marist College’s Nicolas Pisecky in the first round, but not without putting up a fight. Posner overpowered Pisecky 6-1 in the first set, and according to Harris, “He played so well he almost surprised himself.”

Posner then dropped the second set 6-2, but he fought hard in the third set super-breaker, losing by a 10-7 margin.

Meanwhile, in the B singles flight, Simmons fell to Dartmouth’s Robbie Lim 6-3, 6-1 on Saturday.

According to Au, the tournament was a positive experience in his transition to collegiate tennis, which he said was not an easy adjustment to make.

“The margin for error in college tennis is very small,” he said. “You really have to focus on every point.”

Au said he has had to overcome his nerves, especially because before coming to Brown, he had not played much on the junior circuit, either.

“I hadn’t played a lot of tournaments, so I was definitely nervous,” he said. “But once you step onto the court, it’s just you playing against someone else. After I started winning, I loosened up.”

The Bears will not compete again until the end of January, and they look forward to the extra time off for making individual improvements and recovering from injuries. Harris called the break “an important time” for focusing less on tennis skills and more on conditioning.

When the Bears return to the courts for the spring season, they will eye their third Ivy League Championship in four years.

would dictate that a top-five player should make $20-$23 million per season, the market hasn’t properly adjusted to an increase in revenue and a decrease in the value of the dollar.

If Vernon Wells is worth $18 million per season with a career OPS of .809, then clearly with his vastly superior talent, versatility and all the records he is going to break, Rodriguez is worth a lot more than that.

A-Rod is as insecure and melodramatic as any superstar I’ve ever seen.

He’ll frustrate you by expanding the

strike zone and chasing pitches in pressure situations. He’ll confuse you with his controversial comments.

Still, A-Rod is a once-in-a-generation type talent, and between a league full of foolish GMs, a smart agent, wealthy owners and the decreased value of the dollar, someone will be happy to pay A-Rod a lot of money.

Tom Trudeau ’09 likes to pretend he is an economist. Gold is up two points.

Page 9

E ditorial & L etters Page 10

Thursday, November 8, 2007

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Staf f Editorial

Republicans live here, too “Honk to bomb Iran” is hardly a substantive political message. The handful of students who have recently urged cars passing through the intersection of Waterman and Thayer streets to honk in favor of pro-war messages scribbled on cardboard placards do not inspire informed discourse. Still, these counter-protests, held adjacent to anti-war demonstrators, have proved one thing for sure: despite assumptions to the contrary, Republican voices are alive and well on College Hill. And as the 2008 presidential campaign nears, their voices will likely only get louder.

We realize this may be confusing. We’re supposed to be granola-munching hippies, closeted pinkos or left-leaning radicals. As the 2008 showdown approaches, Brunonians might expect Hillary vs. Obama debates — not discussions of the merits of Mitt Romney and John McCain’s pro-war subtleties — to dominate dining halls.

To be sure, Republicans are certainly outnumbered on campus. A February 2006 Herald poll found that only 5 percent of students consider themselves Republican, compared to 62.8 percent who self-identify as Democrats. Though 20.3 percent of undergraduates considered themselves independent of either affiliation, conservative affiliation clearly qualifies as the minority position.

Regardless of their number, outspoken Republican Brown students have frequently filled Herald opinions pages, brought a spattering of speakers to campus and, of course, helmed the Spectator — the well-known campus conservative political journal without, it seems, a consistently published liberal-leaning opponent. The strains of campus conservatism reach impressively high decibel levels given the small number of proponents. Maybe being a Republican at Brown may not be so tough after all. Sure, Democratic students benefit from the state’s blue tint in a variety of ways outside the classroom, in City Hall and in local U.S. Senate offices. GOP undergrads have fewer in-state options for political experience. As local Republican organizer David Talan told The Herald, from the national party’s perspective, “Rhode Island means we might as well be a foreign country.”

But a dearth of elected Rhody Republicans hasn’t kept the College Republicans and others from getting involved as the presidential race heats up. The group is not uniformly supporting one candidate, but members say they plan to schlep to New Hampshire and sleep on floors if that’s what it takes to communicate candidates’ causes.

Those volunteers arriving in Nashua from the Main Green may be especially well-prepared to counter the opposition. Former Spectator editor-in-chief Pratik Chougule told The Herald he’s not only enjoyed being a conservative at Brown, he’s also become more confident in his views because they are constantly challenged.

So perhaps for the next nine months, the granola-munching types (or closeted pinkos) among us can expect political discourse that just might challenge their viewpoints, too.

frances choi

L e tt e r s Townsend ’09 apologizes To the Editor: The education that Brown has provided me, both inside and outside the classroom, has been a gift. Although I doubt I will ever be able to truly repay the school for that, I have tried over my three and a half years to give back some measure of what I have received. However, in the past few days it has become clear to the community that while receiving so much I have been betraying one

of the values most central to this institution. For my actions I am sorry. I have no explanation and no excuse — only guilt and regret. I have done stupid things, but I love Brown deeply and sincerely hope that, in time, the community — both individuals and as a whole — will find a way to forgive me.

Zachary Townsend ‘09 Nov. 7

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Last week, Brown Television was featured in a Herald on article on Tuesday (“Dead air on BTV may lead to station’s extinction,” Oct. 30) and got a coal on Friday (“Diamonds and coal,” Nov. 2). We as the student management team feel that there are certain myths that need clarification.

BTV is dying. We do not think that our student group “faces extinction.” First, we have had tremendous administrative support. Director of Student Activities Ricky Gresh and a host of Computing and Information Services staff members have been incredibly willing to donate their time and expertise to our effort. Second, silly similes aside, we are a dedicated group of people that was initially drawn to BTV out of frustration with the station’s current state, and the idea that we can make it better. None of us thought, “Hey, what’s a declining student group that I can join and ride to the bottom?” Instead, we are committed to revitalizing one of Brown’s most visible student organizations. We are aware of what it looks like to students now — we watch it! It is our driving goal to replace the black buzz with movies and student content as soon as possible. Third, we have made real, albeit behind-the-scenes progress.

Already, we have fixed the sound problem that plagued last semester, and we anticipate a quick return to fully operational status. Following that, our goal is to establish ourselves as a resource for students interested in creating and broadcasting original content. Lastly, two of our members are committed sophomores who will

ensure that BTV has the management continuity that it so obviously lacked at the beginning of this year, when we had a team that was 100 percent new.

The Undergraduate Finance Board will not fund BTV. As highly intelligent Brown students, we are aware that UFB funds formal, well-presented requests for specific purposes. We have not made any requests — ergo, it has not funded us. This is reflective of our hesitance to sink more student-raised money into soonto-be-obsolete equipment. In addition, we have worked with vendors to ensure that we will be able to operate up to the end of the spring semester without major external funding.

The Spice Girls are not going to be successful in their comeback effort. We apologize for this incendiary and inappropriate remark and wish the Spice Girls the best in their endeavors.

Of course, the true test of our success will not be our perception as facilitated by the media, but the viewing experience that students have. Trust us, Brown — our interests are aligned with yours. We pay the student activities fee. We watch television. Some of us even want to broadcast our bad similes to the broader campus via a student-run television channel. BTV is not going extinct — it is preparing for glory.

Kevin Volk ’08 Elizabeth Backup ’08 Jad Joseph ’10 David Notis ’10 Nov. 6

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O pinions Thursday, November 8, 2007

Page 11

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

So, Albus Dumbledore is gay! Who saw it coming?

LILY SHIELD Opinions Columnist

Not me. Like most Harry Potter fans I know, I was pleasantly surprised to read J.K. Rowling’s recent disclosure that she had always pictured the beloved, near-omnipotent character of Professor Albus Dumbledore, headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, to be gay. I was disappointed that the information wasn’t openly revealed within the series, but that made me wonder: Could this be Rowling’s attempt to compensate for the stereotypical 1950s-style romance that characterizes most of the relationships in the novels?

Rowling stated in the question-and-answer session in which she outed Dumbledore that “the Potter books in general are a prolonged argument for tolerance, a prolonged plea for an end to bigotry.” Accordingly, many fans’ first inclination, including my own, was to wonder why she hadn’t made Dumbledore’s sexuality explicit if she was so concerned with conveying messages of open-mindedness. She certainly advocated for acceptance through other themes; the magical world’s social class system of “pure-bloods,” “half-bloods,” Muggle-borns (or the pejorative “mudbloods”) and Muggles is an innovative proxy for real institutions of discrimination.

Of course, there’s the obvious possibility for why she didn’t spell out Dumbledore’s illfated love for rival wizard Gellert Grindelwald within the books: to avoid criticism and book bans, presumably largely from religious groups like those that protested the series for supposedly promoting witchcraft. Fair enough — she wanted to sell books. More altruistically, she

could also be making a calculated political move by forcing homophobic readers who had grown to love the headmaster to confront their intolerance. Much like unexpectedly finding out a close friend is gay, they need to reconcile their conflicting feelings in light of the new information and hopefully recognize that what drew them to care for the character/friend hasn’t changed.

It’s also possible (though I find it unlikely) that Rowling simply never considered Dumbledore’s sexuality to be something important

were always presented as absurdly heteronormative and traditional, approaching a level of convention that could belong in 1950s dating manuals but probably not in today’s world.

Consider these recurring characteristics of the romantic relationships in the novels (spoilers ahead): Almost everyone marries their high school sweetheart straight out of Hogwarts and immediately starts having children (Lily and James Potter, Arthur and Molly Weasley, Harry and Ginny, Hermione and Ron.) The women all assume their husbands’ last

What strikes me more than the fact of Dumbledore specifically being gay is the sudden acknowledgement of homosexuality in the magical world. enough to reveal. She has said that she writes backstories even for minor characters and knows all sorts of information about them that’s never published. The revelation did come out seemingly inadvertently, when an audience member asked her if Dumbledore had ever been in love. But whether she intended it or not, the disclosure has political implications, and what strikes me more than the fact of Dumbledore specifically being gay is the sudden acknowledgement of homosexuality at all in the magical world.

For all of the progressive themes and messages of the Potter series, their relationships

names. No one ever gets divorced. There is no interracial dating, with the brief exception of Harry and Cho Chang. (Of course, only a token handful of characters of color appear in the books at all.)

Furthermore, with the exception of Snape, every Hogwarts teacher is presented as entirely asexual — none of them are married or given the slightest reference to a romantic past. That isn’t necessarily a flaw — as the whole series save for several chapters are written from the perspective of a student, the professors’ asexuality can be read as the students’ realistic ignorance to the reality that teachers have

lives outside of school. The fact that Hagrid is the only teacher we see dabble in dating, when he also has a personal friendship with Harry, supports this theory. Of course, Harry had something of a personal friendship with Dumbledore as well, though with very different dynamics.

The point is that it feels contrived to reveal Dumbledore’s sexuality after the fact, when all of Rowling’s characterizations of non-deviant relationships are firmly reinforced time and time again. The strict heteronormativity of the series never made me think to search for hints that there might be something else going on under the surface. I have read and loved the books for almost 10 years, and I always disappointingly chalked up the lack of queer characters as something Rowling was simply going to avoid. The disclosure at this point feels like a cop-out — if she wanted to send an overarching message of tolerance for non-traditional sexualities, couldn’t she have normalized it by casually mentioning Seamus Finnigan’s crush on Dean Thomas or pointing out two Ravenclaw fourth-year girls dancing at the Yule Ball?

Of course I ultimately have to give Rowling at least some credit, since I never thought queer people would be acknowledged as a reality in Harry Potter’s world. And again, perhaps the revelation at this point really will have a more effective impact among homophobic readers than knowing all along about queer characters in the books would have. A late plea for tolerance is undoubtedly better than no plea at all. Still, the bottom line is that while outing Dumbledore now is a step in the right direction, a casual approach in simply making homosexuality an unremarkable part of the magical world would have been a far more effective way to actually convey normalization and acceptance.

Lily Shield’s ‘09 Patronus is a gay penguin.

Brown must address hypocritical standards of academic freedom in Middle East studies

BY THALIA BEATY Guest Columnist As a senior Middle East studies concentrator, I was disheartened by The Herald’s recent article about a controversy between Rabbi Serena Eisenberg ’87, executive director of Brown Hillel and an associate University chaplain, and Associate Professor of Comparative Literature Elliott Colla (“Prof.’s essay alleges threat to academic freedom,” Oct. 31).

There are serious complaints both in Colla’s article and in The Herald’s coverage that involve the reputation of individual faculty members and the University as a whole. I was most upset by The Herald’s choice to end this article with a quotation from Zack Beauchamp ’10, a clear partisan in this dispute, who claims that, “Like so many issues in the Arab-Israeli conflict, there are basically two narratives and two descriptions of what actually happened.”

This just has to be read as a sign of mauvais-fois from Beauchamp because it reveals an unwillingness to engage with the substance of Colla’s original complaint and with the substance of the secondary criticism coming from Brown Students for Israel (of which Beauchamp is co-president) and Eisenberg.

Colla’s main complaint was that a nonacademic faculty member was persistently interfering with academic forums. The Herald’s article, in my opinion, failed to adequately investigate this point and instead filled its pages with quotations from Omri Ceren, a clearly radical blogger based in Southern California.

Ceren said last April, “We’re determined not to let this conference go by without making

it clear to the University that this disregard of academic standards/norms and disrespect for Brown’s Jewish community is not acceptable.”

(I take this to be the position of the BSI in this debate.) The Herald’s article should have been written about these conflicting complaints, about what constitutes academic standards in the area of Middle East studies. Is it a problem

example of Brown’s willingness to hear diverse view-points that contain offensive material. No ideological balance was present at this event.

Yet a conference about challenges in Middle East studies after Sept. 11, 2001, which slanders no group and no religion, is described, again by Beauchamp, as “outrageous”? This discussion of challenges to Middle East studies

As a student of Middle East studies, I am disappointed with the way The Herald’s article was written and with the University’s failure to address this issue with alacrity. that non-academic faculty members interfere with academic courses and conferences? Is equal representation of conflicting view-points necessary at every event? Should there be equal numbers of events that “represent” both “sides”? Can only non-controversial or nonbiased speakers take part?

Brown’s president has repeatedly insisted that it is not the University’s role to protect students or community members from opinions or viewpoints that might offend or wound their sensibilities. Robert Spencer’s speech two weeks ago claiming that Islam is a fundamentally violent religion was held up as an

post-9/11 is not radical but rather has been a major feature in academic conferences and publications across the country and around the world. It is, then, frustrating to learn that President Ruth Simmons has, unofficially, taken sides in this debate. The Herald article depicts Simmons’ support for Eisenberg being primarily based on her character, not on the events that occurred in relation to the conference. Colla must know the seriousness of publicly naming Eisenberg in an article in a prominent academic magazine, and it must be assumed, therefore, that he felt he had more than insidious rumors to support his

description of the event.

However, Simmons’ unofficial e-mail did say that Colla’s article was “incorrect as to the facts of what transpired,” but with all parties gagged, the “facts” are left to commentators like Ceren and Beauchamp. I think that the University has a responsibility to publicly address this controversy and to elucidate the facts. It is Brown’s reputation as a place of open and rigorous discourse that is at stake.

The response cannot just be from four faculty members from pediatrics, medicine, sociology and environmental studies who publish a letter of support for Eisenberg. If the University fails to respond to this situation, they are implicitly condoning the kind of double-speak that allows for Robert Spencer to come to campus but which also hassles the organizers of a conference dealing with an issue of national importance — that of the production of knowledge about the Middle East.

As a student of Middle East studies, I am disappointed with the way The Herald’s article was written and with the University’s failure to address this issue with the kind of alacrity that I think is necessary. I am not looking for a trial, with guilt laid on one party or the other, because the characters of Colla and Eisenberg are not the central issue. Instead, these challenges to academic freedom (no matter which way you define them, as overly pro-Israeli or maliciously anti-Israeli) need to be addressed and the University’s position on this issue needs to be clarified.

Thalia Beaty ’08 suggests you look at the article published Sept. 10, 2007, New York Times entitled “Fracas Erupts Over Book on Mideast by a Barnard Professor Seeking Tenure.”

S ports T hursday Page 12

Thursday, November 8, 2007

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Even devalued, M. tennis’ youngsters make most of chances in N.H. A-Rod will get his millions

By Erin Frauenhofer Sports Editor

After seeing Scott Boras refuse to let the Yankees meet with his top client and free agent, Alex Rodriguez, without an offer of at least 10 years and $350 million, I reacted the way anyone familiar with the economics of baseball would: with a chuckle.

Tom Trudeau Tru Story It defies logic to think an owner would willingly pay a single player that much money. Still, it might not be as crazy as we think. Alex Rodriguez will be baseball’s first $300 million man and here’s why.

Talk about a mismatch: Uberagent Scott Boras against Major League Baseball general managers.

GMs are the most insecure people on earth, capable of doing just about anything if it means winning a few more games and saving their job for another year. Last offseason, team after team signed free agents to deals that made no sense before hindsight. The San Francisco Giants made Barry Zito the richest pitcher in baseball history in return for 11 wins and an ERA above the league average at 4.53. The Blue Jays shelled out $126 million for Vernon Wells, who hit .245 this past season.

The Cubs thought enough of Alfonso Soriano’s career .327 on base percentage to give him $136 million in return for 70 RBI in 2007. The Boston Red Sox gave $106 million combined to J.D. Drew and Julio Lugo, who “rewarded” them with play barely above replacement level.

You get the point.

Meanwhile, Scott Boras is among the smartest people in baseball, and he has the best player in the game to market in a historically weak free agent class. He’ll call A-Rod a revenue machine and the future all-time home run king in the prime of his career. He’ll point out Alex’s career achievements, such as the three MVP awards he has won, the 10 straight seasons with 35 home runs and his being the youngest player to hit 500 home runs in history. He’ll point out that Alex can single-handedly turn a team into a contender.

Think of Scott Boras as the kid from Disney’s “Blank Check,” except he’ll insert a number a lot bigger than $1 million.

Next, owners have money to spend because the game is drowning in money. No, not like, MarkWahlberg-in-“The Perfect Storm” drowning. Not even Rudy-Giulianiwaterboard drowning. I’m talking about the good kind of drowning.

In an Oct. 19 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article, it was reported that Major League Baseball passed the $6 billion mark in revenues for the first time in 2007 and is primed to surpass the NFL as the U.S.’s top revenue-generator in sports. The MLB.com Web site, along with an increase in online ticket sales, satellite radio broadcasts, out-of-market television packages and international growth has made owners richer than ever. If teams don’t pay above-market values for free agents, all they’ll do is pocket more profits. That’s a good thing in business, but often not the priority of owners who already have hundreds of millions, if not billions, continued on page 9

The youngest members of the men’s tennis team had a chance to shine over the weekend when they competed at the Big Green Invitational, hosted by Dartmouth. Kendrick Au ’11, Charlie Posner ’11 and Cody Simmons ’10 played impressive matches to make the Bears proud in their final

tournament of the fall season.

“All three of these guys have really been working hard this past month,” said Head Coach Jay Harris, adding that though the three had not competed since the Northeast Intercollegiate in September, they “all played really well at times.”

Au advanced the farthest in the tournament, reaching the semifinals of the A singles flight. In the first

two rounds, which took place on Saturday, Au defeated Dartmouth’s Stephen Greif by a score of 6-3, 7-6 in the first round. He then battled through a 6-4, 7-6, 10-7 second-round victory, prevailing in a 10-point superbreaker after splitting the first two sets to reach the quarterfinals.

“Kendrick played an awesome tournament,” Harris said. “This past month, he really worked on

his serve and return, and he ended up with good results.”

The next day, Au took a 6-4, 7-6 victory over Harvard’s Alexei Chijoff-Evans to advance to the semifinals.

“I think I played the best I’ve played all fall,” Au said. “I’ve made a lot of improvements, and my continued on page 9

Jake Melrose / Herald File Photo

The fencing team lunged to the top at The Big One last Saturday.

M. and w. fencing win big at The Big One

By Peter Cipparone Spor ts Editor

The fencing team posted dominating results in its season debut at The Big One over the weekend — the Bears earned 11 medals at the individual tournament, including at least one medal in the men’s and women’s saber, epee and foil draws. But the team insisted it has a long way to go to reach midseason form.

“It was a great performance to

start the year, but we always think we can do things better,” said tricaptain Charlotte Gartenberg ’08.

“You can always find flaws, and working on them is the way we improve.”

The competition featured pool play first, which helped determine seeding in the single elimination brackets for each weapon. Brown faced fellow Northeastern mainstays in the competition, including Brandeis, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Boston

and Wellesley colleges.

In men’s and women’s foil, Brown showed it has little room for improvement at the top. Francesca Bartholomew ’11 won the women’s event after going through pools undefeated in her first collegiate competition. Adam Pantel ’10, who transferred this year from Rutgers, won the men’s competition to complete the sweep for the Bears. In addition to foil’s two gold medals, Jonathan Yu ’11 tied for third, Kirsten Lynch ’10 finished

eighth and Herald Executive Editor Allison Kwong ’08 took 13th.

Bartholomew was particularly dominant. She cruised through five bouts in pools. In her direct elimination bracket, where bouts either go up to 15 points — known as touches — or a time limit, she kept each of her opponents out of double-digits in points before winning.

“For the first competition of the continued on page 9

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W. icers’ Stock ’09 on the rise

Ashley Hess / Herald File Photo

Nicole Stock ’09 stopped almost everything that came her way over the weekend and was rewarded as the ECAC Goaltender of the Week.

Despite the women’s hockey team’s two losses over the weekend, Nicole Stock ’09 was selected ECAC Hockey Goaltender of the Week with a weekend total of 72 saves on 77 shots.

On Saturday, Stock posted 34 saves but the Bears dropped a 3-0 decision to Yale. The following day, Stock tallied 38 saves in a 2-1 overtime loss to No. 8 University of Connecticut.

So far this season, Stock has recorded a 1.98 goals-against average and a .938 save percentage over the course of four games.

These impressive statistics earned Stock her third career Goaltender of the Week honor. She took home the title twice last season.

— Erin Frauenhofer