2013-09-25

ONE-HUNDRED-TWENTY-THREE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM Wednesday, September 25, 2013

Ann Arbor, Michigan

michigandaily.com

STUDENT GOVERNMENT

CSG reps upset with counsel candidate Despite allegations, Keeney appointed as general counsel

By AMRUTHA SIVAKUMAR ERIN KIRKLAND/Daily

LSA senior Antoyrie Green gets ready to read from “To Kill a Mockingbird” during the University Library’s Read Out in honor of Banned Book Week. Participants read a two to three minute excerpt of some of their favorited banned books in order to raise awareness about literary censorship.

Banned books get spotlight ‘Read out’ held on Diag to start censorship dialogue

By SARA YUFA For the Daily

In a town like Ann Arbor, it’s hard to imagine access to books would ever be denied. However,

bans on certain literature are still an issue across the United States.

Tuesday afternoon, University Libraries hosted its fourth annual Read Out on the steps of Hatcher Graduate Library to raise awareness of censorship during national Banned Books Week.

Participants read a few passages from books that have his-

torically been contested and banned such as “Invisible Man”

by Ralph Ellison, “And Tango Makes Three” by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson, and “Waterland” by Graham Swift.

Other Banned Books Week events at the University include an exhibit at Shapiro Undergraduate Library that took place last week and a Virtual Read Out Thursday.

Associate Librarian Emily Hamstra, who has planned the event for four years, said it is an advocacy week from the American Library Association to spotlight censorship policies.

“It’s mainly to make people aware that these sorts of things happen in our community because people have pushed to have (books) taken off of the See BOOKS, Page 2A

‘U’ researchers work on brain breakthroughs

By IAN DILLINGHAM Daily Staff Reporter

The human brain forms synapses — microscopic connections between neurons in the brain — to record thoughts, memories and ideas. When 100-billion neurons need to find their connections, the biology behind the process is complex, to say the least.

Assistant Biochemistry Prof.

Hisashi Umemori said many debilitating diseases, including autism, epilepsy and schizophrenia, could be linked to certain neurodevelopmental dysfunctions that occur when brain structures fail to properly mature.

Umemori’s research was published in the scientific journal, Nature, on Sept. 15.

At the molecular level, these dysfunctions are caused by improper wiring of synapses.

Recently, Umemori’s lab identified an important new molecule,

SIRP-alpha, which is involved in the process of synapse maturation in the brain, thus opening the door to possible therapeutic treatments.

“These diseases are caused by defects during synapse formation, so that’s why understanding the steps of these molecules — by which the brain is formed — we hope to contribute to the treatment and prevention of those diseases,” Umemori said.

The lab is exploring neuron connectivity and brain development, especially the pathways by which the brain systems become wired early in life.

“Neurons are precisely connected to each other, meaning each neuron knows exactly where to connect,” Umemori said.

“We’re interested in how such a precise network is formed.”

Neuronal pathways in the brain are formed in two distinct steps, Umemori said. The first step, which begins at birth and continues until adolescence, establishes the initial connections between neurons and forms a preliminary network.

In the second step, the connections are either reinforced or eliminated based on the amount See BRAIN, Page 2A

Party politics took a toll on the Central Student Government agenda on Tuesday night as assembly representatives made accusations against Law student Jeremy Keeney, who was nominated to be student general counsel, of being ethically compromised.

The University Election Commission is a five-member body responsible for settling electionrelated disputes in CSG. A member of the assembly is required to serve on UEC each year. Keeney, who served as an independent assembly representative for the 2012-13 academic year, was nominated for the position.

WRITE OFF

RESEARCH

Work focuses on synapses, has potential clinical applications

Daily Staff Reporter

The assembly members voted to appoint Keeney as SGC with 20 yes votes, six no votes and 12 abstentions.

During the last CSG election cycle in late March, LSA senior Chris Osborn — political party forUM’s presidential candidate — was disqualified from the CSG elections on grounds of election code violations despite garnering a plurality of the popular vote. Candidates of opposition party youMICH, Business senior Michael Proppe was instated in his place.

Rumors that Jeremy Keeney had been promised a position in the executive branch of CSG in return for ousting forUM through the UEC from the election circulated, along with an e-mail that allegedly proved Keeney’s prior affiliation with youMICH. In April of last year, University alum Shreya Singh, former See CSG, Page 2A

ACADEMICS

History professor’s lecture to be aired on C-SPAN Lecture recorded in Ann Arbor to be featured in history series ERIN KIRKLAND/Daily

Ross sophomore Angie Pae works participates in the Great Write Off at Espresso Royale on State Street on Tuesday. In honor of the upcoming State of the Book literary symposium on Saturday, Espresso’s front window area was decked out with typewriters and free donuts in order to raise money for six local literary organizations.

CRIME

Lectures focus on minors’ safety on college campuses Presenters reflect on cases at University, UPenn

By RACHEL PREMACK Daily Staff Reporter

In a small School of Social Work classroom Tuesday, the school held the first seminar in

a yearlong series on the safety of minors on colleges campuses.

Supported by a grant from the Family Assessment Learning Laboratory for Education and Research, the series will consist of eight three-hour discussions on the maltreatment of minors on college campuses.

The series is a response to the child sexual abuse scan-

dal involving Jerry Sandusky, Pennsylvania State University assistant football coach, and the child-pornography case involving former medical resident Stephen Jenson, along with the institutional failures surrounding these events.

Social Work Prof. Kathleen Coulborn Faller said these incidents highlighted flaws in See LECTURES, Page 2A

By SAM GRINGLAS Daily Staff Reporter

History enthusiasts, mark your calendars.

C-SPAN, the cable network known for uninterrupted broadcasts of congressional hearings, is set to air a lecture Saturday that was delivered by History Prof. Gina Morantz-Sanchez.

The lecture will air at 8 p.m. on C-SPAN3 — channel 105 in Ann Arbor. Morantz-Sanchez’s lecture will be featured on American History TV, a weekend-long programming block designed especially for history buffs. Each weekend, a college lecture is featured in the 8 p.m. timeslot, branded as “Lectures in History.”

Morantz-Sanchez’s lecture will cover the backlash toward the Women’s Liberation MoveSee C-SPAN, Page 2A

Dave Brandon’s fireworks A look at the athletic director, businessman and Michigan man

WEATHER TOMORROW

HI: 74 LO: 50

GOT A NEWS TIP? Call 734-418-4115 or e-mail news@michigandaily.com and let us know.

NEW ON MICHIGANDAILY.COM The Wire: Snyder campaign buys ads MICHIGANDAILY.COM/BLOGS

» INSIDE

INDEX

Vol. CXXIII, No. 138 ©2013 The Michigan Daily michigandaily.com

NEWS......................... 2A OPINION.....................4A S P O R T S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7A

SUDOKU.....................2A CL ASSIFIEDS...............6A T H E S TAT E M E N T. . . . . . . . . .1 B

News

2A — Wednesday, September 25, 2013

BOOKS From Page 1A shelves,” Hamstra said.

There are no books that are banned from the University, but the practice continues to be an issue in some U.S. school districts.

People stopped to listen as they walked through the Diag — Hamstra noted that in the past people have been confused as they walked past the reading because censorship does not seem to be a pressing issue on campus.

“I think it’s important that the library has this advocacy this week so that students are encouraged to be good patrons of their libraries so they think critically as they get involved in their communities and school districts,” she said.

Banned books have included content against religious values, magic with claims of cultism, religious texts, offensive language or anti-family themes.

Hamstra said claims of anti-family content usually pertain to books that include gay parents such as Lesléa Newman’s “Heather has Two Mommies.”

In 2010, the Tucson Unified School District banned all books by Chicano and Native American authors, in response to a state law that banned schools from including material in their instruction that promote ethnic solidarity over individuality. The TUSD decision to remove these books was overturned this July by a federal court order.

LECTURES From Page 1A the system of protecting children, prompting administrators and professors to examine how minors are protected on campus.

Experts from different fields, from medicine to risk management, discussed the institutional flaws. Bethany Mohr, medical director of University of Michigan Health System Child Protection Team, said UMHS faculty and residents are not screened for a history of committing child abuse.

This screening, different from a background check, would narrow in on instances that typically do not warrant arrest and where employees abuse their own children. Though the Sandusky case involved sexual abuse, Jenson was not accused of having an inappropriate contact with children.

Mohr added that there are issues with establishing policies on the provider-patient relationship, which must comprehensively cover all possible instances of abuse. She said such policies should be better known.

“Close to zero parents know what to do,” Mohr said about cases where parents must grapple with alleged abuse incidents. “They just don’t have any resources.”

The complexity of minors interacting with University officials even extends to the Law School. Frank Vandervort, superJl[fbl Jpe[`ZXk`fe vising attorney at the University

LSA freshman Jessica Longe was a junior at Salem High School, 25 miles outside of Ann Arbor, when the superintendent decided to ban “Waterland” from her AP English class after a complaint from one of the student’s parents due to sexually graphic descriptions.

After months of debate at school board meetings, a panel of community members decided to revoke the ban.

Longe — who read a passage aloud at the event — said the debate brought religion and politics into the school system, which she didn’t think was appropriate.

She was frustrated that the school system was trying to appease specific children rather than creating curricula that works for the entire student body.

Just last week, the school board in Ralph County, N.C. banned the book “Invisible Man” claiming it was innapropriate for teenagers and that it did not hold any literary value. Visiting Prof.

V.V. Ganeshananthan read an excerpt from “Invisible Man” at the Read Out. The Banned Books Week website includes a map of banned books in the United States. Advocates can also report occurrences of book banning to the ALA. On Thursday, Sept. 26, students can contribute to a Virtual Read Out video statement celebrating the freedom to read by reading out a few lines from a banned book. Anyone interested should go to the Practice Presentation Room in the Undergraduate Library from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.

Juvenile Justice Clinic, said his students represent minors in criminal courts.

However, the Law School doesn’t have policies on how to appropriately treat children.

Vandervort recently asked his colleagues where he could find such policies.

“Most of the people looked at me with a very strange face like I was from outer space,” he said.

Lawyers and clergy members are not required to report witnessed sexual abuse even in states where all adults are required to, a precedent that angered Vandervort.

“It seems to me in that circumstance the response is so obvious is that we shouldn’t have a national debate or conversation about these sort of things,” he said.

Faller said she hoped the seminar translates to better policy at the University. Her fellow speakers said other colleges’ policies lack comprehensiveness, though some campuses are more advanced.

“We’re hoping that out of this will come more coherent understanding, but also a better policy and better ideas of policy when kids are on campus,” she said.

Some graduate students may attend the seminars for credit.

Social Work graduate student Christian Moore was one such student in a crowd of professors — he hopes to work in University outreach.

“I wish that more students were aware of the course,” he said. “It promotes a greater dialogue about safety.”

SUDOKU HARD

+

)

(

/

+

-

, )

. )

* - ,

* / ,

/ 0 + / (

TOUGH LOVE.

0

*

( . jl[fbljfcm\i%Zfd% =fi g\ijfeXc lj\ fecp%

puzzle by sudokusyndication.com

CSG From Page 1A youMICH presidential nominee, sent an e-mail to assembly representatives and youMICH affiliates, recommending candidates for select executive and legislative positions, including that Keeney was qualified to be instated as the rules committee chair. At the time, Keeney was a representative on the assembly, popularly elected as an independent.

At the time, youMICH party members served as the majority in the assembly, giving them the majority vote to select and confirm candidates for committeechair positions.

Keeney denied all allegations of affiliations with youMICH prior to the UEC hearings.

While the youMICH e-mail suggests that Keeney was affiliated with youMICH, Proppe said the decision to instate Keeney as chair of the committee was solely due to the fact that Keeney was the most qualified candidate for the position.

While Keeney previously served as a lawyer for the youMICH team during the legal proceedings that followed the 2012 CSG election, he was appointed externally by the Central Student Judiciary to serve youMICH — along with now-defunct party OurMichigan — and was paid for his services.

As a result, when Proppe announced his nomination of Keeney for a position on his executive branch, the Executive Nominations Committee conducted an investigation on the alleged affiliations that may compromise Keeney’s impartiality.

Architecture senior John Arnold, chair of the Executive Nominations Committee, said although Keeney was a qualified candidate for the position and he recognized that a lot of the allegations were “hearsay,” the committee felt

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com that Keeney was ethically compromised.

“We feel that because of (Keeney’s) prior involvement with youMICH, it would have been good ethical practice for him to recuse himself from the (UEC) hearings,” Arnold said. “Confirming a candidate that has been intimately involved with the past two (election trials), we don’t think is a good way to ameliorate the issues.”

In an August interview, former student general counsel Lukas Garske, an ex-officio and non-voting member of the last UEC, said he made all UEC members disclose their party affiliations prior the hearing and that the decision to oust the forUM candidates was a “very clear-cut decision.”

In a written statement, Garske said there was no proof confirming rumors that Keeney had “accepted a deal” from youMICH that promised he would be appointed as SGC if the UEC disqualified Osborn from the presidency.

“It would be a shame if (Keeney) was denied the ability to continue to serve CSG because of party politics,” Garske wrote.

Proppe stressed that he never promised Keeney the SGC position before the hearings had finished. In contemplating possible candidates, Proppe said the first time he reached out to Keeney for the position was in late April, after all election disputes had been resolved.

Law student Betsy Fisher, who served as forUM’s lawyer during the election cycle, issued a statement that said that the issues raised were “structural rather than ethical” as Keeney’s presence on the UEC panel was his responsibility as an assembly member, regardless of affiliation.

“I worked hard on forUM’s case, and I’m disappointed that anyone from forUM would attack the credibility of their colleagues six months after the election dispute was finalized,” she added. “I’m embarrassed to be associated with anyone who would.”

DO YOU LIKE KEEPING UP WITH ALL THE STUFF THAT’S HAPPENING ON YOUR COLLEGE CAMPUS?

NO? FOLLOW THE DAILY ANYWAY @MICHIGANDAILY

420 Maynard St. Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1327 www.michigandaily.com ANDREW WEINER

KIRBY VOIGTMAN

Editor in Chief Business Manager 734-418-4115 ext. 1252 734-418-4115 ext. 1241 anweiner@michigandaily.com kvoigtman@michigandaily.com

Newsroom

News Tips

734-418-4115 opt. 3

news@michigandaily.com

Corrections

Letters to the Editor

corrections@michigandaily.com

tothedaily@michigandaily.com

Arts Section

Editorial Page

arts@michigandaily.com

opinion@michigandaily.com

Sports Section

Photography Section

sports@michigandaily.com

photo@michigandaily.com

Display Sales

Classified Sales

dailydisplay@gmail.com

classified@michigandaily.com

Online Sales

Finance

onlineads@michigandaily.com

finance@michigandaily.com

EDITORIAL STAFF Matthew Slovin Managing Editor Adam Rubenfire Managing News Editor

mjslovin@michigandaily.com arube@michigandaily.com

SENIOR NEWS EDITORS: Alicia Adamczyk, Peter Shahin, K.C. Wassman, Taylor Wizner ASSISTANT NEWS EDITORS: Ariana Assaf, Jennifer Calfas, Hilary Crawford, Ian Dillingham, Will Greenberg, Sam Gringlas, Matt Jackonen, Rachel Premack, Stephanie Shenouda, Christy Song

Melanie Kruvelis and opinioneditors@michigandaily.com Adrienne Roberts Editorial Page Editors SENIOR EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS: Dan Wang, Derek Wolfe ASSISTANT EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS: Aarica Marsh, Megan McDonald

Everett Cook and Zach Helfand Managing Sports Editors

sportseditors@michigandaily.com

SENIOR SPORTS EDITORS: Alejandro Zuniga, Jeremy Summitt, Neal Rothschild, Rajat

Khare, Daniel Wasserman, Liz Vukelich ASSISTANT SPORTS EDITORS: Greg Garno, Alexa Dettlebach, Daniel Feldman, Erin Lennon, Lev Facher, Max Cohen

Kayla Upadhyaya

Managing Arts Editor

kaylau@michigandaily.com

SENIOR ARTS EDITORS: Elliot Alpern, Brianne Johnson, John Lynch, Anna Sadovskaya ASSISTANT ARTS EDITORS: John Bohn, Sean Czarnecki, Max Radin, Akshay Seth, Katie Steen, Steven Tweedie

Adam Glanzman and Terra Molengraff Managing Photo Editors

photo@michigandaily.com

SENIOR PHOTO EDITORS: Teresa Mathew, Todd Needle ASSISTANT PHOTO EDITORS: Katherine Pekala, Paul Sherman, McKenzie Berezin, Ruby Wallau, Patrick Barron

Kristen Cleghorn and Nick Cruz Managing Design Editors Haley Goldberg Magazine Editor

design@michigandaily.com statement@michigandaily.com

DEPUTY MAGAZINE EDITOR: Paige Pearcy

Josephine Adams and Tom McBrien Copy Chiefs

copydesk@michigandaily.com

SENIOR COPY EDITORS: Jennie Coleman, Kelly McLauglin

Austen Hufford

Online Editor

ahufford@michigandaily.com

BUSINESS STAFF Amal Muzaffar Digital Accounts Manager Doug Soloman University Accounts Manager Leah Louis-Prescott Classified Manager Lexi Derasmo Local Accounts Manager Hillary Wang National Accounts Manager Ellen Wolbert and Sophie Greenbaum Production Managers The Michigan Daily (ISSN 0745-967) is published Monday through Friday during the fall and winter terms by students at the University of Michigan. One copy is available free of charge to all readers. Additional copies may be picked up at the Daily’s office for $2. Subscriptions for fall term, starting in September, via U.S. mail are $110. Winter term (January through April) is $115, yearlong (September through April) is $195. University affiliates are subject to a reduced subscription rate. On-campus subscriptions for fall term are $35. Subscriptions must be prepaid.

The Michigan Daily is a member of The Associated Press and The Associated Collegiate Press.

apse,” Umemori said.

The molecule was discovered in 2010 in a research study focusing primarily on the first step of of activity they encounter, estab- neuron development. It wasn’t lishing a “functional circuitry,” until the lab’s most recent pubUmemori said. lication that they realized the “In the beginning, we usu- importance of this molecule in ally have excess synapses, so synaptic reinforcement was realwe choose good ones,” he said. ized.

“Active ones will be stabilized In the search for molecules and inactive ones will be elimi- involved in the synapse matunated, so that we will basically ration process, Umemori’s lab have the most efficient circuitry screened brain tissue samples in in the brain.” culture — placing neurons in conWhile the lab’s research tact with a variety of molecules involves development of the brain thought to play a role in synapse over time, the recent findings development. focus on the molecular mechaAfter identifying cultures nisms that underlie the process of with active synapse formation, synapse maturation in the second the tissue samples underwent a step of the process. procedure known as biochemiIn particular, Umemori’s lab cal purification, which separates has confirmed the role a new molecules based on different molecule in this step: signal regu- characteristics such as size or latory protein-alpha. SIRP-alpha charge. travels between pre- and postIn future studies, Umemori synaptic neurons, binding with said the lab hopes to analyze the specific receptors that tell the effects of synapse dysfunction neuron to reinforce the synaptic in schizophrenia using geneticonnection. cally modified mice, often called “SIRP is basically used as a knockouts. While these mice are communication tool between thought to express schizophrepre- and post-synaptic cells to tell nia, the lab plans to run behavior_kkg1&&jl[fbljpe[`ZXk`fe%Zfd&jl[fbl&^\e\iXkfi&gi`ek& them that this is an active syn- al studies to confirm the presence

of this trait — or “phenotype” — and its link to synaptic development.

“We have the knockout animals, and knockout animals do have synaptic changes, but we don’t know if they have different phenotype yet,” Umemori said.

“If the animals show schizophrenic phenotype then we can try to treat (them) and see if that can be a disease model.”

Additionally, future research in the lab will examine other areas of the brain, since the recent findings were isolated to specific regions like the hippocampus.

Erin Johnson-Venkatesh, a postdoctoral research fellow in the lab, plans to expand the research to cover other aspects of synapse development.

“The paper focuses only on excitatory synapses,” JohnsonVenkatesh said. “Inhibitory synapses also may be affected, so I’m trying to figure out why and how.”

Although the research has potentially broad implications for clinical treatments of neurodevelopmental diseases, JohnsonVenkatesh said the molecular processes tend to dominate the

day-to-day focus of the lab. Only when a project reaches the publication stage does she come to fully realize the impact of such work.

“You get really engrossed in a particular set of experience and sometimes you forget to even come up for air and all of a sudden … we need to write a paper and share these results,” she said.

“Usually at the beginning and the end you sort of think more larger picture, and in the middle you’re just focused.”

Two University alumni, Anna Toth and Lily Zhang, both contributed to this recent publication. Given their success in this field, Johnson-Venkatesh offered advice to undergraduates interested in pursuing research.

“I think finding something you’re interested in is probably the most important,” she said.

“And the second most important is finding an environment that you like working in … because then you’re going to enjoy being there.”

today really existed,” MorantzSanchez said.

At the time, she said most history classes were about ‘male history.’

“We never spoke about women,” Morantz-Sanchez said.

History as studied at universities and taught in classrooms, she said, was told through a narrow lens. The subject generally ignored the complexities of race, class and gender — it generally focused on a political narrative absent of cultural influences.

Morantz-Sanchez left Columbia later that year. At that time, interest in the Civil Rights Movement was growing at universities.

Morantz-Sanchez considered trekking down South to register disenfranchised voters.

“Growing up in this extraordinary 12 years of social and political change in the ’60s and ’70s, I think many of us were open to thinking outside the box,” she

said. “And one of the first things the Civil Rights Movement did was to touch other people living in American society.”

In essence, the period’s political tumult influenced MorantzSanchez and her contemporaries to broaden the lens through which academics and students write about and study history.

“All of these things were not necessarily taught as what was ‘real history,’ ” she said. “What it does is help us much better understand ourselves — once we understand the complex ways we are created as Americans, as gendered people, as classed people, as raced people, and all those different categories are working together mutually construct the cultural world in which we live.”

Despite these disciplinary advances, Morantz-Sanchez said enrollment in many of her history courses has decreased over the

past 10 years.

“I think we’re a society that doesn’t believe in history anymore,” she said.

On Saturday, a program dedicated to “the people and events that document the American story,” will air the lecture of a professor hoping to do just that in her Ann Arbor classroom.

But Morantz-Sanchez, who was recruited by C-SPAN for inclusion in the program, doesn’t have any delusions about the network’s demographic reach.

“Do I think anybody will watch this C-SPAN thing? History buffs, maybe,” she said.

Morantz-Sanchez isn’t discounting the power of history, though. She’s seen its enduring weight when classes end each term and a student says: “Boy I really didn’t want to take this, but I really do understand myself better now.”

BRAIN From Page 1A

C-SPAN From Page 1A ment during the 1970s and 1980s, including the conservative women who fervently fought against the Equal Rights Amendment, which was never ratified.

The episode was taped during a lecture the 2013 winter semester in Morantz-Sanchez’s course, “Women in American History Since 1870.”

When Morantz-Sanchez earned a Ph.D. at Columbia University in 1971, classes like “Women in American History” would never have appeared on the pages of a university course guide.

“When I went to graduate school, I learned nothing really, except the ability to tell good history from bad history because none of the history we practice

—Alexandra Soos and Madison Dettlinger contributed reporting.

GET UPDATES IN YOUR NEWSFEED: FACEBOOK.COM/MICHIGANDAILY

Generate and solve Sudoku, Super Sudoku and Godoku puzzles at sudokusyndication.com!

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Wednesday, September 25, 2013 — 3A

Opinion

4A — Wednesday, September 25, 2013

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

The curious case of Alice Walker

Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890.

420 Maynard St. Ann Arbor, MI 48109 tothedaily@michigandaily.com MELANIE KRUVELIS ANDREW WEINER EDITOR IN CHIEF

and ADRIENNE ROBERTS

EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS

MATT SLOVIN MANAGING EDITOR

Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily’s editorial board.

All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.

FROM THE DAILY

Bad policy, bad logic Michigan’s defense of ban on adoption by same sex couples is baseless

I

n October, Jayne Rowse and April DeBoer, a gay couple who have three adopted children, will challenge Michigan’s ban on same-sex joint adoption before the U.S. District Court in Detroit. Basing their case on the precedents established by United States v. Windsor, which found the Federal Defense of Marriage Act’s restriction of the definition of marriage to “one man, one woman” unconstitutional, Rowse and DeBoer hope to convince the court that Michigan’s ban on adoption by homosexual couples is in violation of the right to due process. With the gay-rights movement gaining momentum across Michigan and the rest of the United States, overturning the ban is a logical decision for the state’s future.

Attorneys representing Michigan, led by Republican Attorney General Bill Schuette, are disputing Rowse and DeBoer’s motion to challenge the law in court. However, their argument can only be described as inappropriate. In a brief filed earlier this month, Schuette claimed that Michigan has a legitimate interest in restricting child adoption to heterosexual couples in order to encourage “the unique procreative capacity of such relationships.” He goes on to say, “...social scientists have consistently recognized the essential connection between marriage and responsible procreation and childrearing.”

Essentially, the state must exclusively sponsor opposite-sex marriages to promote population growth. This explanation is preposterous and doesn’t represent the state of Michigan.

Practically speaking, fighting this case continues the growing waste of the state’s resources and keeps vulnerable children from families. Most times, there are about 3,000 foster children in Michigan in need of

a home. Continuing to fund these kids when there are families willing to care for them is careless spending and simply cold-hearted.

Snyder should not allow his personal or his administration’s beliefs interfere with letting a child live in a positive environment. Baseless claims, like this one, are the cause of pointless arguing within Michigan’s government that takes up a great deal of time.

According to the Michigan Department of Human Resources, “Michigan has been recognized as a leader for our innovative approach to adoption and our high adoptive placement rates.” However, allowing this policy to continue is the contrary. Withdrawing Michigan’s legal defense of the ban on samesex joint child adoption and instituting a fair procedure to allow these adoptions to occur needs to be the state’s course of action. Likewise, Schuette and his associates should be publicly censured for their abuse of science in the brief challenging the motion from Rowse and DeBoer.

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

Kaan Avdan, Sharik Bashir, Barry Belmont, Eli Cahan, Eric Ferguson, Jesse Klein, Melanie Kruvelis, Maura Levine, Patrick Maillet, Aarica Marsh, Megan McDonald, Harsha Nahata, Adrienne Roberts, Paul Sherman, Sarah Skaluba, Daniel Wang, Derek Wolfe ALEXIS NOWICKI | VIEWPOINT

Pedestrian paradise

On Sept. 20, an event called PARK(ing) Day came to Ann Arbor for the first time in three years. In promotion of a pedestriancentered city, two University graduate students — Rackham student Jenny Cooper and Rackham and Public Health student Arielle Fleisher — took over a parking spot on State Street and converted it into a mini-park — a place for relaxing, lunching and socializing, open to any Ann Arbor resident who happened to be walking by between 11:30 a.m. and 5:00 p.m.

A public place of this sort seems almost necessary for a well-planned city, but if you think about it, downtown Ann Arbor seems to be lacking these open-space environments.

There are currently four designated “city parks” downtown, but there are problems.

First is Liberty Plaza — great for Sonic Lunch, but otherwise a popular gathering place for the homeless. Next is the Kempf House Museum, which is a museum, not a park. Sculpture Plaza is a charming brick area surrounded by restaurants. And lastly, the Farmers Market is a pavilion-covered area usually inhabited by people only during the brief times when it is open.

While all these places are beneficial in their own ways to the character of downtown, they aren’t exactly the image that comes to mind when most people hear the words “city park.”

Ann Arbor residents want to be able to spend time downtown without being in a store, at a restaurant or walking through areas that seem to be more automobile-friendly than person-friendly.

PARK(ing) Day makes a much-needed statement for the necessity of more green spaces and open areas downtown and brings forth the unfortunate truth that Ann Arbor, like the majority of cities, is made for cars.

While cars provide the “easiest” mode of transportation for most people — especially families — they aren’t the most city-friendly, and they are definitely not the most environmentally friendly. People often get out of the suburbs

the podium

and head downtown for a car-free experience that you can’t find elsewhere, but many downtown experiences have come to mirror those in the suburbs: driving, parking, buying and then going back home to the “burbs.”

From an urban planning standpoint, there are many things that could be addressed to fix the city’s car-plagued atmosphere. Ease for walkers and bikers seem to be at the foreground of these potential solutions, with proposals for more defined bike lanes and more bike parking in and out of parking garages.

Most often, citizens complain that they can’t find locations downtown where they can spend more than a few minutes without being expected to make a purchase. Hanging out at Starbucks is great, but not without first purchasing an overpriced beverage.

One main problem here is that it’s most cost-beneficial for the city to dedicate space to businesses that will pay to use it. Naturally, less profit is being made if the area is designated for the recreation that doesn’t involve spending money.

Part of the solution to this problem comes from the way that public areas are set up. If they’re open to events that will end up making the city money, they become more economically practical in the eyes of officials, as well as more welcoming in the eyes of the community.

Another more significant part of the solution is in the community mindset. This is what PARK(ing) Day is trying to get across — the point that urban spaces weren’t created to be made up of cars and concrete, but to foster a walkable, bikeable environment that allows a city of students and workers to clear their heads during every bit of the short hours they’re able to spend outdoors.

Ann Arbor might not have the capacity for a Central Park, but the interspersing of urban and green environments is the ideal equivalent for a pedestrian’s peace of mind.

Alexis Nowicki is an LSA freshman.

Building Blocks: Have you heard of Elon Musk and his plans for travel on and outside of earth? Abhishek Cauligi talks about his impact, and how it affects the future.

Go to michigandaily.com/blogs/The Podium

I

n August, the esteemed American novelist, activist and Pulitzer Prize winner Alice Walker was disinvited from giving the keynote address for the University’s Center for the Education of Women’s 50th anniversary event in ZEINAB March. On her KHALIL blog, Walker expressed her disappointment in the University’s decision. Just a few days later, this news made national headlines, and the University wasn’t looking too hot for disinviting a world-renowned writer and peace activist committed to transformative change.

The University then announced a few weeks later that it had extended a different invitation to Walker, this time for the Zora Neale Hurston Lecture co-hosted by the CEW and the Department of Afroamerican and African Studies next fall. Walker has accepted the new invitation and will speak on campus in November 2014.

While I’m thrilled that Walker will come to campus — though it’s a bummer that I will have graduated by then — the “ending” to this highly embarrassing and murky situation is far from peachy. Walker’s reinvitation doesn’t excuse the University from answering some serious questions that have come to light through this incident.

What symbolic message does the University send when it appears to silence and monitor a prominent Black, female activist? What does this incident tell us about the voices of figures who hold critical, counterhegemonic perspectives — in this case about Palestine and Israel? And finally, what does the case say about donor transparency and accountability at the University?

Too often, Black women are policed for how they behave and what they say. This marginalizing is perhaps even more severe for women activists who promote alternative models of framing and understanding of social and political issues.

The revoking of Walker’s initial invite must be read against the back-

drop of a campus that has a lot of assault launched by Israeli military work to do in fostering an inclusive forces that resulted in the deaths of college climate: underrepresented 1,416 Palestinians and 13 Israelis. In a minority enrollment — including show of extremely disproportionate Blacks, Hispanics and Native Ameri- force, Israeli-armed forces repeatcans — is worse now than it was 10 edly violated international law and years ago, falling from 13.6 percent in exercised collective punishment 2002 to 10.2 percent in 2012. Just as by dropping white phosphorous on troubling is the 6.6-percent represen- densely-populated communities. On tation of women of color from under- her trip, Walker spoke out against represented groups in 2011 and the this assault and implored Israel and 7-percent representation of women Egypt to open their borders and end of color faculty in 2008 — only 3 the ongoing siege of Gaza, a territory percent for full professors. Campus roughly the size of Detroit inhabited climate certainly goes beyond statis- by nearly two million people. tics, but these numbers nevertheless Most pressingly, the Walker case point to something telling and dis- begs a question of transparency: tressing that can’t be detached from Who’s calling the shots? While the campus happenings such as this one. University insists that Walker’s disWalker’s racial liberation activ- invitation had nothing to do with ism stretches back to the Civil her political positions or the conRights Movement, where she mobi- tent of her speech, her agent noted lized Black voters in the south dur- that the disinvitation happened at ing the 1960s and demonstrated the request of an unnamed donor’s alongside Dr. Martin Luther King “interpretation” of her “comments in the 1963 regarding Israel.”

March on How can we Washington. challenge such How can we challenge She continues decisions — or such decisions if we her activism similar future through more ones — and hold don’t know who affects their recent events: actors in March the decision-making? accountable if we 2003, on don’t know who International affects the deciWomen’s Day, just 11 days before sion-making? It’s unfair and shallow the United States dropped its first to point to those who are the face of bombs on Iraq, Walker was arrest- the University — that is, CEW and its ed in front of the White House with administration, as bearing the brunt a number of other anti-war woman of responsibility in answering these activists. Walker demonstrated questions. Rather, those who play a because she believed the lives of more behind-the-scenes role in the Iraqi women and children to be just decision-making must also respond. as precious as American lives, but Obviously, donors to the Univerthe petty charges waged against sity are crucial for the role they play her made clear that her anti-racist, in sustaining campus life. But where anti-imperialist message posed a is that role ever clearly defined? At threat to the mainstream warmon- what point do the perspectives of gering narrative. alumni and donors — many of whom But perhaps even more unsettling are no longer on campus and may to the status quo — and her stated not realize the changing climate reason for being disinvited from the — encroach on what voices are welUniversity in the first place — are comed on campus and what views Walker’s views on the Israeli gov- students are exposed to? The Uniernment’s military occupation of versity community must openly and Palestine. Walker joined the Free- urgently confront issues of academic dom Flotilla in 2011 to challenge integrity and financial pressure to the Israeli blockade of Gaza, and ensure that such insidious behavior prior to that, in 2009, she travelled has no place on our campus. to Gaza with the anti-war feminist organization, Code Pink, in wake of — Zeinab Khalil can be Operation Cast Lead, a three-week reached at zkha@umich.edu.

INTERESTED IN CAMPUS ISSUES? POLITICS? SEX, DRUGS AND ROCK’N’ROLL? Check out The Michigan Daily’s editorial board meetings. Every Monday and Wednesday at 6 p.m., the Daily’s opinion staff meets to discuss both University and national affairs and write editorials.

E-mail opinioneditors@michigandaily.com to join in the debate.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Give full refunds on basketball tickets TO THE DAILY: I’m not entirely opposed to the idea that fans have to “claim” their tickets for basketball games next season, but the Athletic Department’s plans to resell unclaimed tickets without providing compensation to students is pure thievery. If the Athletic Department is so confident in the non-student demand for tickets, then give all 4,500 students their guaranteed seats, provide a window two or three weeks prior to basketball games for students to sell their tickets back to the Athletic Department, and then go resell them themselves. Did they think that students enjoy eating the cost of not being able to resell unused tickets?

By offering season ticket refunds, the Athletic Department is tacitly acknowledging that they broke the rules when they materially changed

Academics a priority over basketball TO THE DAILY: Last year, I purchased Michigan basketball season tickets. Going to Michigan basketball games was a great break from my studies as a first-year law student. I was excited to purchase season tickets again this year.

But I confess — I didn’t make it to every game last season. I was there for the big games. But I missed a few, mostly in the non-conference season. I missed games because I had to focus on school. After all, I’m a student. Given the amount of tuition I pay to the University of Michigan, I couldn’t afford to skip studying to go to a basketball game during finals week.

Send letters to: tothedaily@michigandaily.com the ticketholder agreement after the time of sale. But refunding my $200 does not put me back where I started six months ago. I paid a $15 “application fee” for season tickets (as, I assume, did everyone else). What exactly did this application fee cover? Dave Brandon’s $800,000 salary?

The Athletic Department also owes me interest on my $200. While this is only a few dollars, had I known about the forthcoming change in policy, I would have chosen to keep my $200 tucked away in my bank account or elsewhere, earning some sort of return, however small. From season-ticket sales, the Athletic Department collected approximately $90,000 in fees and retained interest, not to mention $900,000 in sales revenue. While the Athletic Department can bully individual season-ticket holders into forfeiting $20, the aggregate amount at stake may be enough to justify a class-action lawsuit.

This weekend, I decided that I will

simply buy individual game tickets this year, and I requested a refund of my season tickets from the Athletic Department, with interest and application fees. They replied, “We will only be able to offer you the $200 refund. Our policy is that any refund we issue is cost of ticket only.”

I asked them to elaborate on the “policy” that was in place at the time I bought my tickets. They replied, in relevant part, “REFUNDS: If you apply for a season ticket and later decide not to enroll for the Fall 2013 term, you may receive a full refund provided you send a written request to the Ticket Office prior to Nov. 1, 2013 ... Please consider this matter closed.” I replied by pointing out the obvious fact that the quoted refund policy has nothing to do with the circumstances surrounding my refund request. I’m still waiting on an answer.

I often hear rhetoric about collegiate amateurism and education of student athletes. Student non-athletes also need to focus on school. I don’t enjoy the prospect of a National Basketball Association contract. Instead, I enjoy the prospect of working hard in school and finding a job to pay back my loans. Michigan’s new student season ticket policy encourages students to neglect our academic obligations so that we don’t lose the chance to attend future games and our (soonto-be nonrefundable) investment in season tickets. This policy is illadvised and disappointing.

I enjoy going to Michigan basketball games. Michigan’s basketball team has boosted my allegiance to the school (and given that this seems to be a revenue-driven move, the University should remember that

student good-will translates into future financial support). But attending Michigan basketball games is not my priority. Academic success is my priority. Forced to choose between attending games zealously — or losing my money and my ability to attend games — and flexibility to pursue my studies appropriately, I choose to focus on academics. Please refund my season ticket purchase.

I’m disappointed by this policy.

The University of Michigan is a wonderful academic institution.

The fact that it is also a great basketball school shouldn’t threaten the University’s academic focus.

The Athletic Department should not bully students into attending games at the expense of academics.

Zachary Robock Law Student

Eli Temkin Law Student

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Arts

EVENT PREVIEW

Hirsch to speak on Gottlieb’s legend Gottlieb Foundation director to give lecture

By LENA FINKEL Daily Arts Writer

Their lives were always destined to become intertwined.

An artist in his own right, Sanford Hirsch knew of painter Adolph Adolph Gottlieb even before their Gottlieb: chance meeting Sculptor on the streets - Lecture of Manhattan.

And now, by Sanford Hirsch will give Hirsch an inspiring lecture about Friday at the man who 5:30 p.m. changed his UMMA life.

Hirsch, Free the Executive Director of the Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation, claimed his obsession with Gottlieb began long before their introduction.

“He was already very famous,” Hirsch said. “When I was young and coming up, he was very well

known.”

In truth, Gottlieb had already established a reputation as an innovator in the Abstract Expressionist movement by the 1930s and was a founding member of the artist group known as “The Ten,” which formed in 1935. By 1945, his success skyrocketed with the Guggenheim Museum purchasing 11 works of art. The Guggenheim, along with the Whitney Museum, eventually became the locations for his retrospective exhibition — making him the only artist to fill both museums simultaneously.

In 1967, at the age of 64, Gottlieb found himself with more success than he had ever thought possible.

“He needed to be challenged — try something he had never tried,” Hirsch said.

So Gottlieb moved on to a new medium: sculptures.

Though they only formed a short period of his career, Gottlieb’s sculptures will be expanded upon in Hirsch’s lecture.

Hirsch will also discuss Gottlieb as a person and the things that were important to him, in addition to his life as an artist.

“I intend to give an overview of his whole career and convey who he was as a historical figure,” Hirsch said. “I’ll try to give a general understanding — no art-speak.”

Hirsch is certainly a qualified candidate to deliver the lecture, as he has written extensively on the artist and even helped to set up the foundation.

“At the time, I was an artist myself and I wanted to use the year (1976) to work,” Hirsch explained. “But the opportunity was too important to walk away from.”

More than 37 years later, Hirsch has continued to work tirelessly as the executive director of the foundation, even helping to set up a grant program for what he called “artist emergencies.” This can include a number of catastrophic events, like fires or floods, which may destroy an artist’s studio.

Despite working for the foundation for so many years, Hirsch’s passion has never waned.

“There’s always some new challenge, some new set of circumstances for organizing an exhibit,” he said. “It’s very rewarding.”

TV REVIEW

FOX

Wednesday, September 25, 2013 — 5A

ALBUM REVIEW

RCA

“It’s edgier if we’re all looking different ways, trust me.”

Kings of Leon remains unexceptional on ‘Bull’

By JAKE OFFENHARTZ Daily Arts Writer

Don’t worry if you forgot about Kings of Leon — most of us did. So, with the release of the band’s sixth studio album, Mechanical Bull, on Sept. 24, a quick refresher course Bmay be in order.

Kings Mechanical of Leon, Bull comprised of the Followhill Kings of Leon family — the literal sons RCA and nephew of a preacher man — spent much of the early 2000s as garage rock’s southern darlings before achieving colossal commercial success on their stadium-friendly fourth album, Only By Night. After two years as unprecedented rock gods, they released the mediocre Come Around Sundown, which maintained neither the rebellious charm of their early work, nor the anthemic hits of their previous album. While on tour supporting the album, amid rumors of alcoholism and infighting, lead singer Caleb Followhill famously left the stage to “vomit and drink a beer.” He didn’t return, the band cancelled the rest of the tour and more or less vanished for three years.

Now, the Nashville boys are back and ready to reclaim their throne, though for a band that has held royalty in the world of both unrefined blues-punk and chart-topping pop rock, to which

kingdom they intend to return remains uncertain.

The album’s opening song and lead single, “Supersoaker,” plays like a compromise on that very question. The verses possess the volatile urgency of their early work, as a reverb-heavy guitar riff rips through Caleb’s whiskey-soaked recollections of time “down in the delta ... ringing bells.” Verses soon give way to an arena-approved, mostly unintelligible chorus about sentimental girls — an effective reminder that the band still knows what it takes to write a hook.

The album’s next two tracks, “Rock City” and “Don’t Matter,” are bluesy, ephemeral offerings that mostly succeed in carrying the momentum of “Supersoaker.”

The guitar solos are too dominant on both songs and the melodies are vaguely familiar, but for the most part, Mechanical Bull opens very strong.

They’re kings of playing it safe.

This energy is lost entirely on the following track, “Beautiful War,” a sleepy ballad that goes on about three minutes too long. With a chorus of “I say love / don’t mean nothing / unless there’s something / worth fighting for,” one is reminded of the phoned-in, fauxprofound lyrics that left so many bored on Come Around Sundown.

Three mediocre songs follow, and though maybe not filler, the album’s midsection does little to recapture the spastic vitality of the first three tracks. It’s here that the band’s signature tendencies begin to feel repetitious — the moody lyrics seem whiney, the echoing guitars overproduced, the oncerousing crescendos cheap.

After two more flat songs, Mechanical Bull regains some steam with its second-to-last track, “Coming Back Again.” Though it suffers from some of the same setbacks as the previous songs, “Coming Back Again” represents the band at its most primal and unrestrained. When Caleb sings, “I could feel it coming back again” over a twinkly, yet desolate guitar part, you really do want to believe him.

Mechanical Bull closes with “On the Chin,” a slow, Counting Crowsesque number that pays homage to the band’s country roots and may be the only curveball on the album. With wistful nostalgia for “chain smoking in the basement / shattered like the windows,” it’s an unexpected final track on an album dulled by monotony.

Like riding an actual mechanical bull, Kings of Leon’s sixth album is predictable, striving for authenticity while never taking any real risks. It’s also best enjoyed drunk, surrounded by close friends in a dimly lit, Lynyrd Skynyrd-themed bar. It’s not the most fun you’ll ever have, but given the circumstances, Mechanical Bull could be a lot worse.

“Found my copy of ‘Fifty Shades’!”

Leave your head behind and An action-packed ‘Illiad’ just enjoy campy ‘Hollow’ PERFORMANCE PREVIEW

By LENA FINKEL

By KELLY ETZ Daily Arts Writer

From “This is the End” to “World War Z,” there seemed an endless surplus of the-apocalypseis-upon-us plotlines at B the movies this summer. Sleepy Banking on the Hollow trend, FOX’s new genre- Pilot procedural Mondays “Sleepy Hollow” brings at 9 p.m. the end of FOX the world as we know it to weeknights.

All the elements are in place here. There’s a headless redcoat revolutionary, murmurings about witchy covens, a blurrily indistinct demon and George Washington’s bible. The most surprising twist? “Sleepy Hollow” isn’t that bad.

Two of the four creators of the series, Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, put their “Fringe” background to excellent use, infusing “Sleepy Hollow” with an exacting amount of seriousness.

Nobody’s laughing, and yet, the campy element is fully embraced.

There are genuinely spooky moments — thumbs are nearly bitten off, heads are literally rolling everywhere (with one encased in a jar), living bodies claw their way out of the dirt — but all is done with a self-aware kind of silliness. It’s obvious the pilot knows it’s not “Hannibal” or “American Horror Story.”

It’s not trying to be real, only

entertaining.

And shockingly, it succeeds.

If disbelief is suspended and nothing examined too closely, you might find yourself laughing good-naturedly at the inanity.

The pilot begins with Ichabod Crane (played by the dashingly British Tom Mison, “One Day”) fighting in the Revolutionary War and unknowingly beheading the final horseman of the apocalypse. Fast forward to present day, fictional Sleepy Hollow (they just had to throw in the “Welcome to … ” shot), where Ichabod and his horseman nemesis have been mysteriously resurrected.

Lieutenant Abbie Mills (Nicole Beharie, “Shame”), finds an unexpected ally in Crane after her boss is unceremoniously dispatched by Death himself.

It’s silly, but the show is selfaware enough to make it work.

It’s a fanciful reimagining for sure, as the pilot moves further and further away from the story of Ichabod Crane as we know it and closer to an apocalyptic “National Treasure”-style witch hunt. Mison plays Crane as the self-confident academic instead of the stuttering, gangly milksop the character generally inspires. And once the Book of

Revelation is brought into the whole thing, the only connection to Washington Irving is the requisite side character, Captain Frank Irving (Orlando Jones, “Identity”).

Despite the borrowing of character names, “Sleepy Hollow” is all about the Four Horsemen and the world’s descent into hell. There’s a lot of exposition, this is a pilot after all, and there’s the tedious skepticism to be overcome every time a new character enters the scene. As a genre series, “Sleepy Hollow” will naturally excel (if it avoids imminent cancellation) once its supernatural basis has worked out all the bumps with a few establishing episodes. After everyone is on board — audience included — the series can work in procedural cases, similar in style to fan favorite “Grimm.”

Though there are persistent problems, including the fact that a villain with no head is decidedly one-dimensional, it’s clear that FOX has at least borderline faith in the series.

Currently airing on Monday nights, “Sleepy Hollow” has tough network competition, but the niche element gives it an edge over watered-down gunk like “Dancing with the Stars.”

As mindless (and headless) fun, “Sleepy Hollow” works on nearly every level. It’s complex enough to require functioning brain cells, but silly enough to work as a Candy Crush background track. It’s not the most enticing pilot of the fall season, but it’s original. And that’s better than most.

Daily Arts Writer

In one of the hottest plays to hit the stage, the dynamic duo of Director Tim Rhoze and Actor John Manfredi hopes to An Illiad breathe new life into a classic Thursday at 7:30 p.m., tale.

“An Iliad,” Friday at 8 adapted by Lisa p.m., Saturday Peterson and at 3 and 8 p.m.

Denis O’Hare, and Sunday at 2 p.m. transforms Homer’s epic poem into a Performance dramatic one- Network Theatre man play. But From $22 this won’t be your average stool-sitting, monotone-narrated snoozefest. The star Manfredi insisted there is “no lack of activity” and that it will indeed be an action-packed event.

“I had to make sure I was in shape, as it was more of a physical play,” Manfredi explained.

But this shouldn’t be too difficult to accomplish, as Manfredi is no stranger to the stage. He previously performed in Performance Network Theatre’s productions of “A Picasso” and “K2,” the latter of which Rhoze also directed.

But even prior to their collaboration in “K2,” Rhoze and Manfredi had developed a strong relationship.

“I’ve known him for over 20 years,” Rhoze said. “As a person, I’ve known him very well. As a professional, it was exciting to unearth all the things he could do.”

Added Manfredi: “We get along fabulous. We have a very similar approach, and I trust him.”

Manfredi’s trust will be important, as Rhoze plans to take a lot of risks with their interpretation of the play.

Manfredi and Rhoze are a dream team.

“Tim is not afraid to try new things,” Manfredi said. “It’s a new telling, a brand-new play — only two years old. But Tim’s version is even newer than that.”

Added Rhoze: “My approach is different from what it has been. The setting is different; the music is different — as it

should be. You bring your own personality.”

The twosome may be demanding high expectations of its performance, but with both members in their sweet spots, their goals are likely to be met.

A professor at Oakland University during the day, Manfredi asserted that, “Acting is far and away my bigger passion. I’m blessed to get a lot of work.”

As for Rhoze, he has a wealth of both acting and directing experience but much prefers the director’s chair.

“I love the collaboration with the producers, the costume and set designers and, sometimes, even the playwrights,” he said.

With their passion — and so much dedication — Manfredi and Rhoze are sure to enthrall the audience with their oneman adaptation of a classic adventure.

Arts

6A — Wednesday, September 25, 2013

PERFORMANCE PREVIEW

UPO to bring ‘Fantasies’ to Hill Symphony orchestra to strive for beautiful sound

By GRACE PROSNIEWSKI Daily Arts Writer

The University Philharmonia Orchestra (UPO) is gearing up for its first performance of the fall semester and hoping to share a little magic.

Composed of around 80 members, the UPO is a fullsized symphony orchestra, with complete strings, winds, brass and percussion sections. The all-music-major orchestra performs three to four concerts a semester and is led by Conductor and University Associate Director of Orchestras Christopher James Lee. Lee conducts the Contemporary Directions Ensemble in addition to leading the UPO and teaches Intermediate Instrumental Conducting for the School of Music, Theatre & Dance.

Rehearsing three times a week, two hours at a time, students must perform in the UPO as a curricular requirement within the School of Music. The goal is to prepare students for their professional lives ahead.

“We tend to focus on building

the skills of what it means to play in an orchestra because, for many of the exclusively performance majors, their primary employment will be through a regional orchestra,” Lee said.

The repertoire for a performance arises quite organically, with enthusiasm as a marker for importance.

“I try to find good music that the orchestra will enjoy playing and the audiences will enjoy hearing,” Lee said, “and finding a way to tie them in through a concept, an idea, a thought, a theme, a thread, that we can accomplish in the set amount of time we have.”

Inspired by music for the stage, the UPO’s “Musical Fantasies” will include Weber’s Overture to Oberon, Borodin’s Polovetsian Dances from Prince Igor and perhaps the most wellknown piece, Tchaikovsky’s Suite from Swan Lake.

“It’s music that would be played in the pit, being brought on stage as the center focus,” Lee said.

Many of the refrains from the second act will be familiar to fans of the Academy Awardnominated film “Black Swan.”

But, as Lee explained, both recognizable and obscure bits are equally intriguing and infectious.

“All the music has great tunes, and you’ll go away humming

all of the great melodies,” Lee said. “It’s a good skill-building program for the orchestra as well.”

The UPO seeks not so much to produce sound, but rather to create an environment in which one can fully understand its reflective and transformative power.

“What we continuously strive for in our craft is not the addition of more sound, but of more beautiful sound,” Lee said.

“It’s a way for people to enter into a world that’s sculpted around beauty. And hopefully we find, certainly, the fun, the lightness, the levity, the drama, but also a sense of magic.”

The performance will be headed by a pre-concert lecture given by the assistant conductors of the program at 7:15 p.m. in the lower lobby of Hill Auditorium. Curious audience members can hear about the program, learn about the plots of the different operas and sample a little of the music prior to the performance.

Lee’s confident that once students/audience members attend a UPO performance, they will fall under its spell.

And with a program filled with tales of magic and fairies, it’s only fitting.

“I promise that you’ll fall in love with it,” Lee said. “And you’ll want to come back to the next one.”

BECOME A PART OF THE DAILY ARTS FAMILY. APPLY TO THE TV/NEW MEDIA, FILM, MUSIC, COMMUNITY CULTURE OR FINE ARTS BEAT. E-mail arts@michigandaily.com to request an application.

Classifieds

Call: #734-418-4115 Email: dailydisplay@gmail.com

RELEASE DATE– Wednesday, September 25, 2013

Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle

SERVICES

Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis

ACROSS 1 Pizza Quick sauce brand 5 Boxer’s weapon 9 Frankly declare 13 Parade instrument 14 “The Andy Griffith Show” tyke 15 Olin of “The Reader” 16 Cheers for a torero 17 Like a blue moon 18 Overcast, in London 19 Animation pioneer 22 Too scrupulous for 24 Peasant dress 27 Warren Harding’s successor 32 Jacuzzi effect 33 50+ group 34 Score after deuce 35 Line on a map 37 1999, 2000 and 2001 Best Actor nominee (he won once) 43 Japanese fish dish 44 Battery post 46 “Dear” one?

47 __ qua non 51 Duds 52 Cry of pain 53 Eat too much of, briefly 54 Poems of praise 55 Company’s main activity, and a hint to a different three-letter abbreviation hidden in 19-, 27and 37-Across 58 Coyote’s coat 59 Bridge player’s blunder 60 Work on a garden row 62 Garden pest 63 Low points on graphs 64 Benelux locale: Abbr.

65 Billboard fillers 66 Lacking a musical key 67 Souse’s woe

DOWN 1 Frat letter 2 Longtime ISP 3 Got tiresome 4 Not in the know 5 Old West defense 6 High-tech release of 2010 7 Voice-activated app for 6-Down 8 Football supporters 9 African country that was a French colony 10 “Well, that’s weird” 11 With 12-Down, sign with an arrow 12 See 11-Down 20 Island ring 21 Patriots’ org.

22 Serving success 23 Horrible 25 Modern film effects, briefly 26 Understanding 28 __ the Great: boy detective 29 Rob Reiner’s dad 30 Hershiser of ESPN 31 Oil bloc 35 FICA benefit

36 La-la lead-in 37 Ruddy, as a complexion 38 Places to plug in mice 39 More reserved 40 En pointe 41 Place to store cords 42 Beats by a whisker 43 For instance 45 Slalom curve

47 “Fine” 48 Words accompanying a shrug 49 Like much metered parking 50 Head-scratcher 56 Columnist Bombeck 57 Country singer McCoy 58 SFO overseer 61 Hesitant sounds

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:

THESIS EDITING. LANGUAGE, organization, format. All Disciplines.

734/996‑0566 or writeon@iserv.net

HELP WANTED

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

EVENT PREVIEW

COURTESY OF THE CONFUCIUS INSTITUTE

Garments from Xu Rui’s “To See the Invisible” fashion show.

Fashion exhibit to cast light on ‘The Invisible’

By CAROLYN DARR For the Daily

On Sept. 26, the Michigan Union’s Anderson Room will look more like a high-end nightclub than a stately To See The conference room.

It Invisible will host an Thursday, interactive Friday, and fashion show Saturday featuring designs by Xu Union Rui, an award- Free winning professor and fashion designer from China.

The show is one portion of a three-part fashion exhibition hosted by the University’s Confucius Institute.

Professor Joseph Lam, director of the Confucius Institute, explained how this chic event came to be offered at the University.

Lam pointed out that the Confucius Institute has offered many events, like lectures, exhibitions, painting, calligraphy and theater, but has yet to do anything related to fashion.

“I had the idea of doing a fashion show, and that year we were visiting The Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing,” Lam said. “I met with the director of The Academy, and I told him I wanted to do a fashion show from China, and I didn’t want to do just the traditional Chinese pieces because we have seen enough of that. I wanted something new.”

It was then that Lam was introduced to Xu Rui, who is currently the director of the Fashion Design Department within the School of Design at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in China, as well as a worldrenowned fashion designer.

“I met with her, and she showed me all her work and I immediately knew this was the person I wanted,” Lam said.

Rui’s exhibition at the University is titled “To See The Invisible” and will consist of 15 garments, which will be displayed for public viewing in the Art Lounge at the University Union from Thursday until Saturday. The pieces will be further showcased on Sept.

26 from 4 to 5:30 p.m. in an interactive fashion show in the Anderson Room.

Come see hip and cool China.

“So when we say fashion show, we think of people wearing pieces of clothing and walking along the catwalk, but this is not like that, this is really avant-garde,” Lam said. “We have models, students, coming into the show. They will be wearing the clothes and dancing among the audience. The whole room will be dark, except the clothes, so they will stand out.

There will be lights flashing in and out, and the models will be holding lights so it will be

WWW.STUDENTPAYOUTS.com Paid survey takers need in A2.

100% FREE to join. Click on Surveys.

ANNOUNCEMENT

xwordeditor@aol.com

09/25/13

MARCH FOR ELEPHANTS! Marchers needed @ State & North U 10 AM. Fri, Oct 4. Elephants in crisis!

35,000 killed last year for ivory!

Extinction less than 10yrs! Sign up at MarchforElephantsSF.org or google March for Elephants Ann Arbor

FOR RENT CAMPUS REALTY 8 month leases at the Crawford House for next year !!!

734‑665‑8825 www.campusrealty.com CENTRAL CAMPUS 6 and 7 bedroom houses great furniture/decor ethernet and wireless free laundry and parking for rent NOW for May 2014 www.horvathproperties.com or call (734) 972‑7368

By Mangesh “Mumbaikar” Ghogre (c)2013 Tribune Content Agency, LLC

09/25/13

WWW.CARLSONPROPERTIES.COM 734‑332‑6000.

COURTESY OF THE CONFUCIUS INSTITUTE

Garments from Xu Rui’s “To See the Invisible” fashion show.

a whole show of fashion, light, darkness and dances, so it’s really an experience.”

This experience is not something one would regularly encounter in Ann Arbor.

“It is something that in the high-end artistic world — Paris, New York, London — you might see,” Lam said. “When you go to see her shows in those areas, you pay 100 euros, and here it’s free.”

Interested people will also have a chance to meet the artist directly and participate in a roundtable discussion with other students and staff on Sept.

27 in the Union’s Wolverine Room.

Through her collection, Rui explores the concept of “Where naught is made to aught, aught changes into naught,” or how two opposites can be transformed into one.

“People think of fashion as just pieces of clothing to keep warm because it is so basic to our lives, but actually if you think of it, fashion is always about who you are, it’s always about making a statement,” Lam said. “So this artist is exactly like that. She has this theory called ‘To See the Invisible’ because her argument is that clothes are not just clothes.

For the more affluent, elite and intellectual, clothes are worn to show people who they are and what they want. What they wear is a statement of what they are. So her argument says that under every piece (of clothing), there’s a game of identity, which is what she basically meant by the ‘invisible’ part of the culture.”

The clothes themselves are as unique as the concept.

“She is using material that is not just fabric or silk,” Lam said.

“She is making technologically altered, metalized clothes, which is why her clothes are not just flat. They’re also very hard with shapes that make them threedimensional. The shade is metal with many different patterns and every angle, every fold of the garment is to make people think.

You look at the clothes, and you see they are not your everyday garment. This is where art and cutting-edge technology are joining.”

Lam hopes that through experiencing this exhibition, University students will expand their world view and utilize their personal creativity.

“The basic thing,” Lam said, “is to make people feel good, realize how art is powerful and then in the process learn a little bit about China.”

When people typically think of China, contemporary art might not quickly come to mind. Joseph Lam hopes that this example of modern Chinese fashion will change that.

“This is one side of China that people don’t talk about,” Lam said. “We’re talking about now. Contemporary, creative, young and edgy China. Come experience hip and cool China.

You will like it.”

Sports

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Wednesday, September 25, 2013 — 7A

Lewan: ‘I’m not going to apologize for being 4-0’

By LIZ VUKELICH Daily Sports Editor

When fans watched the Michigan football team scrape by Connecticut on Saturday, it was almost like a horrible sense of déjà vu. The Wolverines didn’t see it that way, though.

After beating the Huskies, Michigan sauntered off the field, patting each other on the back and smiling. The mood was jovial. You wouldn’t have been able to tell the Wolverines just survived another close call, another narrow win against a team they were supposed to have run circles around.

It was a far cry from the Akron game a week prior. After that disappointment, Michigan didn’t celebrate its win. It walked off the field in silence. Fifth-year senior left tackle Taylor Lewan cursed during his postgame

interview, while redshirt junior quarterback Devin Gardner sat by his side in silence.

Fans may not have been able to tell the difference between the team that played the Zips and the one that faced the Huskies, but Michigan coach Brady Hoke certainly could.

“It was a much different team,” he said when asked if he saw an improvement in the Wolverines from Akron to UConn.

Lewan agrees. The captain used the word embarrassing five times to describe Michigan’s performance against Akron.

Tuesday, though, he was more optimistic about the Wolverines’ future as they head into their first bye week on the eve of Big Ten play.

“I’m not going to apologize for being 4-0,” Lewan said. “I saw a huge sense of urgency in those young guys. They understand we

BY THE NUMBERS First two games

Last two games

+61

Point differential

Turnovers

Passing yards

+7

4

8

515

345

64.6

50.9

620

624

Gardner’s completion percentage

Opponents’ total yardage

want to be successful every single week. I think it really clicked for them in the second half of the game.”

But for as much as the program says it’s improved over the last week, there’s one main area of concern — the coaching staff is still looking for a way to reign in Gardner’s unpredictable play that manifested Saturday with his eighth interception of the season.

Last week, offensive coordinator Al Borges said Gardner wasn’t generally the type of player to make the same mistake twice.

Hoke contradicted that statement on Tuesday, though, saying that Gardner now has to be “recoached,” since he’s become such a wild card on the field.

The issue of Gardner as a Superman figure has also been addressed this season — does Gardner try and do everything himself because he simply doesn’t have enough trust in the rest of his teammates? Hoke says no.

“I think he’s been a Superman a long time,” Hoke said. “I think when you grow up being Superman, you have that in your mind, and he’s competitive. It’s in his DNA.” Lewan has been Gardner’s staunchest supporter, putting much of the quarterback’s woes on his shoulders after the Akron game.

As he reminded Gardner’s critics, there are still 10 other players on the field, and a missed assignment from any one of them can be responsible for Gardner’s unpredictability.

“We haven’t played a perfect game yet,” Lewan said. “Our job is to perform like a Michigan team every year. You look around, there are banners everywhere of successful Michigan teams. That’s what we need to live up to.”

TERRA MOLENGRAFF/Daily

Redshirt junior quarterback Devin Gardner has struggled to balance making plays and trying to be “Superman.”

NOTABLE QUOTABLE

I think the media takes opponents and downplays them. You know, I feel they did that with UConn and did that with Akron.

Those are two great football teams and two great programs.

—Senior defensive end Jibreel Black

MEN’S SOCCER

Despite a barrage of shots, still no goals Michigan fired 17 shots, but offensive crisis builds

By JEREMY SUMMITT Daily Sports Editor

TRACY KO/Daily

Redshirt junior goalkeeper Adam Grinwis finished with a season-high 10 saves against the Grizzlies, the second-highest total in Michigan program history.

‘M’ can’t break tie at Oakland

By JESSE KLEIN For The Daily

OAKLAND, Mich. — The win against West Virginia last weekend was a brief hiatus from the frustration 0 MICHIGAN that has 0 OAKLAND become the Michigan men’s soccer season. The team’s second overtime game in a row didn’t end with the heroics of the past weekend. This time the team tied Oakland with goose eggs on either side of the scoreboard Tuesday night.

Oakland slightly controlled the first half because of Michigan hand balls and fouls that forced the ball back into Michigan’s half.

Oakland forward Shawn Claud Lawson got the first shot off in the 10th minute, managing to pull an ultimately unsuccessful corner.

Overall Michigan had trouble maintaining possession in Oakland’s half, losing many headers to the Grizzlies. At the half, Oakland led the game with eight shots.

Michigan had just five.

The second half saw a dramatic

increase in speed of play and passion from the Michigan side.

“I thought the passion was greater in the second half,” said Michigan coach Chaka Daley said.

“We moved it and we connected it. I thought we dug ourselves out of the hole we created in the first half and essentially kept the ball in their half.”

Michigan threatened in the half when Fabio Pereira fired a swift shot to the left, but Oakland’s goalkeeper came up with a diving save, one of two on the night.

Junior midfielder Marcos Ugarte, who had been providing much needed speed down the left side of the field for Michigan, was injured halfway through the second half on a blocked cross and had to leave for the remainder of the game.

Michigan tried to capitalize on its corner kicks as regulation drew to a close. Freshman midfielder Brett Nason fired a cross to sophomore midfielder Colin McAtee, the hero of last game, for a shot that went wide of Oakland’s goal.

Again Michigan missed a chance to end the game with 1:30

remaining with a header from sophomore forward James Murphy that dinged off the crossbar.

In overtime, Michigan kept its momentum, getting a shot on goal in the first minute.

Oakland responded with two quick shots and redshirt junior goalkeeper Adam Grinwis saved both in extraordinary fashion.

This was Grinwis’s first shutout of the season, and he finished with 10 saves, his season high.

Passions and tempers started to run high as the referees continued to make few calls that Michigan agreed with. Daley was almost ejected and two separate foreheads-pressed-together moments between players occurred in the first half of overtime.

“We are disappointed that we weren’t protected enough by the referee but those things happen and we dealt with it and moved on,” Daley said.

In the last 10 seconds of the first overtime session, senior forward Malcolm Miller broke away, pulling the Oakland keeper to the top of the 18-yard box, resulting in a collision that gave Miller a con-

troversial yellow card. It was the third of four for the night, two to the Grizzlies and the fourth to freshman defenseman Lars Eckenrode.

In the second overtime, Oakland outshot Michigan 5-4, but Grinwis kept the shutout intact by forcing a bouncing ball wide of the goal post.

The frustrations and stressors continued for Michigan up until the final seconds, as the game clock was stopped for an Oakland corner with 14 seconds remaining in overtime.

The game remained tied, though, leaving Michigan to continue its struggles on the road. The Wolverines lost six road games last season, and won just two. In 2013, they are now 1-1-2 on the road. But according to Daley, their biggest improvements could still come in the offensive half where he said they need to score goals.

“There were five or six really quality chances, but we need to connect them on target,” Daley said. “We got to make the keeper make a save or put in the back of the net and we didn’t do either.”

OAKLAND, Mich. — In a 0-0 overtime draw against Oakland on Tuesday, the Michigan men’s soccer team struggled to garner many quality chances, despite firing 17 shots. Quality over quantity is what Michigan coach Chaka Daley urged his squad to focus on offensively, but Michigan could muster just six strikes on goal.

Nothing epitomized the Wolverines’ struggles more than when the Grizzlies’ goalkeeper, Sean Lewis, made his first save in the 59th minute of the match.

After that, he coasted to a relaxing evening.

“There’s only one save I think I remember him making that I think he had to make,” Daley said.

There aren’t issues with the attacking build-up or the possession battle, though. Both of those went according to plan for the majority of the match.

Specifically in the overtime sessions, Michigan controlled the ball in the final third as it toyed with Oakland’s back line.

The Wolverines continued to string creative passes together but could never break through.

Shots from sophomore midfielder Colin McAtee and senior forward Tyler Arnone barely crept wide, while others sailed over the crossbar at crucial moments. In the final 90 seconds, sophomore forward James Murphy’s header bounced off the crossbar before it was cleared to ensure extra time. The list of missed opportunities goes on and on. The Wolverines were close, but putting 31 percent of their shots on goal is far from desirable.

“I know them all,” Daley said.

“I remember every single one of the missed chances in the 18, in and around the box, that were better than what you’d call half chances, and we didn’t take them.”

Michigan was often passive while peppering the Grizzlies’ defense, which hindered the chance for quality opportunities that Daley was looking for.

Rightly so, frustration began setting in after regulation, as yellow cards were shown to Murphy and freshman defender Lars Eckenrode for retaliations in the offensive third.

“I thought we tried to be a little bit too precise at times in the final third, as opposed to kind of being a little more aggressive and assertive,” Daley said.

Similar offensive setbacks have plagued the Wolverines all season. Michigan has been shut out three times already this season with four goals in the past six games. A 5-2 thrashing of Loyola-Chicago in the season opener fooled everybody.

A 228-minute scoring drought before netting two goals at West Virginia this past weekend was the most recent episode of the Wolverines’ offensive shortcomings.

The woes are slowly turning into something resembling a crisis for Michigan. With Big Ten season looming this weekend, the Wolverines are urgently searching for answers.

LIKE US ON FACEBOOK

www.facebook.com/ michigandaily

8A — Wednesday, September 25, 2013

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

statement SEP TEMBER 25, 2013

DAVE BRANDON’S FIREWORKS

2B Wednesday, September 25, 2013 // The Statement

online comments

issue 9/18/13

feast your eyes: an ode to ari and paul

Filling a need: How vital are foreign graduates to American science and industry?

“Perhaps the author can also explain why it is that once an H1-B holder earns their green card or citizenship, that layoffs for them increase. They get replaced by newer H1-Bs.”

– USER: Lee “There is NO requirement that a US based company even consider US citizens for openings before offering positions to foreign nationals. Look at the statistics. There are more STEM graduates annually than projected openings. H-1Bs are not limited to STEM degree holders; any position requiring a bachelors degree - business, education and liberal arts - can be filled by a H-1B visa holder. So all of you business and education majors looking for a job are competing with people who will work for far less than market rates just to remain in the US.”

– USER: disqus_TZwmIwpSB5 “How important are foreign students to the USA is the real question. The answer is, ‘Not very important.’ The reason is that American companies continue to lay off Americans in engineering and the sciences in order to hire cheap foreigners. What does this mean? There is no shortage of STEM. So, we don’t need cheap labor from foreign countries here taking American jobs.”

– USER: coolgreen “There is no shortage of American STEM graduates, only companies willing to hire them. I have a CS degree and 25 years of experience - yet no company is hiring older American engineers where I live. I feel really sorry for younger STEM grads that aren’t going to be able to pay off their student loans.

THE SOLUTION: Tax H-1B’s and use the money to pay off the student loans of Americans who graduate with STEM degrees. Problem solved.

If the corporations really believe the load of BS they are shelling out, then let them put their money where their mouth is.”

– USER: DJHawkins

THE

statement

Magazine Editor: Haley Goldberg Deputy Editor: Paige Pearcy Design Editor: Alicia Kovalcheck

Photo Editor: Teresa Mathew Illustrator: Megan Mulholland Editor in Chief: Andrew Weiner

Managing Editor: Matthew Slovin Copy Editor:

Dear Ari Weinzweig and Paul Saginaw, masterminds behind Zingerman’s Deli, My name is Siena Witte and I have a confession to make. I have a huge crush on you.

It wasn’t long ago that I was a bright-eyed freshman, stuck on North Campus — Baits II, represent — and asking for directions to Angell Hall. I learned quickly that you don’t talk about Ann Arbor without talking the greats: Michigan football, Rick’s American Cafe, and Zingerman’s. Well, I was already at the University, I had my season tickets nestled safely under my mattress, and I was too young (both literally and spiritually) for the underbelly of student nightlife that is Rick’s. So to Zingerman’s I went. And I must say, it changed my life — and for the better.

Before my arrival to campus, I’d been to the Zing’s a few times before. I’m by no means a regular, but I know my way around an Abra’s Nutty Yard Bird and a side of macaroni and cheese. But I must say, each and every time I go, it’s a strangely harrowing experience.

By the time I get face-to-face with that glass case of cured meats and bagels, my palms are sweating, I can’t breath, my heart is racing, and, oh my god, why are there so many people in this tiny room? The act of choosing a Zingerman’s sandwich — a.k.a. the finely curated piece of

art that will grace my palette with its sweet succulence in a matter of minutes — is almost too much.

But then I stop. And I breathe.

And I think, “What would Ari and Paul eat?” And suddenly, everything goes black. Like a prophecy flowing down from heaven above, it comes to me: something savory but not too heavy, with a touch of something crunchy and a little bit tangy, something creamy and rich, but light enough that it sails off the tongue and into your stomach like a beautiful crescendo at the end of a symphony. A simple white bread with just a hint of something — maybe rye? And of course, a light browning on both sides.

But over the years, I’ve learned it’s not just about the food. I mean, it is, and it isn’t. Get between my server and me when they call my name and it will be one of the most regretful decisions you’ve ever made. There is no amount of heartbreak or failing grades that a big ol’ bowl of your steaming hot matzo ball soup can’t fix. And let’s be honest — you can bring more people to a party with Zingerman’s old pickles than you can with a full keg of light beer and red solo cups.

We all know that the food is superb.

But this isn’t what I’m here to talk about.

I’m here to talk about the witty sandwich names, the exotic samples (pickled mozzarella and jalapeño peaches anyone?), the drool-worthy cheeses and snacks on snacks. I’m here to talk about how you blow me away with your wall of choco-

by siena witte

late, and your Bacon of the Month club. It’s like you’re taking me by the hand and saying, “I don’t care who you are or where you’re from — there is something here that you will love.” And that feels awesome.

And the people! How could I forget the people? Each and every time I walk through those doors — no, come within a two-block radius — there’s someone on the corner of Detroit and Kingsley hooting and hollering about the latest special, their thoughts on the olive oil I’m sampling, and the crazy thing someone said to them that day. Someone is blowing my mind with the prospect of putting peanut butter on the chocolate sourdough. Someone is making me laugh so hard with a joke about the soup they spilled on their apron that I start crying.

These in between moments of potential-best-friendness are what keep me waiting over an hour in seven-degree weather for a God damn sandwich. They make me proud to say we’ve shared this city, even if only for a little while.

I’m here to tell you, Ari and Paul, that I want to grow old with you and your culinary masterpieces.

You’ve made me a better person.

You’ve made me want — no, deserve — the crème de la crème, the Grade A and the Amish chicken. You stand for all that is right in this culinary world, and, for that, I salute you.

Peace, love and pastrami, Siena

Tom McBrien Josephine Adams

THE

Jennie Coleman

No. 491:

Fall: the season of Instagram.

Brace yourself for pumpkin spice lattes in Lo-Fi.

No. 492:

Freshmen, it’s now OK to admit if you miss your parents — and mostly your dog.

rules

No. 493:

Bye week, a.k.a. time to find another excuse not to do homework on Saturday.

Wednesday, September 25, 2013 // The Statement 3B

statement on the street: What should the band play at halftime?

“

on the record

“There was a lot more free stuff; like, I got 15 t-shirts at PennApps.”

– DAVID LUI, Binghamton University senior, comparing the free swag at last weekends world record breaking MHacks hackathon to a similar event hosted at the University of Pennsylvania.

PHOTOS BY TERESA MATHEW

“Kanye West, because he is the greatest. ‘Can’t Tell Me Nothing,’ or also ‘Jesus Walks,’ slightly controversial ... maybe not that one.”

“Daft Punk. ‘One More Time,’ … If they could somehow replicate the (Daft Punk) helmets instead of wearing their marching band hats, that would be dope.”

“Eminem. Because he has really inspirational music. I don’t think Beyoncé has any inspirational things like that, but that’s OK.”

Ann Noetzel, Engineering sophomore

Josue Estrella, Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program Assistant

Marina Haque, LSA junior

“Often comparing it to real life sex, Jon views porn as a way of life, something as usual as going to the gym or hanging out with his friends.”

– MAYANK MATHUR, Daily Arts Writer, about the new film “Don Jon”.

“We all are trying to figure out where we’re at as a team.”

”

– BRADY HOKE, Michigan coach, after the football team’s close victory over Connecticut.

trending #GovShutDown #Emmys #Kenya

AP PHOTO/J. Scott

It’s happening again. Congress is facing another budget dilemma, this time without a single funding bill passed, according to the Washington Post. If a budget isn’t resolved within the next week, it’s shutdown time.

THEO WENNER/Rolling Stone

In a candid interview with Rolling Stone, Miley Cyrus credited Detroit for helping her transition from Hannah Montana to her new provocative persona. She filmed the movie “LOL” three years ago in the city, and explained getting her first tattoo in a studio on 8 Mile helped her grow up.

She’s twerkin’ it for the D.

#BBallTkts #DetroitMiley #BBMforhelp #Satisfries #FluShot

AP PHOTO/The Canadian

After cutting its workforce by 40 percent last week, BlackBerry hopes to become part of the private Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd., according to The Wall Street Journal.

The deal isn’t final, but Fairfax agreed to buy the shares it doesn’t own at $9 per share.

Researchers in London may have found a new flu vaccine that could be a universal antidote to the sickness, according to CBS News. A viruskilling immune cell was discovered in blood samples from people who didn’t get sick during the 2009 swine flu scare. More CD8 T cells = more protection from the flu.

LISA LAKE/AP Images

4B

Wednesday, September 25, 2013 // The Statement

Wednesday, September 25, 2013 // The Statement

TWO SIDES OF THE SAME COIN: HOW ‘THE DAVE BRANDON SHOW’ CHANGED THE ATHLETIC DEPARTMENT

I

n February 2006, Domino’s Pizza CEO Dave Brandon thought, “Wouldn’t it be cool if we could rent out Ford Field the week of the Super Bowl?” So he did. He threw a company party at the Lions’ stadium days before Super Bowl XL came to Detroit.

The company would celebrate each time Domino’s stock hit a new high, and one time he ordered kegs of beer and brought them into the office.

Years prior — when Brandon was CEO of Valassis Communications, Inc., a promotions company — there was an old, vacant airline hangar at Willow Run Airport in Ann Arbor.

With Brandon leading, it was turned into the site of a party. Employees dressed as pilots and flight attendants, there was ambient lighting and a B-52 aircraft gave rides to pleased workers.

“He always does everything with panache,” said Domino’s Executive Vice President Lynn Liddle. “Big into celebrating wins and throwing parties. Fireworks, there’s always fireworks. Wherever there can be fireworks, there are fireworks.”

Fans in Michigan Stadium the evening of Sept. 7 might say that Brandon has brought a similar approach to his job as athletic director at the University. The second night game against Notre Dame, Under The Lights II, brought the fireworks. It brought Beyoncé to the video board, a light show at halftime and flyovers — plural, a handful of flyovers. The celebrities of the Michigan athletics world turned out for the event, too.

Those football fans may also recall a man f lying out of Michigan Stadium at halftime via jetpack during the Central Michigan University game.

They’ll recall the Big Chill — an outdoor hockey game, played under the lights, at the Big House on Dec. 11, 2010.

As Brandon begins his fourth academic year at the helm of Michigan sports, his administration can be characterized as one of “more.”

More staff members: After an initial reduction of staff from 275 to 190 upon replacing Bill Martin, the former athletic director, the number of department employees has expanded to 308.

More money: Compared to $96 million in revenue in 2008-09, the last full year before he took over, Brandon projects $146.4 million in revenue for the upcoming year.

More facilities: Though renovations to

By Neal Rothschild Crisler Center and Yost Ice Arena stemmed from plans during Martin’s tenure, a proposal for a redeveloped athletic campus was approved a year ago. The plans, which include a tree-lined “Walk of Champions,” are expected to exceed $250 million.

More teams: Men’s and women’s lacrosse were added to the Michigan sports buffet as of the 2012-13 school year.

But Brandon’s entry into cut-

throat college athletics — and University athletics, specifically — predate his arrival as athletic director in 2010.

Brandon’s roots with Bo Don Eaton remembers the football positional meetings as part of Bo Schembechler’s teams in the early 1970s. Before becoming an athletic director, Brandon had first-hand expe-

rience in the rat race of college sports in its earliest stages: playing under Bo from 1971-73.

Eaton and Brandon, both playing defensive end, were grilled. They were quizzed on assignments and f lawless preparation was demanded. They didn’t play perfectly, but their supreme dedication would lift the Wolverines above the also-rans. That was Bo’s belief.

This was in the heat of the

10-year war between Schembechler and Ohio State coach Woody Hayes. Paranoia was high between the two legends, the fear that the other team would win the slightest advantage. Any edge one coach could deploy was considered crucial.

Though he saw game action just once in his career, Brandon was brought up in this crucible — before big money was involved and before commits signaled their inten-

tions on Twitter.

“They just established such a work ethic and such a perfectionist attitude,” Eaton said. “Everything was discipline and work hard: Do every little thing correctly.”

Brandon and Eaton were schooled early on that Michigan held a special place in college athletics. They learned that the University was not subject to the same standards as all the others — Michigan deserved more, Eaton and Brandon said in former interviews. It deserved the fireworks.

His hire in 2010 as athletic director may have been his first foray into athletic administration, but Brandon was in the University’s power circle dating back to 1998 when he was elected to the University’s Board of Regents by a statewide vote, a position he held until 2006. As a regent, he played a significant role in bringing in University President Mary Sue Coleman in 2002, who in turn hired Brandon as athletic director.

Compared to Bo’s era, Brandon’s present world is different, but the need to retain the edge remains constant. Just as competitive as Schembechler, Brandon refuses to fall behind in the race of college sports.

Fan happiness and the traditional, simple joys of Michigan sports are fine, but the modern Athletics Department is out for something else. It needs the most money to build the best facilities.

It needs the best facilities to land the best recruits. The best recruits to win the most games.

Win the most games to build the best brand, so the cycle restarts — over and over.

Brandon has played the role of carnival barker, calling out for all to come see the big-tent circus in Ann Arbor. A smartphone app was introduced to promote steadfast loyalty from Michigan students to the athletic teams. As the department admitted last week, skywriters were hired to draw Michigan-positive phrases in the air on game days. Games have been marketed with tag lines, new jerseys have been introduced and the Michigan Legends uniform number system was implemented, in which current players deemed deserving are given the jersey of a Wolverine great from yesteryear.

Branding hasn’t been the only thing corporatized about Michigan athletics. Michigan is remarkably vigilant in controlling its message. Media access is limited, and players are coached to be tight-lipped. You won’t find Michigan coaches or players straying

from the company line.

“It’s no secret that Dave is creating a culture with the Athletic Department that is very defined and is important to his success,” Basketball Coach John Beilein said.

His polarizing nature But recently, Brandon the businessman has made some decisions to alienate segments of the student body, some of which have led to backlash against Brandon personally.

First, there was the unilateral decision to change the football student seating to a general admission format. That came along with a price hike. There was outrage against the new policy and outrage that the department hadn’t bothered to consult the students about the dramatic policy change.

Most recent was the change in the basketball student ticketing policy. Season tickets were oversold, and a new policy for claiming games was instituted just over a month before the season began. Students were no longer guaranteed all the games they paid for. Their only recourse: get a refund. There was considerable pushback from students, but ultimately, the department found a way to get more seats filled for more games.

Despite his successes, there’s some resentment from students towards Brandon, stemming from the “money-grubbing athletic director” perception they’ve developed in response to recent changes.

But the flipside of that coin is a magnanimous leader, one in touch with the world outside Michigan athletics and intent on making someone’s day.

There’s the gesture of inviting Grant Reed, a 12-year-old cancer survivor that named his tumor “Michigan,” to be Brady Hoke’s guest for “The Game” against Ohio State in November.

Then, there was Cooper Barton, the five-year old Oklahoman who was forced to turn his Michigan shirt inside out at school. So Brandon invited him to Michigan Stadium to be introduced at halftime last year.

Of course, there’s the cynical view that Brandon knows a good publicity opportunity when he sees one. But it’s hardly all a front.

One thing Brandon can’t be accused of is acting out of character.

Just a couple weeks ago, an employee at Domino’s suffered the loss of their toddler. It was a difficult week for the entire company, where Brandon serves as chairman. Though Brandon was busy preparing for Under the Lights II, he found the time to attend the funeral and put a sympathetic arm around the pained parent.

Domino’s also suffered a rough period earlier in the decade. Sales were up, but the company wasn’t meeting its profit targets.

That meant no bonuses.

Brandon went to the company’s board and explained how morale was down. The employees needed a win — something to feel good about. Brandon was able to convince the board members to get everyone an extra paycheck.

“People were in the lobby crying because Dave got us an extra paycheck,” recalled Liddle, his Domino’s co-worker dating back to the 1990s. “I think he really does care a lot about people and he wants to help them celebrate when they win and he wants to shore them up when they’re not winning.”

Just Dave When Liddle came to Domino’s for an interview, she mistook the lobby for a physical therapy clinic. It looked nothing like the palatial corporate

rise, Frank Lloyd Wright-style complex.

“That lobby has the stamp of Dave Brandon all over it,” Liddle said. “He actually worked with designers and got all of us involved and jackhammered the whole center of the building.”

The remodeled lobby moved the CEO suite from the outskirts of the complex to the floor above the lobby. Front and center, where he could be visible to everyone. He wanted to be an accessible CEO. He’d come into the company and made his presence felt. The differences were tangible and often hard to ignore.

When he came in as CEO in 1999, he changed the conservative culture. It was no longer suits for the men and skirts for the women. He wanted everyone comfortable and happy when they came to work. When addressed as

5B

His decision-making was just as precise.

“There must always be a vision and a strategy and a way to measure and know how you’re doing so you can benchmark against yourself,” Liddle said. “He’s got somewhat of a formula that he uses that is consistently results producing.”

Perhaps the most scrutinized choice Brandon made was Domino’s self-critical ad campaign.

As the Brandon administration wound down to give way to new CEO Patrick Doyle in late 2009, the company launched a marketing crusade against its very own product.

Commercials showed consumers complaining about the quality of the pizza. A new recipe would be introduced. Domino’s was admitting that the product it had cooked all these years was deficient.

The employees in charge of the menu would come to Brandon with improvements, and they’d be sent back. He’d tell them to go back to the drawing board. Domino’s needed a distinctive change, and he wouldn’t accept the new recipe until there was a true, noticeable difference.

It wasn’t the safe move for Brandon, as the campaign would affect his legacy as CEO. But the company knew the pizza could be better. What began with tweaking the recipe, ended up changing the crust, changing the sauce and changing the cheese.

The commercials showed that Brandon had no qualms about making the big move. He was going to do what he wanted.

As Liddle explained, America was at a point where the banks were folding and nobody trusted corporate America. People were losing their houses. It was a nasty time, and nobody was just saying it like it is.

“He will look at a problem unemotionally,” Liddle explains. “He will say, what’s the right thing to do? He’ll think through how will this affect my organization, how will this affect the competition, how will this affect the industry, what are the financial implications? And then he always tries to put a creative spin on it.”

Fighting the three-front battle

playground it resembles today.

Now, it’s an open space with glass walls and low, round glass tables with ergonomic white leather reclining chairs. Strategically placed Domino’s logos prohibit you from forgetting where you are. There are LED displays and a rotunda in the middle of the lobby. Look down the rotunda and you see a training kitchen, visible from all f loors of the low-

Mr. Brandon, he would correct, “just Dave.”

He was never one for corporate speak.

He prefers his messages in plain English, so everyone can understand. He’s a proponent of the catchphrase: “Change isn’t a criticism of the past. It simply means the future is going to be different.” “If it ain’t broke, break it.” “Don’t talk the past, create the future.”

It’s said that athletics is the only business with two bottom lines. At a place like Michigan, there may as well be a third.

There’s the winning and the money-making, but then there’s the demands of being at a public research university with a rabid fan base that treasures the idea of Michigan athletics just as much as it treasures the teams themselves.

There are those who see a problem in turning the enterprise of amateur athletics into big business.

As John Bacon, a prominent University sports historian, points out in his recent Continued on Page 6B

6B

Wednesday, September 25, 2013 // The Statement

book, “Fourth and Long,” the athletics budget has increased nearly 40 percent since Brandon took over.

“Operating and administrative expenses” have nearly doubled over the four years. There’s been a 62-percent increase in athletic-administrator compensation, and “professional travel and conference dues” tripled from 2010-11. Even the line item “hosting, food and special events” has increased six-fold.

To fund these expenses, ticket prices go up, all sorts of new apparel are sold and season ticket holders pay for a personal seat license.

As former University President James Duderstadt says in the book, he’s alarmed “how little of these revenues are actually spent on student-athletes — for financial aid, academic support and health care — and instead are spent on the expansion of facilities and the staff, in areas such as marketing. … In the revenue sports, these are approaching levels that are truly extreme and quite unwarranted when compared with other university activities.”

He also accuses Brandon of using his platform to gain personal glory.

“Brandon comes out of a CEO world — and even a million-dollar salary is chump change for those guys. So it has to be a personal payoff to be out in front of a crowd of one hundred thousand, cheering for you. You don’t get that as CEO.” It may be that Brandon is simply powerless to the commercial direction of college sports. The ship has already departed the dock, and he’s not going to be the one responsible for Michigan being left on shore.

After multiple e-mails and phone calls requesting an interview, the Athletic Department declined to make Brandon or any other department member available for comment.

“The money end of it and the demands of the kids now, that bothers me,” Eaton, the former Michigan defensive end, said.

“But we’re competing out there, and it’s not Michigan’s place to try and save college athletics. It’s the presidents of the universities of the country to help control that. Personally, I think it’s gotten out of hand.”

There’s little reason for Brandon to change his style unless university presidents do indeed step in. The Michigan Athletic Department is making money, and when it’s not, it’s being given money, like $100 million from Stephen Ross.

Its teams are successful. Last year, the Wolverines came in fourth in the country in the Director’s Cup, a measure of success across all sports. It was the school’s highest finish in five years.

And even despite Michigan’s place in the decrepit state of Big Ten football, the Wolverines couldn’t be more relevant in today’s college sports landscape. And Dave Brandon is making sure of that.

So until there’s reason not to, there will be fireworks. Always the fireworks.

Dave Brandon as part of Bo Schembechler’s 1973 football team. Photo from the University Athletic Department, Bentley Historical Library, University of Michigan.

Wednesday, September 25, 2013 // The Statement

7B

The Goose Incident

by Taylor Wizner

ILLUSTRATION BY MEGAN MULHOLLAND

I

must confess: a few weeks ago, I ran over a goose.

It feels cathartic to write, although, I’m pretty sure accidentally killing an animal is not a crime.

It happened on the worst day. I was just driving back from a meeting that I had been terribly late to after getting lost. It wasn’t until I reached the street, adjacent to the lake and only a few blocks away from my home, that I felt at ease. The windows down, a good song on the radio, I was finally relaxed.

So when I reached the bend in the road, and saw the geese blocking the way, I didn’t think twice. There were geese on this road all the time and they usually moved out of the way. I slowed the car and when they started to fly upwards I picked up speed again.

Then, all at once, I hit the goose. The bird’s companions quickly ascended into the sky toward the lake, but this one was at the end of the pack and changed direction.

It was slowly flapping its wings toward the median, not the lake, and before I realized, my side of the car collided with the bird, ripping its body beneath me.

When you hit an animal mid-air, you really hit it three times. The first hit is the front of the car, and the next hits are when it rolls underneath each set of tires. The time in-between feels like an eternity; you

know its coming and you can’t do anything.

Out of breath, I drove to the next turn around and pulled over. I couldn’t look back but cowardly eyeballed the road to my right where I saw a few black feathers sadly trail away in the wind. My first instinct was paranoia. Someone had seen, and knew, what I did.

I drove to my parents’ house, called my mother and crawled under the covers to cry a little.

People run over animals in the street all the time. I heard something like every second an animal is killed by a moving vehicle.

For example, in Yellowstone National Park, six bears are killed every year from cars crashing into them. That’s more than the number of human fatalities caused by bear attacks, which average to about three each year (in all of North America.).

I’ve been in cars that have run over animals before, and each time it happens I am completely surprised.

One time on a road trip, a girl ran over a raccoon as if it was nothing and kept moving. Afterwards, she explained pensively, “I didn’t see it until it was too late. I couldn’t have swerved.”

I knew it was wrong of me, but I assumed people who hit animals on roads were not alert, or saw the animal and ran it over without a care. In that moment of panic before impact, I figured people still

had time to make a choice. Did my friend mean she physically wasn’t able to swerve, or that she wouldn’t because it would have been too dangerous?

That day was like any normal, bright morning. There was no fog, no roadblocks and no curving streets. I had not paused when the bird changed directions. I merely hit the thing and left.

This same summer, I interned at an endangered-species nonprofit in Washington, D.C. I spent over three months studying policy initiatives that would better protect endangered species in North America. I read news reports of hunters in Colorado who shot and killed a gray wolf cub after its federal protections had been cut.

I also had learned how to protect backyard birds that fly into the shiny windows that create the illusion of tree branches.

In one meeting I attended, one employee explained how to put up window decals so that the bird can discern the difference between the window and the trees. Afterwards, another employee mentioned how birds die from hitting the window, not so much because of the impact, but because of the stress from not being able to understand where the pain came from. The man noted that you could save the bird by cupping it in your palms or placing it in a small box. The warmth supposedly calms it

enough until it can fly away without injuring itself again.

My days interning were filled with unexpected pockets of interesting information.

I grew to have much admiration for the animal life around. I even purchased a D.C. bird book so that I might be able to identify some of the species wandering outside my office.

But just a few weeks later, the same mindful driver, the vegetarian and wildlife advocate, ran over a bird without a moment’s hesitation. It was almost too easy.

The event left me with a crisis of conscience. I kept replaying the incident in my head. Why didn’t I swerve? How could I just run the poor, helpless animal over and keep going? I heard the soft ‘thump thump’ over and over.

Things like this happen all the time.

They are in your control to stop, but you don’t always stop because of the way we think and the nature of our daily routines. I expected I would not hit the bird. I expected it would fly away.

And I should have for all accounts. The other geese around my bird did fly away.

This one just happened to be on that busy road, it happened to be indecisive, a slow flier. It turned left instead of right.

Taylor is an LSA junior and Daily news editor.

8B

Wednesday, September 25, 2013 // The Statement

I N S TA G R A M S H O O T- O U T Two Daily photographers take to the Arb and face off with iPhone cameras

Teresa Mathew Erin Kirkland