Why winter makes you sick and what to expect from the rest of the flu season
Double the Grouper, Double the reverb +ARTS, page 4 University of Wisconsin-Madison
+SCIENCE, page 5 Complete campus coverage since 1892
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dailycardinal.com
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
City approves Langdon area redevelopment By Sam Garigliano The Daily Cardinal
Madison’s City Council voted Tuesday to approve a highly contested demolition of three residence buildings in the Langdon Street area to make way for a new student-oriented apartment complex. The 15-three decision marked the final step in a 5-year process that involved substantial deliberation and planning between developers and city officials. The six-story apartment complex, which will replace three existing buildings on Iota Court, will include 231 bedrooms, underground parking and increased emergency vehicle access to the region by way
of a new fire lane. Dozens of people spoke at the meeting, both for and against the development, including area residents, property developers, students and a variety of concerned citizens. Adam Hermanns, a UW-Madison sophomore and resident at the nearby Chi Psi Fraternity, spoke against the development saying it will negatively affect the population density, cost of living and historic nature of the area. “When I come back in 30 years with my kids I want to be able to enjoy the same historic district that exists
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State Democrats propose act to expand health care By Jack Casey The Daily Cardinal
Democratic state legislators introduced measures Tuesday to strengthen BadgerCare, a state health care program, which prompted skepticism from Republicans who said the requested funding for the act may not be available. BadgerCare is a state initiative
designed to provide health care coverage to people who do not qualify for healthcareinsurancethroughtheirjobs or cannot afford it on their own, according to the Wisconsin Department of Health Services website. The Strengthen BadgerCare Act, spearheaded by state Sen. Jon
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on campus
New workout plan
Students workout and sweat during Beach Body Blast class at the South East Recreational Facility Tuesday. + Photo by Taylor Galaszewski
Sustainability Committee votes on campaigns, elects leadership The Associated Students of Madison Sustainability Committee voted on two spring campaigns to address campus waste management and energy use, and elected committee leadership in a meeting Tuesday. The waste campaign will include efforts to standardize and increase recycling and compost bins across campus, according to Sustainability
Committee Chair Colin Higgins. Higgins said the campaign stems from a lack of bins across campus, as well as a lack of knowledge about what items can be recycled or composted. Along with standardizing the bins, the committee plans to create posters outlining appropriate items for recycling. Committee member and freshman Will Mulhern said he feels this will be an impor-
tant campaign based on his experience living in residence halls where many students throw their trash and recycling bins into one bag before throwing it out. The committee will also launch an energy campaign, which will include efforts to better educate campus about energy use, in addition to a
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UW student group hosts lecture on Tibetan protests By Sam Cusick The Daily Cardinal
Grey Satterfield/the daily cardinal
Keynote speaker Tsering Shakya discusses the motivations behind the Tibetan protesters and their political significance.
With acts of self-immolation on the rise in Eastern Tibet, the Tibetan Students Association of Madison hosted a lecture Tuesday to raise awareness about the protests and discover the motivations behind them. Tibetans have protested alleged human-rights violations since China gained control of the region in 1951. Since 1998 when self-immolation, a person setting themself on fire, began, 99 people have chosen to selfimmolate to bring attention to their plight for a free Tibet. University of British Columbia Professor Tsering Shakya, the keynote speaker and an expert on Tibet and its relationship with China, discussed the reasons Tibetan citizens have chosen to protest by self-immolating, and its impact
on Tibetan society. Shakya said protesters choose to self-immolate to sacrifice their body in the hopes of saving others, which is a fundamental idea in Buddhist teaching. He added activists feel the method is the best way to cause the least harm to others, as it only harms the protester. “There is incredible [Chinese] control of the human body and movement [in Tibet],” Shakya said. “[Selfimmolation] has become, clearly, the ultimate rejection of state authority.” Shakya also explained the two competing viewpoints, Chinese and Tibetan, on the protests. He said Tibetans feel the protests are happening as evidence of a strict and repressive Chinese government, while the Chinese government sees the protests as the work of
“religious fanatics.” Due to increased surveillance in the region following past protests, activists cannot organize large group protests without raising suspicion, which causes them to feel as if self-immolation is their only option, Shakya said. TSA Co-Chair Tenzin Dechen said the group hosted the event to raise students’ awareness about the plight of Tibetan protesters, since members feel very few students know about what is happening in Tibet. “It took one guy in Tunisia to start the Arab Spring and Tibetans have been self-immolating for two years now,” Dechen said. “And its been a total number 99 [protesters who have self-immolated], almost reaching 100, and yet the world doesn’t necessarily know a lot about it.”
“…the great state University of Wisconsin should ever encourage that continual and fearless sifting and winnowing by which alone the truth can be found.”
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tODAY: chance o’ snow hi 32º / lo 30º
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
An independent student newspaper, serving the University of Wisconsin-Madison community since 1892 Volume 122, Issue 78
thursday: snowy snow hi 34º / lo 19º
dailycardinal.com
Wednesday Morning Hangover:
2142 Vilas Communication Hall 821 University Avenue Madison, Wis., 53706-1497 (608) 262-8000 • fax (608) 262-8100
News and Editorial
edit@dailycardinal.com Editor in Chief Scott Girard
Managing Editor Alex DiTullio
News Team News Manager Taylor Harvey Campus Editor Sam Cusick College Editor Cheyenne Langkamp City Editor Melissa Howison State Editor Jack Casey Enterprise Editor Samy Moskol Associate News Editor Meghan Chua Features Editor Ben Siegel Opinion Editors David Ruiz • Nikki Stout Editorial Board Chair Matt Beaty Arts Editors Cameron Graff • Andy Holsteen Sports Editors Vince Huth • Matt Masterson Page Two Editors Rachel Schulze • Alex Tucker Life & Style Editor Rebecca Alt Photo Editors Grey Satterfield • Abigail Waldo Graphics Editors Angel Lee • Dylan Moriarty Multimedia Editors Eddy Cevilla • Dani Golub Science Editor Matthew Kleist Diversity Editor Aarushi Agni Copy Chiefs Brett Bachman • Molly Hayman Rachel Wanat Copy Editors Ali Bartoli • Jake Smasal
Business and Advertising business@dailycardinal.com Business Manager Jacob Sattler Office Manager Emily Rosenbaum Advertising Managers Erin Aubrey • Dan Shanahan Senior Account Executives Philip Aciman • Jade Likely Account Executives Jordan Laeyendecker Elissa Hersh • Madi Fair Tessa Coan • Lyndsay Bloomfield Zachary Hanlon • Paulina Kovalo Hannah Klein • Danny Mahlum Eric O’Neil • Will Huberty Ali Syverson • Catherine Rashid Alyssa Boczkicwicz Web Director Eric Harris Public Relations Manager Alexis Vargas Marketing Manager Caitlin Furin Events Manager Andrew Straus Creative Director Claire Silverstein Copywriters Dustin Bui • Bob Sixsmith The Daily Cardinal is a nonprofit organization run by its staff members and elected editors. It receives no funds from the university. Operating revenue is generated from advertising and subscription sales. The Daily Cardinal is published weekdays and distributed at the University of WisconsinMadison and its surrounding community with a circulation of 10,000. Capital Newspapers, Inc. is the Cardinal’s printer. The Daily Cardinal is printed on recycled paper. The Cardinal is a member of the Associated Collegiate Press and the Wisconsin Newspaper Association. All copy, photographs and graphics appearing in The Daily Cardinal are the sole property of the Cardinal and may not be reproduced without written permission of the editor in chief. The Daily Cardinal accepts advertising representing a wide range of views. This acceptance does not imply agreement with the views expressed. The Cardinal reserves the right to reject advertisements judged offensive based on imagery, wording or both. Complaints: News and editorial complaints should be presented to the editor in chief.
For the record In the Feb. 5 Faculty Senate article, it was incorrectly stated statistics showed only 3 percent of African American high school students from Wisconsin are “well-prepared” to attend UW-Madison. The correct number is 2 percent of African American high school graduates from Wisconsin. We printed in Tuesday’s paper that a city planning commission rejected a proposed housing development
Graphic by Dylan Moriarty
Death to pretzels adam wolf howlin’ mad
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elcome back to school, everybody. If you read this space in the Cardinal last semester, you may remember me as a shameless hater with a Bruce Springsteen obsession often bordering on masturbatory. Those characterizations are indeed still accurate, but this semester I plan to convey such thoughts through a series of predetermined subtopics. My hope is that it makes my writing more enjoyable to read (Note: It’s also because I’m too lazy to synthesize an original column topic every week). We’ll call it the “Wednesday Morning Hangover.” Let’s dive in.
Movie from your childhood that still kicks ass “Jack” (1996)—Robin Williams stars as the title character, a 10-year-old kid that looks like he’s 40 due to a rare condition that causes him to age rapidly. I was about 11 or 12 when I first saw this film, and when Jack’s friend Louis reads aloud this touching paper he wrote on why Jack is his best friend I bawled like a goddamn baby. My older sister gave me a lot of shit for it, and since then I’ve done my best to suppress my tears when I watch emotionally moving films. It’s totally stupid that some imagined macho creed prevents males from displaying a human reaction to something touching, but brainless sheep that I am, I adhere to this creed anyway. Except for “Toy Story 3.” If you don’t cry during that film, you could be a robot.
on Langdon Street. The commission actually approved the plan five votes to three. Corrections or clarifications? Call The Daily Cardinal office at 608262-8000 or send an email to edit@ dailycardinal.com.
Shit that salvages an otherwise shitty day Even with pretty much any song we want to hear accessible on demand nowadays, it’s still much more exhilarating to hear
that song randomly on the radio or somewhere else. I was in a terrible mood one day last semester, so I decided to go to the SERF to burn off some steam. Now, the music selection in the SERF’s weight room typically consists of nu metal or some other terrible alternative rock, and since I don’t own an iPod, working out can be an especially taxing endeavor. But not that day. As I walked through the weight room entrance, I surprisingly heard U2’s “Mysterious Ways” and got unnaturally amped up. I actually let out an audible “hell yeah,” prompting a dude nearby to stare at me dumbfounded. I didn’t care. In that moment, all the worries and concerns weighing me down faded away. At least until Korn came on and ruined that temporary high.
First-World Hate of the week This week’s hate is reserved for the makers of Gardetto’s, who insist on filling 70 percent of their bags with pretzels. Gardetto’s are delicious and have more than earned their place as the Holy Grail of Snacks, but when you’re denying space in your bag that could be set aside for more rye chips and breadsticks, are we supposed to take that shit lying down? I can’t think of a more useless snack than pretzels. When you lay out a spread of snack foods for your guests, is the bag of pretzels ever going to be devoured before the Doritos, Sun Chips or even popcorn? No, because pretzels are bland, empty carbs that lack flavor and offer nothing to get excited about. Remember last year when Hostess announced it was liquidating its inventory and everybody was decrying the death of Twinkies? Nobody would go to bat for Rold Gold if it was forced to cease operations. The makers of Gardetto’s need to realize that pretzels suck and are killing the integrity of their product. I’m still going to continue eating Gardetto’s because they’re irresistible, but one day someone
will emerge and put a rightful end to pretzel tyranny. I’m very excited for that day.
Unedited moronoic facebook status from a kid from my high school
Song that will make you wet your pants with excitement
“jeeesh all this shit om my fb wall bout that fucking gun band so ill put my 2 cents into this one look here i finally got to have guns in my house cause my dad dnt like em so theres no fucking way im lettin em take em god bless my 12 guage shot gun this is the time for the south to rise again and any one with a gun for that matter” Yes folks, the same South that lost the Civil War—due in no small part to its lack of factories for capably manufacturing GUNS AND AMMUNITION— will rise again as the Gun Overlords they never were. So if you see one of the guys from “Duck Dynasty” leading a shotgun-toting militia from the Bayou to Capitol Hill, you heard it here first. Be sure to email ajwolf2@ wisc.edu to share in his anger.
“Rebel Rebel” (David Bowie, 1974)—You might not know this song by name, but surely you recognize its riff. Oh, that gorgeous, gorgeous riff. I’m always in search for new music, but it’s difficult to get into new songs until after a few listens and that’s kind of a chore. So it’s thrilling when a vaguely recognizable song like “Rebel Rebel” pops up on my Pandora station because it seems newyet-familiar, since I only knew it as “that song with the riff.” Somebody needs to create a chip that probes the inner recesses of your mind to recall longforgotten songs like that. I say we divert funding away from NASA to make this happen.
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Thief on W. Gilman St. takes woman’s backpack, wallet An unknown suspect robbed a woman on the 400 block of West Gilman Street Sunday evening, according to a police statement. The 21-year-old Madison resident was walking on campus when the suspect approached her from behind
and grabbed her Under Armour backpack, which contained her wallet and some clothing, Madison Police Department spokesperson Joel DeSpain said in a statement. Although the robbery occurred at approximately 10:30 p.m. Sunday, the victim
did not report the incident to the Madison Police Department until Monday morning, according to the report. Since the suspect approached the victim from behind DeSpain said she could not provide the MPD with a detailed description of her attacker.
Online Heenan petition floods city’s email The City of Madison’s online mail system experienced delayed and blocked emails following an influx of messages Tuesday from an online petition to remove a Madison police officer from duty for his involvement in the Nov. 9 shooting of resident Paul Heenan, according to a press release. In addition to sending letters to the Madison Police Department, community members created an online petition,
which has received more than 90,000 signatures as of Tuesday night, to permanently remove officer Stephen Heimsness. Madison’s Technical Services Manager Rich Beadles said due to the way the social reform website Change.org allows its users to share petitions with their Facebook and email contacts, the number of messages sent to the city increased exponentially throughout Tuesday morning.
“In one case we were able to identify one person who submitted a petition from the site and that generated 500 more petition emails,” Beadles said. According to Beadles, the city’s information technology department created a separate gmail account to compensate for the flood of messages and said the authors of the petition cooperated when asked to reroute all Change. org emails to the new address.
Princeton Review ranks UW seventh best value
Walker seeks applicants for student regent position
The University of Wisconsin-Madison was ranked seventh nationally in the 2013 Best Value public colleges and universities Tuesday by the Princeton Review. The Princeton Review ranks 75 public and 75 private colleges and universities based on data from Fall 2011 to Fall 2012, and 30 total qualifications including tuition costs, academics, financial aid, financial aid rewards and teacher assessments. The Princeton Review has consistently ranked UW-Madison among the top valued public colleges and universities and was ranked fifth last year. Its number seven ranking this year makes UW-Madison the highest ranked Big Ten school on the list. The top ranked public colleges were University of Virginia, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and the New College of Florida. The complete rankings of both private and public colleges can be found on the Princeton Review website.
Gov. Scott Walker is seeking applicants for the traditional University of Wisconsin student representative on the UW System Board of Regents, according to a statement released Tuesday. The student regent serves a two-year term and must be enrolled at least half-time at a UW System institution for the duration of the term. Applicants who attend UW-Madison or UW-Parkside will not be considered because student representatives from both institutions currently serve on the Board. The Board has jurisdiction over policies governing the UW System, including university admissions standards, tuition price and budget proposals. According to UW System spokesperson David Giroux, the student regent positions exist to give students a voice in UW System governance. “The student regents I’ve worked with have done a good job of representing those interests,” Giroux said. The position is currently filled by UW-Madison senior Katherine Pointer.
council from page 1 today and this building does not belong in this historic district,” Hermanns said. But Jeff Houden, coowner of the property and Palisade Apartments, said many of the features in the existing apartments, including plumbing and structural design, are not salvageable. “No matter what we’d do to these buildings, they’d remain substandard and obsolete housing,” Houden said. In accordance with the project developers, some residents of the Langdon area spoke in favor of its construction. John Magnino, a UW-Madison student and president of the State-Langdon Neighborhood Association, cited complaints from a number of residents and said the current lighting in the area, which the developers plan to increase, poses safety issues. “Overall I think there are some very positive aspects from this project and for [the] student community,” Magnino said. Ald. Scott Resnick, District
nithin charlly/the daily cardinal
Common Council approved a new Langdon area apartment complex Tuesday that will replace three existing buildings. 8, echoed the safety concerns surrounding the current conditions of the area. “I’m glad that some of the men [in the area] can walk safely to and fro, but when I’m at neighborhood meetings, talk-
ing to female students, that’s not what I hear, “ Resnick said. According to the developer’s report, construction is tentatively slated to begin in August 2013 and be completed by August 2014.
xinyi wang/the daily cardinal
ASM Sustainability Committee Chair Colin Higgins says he is looking forward to beginning the waste and energy campaigns.
sustainability from page 1 possible energy audit of campus buildings. Higgins said the audit would collect energy use data for campus buildings so next year’s committee can target specific areas of campus to increase energy efficiency. Overall, Higgins said he is excited for the committee to
begin attempting to accomplish its goals this semester. Higgins said the committee will try to narrow down goals for both campaigns and identifying stakeholders. The committee also elected freshman Will Mulhern as vice chair, freshman Michael Quesnell as secretary and Kevin Englebert as social media manager. —Cheyenne Langkamp
UW-Madison provides third-most volunteers for Peace Corps in 2012 The University of WisconsinMadison ranked third on the Peace Corps’ annual list of top volunteer-producing, large U.S. universities for the second consecutive year. UW-Madison has 103 graduates currently working overseas in 47 countries around the globe, according to a university press release. University of Washington and the University of Florida top the list this year, each sending 107 volunteers to serve abroad. UW-Madison has made the top 25 list since the Peace Corps started ranking universities in 2001, and held the number one spot from 2001 to 2006.
Since the Peace Corps was established in 1961, approximately 3,070 UW-Madison alumni have served across the globe. UW-Madison falls short to University of California at Berkeley for most overall alumni volunteers. Applications for graduating students looking to be considered for the remaining assignment openings for 2013 or for programs in 2014 are due Feb. 28. Recruiters at UW-Madison will hold information sessions for interested students Feb. 14, March 5 and April 4 in the First Floor Masley Media Center of the Red Gym at 6 p.m.
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D-Shorewood, said the act would help low-income citizens avoid economic troubles from potential health care costs. “I know that access to affordable health care is critical to ensuring our citizens have a path toward economic stability, and this is exactly what the Strengthen BadgerCare Act does,” Pasch said. But Cullen Werwie, Walker’s press secretary, backed the governor’s record on health care saying the governor increased taxpayer spending on Medicare by $1.2 billion in his last budget. Werwie also said the federal funding Democrats say is available to finance the act may not be approved by the federal government, a fact Richards contested. “Given current fiscal uncertainties, the federal funding contained the bill today remains in question,” Werwie said in an email. If the federal funding is not approved and the proposal is passed through the state government, Wisconsin taxpayers would be responsible to cover spending under the act.
Erpenbach, D-Middleton, and state Rep. Jon Richards, D-Milwaukee, is designed to use federal funds to increase the number of childless adults earning less than 133 percent of the Federal Poverty Level who can qualify for coverage under BadgerCare. The legislators said in a joint statement Gov. Scott Walker has “refused” to pursue this change. While some adults in the category are currently covered, a previous 2009 enrollment cap left 150,000 people without BadgerCare health insurance. The act would be entirely federally funded for its first three years and 90 percent federally funded after that, according to the statement. Richards said the bill aims to help people achieve a middleclass lifestyle. “By strengthening BadgerCare we can provide more Wisconsinites another stepping stone to the middle-class dream,” Richards said in the statement. “This is about doing the right thing and the smart thing.” State Rep. Sandy Pasch,
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Grouper’s latest descent into dreams CD REVIEW
The Man Who Died in His Boat Grouper By Cameron Graff The Daily Cardinal
The first time I heard and saw Liz Harris perform under her Grouper moniker was in 2009, when she opened for Animal Collective after their meteoric rise to relative fame with Merriweather Post Pavilion. The crowd, a robust and remarkably enthused group of largely teenagers and college students, were all hot and bothered at the prospect of Animal Collective playing a presumed hour-and-a-half rendition of “My Girls” and bobbing their heads manically until their collective necks ripped at the tendons. Needless to say, they were not prepared for Grouper. Neither was I, actually; like much of the crowd, I spent most of her haunting set loudly discussing with my friends how long tonight’s rendition of “Fireworks” would be. Occasionally I even made a snide comment about Harris’s shimmering wall of crooning vocals and off-beat guitar. I, very unfortunately indeed, compared her to The Edge, citing one-trickponyism and a cloying over-reliance on her reverb pedals over technical prowess. A girl next to me, in an apparent act of empathetic rebellion, puked all over her shoes. It was a dour moment for most of humanity. Things have changed since then and I have too, but I still
squirm a little thinking of my voracious rudeness and closedmindedness during that opening set. How Harris must have looked down at me, singled me out as just another name on her “people-who-talk-duringmy-show-hitlist” (as I wade in perpetual worst case-ness). And now, years later, I wonder if maybe, lurking amongst the deluge of eerie vocals, twittering pianos and chiming guitars, some splintered remnant of that night has found its way into Harris’s most recent release, The Man Who Died in His Boat. I use this, of course, as less a narcissistic claim-to-fame but instead as a convenient segue. Harris’s music, for better or for worse, is best described as the music of memory. Nostalgia and poison recollection trickle from every pore of her songs, leaking from one vaguely defined tune to another. It’s right there in the title, after all—Harris’s recent collection reflects upon a boat she and her father visited, washed up on shore and still littered with the remnants of life but devoid of any life itself. “I remember looking only briefly, wilted by the feeling that I was violating some remnant of this man’s presence by witnessing the evidence of its failure,” Harris recollected in a recent press release. Much like Leyland Kirby’s oft-discussed (mostly by me) project The Caretaker, an endeavor which revolves around the deliberate distorting of old ballroom songs to recreate the sensation of the ghostly banquet in “The Shining,” Harris’s music looks back to the past and sees nothing but haze. The tone isn’t set as either morose or revelatory; it’s some
Photo Courtesy of Rachel Brandon
sleepy middle ground, where facts and objectivity have been marred by the mists of time.
Nostalgia and poison recollection trickle from every pore of her songs, leaking from one vaguely defined tune to another. The title track, for all its sour implications (failure, spiritual voyeurism, gruesome death, etc) is a relatively upbeat number, more a thing of beauty than the grotesquery of a man slowly dying alone many miles from his home. Though, if you close your eyes and listen really closely, you can almost picture a
moment of serene epiphany in the shimmering chord progression. A moment where the titular man, looking up through the clouds, knows he is about to die, knows and yet still finds peace. All of The Man’s tracks are culled from Harris’s monumental Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill sessions, so they all follow the same general outline of that particular collection. Hushed and impenetrable vocals—half words, half seraph-chant—flow like running water over a wall of acoustic guitar reverberation to create a molasses-slow universe of pure sleepiness. A good third of the tracks are early indicators of Harris’s A I A period obsession with a purer refinement of drone and ambient music, and
“Vanishing Point” eschews all reference points entirely for three minutes of hushed piano rattles, like someone absently tapping on keys, trying to recall a song they learned a long time ago. They may be effective b-sides, but no Grouper is ever bad Grouper. The issue here, then, is that Harris is as divisive as ever, because to some people all Grouper is, in fact, bad Grouper. There will always really be just two camps: the sweaty crowd at the Animal Collective show and the folks who opted out of the show entirely to sit in their collective rooms and mull on their collective pasts. You’ll know where you sit almost immediately after you first listen. Rating: B+
Grouper’s 2008 masterpiece dragged back into reissue CD REVIEW
Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill Grouper By Max Fisher the daily cardinal
Grouper is sound in black and white. Peering through a telescope, lost and alone at sea. Bleak, lonely curls of fog span the view. Or wind on some forlorn, forgotten hill. A weighty fish lumbering with concealed purpose below the murky depths of a cold, dark lake. Grouper is music to drown to. On the heels of last year’s breathtakingly gorgeous double album A I A: Alien Observer/A I A: Dream Loss, Grouper, the moniker of Portland-based songwriter Liz Harris, is releasing a new collection of material from 2008 titled The Man Who
Died In His Boat. Overall, it’s a good album from a great artist, certainly worth a listen for anyone who’s already a fan. But the real treasure here is that along with The Man Who Died In His Boat, Grouper’s label is reissuing her out-ofprint, under-acknowledged and reverb-drenched masterpiece Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill. A friend first described listening to Dragging a Dead Deer to me as the closest you could be to dreaming while sober and awake. He said it was like walking barefoot on wet grass at night. From the moment the album begins with the aquamarine textures of “Disengaged,” it’s hard not to feel swallowed up, as though swimming through a bed of seaweed with water filling your ears. Lyrics are present but indecipherable; delicately strummed acoustic guitar notes are there but they’re indistinguishable. Trying to stay awake until the album is finished is akin to fighting against the current. The whole of Dead Deer is beautiful melancholy; Harris’s voice is fragile and
curious like an undated photograph of an anonymous bride. Few of her words pierce the nimbus of wet tremolo and tape hiss. But occasionally, as though hearing someone whispering from behind closed doors, snippets about drowning, rising water and falling asleep can be made out through the murk. Trying to distinguish one song from the next proves a difficult and ultimately unnecessary exercise. The album functions more like lapping waves with crests and valleys, making listening a patient and time-rewarding experience. With each listen, compositions begin to take shape out of the haze, and it becomes apparent that lurking underneath all the reverb is some truly excellent songwriting. Tracks like “Heavy Water/I’d Rather Be Sleeping,” “Stuck” and “Fishing Bird (Empty Jutted in the Evening Breeze)” certainly represent crests of achingly beautiful chords and melody that rise out of the depths and fold back into it. Ultimately, Grouper is
an experiment with background as foreground. Last year’s A I A was 80 minutes long—intentionally the average duration of one sleep cycle—while Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill provides an intangible and artful ambience for continents to drift to. The final track, “We’ve All Time to Sleep,” is a lullaby that gently washes the album out to sea. “We’ve all gone to sleep/We’ve all gone to bed/
We wait for our dreams to fill our head,” Harris fades. Set in no particular trend or place in time, Dragging a Dead Deer is not an album to listen to once and move on; it’s a sunken ship filled with hidden treasure that must be explored. It’s a fountain of wealth and reward to be tapped, so long as you’re willing to put forth the effort to do so. Rating: A+
science Collective effort leads GATA-2 study
dailycardinal.com
By Mary Sagstetter the daily cardinal
Many college students read science journal articles as a requisite for class and directed studies toward understanding experimental details. However, more often than not, most research endeavors involve a narrative about collaboration across several disciplines leading up to the discoveries published in journals. In September 2012, professor Emery Bresnick and his research group in the Department of Cell and Regenerative Biology at the University of WisconsinMadison published a collaborative research article in the Journal of Clinical Investigation with Steven Holland, an expert in immunological diseases at the National Institute of Health (NIH), and Jing Zhang, an expert in blood cell development from the McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research at UW-Madison. This venture began with an intriguing colloquy between Holland and Bresnick about a DNA point mutation found near the Gata2 gene. This mutation was found in a DNA sequence of a patient with MonoMAC disease, a type of immunodeficiency disease that commonly progresses to leukemia. Even though Bresnick’s research lab does not directly study immunodeficiency diseases like Holland’s lab, Bresnick’s research does study the physiological consequences from genetic mutations in genes regulating red blood cell development. Examples of these consequences include myeloid leukemia and poor vasculature integrity. One of the many genes involved in regulating red blood cell development is Gata2, a gene in the human genome that encodes for a protein called GATA-2. Bresnick’s lab uses genetically modified mice to help elucidate the complicated network of Gata2 gene regulation in hematopoiesis. “If this protein is missing or limiting, then the mouse embryo would die due to lack of red blood cells,” Bresnick said. GATA-2 protein is a master regulator protein that helps control the blood cell maturation process in hematopoiesis, a common physiological development pathway of erythrocyte and leukocyte cells from hematopoietic stem cells. Research from various groups has demonstrated that the hematopoietic stem cells start with a high GATA-2 protein concentration. Bresnick’s team mapped where the GATA-2 protein attaches to the chromosomal DNA. Consequently, they discovered that as the stem cell matures into a red blood cell by certain chemical growth factors, GATA-2 protein is switched with GATA-1 protein, a related regulatory protein, at the same site
on the chromosomal DNA. This mechanism is called the “GATA switch.” “When GATA-1 levels rise, it replaces GATA-2,” Bresnick said. “When it does that, it changes the activity of the associated gene.” By using molecular techniques, Bresnick and his team found five GATA switch sites scattered within and upstream of the Gata2 gene. “One [site] was in an intron of the Gata2 gene,” said Bresnick. “Three sites were immediately to the left of the gene and an additional site was very far upstream of the Gata2 gene.” Bresnick said there were four papers published in 2011, which announced “point mutations, or a single amino acid change, occur in GATA-2 modifying the protein and not the +9.5 DNA regulatory sequence.” These mutations occur in individuals who have the immunodeficiency disease MonoMAC. MonoMAC stands for monocytopenia and mycobacterial infection syndrome, which is a deficiency in dendritic, monocyte, B cells and Natural Killer cells. Since these types of white blood cells are part of the immune system, patients with MonoMAC are susceptible to mycobacterial, fungal and viral infections as well as human papillomavirus-associated cancers. However, in one of Holland’s patients who had developed MonoMAC, the patient’s GATA-2 protein did not display any amino acid mutations as stated in the 2011 papers. In pursuit of this genetic conundrum, Bresnick said Holland had read the research done by Bresnick’s lab and was curious if there was any application of Bresnick’s research to his patient who had MonoMAC disease with non-mutated GATA-2 protein. Thus, Holland had his staff member sequence the patient’s DNA and evaluate the integrity of the GATA-2 protein switch sites. “Holland’s group identified a small deletion within the intron site, which corresponded to the +9.5 element,” Bresnick said. The +9.5 site is one of the GATA-2 binding sites Bresnick’s lab had previously found in the intron of the Gata2 gene. In addition to Holland’s contribution, Kirby Johnson, a senior scientist in the Bresnick group, made seminal contributions to all aspects of the study. MyungJeom Ryu, Jinyong Wang, Yangang Liu and Jing Zhang from the McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research provided outstanding expertise to quantitate stem cell activity in the +9.5 site mutant animals generated in the Bresnick group. “This long term study came to fruition through a highly productive multidisciplinary effort,” said Bresnick.
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graphic by jacob berchem
The severity and peak of the influenza season varies year to year. There is no absolute way to predict how a season will affect the population. (Source: CDC)
2012-’13 flu season proves to be unpredictable as usual By Rachel Schulze the Daily Cardinal
Those looking to know whether the worst of flu season has passed may be disappointed to find out that the most predictable thing about flu is that it’s unpredictable, according to Thomas Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “There could be another bump, and there could be another peak, or we might have been through the worst of it,” Craig Roberts, an epidemiologist for University Health Services, said. “You never know.” Generally, flu season begins in October and ends in March. Despite heightened concern about flu around the country in mid-January, this flu season doesn’t appear to be anything unusual for UHS, Roberts said. He described the 2012-’13 season as moderate and not particularly severe, but still encouraged students to get vaccinated. Nationally, as of the week ending Jan. 26, a lower proportion of people were seeing health-care providers for influenzalike illness, but as of that weekend, the proportion remained above baseline levels, according to the CDC. UW-Madison appears to be following national trends with a two-to-three-week lag, Roberts said, so numbers on campus could drop soon. Or not. It’s hard to determine how the season will pan out. “Every year is different in terms of both timing and volume and severity and which strain is gonna predominate and who’s gonna get the sickest,” Roberts said. Two to three different strains of the flu circulate among the population annually, with one strain causing the majority of cases. This year’s dominant strain, H3N2, has been associated historically with more severe flu seasons, Dr. Frieden said.
According to Roberts, how severely a flu virus affects the population also varies among individuals. “I would say there’s more variation between people than there is between viruses,” Roberts said. Other strains of flu circulating this year include H1N1 and a type B flu. Strains of the flu are labeled type A, B or C based on their nucleic acids and protein composition. Both H3N2 and H1N1 are type A strains of influenza. Type C strains of influenza are found in humans but do not cause widespread outbreaks, whereas types A and B do. Each year scientists create a new seasonal flu vaccine that targets what they predict will be the dominant strains in the population come flu season. Generally, an annual flu vaccine is designed to fight against the dominant A strain, B strain and the 2009 H1N1 virus. According to the CDC, this year’s vaccine shows a 62 percent effectiveness, meaning those who receive the vaccine are 62 percent less likely to contract the flu this season. Roberts advised students who are experiencing influenza-like illness to stay at home for 24 hours after fever has resolved and encouraged students to get a flu shot. Flu symptoms include fever, sore throat, runny nose, headache, fatigue and muscle aches. People contract the flu by breathing in droplets exhaled by those infected with the virus. Someone with the flu can spread it to a person up to six feet away. “Influenza is not a cold,” Roberts said. “It’s a much more serious illness, and people who’ve had it can tell you it tends to feel more like you’ve been hit by a truck.” University of Wisconsin-Madison students can receive flu shots for free by calling UHS to make an appointment.
Ask Mr. Scientist: Why the cold weather makes you miserable Dear Mr. Scientist, What is it about being out in the cold that causes my nose to run? —Tom J.
Dear Mr. Scientist, What is it about winter that makes it cold/flu season? Does the cold weather have some sort of effect on our bodies? —Lisa U.
There are a couple of things going on that turn your nose into an open tap. First of all, your nose has the job of warming and humidifying the air you inhale so it doesn’t irritate your lungs. Your nose has to work extra hard to humidify the dry winter air so it increases fluid production. If too much fluid is produced, it will begin to run from your
Researchers aren’t quite sure why, but there is a definite increase in cold and flu outbreaks in January and February. The most common explanation is that during the winter, people spend more time inside and are therefore more likely to come into contact with an infected person. In addition, new research has shown that viruses (like the ones responsible for causing colds and
nose. The other factor that comes into play is that the air you exhale is warmer and moister than the surrounding air. As you breathe out, this wet, warm air condenses on the tip of your cold nose, and the collecting moisture drips out. When these two conditions team up, you become cursed with a nose that runs like a faucet.
5
graphic by dylan moriarty
flus) create a protective fatty coating that solidifies in cold temperatures. With this coating, the virus is able to survive for a while on its own and can contaminate the surfaces that people touch. In the heat of the summer, though, this coating isn’t able to solidify, so the virus has no protection and dies rather quickly, which may be why colds and flus aren’t as common in the summer.
Ask Mr. Scientist is written by Michael Leitch. If you have a burning science question you want him to answer, tweet @DC_Science or email it to science@dailycardinal.com.
opinion Legal status needs to be more accessible 6
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Wednesday, February 6, 2013
dailycardinal.com
Matt Beaty opinion columnist
T
he Senate and President Barack Obama recently released separate, but fairly similar, outlines for immigration reform. Since immigration policy has been a dismal failure for multiple decades, it is an exciting prospect to see the federal government “fix the system.” Unfortunately, neither the Senate’s Gang of Eight proposal nor President Obama’s proposal will do anyone much good in the long run. The American immigration system is hardly effective. It makes it difficult for potential immigrants to come to the country legally, and in turn undocumented workers cross the border for work and many people overstay their work or education visa (or worse, leave after their education visa runs out). More so, many undocumented workers arrive in America via inhumane ways. Clearly, fixing the immigration system will benefit all parties involved. However, plans put forth are practically non-starters. There are some positives, such as getting back taxes and fines from undocumented immigrants who wish to become documented. It is important for the government to officially know who is in the country,
Isabel alvarez/cardinal file photo
Protestors marched in Madison May 1, 2007 for national immigrant and migrant workers day. The large banner reads “permanent licenses” and features a picture of Ernesto “Che” Guevara. and it is beneficial for immigrants to become documented. But there is no provision in the plans that will reasonably stop illegal immigration in the future. The Gang of Eight proposed E-Verify and other border security measures. The problem is these plans will probably never happen because they are so-called “triggers” in the legislation. They are meant to go in place eventually, which in Washington speak means never or in a weakened form so bastardized from the original intention it might as well not be implemented. Even more, these control measures will be expensive and ineffective. Secure borders and controlled immigration are important goals, but the facts speak louder than
hopes and wishes. E-Verify has been ineffective in Alabama, where it is already implemented, and the federal government should use that experiment as a warning not to waste the time and money. And if history has taught us anything, it’s that if there is a border, people will get around it. The mix of unpromising enforcement tactics and the promise of de facto amnesty will ensure nothing but the necessity to address immigration reform again in the next 30 or so years. So, what should be done? Immigration reform needs a way to control immigration. The best way to do this is to make the legal channels for immigration easier. This does not mean America needs to
make citizens out of anyone who asks, but willing workers should have a flexible way to get a visa and legally work in the States. It means the American and Mexican governments—let’s be honest, immigration reform is really geared toward south of our border—need to work together to make sure that citizens are coming in safely and legally. Reformer wannabes in Washington could look to the European Union and its labor agreements. They could draft a freedom of movement for workers that allows Mexican workers easily accessible paperwork, in order to freely find work in America. Or perhaps they could create a guest worker program that does not tie workers to a single employer or
field, but to employment in general. The United States doesn’t need to make immigration tougher—11 million undocumented immigrants show that they will go to great lengths to work in America—they need to make it more enticing to go through the legal channels. If Washington tries to make visa, guest-worker programs and highskilled immigration less of a pain in the ass, it will do more to control the borders than any fence could. Surely allowing for more legal workers to migrate to America will raise some questions. When can workers begin to collect government benefits? What will the path to citizenship look like for those just looking for work? These are more longterm issues our representatives need to worry about, but they only seem to care about how these reforms will affect the next elections. Hopefully, Washington will take time to look to fixing long-term issues in the immigration system. Immigration is an economic as well as a humanitarian issue. The American people deserve a government plan that will be enforceable. Immigrants deserve a safe way to get here and get documented so that they can work to their benefit, as well as to the benefit of the larger economy. Until the politicians aim to fix the system in the long run, their plans don’t deserve the title of a reform. Matt Beaty is a senior majoring in computer science and mathematics. Please send all feedback to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
Defining life and when it begins underlies abortion debate Tom Jensen opinion columnist
G
reetings, fellow Badgers. My name is Tom Jensen and I am a senior majoring in Religious Studies. As such, this column will focus on religious topics and hopefully shed some light on why certain religious groups do and think as they do. If you have a topic you would like me to cover, or if you feel I misrepresented a certain group, please feel free to contact me. Additionally, if you disagree with anything I say, let’s get a good old-fashioned newspaper debate going. Write a letter to the editor. Call me out. It will be way more exciting than watching “The Office” on Netflix, so I guarantee a response. I thought for this first week I would come out of the gates with a hot-button issue: abortion. It is easy to drown in the sea of rhetoric that flows from both sides of the abortion debate, so I figured I would have us take a step back and look at what everyone is actually debating. Despite what you may have read on your friends’ Facebook statuses or in those very passionate Tumblr posts, the main issue is not women’s rights, the right to life or whether it is okay to kill a baby. I think most of us agree that women have the right to do whatever they would like with their bodies, that everybody has a right to live and it is obviously not okay to kill a baby. Those are generally-accepted notions. What is not generally-accepted and what we are really arguing about, is when
life begins. If life begins at conception, as the Roman Catholic Church emphatically asserts, then telling a woman she cannot have an abortion deals less with women’s rights and more with the child’s right to live. If, however, life begins much later, then banned abortions are indeed infringing on women’s rights. If a fetus qualifies as a human life, then abortion is destroying a human life. If not, it’s not. You can see how important this particular aspect of the debate is, and how the way we answer this question completely affects the rest of the discussion. Now, situating myself on the Catholic side of the debate, I have two considerations for pro-choice advocates. The first is to consider dropping the argument that people should keep religion and politics separate. People who argue this do not understand how most religions work. It is not just an hour-long obligation on Sunday or an ancient diet plan. You see the entire world differently when you believe God created it, just as you see a fetus differently if you believe its life began at conception. Compartmentalizing religion and politics into two separate categories undermines them both, because you are essentially saying that your beliefs about the world are not important enough to shape how you think the world should be run. What’s more, religion in politics is not always so bad. Look at one example: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the paragon of American civil rights. People laud him as a politi-
cal go-getter, but seem to forget that he based his entire movement on the New Testament—specifically the Sermon on the Mount. “At the beginning of the [bus boycott] the people called on me to serve as their spokesman,” he writes in an article titled “How My Mind Has Changed.” “In accepting this responsibility my mind... was driven back to the Sermon on the Mount and the Gandhian method of nonviolent resistance. This principal became the guiding light of our movement. Christ furnished the spirit and motivation while Gandhi furnished the method.” King is blatantly religious when talking about his movement, and even references Mahatma Gandhi, another paragon of civil rights (who employed his own religious beliefs in his movement against British Colonialism). The point I am trying to make is that we should stop being so scared of religion bleeding into people’s politics. And we should understand, especially with
abortion, why that bleeding happens. Take a moment and imagine that your worldview left you with the conclusion that human life started at conception, and therefore that abortion was killing hundreds of thousands of babies. Would you sit idly by and let it happen because you were afraid that you might be too religious in your politics? Be honest—probably not. If you do not agree with the Roman Catholic Church about life beginning at conception, you are going to have to come to a concrete conclusion as to when life actually does begin. We have already covered one pole, life beginning at conception. There is also a school of thought on the other pole, which determines that life begins well after birth. Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva, in their Journal of Medical Ethics article “After-birth abortion: why should the baby live?” found no significant difference between a fetus and a newborn, stating that “both fetuses
and newborns do not have the same moral status as actual persons, … [and the fact that] both are potential persons is morally irrelevant.” This conclusion led to a further conclusion that if it was alright to abort fetuses, it was equally alright to terminate newborns. So now you are aware of both poles of the issue, from no abortions to abortions well after the pregnancy is over. Now it is up to you to do your research and come to a conclusion. I would also ask that in your debating with other people, keep in mind where they are coming from. Understand that if you are arguing with a Catholic, you are arguing with someone who believes the fetus is a human life, and therefore they are not trying to quell women’s rights or make life inconvenient for a family economically incapable of raising another child. They are trying to save lives. Tom is a senior majoring in religious studies. Please send feedback to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
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Today’s Sudoku
Eatin’ Cake
The happiest place on earth? The document that officially broke up The Beatles was signed at Disney World. Wednesday, February 6, 2013 • 7
By Dylan Moriarty www.EatinCake.com
© Puzzles by Pappocom
By Melanie Shibley shibley@wisc.edu
Solution, tips and computer program available at www.sudoku.com.
Fill in the grid so that every row, every column and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 through 9.
Caved In
By Nick Kryshak nkryshak@wisc.edu
Today’s Crossword Puzzle
First in Twenty
Evil Bird Classic
By Angel Lee alee23@wisc.edu
By Caitlin Kirihara graphics@dailycardinal.com
Answer key available at www.dailycardinal.com
THE LIFE CROSSWORD ACROSS 1 Autumn blossom 6 Thailand, once 10 Divisible by two 14 Michael Jackson performed in one 15 Bindlestiff 16 Airline price 17 ___ in on (approached a target) 18 Decorative water server 19 Go with the ___ 20 Shorten 22 Result of a thumbsup? 23 Chew the fat 24 Alpine song 25 Bathing beaches 29 Breakfast rasher 32 Lomond and Ness, e.g. 33 Feeder stream 37 Reverberate 38 Loses one’s coat 39 Port between Buffalo and Cleveland 40 Good-deed doers 42 Gale’s teammate Piccolo 43 Lovers’ engagement 44 Saudi Arabian currency
45 8 4 49 50
Like gummy bears Lady’s man Booty Old computer addon Planning to vote no Fictional coward Called one’s bluff Fingerboard ridge 1816 Jane Austen novel Round sealing gasket Pitchfork prong Phobia “Beau ___ “
4 2 25 26 27
DOWN 1 Turkish general (Var.) 2 Untidy diner 3 Egyptian pyramid, e.g. 4 “As ___” (letter closing) 5 They fly by night 6 Arabic honorific 7 Davenport’s state 8 Help a criminal 9 Additional 10 Brazen boldness 11 Sound, as reasoning 12 Become weatherworn 13 Handrail support 21 “___ in victory” (elementary lesson)
1 4 42 44
7 5 58 59 60 61 62 3 6 64 65
28 29 0 3 31 33 34 35 36 38
45 46 7 4 48 0 5 51 2 5 53 54 55 56
Not me Common person Out of one’s mind Needing kneading, maybe Author without credit Baseball Hall-ofFamer George Assists Broadcasting giant Therefore Verdi specialty Omani money Pinings Worcestershire sauce ingredient Blubber English setter, e.g. Fixed circle above a moving center? Knitting or bookbinding, e.g. “Gregorita” painter Robert Consumed Underwater transmission Figure on a staff Phone call cost, in old films Capital of Italia Barely cooked Crocus cousin Blow off steam Outer limit
In House Ad
By Miles Kellerman graphics@dailycardinal.com
Sports
wednesday february 6, 2013 DailyCardinal.com
Flacco now among elite quarterbacks, whatever that means
Men’s Basketball
vince huth huth the truth
W grey satterfield/cardinal file photo
Junior guard Ben Brust scored 20 points on 7-of-11 shooting Sunday at Illinois, his first game in double figures since Wisconsin’s Big Ten opener against Penn State Jan. 3.
Iowa looms for Badgers Wisconsin looks to even season series with Hawkeyes By Vince Huth the daily cardinal
The last time the Badgers (6-3 Big Ten, 15-7 overall) played Iowa (3-6, 14-8), they were coming off a win at then-No. 2 Indiana and atop the conference standings. However, the Hawkeyes jumped out to a 20-point lead in the first half and eventually topped Wisconsin, 70-66, despite a 20-point second-half effort from redshirt freshman guard George Marshall. It was Iowa’s third consecutive win over UW and the first of three Badger losses over a four-game stretch. Sophomore forward Frank Kaminsky, who has yet to beat the Hawkeyes in three tries during his college career, said Iowa’s hustle—specifically for loose balls and offensive rebounds— has been a big factor in its recent success over Wisconsin. Wisconsin did a relatively good job of limiting Iowa’s second chances in the Jan. 19 meeting; in fact, UW pulled down 10 offensive rebounds compared to the Hawkeyes’ seven. Despite that advantage, Kaminsky, who missed UW’s game in Iowa City with an eye injury, said the Badgers would need to avoid those defensive lapses if it wants to be successful Wednesday. “We get them down and we make them take a tough shot at the shot clock, and then we don’t get the rebound and then they get another possession and they score,” Kaminsky said. “There’s plays where we do have stops, but we let them get a loose ball, outhustle us.” It will certainly help Wisconsin to have its backup big man in the rotation against Iowa. Associate head coach Greg Gard said Kaminsky’s addition simply gives UW’s offense another dimension. “It helps with our front line, giving us another body to run through the rotation,” Gard said. “It’s a 6-[feet]-10-[inch]
that defenses have to shoot over, it’s a 6-[feet]-10-[inch] that you have to chase around the perimeter a little bit. And obviously he was able to get to the free throw line as well [Sunday] and shot it really well.” The Lisle, Ill., native scored a career-high 19 points, including 12-of-14 from the free throw line in UW’s 74-68 win over the Fighting Illini. It could be coincidence that junior guard Ben Brust, who scored 20 points on 7-of-11 shooting Sunday, had a big game because of Kaminsky’s extended playing time (23 minutes). Regardless, Brust said Kaminsky will be a key for the Badgers down the stretch this season.
“We’re not good enough to worry about any trap games ... We haven’t beaten Iowa in a while.” Greg Gard associate head coach Wisconsin basketball
“Frank was playing really well before he got hurt, so it was good to see him after his injury come back and have a good game,” Brust said. “It’s always good to have a bench player who can come in and contribute right away, and he did that.” Brust, who took just five shots in 34 minutes of playing time during UW’s previous meeting with Iowa this season (3-of-5, 7 points, 2 rebounds, 2 assists), was particularly effective at Illinois because he mixed his 3-point shooting with dribble penetration into the lane. He had not necessarily been ineffective on offense, having shot 15-of-32 (47 percent) from the floor in the last five games, but he was more effective Sunday because of the offensive balance (2-of-5 from 3-point range, 5-of-6 from inside the arc). “I think I missed more threes than twos, which is good for getting a little more variety,” Brust said. “But getting in the lane and making good things happen, it doesn’t always have to be scoring, it can be getting in
there and finding other people.” While the Hawthorn Woods, Ill., native didn’t feel like he was struggling, he said he had perhaps gotten away from his play earlier in the season, when he was regularly attempting more field goals from inside the arc. Before Sunday, 40 of Brust’s 60 field goal attempts in Big Ten play had come from 3-point range. The junior said he wasn’t playing as aggressively as he had been earlier in the season. Gard noticed much of the same, but not only when Brust had the ball in his hands. “I thought what was better Sunday is he was a little more aggressive with the ball in terms of attacking, getting fouled. And he’s doing a better job cutting away from the ball and using screens and setting up defenses that way,” Gard said. “We just gotta make sure we find him. We were caught napping as a passer a couple times.” The associate head coach said the important thing for Brust is to make sure he takes what comes to him, and sometimes that means driving to the basket and drawing defenders instead of looking for an open jump shot. “It’s as balanced as his game has been in quite a while in terms of mixing twos, free throws, knocking down some threes,” Gard said. “So that was good to see, and hopefully that’s a step forward for him.” Wisconsin doesn’t currently lead the Big Ten, but it is certainly in contention for a conference title, and its matchup with the Hawkeyes this time around is arguably bigger than last month’s matchup. Not only does UW have home-court advantage, but also its next three games are against ranked teams, including a showdown with No. 3 Michigan at the Kohl Center Saturday. The Badgers are not guaranteed to beat Iowa Wednesday, but Gard is positive they aren’t concerned with the Wolverines just yet. “We’re not good enough to worry about any trap games,” Gard joked. “Our margin for error is so paper thin that we can’t afford to have any lapses, because we haven’t beaten Iowa in a while.”
ith Baltimore’s Super Bowl win Sunday, Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco has officially earned the title, “Elite NFL quarterback.” The thing is, I’m not exactly sure what this means. As far as I know, the guy has to be included in every TV analyst, reporter and common fan’s discussion of the league’s top signal callers. An NFL championship seems to be the only real requirement for a QB to reach elite status, and it makes me wonder what would have happened if Baltimore hadn’t beaten San Francisco. Flacco proved he could lead a team to the Super Bowl, and he played phenomenally on the biggest stage (22-of-33 for 287 yards and 3 touchdowns, 0 interceptions). Hey you guys, that’s good enough for a QBR of 95.1! But let’s say the 49ers scored on that final possession. Let’s say Colin Kaepernick hit Randy Moss in the back of the endzone for the go-ahead touchdown, giving the Ravens the ball back with less than two minutes to play. If Flacco doesn’t answer and lead Baltimore on a game-winning touchdown drive, does he immediately fall short of becoming an elite QB? Further, does Kaepernick take his place? I know, I know, “A truly elite signal caller would march his team down the field…” blah, blah, blah. But I wonder how successful the rest of today’s “elite” quarterbacks would be in that situation. How many times out of 10 do their teams come out victorious? Three? Four? Even that might be too generous. Based on the “Super Bowl” requirement—maybe that’s what we should call it, the NFL’s “Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks”—the top QBs in the NFL are Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Aaron Rodgers, Drew Brees, Eli Manning, Flacco and Ben Roethlisberger, in some order (and that’s mine). Your list might look completely different from mine. It could look like the one on the right-most column of this page, or it might (it just might!) include
guys who haven’t won a championship yet. And as far as I’m concerned, there would be absolutely nothing wrong with that. Regardless, Flacco’s inclusion on the commonly accepted list was entirely dependent upon the outcome of Sunday’s championship game. Either Baltimore would win and he’d become an elite QB, or San Francisco would come out on top and Flacco would simply be another above-average, Matt Ryan-type guy. It’s a similar situation to when a little kid trips and falls on the sidewalk. He either shrieks in agony or he pops right back up and trots along, as though totally eating shit was all part of the plan. I swear, it’s one or the other every single time.
Super Bowl wins
Current NFL quarterbacks Tom Brady
3
Eli Manning
2
Ben Roethlisberger
2
Joe Flacco
1
Aaron Rodgers
1
Drew Brees
1
Peyton Manning
1
If you ask me, I think Flacco was one of the top quarterbacks in the league coming into this season. I’m not exactly sure where I would have ranked him on that list, as the one I provided earlier in this column is my first attempt. Nonetheless, he’s won 10 or more regular season games in four of his five seasons as Baltimore’s starter, and the Ravens have not only reached the postseason, but also won at least one playoff game in each of those five seasons. Unless Flacco had a Mark Sanchez-butt fumble type of game in the Super Bowl, he’s on my list of elite NFL quarterbacks regardless of the game’s outcome. And I’m still not entirely sure what that means. Do you think Joe Flacco is among the NFL’s elite quarterbacks? If Baltimore had lost the Super Bowl, would your answer be the same? Do you think the “elite” list is stupid? Let Vince know by sending him an email at sports@dailycardinal.com.
Martin claims Big Ten award Sophomore Ivy Martin was named the Big Ten’s swimmer of the week Tuesday after her strong showing at this weekend’s Big Ten Quad Duals at the Natatorium in Madison. Martin picked up five firstplace finishes, including two individual races. The Madison native set a school record in the 100-yard freestyle with a time of 49.75. She also won the
50-yard freestyle (22.32). On the relay front, Martin was a part of first-place finishes in the 200-yard medley relay (1:39.92), 200-yard relay (1:31.38) and 400-yard relay (3:19.82). This is Martin’s second Big Ten swimmer of the week award this season. vince huth / the daily cardinal