Volume 29, Issue 16, Jan. 11, 2007

THE

1.11.07 • Vol. 29 No. 16 • http://metonline.mscd.edu • Serving the Auraria Campus since 1979

METROPOLITAN

Auraria’s master plan PAGE 3

Parkin’ in a winter wonderland

Photo by Johanna Snow • snowj@mscd.edu

Tiara Lewis and Aaron Floyd, both sophomores at Metro, braved the third round of snow Jan. 5 to workout at the gym on Auraria Campus. The cold weather caused the parking lot payment machines to malfunction, forcing the students to dig for more change.

Gamers’ choice PAGE 12

AVORITE of 2006

S

Cimarron fills void inside the Tivoli PAGE 3

PULLOUT SECTION F

NEWS

Year in music: cheery and dreary PAGE 10

MetNews

THE METROPOLITAN • PAGE 3 • DAVID POLLAN • DPOLLAN@MSCD.EDU

Auraria plans for future growth Denver planners, developers seek integration with campus

By Amy Woodward awoodwa5@mscd.edu Metro’s Board of Trustees met with various urban planners this past December to discuss the integration of Auraria into the downtown area.

“There is a natural fit with Auraria and downtown,” said John Desmond, the Downtown Denver Partnership’s vice president of urban planning and environment.

The DDP has been working in conjunction with Auraria to merge the campus with the city. The campus is considered part of the Denver Downtown Area Plan produced by the Partnership, which leads the effort to manage and develop downtown Denver.

The plan seeks to strengthen the economic, physical and social ties between Auraria and downtown.

With the recent development of close-proximity student housing, students are spending more time and money downtown. One focus of the plan is to raise awareness about the job opportunities and retail outlets downtown Denver provides.

Jim Kirchheimer, director of economic development for the DDP, said that while internships and jobs after graduation are important, there are many students who are not ready to make that move into a career and are looking for a part-time job to help pay the bills.

“There are so many job opportunities, particularly in the Tabor Center, Denver Pavilions, Larimer Square and Writer Square,” Kirchheimer said. “These employers are always looking for good part-time employees, and we were not even aware of it.”

Improving career centers, open arts programs and additional academic programs is another goal of the Partnership.

Kirchheimer said the organization has been working with representatives from UCD to help enhance the university’s career center.

As student housing continues to grow, the DDP would like to introduce information about downtown’s retail community into student orientations at Auraria, Kirchheimer said.

“Besides bars and restaurants, we would like to provide students with information about stores such as Home Depot, stores that students could benefit from to get the supplies they need,” he said.

Providing a streetcar to Auraria that would bridge down-

See AURARIA Page 4

Map courtesy of studioINSITE • Modified by Joe Nguyen • nguyejos@mscd.edu

Developers use basic planning maps, such as the one pictured above, to determine the feasibility of different growth scenarios. Auraria is shown in blue.

Ritter swears in as No. 41

Local cafe makes Tivoli new home

By Allison Bailey abaile19@mscd.edu

Photo by Rachel Crick • crick@mscd.edu

Democrat Bill Ritter took the oath of office on Jan. 9 to become the 41 governor of Colorado. Ritter, a former Denver district attorney, defeated Republican Bob Beauprez in the November 2006 election. During his campaign, Ritter promised voters he would make improving higher education a priority. st

Before the winter break, it was all but certain that the Tivoli’s on-site catering company, which is owned by Sodexho, would take over the spot previously inhabited by the Daily Grind. But as of Dec. 1, 2006, Cimarron, a small, privatelyowned company, was awarded the bid.

The cafe plans to open Jan. 15.

Shaun Lally, the UCD chair of the Student Advisory Committee to the Auraria Board, said Cimarron was selected by a committee of two SACAB representatives from each of the three schools at Auraria, as well as three representatives from the Auraria Higher Education Center.

The final decision was entirely up to the student representatives, Lally said, and the AHEC representatives were there only to ensure the process was done correctly and that there were no legal problems.

The committee had certain criteria in mind, including social responsibility and a willingness to work with student groups and contribute to the campus community, Lally said. He said Cimarron specializes in fair-trade coffee to protect the well-being of coffee growers in underrepresented parts of the world. The company also discourages the use of plastic foam cups, plans to

See CIMARRON Page 7

4 • NEWS

1.11.07 • THE METROPOLITAN

METROPOLITAN STATE COLLEGE of DENVER

Student Life Resources http://www.mscd.edu

ACCESS Center

For Disability Accommodations & Technology

Library 115 • (303) 556-8387 http://www.mscd.edu/~access

Campus Recreation at Auraria Recreation Center • (303) 556-3210 http://www.mscd.edu/~cra

Career Services

Tivoli 215 • (303) 556-3664 http://www.mscd.edu/~career

Ψ

• Campus Resources • Disability Accommodations for Metro State • Adaptive Technology & Alternative Text • Adaptive Lab Serves MSCD, UCD & CCD •Tri-Institutional - MSCD, UCD & CCD • Health Club Facilities/Aerobics/Sports • Physically Challenged Program • Kayaking, Rock Climbing, Skiing

• Career Fairs • Career Assessment and Advice • Employer Contacts • Employment Workshops

Counseling Center

• Personal Counseling • Support Groups • Student–Peer Educators • Stress Management

GLBT Services at Auraria

•Tri-Institutional - MSCD, UCD & CCD • Support Services & Advocacy • Resource Center • Events and Education

Tivoli 651 • (303) 556-3132 http://www.mscd.edu/~counsel/

Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Student Services

Tivoli 213 • (303) 556-6333 http://www.glbtss.org

Health Center at Auraria

•Tri-Institutional - MSCD, UCD & CCD • Illness/Injury Care, Lab/X-ray • Specialty Doctors On-Site • Student Health Insurance & Health Education

Student Activities

• Opportunities Networking • Leadership Education • Lectures and Programs • Community Service

Student Government Assembly

• Advocacy • Events • Representation • Involvement

Student Judicial

• Standards of Conduct • Student Rights and Responsibilities • Student Due Process • Discipline Records

Plaza 150 • (303) 556-2525 http://www.mscd.edu/student/resources/health/

Tivoli 305 • (303) 556-2595 http://studentactivities.mscd.edu/

Tivoli 307 • (303) 556-3312 http://www.mscd.edu/~sga/

Tivoli 311 • (303) 556-3559 http://www.mscd.edu/~judicial/index.html

Student Media

•The Metropolitan Newspaper (and Online) •Metrosphere Literary & Arts Magazine •Met Report Streaming Online Video Newscast •Met Radio Webcast Radio Station

Student Problem Action Network

• Source for Information & Resources • Problem Solving • Negotiating College Processes

Student Travel

• Funding to educational conferences • Proposals reviewed monthly • One conference per student per year • Faculty or staff advisor required

Tivoli 313 • (303) 556-2507 http://www.mscd.edu/~osm

Tivoli 311 • (303) 556-3559 http://www.mscd.edu/~studlife/span.html

Tivoli 305 • (303) 556-5026 http://www.mscd.edu/~travel

Need a job with flexible hours in a supportive environment?

Then contact one of the departments listed above.

Board paves way for solar power

By Lou Christopher achris25@mscd.edu

A recent proposal to bring solar energy panels to the roofs of three Metro buildings was passed in December by the Auraria board of directors. Specific contract negotiations for the proposal are currently underway.

The project was a student initiative largely led by the Colorado Public Interest Research Group. It was brought to campus in part by Xcel Energy and 3 Phases Energy Services and will be the fifth largest solar initiative on a college campus in United States, said Jack Wylie, Student Government Assembly president. Wylie said the other four campus projects were in California.

Under the proposed contract, 3 Phases Energy Services would maintain ownership of the panels, but Metro would use all the energy they supplied.

Wylie said the panels would provide 3 percent of Metro’s energy. The project would also have potential for expansion, he said.

Larry Lopez, chair of the Auraria board of directors, said that due to time restrictions set forth by Amendment 37 – which states that 10 percent of electricity used in Colorado must come from renewable energy by 2015 – the negotiations would be concluded soon.

AURARIA • Denver eyes new campus connections Continued from 3 town and campus has been discussed, Desmond said.

“Speer is the physical barrier between Auraria and the city,” he said. “We would like to develop and enhance the landscape of Speer Boulevard.”

New developments could include retail shops, restaurants and bookstores. The DDP is also working to improve traffic light timing to make it easier to cross Speer.

Planning has also included a cultural focus on Auraria’s theater productions and the Starz FilmCenter. Desmond called the film center part of the “cultural fermentation” of downtown.

“The dynamic of the campus is going to change significantly in the next three to five years,” Kirchheimer said. “Auraria is the focal point for downtown, it is so important.”

Metropolitan State College of Denver is seeking comments from the public about the College in preparation for its periodic

evaluation by its regional accrediting agency. The College will undergo a comprehensive evaluation visit March 12-14, 2007, by a team representing The Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools. Metropolitan State College of Denver has been accredited by the Commission since 1971. The team will review the institution’s ongoing ability to meet the Commission’s Criteria for Accreditation.

The public is invited to submit comments regarding the College: Public Comment on Metropolitan State College of Denver The Higher Learning Commission 30 North LaSalle Street, Suite 2400 Chicago, IL 60602 Comments must address substantive matters related to the quality of the institution or its academic programs.

Comments must be in writing and signed; comments cannot be treated as condential.

All comments must be received by February 12, 2007

THE METROPOLITAN • 1.11.07

NEWS • 5

Photo by Jason Small • jsmall4@mscd.edu

ABOVE: Matthew Gray Gubler from the show Criminal Minds on CBS visits Professor Allison Cotton’s juvenile justice class on Nov. 14.

LEFT: Professor Robert Whitson holds up a piece of evidence from a mock crime scene his comparative criminal justice class investigated in March 2006.

Photo by Jenn LeBlanc • jkerriga@mscd.edu

Crime dramas favor fiction over fact New criminal justice students face realities not seen on television

By Geof Wollerman gwollerm@mscd.edu Professors say the popularity of law enforcement television shows like CSI may be encouraging students to take an interest in criminal justice, but may also be distorting their perception of real police work.

The annual number of graduates from Metro’s criminal justice program rose to 197 in 2005-2006, making the program the second most popular at Metro, according to the Office of Institutional Research.

“The trend over the last 25 years has been continuous growth,” criminal justice professor Joseph Sandoval said. “It’s simply that over the last ten years it’s increased significantly.”

And the program’s popularity is most likely due to shows like CSI, but students might be in for a surprise when they find out what law enforcement is really like, Sandoval said.

“The glamour that’s associated with the crime scene, with that kind of activity, is generally misplaced,” he said. Crime scene investigators are “not as popular as (CSI) would have you believe,” he said.

The show portrays special investigators solving complex and gruesome crimes, but Sandoval made clear that it is not accurate in its depictions.

At a real crime scene, the CSI officer may simply be an adjunct to the overall investigation, and the detective will still have control.

The investigative work shown on CSI involves a lot of lab work and requires a strong academic background in chemistry and anatomy, said Melinda Garner, a junior in the crimi-

nal justice program. Interested students might decide against the career track when they find out the schoolwork involved is more rigorous than expected.

“Chemistry’s a very hard field. (Students) have no idea … what the job is all about,” she said. “When you’re investigating a crime scene, you have to have the intelligence and information to know how to investigate it. If somebody’s dead, and they need to figure out how the person died – What was the cause of death? Did they get murdered? How can I tell? Well, let’s go into the anatomy of the body.”

“Now that I’m further along in my degree and I realize the reality of things, I watch it less and less, and I enjoy it less and less,” Booz said.

“It’s the drama of life, and you can’t show that accurately in an hour. You just can’t.”

Last semester, criminal justice professor Allison Cotton, whose background is in criminology, brought in actor Matthew Gray Gubler from the show Criminal Minds to speak to a class about what it’s like to play a criminologist.

It was interesting and exciting for the class, but Gubler’s character does not reflect the work of a real criminologist, Cotton said.

“I think we have an influx of students who are interested in forensic science, who are interested in criminal justice because they don’t understand what forensic science is .”

-- Prof. Allison Cotton Because evidence appears so readily on CSI and everything is conveniently connected, people get the impression that solving cases is easy, Garner said.

“People think, ‘Oh my gosh, how easy that looks, and how much fun that is. Look at all the technology they can use.’ When in all reality it’s not going to be that easy,” she said.

Law enforcement television shows are definitely not accurate, criminal justice student Rhea Booz said.

“I think that some people who actually get into it and realize really what it is that you have to learn to be a CSI – I mean, it’s daunting. The chemistry is just overwhelming,” she said. “So I think maybe that (students) have a little disillusionment there, that it’s a little bit harder and that it’s a little bit more boring.”

Booz said she used to watch CSI a lot more but the show was not why she went into criminal justice.

“There are very few elite units like the television show Criminal Minds,” she said. The show is centered on a team of five agents trained in everything from behavioral science to drugs to explosives. In the real world, no such criminologists exist.

“As criminologists we basically study and write reports. We publish,” Cotton said. “We don’t carry guns, we don’t know anything about drugs or explosives. And so those television shows really put everything in a very unrealistic light.”

Criminal justice students may be initially influenced by television shows, but Cotton believes this just gives professors the chance to show them what the field is really like.

“I think we have an influx of students who are interested in forensic science, who are interested in criminal justice because they don’t understand what forensic science is,” she said.

“You basically have a degree in some type of science, and you are not an agent.”

Also, people involved in forensics are generally civilians and are rarely called to the scene of a crime, she added.

“The people who are the forensic scientists are the people who are analyzing blood samples and stuff like that,” Cotton said. “They sit in a lab all day, every day, for months on end, before anything breaks in the case. So their jobs are much more monotonous than the television shows.”

Shows like CSI definitely influence students, criminal justice professor Hal Nees said, and their content does not reflect real life.

“Ninety-five percent of what you see on TV has nothing to do with the reality of criminal justice,” he said. “(Some people) think that CSIs run the investigations. They don’t. … Investigators run the investigations.”

Employees on the scientific side of cases usually hold doctorate degrees, and are intended to be technicians, Nees said. “They’re good quality, intelligent people who know what they’re doing, but they are not investigators,” he said.

The people who investigate crime scenes are, for the most part, detectives, Sandoval said, adding, “And in order to get that assignment you have to spend time as a police officer.”

After completing a 16-week academy program and an additional four-month training program, new college graduates will generally spend five to 10 years as an officer in order to become a detective, said Virginia Quinones, a Denver police detective.

In terms of CSI work, it depends what sort of law enforcement department in which you find a job. For instance, she said, Denver has a crime lab, but a lot of its employees are civilians with specialized backgrounds.

“There’s no guarantee at all that that’s where you’ll end up,” Quinones said.

6 • NEWS

Retaining students, setting goals

By Ruthanne Johnson rjohn180@mscd.edu In an effort to increase student retention and graduation rates, Metro implemented the Reece Learning Community in fall 2006. It was the first program in a four-pronged initiative called Transition Services, which also includes a General Learning Community, Sophomore Retention Services and Services for Transfer Students.

“A series of interrelated factors affects our low student retention and graduation rates,” Metro President Stephen Jordan said. “We had to figure out how to better create success for our students.”

Jordan cited increased student enrollment and a higher number of provisional students

admitted as a few of the recent challenges presented to Metro.

“Metro is an institution for opportunity, a college that has generally admitted students based on having a high school diploma or GED, as compared to other institutions that can choose who they admit,” said Sallye McKee, associate to the president for diversity. “Transition Services is geared to help not only those students who are less prepared for college, but also for those wanting a more meaningful college experience.”

McKee added that a successful college experience includes involvement in the academic community, identifying and realizing personal goals, and establishing strong commitments.

“The learning community concept is based

on about 20 years of research,” McKee explained, adding that academically celebrated schools such as the University of Michigan have been using learning communities for years.

“Learning communities are designed to more closely involve students with other students, faculty with their students, faculty with other faculty, and everyone with their surrounding community,” she said.

According to McKee, fragmentation within the various college departments has long been the norm in higher education. But research now demonstrates that integration between departments creates a more comprehensive learning experience for the student.

Headed by faculty member Dalinda Solis,

See TRANSITION Page 7

GRADUATING?

Attention! All Potential Spring 2007 Degree Candidates All Students Who Will Have Completed All Degree Requirements by the End of Spring Semester, 2007: 1 Must file an Application for Graduation in the Office of the Registrar (CN105) by Friday, January 26, 2007.

The Application for Graduation is available in the Office of the Registrar (CN105) and on-line: www.mscd.edu/enroll/registrar/docs/index.htm (May be faxed to 303-556-2568.)

2 Should have a CAPP Compliance Report run NOW in their major department or the Academic Advising Center (CN104).

3 Must clear or explain all CAPP discrepancies (Not Met) with the Registrar’s Office by March 2nd in order to remain a degree candidate for this semester.

4 Monitor the Spring 2007 Graduation/ Commencement Website on MetroConnect throughout the semester.

METROPOLITAN STATE COLLEGE of DENVER

1.11.07 • THE METROPOLITAN

5 seats filled despite subpar voter turnout

By Lou Christopher achris25@mscd.edu The Student Government Assembly held a special election in early December that filled five of the assembly’s seats.

The election drew 447 voters – or about two percent – of the 21,151 students enrolled at Metro during the fall semester. Jason Doyle, chair of the special election’s commission, said the average turnout for a normal general election is 500-600 voters.

The election filled three senate seats, the student representative for the Student Advisory Committee to the Auraria Board seat and the vice president’s seat, which has not had a permanent person in the role since May 2006.

The three new senators are MacKenzie Lintz, Brian Campbell and Jacy Pickens. The student representative for SACAB is Tiffany Pendleton and the new vice president is Ashley Averill. Eight candidates ran for election.

“I thought we did pretty well with under three weeks’ preparation,” Doyle said about the relatively low turnout.

To get the word out, Doyle said the special election commission sent out personal e-mails, left messages on the message boards of MetroConnect, hung flyers around campus and banners at the Tivoli and set up a polling booth at the Auraria Library.

Erica Munguia, an SGA senator, said she thinks the low turnout was due to students not using their MetroConnect accounts and also a general lack of school spirit.

Munguia didn’t use her account until she joinined clubs and got involved on campus.

However, Munguia said she has high hopes for Metro’s future.

“I don’t think people care now, but they will in the future with campus housing,” she said.

With more housing opportunities around the college for younger students and the average age of students becoming lower, the college will change into a more traditional higher learning center, Munguia said.

“I don’t think it is necessarily low school spirit per se, but (students) have more going on with their own lives,” said Jack Wylie, the SGA president.

“Education is number one for Metro students,” he said.

With students not aware of elections or what the SGA does, Wylie said students are reluctant to vote because they don’t see their vote as having an effect.

Wylie is optimistic about future elections.

With one election under their belt, the commission now has the experience to successfully handle the next general election and increase voter turnout, Wylie said. Without the time constraints of a special election, the commission can get started sooner and planning will not be a last-minute thought.

“With one more week, we could have significantly had more votes,” Wylie said.

Kaivon Tolooee, a Metro student, said he didn’t vote in the election because he didn’t know enough about the candidates or the SGA. “If I knew (the SGA) had an impact, I would vote,” Tolooee said.

THE METROPOLITAN • 1.11.07

NEWS • 7

Campus doubles as winter shelter Amy Woodward awoodwa5@mscd.edu

Photo by Jenn LeBlanc • jkerriga@mscd.edu

The Daily Grind’s longtime spot in the Tivoli will be filled this semester by locally-owned Cimarron Cafe, which will host open-mic nights and poetry readings.

CIMARRON • Fresh decor, quality food defines Tivoli’s new eatery Continued from 3 implement a recycling program and is willing to install a dishwasher and use real dishes instead of paper plates.

“It was primarily the quality of what they are,” said Teb Blackwell, tenant relations coordinator with the Tivoli’s Student and Auxiliary Services. “SACAB made the selection and went back and had each of the potential bidders present a little meeting that had samples of their food. They opened the floor to questions, and it just seemed like this was the company that the committee liked the best.”

Some other factors contributing to the selection of Cimarron were the prices, the menu, the quality of the food and that they could be up and running by the time students returned to campus for the spring semester. The cafe is also willing to host poetry readings and open-mic nights.

“We wanted students to be able to have something to do after hours, and Ci-

marron said that as long as there was business, they’d stay open,” Lally said.

“We want to become the local hangout,” said Maria Portelli, Cimarron’s general manager at the Tivoli location.

Cimarron is an independently owned company that has been in operation for three years.

They have two other Denver locations.

“These people seemed more organic,” Lally said. “They seemed more excited about working with students and making it a cool place to hang out than with profit margins.”

The cafe serves a lot more than coffee and pastries, Portelli said. It will have a grill, which means it will be able to offer more complete meals, and is also in the process of applying for a liquor license.

“This is probably our biggest location so far,” Portelli said of the Auraria contract. “We’re very excited to work with students.”

The week before the cafe opens will be spent decorating and painting.

“The aesthetic part will be totally different,” Portelli said.

The new decor will include a bigscreen TV, a stage area and better lighting.

Cimarron is still in the process of hiring staff, and Portelli expects to be working on staffing until the end of January.

Cimarron is still in the process of reviewing its contract with Auraria, but the deal should be finalized by Jan. 10.

Though the Daily Grind chose not to renew its lease in 2007, it left a lasting impression on the campus as a friendly, independently owned company.

“Hopefully this group will have the same warm feeling instead of a cold corporate thing,” Lally said.

TRANSITION • Learning communities facilitate student retention Continued from 6 who implemented a similar learning community program at the University of Texas-Pan American, the project is geared toward helping Metro students successfully transition into college and to facilitate a comprehensive learning experience that will encourage them to remain at Metro throughout their higher education.

The Reece Learning Communities initially recruited 100 provisionally admitted freshmen, targeting them for additional assistance through peer mentoring, supplemental instructors, blocked scheduling and linked courses.

Assigned into groups of 20, students in the program take two general education courses together, after which a designated “Rowdy Break” with tutoring and study time is scheduled. As the program evolves, the faculty strives to teach students to learn together and act collectively on projects, while developing joint syllabi and class projects.

Of the 100 students who volunteered for the Reece pilot program, 65 will continue through spring 2007. Mandatory enrollment in the Reece Learning Community for all provisionally admitted students will begin in fall 2007.

Much like the Reece Learning Community, the General Learning Community includes a cross-pollination of departments, courses, students, faculty and curriculum. Unlike the provisionally required program, however, it is available for any Metro student on a voluntary basis and for faculty wanting to develop a new learning community within the college.

Sophomore Retention Services will focus on developing sophomore level learning communities and ensuring that sophomore level students have sufficient academic support. They will hire peer educators and supplemental instructors who will be trained and assigned to gate keeping general curriculum courses and providing

outside class support. Student tutors will be hired specifically for sophomore level students, and additional training in retention issues will be given to faculty who teach sophomore level courses.

Services for Transfer Students will focus on developing learning communities geared toward the specific needs of transfer students. Additional training will be provided for faculty in the unique transfer niche.

As Transition Services moves toward full implementation in fall 2007 and evolves over the next five years, President Jordan hopes that Metro will join the ranks of other academically prestigious urban colleges.

“When I became president and saw what was occurring on Metro’s campus, I realized we were churning too many students,” he said, adding that it is his vision to create a pre-eminent urban baccalaureate college.

Auraria Campus was transformed into a temporary Red Cross shelter for stranded motorists, travelers and others in need during the back-toback blizzards that hit Denver last December.

“During both storms we received a call from the Denver Office of Emergency Management requesting that we open the emergency shelter,” said Heather Coogan, chief of police at Auraria.

As laid out in a signed agreement with the Red Cross, Auraria sometimes makes its buildings available to house people affected by storms, natural disasters and other emergencies. And with well over 100 people sheltered during each of the recent storms, Auraria’s empty buildings became much-needed safe havens.

According to Coogan, more than 300 people were sheltered on campus during the storms, including 150 Amtrak travelers brought over from Union Station.

During the first blizzard, these passengers stayed in the Auraria Event Center. The Red Cross furnished supplies needed for the emergency – cots, blankets and food – and campus police assisted as needed, Coogan said. The blowing snow was so bad that at one point during the first storm the Red Cross had trouble transporting people to the campus, she said.

“The very large bus that brought the people to campus got stuck in the storm. It took my officers two hours to dig it out,” Coogan said.

During the second blizzard, the campus police received another call for assistance and ended up housing about 120 people at the King Center.

“This time the group of people came from the bus depot,” Coogan said, referring to the Greyhound terminal at 1055 19th St. “They were furnished with cots and blankets, and the Salvation Army provided food.”

There were no major problems on campus during either storm, but several minor situations kept Sgt. Greg Stall busy. In one memo, Stall reported that a pregnant woman staying in the King Center was experiencing pain and bleeding. The woman was later transported to Denver Health Medical Center.

Other reports by Stall indicated that several individuals had medical problems.

In Stall’s first memo, Officer Ken Olin and guard Randy Vialpando were mentioned with gratitude for their help. Olin and Vialpando spent nights checking in on the King Center’s unexpected residents.

“The people were very grateful for our help and the safety we provided,” Coogan said.

Big blizzards Dec. ‘06 49.2” March ‘03 35.0” April ‘05 19.7”

Information obtained from the NOAA

metrospective Who wants to play a game?

PAGE 12

The Met’s Lou Christopher rocks out with a Guitar Hero controller. Guitar Hero 2 is one of the staff’s picks for games of the year.

Photo by Jenn LeBlanc • jkerriga@mscd.edu

Earthquakes out of tune The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes 99 minutes Not rated Opens Jan. 12

By Joe Nguyen nguyejos@mscd.edu Sometimes beauty is a beast.

In The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes, directors and identical twin brothers Stephen and Timothy Quay delve into a surreal world where dreams cross reality and nothing is as it seems. Although the cinematography is captivating and the performances are enjoyable, its nonsensical plot and poor storytelling make it difficult to endure.

The story begins with Malvina, played by Amira Casar (Sylvia), an attractive opera singer who is temporarily killed and abducted on stage by the mysterious Dr. Droz, played by Gottfried John (GoldenEye). A piano tuner named

Courtesy of Zeitgeist Films

César Saracho plays Don Felisberto Fernandez in The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes.

Felisberto, played by César Saracho (Institute Benjamenta), is summoned to Droz’s illustrious home to work on his bizarre automatons. While there, Felisberto uncovers Droz’s diabolical plan to imprison Malvina with his automatons.

Unfortunately, the filmmakers fail to explore Droz’s potential as the story’s antagonist or to explain his motivation for kidnapping Malvina. Instead they make him out to be an obsessed fan who decides to take her during a performance. Add this to the strange machinery Droz keeps in

THE METROPOLITAN • PAGE 9 • ADAM GOLDSTEIN • GOLDSTEA@MSCD.EDU

his home, and he comes off as nothing more than a onedimensional super villain.

Saracho’s ability to connect with the audience as the story’s hero makes his performance a bright spot in this otherwise dreary mess. Unlike his fellow cast members, he was able to convey natural human emotions.

Some of the film’s more frustrating aspects are the awkward transitions packed into this 99-minute feature.

Just as tension builds up, the music is cut and the focus is abruptly shifted to something different.

Of the movie’s few strengths, the one that stands out is its aesthetically pleasing cinematography. The filmmakers made full use of the surrounding landscape to create stunning shots. The soft filter used throughout creates the effect of dreamlike hallucinations while color filters separate dream sequences from reality, a technique reminiscent of the one used in Zhang Yimou’s Hero.

The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes is a world filled with beauty and intrigue. It’s a shame that the audience can’t share in the latter.

PULLOUT SECTION

timeout “ THE METROPOLITAN • 1.11.07

METROSPECTIVE • 11

I want you To be my Te Ni Nee Ni Nu Tell me the truth Ain’t you my Te Ni Nee Ni Nu?

Everyday Blues

”

– SLIM HARPO

Adam Goldstein • goldstea@mscd.edu

This Day in History 1.11.07 Today’s Birthdays

Statesman Alexander Hamilton – 1757 Wrestler Gory Guerrero – 1921 Blues pioneer Slim Harpo – 1924 Jazz composer Lee Ritenour – 1952 Golfer Ben Crenshaw – 1952 R&B chanteuse Mary J. Blige – 1971 Actress Amanda Peet – 1972

On this day...

I vant to suck your blood...

DTU

Joe Nguyen and Conor Drummond • nguyejos@mscd.edu • cdrummon@mscd.edu

1919 – Romania annexes Transylvania with little trouble. Happily, the native bloodsucking population is allowed to keep their coffins, widow’s peaks and trusty bat familiars.

Flight of the navigator…

1935 – Amelia Earhart becomes the first aviator to fly solo from Hawaii to California and the first pilot to use a two-way radio during flight. Less than two years later, the trailblazing flyer would disappear over the Atlantic. The two-way radio was never heard from again.

Going to a gogo…

1963 – The Whiskey a Go Go, which became the launching point for some of rock’s bestknown artists, opens in Los Angeles. Scantily clad female DJs hang in suspended cages around the room during the first show, paving the way for Mary Quant’s revolutionary miniskirt design three years later.

Across 1- Applaud 5- Trading center 9- Horn-shaped bone 14- Shelter for honeybees 15- Banned apple spray 16- Mountain nymph of Greek mythology 17- Image of a deity 18- Liqueur of Greece 19- Stiff 20- Ratified 22- Steal, ransack 23- Fish appendage 24- Fatal agent 25- Theme 29- In front 32- Assumed name 34- Embellishment 39- Short tail 40- Relaxed 42- Neighborhood 43- Liquid hydrocarbon 45- Capital of Burma 47- Fragrant oil 49- Ages 50- Rifts 54- Organ of hearing 56- Rate 57- Nonsense 63- Deep black 64- Drug-yielding plant 65- Reflected sound 66- Flinch 67- Female child 68- Similar to 69- War horse 70- Completely without madness 71- Unit of force Down 1- Stylish 2- Italian resort 3- River which flows through Stratford in England 4- Dirty money 5- New Zealand aboriginal 6- Female graduate 7- Tear down 8- Stepped 9- Bullfight 10- Bay window 11- Royal 12- Ingenuous 13- Mammary gland in cows 21- Full of unresolved questions 24- City in central Sri Lanka 25- Face covering 26- A single time 27- Travel from place to place 28- Excited about 30- Old Testament book 31- Before 33- Confronts 35- Long luxuriant hair 36- Therefore 37- Inert gas 38- Makes brown 41- Hill insect 44- Siberian dog 46- Swiss river 48- Converted, in a way 50- Ships’ companies 51- Nun wear 52- Make amends 53- From that time 55- White-barked poplar tree 57- Jokes 58- Bones found in the hip 59- Went through, as the paper 60- Distasteful 61- Type of guard 62- Sharpen Crossword reprinted courtesy of bestcrosswords.com. Solution for puzzle can be found at http://www.bestcrosswords.com/. (Solution is under Jan. 7 puzzle.)

13 • METROSPECTIVE

1.11.07 • THE METROPOLITAN

THE METROPOLITAN • 1.11.07

METROSPECTIVE • 14

Clockwise from left: Sony’s PSP system turned out titles that redefined handheld gaming capabilities in 2006.

Galactic Civilizations 2: The Dread Lords gives players the option to fully customize their ships.

Play time

Wii Sports incorporates full-body motion with the aid of wireless controllers. The tactile approach to gaming brings baseball, tennis, bowling and golf to a higher level.

Photo illustrations by Jenn LeBlanc • jkerriga@mscd.edu

The Met staff choose their favorite video games of 2006 Guitar Hero II Publisher: Red Octane Platform: PS2 Price: $49.99 In this age of gaming, currently dominated by first-person shooters, sports games and Grand Theft Auto clones, Guitar Hero II is a well-crafted and innovative foray into the oft-overlooked puzzle genre.

Included with the game is a 5-fretted guitar controller, which is strummed to play. The game features 64 songs from artists as varied as Guns N’ Roses, Megadeth and Primus.

Building on its predecessor, Guitar Hero II offers a multiplayer mode, allowing two players to play – one on lead guitar and the other on bass or rhythm guitar to a given track.

The track list is predominantly metal, which means quick fingering passages in between multi-fingered chord changes on the harder levels. Or to take Strong Bad’s advice, “For squeadlies, mash on the trembalo. For meadlies, tone up on your chord supressors. Oh, and I’m awesome.”

However, on the easier difficulty settings, the game can almost be too easy.

To compensate for the added difficulty, the control sensitivity has been tweaked, making hammer-ons and pull-offs much easier to complete.

The game is best enjoyed in a group setting, with players of all different levels of skill and sobriety rocking out and trading riffs.

Owners of the Xbox 360 can look forward to a March 2007 port of the game, complete with 10 extra tracks and the prospect of downloadable songs.

– Matthew Quane • mquane@mscd.edu

Galactic Civilizations 2: The Dread Lords Platform: PC Publisher: Stardock Price: $29.99 Galactic Civilizations 2: The Dread Lords consumed my life for months after its release. Night after night I stayed up until ungodly hours, directing my civilization towards total domination of the known galaxy. Nearly every facet of this game, from the challenging computer opponents to the awesome ship design function, was perfectly tuned. Even better, the developers have continually fixed problems, tweaked rough areas and added new features via free, downloadable updates to keep it fresh. The result is possibly the best space-strategy game ever created, one of the few games I see myself still playing five years from now. The fact it emerged from a tiny, independent publisher almost without fanfare and went on to become a top seller and made plenty of “Game of the Year” lists also makes it the gaming world’s feel-good story of the year.

– Cory Casciato • casciato@mscd.edu Daxter Publisher: SCEA Platform: PSP Price: $39.99 The real appeal of Daxter goes far beyond its intricate environments, its surprisingly responsive gameplay and its sardonic storyline. This portable incarnation of the well-trod franchise proves that the PSP can offer a game that is just as mature, challenging and graphically rich as its console kin.

The game impressively incorporates innovation and familiarity in its graphics, sound, plot and seamless controls. Daxter has left Jak behind, and the character’s first solo foray into the action genre finds him fighting fantastical creatures, exploring labyrinthine mazes and piloting speedy hover vehicles.

Though the main mission of the game is to rid Haven City of insects, Daxter

The Wii sports a slim, stylish design and includes a free copy of Wii Sports. Nintendo’s new system seeks to attract new gamers of all ages and backgrounds with its novel and approachable controller design.

manages to pack in plenty of auxiliary adventure. This game is much more than merely swatting bugs, as each level presents a unique mission and a new nuance in the gameplay. The game’s diverse approach is especially noteworthy considering the game’s platform, as its depth and fluidity easily trumps most other PSP titles and even rivals many console games.

If Daxter’s triumphs are any indication, 2007 will see a higher quality in Sony’s portable gaming titles. Though its graphics and gameplay will be hard to beat, I look forward to the efforts.

– Adam Goldstein • goldstea@mscd.edu Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories Platform: PSP Publisher: Rockstar Games Price: $29.99 The formula is simple: Give gamers a free-roaming environment, a dizzying arsenal of weapons, a nostalgia-driven pop soundtrack and let them loose to wreak violent virtual havoc.

This basic recipe has made the Grand Theft Auto series one of modern gaming’s most ubiquitous and most imitated franchises. Despite its more tired and familiar elements, the series continues to crank out engaging and entertaining games for a variety of platforms.

Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories, 2006’s follow-up to Liberty City Stories, manages to maintain the gory appeal of its forebears even as it introduces some entertaining plot twists.

Sure, the action may seem worn to players familiar with the series. Sure, the GTA formula does not allow for great strides in innovation or variation from the established formula. And, sure, many of the missions seem to echo past incarnations. The fact remains that no imitator can match Rockstar’s unique combination of violence and soap-opera histrionics, and the publisher has maintained a degree of quality and integrity with all its titles.

The inherent limitations of the PlayStation Portable tend to adversely affect

the trademark gameplay of the franchise. Vice City Stories stands out among its fellow portable titles as one of the year’s most engaging and entertaining additions.

For any gamer content to explore well-worn action and familiar settings, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories provides enough fast cars, dangerous guns and ’80s pop tunes to satisfy until the release of GTA IV later this year.

– Goldstein Wii Sports Platform: Nintendo Wii Publisher: Nintendo Price: Free with a system purchase Sure, Wii Sports is overly simple, looks like it could have come out ten years ago and lacks the buzz of the year’s blockbuster titles, but it was one of the best, and most important, games of last year. Up to four players at a time can compete, using customizable, cartooney, Playmobil-like characters called “Miis.” It may not sound like much, but the awesome power of this free game (it comes packed in with the Wii) should not be underestimated. Any video game that can convert a roomful of self-declared video game haters into enthusiasts in the course of a single game of bowling is a great game indeed. Wii Sports is the premier gateway drug of gaming.

– Casciato Gears of War Platform: Xbox 360 Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios Price: $59.99 Gears of War is not only the best-looking game I’ve ever seen, it’s also one of the most intense, visceral shooters I’ve ever played. Sure, the story is weak and the characters are overly macho, generic “space marine” types, but this is the video game equivalent of a blockbuster action movie. From the moment the game places a gun into the player’s hand to the final, grueling fight, Gears never falters.

If it gets too hard – and it gets damn hard – a second player can jump in at any time to help out. When the too-short campaign ends, endless battles against friends and strangers can be found on Microsoft’s Xbox Live online service. What else could hardcore shooter fans ask for? A gun with a chainsaw bayonet, maybe? Oh yeah, it has that too.

– Casciato Marvel Ultimate Alliance Publisher: Activision Platforms: Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, PS3, PS2, Xbox, PSP, GBA, PC Prices: $59.99 (360, PS3); $49.99 (Wii, PC); $39.99 (PS2, Xbox, PSP); $29.99 (GBA) As a Marvel fanboy, Ultimate Alliance is a fantasy come true.

Based on the X-Men Legends engine, the game allows players to choose up to four heroes to take into battle. And with 24 playable characters, including fan favorites Spider-Man and the Silver Surfer, gamers can create their dream team of heroes.

In all there are more than 140 characters making appearances, making this the largest cast of Marvel creations ever assembled in a video game. Players take their team through levels battling an assortment of super villains, from the mischievous Arcade from Uncanny X-Men to the demonic Mephisto from The Silver Surfer.

The only problem with the game is that it’s too easy on the normal difficulty level. Unfortunately, players have to beat the game on normal in order to unlock hard.

Despite this setback, Marvel Ultimate Alliance is an action-packed game that boasts hours of entertainment. And with the seemingly endless number of heroes in the Marvel universe, there’s bound to be sequel with more characters, especially since this game hints at an eventual showdown with a big super villain.

– Joe Nguyen • nguyejos@mscd.edu

THE METROPOLITAN • PAGE 14 • MEGAN CARNEAL • MCARNEAL@MSCD.EDU

audiofiles

Staff favorites for 2006 Bob Dylan Modern Times (Columbia)

Decades after releasing his first album, Dylan serves up another solid, haunting performance that includes a few new covers of some old classics.

Geof Wollerman • gwollerm@mscd.edu Old Bob may be near the end of a legendary career, but he still felt the need to spit out one more masterpiece. His first album in five years is considered one of his best works, and can even be ordered on vinyl.

Upcoming shows The Gourds Jan. 13 Gothic Theatre 3263 South Broadway 8:00 p.m. $14, 21+ The Gourds are known for being the epitome of random music makers, associating their already odd songs with things like “Spanish poetry” and “Oregon motels.” The result makes for a night of music without the slightest clue of where the tunes will end up.

Shannon Yoshida • syoshida@mscd.edu

Shannon Yoshida • syoshida@mscd.edu

God Forbid

The Hold Steady Boys and Girls in America (Vagrant)

Jan. 17

The Thermals The Body, the Blood, the Machine (Sub Pop Records)

Combining drugs, booze and a thesis straight from Kerouac, Craig Finn and company have crafted a pick-of-the-litter album. In retrospect, The Hold Steady’s 2005 effort Separation Sunday should have topped my best-of-2005 list, but this placement is hardly a way of making up for my previous lapse in judgment.

This punk-rock concept album about a messianic religious cult and the apocalypse couldn’t have been better if it were recorded by David Koresh himself.

Cory Casciato • casciato@mscd.edu

Matt Quane • mquane@mscd.edu

The Little Willies The Little Willies (Milking Bulls)

Joanna Newsom Ys (Drag City)

Norah Jones and friends play raucous, unadulterated honky-tonk with a little country soul. This album is riddled with lyrics that are dirty, bizarre and miles from innocent.

Newsom redefines the scope and possibilities of popular music.

With just five tracks, Ys proves that not only classical instruments, but also classical composition has a place in this ever-“progressive” world.

Bluebird Theater 3317 E. Colfax 7 p.m. $14 in advance, $16 at the door, 16+ Splicing melody with metal while relentlessly touring, God Forbid leaves a lasting impression in every town they visit. They are a vibrant New Jersey export who have enjoyed a substantial underground following since their inception in 1996. With their soul-slashing guitar work and shameless showcasing of emotion both in lyrics and tone, this quintet will gather all of their strength in a concentrated effort to bring you to your knees.

Billy Schear • wschear@mscd.edu

Taylor Sullivan • tsulli21@mscd.edu

• Wollerman

Beirut Gulag Orkestar.

(Ba Da Bing!)

Beck The Information (Interscope)

Shiny Toy Guns We Are Pilots (Universal)

You’re in love with a Russian girl who is about to be deported and you will run, fight, die and do anything but be separated from the most beautiful thing that ever happened to you. This is the soundtrack.

Beck has created yet another album that hits the notes near perfection. With nostalgic rhythms similar to those in Odelay, he sings of nausea and his cell phone dying.

With their high-energy live electronica, Shiny Toy Guns put a fresh beat into every party. We are Pilots offers high spirits, even in the face of death, and danceable tunes. The abundant happiness reminds people that there are good times to be had.

• Yoshida

• Sullivan

Cassie Hood • hoodc@mscd.edu

Wolfmother Wolfmother (Interscope)

Radio Disney Jams Volume 8 (Disney)

Califone Roots and Crowns (Thrill Jockey Records)

For those who thought rock about mythical creatures, mystical love and the forces of Satan was history, the Australian band Wolfmother gave a heavy nod to the genre with this self-titled tribute. With tracks such as “The White Unicorn,” “Pyramid” and “Where Eagles Have Been,” the album is equal parts Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath and Ronnie James Dio. Horns not included.

The quintessential Radio Disney collection, Volume 8 is an evolutionary step up from the previous seven. Avril Lavigne’s “Sk8er Boi” has occupied the play lists of many a compilation album, but now it’s finally properly complemented by appearing alongside such other stellar artists as Hillary Duff and Bowling For Soup. This album will teach you to love life.

The band’s mutant sci-fi blues/folk/ country hybrid was polished and refined to near-perfection on this album. Fine songwriting and excellent production made this not only their most accessible album so far, but possibly their best as well.

• Wollerman

Billy Schear • wschear@mscd.edu

• Casciato

THE METROPOLITAN • 1.11.07

AUDIO FILES • 15

New York Dolls One Day It Will Please Us To Remember Even This (Roadrunner)

Red Hot Chili Peppers Stadium Arcadium (Warner Bros.)

Mastodon Blood Mountain (Reprise)

After influencing a host of artists and musicians over the past three decades, it was about time that two out of five original members reunited and released a few tunes reminding us that only the good die young. A heartfelt blast from the past, or an exercise in pointless nostalgia? Only their true fans know for sure.

Stadium Arcadium is likely one of the most impressive records by the Chili Peppers since Californication. Throughout the 28-song journey on the double-disc boxed set, John Frusciante is clearly the heart of the new album. Coming back from his heroin addiction, he brought with him the guitar skills that make his solos pure genius.

Every skinny indie kid needs a healthy dose of metal every once in a while, and Mastodon has the wherewithal to serve up more than a person’s daily allowance.

• Yoshida

• Schear

Pat Bianchi East Coast Roots (Jazzed Media) The Hammond organ’s unique sound has made its way from the jazz world into just about every other genre. Denver’s Pat Bianchi is among the few players who stay true to the instrument’s roots, and this album is a modern testament to the wide-ranging adaptability of the Hammond’s timeless tone.

• Wollerman

Heartless Bastards All This Time (Fat Possum)

• Quane

Grizzly Bear Yellow House (Warp)

Rocky Votolato Makers (Barsuk)

The vocals and instrumentation on Yellow House waltz in your stomach, creating the feeling that you’re in a place you’ve never been and didn’t know existed – until now.

• Sullivan

Emily Haines Knives Don’t Have Your Back (Last Gang Records) This album will most likely not be found on many critics’ lists, but Haines – best known as the frontwoman of Metric – put together a solo effort that left me breathless multiple times over the course of the year.

The gentle, poetic folk tunes from ex-Waxwing member Rocky Votolato’s release Makers mollify the mind into a dreamstate. His delicate vocals and majestic guitar work weave a path through happiness and heartache. Anyone can relate to this journey, and the album provides a picturesque soundtrack for the year.

• Hood

Anti-Flag For Blood And Empire (RCA)

• Quane The image a name like Heartless Bastards conjures up is one of trite, overdone emo music. However, on their album All This Time, the angst isn’t the same old whiny crap.

Their lo-fi approach creates an authentic, down-home blues sound, and this album is perfect for sitting and relaxing.

OK, it’s a reissue, but this album is a criminally overlooked gem.

A blend of world-music rhythms and electronic tones and timbres that sounds genuinely prophetic next to what followed in its wake.

• Hood

• Casciato

Lily Allen Alright, Still (Parlophone/EMI)

Brian Eno/David Byrne My Life in the Bush of Ghosts (Nonesuch Records)

Islands Return to the Sea (Equator)

This Internet darling made the leap from MySpace to the big leagues with her amazing first album. Her pure pop appeal kept me skeptical, but she won me over with her comedy of British errors. Here’s to hoping she can keep it up.

Good pop music is hard to come by. Good Afro-Carribean, wittyyet-smooth, ingenious pop rock – with a slice of some untouchable rhymes from Busdriver – is almost impossible to find. Enter the Islands.

• Quane

• Sullivan

Oneida Happy New Year (Jagjaguwar)

Asylum Street Spankers “Stick Magnetic Ribbons On Your S.U.V.”

No band I’ve heard makes better use of repetition, dynamic shifts and grinding noise. They graft those elements to catchy melodies and so-dumb-they’re-clever lyrics to craft perfect, garage-pop masterpieces.

• Casciato

Arctic Monkeys Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not (Domino) The guys in the Arctic Monkeys are full of themselves, but their album, Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not, gives them room to be. They swept the world with their cocky attitude and fast, catchy songs.

OK, so it’s not an album. But the latest release – available via YouTube – by this long-running, raunchy ragtime group is one big hilarious pun and worth a few minutes from your day.

• Wollerman

Politics finally mixes with music thanks to these brave young men. Their first major label album proves to be a smash simply by overstating the obvious. It will stand the test of time by offering the world a list of problems with few or no solutions attached.

• Schear

The Decemberists The Crane Wife (Capitol) The Decemberists were my top pick last year, but dropped one slot this year – though not for lack of effort, as their interpretation of a Japanese folk tale soars above the rest of the fodder offered up this year.

• Quane

The Fiery Furnaces Bitter Tea (Fat Possum) Full of pain and misery, Bitter Tea by The Fiery Furnaces takes on the clever disguise of being upbeat and promising. With its randomly placed, quirky noises, melancholy lyrics and raspy, often out-of-tune vocals, the album defies the rules of a how to create a great record. Somehow, by using the elements that would usually form crap, the band created an ear-catching album.

• Hood

Regina Spektor Begin to Hope (Sire)

The Blow Paper Television Remarkably raw emotions are laid smooth to crisp, inventive mu- (K Records)

sic on Spektor’s most recent. With Begin to Hope, Spektor continues to put out strong albums without conforming to any dangerous boys’ games.

• Sullivan

Catchy songs powered by a tasty blend of electro-pop and indie-rock sensibilities and sounds may be an increasingly common idea, but The Blow pull it off as well as anyone and better than most.

• Casciato

• Hood

Oasis Stop The Clocks (Sony)

Bruce Springsteen We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions (Columbia) The Boss is back, and he brought everyone to his living room for the spontaneous creation of his latest album. Covering age-old songs in his own, legendary, blue-collar style, We Shall Overcome was recorded entirely in one take. Springsteen made sure to include violins, his folk guitar playing and an entourage of background vocals.

Our favorite Beatles imitators resurface, this time offering what has already been offered in this greatest-hits album – 18 tracks of pure delight. It opens the mind as well as the esophagus, causing gleeful vomiting every time it is played.

• Yoshida

• Schear

Murder By Death In Bocca al Lupo (Cooking Vinyl) Murder By Death aren’t as bad as their name sounds.

Despite the emo-rific name, the band reminisces of the good ol’ saloon days with songs about whiskey and brotherhood.

With a cello and Adam Turla’s hearty vocals, they are one of the most original sounds to come through the United States in years.

• Yoshida

16 • AUDIO FILES

1.11.07 • THE METROPOLITAN

Albums to look out for in 2007 Norah Jones

Tupac Shakur

Guns N’ Roses

Ry Cooder

A preview of the track “Rosie’s Lullaby” is available on Amazon.com, and Jones’ voice sounds just as smoky and sultry as ever. Due out in late January, this album will be a sure bet Valentine’s gift for any clueless lovers.

Tupac Shakur’s tentatively titled Till I C L.A., to be released in November, will be sure to change the way we feel about dead people releasing albums. This one promises to be even more introspective than the six other albums released since his early demise. Truth be told, the Thug Life really does pay off in the end.

Finally Axl Rose will live up to his destiny, reforming Guns N’ Roses with all-new musicians and releasing all-new material. This longawaited follow-up to 1991’s Use Your Illusion I and II is going to stabilize the economy in China and create one or two opposing parties that will nominate candidates who will run in the next election.

Cooder has been influential since the ’60s, producing numerous albums including Buena Vista Social Club and the movie score for Paris, Texas. This one is about the life of a fictional character named Buddy Red Cat, a little of whom is apparently in each of us.

• Schear

• Schear

• Wollerman

50 Cent

Courtney Love

Nine Inch Nails

As one of the hardest rappers in the industry, 50 Cent has capitalized stupendously on the thug appeal of gangsta rap. According to www. hiphopgalaxy.com, he told MTV that the album’s name comes from the fact that his self-destruction “could potentially happen.” Is this rap mogul predicting his own demise?

While in a court-ordered rehab center, Courtney Love penned eight of the songs on her upcoming album How Dirty Girls Get Clean. This sophomore solo record of Love’s will initiate listeners into a world of chemical dependency where only the six strings of a guitar can soothe the nerves. Also, as rumor has it, certain bars will exchange a free alcoholic beverage for it.

Nine Inch Nails is slated to release another album this year. So far it has no title, but sure as can be it will be chock-full of melancholy and remorse. It’s always fun to hear the escape of a man’s self confidence, especially when accompanied by some heavy synth music.

• Wollerman

• Schear

• Wollerman

Britney Spears The new Britney Spears album will dare to cross the threshold of pain and illusion, and it shall do so with the help of advanced marketing techniques. Rumors will be put to rest and rivals will be quashed when Spears takes the mic on what will be her fifth studio album. She is the voice of our generation, and we all have a sacred duty to hear her and obey.

• Schear

• Schear

Clem Snide

Worst album of the year

Named for a recurring William S. Burroughs character, this band is lamenting, talented and – with songs like “My African Friend” and “Messiah Complex Blues” – doggedly working to make weird the new cool.

• Wollerman

A true American personality, Kevin Federline demonstrates that Caucasian-induced hip-hop will never go out of style. Debuting at No. 151 on the Billboard 200 chart is ample evidence of his staying power and catching popularity, even though the following week it dropped off the charts completely.

Black Eyed Peas

• Schear Who knows what these eclectic hip-hoppers will put out next. One thing is for sure: you’ll be able to shake your ass to it.

• Wollerman

Kevin Federline Playing With Fire (Federline Records)

Hollywood will sign anyone these days. K-Fed is living proof, considering that when promoting his first and final album, he sang to nearly empty venues. Rapping that he wasn’t the “outcast” that the media labeled him, he was obviously lying only to himself.

freeplay

• Yoshida

Subhumans Religious Wars (Spiderleg Records, 1982)

By Megan Carneal mcarneal@mscd.edu

If punk were a religion, the Subhumans would have been its messiahs. Preaching to the masses from the anarchy gospel, they roused utopian visions of a self-sustaining subculture free from the confusion and abuse of an esoteric government.

Unfortunately for the Subhumans, the idea of anarchy as a peaceful lifestyle choice never fully caught on, and to this day, there is still no exclusive island where droves of

vegan-leather-clad citizens farm vegetables off their land by day and spend their nights frolicking between political and animal-rights discussions, science fiction book clubs and the atheist version of “Kumbaya.”

No, their legacy does not include said fantasy island, but what it does include is about two decades worth of amazing music, and their third EP, Religious Wars, offers a four-track glimpse into this impressive catalogue.

The namesake track showcases the epitome of a Subhumans song. Witty and provocative lyrics from the atheist’s view of dying for religion are conveyed with the frantic vocals of a paranoid genius. The instrumentation is apocalyptic, with tension-building progressions crashing into chaotic freeform explorations that defy the boundaries of genres.

As with most of their songs with intense subject matter, the lyrics inciting the most thought are accompanied by little instrumentation to make sure the idea comes across clearly.

“Work Experience” also carries the same kind of musical abandon felt in “Religious Wars.” The melody of the track is carried by the bass line, a technique they used heavily throughout their career. The guitar occasionally accents the song to provide backup melody for the chorus or to explode into epic breakdowns and strange sound effects.

Formerly the only way to obtain this out-of-print EP was to buy the Subhumans EP-LP, which contains all four of their first EPs. However, thanks to http://7inchpunk.com, frivolous spending can be avoided and Religious Wars can be downloaded by itself for free.

Download Subhumans’ Religious Wars EP at http:// www.7inchpunk.comcat=5

Every week, Freeplay will cover the best free albums and EPs to be found on the World Wide Web

“ Insight THE METROPOLITAN • PAGE 17 • MATTHEW QUANE • MQUANE@MSCD.EDU

Some of the guards started to taunt him - by shouting Islamic words. A cleric who was present asked Saddam to recite some spiritual words.

Saddam did so but with sarcasm.

– JUDGE MUNIR HADDAD

Adam Goldstein • goldstea@mscd.edu

”

ZÖE WILLIAMS williamz@mscd.edu

Justice in Iraq won’t come with a noose

their lay-about husband Duane, the “Electronic Technician,” to take down the Christmas lights.

Duane’s response? “Hold up, baby, right after the hog-tie competition. And bring me another Coors Light, will ya?”

Wake up, Denver. Duane is passed out on the couch, and Jerry Springer reruns are blaring on the tube. The other state capitals on the block are all laughing at us and telling their kids not to play in our yard.

This extravagance wouldn’t be a problem if the displays at the City and County Building were tasteful. But seriously, a blind kindergarten class could do a classier job than the floodlight disaster that drowns the building every year. It looks like a prisoner is trying to escape lockup at the Fisher Price Penitentiary. And let’s be honest, they’re not holiday lights, they’re Christmas lights. Hello, baby Jesus? So why are they left up for the stock show? You’d have to

On the first day of Eid-Al-Adha, the Muslim Feast of Sacrifice, Saddam Hussein was hanged for his role in the 1982 Dujail massacre that killed 148 Iraqis. Photographs and video splashed every news station with images of the black-clad Hussein led to the gallows by men in masks.

As a longtime anti-death penalty activist and an opponent of the Iraq war since its inception, it was a somber day. It is three and a half years into an unending war, 3,000 troops, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians and unknown hundreds of Iraqi combatants later, and the public is to look at the event as a “milestone on Iraq’s course to becoming a democracy,” as President Bush said.

It doesn’t make sense. The entire situation in Iraq has never made sense. We can look back and count every time Bush told us to “stay the course,” scrutinize the doomsday weapons-ofmass-destruction speeches and keep tallies of the dead, but you cannot make sense of a catastrophe. We can believe that killing Hussein is bringing Iraq closer to democracy, or we can start to push for coherence.

I choose the latter because I like my politics the way I like my cake batter: consistent.

After a stroll through the news headlines of the past four years, I can tell you that there isn’t one thing Saddam has done that Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice and their brigade of lackeys has not. After all, Donnie Rumsfeld shook hands with Hussein one year after he committed the crime that got him hanged.

Hussein was tried for the massacre at Dujail. I am not a big fan of judges and contemporary judicial process, but if we are aiming for consistency, set some dates for the massacres

See TAYLOR Page 18

See ZOË Page 18

All right kids, lights out Happy January, everyone, and welcome back to school. It’s time to finally put down your Wii controllers, purge your New Year’s Eve hangover and forget all about the holidays.

Not so fast, Denver City and County Building. Stay right where you are. You have to stay lit up like the holiday-clown whore you are.

Apparently, as tradition has it, whoever is in charge of the holiday lights at the City and County Building must be a full-blooded redneck, procrastinating against taking down the lights until they get Federico Peña’s ’84 Trans-Am off of the cinder blocks in Civic Center Park.

So what is behind this post-holiday, callthe-tenants’-association-to-complain, city-wide embarrassment? According to Denvergov.org, it is a tradition to keep the holiday lights lit, not through the duration of the holiday season, but until the king of cow-town antics, the National Western Stock Show, leaves town. So shortly after the New Year’s Ball drops, the building changes from a holiday-clown whore to a rodeo-

TAYLOR SULLIVAN tsulli21@mscd.edu clown whore.

Ahhh. Now it all makes sense. Red and green lights are an obvious representation of bull riding and funnel cake. And all the livestock from the nativity scene makes an easy transition into stock-show fare, with Joseph and the three wise men making excellent cowboys, and Santa standing in as a fine champion hog.

Everyone with any sense in Denver is like the nagging wife in this situation, begging

18 • INSIGHT

1.11.07 • THE METROPOLITAN

Safety before common sense Early New Year’s morning I found myself at a rockabilly tiki bar on Wienerstrasse in Berlin, suffering from a slight case of culture shock. My wife and I had come to Germany for the holidays to visit her family, and after 12 days of Christmas on the farm with all the siblings and grandmas, we escaped to celebrate New Year’s with friends in the big city.

With only a few hours until our flight, I sat with the dreamy sounds of Del Shannon’s “Runaway” drifting through the smoke-filled room, the night’s celebration still vibrating in my bones. I remembered what a German friend had said earlier in the night.

“It sounds as if New Year’s in America is all very organized and boring,” he said. “America is the land of the free, but almost everything you are doing tonight in Berlin is forbidden there.”

Here I was in Germany – the land of rules and regulations – getting lectured on how wellbehaved and obedient my country was. When I caught myself trying to explain that the laws are meant to protect us, I knew he had a point.

I was smoking in the bar, drinking after 2 a.m. A strange fragrance graced my nostrils of something other than tobacco being smoked publicly. Outside, the cherry bombs, rockets and things like sticks of dynamite continued to crackle in the night. Nearly everything I witnessed in Berlin was in some way illegal in Denver. What had changed in the United States, in Germany, in the world, that a German could

ANDREW FLOHR-SPENCE spencand@mscd.edu question American freedom?

In America, we have been overcome with fear. We are jaded and apathetic – ready to bargain away our freedoms in return for safety.

Fireworks are dangerous, that obviously had to be banned. Smoking kills and is stinky so we got rid of that, and drinking should only be done behind closed doors. Since Y2K and Sept. 11, because of the obvious dangers, large public celebrations have given way to private parties.

Along with the rash of new crosswalks and plastic playground equipment, America has regulated and restricted everything we could think of in the last 20 years, and now we make the Germans look like reckless rebels.

In Berlin, perhaps because of the relatively recent bouts with death and destruction, the people seem to go about life more carefree, ignoring the possible risks involved. It is good to be alive, to be free.

Shortly before midnight, everyone tumbled outside onto the sidewalk with drinks in hand for the countdown. A glass of champagne in one hand and a cone-shaped cigarette in the other, I put my back against the wall and stood watching the mayhem around me. The streets were filled with people milling about, dancing, singing and tossing firecrackers in the air like candy.

Through the gray smoke covering the street I could see flashes everywhere. The city whistled and thumped with explosions. Dust and cinders fell down like snow from the rockets bursting above. The chant of “zehn, neun, acht ...” rose up in the crowd, and at the count of “eins,” everyone cheered and began hugging and kissing. Champagne and beer were splashing everywhere, and glasses were broken.

The image of this public show of fearlessness struck me later that night. The fact that I was in a tiki bar surrounded by rockabilly hairdos, tattoos, piercings and leather jackets, and yet was supposedly in the land of lederhosen and spiked helmets, was a strange reminder of how small the world was getting. Fashion knows no borders. In this moment, what worried me was that in some ways the world was getting much more distant. Security was replacing common sense, and the fear of possible dangers was driving people to stay inside, yet life was on the street, embracing people and raising a glass to the new year.

TAYLOR • National Western Stock Show ensures ZOË • U.S. leaders that the lights will be up until the cows come home deserve equal treatment Continued from 17 ask the ghost of Buffalo Bill himself.

The only reason anyone comes to this town is because they expect an Old-West-style shootout to break out any minute, cowboys flying through the window of the corner saloon. And we wonder why!

Maybe it’s the shining beacon that can be seen from space telling the whole world that Denver never left 1878, that we are frozen in time like a woolly mammoth from the ice age.

We don’t even have cars here, just horses and carriages. No police, just the respect that comes at the end of a Winchester.

In fact, you will probably find some gold just sitting in the street next to the South Platte. If you can’t find us, just follow the smell of cow manure and the holy lights of the West.

If Denver wanted to leave the lights on a little longer, the least they could do is come up with a better excuse, like Chinese New Year’s, or Presidents Day, or “I’ll do it next Saturday,” for God’s sake.

Almost anything would be better than the National Western Stock Show, except maybe a clown whore. Anything is better than a clown whore.

Continued from 17 Fallujah, Basra, Baghdad, Mosul, Kirkuk and dozens of other Iraqi cities. As a friend of mine says, while Saddam’s cage is still warm, let’s pack the next round of brutal leaders in!

In all seriousness, a war crimes tribunal is the best opportunity we have to see our homegrown humans of mass destruction and war profiteers held accountable for the crimes of their rule. The Democrats surely won’t impeach them. Unless a revolution sparks up before 2008, the Bush administration facing the jury is the only chance for the people of the world to rest assured that, even in these times, justice can be served.

Think you could be the next Ann Coulter or Bill O’Reilly?

Too bad, they’re blowhards – we’re looking for someone more intelligent, like David Brooks or William Buckley Jr. The Metropolitan opinions section is currently looking for conservative writers to bring balance to its left-leaning pages.

ERIK WIESNER ewiesner@mscd.edu

Latin America moves left The political landscape of the world has often seemed bleak. That the country we live in represents a shamefully inhumane economic system is one thing; that it and its allies have been able to prop up this capitalist system across the world is a larger issue.

We on the left no longer have the dubious example of the Soviet Union as a sample of the economic possibility of cooperative work toward economic equality. Though the USSR had its own shameful hegemonic tendencies, millions were empowered by its aid and inspiration to cast off the shackles of colonialism, enabling them to experiment with economic models rooted in cooperation instead of exploitation.

For the last fifteen years, even that flicker of hope has been absent from this capitalist dystopia called Earth. Does this mean those with the courage and imagination to dream of a world without the waste of profiteering must now be hopeless? Should we just accept that, as Francis Fukuyama claims, we are at the end of history?

I, for one, know this is not the case. Capitalism has expanded to every corner of the globe, but that doesn’t mean it is victorious. And just because many think that this is a good system does not make it eternal. After all, there was a time when the majority could imagine no system better than agrarian feudalism.

It isn’t enough, however, to possess the vision to see beyond the status quo. If we can envision a better world than this one, we have a moral obligation to try to make that world manifest. This is where the bleakness of modern life sets in: Sometimes this system of hunger, wages, bosses, classes, et al. appears so firmly entrenched that to change it seems futile.

Yes, global capitalism seems to have a vice-like grip on power, but that grip is weakening enormously. The world as we know it is changing, and within our lifetimes we will see the beginning of the end of the system that has defined those lifetimes. Where is this change coming from? This country’s so-called backyard: Latin America.

Over the last decade, enormous changes have occurred in the political reality of Latin America. Men such as Hugo Chavez and Evo Moralez have been elected. Just recently Daniel Ortega was voted back into office in Nicaragua, and now a leftist economist named Rafael Correa is poised to win the presidency of Ecuador.

These men and many more people like them are pushing through reforms to feed and house the poor, provide free health care, fight corruption and much more.

This new tendency in Latin America is the direct result of U.S. behavior in a region it once considered a loyal sphere of influence.

The people of this hemisphere have tasted “free

See ERIK Page 19

THE METROPOLITAN • 1.11.07

ERIK • Democracy thrives in S. America Continued from 17 trade” globalization, and it tastes a lot better than the repressive, imperialistic economic systems imposed on them in the past. In short, they know the system that the United States has tried to push on them stinks, and they have taken it upon themselves to make sure they don’t have to deal with it anymore.

This growing movement of social change throughout Latin America is a ray of hope for those who see the moral corruption of the profit system and its advocates. I have no illusions that the leaders being elected are perfect men or even that they are motivated by anything more than self-interest, but the people of these countries have made their minds up, and anyone in power in Latin America had better do what the people want. It is this movement that will make the way for a better world.

This growing trend in Latin America is exactly what the world needs. We need to question the system in which we live and to examine the reasons people in Latin America have for rejecting it. Let this new movement shine as a beacon to those who know better than to blindly accept the status quo. Capitalism is all about competition, right? Well, now the capitalist concept itself is going to have to compete for its very existence.

SINCE 1979 EDITOR IN CHIEF Cory Casciato • casciato@mscd.edu MANAGING EDITOR Geof Wollerman • gwollerm@mscd.edu NEWS EDITOR David Pollan • dpollan@mscd.edu ASSISTANT NEWS EDITOR Lou Christopher • achris25@mscd.edu Josie Klemaier • jklemaie@mscd.edu OPINIONS EDITOR Matthew Quane • mquane@mscd.edu ASSISTANT OPINIONS EDITOR Andrew Flohr-Spence • spencand@mscd.edu FEATURES EDITOR Adam Goldstein •goldstea@mscd.edu ASSISTANT FEATURES EDITORS Chelsey Emmelhainz • cemmelha@mscd.edu Joe Nguyen • nguyejos@mscd.edu MUSIC EDITOR Megan Carneal • mcarneal@mscd.edu SPORTS EDITOR Eric Lansing • lansing@mscd.edu PHOTO EDITOR Jenn LeBlanc • jkerriga@mscd.edu COPY EDITORS Jeremy Johnson • jjohn308@mscd.edu Taylor Sullivan • tsulli21@mscd.edu Joel Tagert • tagert@mscd.edu ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF STUDENT MEDIA Donnita Wong ADVISER Jane Hoback

The Metropolitan is produced by and for the students of Metropolitan State College of Denver and serves the Auraria Campus. The Metropolitan is supported by advertising revenue and student fees, and is published every Thursday during the academic year and bi-weekly during the Summer semester. The Metropolitan is distributed to all campus buildings.

No person may take more than one copy of each edition of The Metropolitan without prior written permission.

Please direct any questions, comments, complaints or compliments to Metro Board of Publications c/o The Metropolitan. Opinions expressed within do not necessarily reflect those of Metropolitan State College of Denver or its advertisers. Deadline for calendar items is 5 p.m. Thursday. Deadline for press releases is 10 a.m. Monday. Display advertising deadline is 3 p.m.

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Our offices are located in the Tivoli Student Union, Room 313. Mailing address is P.O. Box 173362, Campus Box 57, Denver, CO 80217-3362.

INSIGHT • 19

Voter turnout falls flat What is with Metro’s Student Government Assembly elections and its paltry 2 percent voter turnouts?

Year after year, whether it is a special election or not, the SGA and its revolving door of an election commission cannot seem to drum up more than 400 to 600 voters.

Actually, the revolving-door metaphor is insufficient; a carousel would be a more appropriate comparison to this sometimes annual and often biannual circus act.

The election commission and its humble commissioners seem to consistently be working under a ridiculous time crunch. And why?

Because election matters are put on the back burner of the SGA priority list, resulting in a last-minute scramble with a voting window that mirrors finals week.

So here is my advice for the SGA in order to in-

MATT QUANE mquane@mscd.edu crease voter turnout.

SGA, please begin your preparations for the spring election now. Do everything in your power to not scare off or fire Jason Doyle as the chair of the election commission.

Allow Doyle to immediately set an election

schedule that does not coincide with finals so that you have a chance to grab the attention of students before they begin to worry about whether or not they are going to pass a class.

It should be obvious by now that the tactics employed to get out the vote are insufficient.

Sending out e-mails, posting on message boards, hanging flyers and banners around campus and a lone polling booth are getting the job done – but lacking a personal touch.

Try getting out on campus, meeting faceto-face with students and personally reminding them to vote. The soiree in the physical education building was a nice start – try having another before the election.

Whatever you do, the focus should be on increasing student awareness. Is a 5 percent voter turnout too much to ask?

InResponse: Letters to the Editor Berlin is bland but Zoë is zesty Berlin can have an altering effect on one’s personality. After returning from over a year in Berlin, I was starving intellectually. Nothing was intriguing and everyone lacked conviction.

This semester, if it was the intriguing and provocative I sought, I had only to find Zoë’s column in The Metropolitan. From men’s indifference to the plight of woman to the abysmal food choices we have on Auraria Campus (especially after the closure of the Daily Grind) Zoë’s columns challenged the unquestioned status quo.

Freshman year and a lifetime ago I unfairly designated Zoë as a

red, feminist, “Creative Resistance” ideologue; today I see Zoë, among other things, as a person who helped me cope with my remaining time in Denver.

For that I thank her, and if she so fancies I would enjoy meeting next semester for a cup of fine coffee, as to express personally my respect.

Mit freundlichen Grüßen, Tim Kish kisht@mscd.edu

Adjuncts can’t help that they can’t help This letter is in reply to the Josie Klemaier article “Metro seeks immediate increase in full-time faculty.” As members of the Metro State Adjunct Organizing Committee (MSAOC), we take issue with the statement “Adjunct faculty members are part-time instructors who often have careers outside of teaching and are not available for advising.”

While adjuncts are part-time instructors at Metro, a significant number would prefer to have a full-time position but are precluded from that opportunity due to limits placed on adjunct positions by Metro’s policies.

In the groundbreaking survey of adjunct faculty conducted in fall of 2005 by the MSAOC, 56% of respondents stated that teaching was their primary source of income. Seventy-nine percent of the adjuncts surveyed wished to work full time in higher education, and only had outside parttime positions to supplement their less-than-full-time Metro teaching incomes. Currently many adjuncts are unsure on how many classes, if any, they will be teaching this upcoming spring semester. Therefore having a job off campus is a financial necessity, not a manifestation of any lack of commitment to teaching or to Metro.

With regards to the issue of advising, adjunct faculty are not given training nor paid for the additional time required to advise students. In many departments, 20 or more adjuncts share one office, with at most only one or two computers among them. Thus, it is not that adjuncts do not want to advise students, but that the school has not given them the resources to do so.

While the present college administration desires to employ more fulltime faculty, it is difficult to see how they can reach their goal. At CUBoulder, a full-time tenure-track teaching position teaches two classes per semester. There are also graduate students in many departments to assist with teaching and grading for the professors, allowing them to continue their research. At Metro, the same position requires double the

teaching load, four classes per semester, with no graduate students to help. Does it truly make sense to require the tenure-track candidates to have an extensive research background, when they will have little time to continue that research as a professor here at Metro?

Metro is a great teaching institution. Even though there is a desire and maybe a need for Metro to expand its mission to include more research, teaching will always be a significant and important part of Metro’s mission. The quality of Metro’s teaching resources, most of whom are currently adjuncts, is what makes our school great – people who love to teach. The administration’s plan to primarily hire those with extensive research experience, and apparently to place less importance on teaching, is a disservice to the entire student body. Members of the MSAOC implore the administration to reflect on who currently constitutes the majority of the quality teaching resources at Metro and to retain the adjuncts who have tirelessly delivered the bulk of the quality teaching for which Metro is famous. The path to “pre-eminence” need not start with the dismissal of quality adjunct instructors nor with the removal of opportunity for the very people, the adjuncts, who have demonstrated their commitment to excellence and to Metro in spite of the lack of commitment from Metro to them.

Sincerely, The Steering Committee for the Metro State Adjunct Organizing Committee Christine Dupont-Patz, Art History; Howard Flomberg, Management; Claire Hay, Earth & Atmospheric Science; Melvena Rhetta-Fair, Management; Norman Schultz, Philosophy; Laurel Thompson, English; Mark Weigand, Anthropology and Sociology

The Metropolitan welcomes all letters from Metro students, teachers, faculty and administration. Letters must be typed and submitted to the Opinions Editor by Monday, 3 p.m. the week of production. Send letters to mquane@mscd.edu or leave your letter for Matthew Quane in the Office of Student Media, Tivoli Student Union, Room 313. Editors reserve the right to edit all letters for content, clarity and space. Letters must be signed and dated with contact information for the writer. Letters may be no longer than 300 words. All rules apply to longer essays. Essays may be no longer than 500 words.

THE METROPOLITAN • PAGE 20 • ERIC LANSING • LANSING@MSCD.EDU

Sport

DID YOU KNOW...

The men’s and women’s basektball teams are nationally ranked at the same time for the first time since the 1997-1998 season. This season, the men’s team is ranked 17th in the NABC Division II basketball rankings. The women’s team is ranked 14th in the USA Today/ESPN poll.

Metro falls in mountain-sized upset Free throw in waning seconds sends Metro to second RMAC loss

By Eric Lansing lansing@mscd.edu

Photo by Jeremy Billis • jbillis@mscd.edu

Metro guard Ashley Mickens, left, looks for the open lane on Emporia State guard Tegan Stuart, right.

Metro pulled off the huge upset against No. 1 ranked Emporia State Dec. 2 at the Auraria Events Center.

The women’s basketball team is pretty good.

In fact, it is so good that it is currently 14th in the country after defeating the No. 8 and the No. 1 teams in the country on consecutive nights.

The last time the Roadrunners were nationally ranked was the 1997-98 season, so this is uncharted water for the current women’s basketball team, which now becomes the hunted instead of the hunter.

“We haven’t been nationally ranked since before my time,” head coach Dave Murphy said.

“It is foreign territory to us, and we have to learn to walk with a target on our backs. We have to come and play with our A-game for 40 minutes.”

Unfortunately, in the team’s 58-57 loss to the Western State Mountaineers (5-7, 3-1 in the RMAC) on Jan. 4 in Gunnison, Colo., 40 minutes were three seconds too long.

The ’Runners jumped out to a 17-10 lead in the first half with Megan Sinclair’s six points and two steals, while Cassondra Bratton added three points, a rebound and a steal. But Western State ended the half on an 18-10 run to carry a one-point lead into halftime.

Guard Chelsea Wilkins scored eight points in the run, and forward Stephanie Warnke nailed a 3-point shot with one second left in the first half to give Western State a 28-27 lead.

The second half was a battle in itself as the teams went point-for-point with eight ties and nine lead changes until the final lead change that favored Western State at the free throw line.

With 55 seconds left in the game, Metro’s Ashley Mickens made a layup and was fouled by Western State’s Chelsea Wilkins to tie the game at 57. Mickens missed the ensuing free throw, and the Mountaineers grabbed the rebound with

31 seconds remaining.

Western State held the ball in order to take the last shot, and with three seconds left, Mickens committed a foul that sent Taryn Brennan to the line. Brennan missed the first free throw but went on to make the second, giving the Mountaineers a 58-57 lead.

Mickens threw up a final second shot, but it fell short, and the Mountaineers pulled off the upset.

“It looked like they just won the national championship,” Murphy said. “They were so excited over one win, which means every team is coming at us like we are their Super Bowl.”

Metro guard Paige Powers, whose minutes have been limited due to her recovery from shoulder surgery, played 15 minutes and scored four points on 2-of-5 shooting. Powers was named to the Preseason All-RMAC and AllEast Division teams and was the team’s scoring leader last season.

When asked if Powers was needed for this team to get back on the winning track, Murphy said every player makes a contribution and that no one is required to be a hero. He added that every player on his team makes plays toward the team goal of winning, and no one player is more important than the other.

Metro’s two RMAC losses put them third in the RMAC standings behind 5-0 NebraskaKearney and 3-0 Regis. But Murphy isn’t too concerned and has faith in his team’s ability to bounce back.

“We like this part of the year to improve our team,” Murphy said about the slow start in RMAC play. “We are disappointed, but we are optimistic that we will gain momentum. It is like driving a car. Sometimes we got to put on the brake, but then we got to get back on the gas pedal and build back on that momentum.”

The loss brings the Roadrunners’ record to 10-3 and 3-2 in the RMAC. Metro looks to rebound from their loss when they take on New Mexico Highlands on Jan. 12 and Western New Mexico on Jan. 13, both at the Auraria Events Center.

Mike Shanahan has lost his master ‘mind’ DAVID POLLAN dpollan@mscd.edu

Atrocious.

That is the word to describe the Broncos’ season.

The Broncos finished the season on an extremely low note, with an inexcusable 26-23 overtime loss to the San Francisco 49ers, after blowing a 13-0 lead. This loss not only left the Broncos one win short of a 10-win season, but also prevented them from returning to the playoffs. They controlled their own destiny – one win and they were in – but fell short.

How did this happen? How did a team that

was expected to win their division and go to the playoffs come up short? How did a 7-2 start become a 2-5 finish?

Injuries, the loss of Gary Kubiak, poor coaching and poor decision-making all contributed to the Broncos’ disappointing season. All these were factors, but the man responsible for the downfall was head coach Mike Shanahan and his blatant arrogance.

The Broncos’ trek downhill began on draft day when the Broncos traded up to draft hotshot Jay Cutler with the 11th pick.

The choice to draft him was brilliant for the future of the franchise, but it was a decision that doomed the Broncos for the season. It caused a constant quarterback controversy that hurt the team more than it helped. Locker-room morale was destroyed and took the focus of the season from the field and put it squarely on the quarterback controversy.

Plummer remained the starter for more than half the season, but his poor play and a

See POLLAN Page 21

21 • SPORT

POLLAN • Two Super Bowl titles are old news and a third one is due Continued from 20 struggling offense caused Shanahan to go with his gunslinger rookie, who, Shanahan said, gave the Broncos the best chance to win. Well, he finished 2-3 as a starter and threw a costly interception that was returned for a touchdown in a game that had to be won to get to the playoffs.

The kid has skills, but he failed to get his team to the playoffs, something Plummer was able to do three years in a row.

So how did the kid give the Broncos the best chance to win?

He didn’t, and the change in leadership in the midst of a playoff race was a huge mistake

by Shanahan. That cost the Broncos the season.

In fact, I am willing to say that after Plummer’s last game as a starter, a 19-10 loss to Kansas City, Shanahan gave up on the season and started looking to next year. He let the losing streak and injuries get to him, and it gave him an excuse to give his rookie quarterback the opportunity to get some experience heading into next year.

It was valuable experience, no doubt, but Cutler didn’t give the Broncos the best chance to win this season. Plummer would have won the games against Seattle and San Francisco and led the Broncos to the playoffs if he had remained the starter.

No coach in his right mind would start a rookie quarterback in the heat of a playoff race and expect to win out and win in the playoffs.

It’s absurd to think so. This is the NFL. But we are talking about the “The Mastermind” Mike Shanahan. He knows football and knows what it takes to win. Let’s not forget that he has two Super Bowl victories and is smarter than anyone in the league, or so he thinks.

He is hardly “The Mastermind” of the past.

It has been eight years since Shanahan won a Super Bowl, and since then he has been 1-4 in the playoffs. Wake up, Mike! You have lost “Mastermind” status.

The fault of the season lies with Shanahan, who proved to be gutless and a quitter when things got tough. He quit on the season, and he quit on his players. If he were coaching for his job, I guarantee he wouldn’t make a change at quarterback.

Well, I say make Shanahan coach for his job, demand playoff victories and a return to the Super Bowl in the immediate future. In this league, all that matters is Super Bowl wins, and eight years is too long.

So, Broncos fans, it’s time to stop blaming Plummer for the inability to win in the playoffs. He will be gone and can no longer be your scapegoat. It’s time to start looking at the real root of the problem, Shanahan.

If Shanahan fails to coach the Broncos to the Super Bowl next season, then maybe they need to find a new “Mastermind” to coach this team.

Mike Shanahan in the playoffs since 2000 2000- Lost to Ravens in 1st round 2001- Missed playoffs, record 8-8 2002- Missed playoffs, record 9-7 2003- Lost to Colts in 1st round 2004- Lost to Colts in 1st round 2005- Defeated Patriots in 1st round - Lost to Steelers in 2nd round 2006- Missed playoffs, record 9-7

1.11.07 • THE METROPOLITAN

Metro holds off Mountaineers

By Eric Lansing lansing@mscd.edu

Carrington’s 16 points leads ’Runners to 4-1 record in conference Metro used a balanced attack on offense and a career-high 16 points from Marquise Carrington to defeat Western State 81-71 on Jan. 4 in Gunnison, Colo.

Along with Carrington’s total, the No. 17ranked Roadrunners had three other players in double figures and two others with nine points each in winning their fourth straight game and their seventh in eight contests.

“We have not had one player win the player of the week in the RMAC,” head coach Brannon Hays said about his team’s play throughout the season. “It shows the strength of our team. We have really good balance, and we are learning to be patient.”

Men’s Basketball Jan. 4 vs. Western State Metro Western State

Total 43 38 81 27 44 71

Leading Scorers: Metro, Carrington 16, Wagstaff 14 Western State, Coggins 17

Women’s Basketball Jan. 4 vs. Western State Metro Western State

27 30 28 30

Total 57 58

Leading Scorers: Metro, Harris 16, Ashley Mickens 9 Western State, Warnke 17, Wilkins 13

Forward Jesse Wagstaff had 14 points and six rebounds. Guards Benas Veikalas and Terrell Burgess added 10 points each, and forward Michael Bahl scored nine points and pulled down eight rebounds for the Roadrunners.

The first half belonged to Metro, who outscored the Mountaineers 43-27 and shot 50 percent from the field, including 6-9 from 3-point range. Carrington played a huge part by scoring 14 of his 16 points in the first half.

“Carrington is starting to mature,” Hays said. “He is really making a push and it is starting to pay off in his game and for our team.”

Metro carried their momentum into the second half, extending their lead to 22 with 9:13 to play. Then Western State regrouped and went on an eight-minute 24-11 run to cut the lead to seven with 1:07 to go. Mountaineers guard Josh Kollasch led the way by scoring nine points, and forward Brandon Gilbreath added seven points of his own.

Hays said he is always concerned about his team giving up leads late in games but was

happy that his team could build a 20-point lead on the road against a tough Western State home team. Hays added that as the season progresses, his young team is learning to put teams away.

That maturity showed as the Mountaineers had to foul for the remainder of the game and rely on the Roadrunners to miss free throws.

But Metro, who are second in the RMAC in freethrow percentage at 72 percent, preserved the win by going 5-6 from the stripe.

For the game, Metro outshot Western State 51 percent to 38 percent from the field while shooting an amazing 61 percent from downtown, going 8 for 13 from the 3-point arc. The Mountaineers relied too much on the long ball, attempting 25 3-pointers and only making seven.

“Our team showed their resiliency by bringing the lead back out,” Hays said. “We didn’t panic and we finished strong to end the game.”

The win improves Metro’s overall record to 11-2 and 4-1 in the RMAC. They face off against New Mexico Highlands Jan. 12 at the Auraria Events Center.

SCHEDULE

SCHEDULE

New Mexico Highlands

New Mexico Highlands

Men’s Basketball 7 p.m., Jan. 12 Auraria Events Center

Women’s Basketball 5 p.m., Jan. 12 Auraria Events Center

Western New Mexico

Western New Mexico

Colorado Christian

Colorado Christian

Colorado School of Mines

Colorado School of Mines

7 p.m., Jan. 13 Auraria Events Center 7 p.m., Jan. 16 Auraria Events Center 7 p.m., Jan. 19 Auraria Events Center

5 p.m., Jan. 13 Auraria Events Center 5 p.m., Jan. 16 Auraria Events Center 5 p.m., Jan. 19 Auraria Events Center

Philly’s trash becomes Denver’s gold nugget

GEOF WOLLERMAN gwollerm@mscd.edu Thank you to the basketball gods for ridding the Nuggets of Andre Miller and delivering unto us Allen Iverson. Thank you. My prayers have been answered. I am a basketball fan once again.

The last time I followed hoops with any real interest or conviction, Clyde Drexler was one of the league’s top scorers, Michael Jordan was the king of the court, and Charles Barkley and Dennis Rodman were the bad boys of the league. For me it was the heyday of the NBA. Then came the lockout. For months, my excitement for America’s sport withered away until the very vernacular of the game grew dumb upon my tongue. What was there, I asked myself, but basketball? A sport on the verge of becoming a universal cult had rapidly become just another sport. A world I had thought of as safe

had been upended. I stopped watching games and stopped caring about the playoffs. As a sick joke, I became a Nuggets fan by name.

It would take the miraculous appearance of a 5-foot-11-inch guard from Philadelphia to get me excited about basketball again.

In his first four and a half hours of play with the Nuggets, Iverson averaged 28.8 points per game and had 53 assists.

On Dec. 28 he scored 44 points against Seattle. He may have been the wrong “answer” for Philadelphia, but Iverson might be the variable that can help Denver solve its elusive championship equation.

Unfortunately, because of the Carmelo Anthony and J.R. Smith suspensions, the fortuitous holiday deal has yet to come to full fruition. But as a native I can say with confidence that Nuggets fans will wait.

I’m not saying that Iverson is the best player in the league. And I would be the first to state that the whole Nuggets roster is a little rough around the edges. But the team’s got heart.

They’re playing some solid ball when they want to, as they were long before Iverson’s arrival. But with the addition of Iverson, this year’s squad has the potential to be the best in Nuggets history and make a legitimate bid for the playoffs.

Of course, the Nuggets have always had “potential.”

I know I’m falling into the classic Nuggets-fan complex in which I build up all my hopes only to see them crushed and see brilliance where there is only banality. But I can’t help it. The Nuggets deserve some love.

Lately, when I watch the Nuggets on TV – if I blur my eyes hard enough – for the Allen Iverson first time in years, I feel like basketball might be on the verge of something great again.

So here’s to the team winning the fourth quarter in ’07, because I realize we’re up now, but it’s only the third quarter and I am watching the Denver Nuggets.

22

1.11.07 • THE METROPOLITAN

Calendar ONGOING

Yoga Programs – Mats & props are provided. All sessions will be held at the St. Francis Atrium. Please wear comfortable clothing for the sessions listed below. The winterim schedule will run until Jan. 29. For more information, please e-mail wilkinli@mscd.edu or call (303) 556-6954.

Gentle Yoga – Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, Noon – 1 p.m. Gentle Yoga is about gently bringing your body and mind back in touch with each other and giving yourself a chance to heal. It encourages your body to let go of built up tension and stress This gentle, slower paced practice makes it accessible to people of all sizes, ages, and fitness levels.

Yoga as Therapy – Wednesdays 1:15 2:15 p.m. Hansa’s yoga teaching can adapt classical yoga poses to people who have physical challenges.

Learn how you can benefit from hatha yoga at any age and in any condition.

Free Blood Pressure Screenings – Fridays at the Health Center, Plaza 150 from 2-4 p.m.

Free HIV and Tuberculosis (TB) Testing – Ongoing at the Health Center at Auraria. Call (303) 556-2525.

Eating for Health and Energy – Please call Susan Krems at (303) 770-8433 or (303) 556-6818 for information.

Tobacco Cessation Support – The Health Center offers many types of help to stop. Call (303) 556-2525.

AA Meetings on Campus – Please contact Billi at (303) 556-2525 if you are interested in chairing 12 step meetings on campus.

Cancer Support Groups – Please contact Linda Wilkins-Pierce for details at (303) 5566954.

Training for Mentors – Volunteers are needed to serve as mentors to at-risk youth. No expertise needed. Call (303) 995-7060 for more information or e-mail accmentoring@mentoring for more info.

Crypto Science Society – Every third Saturday from 3-6 p.m. at Sigi’s below the pool hall in the Tivoli. Meetings explore aspects of the unknown. Free and open to the public. For more info see studentactivities.mscd.edu/~cryptoscience.

Colorado Mutual UFO Network – For a $5 fee, Hear the latest info regarding local field investigations and guest speakers. For more info and interim meeting times, see studentactivities.mscd. edu/~cryptoscience.

January 18, 2007

February 10, 2007

(REAL): Photographic Constructions – Metro State’s Center for Visual Art will host an exhibition that explores different photographic perspectives and features local and national artists. Dimension, space and reality will be the central themes of this exhibit. The opening reception will be on Jan. 18 at 7 p.m. at the CVA, 1734 Wazee Street, and will run until Feb. 23. For gallery hours and more information, call (303) 2945207 or visit www.colophotoartscenter.org.

Recovering from the Holidays – This workshop is designed to teach yoga and Ayurveda exercises that are geared to revivify from holiday stress. The class is free of charge and taught

by Patricia Hansen. For more information, e-mail Linda at wilkinli@mscd.edu.

January 22, 2007 MythBusters –1 p.m. in the Tivoli Turnhalle.

Join cast members Kari Byron and Grant Imahara from the Discovery channel’s “MythBuster” program as they test the validity of college-themed legends. Students are encouraged to suggest their own myths to be “busted,” and winning participants will receive prizes including a $150 gift certificate from STA Travel. Submit suggestions to the Office of Student Activities, Tivoli 305, by Jan. 17.

For more information, call (303) 556-2595.

February 8, 2007 Protecting Ourselves: Self Defense for Women Level 1 – To register for these classes, e-mail Linda at wilkinli@mscd.edu. These classes are taught through RAAP of Denver.

February 17, 2007 Metro State Open House – This campus event is aimed toward visitation and recruitment for prospective and accepted students and their families and friends. The open house will take place in the Auraria Event Center at 10 a.m. For more information, visit www.mscd.edu/openhouse/

February 23, 2007 Once On This Island by Lynn Ahers and Stephen Flaherty – Join the Metro State Theater Department as they stage “Once On This Island,” a whimsical romp that reinterprets the tale of the little mermaid. The play will premiere Feb. 23 and run until March 4. The admission is free for MSCD students and faculty, $15 for adults and $8 for children and seniors. For reservations and further information, call the King Center box office at (303) 556-2296.

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