UWM Post 12-12-11

THEUWMPOST est. 1956

THE STUDENT-RUN INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER

December 12, 2011

Issue 14, Volume 56

EDITORIALS SA violated open meetings laws Hope and change in the student association page 20 Paul Simon at The Riverside page 7

The Post’s New Year’s Eve Guide page 7

Badger vs. Panther basketball preview page 5

Hundreds of issues of the Post swiped, disposed of SA president SA official admits to newspaper theft, implicates former President Kostal resigns

By Steve Garrison News Editor news@uwmpost.com

A UWM Post investigation has revealed that former UW-Milwaukee President Alex Kostal and former Senate Oversight and Rules Committee Vice Chairman David Sidhu were involved in the theft of approximately 800 copies of the UWM Post on Oct. 31.

Kostal admits that the thefts took place, but denied taking any part in the theft or directing SA office manager Andrew Hapka to steal the newspapers.

However, several members of SA, including SORC Chair Tereza Pelicaric and Senator Jesse Brown, have told the Post they heard Kostal direct Hapka to steal the newspapers in what was called “Operation Boston Tea Party.”

Hapka, a roommate of both Kostal and Sidhu, admitted that he and the president participated in the theft and that Sidhu helped dispose of the papers after the UWM Post began inquiring about them.

“Yeah, I felt offended and, you know, then Alex said, ‘We should go steal a bunch of these and take them, so no one sees them,’” Hapka said.

He continued that Kostal told him to take the fall for the newspaper thefts and to implicate fellow SA member Tereza Pelicaric in the incident.

“More or less, he was concerned that he would be thrown under the bus for what is going on,” Hapka said. “… After that, he told me to say Tereza had done it and was involved and that he was going to be talking to you later on today.”

Kostal did not implicate Pelicaric

during his interview with the Post, but Sidhu said he, “heard she did it with them.”

In a later interview with the Post, Sidhu said he was never told by Kostal to implicate Tereza in the thefts but simply heard the rumor around the office.

Sidhu said he had no involvement in the theft, but chose not to comment about his participation in their disposal for legal reasons.

David Allen, chair of the Department of Journalism, Advertising & Media Studies, said the thefts perpetrated by elected representatives of government were unethical and probably illegal.

“When you steal newspapers from newspaper racks and toss them in dumpsters or whatever, at least theoretically, you’re keeping people from having been exposed to some ideas,” Allen said.

Both Kostal and Sidhu resigned from SA at Sunday night’s senate meeting while under concurrent investigation by both SA and the university.

The papers were stolen in response to an editorial published on Oct. 31 by the Post criticizing Vice President Brent Johnson’s “Brighten the Night” event.

The event was organized to dispel freshman fears over crime in the area surrounding campus but was poorly attended and, the Post asserted, misguided in its intentions.

In the editorial, the Post said “There is so much about ‘Brighten the Night’ that is either bizarre or contrary to reality that it’s hard to know where to begin.”

“I’m not gonna lie, we were all kind of disappointed in the article, but I tried to tell them, in my wisdom from last year, ‘Look, you’re not always going to get

good press, just deal with it,” Chief of Staff Angela Lang said.

Hapka said that Johnson was not involved in the theft, instead opting to submit a letter to the Post, which was published the following week.

Several SA members, including Senator Matthew Rosner, confirmed this.

“I know that Brent was pretty upset with it, but I also heard that Brent was right, and he took his punches in,” Rosner said. “He was like, ‘You know what, I’ll try to rise above it and create something better.’”

The Post first became aware of the theft when distribution manager Patrick Quast informed management that approximately 800 copies had disappeared from newspaper stands in the UWM Union.

The Post filed a report with the UWM police department, but officers found no evidence of wrongdoing in their investigation.

The Post then obtained surveillance footage from a student service employee showing two individuals, one wearing a green jacket with a red dot on the back, shoving newspapers into their backpacks.

Hapka identified himself in the video as the one wearing the green jacket. He said he was dressed in a Halloween costume, which included a gas mask, in preparation for the Spaights Plaza Spooktacular that was taking place later in the day.

“I had my Halloween costume on, and I was like, ‘Hey, I am all dressed and ready to go, we’ll go,’” Hapka said.

“Then we all went – me, Alex, Kevin and the other guy.”

Lang and Speaker of the Senate Rick Banks said they saw Hapka in a gas mask

on Oct. 31.

Hapka identified the other person in the video as a friend of his who is not involved in SA. Hapka said he was upset by the editorial and him and Kostal made the decision to steal the newspapers, “so that Brent [did not] get a hold of it and feel offended and blow a gasket or whatever.”

Hapka estimates that the group stole about 300 or 400 copies of the Post and hid them in the room adjacent to Kostal’s office.

Banks said he was out of the office while the incident was taking place but saw Hapka return in a gas mask with a full backpack.

“I was like, ‘What the hell are they doing?’” Banks said. “And they were like, ‘Oh, we are stealing newspapers. We are stealing Posts because of the article.’”

Lang said she confronted Hapka and Kostal about the thefts.

“Kind of the story of my life, again I told them don’t do this, it’s an idiotic thing to do, you’ll easily get caught,” Lang said. “Then when I found out they were in Alex’s office, there were more swear words, they needed to get out of the office and be put back.”

Lang said the newspapers were moved, but she highly doubted that they were put back.

“I think they disposed of them,” she said.

Hapka confirmed that after the Post came into the office asking about the missing issues, they decided to get rid of the evidence.

“We found a, well, it was a huge garbage can, I want to say on Farwell,

news@uwmpost.com

Milwaukee County Circuit Court issued a two-year restraining order against former Student Association Vice President Brent Johnson last Thursday morning.

Commissioner William Honrath oversaw the injunction, which was petitioned for by former SA Senator Tiffany (last name withheld per victim’s request), who alleges that Johnson sexually assaulted and harassed her before she resigned from SA on Nov. 19.

Honrath said during the hearing that although his opinion was not representative of a jury decision, he was the law in the matter, and he believed

INDEX

NEWS SPORTS

that Tiffany was telling the truth.

“The story she told seems to be her experiences,” Honrath said.

Honrath continued on to say that he found Johnson’s claim that he did not remember much of the circumstance surrounding the case to be suspect.

The petitioner’s complaint “is not the type of thing you wouldn’t remember,” Honrath said.

The hearing was scheduled following the victim’s decision to seek a temporary restraining order issued against Johnson on Nov. 28.

Tiffany said in a previous interview with the Post that she sought the restraining order at the behest of the district attorney’s office after sexual assault charges against Johnson were dropped for lack of evidence.

1-4 5-6

FRINGE EDITORIAL

Although Johnson did not have an attorney present during the hearing, Tiffany was provided legal representation.

Both sides provided testimony about what happened the night of Johnson’s 21st birthday, during SA’s trip to Washington D.C. for the United States Student Association Conference and in the SA offices.

The commissioner then made the decision to approve the two-year restraining order, which will expire on Dec. 8, 2013.

“Under the circumstances, I believe the petitioner is telling the truth,” Honrath said. “She not only thought it was serious enough to come here, she went to the police.”

The commissioner said that while he

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Assistant News Editor news@uwmpost.com

Alex Kostal resigned as Student Association president Sunday night, along with Senator and Senate Oversight and Rules Committee Vice Chairman David Sidhu before a committee conducting an internal investigation could recommend his impeachment for charges including theft, intimidation and other office misconduct.

“I warned against forming scapegoats – it’s always an easy way out when the organization has some serious flaws in it,” Kostal said outside the meeting. “But I think the appointment of Vice President Lang today is a step in the right direction, and hopefully under her leadership, we can start to solve some of these conduct issues.”

understood intimate conversation to be difficult, he believed “what is going on here was something different.”

During the hearing, Tiffany said she made clear to Johnson in early September that his comments to her should be of a professional nature only.

“From day one that I met Brent, I remember we went lobbying, and he said, ‘So, as a feminist, what kind of compliment can I give you without offending you?’” Tiffany said during her interview with the Post. “And I said, ‘You can tell me I’m pretty or smart, but…’”

Honrath said that this statement was a clear indication of expectation by Tiffany.

The restraining order prohibits Johnson from “contact that harasses or

See JOHNSON page19

See SA page 2

See THEFT page 4

Allegations of hazing, drinking and sexual harassment Garrison, News Editor

By Aaron Knapp

Kostal’s resignation will go into effect at 6:30 p.m. on Monday, Dec. 12, at which point newly elected Vice President Angela Lang will assume the presidency. All three of the SA officials that resigned in the past week, which includes former Vice President Brent Johnson, will temporarily leave UWMilwaukee next semester, all of their own accord and not at the request of the SA or the university.

In his resignation speech, Kostal deflected the accusations against him, calling on each SA official to make a personal change to win back the trust of the students. He expressed pride in his accomplishments this year, as well as those of Johnson, and alluded that the internal investigation against him was biased.

“Our organization has much to develop, much to learn and much to change before we can hold our heads high, but unfortunately, I cannot be part of this change, for I must leave you all tonight,” Kostal said in his speech to the senate.

After over an hour of debate, three quarters of the senate voted to approve Lang, who was formerly chief of staff, as vice president, knowing that she

Restraining order against Johnson upheld

By Callie Koller, Staff Writer, and Steve

Chief of staff to become new president

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December 12, 2011

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SA eases recall restrictions

Presidential candidates no longer need to be in SA for six months to be on ballot

By Aaron Knapp Assistant News Editor news@uwmpost.com

The Student Association Senate revamped part of the Independent Election Commission bylaws to make SA officials much easier to recall, Sunday night, in wake of investigations of corruption and misconduct by the former President Alex Kostal and Vice President Brent Johnson.

Introduced by Senator Matt Rosner, who has been a victim of hazing by Kostal and Johnson, the SA Accountability Act will require that a recall petition must have as many signatures as there were students who voted in the previous presidential election, in order to initiate a recall election for any senator or elected official.

“The SA Accountability Act is a mechanism where it will make the process of recalling the president and vice president a lot easier,” Rosner said.

Written primarily by Rosner with help from Speaker of the Senate Rick Banks, the act attracted more than a half dozen co-sponsors including Deputy Speaker Tereza Pelicaric and Senator/Communications Director Dan Laughland, all hoping to salvage the reputation of SA after numerous scandals involving the executive branch resulted in the resignations of Kostal and Johnson.

“This bill will prove to the UWM student body that we are adults, and we will be accountable for our [actions],” Rosner said.

At Banks’ request, the act also removed a controversial requirement passed last summer that allows only presidential candidates that have been in SA for six months to be on the ballot, which would have forced outsiders to run on write-in campaigns.

Previously, a recall petition required signatures of 25 percent of the student body, or approximately 7,500 signatures,

and could only be filed after six months, Rosner said. However, with only 1,647 students voting in the last presidential election, the old requirement would have been nearly impossible to achieve.

The bill now allows recall petitions to be filed three months after an official assumes office and requires significantly fewer signatures. For example, a recall petition for any senator this semester will require 1,647 signatures, the number of students who voted in the last presidential election, but a petition to recall the person who assumes the president’s office would have to wait three months and would still require the same number of signatures.

With the requirement that the ballot only contain presidential candidates that have been on SA for six months removed, the general elections in April will follow largely the same procedure as the last elections.

SA president resigns amid scandal

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SORC finds Kostal violated code of conduct and abused his power

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Student Association President Alex Kostal announced he would be joining the National Guard after resigning at an emergency senate meeting on Sunday night while under scrutiny from a Senate Oversight and Rules Committee investigation.

During Sunday’s meeting, SORC announced that the investigation had found Kostal in violation of six standards based on SA’s code of ethics.

Kostal resigned in a speech to the senate before the official findings of the SORC investigation were announced.

According to the results of SORC’s office climate survey, “Respondents who had negative responses identified the president [Kostal] and other officials as the source.”

The SORC investigation found five incidents in which Kostal violated the code of ethics and four incidents in which Kostal had abused his power.

Several members of SA have also made allegations that Kostal has contributed to a hostile work environment, has intimidated other members of SA, is trying to cover up previous wrongdoings and was involved in the theft of UWM Post newspapers.

Findings of the SORC Investigation These are the five incidents in which SORC found Kostal had violated SA’s code of ethics, according to the minutes of a Dec. 11 SORC meeting: • Involvement and knowledge of setting alcohol on fire in a hotel room on a state funded trip for United Council while in office as SA president.

• Involvement with and knowledge of the bullying and hazing of Senator Matt Rosner.

• Active involvement and knowledge of theft of minks and being in possession of stolen property without the intention of returning it.

• Interfering with the university and SORC investigation by instructing staff members to deliberately mislead university and student association investigators.

• Involvement and knowledge of the deliberate destruction of the UWM Post newspapers.

These are the four incidents in which SORC found Kostal had committed an abuse of power, according to the minutes of a Dec. 11 SORC meeting: • Intimidating and coercing SA employees from cooperating with the university investigation and deliberate manipulating of subordinate employees.

•

The directive to the office assistant Andy Hapka to seize issues of the UWM Post and in a deliberate attempt to suppress the UWM Post’s right of freedom of press.

• Through complacency, he has failed to be the general supervisor of the executive branch and the official representative for all matters affecting student life and interest.

• Attempting to obstruct the Senate Oversight and Rules investigation, university investigations and violating his temporary restraining order.

The investigation began as a result of SORC’s office climate survey, given to about 50 members of SA last Sunday, in which several respondents named Kostal for wrongdoings in and outside of the office.

Oct. 31, about a month prior to the start of the investigation, close to 800 copies of the UWM Post were stolen from the stands early in the morning.

“We were all in the common area of the Student Association office, and the paper came out criticizing ‘Brighten the Night,’ and I heard Alex [Kostal] instruct Andy [Hapka] to go on an operation to find and destroy all papers,” Deputy Speaker Tereza Pelicaric said.

See RESIGNATION page 19

SA Continued from page 1 would become president the next day. In one of his last acts as president, Kostal nominated Lang to fill Johnson’s former position.

In her address to the senate about the nomination, Lang said that she plans to steer SA back to what it was like last year, in order to regain a positive reputation among the students.

“We need to figure out how to be more inclusive and more tolerant of others and more respectful,” Lang said when listing her goals for her new position. “Some of the things that we’ve all heard in the past couple weeks is that we weren’t always tolerant or respectful of each others’ opinions.”

Midway through the debate over whether or not to approve Lang, the senate voted to suspend the rules and hear from the Senate Oversight and Rules Committee, which conducted an internal investigation of the Kostal, Sidhu and Johnson and was ready to present its recommendation to the senate to impeach all three.

The committee found that all three had engaged in various forms of office misconduct. It found that Kostal was found to have been in violation of six standards of the SA code of ethics by engaging in theft, intimidation in the office, hazing Senator Matt Rosner, destroying hundreds of copies of the UWM Post and interfering with SORC’s investigation.

“This was a very tedious task [and] it was very difficult to do,” SORC Chair Tereza Pelicaric said, thanking the members of the committee for taking part. “For President Alexander Kostal, [we] recommend impeachment and removal to the senate regarding conduct… unbecoming of an SA official and abuse of powers.”

Kostal, Johnson and Sidhu largely deny the charges that have surfaced against them since Johnson was accused of sexual assault several weeks ago. While Kostal said that the SORC investigation was suspect and unfairly targeted him, he expressed hope for SA’s future.

“I warned against forming scapegoats – it’s always an easy way out when the organization has some serious flaws in it,” Kostal said outside the meeting.

“But I think the appointment of Vice President Lang today is a step in the right direction, and hopefully under her leadership, we can start to solve some of these conduct issues.”

Kostal, Sidhu and Johnson plan to leave UWM at the end of the semester and enlist in the National Guard together. After basic training, Kostal plans to return to UWM next fall to continue his studies and possibly rejoin SA. The senate took no action against the three except to accept their resignations.

During the rest of the meeting, the senate considered two bills introduced

by Senator Matthew Rosner that were meant to indicate to students that SA had begun anew. The SA argued over how far it wanted to distance itself from the Kostal administration, as they considered bills to make officials easier to recall and to freeze the salaries of the SA president and vice president. Both of these bills passed with some amendments to make them less harsh on SA officials.

Additionally, the senate approved most of the Senate Finance Committee budget, leaving only the amount of money dedicated to UPARK to be determined, and approved three new senators.

The senate is scheduled to reconvene twice in the next week, but Speaker of the Senate Rick Banks may choose to not hold Thursday’s meeting if there is nothing urgent for the senate to address.

Senator Camille Ridgeway also resigned at Sunday’s meeting.

NEWS

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December 12, 2011

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Vice Chair of SORC David Sidhu accused of misconduct

Allegations include displaying pornographic material, contributing to hostile work environment

By John Parnon Assistant News Editor news@uwmpost.com

Several members of the Student Association alleged that former Senate Oversight and Rules Committee Vice Chairman David Sidhu used office computers to display pornographic material, contributed to a hostile work environment and was involved in the destruction of 800 copies of the UWM Post.

Sidhu resigned at Sunday’s emergency senate meeting before SORC announced their findings on the investigation.

Sidhu then announced he would be joining the National Guard.

Until his resignation, Sidhu was still allowed to maintain his position on SORC, despite the fact that he was the subject of an active SORC investigation into his actions, including showing SA members an “Avatar porn” trailer on an office computer.

SA Chief of Staff Angela Lang said that Sidhu came into the office while the Senate Finance Committee meetings were going on to show her and Senator Eric Grow the Avatar porn

trailer, telling her that it was the most expensive porn ever made, and used Lang’s computer to display it.

“David, you are not going to do this on my computer. Just stop...” Lang said.

“This is weird, awkward. I’m pretty sure I turned bright red and left.”

Sidhu said he thought what he did had been OK at the time and that Lang and Grow were laughing with him and Lang never said anything to him during the incident.

About 800 copies of the UWM Post were stolen on Oct. 31, and Office Manager Andrew Hapka, who admitted to being involved in the theft, said Sidhu was not involved in stealing the papers, but did drive Kostal and Hapka to a disposal site for the stolen papers.

“We were driving in Sidhu’s car, and we just threw them in the trash,” Hapka said.

Sidhu told The UWM Post that for legal reasons he would prefer not to comment on the incident.

Tiffany (last name withheld per victim’s request), the alleged victim in the Brent Johnson sexual assault case, also made allegations that Sidhu came into a SFC meeting the weekend of

Nov. 18 and said, “I’ll sit over here so you don’t file a sexual harassment claim against me.”

Sidhu said he never talked to Tiffany at the meeting and that he never said those words.

“I remember being really angry about Tiffany and Brent, and I was talking to Eric Grow. I believed I bumped into Eric Grow,” Sidhu said.

“David you are not going to do this on my computer.

Just stop...” Lang said. “This is weird, awkward. I’m pretty sure I turned bright red and left.”

“And I was like, ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean for that to be sexual harassment.’ It was not directed to her at all.”

About two months prior to that, on

Sept. 6, Sidhu posted on his Twitter account, “Stupid Wiccan bitch. Don’t question why I have an office. #stfu,” with “stfu” standing for “shut the fuck up.”

Lang said she has heard the term “Wiccan” being used previously in the office to describe Tiffany.

Sidhu said he couldn’t remember what he had been tweeting about on Sept. 6, and he wasn’t sure if it was about Tiffany.

“I know that in September I didn’t know Tiffany. I know she is a Wiccan now, and I don’t remember if I said anything to her during that senate meeting or anything like that,” Sidhu said. “Honestly, I am a pretty emotional person. I don’t really hold too much back, which is why I am in this position now. Maybe it was about something I didn’t agree with, if it was about her.”

Sidhu posted on his Twitter account again that day, “Wiccan. Your vote will not count,” followed by, “They just start giggling and talking about the most annoying shit. And then gossiping about texts. And by they I mean the Wiccan and Rosner.”

Speaker of the Senate Rick Banks responded to Sidhu’s tweets and posted,

“Who’s this Wiccan and why are you bitching so much?”

Tiffany said she was referred to as the Wiccan “because I am new age and they were aware that I had the Wiccan handbook.”

That same day, Sidhu also posted to his Twitter account, “I wonder how many times @GetBentJohnson has masturbated in this office alone,” with @GetBentJohnson being the user name for former SA Vice President Brent Johnson, Banks confirmed.

On Nov. 22, Sidhu posted on his twitter account, “[Redacted] might have fake tits…” followed by, “[Redacted] has an insurance policy on the twins.”

When the Post confronted the SA official mentioned, she said the tweet was very inappropriate, and seemed mortified when shown Sidhu’s post.

“I obviously saw it when he did it, and I told him to take it down,” she said.

“And he was like, ‘What? I don’t have any followers – no one will see it.’”

As of Dec. 6, David Sidhu has 29 followers on Twitter.

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December 12, 2011

the uwm post

Screen shots from security camera footage just outside of the Terrace Cafe in the Union on October 31st, 2011.

UWM Post to file civil charges against Kostal and Sidhu THEFT Continued from page 1 After serious deliberation, the UWM Post has decided not to file criminal charges at this time against the individuals involved in the theft of approximately 800 copies of the UWM Post, instead seeking redress through a civil suit.

After consulting with Attorney

Advocate Adam Goldstein with the Student Press Law Center, the UWM Post has made the decision to sue former Student Association President Alex Kostal and former Senate Oversight and Rules Committee Vice Chairman David Sidhu for First Amendment violation.

The Post believes that both Kostal

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and Sidhu participated in the theft and destruction of 800 copies of the UWM Post and that because they were both acting as representatives of the state, as per Wisconsin State Statute 36.09(5), they should be held accountable under applicable civil rights law.

This week’s crossword solution

Try your hand at this week’s puzzles, turn to page 19 Last week’s solution

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while we were driving in Sidhu’s car, and we just threw them in the trash,” he said.

Sidhu said that he was aware how serious the matter was and chose not to comment on his involvement in disposing of the newspapers.

“I know that it can be an infringement on the First Amendment,” Sidhu said.

“That’s why I want to make sure that I’m cautious, and anybody else to make sure that we know exactly what we’re saying when we say we don’t want to … you know, do anything stupid.”

Too late, Rosner said.

“Frankly, if you are really that desperate to give yourself a better image in the world, don’t steal newspapers,” he said. “You improve your image, you make yourself accountable to your actions. In fact, stealing newspapers sort of makes it worse.”

Kostal has maintained that he did not steal the newspapers or direct Hapka to do so.

“I definitely did not tell Andy to do it, but, you know, it was stupid and it happened…” Kostal said. “I’m just, you know, worried about Andy.”

HAPPY HOLIDAYS From your friends at THE UWM POST

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SPORTS

December 12, 2011

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The downtown showdown

Wisconsin vs. Milwaukee preview

By Tony Atkins

Assistant Sports Editor sports@uwmpost.com

The UW-Milwaukee Panthers men’s basketball team was off to its best start since the 1992-‘93 season. At 8-1, the Panthers were riding high into Cedar Rapids, Iowa, for a showdown against Northern Iowa. The Saturday trip resulted in a 16-point drubbing (51-67) of the Panthers as they head into what is arguably their biggest game on their regular season schedule.

The No. 16 ranked Wisconsin Badgers will be coming downtown, this time to the U.S. Cellular Arena, for a matchup against the Milwaukee Panthers. The Badgers suffered a loss in a hard fought game against North Carolina where they played with toughness, grit and intensity. Their game against such a team may have them working out the kinks in their offense that is, at times, stagnant. Since then, the Badgers have lost one game and won two.

The Panthers are coming off of a loss against Northern Iowa, and they will be doing some re-grouping of their own heading into the showdown against the Badgers.

The key for the Panthers is to slow down dynamic scoring guard Jordan Taylor. Currently, Taylor is averaging

12.4 points per night. This is a relatively low average, but this is the type of player that can go off on any given night. Any night the Badgers have lost in recent years, Taylor has been contained or completely shut down. With the tenacious defense that the Panthers are capable of, this is certainly not impossible.

Expect Kaylon Williams to continue his great scoring for the Panthers; it will certainly be needed. After scoring a career high 21 points and following that up with 16 more, Williams’ scoring will be a big factor in the success of the Panthers.

The team is dealing with more than a handfull of injuries, and so far they have been surprisingly cohesive as a unit. The team’s health may start to catch up to them as the season progresses. The depth here may be an issue, but with players like Tony Meier coming back from injury, the Panthers should stand tall.

James Haarsma will be key for Milwaukee in this matchup. Rebounding should decide this game, and the rebounding from Haarsma and Demetrius Harris will need to be present.

For anybody writing this game off, don’t be so sure. The Badgers are only as good for as far as their three-pointers will take them, and if Milwaukee can find their scoring, this should be a pretty interesting game.

The Panthers host the Wisconsin Badgers tomorrow at the U.S. Cellular Arena.

Photo from Zhao Lim of the Badger Herald and Sierra Riesberg of the Post.

Men’s and women’s basketball both fall on the road

Turnovers doom Panthers against tough opponents

By Nick Bornheimer and Eric Engelbart Staff Writers

Sports@uwmpost.com

The UW-Milwaukee men’s and women’s basketball teams fell on the road this weekend 67-51 to Northern Iowa and 70-52 to No. 23 Oklahoma, respectively.

Kaylon Williams, Kyle Kelm and James Haarsma all scored in double figures Saturday but watched as the UWM men’s basketball team fell for only the second time this season.

Center Courtney Lindfors scored 15 points Sunday afternoon for the women, but that would be the only offensive bright spot for Milwaukee, as the squad suffered their sixth loss this season to Oklahoma.

Men’s basketball vs. Northern Iowa

The UWM Panthers (8-2) outshot the UNI Panthers (9-1) in both halves, but committed 15 turnovers, which resulted in 17 UNI points – one more point than the difference in the final score.

Milwaukee was close throughout the first half, but UNI scored the final five points to gain a 27-18 halftime lead.

UNI pulled away in the early minutes of the second half, but Milwaukee did not go down easily. UWM was within as few as six points twice in the second frame, but UNI scored 40 points in the half to help lead the team to their ninth victory on the early season.

Northern Iowa owned the three-

point shooting category, something UNI squads are typically known for. Both teams struggled out of the starting gates, but 9-19 from behind the arc made an otherwise sub-par shooting night look much better.

Northern Iowa’s Jake Koch, who finished with a game high 21 points, went 3-6 from three-point land and a perfect 6-6 from the free-throw line. Milwaukee’s Willams, Kelm and Haarsma finished with 16, 12 and 10 points, respectively.

Women’s basketball vs. Oklahoma Oklahoma women’s guard Whitney Hand scored a game high 17 points and 10 rebounds in their victory over UWM Sunday afternoon. Aaryn Ellenberg added 14 points of her own, as the Sooners (4-3)

moved above .500 and ended a three-game slide.

The Panthers (2-6) rolled into Norman after a crushing 72-41 defeat to No. 1 Baylor on Thursday and could not salvage a victory on the road trip.

The Panthers didn’t manage a single lead in the 22-point loss.

A bright spot in the game was a play by UWM freshman forward Ashley Green, who stepped in as a starter with Emily Decorah, out indefinitely with a knee injury. Green grabbed seven rebounds while scoring eight points.

The most indicative stat of the Panther’s struggles has been their shooting percentage over the course of the two games. On Sunday, Oklahoma shot at

a 46 percent clip from the field, while the Panthers were held to 29 percent.

Thursday, Baylor completed 48 percent of their shots, while the Panthers were held to 28 percent.

Milwaukee looked much more impressive in the second half but still faced too much firepower from the top 25 team.

The men’s team faces a tall task on Tuesday when they take on the No. 16 Wisconsin Badgers at the U.S. Cellular Arena. The women are set to play Thursday at home against Chicago State.

Both tip-offs are at 7 p.m.

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SPORTS

December 12, 2011

Milwaukee Bucks season preview In search of strong offense in the upcoming year

By Mitch Pratt Staff Writer sports@uwmpost.com

With the NBA back in full swing, the Milwaukee Bucks return to the hardwood, striving to make the playoffs again since their 2010 surprise appearance.

After a great run at the end of the 2010 season, the Bucks took a step backward in the 2010-11 campaign. It didn’t help that the team’s arguably two most skilled players struggled. Brandon Jennings had a sophomore slump after breaking out early in his rookie year.

Andrew Bogut was unable to shake off the effects of that gruesome elbow injury that he suffered in 2010. Those two never clicked last season, mainly due to health issues. In fact, the Bucks as a whole struggled with their health.

The team never seemed to have the same starting lineup for two games in a row.

On draft day 2011, Bucks General Manager John Hammond was somehow able to shave the expensive contracts of Corey Maggette and John Salmons in a three-team trade that brought in oftcriticized Stephen Jackson and Shaun Livingston from Charlotte, guard Beno Udrih from the Sacramento Kings and the draft rights to the 19th overall pick in Tobias Harris.

Credit should be given to Hammond for identifying the problems with his team and making the proper adjustments to put a winner on the floor. Salmons seemed to be half the player last season compared to his play at the end of the ‘10-‘11 season, which came after he signed a new contract with the Bucks.

Maggette really never clicked with the rest of the players and coaches. He never was the scorer the Bucks had hoped to get when they traded for him prior to last season.

But that’s enough about the past. The upcoming season promises to be better than the last, despite there being only 66 games to play. The Bucks’ offense needs to improve, plain and simple. The Bucks had the worst offense in the league and

simply could not get the ball in the hoop, leaving them with nowhere to go but up in that department.

It’s also put up or shut up time for Jennings. He treats himself like a superstar off the court, and it’s time for him to play like one on the court. We all know he has the potential, now he just has to stay on his game and prove himself once and for all.

Jackson should provide some punch from the backcourt this year. He has averaged 18 points per game so far in his career and has shown he can get to the bucket. Carlos Delfino will factor into the offense to a certain degree, but the offense will still be mainly run through Bogut, as it should be. He’s the most underrated center in the NBA, despite playing basically one-handed last year.

With the added the talents of Mike Dunleavy, Jr. at small forward to give them some depth, the team will be in good shape, considering the way he can shoot some threes.

The defense is there. Anyone who watches the Bucks on a nightly basis knows that when it comes to defense, they shine.

Health will be another huge factor in the livelihood of the Bucks’ season. Guys like Drew Gooden and Ersan Ilyasova are somewhat effective in the frontcourt when healthy. Gooden dealt with a case of plantar fasciitis, a foot injury, and started in 18 of just 35 games in his first season with Milwaukee after signing on for five years.

As is with most teams in competitive sports, if the Bucks can stay relatively healthy during this shortened season, I think they’ll make the playoffs. They’ll have to compete with the Chicago Bulls and the Indiana Pacers in the Central Division, which might be a tough feat, but I could see them getting in as a seventh or an eighth seed. Here’s to hoping the Bucks staying fighting fit.

the uwm post

Packers chase perfection in home stretch With three games remaining, Green Bay could run table

By Nolan Murphy

Week 15 at Kansas City Chiefs:

Staff Writer sports@uwmpost.com

Talk of perfection has been mentioned in recent weeks, but now with three remaining regular season games and their first NFC North title and first round bye wrapped up since 2007, speculation is now becoming a reality.

The Packers frustrated the Oakland Raiders 46-16 to move to 13-0.

Looking at the Packers’ three remaining games, a plethora of injuries are plaguing their future opponents. The Packers close out the season with two of said three games at home on the frozen tundra of Lambeau Field. A road trip to Kansas City is next on the menu, before closing out the season with two home games against division rivals Chicago and Detroit.

Arrowhead Stadium has historically been a tough venue for opposing teams.

The injury bug has bitten the Chiefs hard this season, with the loss of Pro Bowl running back Jaamal Charles in week two and, most recently, quarterback Matt Cassel. Uncertainty surrounds who will be at the helm of the Chiefs, with the recent acquisition of quarterback Kyle Orton.

Week 16 vs. Chicago Bears: The black and blue rivalry will be renewed with an NFL record 183rd meeting. The Bears will come into the game battered and depleted without their two best offensive players – quarterback Jay Cutler and running back Matt Forte.

The Bears will be hanging on for their playoff lives, so look for Chicago to bring

out all their tricks. The Packers should cruise, as long as they avoid Devin Hester in the return game.

Week 17 vs. Detroit Lions: The Packers look to enter the game with history on their mind. This team has taken the one-game-at-a-time approach all season and will want nothing else but to beat their hated rivals. Barring coach Mike McCarthy resting any starters, the Packers will close out the season with their toughest remaining match.

Remember, the Packers closed the door on the Lions 0-16 season a mere three seasons ago; they could ruin any plans the Packers have of going 16-0.

This 2011 Packers team has a chance to make history, but their real goal will only be achieved with the sight of Lombardi trophy in their hands February 5 in Indianapolis.

New Year’s resolutions FOR WISCONSIN SPORTS THOUGHTFUL WISHES TO HOLD ONTO AS THE CALENDAR CHANGES

By Jeremy Lubus

UWM women’s basketball

For the last issue of the fall semester, the Sports section decided to work up some New Year’s resolutions for both Wisconsin’s college and professional sports scene.

Stay committed to recruiting strong locally. The Panthers and coach Sandy Botham have done a great job landing Ashley Green (Nicolet) and Angela Rodriquez (Oak Creek), but with a new coach at Wisconsin and a Big East Marquette program, it will get more difficult.

UW-Milwaukee men’s basketball

UWM women’s soccer

Commit to playing sophomore Mitch Roelke more. The walk-on standout has a super smooth jumper that is not being used, and if not, he has at least six fouls not being used effectively. Overall, the Panthers need to continue to win games in order to prove last year was not a fluke, as well as to get a commitment from local standout Austin Malone-Mitchell of Rufus King High School, whose father, Marc, played for UWM.

No let down – find the next Sarah Hagen. The program has been absurdly successful under Michael Moynihan, but with another crop of seniors graduating (with awesome grades, by the way), the program has a real chance to become a Midwest powerhouse for good. Finding the next Hagen will be difficult, but if anyone can do it, it’s Coach Moynihan.

Sports Editor sports@uwmpost.com

Milwaukee Brewers Commit to playing Matt Gamel and

Taylor Green, and don’t stray from what got you here, Doug Melvin. The Brewers are not the Florida Marlins and definitely not the L.A. Angels. Wild spending will get the Brewers nowhere and that includes resigning Prince Fielder.

Milwaukee Bucks Stop signing players who are never going to hit their prime (Keyon Dooling, Jon Brockman) or are past their prime (Stephen Jackson, Drew Gooden), and draft better. Also, do not allow the Packers to win more games in a row (19 and counting) than you can in a 66-game regular season.

Green Bay Packers Commit to resigning Jermichael Finley and be the first team to go 19-0.

Resigning Finley is the key to the Packers establishing themselves as a continuous Super Bowl contender every year.

‘‘POSITIVE-LY BS’’ Photo courtesy of danny-wild.com.

uwmpost.com

December 12, 2011

NYE MKE in

T HE P OS T ’S GUIDE T O RINGING IN T HE NE W Y E AR

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NYE MKE 8

the uwm post

December 12, 2011

in

T HE P OS T ’S GUIDE T O RINGING IN T HE NE W Y E AR

By Fringe Staff fringe@uwmpost.com

A bar town at heart, Milwaukee tends to explode on New Year’s Eve, with every corner bar and club featuring some sort of event to celebrate our partying and false resolutions. To clean up the mess a bit and make the calendar a little easier to understand, the UWM Post staff offers up a handy list of Milwaukee’s best and most popular New Year’s Eve goings-on, from small-time shows and family events to the biggest and most high-demand dance parties the city has to offer. Happy New Year!

Ian Gould w/ Frogwater County Clare Irish Inn (Dec. 31, 6 p.m.; 10 p.m.-1:30 a.m.)

If you remember the drunken, lowerclass dance party from 1997’s Titanic, listening to Milwaukee’s Frogwater will either refresh your memory or give progressive bluegrass acts, like Yonder Mountain String Band and Railroad Earth, a run for their money. Led by John and Susan Nicholson, this guitar and fiddle duo jams on the open structures of Irish jigs, bluegrass standards and other Celtic music that is both recognizable and obscure. You won’t see either one tap a delay pedal with their foot or inhabit the riskier, electric side of improvisation, but from an acoustic standpoint, they pick notes like they skip rocks. Where there’s Guinness, there's enough of an old-fashioned, good-time vibe from these two to make even the staunchest Presbyterians jealous. (The group will also perform from 4:30-7 p.m. at Slim McGinn's before this.)

Harlem Globetrotters The Bradley Center (Dec. 31, 1 & 6 p.m.)

The evolution of this talented, allstar brand of players often doubles as comedic spectacle – especially when the players have a healthy lead on their contender(s). Leave it to the Globetrotters, then, to make exhibition basketball games the goofy, all-ages affair they remain under their guise.

After decades of wearing the same pleasant, showboat-y smirk with uniforms that have changed even less, the ‘Trotters provide a nice break from the continual bickering between the

NBA’s greasy-palmed moguls and its ego-inflated players. Considering many sports fans have barely noticed the recent absence of NBA activity, the evening will probably go by like the easy, breezy California rock of the ‘70s – and with plenty of time to catch a few NFL games afterward.

The Get Down New Year’s Eve Party Turner Hall (Dec. 31, 9 p.m.)

Attribute it to whatever you want, but in the spirited, multicultural cesspool of Riverwest’s dirt-cheap dance parties, Mad Planet’s The Get Down has become something of an institution to Milwaukeeans. It began eight years ago, spinning rare 45s in the soul/funk/ R&B vein while everyone else bobbing along seemed rare. But with everyone in America owning (or refusing to own) an iPod, times have changed. That kind of atmosphere has given the neighborhood quite the rep over time, and on New Year’s Eve, the party will relocate to Turner Hall Ballroom, presumably the only place that could cram all of its fans into the same place that night.

As a consolation prize to its loyalists, Mad Planet will host yet another retrothemed New Year’s Eve bash for those who didn't get a chance to think before the event sold out.

Jim Gaffigan Pabst Theatre (Dec. 30, 7 p.m.; Dec. 31, 10:30 p.m.)

Riding on the success of Hot Pockets humor, the self-titled King Baby himself Jim Gaffigan will further his Milwaukee New Year’s Eve tradition by headlining the Pabst Theater on both the 30th and the 31st, bringing in the new year with jokes of self-deprecation and bacon.

Gaffigan’s success has been at an all time high as of late. The comedian’s Comedy Central specials, DVDs and albums have been met with tremendous praise from comedy-lovers worldwide.

In addition, Gaffigan has appeared in numerous films and television series, including a starring role in TBS’s My Boys and a spot in Sam Mendes’ Away We Go. Though the comedian has been in somewhat serious roles (The Great New Wonderful), the recent Broadway play That Championship Season and guest appearances on Law and Order: Criminal

Intent, Gaffigan is by far more known as the chubby pale guy who makes weird voices in an aside pretending to be a concerned audience member.

Gaffigan’s two-night gig at the Pabst is sure to impress. Along with a special guest opening act, the amount of selfreferencing humor will have people howling all night. Though the show on the 30th starts a bit early, the 31st show is set to go down during the ball drop, and Gaffigan will more than likely be chanting the countdown as the balloons drop in the beautiful Pabst Theatre.

Skrillex The Rave/Eagles Ballroom (Dec. 31, 8 p.m.-4 a.m.; 21+) The dubstep revolution has seemingly been quick to move from sweaty basement keggers to packed dance clubs. But really, it’s been going on for at least a decade, originating in London. The ultimate culmination of DJ/remix culture that surrounds what we know as dubstep is fermented in the über-artist Skrillex.

Formally the singer of the emorock band From First to Last, as well as known by his real name, Sonny Moore, Skrillex was quick to leave FFTL to start up a solo career with his new fan base in tow. In a complete 180, Moore released his first solo effort, an electronica-rock EP called Gypsyhook. Though it wasn’t received well, Moore began using the now beloved alias, Skrillex, producing for numerous artists since 2008. As the Los Angeles crowd gave praise to the dubstep DJ at several shows at area clubs, Skrillex exponentially saw his own fan base soar sky high. Soon he was touring with Deadmau5, making appearances at huge festivals, like Coachella.

If history has served us well, Skrillex’s gig at The Rave/Eagles Ballroom on New Year’s Eve will be every bit of a riotous dance show of excessive sweating, drinking and, of course, dubstepping, reflecting the excessive nature of the genre itself. But in addition to Skrillex’s presence, a massive amount of other DJs, local and otherwise, will also be in the building. Billed as a “6 Room, 3 Level Mega Party,” with 50+ DJs, the New Year’s Eve celebration at The Rave/Eagles Ballroom won’t stop (like dubstep) until the crack of dawn.

Skrillex will bring his MTV (and Beavis & Butt-head) approved dubstep, along with 50 other DJs, to the Rave for New Year's Eve.

uwmpost.com

December 12, 2011

Two-on-two with Shawn and Marlon Wayans

The Wayans Bros sit down with the UWM Post

By Tony Atkins, Assistant Sports Editor, and Kevin Kaber, Assistant Fringe Editor fringe@uwmpost.com

Last Friday, the legendary Wayans Brothers came to UW-Milwaukee and put on quite the comedy show for the jam-packed Wisconsin Room. After the show, they sat down with Tony Atkins and Kevin Kaber of the Post for an interview as only the Wayans could.

(Warning: Some of the content in this conversation is explicit.)

Tony Atkins: How was your experience in Wisconsin? How did you enjoy it?

Marlon Wayans: I have never been – it’s cold, it’s cold. It’s not nigga-friendly.

It’s cold, but it seems like there are nice people here, and you got to want an education to come here. You better not come here and not get an education.

Shawn Wayans: Either you got a student loan that is only granted in this region of the country, or there is something here that they teach that is necessary to be here only because it’s so cold. Other than that, it’s a great school. The kids seem smart, everybody seems nice and I fucks with y’all.

TA: I noticed a blend of people of different ethnicities and backgrounds all get out in the cold and enjoy the show you guys put on. How does it feel to stay who you are and reach out to so many people without actually changing at all?

MW: That’s the beauty of humor – it’s colorless. It’s one of those things, like sports. It’s one of those forums that will bring people together. You forget that you are even a race, and you are just enjoying a universal sport.

SW: Until the comic talks about your ass.

Then you look at yourself like, “Ah, shit, I am Chinese!”

TA: So, career-wise, In Living Color.

What’s up with that? When can the fans expect to see that come to fruition?

SW: Sometime next season [fall], and it’s being geared up now. Everything is being put together, so it’s quite a process.

MW: Probably look for that sometime in September.

TA: What about White Chicks 2?

Kevin Kaber: Yeah, what other projects?

SW: White Chicks ain’t happening right now.

KK: You hinted at that quite a bit.

SW: I did, but I was just joking around.

I’m sure one day we’ll get to that.

MW: In the meantime, we have some movies we’re working on and a couple TV projects and more stand-up. We just don’t like to talk too much about things until they’re done. I’m not one of those people that be like, “Oh, I got this coming out.”

SW: This ain’t hip-hop. We don’t got a hype man like, “Yeah, yeah, White Chicks 2!”

TA: Well, if you guys need one…

KK: I always wanted to be a hype man…

TA: “Holla at ya boy! Don’t Be A Menace

three!”

SW: What are your favorite movies that we did?

KK: Don’t Be A Menace [to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood].

TA: Don’t Be a Menace. I actually watched that the other week thinking that these dudes are crazy as hell.

SW: Were you high?

MW: Yeah, that nigga was high. You see the way he laid back when you said that?

TA: Man, I’m too yellow to smoke weed.

Look at my lips. Pink. I don’t smoke.

SW: Man, those shits are brown. You are pink! Your lips are brown.

KK: Tony, if you’re too yellow, then what am I? SW: You’re actually blacker than he is.

MW: You are a dark red.

KK: Works for me… You guys were the first major comedians [to come to UWM] in 10 years, and you are representing BSU as they are representing the entire school. How does it feel?

MW: Well, hopefully it was a great show, and we didn’t know that until you just told us.

SW: It would be a good buzz for other comedians to come through. It’s a great school, good listeners, and I would definitely tell people to come through.

MW: They did a great job. The production was good. The camera and video screen was good. They did a great job, and I would do it again.

Hart-felt magic at Turner Hall Drumming legend returns with zest

Mickey Hart's latest solo venture, while a home of sorts to his spiritual core, has brought welcome changes to the dynamic force that is the Mickey Hart Band.

By Graham Marlowe Assistant Fringe Editor fringe@uwmpost.com

As a member of the Grateful Dead, percussionist Mickey Hart helped electrify (literally) a performance style previously championed by jazz musicians.

In other words, every gig they did was for that audience, for that moment, for that venue. After the innumerable twists and turns of his more than 24 years with the Dead, his solo efforts have often doubled as musicology research projects.

The Mickey Hart Collection, the drummer’s latest release on Smithsonian Folkways, compiles his world-spanning ambitions into 25 volumes, including The Music of Upper and Lower Egypt and The Spirit Cries: Music from the Rainforests of South America. The totality of that collection culminates in the Endangered Music Project, a collaboration between Hart and the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress that highlights sacred musical traditions in danger of extinction.

For Hart, musical traditions aren’t

the only thing at risk today, as his most recent projects – namely Rhythms of the Universe – ponder what the stars, planets and universe itself might sound like and explore the ever-evolving cosmological role of music in our civilization’s ecosystem. Hart, who once said people who pollute the environment are “mentally ill,” continues to attract a special kind of listener, specifically one that can appreciate the nuance between, say, a version of “Eyes of the World” from ‘77 and one from ‘89.

That ability will come in handy this Friday as Hart’s latest incarnation of the Mickey Hart Band relies on his innumerable self-penned epics, like “Let There Be Light” and “Time Never Ends,” most of which are influenced by the space-time continuum in some form or another. As set lists indicate, the band will also sprinkle in reworked Dead material that even neophytes can recognize and appreciate. In his latest interviews, Hart has expressed awe at the overwhelming response from the current tour, and the change of personnel has made this easier to accomplish than

ever before.

The raspy charm of multiinstrumentalist and vocalist Tim Hockenberry, along with Hart’s recruitment of Widespread Panic bassist Dave Schools, guitarist Gawain Matthews, and singer Crystal Monee Hall make this 17-date tour one of the more charismatic.

Whereas the Dead served as a launchpad for American traditional music (country, blues, rock and roll), Hart’s many solo ensembles have operated on a plane that is more cosmological than musical, though in the presence of the drummer’s persona, one never impedes the other. Truth be told, however, those who seek replication of their experiences with other postDead projects, like The Other Ones, Furthur or Phil Lesh and Friends, may find themselves disappointed – but only because Hart’s creative process typically puts him into deeper realms of space than his old friends.

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Laugh Out Loud Marlon and Shawn Wayans create a laugh-heavy atmosphere

Shawn and Marlon Wayans, the minds behind Don't Be a Menace... and Scary Movie 1 & 2, joined BSU as the first major comedy act UWM has seen in 10 years.

By Tony Atkins, Assistant Sports Editor, and Kevin Kaber, Assistant Fringe Editor fringe@uwmpost.com Last Friday, UW-Milwaukee’s Black Student Union hosted their first annual Laugh Out Loud Comedy Show. This event may have quite raised the bar for on-campus functions, in terms of execution and student reception. Oh, and it was headlined by the legendary Shawn and Marlon Wayans. This was definitely a night for the ages.

The evening began with a packed Wisconsin Room, full of anxious fans waiting to see the first major comedy act performing at the university since Rickey Smiley over 10 years ago.

As the event started and the diverse crowd continued to fill the room, BSU organizers entertained the growing mass with elementary games, a raffle and a dance off between audience members, all while local DJ Adamosity played hip hop jams to keep the spirits high.

Though the effort was there on the BSU organizers behalf, the crowd was definitely ready to see the brothers Wayan. But they still had to make it through an opening comedian first.

Brooklyn’s Wil Sylvince, a Haitian comedian who has appeared on BET’s Comic View, HBO's Def Comedy Jam and the syndicated Showtime at the Apollo, revved the chuckling engines of audience members.

Sylvince spent much of his short set discussing the issues we’ve all grown up with, including, but not limited to, parents punishing children and cheating off Asian classmates on test day. Ultimately, his strong observational humor suited the crowd’s needs, whether it wanted to hear Sylvince’s impressions of his Haitian-accented mother or not.

As soon as Sylvince left the stage, BSU organizers allotted another brief intermission before the beloved Wayans entered. Instead of doing a two-man show, Marlon and Shawn strayed away from their successful comedic partnership, as seen in their films and television series.

Marlon took the stage first at 8:30, well after all of the BSU activities and opening act. At his arrival, the crowd blew up in a feel-good outrage. (The same occurred at any mention of White Chicks, in a quasi-situation where the cross-gender and cross-racial receives such praise.)

Immediately, Marlon expressed his interest in the mostly black audience, since this was his first trip to the state: “I didn’t know Wisconsin had this many niggas!” The statement was met with obvious delight by the crowd. In the academic context, racial slurs and borderline offensive jokes felt out of place and could have been deemed a bit uncomfortable (there was, in fact, a mother and her young child who walked out during an extensive gag about sex), although the laughs outweighed any negative feelings.

Marlon’s short 30-minute set included much talk about the differences in alcohol consumption between white and black people – a hypothesis that’s likely turned around in the Wisconsin setting – and the straight-up fact that the Milwaukee Bucks are not a team that is worthy of much fan appreciation. “The Bucks fucking suck,” Marlon stated bluntly, which folks in the crowd had to painfully agree with.

Older brother Shawn took the stage immediately thereafter, riding on the coattails of his younger brother’s energy.

The comic talked at lengths about how new hip hop music pales in comparison to the music his parents’ generation listened to. In the process, however, Shawn frequently cracked up over his own jokes, almost to the point that they couldn’t be completed in one delivery.

Thank goodness for the understanding crowd, who stayed laughing right along the whole time.

All of the night’s most offensive material couldn’t compete with Shawn’s story about his encounter with a deaf woman at a club. During the story’s delivery, the crowd’s laughter went from howling to “Awws” extensively, but again, at this point, it was well understood that everything the night had brought to the table was to be taken lightly.

Overall, for the BSU to pull off an event of this magnitude after a history of subpar events was an amazing victory for the student organization, especially considering the massive fan base the celebrity Wayans brothers have. After the event, BSU members were already talking about next year’s Laugh Out Loud Comedy Show, but they will really have to outdo themselves to top the inaugural event.

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the uwm post

December 12, 2011

A true masterwork

The Roots break free with Undun

By Steven Franz Fringe Editor

fringe@uwmpost.com

Under the radar, 2011 has been one of the best years in recent memory for hiphop and R&B. While there hasn’t been an album of as much critical and commercial import as Kanye West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, there have nonetheless been a variety of releases, some without radio airplay at all, that have compounded to form one of the best roll calls of noteworthy music that the genre has seen in a half decade.

Shabazz Palaces, the collusion of Kanye West and Jay-Z, Big K.R.I.T., Curren$y, the reunion of Blaqstarr, Drake, Atmosphere, the Beastie Boys, the rise of Odd Future, and Pusha T – among others – have all collaborated to release invigoratingly smart, sometimes brilliant works in the last 11-plus months. And if the Roots’ new Undun isn’t the best of them all, then it’s certainly the flag under which they can unite.

Undun is a staggeringly diverse work, which culls not only from the decades-old neo-soul sound through which the band first made their name, but from old and new inspirations that seem to demonstrate forcefully that the Roots, more than any other band, can assume the title of masters of their craft. Where else can the soft, dark, indie-inspired R&B of The Weeknd (here represented on “Sleep”) coexist not just peacefully but beneficially with the guitardriven blues march of the White Stripes (“Stomp”) and the piano-based atmosphere of latter-day Radiohead (“Redford”)?

The last four songs on the album are

structured like a four-movement classical suite, with invocations of avant-garde free jazz (aided undoubtedly by bandleader/ drummer ?uestlove’s involvement with jazz explorers The Philadelphia Experiment) and string quartet piano concertos. It’s a jaw dropping left turn that effectively and concisely reduces the album’s larger story of life and death to a wordless, transcendent, five-minute musical sequence that may not have precedent or parallel in the history of rap music.

As for that story, Undun is both headon and discrete in the way in which it tackles issues of poverty, race, crime and death through the narrative story of the fictional Redford Stephens, who lives and dies over the course of the album as a hustler. It’s head-on in that the concept album structure (it’s the band’s first real concept album) provides a unified theme, which permeates every track as Redford goes through the motions of his fate.

It’s impossible to avoid what the album is saying. But it’s discrete in that the album starts with Redford’s death and tells his story backwards, a risky narrative move that posits very firmly that a black American’s fate is determined before he is even born, and is so inescapable that it may as well already happened.

It’s been a busy year for the Roots. In addition to touring nonstop, as per usual, they’ve slipped nicely into the role of Jimmy Fallon’s late night house band on NBC, a position of comfort that draws them real salaries. But nothing they’ve done personally or professionally has capped or will cap Undun, truly a magnum opus and one of the great rap albums of our time.

uwmpost.com

December 12, 2011

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the uwm post

12 December 12, 2011

Sparkling and fizzling

The Black Keys’ El Camino never gets below the surface

By Steven Franz Fringe Editor fringe@uwmpost.com

It seems like only a few years ago – because I suppose it was – that The Black Keys were electric blues hangerson, a two-piece white-boy blues outfit studying at the University of the White Stripes. They eschewed glitz, they were commercially unknown, heroes of the indie scene and not much else. They inhabited the same loud Americana spaces as bands like Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, but where the latter preferred density, the Black Keys preferred simplicity – one guitar, one

drum kit, no bass, no excess production.

My, how times have changed.

The Black Keys that exist now – first formulated in 2008 with the Danger Mouse-produced Attack & Release, then expanded upon last year with Brothers, their first commercially successful album – are a far cry from the traditionalist, minimalist band that first made its name in the early part of the last decade.

While there are a few bluesy tangents on El Camino, their newest album, and the same pounding drive that there’s always been, the band has been completely transformed. They’ve gone through a 180-degree switch that finds them not just moving past their somewhat

ideological adherence to simplicity but moving ahead in time as well, from electric blues masters like Howlin’ Wolf to soul men like the Temptations and even disco, far more forcefully than ever before.

Part of it might be music’s modernday obsession with its own aesthetics over its songwriting content, but the influence of Danger Mouse here is inestimable. Though he produced Attack & Release, a poorly-received album by almost everyone, he was cast aside for the somewhat self-produced Brothers, save for one song – “Tighten Up,” the band’s breakthrough single, on which the synthesis between the two factions

was perfected. The relationship between band and producer was reconvened on El Camino, and the results bear out the promise made on “Tighten Up.” Here are 11 concise, soulful tunes with an ear for brightness and an obsession with 1970s rock and soul music that can’t be quenched.

But beneath Danger Mouse’s signature textures, there’s not much else. El Camino, which, despite its name, features a Chrysler Town & Country on its cover (and on every single page of its booklet), is a stylistically dense album that draws from dozens of musical influences that range from Bruce Springsteen (“Nova Baby”), Motown

(“Dead and Gone”), and spritely 1960s handclap pop (“Gold on the Ceiling”) to, yes, the blues. But its sound is the extent of its content, which is mostly obsessed with attractive women – being in love with them, being heartbroken by them, yearning for them, being in a relationship with them. There’s no there there, and as a party album – which it most certainly is – El Camino is refreshing, forwardthinking bit of engaging pop music, but its absolute refusal to be anything more than silly and disposable makes it ultimately a radiantly shiny bit of nothingness too obsessed with its own coolness for its own good. Maybe they should go back to the blues.

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December 12, 2011

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the uwm post

December 12, 2011

Melancholia misses the boat

Even Kirsten Dunst’s beauty can’t save this film Melancholia is a flyby planet whose approach towards Earth is seen by some as a galactic experience of lifetime, but for others a realization of their sorrow.

It’s sad it took over two hours for Melancholia (the planet) to arrive. Don’t be surprised if you’re actually rooting for the approach of it. Only then will this drawn-out drawl of a plot cease to exist.

Melancholia comes in two parts.

The first is from Justine’s (Dunst) perspective. It’s the eve of her wedding.

Her rich brother-in-law John (Keifer Sutherland) is holding the after party, but throughout, it’s clear something is bothering Justine. She seems depressed and distant from the guests and her fiancé (Alexander Skarsgård).

Justine’s family thinks she’s going mad, but as Melancholia gets closer, she hauntingly becomes attached to its magic. She’s had premonitions of its arrival, and by the end of Part One, it seems that she’s magnetized to Melancholia’s image.

Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg), Justine’s sister, eventually makes the turn to her sister’s madness, and as Part Two commences, there’s a shift in sentiment. Justine is in the acceptance stage, but Claire can’t handle the gloomy truth. John tries to reassure her that

By Sean Willey Staff Writer fringe@uwmpost.com

“What star is that?” This depressing road trip starts with that simple question.

Melancholia is a restless walk through depression, a relentless attack on our sanity. From the moment the 10-minute beginning montage ends, we’re left in ecstasy on just how imaginative this movie could be, but also left having to trudge along through the muck of this sad piece of art.

Kirsten Dunst, who won Best Actress at the Cannes Film Festival this year, tries her best to keep the audience entertained. The little girl from Jumanji (1995) finally shows us she can effectively expand her horizons to the drama genre.

Lars von Trier doesn’t have to prove his cinematographic expertise.

From the first montage to the endless images throughout of celestial art and movement, this movie has the artistic punch we have come to expect from him. Dogville (2003) is probably his most popular among the mainstream audience, though more committed moviegoers recognize him as the director of 2009’s darkly passionate psychodrama Antichrist.

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the scientists are right, and there is no chance Melancholia will hit Earth.

When Melancholia makes its initial pass, Claire isn’t convinced.

With the help of overpowering classic horns, we eventually arrive at the climatic finish.

Melancholia did what the similarly plotted Another Earth couldn’t do earlier this year. Still, unless you’re Stanley Kubrick with 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) or Terrence Malick with The Tree of Life (2011), making a movie where the cosmos plays a central part is hard to do. It depends on how creative you want to be when you watch a movie, but comparing a human life to the path of a goliath force of nature doesn’t match up.

The cult of Trier’s voracious appetite for visual effects and the gossip of Dunst’s Best Actress performance is why this movie is getting Oscar buzz.

However, its 30 minutes too long and muddled with too much interpersonal extravagance.

Dunst was beautiful, and she’ll probably get an Oscar nomination, but she won’t get the win, because Melancholia is essentially a hit-or-miss movie.

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Thursday, December 15 Cage the Elephant, The Joy Formidable, Sleeper Agent The Rave

Friday, December 30th – Sunday, January 1st Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra – The Gershwins: Here to Stay Uhlein Hall

Tucked between the tireless grunge-rock anthems and the increasing tedium of rap & hip-hop’s cash-money “caching!” of today is Cage The Elephant, one of Kentucky’s premier rock bands of the last half decade. An arid but wellbalanced production style, along with a hazy garage-blues backbone and a rap-like delivery that recalls Beck’s earliest MTV appearances, this post-grunge combo may strike you as either a lighter version of the Stone Temple Pilots or as (still) young-and-hungry leftovers from the ‘00s garagerock revival. Stylistically there is to be discussed, but regardless they’ve had a fast climb to the mainstream with just two albums. Their self-titled 2008 debut rose quickly on the UK Singles Chart, and before they knew it they found themselves touring with Silversun Pickups and Manchester Orchestra. Extensive touring, television appearances, and festival crowd win-overs have paved an easy path to stardom for these five, and their latest offering, January’s Thank You, Happy Birthday, is so much an innovation but a theme and variations on a personal style.

The Roaring Twenties were as interesting period as ever in pre-Depression America. Despite the time’s new social movements, the stage was set for massively popular American music. George Gershwin, along with brother Ira, composed and orchestrated some of America’s most successful pieces of music from the mid 1910’s to George’s untimely death in 1937.

Since then, the Gershwin Brothers have left behind a timeless repertoire of music that lived on through acts like Nat King Cole and Frank Sinatra and will continue to live on for generations.

The Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra will help continue the Gershwin legacy with their New Year’s Eve Weekend show: The Gershwins: Here to Stay. Tickets range in price up to $99.

Friday, Decmber 30th The Mistreaters, Guilty Pleasures, Catholic Boys, Static Eyes Cactus Club

Friday, December 16 Mickey Hart Band Turner Hall Ballroom Of all the Grateful Dead alum, Mickey Hart (drums/ percussion) has been the hardest to define, as well as the most progressive. Further, if one were to sift through the band’s recorded history, Hart best anticipated what the world of music might next offer us. In the context of the Dead, Hart found ways to integrate influences of worldbeat and other percussion-driven genres into an already expansive rock music palette. And through a series of onoff, far out ensembles like Planet Drum and The Rhythm Devils, Hart could safely say there is virtually no musical stone he’s left unturned outside of the Dead. The most recent incarnation of the Mickey Hart Band coincides with the Smithsonian Folkways release of The Mickey Hart Collection – a 25-album series that spans innumerable regions of the globe, including Sudan, Tibet, Indonesia, and Brazil.

Sunday, December 18 Gimme Shelter Times Cinema; 4pm $4

Woodstock wasn’t the only overpopulated “free” concert in American history, but no other example lived up to the ideals it stood for any better than that one. Less than four months later came the release of Gimme Shelter (1970), a documentary from the Maysles Brothers that tracks The Rolling Stones’ star-studded-concert-turned-dystopia at the Altamont Speedway in northern California. An impending doom swept over the film at the time, and many saw it as evidence of the counterculture’s naïveté, or at least proof that the counterculture could no longer be trusted, due to its numerous danger socio-political danger zones (in this case, the Hell’s Angels). “It’s creating a sort of microcosmic society,” said Mick Jagger, “which sets an example for America in terms of how one can behave in these gatherings”. With four births, four deaths, and “an awful lot of scuffles”, the key word there is “could.”

Also notable this week: Ballini, Ogburn and Baumann (Dec 12, Jazz Estate) Thomas Kiedrowski (Dec 14, Boswell Book Company) Mushroomhead w/ guests (Dec 14, The Rave) Mixtape Meltdown #7 (Dec 15, Frank’s Power Plant) UWM Jazz Combos (Dec 15, The Jazz Estate; 9 p.m.)

Disguised As Birds (Dec 16, Cactus Club) UWM Student Film & Video Festival (Dec 17, Union Theatre) Braid & Smoking Popes (Dec 22, Turner Hall)

Milwaukee has always been a fitting setting for the punk scene. With multiple venues supporting the genre, it’s safe to say that it’s in our roots. However, one Milwaukee punk band will be saying its goodbyes at the Cactus Club this winter.

The Mistreaters have been mistreating basements and clubs around the world for the better part of a decade now, but sadly they will be playing their last show in conjunction with the Cactus Club’s final event of their (elongated) 15th Anniversary celebration. Joining the Mistreaters are Guilty Pleasures, Catholic Boys, and Static Eyes to help say goodbye to a premier punk icon in Milwaukee while being one piece of the larger renaissance of the genre, locally, globally, and nationally that will surely help usher in a variety of artists who will have owed a substantial debt to bands like the one saying goodbye this night.

Saturday, December 31st The Get Down Turner Hall If you happened to have missed last year’s sold out New Year’s Eve party at the Turner Hall, fret not because there’s another this year. The Get Down is a New Year’s Eve celebration to end all. Featuring a delectable selection of soul and funk for patrons to groove to all night, The Get Down is sure to be (as it was last year) a sweaty funk-fest up until its balloon drop finale.

Tickets are sure to sell quickly (if not because of the party, then because of the buffet), so get them while they’re hot. But if you can’t make it to the Get Down – which tends to sell out days before New Year’s Eve actually arrives – there are a variety of other New Year’s Eve festivities at almost every bar around the city that are worth checking out, from the annual linesaround-the-block Dead Man’s Carnival New Year’s Eve show to Mad Planet’s massive retro dance party – which traditionally features free pizza and noisemakers to set off when the time is right – among other local music extravaganzas and wall-towall parties. But if we at the Post had to endorse one New Year’s Eve spectacular, it would be this one.

Also notable this week: Mike Krol, Sleeping in the Aviary (Dec 26, Frank’s Power Plant) Evan Christian (Dec 28, The Jazz Estate) Dumpster Babies, The Onions (Dec 31, Frank’s Power Plant) Jim Gaffigan (Dec 30-31, Pabst Theatre) Skrillex (Dec 31, The Rave) New Year’s Eve Bash Retro Dance Party (Dec 31, Mad Planet)

The Nutcracker Marcus Center for the Performing Arts (Multiple showings, Dec. 1026) The holiday season would not be complete without a fair amount of Christmas-themed entertainment. Besides excessive showings of A Christmas Story and holiday music blaring out of department store intercoms, Christmas wouldn’t be complete without the landmark ballet, The Nutcracker.

The mind behind the story of the infamous ballet, Ernst Theodor Amadeus Wilhelm Hoffmann, wrote it while in Germany in the early 19th century. Commissioned to be scored by one of the most important composers of all time, the Russian genius Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (who is also responsible for the Swan Lake composition and the “1812 Overture”), The Nutcracker made its premier during the Christmas season in Russia in 1892. Since its debut, the ballet has been adapted not only into different languages, but in a vast array of different forms, including cartoons and films.

Luckily for Milwaukee, the city’s famed ballet group will be performing the piece all month long (starting this past weekend and ending on Dec. 26th) with both matinees and evening shows offered.

Choreographed by Milwaukee Ballet’s Artistic Director, Michael Pink, The Nutcracker is sure to impress and spark the Christmas spirit amongst all of its viewers.

A Very Bombshell Holiday Special Times Cinema (Saturday, Dec. 17, 10 p.m.)

The Brew City Bombshells are one of Milwaukee’s best-kept secrets, although their recent performance at the Milwaukee Film Festival opening night party has hopefully done quite a bit to dispel that sad fact. The local burlesque masters (or, if you prefer, mistresses) are one of the best in the Midwest, and their holiday spectacular, which features guest performer Lolita Haze, is sure to open a few eyes. Tickets for this event are $10, but with a $2 reduction if you happen to be wearing an ugly Christmas sweater. If you haven’t bought yours by now, you might be out of luck for the discount – though that’s not particularly relevant, because the extra $2 will probably be worth it for the two-hour event.

Call Me Lightning, John the Savage & Absolutely Cactus Club (Friday, Dec. 23, 10 p.m.)

Dubbed “A Very Special Christmas Show,” three of Milwaukee’s top indie rock outfits will stuff the Cactus Club full of adoring fans in the name of charity on the eve of Christmas Eve this year. To benefit the Hunger Task Force and Milwaukee’s Children’s Hospital, the hungry rockand-roll spirit of the Who-inflected Call Me Lightning, experimental lounge rockers John the Savage and the post-hardcore Absolutely, a more recent local favorite, will host a wild pre-holiday free-for-all that will be rough enough around the edges to make the venue’s glowing marquee perspire outside the building. In light of the occasion, the venue has asked ticketholders to bring nonperishable food items to benefit those less fortunate.

Holiday movies (Various locations, various times) The holiday season generally means one thing: movies…

EVERYWHERE. While it’s easy to melt into your favorite chair and enjoy TBS’ annual 24-hour marathon of A Christmas Story, it might be more worth it to go out on the town and see what local theaters, both art house and otherwise, have to offer. The Humphrey IMAX Dome Theater is presenting massive, eye-popping screenings of Robert Zemeckis’ adaptation of The Polar Express (starring Tom Hanks as, like, everyone in the movie). If you want the actual in-theater experience instead of the cable TV experience, the Times Cinema will be showing the aforementioned A Christmas Story. Meanwhile, the Rosebud Cinema Drafthouse – located right down the street from the Times – will be screening National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, as well as the Judy Garland classic Meet Me in St. Louis, which features Garland’s unique and timeless version of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.”

Holiday plays (Various locations, various times) The Christmas season is, and always has been, a very fertile ground for live theater, and in addition to the Milwaukee Ballet’s traditional, world-famous rendition of The Nutcracker, a variety of other theater groups, both large and small, will be rolling out holiday-related productions of their own. The famous First Stage Children’s Theater will be putting on a production of Junie B. in Jingle Bells, Batman Smells!, which runs twice a day through Saturday, and then again on the 28th and 29th. The Milwaukee Repertory Theater’s annual adaptation of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol runs through Christmas Eve, while In Tandem Theatre’s self-aware satire of the same play, Scrooge in Rouge, runs through Christmas Eve and then again from the 28th through the 31st. Other productions include Who Killed the Ghost of Christmas Past?, an audience-inclusive interactive murder mystery presented by the Alchemist Theater, Dale Gutzman’s Holiday Punch at the Off the Wall Theatre and Who Killed Santa?, a different interactive mystery presented

by Carte Blanche Studios.

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December 12, 2011

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NEWS

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SA releases climate survey results RESIGNATION Findings provide snapshot of hostile work environment

By Zach Brooke, Staff Writer and Steve Garrison, News Editor news@uwmpost.com

The Student Association’s Senate Oversight and Rules Committee released the results of the climate survey sent out to SA members last week in the wake of widespread allegations of office misconduct. The confidential survey attempts to gauge the environment within the SA office and includes questions about sexual harassment and assault, bullying, intimidation and hazing.

Of the 37 SA members who submitted responses, one person has come forward with allegations of being sexually assaulted, which the report defines as “intentional physical conduct, such as sexual intercourse or touching, of a person’s intimate body parts by someone who did not have permission to make such conduct.” This is separate from the initial allegation, which led to the arrest and resignation of former SA Vice President Brent Johnson last week.

SORC chair Tereza Pelicaric said that the new claim has been forwarded to UWM’s SA investigation team.

Additionally, one respondent reported receiving a threat of physical

JOHNSON

Continued from page 1 intimidates the petitioner” at Tiffany’s home, work, school and public places. Examples of “contact” include physical, communication by phone, in writing and/or electronic devices. In addition, it requires that they maintain a 300-foot distance between each other at all times. The commissioner said an

violence. Five respondents, or 15 percent of those polled, reported experiencing sexual harassment, which the survey defined as “repeated course of conduct whereby one person engages in verbal or physical behavior of sexual nature, that is unwelcome, serves no legitimate purpose, intimidates another person, and has the effect of creating an intimidating, hostile or offensive work environment.”

Other findings include: 59 percent of respondents do not feel comfortable with the climate in the SA office.

38 percent of respondents experienced exclusionary and/or hostile conduct that has interfered with their ability to work and learn.

50 percent of respondents reported a more negative experience within the SA than in the general campus community.

61 percent of respondents have seriously considered leaving the SA. So far the survey has resulted in former President Alex Kostal being served with a temporary restraining order by the University Student Court, and Kostal and former Senator and SORC Vice Chairman David Sidhu being referred to SORC for further investigation. Kostal and Sidhu resigned from the SA Sunday night. exception to the 300-foot rule would be made if they shared a class, assuming they would not have to directly communicate.

Johnson said that he thought that the decision was wrong, “but I guess that is what appeals are for.”

“Hopefully he learns not to lie,” Tiffany said in response.

Johnson has 60 days to appeal the court’s decision.

Continued from page 2

Former Chief of Staff Angela Lang, who was appointed vice president at the Dec. 11 senate meeting, said she saw a few of the papers in Kostal’s office.

“It’s kind of the story of my life, again I told them don’t do this, it’s an idiotic thing to do, you will easily get caught,” Lang said.

Hapka, Kostal, and Vice Chair of SORC David Sidhu are all currently living together as roommates on the East Side.

Speaker of the Senate Rick Banks

December 12, 2011 said the techniques Kostal used to intimidate people weren’t traditional methods.

“When you think of intimidation you think of someone being all aggressive and in your face. Alex is a much more subtle intimidating. In terms of do this… not explicitly, but you know, inferring and things like that,” Banks said.

Senator and Shared Governance Director Michael Ludwig said he heard that Kostal was intimidating members of SA. “I had heard [Kostal] was telling everyone to get their stories straight, and that I believe there was taking a particular staff member aside, Matt

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Rosner, and yelling at him that he was telling people… just berated him because he was speaking to investigators and telling him wrong things,” Ludwig said.

“I believe it was, ‘Well, we don’t want certain things leading back to certain people,’ that kind of talk.”

Senator Matt Rosner said he remembered the time Kostal had yelled at him for telling investigators the truth about an incident in which Rosner was tricked into drinking Everclear.

“I felt a little intimidated… I mean it’s a weird reaction, it’s a human reaction.

I mean, of course he should have been better than to yell at me in front of other people,” Rosner said. “What Kostal should do, and frankly everybody who’s

The activities of the Campus Activity Board

Restarted after a two-month hiatus

By Stephanie Schmidt Special to the Post news@uwmpost.com

The Campus Activity Board has been restarted by the Student Association for the second time this year, after being tabled when Committee Chairman Hector Santiago left the SA earlier this fall.

CAB was created to bring big name performers to UW-Milwaukee and was funded by the Senate Finance Committee for approximately $300,000. However, it soon became a constant battle for control. Santiago and his vice chair, Nick Edmonds, constantly felt undermined by the executive staff.

“They were really watching over us, and it wasn’t really the best student-run group,” Santiago said.

With a committee focused on planning activities for the whole campus, student participation and feedback are important.

“CAB is really one of those groups where every student should be a part of it,” Santiago said. “Instead it was just the ‘Executive Branch’ committee.”

Santiago left the committee after finding a new job, because he grew tired of the controversy and drama that was occurring within the SA. He said he thought Edmonds would take over and was shocked when Edmonds was immediately fired after Santiago resigned. The question now is who will be leading the committee.

“I guess it will be filled at the next senate meeting,” Speaker of the Senate Rick Banks said. “I don’t plan to run. I don’t know who’s going to lead it.”

Even without a clear leader, Shared Governance Director Mike Ludwig said that because CAB was funded through SFC, it needed to get up and running again.

“The committee needs to start meeting,” Ludwig said. “The money is there, and it has been inactive for so long. That is not a good business model.”

Ludwig said that he supports CAB, because it was vital for the experience at UWM. “An actual service to the students where they can get excited and say, ‘Hey, you know Cornel West is coming to speak at our university.

That is awesome, that is scholarly, you get something out of that,’” Ludwig said.

Brent Johnson had a hearing on the restraining order put on him by Tiffany. Post photos by Austin McDowell

the uwm post

20 December 12, 2011

EDITORIAL The following piece represents the views of the Editorial Board of THE UWM POST. The editorial board is not affiliated with the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee and these views do not represent the views of the university.

SA violated open meetings law

Senate bungles proper procedure for closed sessions The Dec. 6 Student Association meeting went into closed session illegally. While it is clear from interviews with the Senate Parliamentarian and Speaker of the Senate that the closed session was done out of ignorance and not malice, the Post nevertheless feels it’s important to call attention to the fact and to set a precedent.

Law, by its very nature, is an interpretive business. Though the judiciary has final say in clarifying our laws, definitions may be muddled up until final rulings are handed down from the bench, and often long after. For this reason, we are running our understanding of open meeting procedure in the editorial section rather than news. While we resolve that the open meetings law was violated, it’s possible another interpretation could be made. That would be for the courts to decide.

However, in the absence of judicial ruling, we offer our own conclusions.

The first step of an SA meeting is to give public notice that the meeting is taking place. The SA did this.

Unless specifically stated on this form, it’s assumed all meetings will be open. If the meeting is expected to enter closed session at some point, notice must be given of that, too.

As section in Section IV.A. of the Compliance Guide: “The notice provision in Wis. Stat. § 19.84(2) requires that, if the chief presiding officer of a governmental body is aware that a closed session is contemplated at the time he or she gives public notice of the meeting, the notice must contain the subject matter of the closed session” (p. 17).

The SA did this correctly. The university provides a website with a form to fill out notices. On the form, there is the option that the meeting may go into closed session. If this box is checked, the form then directs to give the statutes that allow for closed session. The SA also complied with this part of the law, giving the following three statues: Wis. Stat. § 19.85(1)(b) Considering dismissal, demotion, licensing or discipline of any public employee or person licensed by a board or commission or the investigation of charges against such person, or considering the grant or denial of tenure for a university faculty member.

Wis. Stat. § 19.85(1)(c) Considering employment, promotion, compensation or performance evaluation data of any public employee over which the governmental body has jurisdiction or exercises responsibility.

Wis. Stat. § 19.85(1)(e) Considering financial, medical, social or personal histories or disciplinary data of specific persons, preliminary consideration of specific personnel problems or the investigation of charges against specific persons.

Nowhere on the site or form does it allow for more specification than

stating the statues that allow for a closed session. This is where the SA began to stray from the law.

The Wisconsin Open Meetings Law Compliance Guide states in the Procedure for Convening in Closed Session that “merely identifying and quoting from a statutory exemption does not adequately announce what particular part of the governmental body’s business is to be considered under that exemption.” So while the SA gave proper exemptions, they failed to give specifics. The compliance guide explains that “enough specificity is needed in describing the subject matter of the contemplated closed meeting to enable the members of the governmental body to intelligently vote on the motion to close the meeting” (p. 18).

Basically, giving just the statue doesn’t give enough information. If the body (in this case, the senate of the SA) doesn’t know exactly why they are voting on going into closed session, they are not adequately informed enough to vote intelligently.

By failing to give specific reasons for entering into closed session, the SA broke the Wisconsin open meetings law.

It is very probable that another open meetings law was broken at the SA meeting. At this point, what happened during the closed session is speculation. According to the meeting agenda, the SA went into closed session upon entering item IX.J, “matters to be referred to the Senate Oversight and Rules Committee.”

Since SA President Alex Kostal was under investigation, it is probable that at this time, the senate went over the surveys filled out by the SA in regards to Kostal.

At this point it is important to point out IV.C.2(a) of the Compliance Guide. It says: “If a closed session for such a purpose will include an evidentiary hearing or final action, then the governmental body must give the public employee or licensee actual notice of that closed hearing and/ or closed final action” (19). It goes on to say that “evidentiary hearings are characterized by the formal examination of charges and by taking testimony and receiving evidence in support or defense of specific charges that may have been made…

Where actual notice is required, the notice must state that the person has a right to request any such evidentiary hearing or final action be conducted in open session. If the person makes such a request, the governmental body may not conduct an evidentiary hearing or take final action in closed session.”

If evidence is given to a charge, the person involved has the right to request an open session.

In an interview with Speaker of the Senate Rick Banks, the Post asked if notice was given to the people discussed if they were going to be discussed in closed session. Banks replied no. Kostal told the Post that

he wanted the meeting held in open session, which Banks confirmed.

Banks went on to say that before Kostal left (after being served a temporary restraining order), he told him notice had to be given to the person or people discussed in closed session. Banks conferred with the Parliamentarian Anthony DeWees, who said that was not correct, and Banks told Kostal he had to leave.

Speaker Banks was unaware of these laws. In an initial interview with the Post, he said he would look into it and get back to us. He later said, “the Post brought to light some interesting facts regarding open meetings laws that I was not previously aware of. I’m still looking into the facts regarding the case and open meetings laws in general, and we’ll be making a decision on whether or not we’re moving forward on closed sessions.”

He said he didn’t think this would change anything regarding Kostal’s investigation and that the senate would possibly change the way they went into closed sessions.

That Kostal’s investigatory matters were being discussed during the closed session gives further credence that the session should have been open. The public’s right to know outweighs any reasons SA had for going into close session. The students elected Kostal and the senate dealing with him and have a vested interest in the matter.

We have laid out how they entered closed session illegally, but this is a meeting that never should have been closed at all. The Compliance Guide says that “the policy of the open meetings law dictates that the exemptions be invoked sparingly and only where necessary to protect the public interest. If there is any doubt as to whether closure is permitted under a given exemption, the governmental body should hold the meeting in open session” (p. 18).

They were discussing an elected official voted into office by the students of this university. Closed session is not to protect the privacy of the SA. These statutes are meant to give privacy to employees who work for a government, not to hide the goings-on of elected officials. The SA acted against both the letter and the spirit of the law by entering into closed sessions. The public’s right to know is of greater importance than keeping the elected president’s possible disciplines a secret. SA senators are elected into their jobs, and part of the job is making hard decisions in the public eye.

The general legislative policy of the open meetings law is that “the public is entitled to the fullest and most complete information regarding the affairs of government as is compatible with the conduct of governmental business” (Wis. Stat. § 19.81(1)). It is clear that the opposite happened.

Hope and change in the student association New spirit, legislation signal start of turnaround It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a student association in possession of misfortune, must be in want of good press. For a single, fleeting moment, the Post is happy to oblige.

These are turbulent times for the SA, as they limp into winter break following the resignation of the President and the Vice President, and rocked by allegations of serial misconduct by senior members of the executive staff. Uncertainty looms large for the remainder of the year and all that is assured for the foreseeable is virtual powerless and continued investigations.

However, as bad as it looks right now, there’s reason to believe the crisis has sparked genuine reform within the SA, and we can occasionally glimpse a few flickers of light at the end of tunnel.

They come in the form of the tireless work of a small but dedicated group of individuals within the SA that seek to usher in a new culture of transparency and accountability. For too long the SA has plotted behind closed doors, grudgingly acknowledging the Post and other media through clenched teeth, if at all. Now, however, SA leaders welcome scrutiny, rightfully believing sunshine to be the disinfectant.

And while attitude and environment is certainly important, they are both fragile and abstract manifestations which are ultimately meaningless in the absence of concrete results. Thankfully tangible results have also been forthcoming.

The SA Accountability Act and the Executive Transparency Act introduced by Senator Matthew Rosner are concrete signs of progress. The Accountability Act drastically reduces the amount of signatures needed to recall elected officials, giving students a powerful check on their representatives. While we acknowledge that excessive recalls could potentially lead in the same dysfunction we are trying to correct, we feel that legislation provides adequate safeguards against recall abuse while at the same time ensuring students will be able to take action against problem politicians should the senate fail to act. Likewise, the Executive Transparency Act encourages frugality and openness from SA members, by stipulating that all travel expenses and major purchases must be posted online within 14 days. These are wonderful examples of the right moves being made for the right reasons.

We do not pretend that these measures are all that are needed to clean up the mess previous administrations have left behind. Far from it. Nor do we pretend that these reforms mark the start of smooth sailing from here on out. We will continue to remain vigilant against SA abuses and missteps of power (see below). But we do so with faith that the worst is over, and lasting reform is ultimately the goal of the remaining SA members.

LETTERS

TO THE EDITOR

All of us at THE UWM POST want to hear what you think and welcome your letters to the Editor. Feel free to comment about articles, opinions or anything you find in our weekly issues. Send your letters in an email to letters@uwmpost.com. In your submission indicate whether or not you wish to remain anonymous.

SA will survive scandal The past few weeks have been a difficult time for the Student Association of UW-Milwaukee. In the midst of investigations, allegations of sexual assault and final exams, things are coming to a climax.

I joined the Student Association recently as director of outreach and became privy to the unsettling climate in the SA office very quickly. I tried to do as much observing and as little talking as possible to best gauge the workplace climate. In the short time I’ve been around, I feel that the negative office climate was dictated by the person in charge, the president of the Student Association. He set the standard by which his employees were expected to act.

In all my years working in politics, I’ve never before attended meetings where sexual assault victims were belittled. Never before have I seen someone encourage their colleagues to develop a cover up for a scandal. Never before have I worked with someone who was willing to put the interests of their personal friends and roommates before the interests of the over 30,000 students who pay tuition at this campus. Never before have I worked with someone who openly thought he could buy the loyalty of his peers in exchange for jobs – until I worked with President Kostal.

The truth of the matter is that there are a lot of amazing people working in the SA office, all of who were compromised by President Kostal’s poor choices. They are student employees who were observing questionable behavior but were too afraid to come forward for fear of losing their jobs. There are many SA staff and senators who genuinely care about improving the UWM experience for every single student on our campus.

Every cloud has a silver lining, and this is an opportunity for the SA to realize that we need strong leadership and we need it quickly. It’s clear to me that the president and former vice president took on responsibilities that they were incapable of handling. Their campaign promises ring hollow while their actions are loud and clear. They violated the trust of thousands of students, and the sooner everyone can accept that, the sooner we can all work to make the SA vibrant again.

Accountability and integrity are two values that come to mind in light of recent events. The UWM Post is right – it’s time to clean house. Let’s work together to take care of the mess at hand, and let’s move forward and prove to the student body, through words and deeds, that we are committed to improving their UWM experience and that we refuse to let the recent behavior of the few prevent us from doing our jobs to the best of our abilities. May the SA prevail.

Julio Guerrero Director of Outreach Student Association

OP-ED

uwmpost.com

December 5, 2011

21

Is bi a lie?

When the cold forces people inside,

Nobody wants a case of cabin fever

be aware that tempers can flare

By Miranda Rosenkranz Staff Writer editorial@uwmpost.com

With snow falling and the weather bitter, so starts the season of bundling for warmth and staying indoors. During this time, nothing is better than loafing around, sipping hot beverages and cuddling up with a pile of blankets.

However, this also means more time in front of the fire instead of out on the town. With all of the extra time spent at home, you are sure to be seeing more of your roommates. Be careful not to get sick of each other over the long frost.

During winter hibernation, even the best housemate relationships will be tested. With so much time spent together, moments alone will be rare.

Tensions can grow, and what was once a peaceful communal living situation can turn into an uncomfortable environment.

But there are steps you can take to avoid confrontation and keep everyone sane during Wisconsin’s hibernation months.

First and foremost, practice good roommate habits. Clean up after yourself. More time spent inside means little messes that were tolerable before can become disgusting eyesores. The bitter temperatures outside can make

the nicest of people miserable. Another potential root of roommate problems is gossip. Avoid confrontation by not falling victim to slanderous temptation.

Another step to avoiding altercation is to pull your own weight. Chip in for toilet paper and cleaning supplies, and always keep up with rent. Energy bills inflate during this time of year. Do not let money come between friendships.

Pay bills on time, and repay roommates immediately in order to avoid awkward money games. Money problems are a leading cause of fights in many relationships – fights that can only make friendships awkward and living situations tense.

Most importantly, understand that everyone is different, and allow people space. Some people like things neat and orderly. They use a spoon, wash it right away and put it back in the drawer. Some people are not as concerned with tidiness.

Everyone should make compromises.

The person who is not as clean and tidy needs to pick up after themselves.

The neat freaks should not stress about a few dishes in the sink or crumbs on the counter. Give each other space over break, respect your differences and avoid confrontation. Simple courtesies go a long way and make a house a home.

Pop does not music make Exploring other genres does the body good

By Sandra Padilla Special to the Post editorial@umwpost.com

When we get to know others, one thing we generally ask is: What kind of music are you into? You will get different responses but the two most common are: a) “I really love [insert genre]” or b) “Everything.” But what bothers me is this kind of scenario: “I really love music!” I respond, “Really?” They answer, “Yes, Lady Gaga [for example] is really representing right now!” How can someone say they love music when they make it clear that they stick to one area? Music is something that varies infinitely beyond Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber, Nikki Minaj and Kanye West.

The problem lies in that a fair amount of music these days feels more like an advertisement. Bands and artists are overproduced solely so they can fit the commercial audience. Yet pop music sets the mood for social settings, because everyone is familiar with the culture. Perhaps we may not listen to Bieber, but because he is a target of the media, we are familiar with him.

Frank Sinatra’s professional career led to what is now known as traditional pop. He found a way to reach a wide spectrum of people. Artists like him gave the public something they could talk about, what is known as “pop culture.” It opens conversations. Pop music is just that: music that is popular. Most of what is popular is very repetitive, commercial and aimed towards the youth.

But pop is not the only music playing in the world. What about all the other genres, like alternative, rock, metal, classical, electronic, folk, country and so forth? When people think of these genres, their minds unfortunately stereotype automatically. For example, people may categorize electronic as techno, an ongoing beat that is structured by a pattern. The truth is, however, that techno is just a form – not a subcategory – of electronic music, and the songs can have a great development throughout.

Another such overreaching generalization? Classical means unbearably slow music with no words. But it can be so easy to stumble upon beautiful piano music that was written by one of the “greats,” like Beethoven. It is possible for everyone to find a classical composer they may like, because they all have varying styles, just as music has different genres – not to mention the interesting twists within classical music. If you do a simple search on YouTube or Pandora, you will come across unique ensembles, such as the “Vitamin String Quartet,” who cover music by current bands.

Is there a difference between modern pop and what pop was before? Well, The Beatles are considered ‘60s pop, but they were “different,” an emerging fusion of rock and pop at the time, which is what made them so successful. The Beatles are some of the most respected artists that ever lived.

To read the rest of this article, go to www.uwmpost.com

ONLINE EXCLUSIVES 'Tis the season for rhetorical conf lict

By David Rangel Recent events within the SA raise questions

By Allesha Gilbert-Ewing

Exploring the legitimacy behind bisexuality

By Brody Hess Staff Writer editorial@uwmpost.com

“I remember getting various questions asked [to me] when people found out about Bre and I being together.

‘Are you really dating a girl?’ ‘Do you actually like her or is it for attention?’”

“Bisexuals don’t exist. They’re just overly horny, looking for attention, can’t make up their mind, are in a phase, are just being trendy and really do have a preference – assuming they aren’t just gay or lesbian. They probably just make out with people of the same gender, and even if they do have sex with either sex, they can’t form a relationship with either sex.

They’re sexually immature and won’t be able to form a long-lasting relationship since they can’t even decide what gender they’re attracted to. It’s bullshit.”

Opinions on bisexuality vary greatly in our society, as do our fears surrounding it. People fear forming relationships with bisexuals, because they don’t think bisexuals can be monogamous and worry that their bisexual partner will lose interest in their gender and fall for someone of the opposite gender. People assume that bisexuals are automatically willing to engage in sex with more than one partner simply because they like both genders.

Naturally, being bisexual can be a frustrating experience, especially when their own community doesn’t even always acknowledge their existence. Many gays and lesbians doubt bisexuality’s legitimacy or the legitimacy of a specific person’s bisexuality, causing bisexuals to

feel alienated from what is supposed to be their community, too.

Bisexuality was defined by Eli R. Green and Eric N. Peterson of the LGBT Resource Center at UC-Riverside as, “a person emotionally, physically and/ or sexually attracted to males/men and females/women. This attraction does not have to be equally split between genders and there may be a preference for one gender over others.” I fully agree with this definition. Bisexuality – like all sexuality – is a broad, yet personal, piece of a person’s identity. Straight people aren’t told that because they have only dated one specific body type or personality type that they will only like that kind of person. The heart goes where it wants, and it often surprises its owner.

But bisexuality isn’t the only term spinning in peoples’ heads. Pansexuality – being attracted to all or many gender expressions, including those identifying as androgynous, bigendered, genderqueer, intergendered, pangendered or transgendered – is another concept that many are left in the dark on. With so many different identities in the identity sphere, it comes as no surprise to me that people don’t understand, or care to understand, bisexuality and its variants.

It can be overwhelming.

Also causing trouble for bisexuals are the people who’ve left a bad taste in the mouths of others by claiming to be bisexual as a stepping stone towards embracing their actual homosexuality.

This kind of behavior leads people to think most bisexuals are actually gay or lesbian but clinging on to the notion of

liking women or men to have some sense of “normalcy.” This is unfortunate. In a perfect world, where people could easily come out with whatever orientation they hold, none of this would even be an issue.

It’s very likely that more people you know are bisexual than you’re aware of. Bisexuality is easier to hide from people, because the friends and family members of bisexuals can be shown the heterosexual relationships they hold but remain hidden from the homosexual ones. It’s also less likely to come up in casual conversation than homosexuality.

Whenever I talk about any of my past relationships or lovers, it’s very difficult to hold the conversation without using gender indicative pronouns. I’ve tried, and it just sounds awkward. Bisexuals can easily use the heterosexual indicative pronoun without lying, or at least blatantly lying. Many bisexuals don’t feel the need to come out to friends and family, because the homosexual element is only a part of their orientation. If everyone knew all of the bisexual friends and family members they have, people may feel a bigger need to understand bisexuals.

Attraction is based on emotional, psychological and physical attributes that, when they line up, cause someone to be attracted to another person. That’s it, plain and simple, no gender required.

A person may be attracted completely or predominantly towards one gender, but not everyone works that way. If equality is what we want to achieve, then society needs to come to a new understanding of attraction that doesn’t focus so much on gender as much as attributes.

Kick this winter’s ass

What to do over winter break

By Jesse Anderson Staff Writer editorial@uwmpost.com

Snowfall and frozen puddles are an unwelcome reminder that the dreaded months of blistering cold winds, icy roads and hours upon hours indoors are here. Come winter, every other living thing either dies or hides, but we, the geniuses we are, throw on a coat, scrape our windows and slide across town to meet the demands of our generation.

Studying for exams, finishing projects and meeting deadlines has many of us begging for a break. Thankfully, it’s almost here. Unfortunately, after a while, boredom, winter weight gain and a case of Seasonal Affective Disorder tend to show up uninvited.

The winter blues can get the best among us a little down. That’s no reason to curl up in front of the TV with a blanket and our favorite comfort food this winter. When you find yourself bored or anxious over the break, get up and do something you have been putting off for a rainy (or snowy) day.

Here's some recycled advice that I find needs refreshing this time of year: Get in touch with yourself No, don't touch yourself. Well, I guess there's no shame in that, but I'm talking about asking yourself some questions and finding some answers.

What direction are you heading? Is that the direction you want to be heading?

Most of us could probably be a little more self-aware. A good place to start is with a pen and paper. Write down what is on your mind right now, what has been bothering you or holding you back all these years or what you see yourself doing in five, ten or twenty years from now.

Be your own cartographer. Map your future. Make lists of goals and a timeline for achieving them. What obstacles will you have to overcome? It may sound cheesy or trite, but this formula is so simple and so effective in the quest to kick ass at life. It can be a big relief to be more comfortable with who you are and where you are going.

Get pumped up, not plumped up.

I know we hear about the need to exercise all the time. There are still a lot of people wishing they weren’t out of shape. “Today” is always the day to change that. Not the first of the month, not on Monday… every day. Not only does exercise keep us from getting plump over the winter, it melts away stress from our overworked, under-rewarded college lives. As an added bonus, sex is better after exercise.

The trick is to start cranking out lunges or pushups before your tricky mind can think of excuses or conveniently forget. Or just put on your shoes and go for a run down the block. If it's cold and snowy, you'll just look and feel more badass. Do something that gets your heart rate up for 45 minutes, four times

a week. It doesn’t have to be any more complex than that. If you can't do this, I suggest adding “How did I get so lazy?” to the list of questions to ask yourself.

Get involved with people better than you Motivational speaker Jim Rohn once said, “You are the sum of the five people you spend the most time with.” Including yourself, who is in your top five?

The purpose of college is to specialize. Chances are UW-Milwaukee has people that can help make you even more special. By joining an organization, not only will you develop more skills, you will build a network of people with similar interests. “Social capital” is what social scientists call it. Given the state of affairs of the American economy, accumulating social capital can be the difference between getting a good job or blending in with tens of thousands of other graduates looking for a job.

Don’t be shy or feel like a nerd. Find a club or group with a focus that interests you. You will make friends and most likely find yourself in situations you enjoy.

There are plenty of things students can do over break to throw a warm blanket on the cold reality of winter.

Rather than sit around and let yourself get lazy, depressed and fat, make some moves. Get ahead of the game. It will make everything work better, even when things aren’t working the way you want them to.

22

December 12, 2011

COMICS Primal Urges

Mock Duck Soup

the uwm post Andrew Megow

Mitchell Moeser

She Said, He Said

Kat Rodriguez

Luna’s Upside Down World

Andrea Thurner

uwmpost.com

PUZZLES

THEUWMPOST CROSSWORD

DOWN 1 Sixth sense 2 Snacked 3 Street art

23

SUDOKU INSTRUCTIONS: Fill in the squares so that every row, every column, and every 3x3 box contains the numbers 1 through 9 exactly once.

ACROSS 1 Two under par 6 Otherwise 10 Dutch cheese 14 Swagger 15 Follow behind 16 Strong cord 17 Orange color?

18 Bullets, etc.

19 Tiny insect 20 Last leg before landing (2 wds.)

23 Short-term relationship 25 Meadow 26 However (var.)

27 Sundial number 28 Shape wood 31 Velocity 33 Allows 35 Censor 36 American Indian tribe 37 Popular game show segment (2 wds.)

42 “___ Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts” 43 Mongrel 44 Dinner, for example 46 Greek letter 49 City in Ohio 51 Not against 52 Flightless bird 53 Debt letters 55 Certain tea 57 “Space,” in the Star Trek title sequence 61 Gooey, as a recipe, maybe 62 Golfer’s warning 63 Satisfies 66 American Indian tribe 67 Domain 68 Occurrence 69 Danson and Turner 70 Endure 71 Run-down

December 12, 2011

4 Caribbean country Saint ____ 5 Cultural 6 List-ending abbr.

7 Dalai ____ 8 Easy 9 Get married on the sly 10 Therefore 11 Make a contribution 12 Certain American Indian 13 Plan 21 Fit for growing of crops 22 Jah follower 23 Feel sick 24 Feudal estate 29 Period of British rule in India 30 T-shirt style (hyph.)

32 Certain hair procedure 34 State of agitation 36 Displace 38 Serve 39 Possessive pronoun 40 Exiled person

41 45 46 47 48 49 50 54 56 58 59 60 64 65

Tale Cabin type Shortcoming Expatriate Made a quick forward stride Word before borealis Sounds Variety meat Exit Certain votes Mined metals In order Finish Eye infection

solution found on page 4

GODOKU

INSTRUCTIONS: Fill the squares so that every row, every column, and every 3x3 box contains the following letters exactly once: N, P, R, I, C, D, U, G, O. One row or column will reveal a hidden word!

solution found on page 4

solution found on page 4

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24 December 12, 2011

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