Wednesday, January 29, 2003

by Jeremy Schifeling
Co-Managing Editor

Christine Shin ’04, whose platform for Student Council’s vacant
Appointments Chair position was printed in the Gazette yesterday, will not
be running for office after all, following an email glitch earlier in the week.

With the deadline for candidacy declarations set at noon this past Monday,
Shin sent her platform at 11:49 AM on Monday morning to both the Council
and the Gazette. While the Gazette received the message at 11:50, ten
minutes prior to the deadline, none of the Council members received the
declaration – for technical reasons still unknown.

Council co-Presidents Ryan Budish ’04 and Anna Morgan ’04 noticed the
discrepancy between their candidate roster and the one printed in the
Gazette yesterday. Unfortunately, by the time they got in touch with Shin,
some 100-200 votes had already been cast through the online voting system
according to Budish, placing the Council in the unenviable position of
having to either invalidate the votes or end Shin’s candidacy.

After discussing the issue with the co-Presidents last night, Shin agreed
to take herself out of the race in the interest of preserving the existing
votes and expediting the start of the new Council term.

“I’m disappointed but I’m going to go with their judgement,” said Shin.

Budish, for his part, was disappointed that the decision hinged on a
“technical mistake.”

“It’s really a shame, because there are times when there is no one running
for a position,” said Budish. “We never want to turn willing candidates away.”

However, Budish did note that he and Morgan had offered Shin the chance to
become the Council’s first Diversity Liasion, responsible for keeping the
Council in
touch with the IC, WRC, and BCC. The position has been in the works for a
couple of years and Budish suggested that it would have gone a long way in
helping the Council to become more involved in the blackface and racial
profiling incidents of recent months.

Shin, who is already an active member of the WRC and ADVICE, was intrigued
by the offer, but noncommittal. And while it’s possible that she may take
the new, non-voting position, she remains interested in the Appointments
Chair role, since she has numerous ideas for enhancing committee membership
based on her own experience with SAC and other student committees.

She has yet to decide whether she will run again for Council next year.

*****

Sonya Hoo ’05, President of the Amos J. Peaslee Debate Society, took
first-place team honors at this past weekend’s tournament at Duke University.

Hoo, debating with Gilbert Lee of Princeton University, beat out 20 teams
from 10 other schools to take the championship, including a squad from
Johns Hopkins in the final round. The round, which they won by a unanimous
vote of judges and spectators, focused on the following hypothetical
question: “If weapons inspectors still haven’t found anything a month from
now, should the US go ahead and invade Iraq?” with the Hoo and her partner
arguing against the proposal.

Lee was named the fourth-place speaker at the tourney.

*****

by Roxanne Yaghoubi
Gazette Reporter

While last Halloween’s blackface incident may have seemed quite unlikely at
the time, it now appears that the phenomenon was more prevalent than first
realized, with a similar incident occuring at the University of Virginia
last semester.

There, two campus fraternities had students dress up in black face-paint at
Halloween parties. The university found out about the incident when
pictures of the party and the offending students were posted on a website.

The fraternities, Kappa Alpha and Zeta Psi, were initially suspended, but
were eventually cleared by the university’s IFC (inter-fraternity council)
based on a claim of free speech, and because the students involved were not
members of the fraternity.

In response the university established a race-relations group where
students could freely discuss the issues raised by the incidents.

* Saying the US was in a time of “great consequence” President Bush
delivered his state of the Union Address on Tuesday evening. The speech
outlined his plans for revitalizing the economy and improving health care.
On the international front, Bush did not use the phrase “axis of evil”
coined in last years’ State of the Union. Rather he said that Iraq had not
disarmed sufficiently over the past twelve years, and that full force would
be used against the country in the event of war.

* The Democrats responded to the State of the Union Address with a speech
by Governor Gary Locke of Washington. Locke criticized Bush’s economic
policies and said that many people and places were in great financial
distress. The Governor also urged the President to build an international
coalition before attacking Iraq.

* Ariel Sharon and his Likud Party emerged as the top-vote getter in the
Israeli elections held on Tuesday. The runner-up party was Labor, which
gained 18 seats in the parliament as opposed to Likud’s 36. Sharon called
for national unity and urged the two parties to form a coalition,
particularly in order to better fight Palestinian terrorism.

*****

Psychology Lecture
Lera Boroditsky
Scheuer Room Kohlberg, 4:00 p.m.

Faculty Lecture by Professor Robert Pasternack
“Assembly, Organization and Communication – a Chemistry Lecture”
Kohlberg 115, 4:15 p.m.

French Film Festival, Bolero
Kohlberg 328, 7:00 p.m.

Dance Masterclass
Jacek Luminski, Artistic Director of the Silesian Dance Theatre, Poland
Boyer Studio LPAC, 7:30 p.m.

Mystery Science Theatre 3000 Screening
Sponsored by the Anomalous Picture Show
Trotter 203, 7:30 p.m.

*****

SPORTS UPDATE

Today:
Women’s basketball hosts Haverford, 6:00 p.m.
Men’s basketball hosts Haverford, 8:00 p.m.

Tomorrow:
Badminton hosts Bryn Athyn, 7:00 p.m.

*****

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“And many other [terrorists] have met a different fate. Let’s put it this
way: They are no longer a problem to the United States and our friends and
allies.”
— George Bush

*****
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