Thursday, February 20, 2003

by Pei Pei Liu
Managing Editor

Tralance Addy ’69, Giles Kemp ’72, Nancy Hengen ’73, and Daniel Rothenberg
’95 have been appointed to the college’s Board of Managers.

Addy earned masters and doctorate degrees from the University of
Massachusetts at Amherst, as well as a degree from Harvard Business
School’s Advanced Management Program. Through his work in technology
development, he holds 12 U.S. and a number of international patents, and is
a Fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering.
After spending 20 years as a senior executive at Johnson & Johnson, he is
now founder, president, and CEO of Plebys International LLC, a
technology-based enterprise development company.

Kemp, another graduate of Harvard Business School, partnered with the St.
Louis company Knight’s Ltd. Catalogs in 1991 to found the Home Decorators
Collection catalog. He is currently president of the corporation and has
been working in publishing and marketing for 28 years. A resident of
Scarsdale, New York, Kemp has stayed active in the community, serving on
the board of the United Way of Scarsdale-Edgemont, the Scarsdale
Foundation, and the Scarsdale Historical Society.

Hengen graduated from Harvard Law School and has worked extensively in the
administration of corporations in Liberia, Vanuatu, and the Marshall
Islands. Currently at the New York office of the law firm Holland & Knight
LLP, Hengen is regarded as one of the world’s leading attorneys on shipping
and maritime practices, and specializes in corporate transactions, joint
ventures, and acquisition agreements.

Rothenberg co-founded the Pig Iron Theatre Company of Philadelphia, an
acclaimed company that won Philadelphia Magazine’s Best Theatre Troupe
award and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival’s Spirit of the Fringe award, both
in 1999. The troupe has also been named a Pew Fellow in the Arts.
Rothenberg is currently serving as co-artistic director of the company.

*****

by Greg Leiserson
Gazette Reporter

“I wanted to get us past the tendency in academia and among students,
especially here at Swarthmore, to say, those people out there – they
disagree with us – they must be stupid or prejudiced,” said Professor James
Kurth of the open discussion in the Hicks Mural Room Wednesday evening. The
evening provided an alternative to the often heated and emotional shouting
matches about the possibility of war with Iraq by supporting a reasoned
discussion outlining logical flaws in arguments and stressing the
importance of recognizing the validity of points on both sides of the issue.

After asking for a few questions from the gathered students to direct the
conversation, Professor Kenneth Sharpe began by developing the
administration’s official argument for a war with Iraq. Stressing the
repeated failure of Saddam Hussein to comply with the requests of UN
weapons inspectors and his use of force against the Iraqi people and their
neighbors, Sharpe extended the argument to the logical conclusion that
without the possibility of preemptive war, a doctrine of deterrence will
have no real effect.

Arguments against the administration’s rationale were then examined. In
general these fell into two categories. Some accepted the premise of the
administration’s argument but expressed concern that the desired effect
would not actually be the one that took place. Others argued that there was
empirical evidence in actions by the current administration that challenged
the basic claims underlying their argument. Students challenged the
contentions that a war with Iraq would truly make Americans safer and that
the administration could truly use the same basic premise to justify their
different treatment of Iraq and North Korea.

Students suggested fear as a motivation for action in support of war with
Iraq. Professor Kurth pointed to ways in which politicians and others
opposed to war had failed to address reasonable fears held by large
segments of the American population that resulted from the terrorist
attacks of September 11th. Said Professor Sharpe, “If September 11th,
hadn’t happened this would be a very difficult thing to pull off.” Many
people see war as possibly the only reasonable option left to protect
themselves as effectively as possible.

Further discussion was based around the points that students reported as
causing difficulty when arguing their opinions about a possible war with
people who did not agree with them. The overarching theme that emerged from
these was the question, can and should the United States serve as a global
police force? This was one question about which it seemed nearly impossible
for those with opposing opinions to reconcile their beliefs.

After looking at sticking points in arguing the cases against war with
Iraq, Kurth and Sharpe challenged the students to provide alternatives to
war and look at reasons for or against them as well as reasons why they
were not on the table for discussion at the moment. An international police
strategy was the one most frequently described by students and faculty. The
situation now facing the US has been described as one of war against
terrorists, but many students favored seeing it as an investigation of
criminals. A police strategy would be dependent on significant multilateral
negotiations and would feature programs such as freezing terrorist assets
in savings institutions around the world and arresting terrorists when they
were found. The current war on terrorism is much more militaristic in
approach and contains within it the possibility of unilateral action.

The last topic of discussion was the double shift in US foreign policy put
in place by the Bush administration. Official defense policy has changed
from one of multilateralism and deterrence to one of possible unilateralism
and preemption. One reason that was suggested for the shift was the
changing nature of the challenges facing the United States. In the past
challenges have come primarily from other nations which can often be
deterred from future actions with the appropriate tactics. Now it appears
that most challenges come from terrorist actions which, many would say,
cannot be deterred from their aims, but must be preemptively dealt with
before they can succeed with their attacks.

While the evening at times seemed framed in terms of how to reasonably
criticize the administration’s policy without resorting to cheapening
attacks, overall the discussion featured a higher degree of critical
thinking than many political events at Swat, and students seemed to leave
with deepened understanding of the subject. “The leaders of the discussion
approached this from a standpoint that appreciates the subtleties of the
situation and of people’s responses to the situation,” said Edwin Nam ’04,
“It made me want to take some PoliSci classes.”

*****

* As the Bush administration works on a second resolution to propose to the
UN Security Council that could declare Iraq in material breach of
Resolution 1441, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld outlined three possible
scenarios by which Saddam Hussein could avoid war. According to Rumsfeld,
war can be avoided if Saddam leaves voluntarily and puts in place leaders
that abide by international law, if he leaves involuntarily, or if he
abides by all applicable UN resolutions. Currently there are 181,000 US
troops in the region with more on the way. The White House has said that it
does not feel a second resolution is necessary, but that it could be
helpful for the international community.

* Diplomatic and UN sources said Wednesday that chief weapons inspector
Hans Blix is expected to instruct Iraq to destroy all of it’s al-Samoud 2
missiles in the near future. The missiles would have to be destroyed by
Iraqi officials while being observed by members of the UN Monitoring,
Verification and Inspection Committee. This is a result of a recent UN
study which found that the missiles travel an average of 18 miles beyond
the UN permitted 93 mile limit for Iraqi arms.

* A military plane crash in southeastern Iran on Wednesday killed 302
people, 284 members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard and 18 crew
members. The crash occurred in a mountainous area in bad weather about 20
miles short of its destination. The exact cause of the crash is unknown.

* UN health officials announced on Wednesday that there is an outbreak of
the Ebola virus in the Republic of Congo which has already killed somewhere
between 59 and 67 people. Said Iain Simpson, a World Health Organization
spokesman, “We’re not suggesting that this is over or even contained. We’re
treating it as an active outbreak.” The outbreak has occurred in the
Cuvette West region, which the government has quarantined since last week.

*****

Panel Discussion for the Generations Project
Sponsored by the William J. Cooper Foundation
LPAC Cinema, 4:30 p.m.

Fellini Film Festival: Amarcord (1973)
Sponsored by the Department of Sociology and Anthropology
LPAC Cinema, 8:00 p.m.

Intercultural Music Group Performance: Karmacy
Sponsored by Deshi, SAO, and the Intercultural Center
Upper Tarble, 8:00 p.m.

Information Session with the State Public Interest Research Groups
Sponsored by Career Services
Kohlberg 230, 7:00 p.m.

*****

SPORTS UPDATE

David Pearce ’03 scored an impressive 23 points, while Matt Gustafson ’05
contributed 19. Despite a strong effort by the team, the Garnet fell to
Muhlenberg 66-48. The loss drops Swarthmore into third place in the East
Division, one half game behind Washington

*****

The Garnet triumphed over Muhlenberg 51-46 in last night’s competition.
Katie Robinson scored a game high of 20 points, while Zoey Adams-Deutch ’06
posted eight points and 6 rebounds.

*****

Today:
Badminton at Albright, 7:00 p.m.

Tomorrow:
Track and Field at Haverford, 6:30 p.m.
Men’s Lacrosse hosts Manhattenville, 1:00 p.m.
Swimming at Centennial Conference Championships
Women’s Basketball at Haverford, 1:00 p.m.
Men’s Basketball at Haverford, 3:00 p.m.

*****

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you walk into an open
sewer and die.”
–Mel Brooks

*****
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