what a mess!

(Before you read this, read the entirety of Chip’s post below and Sarika’s comment. They are a lot more important, and I’m a bit embarrased at my interest in relatively frivolous things like UC debates in comparison to World AIDs Day.)

I just got back from the UC debate. What a bloody mess. The post is a little bit ramble-y, and please forgive any small errors. But a few impressions… The candidates were unimpressive, the moderators were funny and mean, and I’m not sure anyone left feeling like they had any clue what was going on.(more in expanded post)

On presentation, Grimeland and Hadfield won the night. They both came off as competent and intelligent, and Magnus got plenty of laughs (most of which he intended to get). Annie was also composed and graceful, although she had almost no time to speak. Haddock came off as knowledgeable and competent, but he spoke about two times as fast as he should have and constantly thanked people for their “great questions” in a way that came of as a little insincere. I think someone gave Voith a horse tranquilizer before the debate started, he seemed confused and bored, and Gadgil kept saying how excited and happy she was but never cracked a smile. Point under dogs.

On the substance of their ideas, unfortunately, the under dogs either had no ideas or ideas from Mars. Q: “How exactly are you going to raise 10 million dollars?” A: “People will give it to us.” Alumni are apparently waiting with baited breath to through tons of money at a 20 year old organization that is still coming to terms with how it handles and distributes money. Q: What do you think about the Council’s role in social programming? A: Maybe they should do this, but on the other hand maybe they should do that… we want to reform the UC!”, but apparently aren’t willing to articulate what that reform would actually look like.

Substantively, Haddock won the debate but just barely. Haddock came off as knowledgeable but occasionally fell into meaningless platitudes and defended his support for ending student involvement in social planning clearly but unpersuasively (although I’m biased). Voith had a good line, “I think the UC should be more than a bank”, but never really explained what that meant (he should have, I agree). When he woke up from his stupor he was good in terms of defending the UC’s involvement in social life but didn’t really explain what he wanted. Worst, he was terrible in defending his own complicity in a series of CLC failures.

Finally, the general tone of the debate was pretty mean-spirited and substanceless. Some of the questions were good and provocative (and even funny), but crossed a line into mean that flustered the candidates and created a weird dynamic of undirected and strange animosity. In offering opportunities to the candidates to ask each other questions, the moderators continually said something like “it’s your turn to take a pop-shot at so-and-so!” That was a far too accurate description of what was going on…

In general, I was entertained but disappointed by the whole thing. At a time in which serious things are being discussed (well, serious in this context…), I didn’t feel like anyone attending actually understood the ideas being forwarded, I didn’t feel like any of the candidates did any sort of job articulating and defending their positions, neither they nor the moderators seemed prepared for the event (the moderators have the excuse of being asked too late, unclear about the candidates), and no one engaged each other in actual dialogue. Here’s to hoping we can do something here tomorrow that didn’t happen at the debate tonight…
Please remember CC’s policy on anonymous comments related to the UC campaigns.

Lest we forget…

That tomorrow is World AIDS Day and the entire month of December is AIDS Awareness Month. I feel that the fact that UC Elections, midterms, final clubs new members events, etc. are going on should not take away from people getting involved with this global problem. There are myriad events on campus from the Medical School to the School of Public Health that will be happening this week. In my expanded post, I’ve included events that will be taking place on campus this week. Hopefully these events will bring about awareness that will eventually result in positive action in each of their attendees. (more in expanded post)

7-10 pm Emerson Hall 105
Philadelphia- When a man with AIDS is fired by a conservative law firm because of his condition, he hires a homophobic small time lawyer as the only willing advocate for a wrongful dismissal suit.

*Wednesday, Nov 30*7-10 pm Kirkland House JCR
State of Denial- an unprecedented and unflinching look at how the citizens of South Africa are living with the AIDS epidemic, given the climate of governmental confusion and neglect.

*World AIDS Day, Thursday, Dec 1*
7-10 pm Yenching Auditorium or Thompson Room, Barker Center (watch posters for final location)
And the Band Played On; the story of the start of the AIDS epidemic, stigma, and the political infighting of the scientific community.
“The HIV Roentgenogram Reveals Serious Structural Weaknesses in Public Health”
DR. DONALD P. FRANCIS, MD, PhD, Executive Director of Global Solutions for Infectious Diseases

*Friday, Dec 2*
7-10 pm Yenching Auditorium
Pandemic: Facing AIDS; Forty million lives. Twenty years of AIDS. Five stories. One pandemic. Covers the key aspects of the world AIDS epidemic through powerful documentary stories about five patients and their communities, on five continents.

Free food will be served at all film events.

pregame analysis for the debate

Mr. Schmidt over at Team Zebra has a great summary of things to look for at tonight’s debate:

1. How will the Haddock/Riley and Voith/Gadgil outline and defend their positions on the UC’s approach to social programming?
2. Will Grimeland/Hadfield clear the “credibility threshold,” and make clear that they know their stuff and have a clear plan and motivation for leading the UC?
3. Which ticket will best demonstrate not only a grasp of the issues and the capacity to deliver on their promises (not to say these aren’t important), but also a clear explanation of why, specifically, they want the jobs of UC President and Vice-President?
4. Which ticket will demonstrate an ability to talk about the UC in a way that makes the campus care about it?
5. Who comes across as a convincing leader?

Check out his full explanations for these five things, and check out the debate tonight at 8 pm at Science Center D.

the first discussion question

Starting tomorrow, each of the three tickets will be joining Cambridge Common to share their thoughts, answer your questions and engage each other in debate about the role of the Council, their priorities and qualifications, and their understandings of where our community and school is and should be. The first question, as I’ve just sent to the campaigns, is:

In light of recent controversies involving social programming and the political content of its advocacy in University Hall, many believe (myself included) that the Council’s role in our community is up for grabs as it hasn’t been in years. However, most conversations surrounding the issue are simply practical: “this works, that doesn’t and so we should or shouldn’t do this or that.” Rather than simply repeating your position on social programming or the Council and politics, I’m interested in what broader principle about the Council’s role on campus unites your policy positions. What, in other words, do you believe it means to be a “student government”?

They’ll have 600 words to answer, and anyone who wants can have up to 200 words to respond or ask questions. I hope that this proves interesting, and I hope you all join in! I will post what they send to me tomorrow afternoon, so come back then!

news without context: what the Crimson doesn’t know, we don’t know

Members of the Undergraduate Council, similar to members of political student groups across campus, are continually frustrated with the shallowness of the Crimson’s reporting on student politics. The Crimson, it seems, believes that it’s role in such things (the UC, the Dems/GOP, BSA, Fuerza, SAA, AAA, etc.) is to show up, transcribe the obvious “facts,” and write them down in the paper. This way, the students can know what happened but not know why it happened, who did it and how, and why in the world they should care.

The Crimson has now run four stories on the UC race in the last two and a half weeks. Most students, at this point, will know only what they’ve read in the Crimson, maybe they’ll have spent a few minutes at each of the websites. But, for most, the Crimson will be the only non-campaign source of information they will get throughout this week and a half journey. For those of us who follow what’s actually going on, the gap between the news coverage and the political reality is wide enough to drive a Buick through. The fact that student opinion forms around this alternative reality of out of context quotations that lack analysis and background, ticky tack campaign violations and non-controversies, and unquestioned declarations of resume points is not reassuring for those of us who believe in some sort of student democracy.

Later in the post, I’ll note a few things that it hasn’t picked up on, first, let’s look at what it has. With 100% retention, then, what would the informed voter know at this point?(things we do know, and things we should know in expanded post)

If you’re short on time, skip down to the bold.

From story 1, they’ll learn that the Haddock/Riley and Voith/Gadgil tickets had formed, they’ll learn that some still think Connor Wilson might run (he tried), they’ll get a sentence or two on each of the individual’s UC history (Haddock worked on libraries, ran against Gadgil; Gadgil worked on CUE and the Women’s Center; Voith worked on the Afterparty and Yale Shuttles (ouch); Riley quit the council but worked on interhouse transfers and peer advising). Ok, so we have about two resume points each.

From story 2, they’ll learn of the Grimeland/Hadfield ticket (including Grimeland’s Norwegian Army service and Hadfield’s failure to get on the Council in the fall) and they’ll get about 2/3 of the story on the fact that some dumb ass on Voith’s campaign bough HaddockRiley.com, Haddock got up in arms, and Voith gave him the URL.

From story 3, they’ll learn a little about the normal UC news (CLC replacement tabled, South Asian Studies bill passed, etc.), and then find out that the first day of campaigning included a few possible violations that were a result of accidentally putting a poster on a Proctor board.

From story 4, ironically titled “Council Hopefulls Present Platform”, they’ll get to hear about prepared answers to six questions, fairly useless quips from each of the candidates, and some random out of context proposals from each of the tickets about funding alcohol-free parties, getting students access to coursepacks, and forming new committees to look into things.

So where does this leave us? A student, who cares enough to memorize each of the four news pieces they’ve read, will know: two or three bullet points about each candidate, some ticky tack news about websites and errant posters, and some random quotes about random positions only just barely related to student health.

What they don’t know is that there is one major question in this campaign that the two major tickets widely disagree on: the role of the Council in social planning. Voith/Gadgil believe that the UC should create a social programming board in place of one of the three committees (CLC) that is separate from the UC and coordinates with the administration. The Haddock/Riley ticket wants to “get the UC out of the social programming business” and leave it to the administration.

They don’t know that Haddock was unsure about this issue, proposed a referendum to “take this decision to the students,” and then scrapped his direct-democracy ideals and took a firm position that strangely lines up with the Crimson’s staff position and the opinion that his campaign manager forcefully expressed in the Indy over a month and a half ago. So much for direct democracy…

Do students know that all of the candidates voted for a bill on Monday night to not only create a standing committee to advocate for South Asian Studies, but also to automatically put unelected members of South Asian Association on the committee, and then promptly went to meet with the South Asian Association about getting endorsements for the election?

Do student know that a major part of the two main candidacies will be each ticket mobilizing their respective Final/Social Club: Voith is mobilizing the Phoenix, Gadgil the Seneca, and most likely Riley the Isis. I know this from talking to the candidates themselves and looking at the people in their facebook groups and in front of the Science Center.

Do students have any sense of what people think of these candidates other than what the candidates say about themselves?

Has the Crimson reported the very interesting news that the Council is fairly split, with about 14 members supporting Haddock and 9 supporting Voith?

(Alright, the rhetorical question format is lame. But I’m not rewriting all of that…)

These are all things an informed electorate should know. And, quick frankly, none of these things require anything other than a few phone calls, a little basic research, and the facebook to figure out. The Crimson, of course, will say that it is holding off on the meat of its coverage until after the debate, because that’s when students start to pay attention. But, without the necessary context for understanding any of this, its unclear to me how any student can begin to analyze the information that comes out of a debate, understand whether or not an accusation or claim is accurate and what motivates that candidate to make that claim. It’s also unclear to me that even debate coverage gets into any serious analysis of ideas or context that can inform a voter.

The problem is, the Crimson wants to send its good reporters, the people who believe in research and scoops, who want to understand context and motivations, to cover the Deans in University Hall, and that’s about it. In assigning talented and experienced reporters they ignore the fact that often the politics that matters most to people is the politics that they’re involved in: ethnic groups, political groups, service groups, student government. University Hall is important, but not all-important. Students need to have a framework for understanding their community, especially when they’re making decisions about its future. The Crimson isn’t giving it, which is why blogs like this and Team Zebra are popping up to offer analysis.

Please remember CC’s policy on anonymous comments related to the UC campaigns.

another mission from God (this time in the war on reproductive choice)

The Crimson opined about it. I talked about it. And now you can watch this 60 Minutes piece about it: the FDA Plan B debaucle, an unsettling example of how religious and moral beliefs are obstructing women’s access to over-the-counter emergency contraception (EC). The segment does a good job of showing how moral positions on Plan B–independent of the scientific evidence–are affecting women’s access to the contraceptive not only at the federal level, with the OTC application, but also at the local level, as many pharmacies and/or pharmacists refuse to fill prescriptions for Plan B on ideological grounds. Wal Mart apparently refuses to carry Plan B at all–a particularly troublesome situation since the retailer caters to low-income people, and EC is especially important for low-income women who may not be able to afford abortions to terminate unwanted pregnancies. Interviews with Susan Wood (one of two FDA officials who resigned in protest) and David Hagar (who wrote the dissenting opinion used as justification for the initial rejection of the OTC application and believes God prompted him to do so) don’t tell us too much we can’t find in other accounts, but it’s nice to put faces to names.

One caveat: on my reading, the piece implies a necessary connection between religiosity (they focus on Christianity) and the belief that Plan B is an abortifacient like RU-486. I think it’s only fair to keep in mind that neither stance necessitates the other: not all religious people oppose contraception and/or abortion, or believe that a fertilized egg is effectively the same as a pregnancy or a baby; likewise, not all people who believe that ‘life’ begins at conception are religious. In any case, as Wood explains, Plan B is not an abortion pill according to the scientific definition because it does not disrupt an established pregnancy. Just something to keep in mind.

Note: In the original version of this post, I included a link to an article in The Nation that featured an interview with Hagar’s ex-wife. A reader kindly brought to my attention the fact that Hagar’s married life is irrelevant to the discussion at hand. With this in mind, I have removed the link. Thanks for your feedback! –kl

Whoop Em!

Whatever happened to beating your kids? I’m not talking about punching them in the face for getting B’s on their AP Calculus pop quiz, but I am talking about taking them home and physically reinforcing who’s boss when they curse you out in the middle of a crowded supermarket. This NY Times article talks about kids who “act out” in public and the reaction from individual adults around them as well as society’s reaction as a collective. I feel that this is particularly pertinent to life here at Harvard where spoiled, impolite kids comfortable in their privilege abound (disregard age…I don’t care if you’re 21 or 12). From the children of house masters, visiting scholars, and resident tutors running amuck to final clubs members too drunk with elitism to lift up their feet for their mansions’ janitor, some people just need a good whooping to get across things that aren’t sinking in verbally through reasoned requests. There are many a time when I and numerous peers of mine here have had to endure racism, impoliteness, or other snubs and not retaliate by knocking some sense into the punk(s) that did it. It’s a daily struggle…

the Dems endorsement

Definitely check out Greg Schmidt’s (the former Dems President) post on Team Zebra about the Dems endorsement. He argues that it is important for both heuristic and structural reasons, and makes a great case for why it rivals the Crimson endorsement as the most politically important of the race (I agree).

Considering the fact that three of the ten members of the Dems board (Bosch the VP, Arth the Leg Director and Abdallah the Membership Director) are already declared Haddock/Riley supporters (in the facebook group) and each of those three are current or former UC members who will likely have considerable sway in such a decision, I’d put my money on a Dems endorsement of Haddock/Riley or no one at all.

NOTE: Having Team Zebra to link to is fun! It’s like having an actual Harvard blogosphere!

on a mission from God?

(Forgive me for stepping out of our non-serious world of campus politics for a moment, this article/issue seemed to warrant it.)

The New Yorker this week features a disturbing article about the War in Iraq. The article reveals a quiet controversy over US plans for replacing ground soldiers with bombings, US Generals’ increasing frustration over not being able to get through to the President, and the disturbing depiction, by top pentagon and administration officials, of a President who is religiously and ideologically so rigid that he cannot respond to reality. Hersh has done some of the best reporting on the war, (breaking the Abu Ghraib story, for instance) and this is an absolute must-read. If you’re short on time, or learn better through multimedia, you can watch this interview with Hersh from CNN: windows media and quicktime.

The article’s depiction of the President is downright frightening. So that people read it, I’m going to leave it all on the front page. READ THIS(emphases are mine):

Current and former military and intelligence officials have told me that the President remains convinced that it is his personal mission to bring democracy to Iraq, and that he is impervious to political pressure, even from fellow Republicans. They also say that he disparages any information that conflicts with his view of how the war is proceeding.
[...]
After the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the former official said, he was told that Bush felt that “God put me here” to deal with the war on terror. The President’s belief was fortified by the Republican sweep in the 2002 congressional elections; Bush saw the victory as a purposeful message from God that “he’s the man,” the former official said. Publicly, Bush depicted his reelection as a referendum on the war; privately, he spoke of it as another manifestation of divine purpose.
[...]
“He doesn’t feel any pain. Bush is a believer in the adage ‘People may suffer and die, but the Church advances.’ ” He said that the President had become more detached, leaving more issues to Karl Rove and Vice-President Cheney. “They keep him in the gray world of religious idealism, where he wants to be anyway,” the former defense official said. Bush’s public appearances, for example, are generally scheduled in front of friendly audiences, most often at military bases. Four decades ago, President Lyndon Johnson, who was also confronted with an increasingly unpopular war, was limited to similar public forums. “Johnson knew he was a prisoner in the White House,” the former official said, “but Bush has no idea.”

The President’s religious convictions have been widely reported (he told a newspaper when he was running for Governor of Texas that he had a long debate with his mother and Rev. Billy Graham about whether or not someone who doesn’t accept Jesus could go to heaven: they both said yes, he said no). But, until now they have mostly just been cause for skepticism or adoration, and their links to his decision-making process only hinted at. If this depiction is true, however, we have a problem in this country that goes so far beyond partisanship and liberal/conservative that it boggles the mind.

NOTE: If you’re interested in learning more about President Bush’s religious convictions, I highly recommend this Frontline documentary: “The Jesus Factor.”

Team Zebra on point

Mr. Schmidt at Team Zebra notes:

Don’t get me wrong – I’m a big fan of the Glazer/Capp campaign’s poster designs – one year, two days ago, I came up with them. It was to my great surprise, thus, to see the same design popping up all over campus and facebook profiles one year later, virtually unchanged… There are a dozen other factors on which the campaign could better be judged, but on this particular factor, the best they could offer is a slightly jumbled rehash of the poster used by last year’s winning candidate.

Read more here.