Charting the future with Doctor Astrology

Leo, the Bear (only people born in soybean fields or on September 12): As a Leo, you are bold and intuitive, but also caring and whimsical. With such strengths, no Turkish prison cell can hold you long.

Joe-Jack, a local Disgrace (born to two people both named Claude): Joe-Jack is rising this week, thanks to dropping prices in stolen fertilizer and Sudafed. Try a new restaurant­, maybe with a new love interest.

Seamus O’Flaherty, Patron Saint of Stereotypical Irish Catholics (born on a pool table): Witty and literary like all Seamus’, you will find the loss of your voice during the week deeply distressing. Don’t worry: Soon, you won’t even have a throat to keep it in.

Cancer, the Occasion for Coming Together as One (mostly crying, some light ‘shoulder-play’): As the days become shorter, Cancers will do well to stay together, preferably indoors, as most of the other signs have already been infected.

Insatiability (no known dates): You are a love cheetah. Handcuff yourself to a radiator before the U.S. Marshals realize their mistake.

Tin Jim, a Chimney Sweep of Base Extraction (both parents beaten by a Tory lord during conception): Things are finally looking up for Tin Jim. That is, if you count a brood of venomous coral snakes in your wheel-well as “things.”

Iceland, the Magical Elven Realm of Elves and Magic (born to people who sing in made-up falsettos): Soon all the shadows will melt away and you will be alone with your fear. If you contest it, though, the judge will knock $10 off of the fee.

Loretta, a Faded Dixie Charmer Wrapped in Calico-Print (family a grotesque nightmare, or itinerant kudzu sellers, or both): The stars indicate that you will run into someone from your past. But oh, my dear, how the years have worn you down like a salt-lick.

Satirical Horoscope, the Worst Punt Ever (Defeated and broken at birth, defeated and broken at death): A new opportunity is in your house this week. Remember, though, that a human’s flesh prefers to be addressed as “Sir” or “Madame” as long as that sweet blood flows.

Throwing Stars, a Real Investment (born at the exact moment of death of a beloved family pet): So what, you’ve been voted “Most Likely To Make An ‘Ejaculate Conception’ Joke At Graduation.” That’s just one more thing you have in common with the evil guy from “Gladiator.”

Pisces, the land of fish and fully-visible forearm veins (October 16 and also the day they invented twine): Mercury is in Pisces this week, proving that Mercury will pull the most insane shit just to get you to buy him Jim Beam. Fuck it: it’s only 12 bucks, and you’ll probably get to see his new four-wheeler.

Sofa King, In which I regress to eighth grade (parents confess regularly in the church of the Bomb): Be confident and zesty in the dance of life. After all, dancing is a lot like what you do now, but with less reference to things like “collateral damage” and “acceptable loss ratios.”

In defense of the landscape genre

I’m a little ashamed to admit, as an art major, my devotion to the landscape genre. Art-makers put landscape on the shelf long ago, as you’ll know if you’ve browsed the Tate Modern or ventured into MOMA. In the glory days of the French Academy, landscape painters could turn their noses up at lowly still life artists and meat painters. Late 19th century artists used landscape as means to communicate moral messages. Monet used landscape for innovative light studies. But, several million meadows later, these days the landscape is hackneyed. Low-brow. It’s much more posh to talk color field painting, Minimalism or the post-modern mixing of media. Landscape painters’ sole patrons are motel contractors who count on mediocre art to match hideous bedspreads.

To make a landscape painting is as tedious as to comment on the weather–but it doesn’t have to be. The real problem with landscapes is that their vocabulary has been reduced. How did you draw landscapes in grade schools?

Purple mountains, a ridge of trees and a lake, right? But landscape can mean all sorts of things: foothills, flood planes, swamps, groves, neighborhoods, faults lines, sand dunes, rock outcroppings.

I just returned from hiking Mount Adams, and even the cliche mountain had character. Was it purple? No. Not from up close. Its slopes are covered with landslides of rock, some bumpy and red like a dried-up loofah, some clean-sliced and gray, with beautiful shadows.
When the sun went down the rocks turned a color somewhere between glowing orange and purple.

Tiny wildflowers clung to rock crevices. I was impressed with a pink-leafed variety that looks flaming red when paired with gray rock, the only color for miles to rival the sky. My whole body got to know the landscape: my fingers, the grit of the loofah rocks, my feet the shapes of pebbles that tried to hitchhike in my Chacos and my abdomen the mountain’s incline. I examined melting mountain glaciers and found out what it felt like to lick one.

I love landscapes. They express the uniqueness of places. Think like a geologist or a botanist–this earth is covered with thousands of interesting colors, shapes and textures.
Walla Walla is known for its rolling hills and its smoke-tinted sunsets, those geographical markers that shock students at first (especially those who reside west of the Cascades–no trees!) but later come to represent best-loved bike rides and stargazing of college.

I don’t care simply that we have wheat fields–I care about the particular curves that characterize them, and that in autumn they turn tufty and golden. When landscapes are specific to detail, they capture what people love about where they live.

In Klamath Falls, Oregon, where I grew up, people love an ugly old pine tree that stands alone on Hogback Mountain.

The landscape isn’t dead, because places continue to be special to people.

Irreplicable sunsets still paint the night sky, and I continue to try to paint them.

Whitman’s focus on ‘diversity’ doesn’t extend to religion

This is not a politically correct article. This article is a step towards removing the veil of political correctness to hopefully arrive at the TRUTH.

Disclaimers: 1) We are not presupposing that some forms of diversity are more important than others, nor are we trying to de-legitimize oppression felt by others. Rather, we are trying to say that all forms of diversity are equally important and therefore equally deserving of our attention. 2) While we may include some instances where a certain group has been victimized, this is not an article aimed at finding the most “oppressed” group on campus. 3) This is not an angry article aimed at people who have been assholes in the past. We are not writing this article as angry Christians, atheists, liberals or conservatives but rather as concerned Whitties.

In last week’s article, we discussed some intricacies of diversity (primarily focusing on racial diversity), some reasons why Whitman desires diversity and how this targeting of certain groups can be sometimes harmful.

Whitman strives to be an all-inclusive community—one that does not impose judgments on people or cultures. Nevertheless, Whitman does not target diversity groups consisting of “race, color, sex, gender, religion, age, marital status, national origin, disability [and] veteran’s status” equally. This blurs the importance of diverse people, not just diverse races.

One group in particular is often ignored and ridiculed freely and often quite viciously (not just a side joke) by many on the Whitman campus without there being the second thought of, “Hey, this might be wrong because they are humans too and I just don’t understand them.” Let us give you an example.

Imagine you’re walking through the Lyman lounge and you hear a group of people discussing the best words to put between “Martin” and “King” to be most offensive to blacks. They then proceed with great delight to say “Martin-c***-sucking-King” or even “Martin-mother-f***er-King.” Now, what would you think? How would you react?
You would be disgusted. You would be outraged. And so would we—and we were when we found that this exact instance happened to a Christian friend of ours at Whitman—except this time, fill in the blank between “Jesus” and “Christ.”

If you still believe that Whitman is not hostile to Christians, take this example: During the spring semester of ‘07, the Stevens Gallery hosted the Post-Secret project where Whitman students anonymously submitted index-cards containing their secrets. To our dismay, one of the postcards read, “I am a Christian.” That was someone’s SECRET! Whitman is supposed to be this open and accepting community that has been rated by the Princeton Review as #1 for “Happiest Students,” so why would anyone be afraid to admit their own identity here?

Maybe it’s hard for students to actually be Christians at Whitman. Since both of us are (we both have our moments where we try to hide it), we face being charged as people who don’t think for themselves, want to constantly convert non-Christians into Christians and are close-minded, crazy and homophobic. What’s interesting is that now, as juniors, we have learned to suppress our beliefs in our conversations—even though our Christianity has A LOT to do with how we live our lives and how we view our world.

These days, racial insensitivity is a definite no-no, but religious insensitivity is not just OK, it’s accepted because many believe that Christians and other religious sects deserve it.
Anyone might argue that in fact, yes, Christians do deserve it because they have persecuted and killed people all over the world in the past and in the present have been gay-hating mongers against all women having the freedom of choice over their own bodies. But look what you just did if you argued that. You categorized all Christians.

Now take Muslims for example. You could argue that in general all Muslims deserve oppression because of 9/11. How ignorant that would be. Doesn’t it sound silly?

Whitman categorizes Christians and many other religious groups. A great example of this was when a friend of ours was literally pushed against a wall and questioned, “So, do you hate gays?” by someone who had found out that our friend was a Christian. Did this person have the right to assume that?

No. He or she did not. And do you know why? Because all people are unique and can have many varying definitions of themselves within their identity all at once. This is “inventive syncretism,” as James Clifford describes in “The Predicament of our Culture.” Because, as we discussed last week from Said, we humans are all guilty of systematically organizing people in categories, we often cannot think of such would-be oxymorons as an “open-minded Christian” or a “pro-life liberal” or a “pro-gay-marriage conservative.” This causes us to further separate ourselves from “the other”—being anyone we think isn’t similar to us—again and again without questioning whether or not this person is a unique human being and might be much more than meets the eye.

These assumptions happen on campus not only to Christians, but to various religious groups as people disrespect others in their personal and often times very private beliefs.

Holocaust survivor Victor Frankl wrote in “Man’s Searching for Meaning,” “From all this we may learn that there are two races of men in this world but only these two: the race of the decent man and the race of the indecent man. Both are found everywhere, they penetrate into all groups of society. No group consists entirely of decent or indecent people. In this sense no group is of pure race.”

No group of any kind consists of people who are all alike. The true difference between each other is whether we decide to hate, to love or, as Frankl so eloquently puts it, to be indecent or decent. Every day we must decide who we want to be. Will we show love to one group and not another because we think they deserve it? Or everywhere we go, should we try to be decent human beings no matter what?

We challenge you to ponder this.

More to come next week. Please respond and say if you wouldn’t mind being quoted in our next article. Remember, this is the beginning of a discussion and we hope to discover new solutions and further expose problems. Please comment freely.

Going mental: Accept it.

America has a serious problem with the crazies. Something in the water here has made it shameful to be on anti-depressants. Something here has made it necessary to be on anti-depressants in the first place because no one wants to talk about what’s wrong. Why is it hard to accept that what’s in my brain is different than what’s in yours?

College students expect to be insane. It’s part of the deal. Never sleep, never sober, never mentioned. What we’re doing here is HARD. It has GOT to be OK to talk about things when they are off-balance. It’s fairly ridiculous what one person is expected to do in college. I will list the things we are expected to do, so that everyone feels accomplished for doing them. Take classes, join clubs, make money, date, self-define, move out of your mom’s house, eat, sleep. A small sampling, clearly, but very different from high school because your family is not here and your professors generally have better things to do than teach here. In short, it’s a lot to handle. Everyone feels overwhelmed sometimes.

This is not meant to be fuzzy and lovey. Although I do love fuzz, and I do love love. The point is that every SINGLE person has felt out of control of some aspect of their lives, I’d wager. And yet there is a line drawn somewhere that officially labels some brains as healthy and some brains as sick, based largely on the fact that some people talk about it, and some people don’t. If you go to a psychiatrist and say you feel crazy, you are more likely to be diagnosed and medicated. If you don’t go to the doctor, people will probably leave you alone until you start eating cats. All the pre-cat time, you may be desperately unhappy and/or craving cat meat for every second. But you won’t tell because “medical conditions” show up on all those important applications you’re filling out for grad school or your huge promotion. No one wants a cat-eater running their business. Everyone loves a blank “medical conditions” column.

Truth is, mental illness is chemical and outside of individual control. Like getting the flu in your brain. And yet, you don’t have to write flu down anywhere when looking for a job. The medicines you get for a mental illness are taboo subjects and not covered by many insurance companies. If you take NyQuil, your life insurance policy will not go down. If you are bipolar, it might. Because you chose to get help when you needed it, your life is not worth protecting.

Some places in the world worship schizophrenics because they are believed to be channeling divine energy. Our schizophrenics live on the street or in straight jackets. We really like it when everyone thinks the same way. And yet, google famous people with autism or bipolar disorder, and you will get a who’s-who of creative and academic genius. Virginia Woolf, Edgar Allen Poe, Beethoven, Marilyn Monroe, Mozart, Jim Carrey, Tim Burton (all bipolar), Darryl Hannah (autistic) to name a few. And we love those motherfuckers. So…why not love all motherfuckers? Why not support the mentally alternatively-abled (of whom I consider myself one) as fully functioning members of society who have medical conditions? You’ve had a medical condition before. And people like you, right? Right.

There is no such thing as a blank “medical conditions” column. So stop judging it. Go to the Counseling Center, or write about what’s bugging you, or go run around Ankeny naked. Apparently all the kids are doing it these days. I’ll probably be there this weekend.

‘Let food be thy medicine and let medicine be thy food’

“Actually, one of the reasons I wanted Indian food this week is because I was sick and a lot of the spices they use are natural medicines,” said my good friend Kaji Shrestha when I was talking to him on the phone this week. Sure, there are plenty of folks around this campus who are super groovy and into herbal remedies and natural healing. So the idea of spices and herbs is not necessarily that unique. Except that Kaji is not another Whitman hippie but a pre-med student at Michigan State University.

So if you are coming down with a cold or just the general “plague” which ravages through the dorms every year, why make a curry? First of all, tumeric (the spice that gives curry its yellow color) has anti-depressant properties that will make you feel good straight off. The antimicrobial chemicals in that tumeric will then start to fight off some of the nasty stuff that is making you feel sick. On the long term, preventative health front, tumeric has chemicals that have been shown to prevent and treat Alzheimer’s, liver disorders and several types of cancer.

Many of the chemicals found in tumeric have only recently been recognized by modern western scientists for their medicinal properties. Many drug companies are especially interested in developing synthetic copies of those chemicals to market as pharmaceuticals. Even though modern medicine is just starting to look to food for medicines, the healing properties of tumeric and other foods has been known for eons by people all over the world. There is an entire spiritual/medicinal branch based in Hindu culture known as Ayurveda, which revolves primarily around the healing properties of spices, minerals and food. Most of these beliefs are considered to be superstitious, but more and more often science is confirming these beliefs to be true.

Our own culture has plenty of folklore about food and health. “An apple a day keeps the doctor away,” eating oranges in order to get more vitamin C, chocolate ice cream to feel better after a break up and garlic to help us feel better when we have a cold. Some of these are rooted in, or have been backed up by, modern science. Garlic, for example, actually does have antimicrobial properties like tumeric. On the other hand, the high level of vitamin C in oranges is mostly myth; you would be much better to eat some sweet potatoes, which also keep considerably better and can actually grow in Walla Walla.

The value of this herbal knowledge and folklore cannot be underestimated. Just because we can get all sorts of medicines over the counter or from doctors when we have health problems does not mean that those medicines will necessarily always be that easy to access, or that we always have the resources to purchase them. If you are feeling tight on cash a trip to the drug store for some Sudafed can seem like a big deal, but throwing some extra hot peppers in food that you have to eat anyway might be less of a sacrifice.

There are also the various foods that offer preventative care. It goes without saying that eating good food can have some fabulous long-term health benefits, but there are also much more explicit benefits. Garlic and onions, besides being essential for 90 percent of delicious meals, help to lower blood pressure and bad cholesterol levels.

Perhaps rather than following an often incorrect and misleading food “pyramid” from the USDA, we should all have a chart of foods with medicinal properties in our kitchens. Some doctors are already starting to recommend diet changes to help patients with diseases that are not generally considered to be diet related. This return to the medical properties of food harkens back to Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, who said, “Let food be thy medicine and let medicine be thy food.” Most importantly to me, if given the choice between artificial grape-flavored cough syrup and lentil daal, I’ll take the daal.

Ahmadinejad speech raises questions regarding freedom of speech

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad spoke this past Monday at Columbia for the university’s annual World Leaders Forum.

Ahmadinejad’s scheduled speech at a United States academic institution immediately caused disagreement. Columbia University students, parents and alumni were outraged that Columbia would invite the president of Iran to their alma mater. Ahmadinejad also requested to visit Ground Zero. In response, signs read, “Our message to Iranian madman: If you even think of setting foot near Ground Zero, you can go to hell!”

Before his speech, some Columbia students said that although they disagreed with the Iranian president’s views, they still defended the administration in bringing Ahmadinejad to Columbia.
“What is better than to send…Ahmadinejad back to Iran with the opportunity for him to learn about our freedoms and the opportunity that in an academic institution such as this one, we are allowing him to come and debate these ideas of his,” said a Columbia graduate student.

“That’s why students come to universities—to discuss differences of opinions and ideologies.”
College is a time for us to speak freely and listen to others under the U.S. belief of freedom of speech. Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger agrees. “[F]ree speech asks us to exercise extraordinary self-restraint against the very natural but often counter-productive impulses that lead us to retreat from engagement with ideas we dislike and fear,” said Bollinger in his opening remarks at the forum on Monday. “In this lies the genius of the American idea of free speech.”

Ahmadinejad is known for denying the Holocaust, saying Israel shouldn’t exist, involving his country in terrorist activities and allowing people to be executed in public. President Bollinger said at the ending of his caustic introduction, “Mr. President, you exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator.”

Through all of Bollinger’s accusations and questions, Ahmadinejad either denied or did not answer them. “President Ahmadinejad failed to respond to literally any of…Bollinger’s statements,” said Austin, a Columbia University student who saw the speech live, in an interview on Fox News. “All in all it was a very bizarre experience.”

And it was. Ahmadinejad said, “In Iran we don’t have homosexuals like in your country…In Iran we don’t have this phenomenon. I don’t know who has told you that we have it.”
Common sense alone reveals the absurdity of Ahmadinejad’s comments. According to CBC Canada news, “Many homosexuals live under the fundamentalist regime in Iran.” They are now trying to fight back. One Iranian, after fleeing from Iran, started a Web site titled the Iranian Queer Organization at irqo.net.

But it is not Ahmadinejad speaking at Columbia University that bothers me. It is the complete hypocrisy by this ultra-liberal institution.

The Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC), a training program to prepare college students to become commissioned officers, is not allowed on Columbia’s campus, yet this known sponsor of terrorism was. Columbia’s reasoning for not allowing ROTC on campus is because of their protest against the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, which was instituted during Clinton’s administration. At the same time, Ahmadinejad completely denies the existence of homosexuals in his own country.

Some people at Columbia are outraged at this contradiction. “I will never donate to the university until the ROTC programs are brought back to campus,” said Austin from the Fox News interview.

This hypocrisy does not end there.

Last October, Columbia University College Republicans invited the Minuteman Project leaders to speak. This anti-immigration, all volunteer organization helps guard our borders against illegal immigrants. As one of the leaders of the Minuteman Project started to speak, a group of students ran on stage with a banner that read, “No one is illegal.” Applause erupted as a mass of students from the group and the audience began to run on stage. People began to chant, “Racist bastard! Go back!” and “Racist Nazis! Go away!” as the leader was silenced and mayhem began. It was out of control, and the Columbia police stood by and did nothing. This was not the encouragement of debate or discussion; it was chaos.

Bill O’Reilly, whom I know most of you absolutely adore, said, “Columbia University is a disgrace. It’s not interested in free speech. It’s a place of indoctrination.”

The student radicals responded a week later to defend their reasoning for storming the Minuteman Project speech. “We are proud to send the message to the country that racist organizations and fascist groups are not welcomed at Columbia or in New York City,” said one female protestor. “Like Hitler in pre-Nazi Germany, Gilchrist and the Minuteman attempt to demonize foreign born poor people by blaming illegals for society’s problems.”

One wonders why this girl didn’t rush the stage Monday in protest of this racist, homophobic president? Is hypocrisy selective in its outrage?

One statement made by Ahmadinejad all could agree on, “In university environment, we must allow people to speak their mind, to allow everyone to talk so that the truth is eventually revealed by all.”

Too often conservative speakers are stopped from speaking at college and university campuses. Some of you might believe bringing Ahmadinejad was a golden opportunity to engage with “the other,” but do you stand back and do nothing as we watch US—our fellow U.S. citizens—get disrespectfully thrown off the stage when they are only stating their beliefs?
The Minuteman Project at Columbia University isn’t the only example. It gets worse. On Oct. 21, 2004, columnist and conservative author Ann Coulter dodged custard pies thrown by two men at the University of Arizona in Tucson. Bill Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard and Fox News contributor, was hit in the face with an ice cream pie while speaking at Earlham College in Richmond, Ind., on Mar. 29, 2005. Pat Buchanan, former presidential hopeful, was splashed with a bottle of salad dressing on Mar. 31, 2005, at Western Michigan University. An audience member at Butler College threw a pie at author and editor of FrontPage Magazine David Horowitz on Apr. 6, 2005.

I am glad blatant acts of intolerance such as these have not happened at Whitman—yet. But what would you do if Ann Coulter came? David Horowitz? Bill O’Reilly? Would you be heading to the bakery or would you be willing to open your mind for just a few hours after spending months in Whitman’s hyper-liberal atmosphere?

America is noticing these blatant inconsistencies within liberal institutions and their half-baked commitment to diversity. We are not fools. If Whitman wants to become a college in the forefront of promoting diversity, it should practice what it preaches and demonstrate a true tolerance for ALL ideas

Could it be the reason why liberals hysterically prevent conservative speakers is because they fear they can’t compete in the arena of ideas? Does not “tolerance” demand an understanding of all sides of an argument?

Enough is enough. Indoctrination promotes and coerces only one idea; education freely examines all ideologies. Education, which tolerates a free look at the whole spectrum of ideas, is what I believe Whitman should stand for. This is the kind of education I want; how about you?

I hope the Whitman administration considers my observations and responds to my pleas for a just and balanced education. Silence would only signal an unwillingness to be fair to ALL students and a bias toward certain select groups. I also hope that Whitman administrators have been reading Ms. Avila’s and my articles on diversity. We will not let up on our discussion, and I will not surrender my fight for intellectual diversity.

Meeting meat: Taking a look at vegetarianism from new angles

The question of whether or not vegetarianism is ethical can be approached from so many angles that it seems almost impossible to discuss.

Many pro-vegetarianism Web sites focus on the conclusion and throw in any argument that will arrive there, including those from ethics, politics, and health. For example, GoVeg.com uses health benefits, animal rights and environmental protection as reasons for following a vegetarian diet. Another pro-vege site (innvista.com/health/nutrition/diet/vresourc.htm) brings economic and human rights issues into the argument by suggesting that meat is too expensive a food source and that large-scale vegetarianism could help prevent world hunger.

In their blind loyalty to the conclusion, they often give each argument equal weight, almost suggesting that red meat’s fattiness is an obvious sign from God of its immorality.

For me, the conclusion is the least important thing. When I hear that someone is vegetarian, I feel that I have found out almost nothing about them. This person could be opposing the sinfulness of killing a sentient being, protesting the modern meat industry or simply trying to lose that extra fifteen pounds. In order to ask the question of whether this person is behaving morally, we must examine the reasoning behind the choice. And in doing so the question itself becomes more intriguing and complex—but complex in an organized, rather than haphazard, way.

Perhaps the most fundamental and most obviously moral question we have to address is that of whether it is right to kill an animal under any circumstance. Most people believe it is wrong to kill a human being, but do not extend the right to life to any other animal. Animals are sentient creatures, however, so they can experience pain. In addition, some are highly intelligent and social creatures that even grieve, in some sense of the word, the deaths of their family members. A contemporary philosopher by the name of Peter Singer argues that many animals are capable of planning and looking forward to the future, which makes untimely death a decided evil for them, just as it is for humans. It is on these grounds that he argues that some intelligent animals deserve a right to life.

But why should a pig have a right to life and not a caterpillar? Both have been living on this earth for millennia. In a sense, doesn’t everything that has made its place here have a right to life? At the same time, however, doesn’t everything have an equal right to kill? This world is based on killing. Everything must kill other beings in order to survive. Every time I kill a spider in my house, I wonder why I should live and not the spider, but I force myself to do it, just to emphasize that the essence of this life is selfishness, is the vivacious affirmation of the self.

The fact that animals do something is not enough to show that it is morally sound, of course. Cats pick up mice and beat them about, torturing them for hours, but I would not therefore condone a man’s pouring salt on a snail and delighting in its suffering. Both the outward action and the inner intention of the subject must enter into the examination. If a man killed and ate a snail in order to feed himself, and if he did so with reverence and gratitude for the life-force he was obtaining, his action would be entirely sound. Humans are the same as other animals in that they need to obtain energy from other life forms, but they are different in that they can empathize with those life forms and can choose to either cause them unnecessary pain or treat them with respect and kindness.

Similar considerations enter into the question of whether it is acceptable to raise animals in industrial-sized feedlots. Does this constitute a reverent use of an energy source or a type of useless torture like pouring salt on a snail? People do not squash cattle into a feedlot and delight in watching them live out their cramped, muddy, stinky lives. In fact, they probably don’t enjoy it much at all.

However, simply not enjoying something while continuing to do it does not make it morally sound. It seems to me that this sort of selfishness goes beyond reverently taking what we need to live vibrantly. It is taking more than we need, or turning our eyes away while a child pours salt on a snail. All of the environmental and economic problems associated with eating meat produced on factory farms really flow from the fact that it is a step beyond beautiful selfishness into the realm of ugly selfishness. The distinction is nebulous, but so are the best distinctions I have come across.

American pie conundrum: Feminism a death sentence for U.S. food

Feminism killed American food.

I love to cook from scratch. Bread, from flour and yeast to loaf—wine, from sugar and fruit to alcohol—yogurt, from milk and culture to tasty sour-ness. And I love to cook for other people. Perhaps it is some maternal urge inside me, but when I hear someone say that they didn’t eat breakfast or that all they’ve eaten in the past three days was tomato soup made from the leftover ketchup packets in the back of their fridge, all I want to do is make them a good hearty dinner. Most of the people I cook for are men, which has always raised interesting gender questions in my head and, because of my feminist background, made me want to reel in my cooking fanaticism.

At the same time, I realize that cooking from scratch is an important skill when it comes to eating well. No matter how you count calories or look for an organic label, processed food embodies more fossil energy, contains more chemicals that are bad for you and is invariably produced on farms that operate on an industrial scale.

This summer I worked on a farm where my food passion didn’t seem so weird. All the dairy on the farm was provided by a lady cow by the name of Loveday who provided us with yogurt, milk, cheese and butter day in and day out. All the vegetables grown on the farm were expected to last the entire year, so once the tomatoes started turning ripe, the canning kitchen was always busy with food dehydrator and hot water canner going strong. Every loaf of bread was baked from scratch and even the sourdough yeast ran wild and free.
The major director of this entire show was Elizabeth Simpson, an accomplished retired professor and English teacher with several books to her name, who is most proud of her homemaking abilities.

Over many tomatoes, strawberries and blackberries, Elizabeth and I spent time talking about our identities as women and lovers of food. Both of us consider ourselves feminists, but through conversations came up with one major theme: In a world of ketchup soup, someone needs to get back in the kitchen.

Modern Western feminism is fantastic. We figured out about half a century ago that women are good at many things other than cooking and cleaning and raising kids. Women do all sorts of things nowadays: fight fires, make amazing scientific discoveries, hold down high power corporate jobs, run for public office and much more. Men often will get time off to help raise the kids, and it is often expected (though not always fulfilled) that men will help with cleaning house and doing laundry. And in the kitchen? Swanson, Kraft, Amy’s and many other folks are there to cook the food.

That’s right, nobody is minding the kitchen in today’s culture. Most people I know, regardless of gender, can whip out a beautiful meal from scratch given the time and occasion. Therein lies the problem: Good food is considered to be something which is reserved only for special occasions. Real food, made from fresh, real ingredients needs to be a part of American food culture again.

In recent years there has been a growing recognition of the death of American food. Many solutions have been proposed, from controlling marketing of junk food to children to Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) projects. All of these are good and important solutions, but if there is no one in the kitchen to cook the vegetables in the CSA box or to create tasty snack that will taste better to children than a McFlurry, then they will all eventually fail. The only way to bring good food back to America will be to GET BACK IN THE KITCHEN AND MAKE YOUR OWN DAMN SANDWICH.

Solutions to skyrocketing text prices

If you’ve ever spent more than $500 on textbooks in one semester, then you’ll agree with me when I say that they’re expensive—prohibitively so. That’s troubling to me: the materials we need to study are so expensive that you’ve got students here on campus—I’ve done this—buying old editions or using shabby used copies in order to save a buck. Shouldn’t education be accessible to students of every economic background? Shouldn’t every student here get a new copy of the book they have to read and be tested from? I’m convinced that they should, and I believe there’s something we can do about it.

Over the summer, The Spokesman Review reported on Spokane Community College’s usage of a textbook rental program. They specifically cited a statistics class, which has now seen more students rent a text than buy it. The staff writer, Shawn Vestal, quotes one professor of this statistics class as saying, “It’s a very expensive textbook… it costs $151 to buy the textbook new, $120 to buy the textbook used, and $51 to rent it for a quarter.”

I don’t know about you, but paying $51 to use a $151 text for class sounds like a deal to me. Additionally, you know that the text will be in new condition because it will either be new when you rent it, or it will have been rented before—which means that the renter will probably have to buy it if they damage it. Since most people would try and sell the book back at the end of the semester anyway, who would flinch at returning it? In my experience, the best deal you can get at the bookstore is half of what you paid for it. In the case cited by the Spokesman, you save two-thirds of the cost, as opposed to half by buying the book new and selling back—if the bookstore will even take it.

So what are the obstacles? What prevents us from implementing this price-slashing innovation? Douglas Carlsen, manager of the Whitman College Bookstore, reports that in order for a book to be even considered for rental status, it would have to be guaranteed for a certain lifespan. That means that a professor would have to promise to teach from it for a period of semesters or even multiple years. In some cases, that’s fine, but occasionally classes and teachers will need flexibility to shift texts. Herein lies our quandary. Which is more important: having the latest information within the field you’re studying (i.e., the latest edition of the text) or having a quality version of a slightly-outdated, affordable text?

This is my contention: those two things are not mutually exclusive. It is possible to teach on an affordable basis, filling in the gaps where need be on the textbook. At least my book won’t have every other word highlighted in neon pink, and I’ll still be able to get a coffee every once in a while. Now, if only we can get a few of the faculty to agree, we may be in business.

Jena Six opens window for protest, Whitties apathetic

When my protest literature professor Nadine Knight walked into the classroom on Friday, Sept. 21, she had just one question:

“How many of you wore black yesterday?”

Not a hand went up.

“Okay… How many of you know why college students across the country wore black yesterday?” she asked.

Blank stares.

“Has anyone been reading the news recently?”

Maybe three timid students muttered something about the Jena Six. The rest just sort of shuffled their feet and looked down at their desks in embarrassment.

For those who haven’t been keeping track, here’s the story of the Jena Six:
Last year, a Black student in Jena, La. (which was once stomping grounds for the KKK) allegedly asked his school principal if he could sit underneath what was dubbed “the white tree.” The principal of course said the student could sit wherever he wanted. The next day there were three nooses hanging from the boughs of the tree (the entire tree has since been cut down, by the way)—and the white students responsible were given only three days suspension.

Racial tensions mounted after that, all culminating in an after-school brawl between white and black students, which ultimately resulted in a white student being knocked briefly unconscious.

This would all have been well and good—just your standard, everyday racial tensions in an archaic Southern town.

Until the six black students involved in the fight were charged by the district attorney with attempted murder in the second degree (he absurdly cited the boys’ shoes as the deadly weapon). One student—Mychall Bell, 17—was convicted and found guilty by an all-white jury in July.

And then all hell broke loose.

Last week more than 10,000 people descended on Jena (population 2,971), demanding that the state “Free the Jena Six.” The protests stretched for miles: Photographs depict mostly college-aged students flaunting posters depicting Martin Luther King, Jr. and slogans from the Civil Rights Era of the 1960s. The Rev. Al Sharpton proudly called the protests the beginning of the 21st Century civil rights movement, and the Rev. Jesse Jackson (in true MLK form) exclaimed, “We will not stop marching until justice runs down like waters.”

There was also a campaign nationwide for students on college campuses to wear black in support of the Jena Six. Apparently, Whitman missed the memo.

To be fair, I feel kind of bad for Jena. Everyone’s trying to get the story straight: Some say that there were really two nooses (not three); others argue that the students responsible for the nooses were not just suspended for three days but actually sent to an alternative school for a month or so. When a story blows up like this one has, it’s hard to know what’s true and what’s been made up for the sake of the show.

Now, obviously it’s ridiculous to convict a student of attempted murder if he’s armed with a shoe, and Jena is unfortunately not unique. If it takes an incident like this one to make the country wake up and realize that racism has become an institution here, then so be it.
But we should all be warned: This is not your mother’s civil rights struggle, and racism in America is no longer a black-and-white issue. It is less obvious today than it was 40 years ago; our government prefers to sweep racism under the rug and pretend like it doesn’t exist (but it does: just look at the prison system, drug convictions, bank loans, medicinal care and any number of other American foundations). Perhaps for this reason alone the protests in Jena were unfocused and sometimes messy.

But they were protests, nevertheless, and for the first time since gay marriage was a major headliner four years ago, civil rights made the front page of the New York Times. That, certainly, amounts to something.

So I am disappointed in Whitman.

Sure, once the Jena Six became a hot topic last weekend there was a little discussion about the incident among students. Maybe a few dozen even joined the Free The Jena Six! Facebook group. But that was it. No discussion panel, no protest marches, no big banners sent to Louisiana with Whitman student signatures. All in all, we were pathetic.

We were especially pathetic because last year Whitman canceled classes for an entire day just to talk about this very subject. We talked about it and talked about it and talked about it until we felt like it was done with; until we all felt better about ourselves. So many students left the Race Symposium last year feeling “enlightened.”

And then we went back to writing Core papers and playing beer pong.

We don’t get a gold star for being able to effectively postulate and theorize about race in America. These issues won’t be on the GREs or your senior written exams. Some of us may feel like we don’t have opportunities to be a part of proactive change in our communities. That’s a frustrating feeling. We’re stressed out, we’re busy, we don’t know what we can do that will really do anything.

That’s why when a chance like this one comes along, we must leap at it, regardless of its
flaws. And anyway, I sincerely doubt that Whitman students failed to participate in the Jena Six protests because we collectively found the oversimplification of the issue problematic.
In the aftermath of last week’s protests, there is a window of opportunity. It is abundantly clear that Americans are not completely ignorant to the blatant assaults on civil rights in this country, and we are not going to take it anymore. Fixing a system that is corrupt at its very groundwork will be difficult, yes, but it’s been a long time coming. It is time for a revolution.
And we at Whitman cannot sit on the sidelines. We must be always alert, always adept, and always questioning. We must read the news, talk to everyone we know, look for sources beyond The Daily Show for information.

The next time, we’ll be ready. One of these days, we’ll be flooding the streets; we’ll finally be a part of the change.

Faculty, students torn over new hires

“It’s like dating,” said Sharon Alker, assistant professor of English, about the hiring process for new professors. “You date a lot of universities, and you see which one you want to marry.”

Some students, however, have issues with the courting rituals. “The system can be very disappointing,” said one senior who wished to remain anonymous.

With the start of the new school year, nine new professors arrived at Whitman. Each went through a rigorous process to get here.

First, faculty must establish that a position needs to be filled, after which the college embarks on a widespread search. Candidates submit an application, which is reviewed by the department. If chosen, candidates will then be interviewed by tenure-track members of the department, often at an off-campus conference like the annual Modern Language Association Convention where new Professor of English Nadine Knight was interviewed.

“It’s an intense experience,” Knight said. “There are thousands of people in suits looking for jobs.”

If all goes well, the next step is a two-day interview on the Whitman campus, during which a candidate will often give two presentations: a teaching presentation and a research presentation, reflecting two of Whitman’s main priorities.

“We’re looking for excellent teachers and scholars,” said Associate Dean of Faculty Tom Callister.

Students are asked to attend these sessions and give feedback about prospective professors.
“There was such a strong commitment to teaching,” Knight said about what drew her to the college. “And students were invested and interested in the process.”

Sometimes, faculty will arrange for a candidate to go out to lunch with students. “You go in and you’re handed a list of things you can’t ask,” an art student said of a luncheon she attended with a candidate. “But it’s cool once you talk with the professors…it’s a good discussion, even if they aren’t hired.”

After these sessions, the department will submit one name to the Dean of Faculty, who consults with the Committee of Division Chairs. The president must approve the appointment.
Some students are not completely happy with hiring procedure. “I question the standards…it seems to ally with a disappointing trend towards prestige over quality,” said a senior English major, speaking of Whitman’s status as an “up-and-coming liberal arts school.”

Tenure is a source of discontent among some students. Under the current system, tenure-track professors are reviewed every two years. In the sixth year, they go up for tenure and must prove three things: their teaching abilities (demonstrated through student evaluations, peer review and self-assessment), scholarship (demonstrated through published articles or books) and community involvement (demonstrated through participation in college committees).

“I really became aware of the politics of getting tenure,” said an anonymous senior English major, who expressed disappointment at losing visiting professor Andrew Osborn last year. The student wished Osborn could have served this year as a sabbatical replacement for Katrina Roberts in creative writing, but he was not hired.

Visiting professors are often hired for a one-year period, not a long-term tenure-track position that would be more expensive. Others are given staff positions.

Provost and Dean of Faculty Lori Bettison-Varga said that there are renewable contracts for visiting professors but that “sometimes our criteria preclude people who have already been here.”

“People we’re attached to leave, and we don’t find out until they don’t show up. I understand there are other factors, but it is frustrating,” a senior theater major said, who is angry at the departure of several technical theatre instructors.

Alan McEwen, technical director at Harper Joy, said in an e-mail, “Although my position is a tenure line job at many colleges it is not here at Whitman, and is not likely to ever be. Having just added a tenure line to the theatre department, there will not be another line for my wife either. Thus, we will likely search elsewhere.”

His wife, Mary McClung, recently left Whitman after receiving a tenure-track position at West Virginia University. McEwen plans to leave if he is able to find a suitable position elsewhere. “Would we stay if the current situation changed? You bet.”

“If there is no position, then unfortunately there is no job and that is a hard thing for most part time professors to accept. The Division of Theatre and the last Dean were very generous in giving/creating an adjunct position and I greatly appreciated it. I just wanted more,” said McClung in an e-mail.

McEwen agreed. “While the administration has not made my position ‘tenure level’ I do think it important to note they have done quite a lot. I have even enjoyed some support for professional activities depending on the number of requests from full time faculty. My department has also been very supportive.”

Some students still question the priorities of the college. “They get rid of good professors, yet we’re building new facilities,” said a senior art major, who regrets the departure of Matt Kelly, a visiting assistant professor. “It really should be staff over appearance.”

One problem for prospective faculty is employment for spouses of professors, given the limited local job market. The college employs some spouses, but it can be difficult when both partners are academics from similar disciplines. One solution is job-sharing, in which professors share one position between each other.

“Whitman is at the forefront of this,” said Alker. Currently there are eight shared positions across campus.

Whitman’s distance from research centers and relative isolation is another reason for hesitation from potential candidates, but Alker said that the college goes out of its way to support faculty research. “They’ve helped send me to research libraries in Edinburgh and Vancouver,” she said. “Penrose library is outstanding and gets me what I need.”
Despite worry from some students that there has been a shift in emphasis, officials remain adamant that teaching, the core of Whitman’s liberal arts mission, remains the foundation of the hiring process.

“Everyone we hire is an extremely qualified teacher and scholar. The potential for excellence is the most important criterion,” says Bettison-Varga, citing a low resignation rate and examples of professors who have remained at Whitman for decades

Humani Interna: Issue 3

New club reaches out to community

“I was disappointed in the number of students participating in the Service Saturdays and Make a Difference Day, so I was trying to think of a way to stimulate more volunteer interest in the Whitman community,” senior Kari Berkas said. “I wanted to create a large group of students who could be contacted when a volunteer opportunity came up.”

Berkas, who is one of the Center for Community Service’s (CCS) Interns and is the Special Projects Coordinator for the CCS, created the Volunteer Club, one of this year’s new clubs, with the help of CCS Director Lina Menard.

The Volunteer Club “is a way to create a listserv of students who have expressed interest in participating in various one-time volunteer opportunities throughout the semester. It is also a way to learn more about volunteer options, meet other students who share your interests and can volunteer with you, gain support from the CCS staff on starting your own projects and build your resume,” Berkas said in an e-mail.

I’m really excited that there is going to be a club specifically designated to bring together people who want to volunteer,” sophomore and Volunteer Club member Maia Hansen said. “Although this year I live in the Volunteer Co-op and it is really easy to hear about things going on, I know what it’s like to be out of the loop and not have an outlet to get involved.”

The Volunteer Club is aimed especially at students who are interested in volunteering in the local community but may not have time to do it on a weekly basis because students who are on the listserv will be alerted to various events throughout the semester.

The most recent Volunteer Club opportunity was on Sept. 23 at the United Way Family Fun Day, a carnival for Walla Walla families, where student volunteers helped run carnival activities.

“I helped with sack races, three legged races and the balloon tosses. It was wonderful spending time with kids and seeing families interact in such a real way and loving way,” Hansen said of her involvement in the event. “I even saw a woman whose house I worked on with Habitat for Humanity, and even though I already had so much respect for this woman who is raising a child by herself while attending nursing school, I felt like she shared some respect for me for being present and involved.”
The next activity is scheduled for the end of October at the Community Center for Youth.
For students interested in being part of the listserv, e-mail Berkas at berkaska@whitman.edu.

‘Devil’s Highway’ author to speak

Luis Alberto Urrea, author of “The Devil’s Highway,” will speak at Whitman Thursday, Sept. 27. Several events on campus pertaining to the book are scheduled, including a student slideshow of border photographs and—for some—dinner with the author.

“The Devil’s Highway” tells the story of 26 men’s journey across the Arizona desert on the Mexican-American border in 2001. Twelve survive in a climate with regular temperatures over 100 degrees Fahrenheit. The book was a 2005 Pulitzer Prize finalist for nonfiction and was chosen by Whitman as the summer reading for first-years this year. Senior Lecturer of Environmental Humanities Donald Snow suggested the book last spring to Lori Bettison-Varga, Dean of Faculty.

“I met Luis Alberto Urrea during the summer of 2006 at Fishtrap, a summer literary conference in the Wallowas,” said Snow. “I was hugely impressed. He was charismatic and compelling—a marvelous speaker.”

Snow read “The Devil’s Highway” soon after the conference.

“Between a strong national interest focused on border issues and President Bridges’ emphasis on diversity, I felt it would be a very appropriate book for entering Whitman first-years to read,” said Snow. “It’s well-written and gripping, a trim, brisk read without being too easy. The saga of the men is handled with delicacy and complexity.”

Spanish Professor Nohemy Solórzano-Thompson was part of a panel of faculty that presented the book to the incoming class this August.

“Urrea is one of my favorite authors, and I’ve taught some of his books before, though I’d never read ‘The Devil’s Highway,’” she said. After reading it, “it’s a particularly horrific story that really puts a human face on the numbers and facts of immigration. Urrea covers the various reasons these men decide to start on such a dangerous voyage, which many people in the United States aren’t aware of.”

Geology Professor Kevin Pogue was also part of the presentation to the first-years.
“It’s important to realize that the desert wasn’t the climate these men were used to,” said Pogue. “They lived in a tropical climate. In the 1970s, if a couple of people were shot crossing the Berlin Wall, it made headline news. Close to 450 people died crossing the Mexican-American border in 2006, and people just aren’t aware of it.”

Once the book was presented to the first-year class, the president’s office approached junior Rachel Stein. As the ASWC Public Speakers Chair, she normally contacts agents, writes contracts and arranges for speakers’ transportation and accommodations.

“This case was a bit different considering that I was working with the president’s office,” said Stein in an e-mail. “I think it’s going to be a really eye-opening presentation. Our daily lives are affected by the number of immigrants entering the United States, particularly from Latin America.”

“Immigration is such a big issue in the United States,” said first-year Anastasia Andreas. “In my hometown, I know a lot of people who have traveled across the border because it’s just too difficult to come legally.”

Andreas was one of a few first-years invited to eat dinner with Urrea before his speech, along with faculty members and some upperclassmen.

“My student academic advisor knew that I was really interested in the book, and she recommended that I be invited,” she said. “I’m excited for the dinner—I have some questions for Urrea.”

In addition to the author’s presentation, other events on campus have been scheduled about the book and border issues. On Tuesday, Sept. 25, students presented a slide show of photographs from their own travels to the Mexican-American border.

Professors Snow, Solórzano-Thompson and Pogue all agreed that Urrea does an excellent job of avoiding placing blame for the situation on any of the parties concerned.

“Urrea has an extraordinary ability to present ambiguities,” said Snow. “It’s a wonderful example of good reporting. His speech is guaranteed to be a superb presentation.”
“What’s really exciting is how involved the community of Walla Walla is,” said Solórzano-Thompson. “There’s events being held in the community related to ‘The Devil’s Highway,’ the public library is advertising his speech—there’s a strong general interest in both the book and the author.”

Whitman community gets involved with Wash. State Penitentiary

The Washington State Penitentiary is a five minute drive and less than two miles away from Whitman. This penitentiary is located on 540 acres of farmland, consists of four separate facilities based on the custody level of the offender and employs over 900 people. The close proximity of the Washington State Penitentiary to Whitman gives excellent opportunities for study.

“The Prison Research Group [PRG] is an entirely voluntary extra-curricular program that has been in existence since the early ‘80s. It originally developed out of an idea proposed by Steve Rubin, the retired Whitman psychologist, who deserves most of the credit for this wonderful Whitman institution,” said Keith Farrington, professor of sociology and original co-founder of the PRG. “It is an opportunity for interested students, faculty, staff and employees and administrators at the Washington State Penitentiary and other criminal justice officials in Walla Walla to get together once a month and sit for an hour to discuss what’s going on in the field of criminal justice in the nation and in Walla Walla.”

In fact, last week members of PRG, who also work at the Washington State Penitentiary here in Walla Walla, invited PRG to conduct their monthly meeting at the penitentiary’s administration building.

But the group doesn’t just stop there. PRG visits other states and other prisons besides the penitentiary in Walla Walla. “We visit the local juvenile justice system and the Walla Walla County Jail. We visit other prisons in Washington and Oregon,” said junior Seren Pendleton-Knoll. “We’re hoping to visit prisons in Australia over this school year’s spring break.”

Each individual within the group looks at the prison and conducts their research differently. Some Whitman students use this group as research for their theses, such as Viviana Gordon, a senior who has been in the group for over a year.

“My thesis is going to be about prisoner re-entry. I am working with the STAR project in town, which stands for Successful Transition and Rehabilitation,” said Gordon. “I’m going to be looking at the barriers for Latino male prisoners reintegrating into the Walla Walla community.”

Other students are deeply interested in the criminal justice system but do not necessarily integrate the group into their senior theses. Many student members of PRG are actually majoring in areas that have no apparent connection to prisons and criminal behavior.
“I like to study the effects of prison on prisoners. Lots of non-violent people go to prison, and then when they’re in typical prison environments with more violent prisoners, they come out [of prison] with more violent mentalities,” said Sarah Deming, a sophomore. “I also am interested in comparing the re-offense rates at different prisons.”

The term in the prison system used to describe repeated criminal behavior or re-offenders is “recidivism.” According to the Washington State Department of Corrections Web site, “Washington’s [recidivism] rate has climbed from 31 percent to 37 percent over the last 10 years…[and] over 3,500 offenders release[d] in 2006 will commit new crimes by 2011.”
Researching why recidivism rates have climbed in the past 10 years is complicated. Two prisons and their curriculums cannot only be compared to determine why their recidivism rates might be significantly different. Prisons vary in size, security measures, type of prisoners and their crimes, location and the curriculums that they offer. All these differences must be calculated into the comparison.

“When you are comparing prisons, it is extremely important to compare similar sized prisons,” said a Washington State Penitentiary employees. “In the same way, comparisons should be made between whole states and their varying policies.”

Varying programs are offered at different prisons. Programs can range from life skills such as parenting to job skills and educational fundamentals. According to the Web site, the Washington State Penitentiary offers various activities, focusing heavily on family bonding and “Offender Change” programs. Unfortunately, programs are not always effective—especially with regards to the type of offender and if he or she has re-offended.

“A majority of the inmates do not care about the programs. They are going to go right back out and re-offend,” said the employee. “Programs should be geared towards the first time offenders because that is the group most likely to be rehabilitated. Most offenders who are down for their third or even second time are most likely going to re-offend.”

Most inmates become involved with programs only to earn themselves points towards their release, instead of doing the programs for the skills themselves. If PRG wants to check whether the prisoner truly wants to be reformed, the employee said, “Make sure to examine the prisoner’s crime, interview [the prisoner] for sincerity and never promise [the prisoner] anything in return for participating in the programs. Otherwise, they’ll only be completing them for the points.”

Farrington noted that many students enter the group with high hopes of fixing the prison system and helping the prisoners incarcerated inside. They come in with “Utopian” ideas only to find out through research that these ideals cannot always be achieved. This causes students to become, as Farrington said, “more realistic” about what can—and what can’t—occur within prison walls.

When asked if she felt anyone could be rehabilitated, Gordon said, “No, I don’t, unfortunately. I used to think that…. The group has made me more realistic, because a lot of times you can go in with really liberal views about the prison because it’s broken, but when you’re there speaking with a lot of professionals and correctional officers…and they’re telling you the reality of it, then it is a much more difficult situation than you thought.”

Arabic course popular among students, faces uncertain future

Whitman took a concrete step toward fostering diversity this semester by adding Arabic to its foreign language offerings.

This is the first time Arabic has been in the course catalog. The class filled up quickly, with a total of 18 students.

“I could have had 30 people in this class, so the demand exists,” said Professor Robert Morrison, who is in the religion department but offered to teach the class this year and has taught Arabic in the past.

Students are excited by the opportunity to take Arabic.

“The people in the class are really enthused about it,” said sophomore Jonah Stotsky.
Arabic is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world. That fact, along with current events, emphasizes its relevance.

“Whitman isn’t a diplomat training institute, but I think that as we become more aware of the importance of the history of the Islamic world and of Middle Eastern history just as something any educated person should know about, that certainly has something to do with why it’s being taught,” said Morrison.

Teaching Arabic is appropriate to Whitman’s interest in diversity and global initiatives.
“Currently we have three European languages, and we teach two of the Asian languages, and my personal feeling is that we don’t teach enough foreign languages, especially for a school that claims to be so interested in global studies,” said Professor Mary Anne O’Neil, who spearheaded the effort to get an Arabic class.

“People I worked with were Professor Elyse Semerdjian in history, who is a speaker of Arabic, and my colleague Professor [Shu-Chu] Wei-Peng in Chinese, and we were trying to figure out now how can we get somebody, what would we do,” said O’Neil. “And in the course of this Professor Morrison, who’s already taught Arabic before, said he would love to do it. So of course we were right on that.”

The future of Arabic at Whitman is uncertain. The administration has been supportive of the foreign language department’s effort to include Arabic in its catalog permanently, but allocating the resources to realize this goal is challenging.

“Whitman is actually not a very rich school. We are well known for doing a lot with a little bit of money. So if I go to President Bridges and say, ‘Well, I think I want you to give me two Arabic teachers, and I want this and I want that,’ well that’s a lot of money. About three million dollars that I’m asking for, and they can’t do something like that,” said O’Neil.

The foreign languages department is in the process of applying for a Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence, who would teach Arabic for either a semester or full year.

“The scholar would help us set up a program, help us make contact with programs abroad, give opportunities for our teachers to get involved in the Fulbright program, and I would think on that basis we would have a much, much stronger chance to get someone to invest in an Arabic program,” said O’Neil.

Aside from its inherent merits, offering Arabic has the potential to attract students to Whitman.

“My feeling is that the liberal arts colleges that are doing very well right now are ones that are offering a lot of languages because languages have come back. There was a time, say in the ‘80s and ‘90s, when nobody learned a foreign language, or it was just Spanish. But the students we are getting now are really interested in languages,” said O’Neil. “If you look at schools like Grinnell College and Macalester College who are really at the top of the liberal arts, they offer a lot of foreign languages, they offer lots and lots of variety.”
Several students echoed this sentiment.

“When I was applying to schools, I was looking for the opportunities to take Hebrew, and if they had Arabic here when I applied, it would have been a much more attractive choice,” said sophomore Danny Kaplan, who is majoring in race and ethnic studies.
Adding Arabic to the catalog would satisfy student interest and keep Whitman up to speed in an increasingly global world.

“I am really out to promote our department because I feel that foreign languages are the basis of global study. I would say languages are the way of the future and we need some more of them here,” said O’Neil.

Tensions Run High…

Postulate: Alex Kerr is an insidious arson snake

Okay, usually I can work through my problems with people, but when I’m expected to associate with a psychopathic criminal, that doesn’t gel with my sensibilities. What am I talking about, you ask? I’m talking about the fact that Alex Kerr tried to set Goodwill on fire. And even though he did a pretty shoddy job of covering his tracks, no one seems to be wise to him – except me.

Let’s examine the facts, shall we? First off, Alex was obviously there on the night of the fire. Take a look at last week’s article from the Whitman Pioneer: “Whitman sophomore and Pioneer humor editor Alex Kerr was on the scene the night of the blaze.” First off, Whitman College is so ready to get down and have Alex’s babies. The amount of time they take listing his titles and accomplishments is almost as long as the damn article itself. Sophomore AND humor editor? Is that even remotely necessary? For shame, Whitman. You should put up more than a fight than that.

Moving on – allow me to quote Alex himself. “’I was meandering to Safeway, and downtown was utterly deserted,’ Kerr said in an e-mail.” That’s right it was, Alex. Because when everybody goes home to their families and homework like normal people, there’s nobody around to see your true, evil nature. And what the hell? You e-mailed your statement to the Pio? Isn’t it standard procedure to have an in-person interview? Maybe it is – for people who aren’t afraid that their lies won’t show through in their empty, empty eyes. Also, the beginning of the article states that “the fire was determined to have originated at approximately 1 a.m.” And you were “meandering” to Safeway, Alex? Safeway CLOSES at 1 a.m. If you really were trying to make it there to buy your Nutter Butters or whatever the hell else sick people like you need at that time of the morning, you should have been SCRAMBLING to make it to the store by closing time. But “meandering”? I don’t buy it.

I think we all know how the rest goes. Alex discovers a fire outside Goodwill, calls the police and fire departments, who then subsequently put the fire out and save the building. Alex is christened a hero of the people. Don’t any of you see the truth? Alex started that goddamn fire HIMSELF, and when it got out of control he hatched a new plan and subsequently “reported” it, making himself even more of a false idol on this tiny little campus. And you all are eating it up like Fire & Spice. For shame.

But hey, it’s not like I’m going to be able to change anyone’s mind with this anyway. If you all want to worship at the temple of Alex Kerr, that’s your prerogative. Ignorance is bliss anyway, right? Well, for sheep, anyway. I’m just saying, don’t be surprised when you hear about Alex defusing a bomb in Olin next month. Because he will. BECAUSE HE DESIGNED AND PLANTED IT HIMSELF.

Signed,
Evan Cartwright

P.S. You want to know why Alex wears a hood all the time? Because he comes from a long line of people descended from deceitful cobras, and now he pays homage to them by emulating the cobra’s hood with his own flannel one. Seriously. Look at his Facebook picture.

Wait, you’re not Facebook friends with Alex Kerr?

Sorry. I don’t buy that.

Counter-postulate: A Rebuttal by Alex Kerr

No I didn’t.

Signed,
Alex Kerr

Philosophy lectures featured in series

On Sept. 18, Whitman’s philosophy department kicked off a series of lectures that will allow professors to share ongoing projects with interested students. The program, which began with two presentations last year, is scheduled to run four lectures from September through November, with four more in the works for spring semester.

“It will, indeed, be a regular program,” said Tom Davis, an associate professor of philosophy. “This is our attempt in philosophy to give everyone a chance to see where each of us is coming from in our current work.”

Among the most eye-catching of the upcoming lectures is “The Problem With Zombies,” led by Professor Rebecca Hanrahan. In an e-mail Professor Julia Davis said, “Philosophers think about imaginative constructs like zombies (and automatons), so this is entirely serious and not just for Halloween!” She said that while “The Problem With Zombies” will address a specific philosophical position and is not designed as a themed lecture, “we are trying to do stuff not covered in our normal courses.”

The push to integrate faculty and students is shared by many in the department. According to Tom Davis, philosophy professors traditionally met for a series of “faculty forums” once a semester to share their professional work with one another, but there was little opportunity for them to engage directly with the students. “The idea is to get the professors in the department to share their current professional work with the Whitman community as a whole,” he said.
“Students go to lectures given by visitors, which is obviously enriching, but too often there’s little chance for following things out,” said Julia Davis. “When a student goes to a philosophy department lecture there’s the hope of on-going conversation with both their peers and me.”
Julia Davis also pointed to the possibility of research collaborations and possible theses topics coming from the lecture series. “I’m hoping the lecture series will foster intellectual community.”

Students should note that the lectures are not just for philosophy majors or people taking a philosophy class. Everyone is encouraged to attend. The next presentation, “The Problem with Zombies,” will be held in Olin 157 at 7:30 p.m. on Oct. 16, with coffee and discussion to follow in the Olin Faculty Lounge.

First-year senators elected

Neon-colored flyers with beaming first-year faces and catchy campaign slogans obscured every door in Anderson. Flashy brochures littered the tables in Jewett’s dining hall. First-years were bombarded with the by-products of this year’s ASWC election. Nevertheless, less than half of the first-year class voted last Wednesday.

Chris Fleming, Allison Ikeda, John Loranger, Ryan Lum, Michael Scigliano, Logan Skirm, Trillium Swanson, Drew Trogstad-Isaacson and Joel Wilson contended for the four Senate positions reserved for first-year students. The winners were Loranger, Lum, Scigliano and Swanson. Results were announced late Wednesday by e-mail.

The new senators will help ASWC decide how to spend the nearly $400,000 granted this year to the organization. That money will go towards the clubs, activities, speakers and concerts that are a staple of college life at Whitman.

Joel Wilson, one of the first-year candidates, said he decided to run because ASWC provides students with “a forum to make change,” unlike his high school student government. “I’m doing it to see if I do actually have a voice in what goes on in the world here.”

“ASWC really does affect you, and it really should be important to you,” said John Loranger, one of this year’s first-year senators.

However, only 205 students, out of a class of 428, chose to vote.

“We have so much going on that voting gets put on the back-burner,” said first-year Emily Allen. “A lot of people feel kind of disconnected from the student government.”

Loranger said he thought that the election turnout was reminiscent of the national participation in elections: “Not that high,” he said, “except for the people who are really interested and who really care.”

Many first-years said they felt that they did not know the candidates well enough to vote. However, those who read the candidates’ platforms online or attended the two forums held in Jewett and Anderson said that doing so was worthwhile.

Gabby Brandt, a first-year who lives in Anderson, walked all the way to Jewett to hear the candidates speak in the First-Year Senate Candidate Forum.

“I went because I heard it was only a 15-minute thing, and I figured I could spend 15 minutes listening to these people talk,” she says. “I’m really glad I went. I think it’s important to be informed.”

Allen said the forum radically affected her decision about whom to vote for. “I really voted based on their personalities and my instinct after watching them speak [in the Jewett forum]. I got a different vibe from each of them. It’s all about the vibes.”

When asked what she thought of the candidates, Allen said, “I prefer the ones who actually seem like they care. Not the ones who want to try to get us chocolate soft-serve in the dining hall.”

Brandt, however, said she really doesn’t care about the outcome of the election.
“I think [all of the candidates] would be good,” she said. “A lot of their platforms were similar.”

First-year Jeff Sterritt was one of the many who did not vote.

“[Voting] just didn’t seem that important,” he said. “It didn’t seem like my vote would make that big of a difference in [an election] that’s not that important in the first place, and besides, I’d have to go a little bit out of my way to do it.”

Time-Appropriate Vegan Rights campaigns throughout history

The “Jena Six” debate surrounding the questionable trial of six (but now five) young black men in Louisiana is being called “the beginning of the 21st century civil rights movement”. Before an escalating series of hate crimes which led to their convictions, these six students decided to sit below the “white tree” at their high school and found nooses hanging there the next day…which is a perfect segue into a national campaign for VEGANISM!

Heart-healthy Whitman students have captured the momentum of the whole “noose” trend and decorated our tree with lynched (and sometimes gutted) stuffed animals. Bacon sucks! With awe for our salad-munching friends, let’s look back at…

Firearms club revived on campus

Whitman College is full of human rights clubs, democratic organizations and liberal groups, so when the Whitman Firearm Education and Appreciation Club formed, it caused interest.
“Whitman is about personal responsibility,” first-year and founder Harry Hixon said. “I believe we should extend this into all realms.”

The club has two purposes. The first is to educate about firearms. The education will entail learning proper gun safety and the teaching of adults and students alike how to disarm a firearm.

“The purpose of this is more practical,” Hixon said. “It doesn’t matter if you like guns or not, it is important to teach how to disarm a gun when it is an a place it shouldn’t be.”
From a political perspective the club will also have guest speakers come to Whitman to talk about guns. There are tentative plans to hold political seminars and debates over issues relating to gun safety and appreciation.

The second purpose of the club is firearm appreciation. The club will sponsor shoots to teach people how to handle a gun. These shoots will be free for first-time shooters, but a small fee will be imposed on regular members because most of the funding of the club will go towards the education aspect of the club.

“We will keep most of our budget towards education,” Hixon said.

The club wants to give people a place to enjoy shooting and getting together socially.
“People from vastly different racial and ethnic backgrounds can come together to do something fun and safe,” Hixon said.

The club was active on campus less than five years ago but dissolved when the founder graduated and nobody took up leadership. The club is being re-established by Hixon, with Associate Professor of Economics Robert “Pete” Parcells as the faculty sponsor.

The club is hoping to promote political awareness and a more universal approach to the way Whitman students view guns.

“Whitman holds liberal values that personal responsibility comes first,” Hixon said. “We blame the drunkard, not the alcohol. Perhaps by showing that we can extend these liberal standards into other very important aspects of the modern world we will be able to see things in a truer light.”

Junior proposes initiatives in Sierra

Last week junior Musa Kpaka presented to a group in Gaiser Auditorium about his Youth Development Initiatives in Sierra Leone, a national project that helps young people design and implement community service projects.

Kpaka was one of two Whitman students who submitted a winning proposal to the “100 Projects for Peace” competition and was awarded $10,000 to implement his project over the summer.

Kpaka sought to design a project that would improve his war-torn home country of Sierra Leone and that would empower young people. He also aimed to create a grassroots program that bypasses bureaucratic obstacles that hinder action.

Sierra Leone’s infrastructure has been damaged by years of war and corruption and is ranked 176 out of 177 countries on the United Nations Human Development Index, which measures things such as education, standard of living, and life expectancy.

“I think the whole process itself was very challenging. Really the challenge was first writing the proposal, and then once I got that, it was really about how I was going to be able to implement this,” said Kpaka.

“Mostly that was very challenging given the circumstances back home as well, because while I was doing the project it was also during the election process, and there was a lot of violence.”
Kpaka traveled the country, visiting schools to invite them to his three-day National Youth Empowerment Workshop.

“It took me a while to be able to get across the country to visit all the schools that I invited. And the other challenge is coming up with a group of people back home that could relate to what I was saying, to the idea and to the message I was bringing, and that would help me,” said Kpaka.

The workshop was attended by 150 students and 15 teachers, as well as by speakers from the government and from the United Nations Children’s Fund.

Attendees were trained to be community peer health educators and to design their own community service projects. Kpaka challenged the students to come up with a project and awarded $500 to the winning proposal.

The winning project was a grassroots campaign that targeted malaria with mosquito nets.
The workshop marked the start of the Youth Development Initiatives. Both the attendees and the nation showed overwhelming interest and support.

The goal now is to raise funds so that Kpaka can return in December to launch at least one project in each of the 14 districts. The hope is that, once the results are presented to the government and local donors, the YDI will be adopted by them and will be less dependent on external donors.

“When I launched the program back home I made a pronouncement to the whole country, saying, you know what, you can give money to youth and they are able to change things. So the idea was that people back home would get inspired and do the same thing. Reports I’m getting are not very positive,” said Kpaka.

“Nobody’s really willing to give money yet. The thing is they know it’s a good project, but they just want that extra push. They want to see the next step and are waiting to see it.”

Fraternity receives table built from fallen tree

Members of Phi Delta Theta were sad last year when the champion catalpa tree by the their house fell down. Now the tree lives on in the form of a cloned sapling and a picnic table that men from Physical Plant Services built for the fraternity.

The tree partially toppled in August of 2006 after rotting out over the summer, taking out the power for a few weeks and disappointing frat members.

“We were upset,” said Wes Matlock ‘08, president of Phi Delta Theta. “It was a mark of pride for us.”

The tree was the largest catalpa tree in the nation. According to a Moon Handbooks travel guide, it was 21 feet in circumference. “It was probably over a hundred years old,” said Matlock.

The fallen tree was declared a hazard and the Parks and Recreational director ordered its removal. But Whitman College has a policy of putting wood to good use, and with encouragement from Physical Plant Director Dan Park and Assistant to the President Pete Reid, Physical Plant Services decided to build a table from the fallen tree’s wood.
“We worked on it for two days,” said Grounds Supervisor Gary Brown, who helped build the table along with carpenters Wayne Dennis and John Groom.

The table was presented to Phi Delta Theta last week and now rests in the backyard.
“It’s the most beautiful picnic table I’ve ever seen,” said Matlock, whose fellow frat members have been studying outside and barbecuing more.

The tree was also cloned in 2001 by the Champion Tree Project, run by a Michigan man who travels the country attempting to “preserve, protect, propagate and plant” America’s most impressive trees. Branches containing buds were given to Schichtel’s Nursery in Milton-Freewater, who donated a clone back to the Phi house following the collapse of the original. The clone was planted in March of last year and is thriving, according to Matlock.

Walla Walla, said David Milarch of the Champion Tree Project in a 2001 interview with the Union-Bulletin, has a remarkable number of champion trees for its size. “The state of Ohio has six national champions in the whole state. The state of Wisconsin has 12 in the whole state, the state of Minnesota has four, there’s four or five states that have none, and yet in Walla Walla there’re 50 state champions in one little city.”

And there may be more soon. “We’re going to plant more trees for the Phis and Sigs,” Brown said. “It’s an ongoing process. We have a good relationship with the fraternities.”

This Week in Greek

• The Thetas had their “Cakes for CASA” fund-raiser last week. CASA (Court-Appointed Special Advocates for Children) supports and voices the best interests of children who have been abused and neglected. They seek to find safe and permanent housing for children who otherwise may drift between various foster homes. Fund raising events such as this aim to support their goal of helping an additional 100,000 children by 2008. The Thetas raised a record $935 thanks to the support of the campus and the rest of the greek system.

Upcoming Events:
Friday, Oct. 12, 2007: TKE Blood Drive in Jewett

• Bids have been released to all of the first-year males who participated in fall rush. If you got one, accept your bid this week!

The Back Page Presents: A Candid Interview with the President of Iran

Outhouse offers myriad recycling options for eco-conscious students

The Outhouse’s large recycling truck can be seen on campus every Sunday morning traveling to each residence hall to collect recyclables. The Outhouse, or the Environmental Interest House, was the driving force behind the establishment of Whitman’s own recycling program, which reflects the environmentally conscious nature of the campus.

But there seems to be some confusion on campus as to how and what students can recycle through this program.

“They’re mistakes I would have made as a freshman,” said sophomore Outhouse resident Chloe Summerland. Students frequently try to recycle things like milk cartons, colored glass or wrapping paper.

It seems the problem is due in large part to a lack of knowledge about what can and cannot be recycled in Walla Walla, especially because students are coming to campus from such a variety of backgrounds.

The Outhouse’s Resident Assistant senior Hongngoc Pham said the interest house is considering making presentations to the first-year sections to remedy this problem. These presentations would try to increase awareness about what can and cannot be recycled and how to prepare items to be recycled. She said one of the most frustrating things is when people don’t rinse out bottles or cans before they recycle them.

Outhouse residents spend a lot of time on Sundays doing the kinds of things that students should do with their recyclables before recycling them. They also have to separate out objects that cannot be recycled.

“One of the biggest uses of time is breaking down cardboard,” said sophomore Outhouse resident Becca Bright.

Outhouse resident Anna Clark viewed certain potentially annoying aspects of the recycling process in a positive light. “When [the residents] don’t take the lids off plastic bottles I have to take them off so I can crush them,” she said, smiling. “We also get to jump up and down on the aluminum cans.”

Pham said she often has to separate colored and clear glass, because the Outhouse can only recycle clear glass in Walla Walla. They can also only recycles types one and two plastic.
Residents of the Outhouse said that people often try to recycle packing peanuts or other Styrofoam products that are not recyclable. An e-mail from the Conservation and Recycling Committee on campus asked that students bring Styrofoam packing peanuts to distribution services at Boyer House, where they will be reused.

Many students are not aware that the Outhouse will recycle batteries, although they do not pick them up weekly.

Pham said this recycling confusion is no worse this year than it has been in the past. In fact, the Outhouse still encounters recycling mistakes in dorms for upperclassmen as well as first-year dorms.

One resident referenced a time when “we went to Douglas and [the recycling] was all over the place.”

Outhouse residents went on to say that the most important thing is for students to sort their own recycling.

“It’s really not that humongous of a hassle,” said sophomore Outhouse resident Joanna Jungerman of the recycling process. “The only time it’s a hassle is when things aren’t sorted or when things are everywhere.”

Woods leads cross-country team at Lewis & Clark Invitational

Brian Woods finished first from the Whitman men’s cross-country team at the Sept. 8 Lewis & Clark Invitational. The men’s team finished third overall.

Woods, a senior co-captain, has been running cross-country since his first year at Whitman. His times at the Northwest Conference Championships have continued to improve since his first year, though “my biggest improvement was from freshman year to sophomore year since I was used to running 5K races and college races are 8K,” said Woods.

As a co-captain, Woods tries to lead by example but recognizes that running is an individual sport.

Woods usually runs about seven miles a day as part of cross-country practice. Practice runs include a Bennington Lake run, the Farm Loop through Robinson Ranch Road and the golf course run. “My favorite run is the golf course because it is grassy and shaded, but a lot of people on the team hate it because we run it so much,” said Woods.

Woods likes the racing part of running. “I like running, getting outside and relaxing, but I do the miles for the racing. I like the competition and trying to beat other people,” said Woods.
Before every race, Woods puts on his racing shoes while listening to “What You Know” by T.I. to pump himself up.

As a chemistry major, Woods enjoys the structure of athletics with academics. “I’m better at scheduling homework when I know that I have to be at practice at a certain time,” said Woods.
Beyond academics and cross-country, Woods has worked as a chemistry tutor and this semester will work as an IM football referee. Though he has played on IM football teams in the past, this is his first year as a referee. Woods participates in the spring semester track club and is a member of Tau Kappa Epsilon. This semester on Wednesday mornings Woods co-hosts a sports talk radio show on KWCW with another cross-country captain, senior Eli Asch.

IM football allows Whitties to ‘hit somebody’

“It’s the only IM sport in which you get to hit somebody,” said senior Eli Asch, describing the lure of IM football.

“I think it really kind of gets everybody started off for the new year,” said IM Committee Chairman Claudia Yeung, a senior.

IM football, the biggest IM sport of the year, started its season last weekend. The sport has become a way to reunite old sections or for first-year sections to get to know each other.
“It’s a good bonding experience for a lot of first-years,” said Asch.

With professional football growing in popularity, IM football capitalizes on a budding itch to at least try football. For some, it’s the perfect study break.

“It’s a good way for people to get out and blow off some steam. It gets you out of the library for a couple of hours on weekends,” said Asch.

This will be a special IM season for Asch, who will be a referee, serve on the IM committee and co-run a sports talk radio show with senior Brian Woods on KWCW at 9 a.m. every Wednesday. The show will devote five to 10 minutes to IM football coverage during every hour show. During the IM coverage, Asch and Woods will recap last week’s scores and preview any big games for the upcoming weekend.

Besides that, Asch will be updating an IM football Web site that can be reached through a link on the Whitman athletics Web site. Before the season began, Asch contacted the captain of each team, asking them a few questions about their team, and then used that to make predictions on the outcome of each division.

Asch denies any prognostic talent at the beginning of his article, but his picks are as follows: In D-I: Old E-section who won the D-2 championship in their sophomore year. In D-2: Bidnam’s World Tour Vol. 2, who as first-years went undefeated last season in D-2 until losing in the championship game. This year they are back with sophomore Andrew Spittle at quarterback whose Samson-like golden locks promise to offset his twig-like figure. Finally, in the Women’s Division, Asch picked the Hungry Hungry Hippos, the runners-up last year to What B?

However, with a new year comes new rules. First of all, the length of the flags has been standardized so that every set is 10 inches long rather than extending to the player’s fingertips. In addition, each team has to have a representative that is willing to referee some games.

Two things that the refs will be looking for this year especially are tackling and pass interference.

“I want people to enjoy the competition but not go overboard,” said Yeung, who is in her second year as IM committee co-chair.

This year Yeung’s co-chair is senior Luke Marshall. Together, they were responsible for scheduling, organizing committee meetings and letting captains know about any changes.
During this last week’s action, Asch’s three picks had mixed success. The Hungry Hungry Hippos won both their games, and Bidnam’s World Tour Vol. 2 won all three games in which they played, while Old-E section lost to the TKE team.

‘Balls of Fury’

A parody of the 1973 Bruce Lee film “Enter the Dragon” with ping-pong instead of martial arts, “Balls of Fury” reveals the “dangerous” side of this seemingly harmless and slightly trivial game.

Randy Daytona is a 12 year-old ping-pong prodigy. His father bet on his victory at the 1988 Olympics with Feng (Christopher Walken), ping-pong enthusiasts and notorious criminal. When Randy’s match ends in a humiliating loss, his father is then murdered by Feng. Nineteen years off the circuit, Randy (Dan Fogler) is contacted by FBI Agent Ernie Rodriquez (George Lopez) to aid in a mission to capture Feng. Feng is hosting an invitation-only ping-pong tournament of the best players in the world, and the FBI believes something fishy is up. Randy is asked to infiltrate the event by being invited.

After such a long time without competing, Randy is a little rusty. He begins lessons with Master Wong (James Hong), a blind ping-pong expert. The Master also began Feng’s training before Feng crossed over to the “dark side.” With the help of Wong’s gorgeous and strong-willed niece Maggie (Maggie Q), Dayton beats the infamous player “Dragon” in the world of underground ping-pong and is invited to Fang’s showdown. In his competition, the matches are played “instant death” literally.

Now, you’re probably thinking, “You actually paid money to see ‘Balls of Fury?!’” Don’t get me wrong, it was bad. Apparently appealing to their demographic, there is a ton of blind-guy-running-into-things, crotch-punching and fart jokes, three of the lowest forms of humor.

Of course, there is the classic stupid comedy plot: boy meets girl, girl is hot, boy is not, boy proves his worth and girl is smitten. However, this brings with it what might be the greatest movie quote of all time: “I’m trying to sacrifice my life for our love, stop being such a dick!”
On that note, some of the jokes were genuinely funny. The fact that there are professional ping-pong competitors involved makes the ridiculous premise inherently amusing. The opening scene at the Olympics is great. At this point in his life, Randy is a superstar, complete with screaming and fainting fangirls, but the commentators are what make the scene. So authoritative, so cocky, so deadpan, commentators are always funny.

Fogler was well suited for the role and did about as much with it as he could. I wasn’t overwhelmed with his timing or the many looks of agony when he is sucker-punched in the, well, balls. But he was kind of cute and definitely endearing. Here’s hoping Fogler’s next screen endeavor won’t get labeled “pretty much the worst movie ever,” because I think he’s got potential.

Walken plays an outrageous character, he too is cocky and deadpan while slowing killing off the world’s greatest ping-pong players.

“Balls of Fury” is like “The Karate Kid” meets “Talladega Nights.” It takes itself very seriously, for comedic effect in this case, which is probably the funniest aspect of the movie. It falls flat on many occasions but redeems itself with outlandish characters and quotable quotes. Rent it.

Safety pins: Making the best of Whitman campus security

“I think the biggest lesson learned from that whole situation at Virginia Tech is don’t wait. Once you have an incident, start notifying the community,” said Delaware State University spokesman Carlos Holmes on Friday, Sept. 21.

That day, two students were shot and wounded at Delaware State. University President Allen Sessoms said that the school had applied lessons from the Virginia Tech tragedy that helped quicken communication during Friday’s violent episode.

Colleges across the country, including Whitman, have reexamined their approaches to security, communication and counseling services following the tragic events in Blacksburg, Va. last April.

LOOKING BACK

The Virginia Tech shootings occurred on Apr. 16, 2007 when senior student Seung-Hui Cho killed 32 people with a pair of handguns before committing suicide. It was the worst school shooting in United States history.

The event spawned grief and a nationwide outpouring of support. At Whitman, students held a well attended vigil on the Cordiner lawn where members of the college and Walla Walla communities shared their thoughts. Students also sent Virginia Tech a banner covered in messages of sympathy and support.

The tragedy generated fears of a copycat killer, leading Whitman to set up a day of extra security. “There was initially uncertainty as to whether this was an isolated incident or orchestrated,” Director of Security Terry Thompson said. Security had an extra person on duty for the Friday following the Virginia Tech shootings.

That night, a freestyle battle was held on the tennis courts. Security staff shut down the event, citing alcohol violations, which angered some students. Senior Avi Conant, who helped organize the battle, regretted its untimely end but did not see a direct connection to the extra security. “In some sense, heightened security may have given them a pretext, but it might have happened anyway,” he said. “It was primarily a lack of communication.”

The Whitman counseling office also increased its availability in the aftermath of the shootings, but did not receive much student response. “There were a couple of people, but there was more concern from staff and faculty,” said Richard Jacks, director of the counseling center.

GOING FORWARD

Virginia Tech began a new school year on Aug. 20 under intense media scrutiny.

The campus recently completed an internal review spearheaded by President Charles W. Steger, which concluded that Virginia Tech will need to “improve its monitoring of troubled students, enhance campus-wide communications and better secure campus buildings.”

To do so, officials at the school have recommended increasing counseling for mentally ill students, creating Internet message boards to alert students of emergencies and installing more surveillance cameras and door locks, according to the New York Times. Some of these changes have already taken place.

In the wake of Virginia Tech, many colleges have formed committees to evaluate their individual response plans. “I think just like post-9/11, there’s a post-April 16 mentality,” said Gerald Massengill, who led a panel at Delaware State University, where the quick response to Friday’s shootings is being touted as an indication of that panel’s success.

In response to the Virginia Tech tragedy, Whitman initiated a task force to examine the readiness of the college to respond to similar situations.

The group began meeting this summer and will meet next week to discuss a preliminary draft of its emergency management preparedness assessment. “One of our key themes is prevention,” said Peter Harvey, Whitman treasurer and head of the task force. “Whitman does a fairly good job.”

Criticisms of Virginia Tech’s communication methods—the school waited nearly two hours before e-mailing students about the initial shootings—have led many colleges to explore technologies that would more quickly alert students of any threats.

Whitman, said Thompson and Harvey, is considering many options for campus-wide communication: mass e-mails, cell phones, VoIP and even sirens. Officials are also discussing whether to require electronic card readers on all buildings. “It’s hard, because it’s also a culture issue,” said Harvey, noting how such restriction might impact Whitman’s open environment.

Like officials at Virginia Tech, Harvey believes that a campus-wide lockdown would not be feasible.
Richard Jacks said the counseling center continues to try to improve its services. “If anything, [the Virginia Tech tragedy] made us more sensitized to making sure people don’t fall through the cracks.”

He noted, however, that this is much more unlikely on the Whitman campus than at a larger university. “This place is so incestuous…everyone knows everyone’s business, and sometimes the faculty functions almost like a mother,” Jacks said, citing instances where worried faculty members have gone to students’ homes and encouraged them to receive counseling.

Harvey plans to hold a forum at which students can give their input and suggestions, hopefully in October.

CONNECTING THE DOTS

A Virginia government report that came out on Aug. 30 was critical of Virginia Tech’s infrastructure.
“No one knew all the information and no one connected the dots,” said the report, highlighting a lack of communication that may have played a part in the events at Virginia Tech. Many individual concerns about Seung-Hui Cho were not shared between branches of the university and there was confusion over confidentiality laws.

Whitman is one of many schools working to increase communication between departments and between the college and the wider community.

Even prior to the incident at Virginia Tech, Whitman officials were meeting once a week to discuss students in need within clearly defined limits of confidentiality.

“It provides a safety net and dispels rumors,” said Thompson. At the meetings are representatives from security, counseling, Residence Life, professors and others who are in contact with students on a day-to-day basis. If there is widespread concern over a student, officials will then work to get that student help.

Harvey said Whitman’s safety director is also working with officials from the other two colleges in Walla Walla “to develop a consistent expectation of the police department,” since unlike Virginia Tech, Whitman does not have its own police force.

Thompson is himself a former sergeant with the Walla Walla Police and talks with them frequently about plans and strategies.

“The issues [of Virginia Tech] are still in our minds and thoughts,” said Dean of Students Chuck Cleveland. “The chances are small, but it could happen.”

‘Good Luck Chuck’

I am going to start this review with a piece of dialogue.

“If I could order you at McDonald’s I would order a McBeautiful titties with tits on the side.” This piece of cinematic gem-dom was uttered by the ‘misogynist Jewish best-friend’ character. He was full of ‘em. You probably laughed at that line, which is OK. That means you would probably also laugh when he fantasized about taking a bong hit off of a hot woman’s farts. I laughed in that way where I looked over at my best friend and asked her what we were doing there. I did that three times during this movie.

That being said, I liked “Good Luck Chuck.” The premise of the story is this: Charles (Dane Cook) is a good-looking dentist with the misfortune of having been hexed by a spurned 7 Minutes in Heaven partner in fifth grade. She cursed him into forever being a good luck charm to his future girlfriends. Every woman that he slept with was destined to break up with him and find her true love in the next guy she met. Right as he is beginning to see this pattern, as is every woman in the city of movie-ville, he meets Cam (Jessica Alba), and falls for her. She takes care of the penguins in the aquatic center. I would fall for her too. She even wears penguin underwear.

Their relationship is off to a rocky start because Cam knows that Chuck has been ‘good-luck-charming’ everyone he meets, and she doubts his sincerity. But she’s awkward and runs into things in a desperate attempt by the movie makers to make it realistic that anyone could actually date someone that hot. I found her adorable, personally. I thought Alba was funny and beautiful and handled her lines, which are always bad in movies like this, very well.Charlie discovers that he really loves Cam, and this time he wants to be ‘the next guy’ for her. He doubts the curse’s reality until he tests it by having sex with the fattest, ugliest, acne-ridden-est woman he can find. Yes, even she finds love thereafter. Now Charlie knows that he is naught but a charm, and he spends the rest of “Chuck” trying to keep Cam around before she repeats the cycle.

Alba and Cook make a cute couple, and their kisses are good. So the romance between them is cute, and their comedic chemistry is great. Dane Cook manages not to slip into being a comedian (physical comedy, ridiculous faces) until very late in the movie, which I appreciate because his stand-up sucks at liking women. His character is likeable and generally sincere. As he is bedding his fat secretary, she tells him he can think about “someone more beautiful” while they’re doing it. He cups her face in his hands and tells her he will imagine “only her.” I don’t really see new movies that often, so I don’t actually know if that was sincere or not. I laughed. But I think it was supposed to prove that he’s a nice guy just doing the women of the world a service, at the expense of his own happiness. And sperm.

Now let’s get back to the best friend. He refers to semen as “baby gravy.” He masturbates to the mammograms of the patients at his plastic surgery clinic. He hits old ladies with frisbees. It’s sort of a strange situation when a famous comedian needs a sidekick for comedic relief, but I guess there’s always gotta be someone in the movie to say when things are gay or when Chuck is acting like a fag. I didn’t know people actually said fag anymore. I also didn’t know people still thought that was funny. My bad.

My discomfort with the word fag sums up a lot of what I felt about “Good Luck Chuck.” I enjoyed watching it, except that every once in awhile something would happen that would remind me of what I hate about mainstream movies. But that’s to be expected, considering the fact that I was watching a mainstream movie. My personal boundary line was only crossed once beside the fag incident. I might be giving something away here, but…it was when Dane Cook went down on a penguin. If you don’t have the stomach for that, “Good Luck Chuck” is not the movie for you.

‘Shoot ‘Em Up’

To say that a film starts off with a bang is usually a figure of speech. Writer and director Michael Davis, however, wastes no time tiptoeing around this issue in his film “Shoot ‘Em Up.” It begins with about 20 bangs, actually, or possibly 30 or 40; it’s hard to keep track after a while. I suppose it is just the way of the action movie. I hesitate, though, to describe “Shoot ‘Em Up” in such a way, if only because the genre immediately brings to mind movies that star Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker. Yet Davis’ film could hardly be described by any other word, as it consists mostly of Clive Owen racing around the city and, well, shooting people. Not a film for the faint of heart.

Owen plays a brooding, carrot-munching loner who self-identifies as “Smith” and happens to have a bit of trouble minding his own business. One evening, a very pregnant woman rushes past him, followed by a group of men who clearly intend to kill her. Out of human decency, or perhaps just pure curiosity, Smith follows the merry troupe into a warehouse and delivers the woman’s baby while dexterously taking down the bad guys one by one. The woman, however, is killed in the fray, and Smith finds himself stuck with a baby and a pack of armed men who are now, incidentally, chasing after him.

Not knowing why this baby was a marked man from birth, but knowing at least that newborn children need to be fed, Smith enlists help the only way he knows how: from a lactating prostitute at a venue he used to frequent. Donna (Monica Belluccci) reluctantly joins Smith in his quest to discover exactly who is after this baby and for what reason. As the pair searches for clues, they find that their charge was not the only baby wanted by these men; two others have already been found and killed along with their mothers. Smith and Donna must continually fight off the hordes of killers (who somehow always find them) while they race to uncover the mystery of the ill-fated baby farm.

There must be something alluring to Clive Owen about films in which the main character must save a child from an unwarranted death, as the plot of this film so closely aligns itself with that of another film Owen recently starred in: “Children of Men.” Alfonso Cuaron’s futuristic tale of a man who must protect the only pregnant woman on Earth is a far superior film conceptually than “Shoot ‘Em Up,” but it is difficult not to draw the parallel between them. Perhaps the juxtaposition of a rugged individual and a little baby is too intriguing an image to pass up; it certainly does make for some interesting viewing.

Owen has practically perfected the quiet, smoldering character that he frequently plays, which makes this film far more appealing than it would have been had he been showy and brash. He can often say more with a look than many actors can say with a monologue, which makes him fascinating to watch. Plus, if you ever wondered how one might use a carrot as a lethal weapon, Owen will show you how this can be accomplished. Paul Giamatti, too, does an excellent job as the leader of the “bad guys.” He has been choosing a number of villainous roles lately, which suit him surprisingly well when you think of his breakout role in “Sideways.” Here, he is smart and understated but also ruthless in his game of cat and mouse with Smith.

Davis’ script occasionally leaves something to be desired, sweeping explanations of certain plot points under the rug, though he does manage to avoid action movie clichés for the most part. With a strong cast and original story line, “Shoot ‘Em Up” succeeds in its goal: to entertain and nothing more.

‘Hillarycare 2.0’ takes moral responsibility for uninsured

In Feb. 2007 at a press conference held with the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), an influential businessman spoke about a need to “guarantee the uninsured access to good health coverage.” His name is Lee Scott, and he is the CEO of Wal-Mart. With conservative execs like Scott on board, universal health care is becoming what it should have been all along: a reality. Here’s a look at Hillary Clinton’s American Health Choices Plan, unveiled this week.

Clinton’s proposed plan mandates that every person has health insurance (quite unenforceable, perhaps, but it sets a standard lacking in American health coverage today). In order to make this possible for America’s 47 million uninsured citizens, tax credits are offered for working families so that they never pay more than a set percentage of their income. Insurance companies are prohibited from denying coverage based on pre-existing conditions and cannot drop purchasers so long as premiums are being paid.

Gone are several limits that made the Clinton health care plan a disaster in the early ‘90s. “Hillarycare 2.0” does not require all businesses to provide coverage. Big businesses are required to help pay for coverage, but small businesses are not, though tax credits will be given to those that do. Whereas the first plan required all Americans to give up their current coverage, the Health Choices Plan allows those who are satisfied with their current coverage to keep it.

I’m personally really glad she’s addressing the millions of us who are wholly and completely happy with our insurers. Those who are unsatisfied have the choice of private plans like those available to members of Congress, or public plans similar to Medicare. The estimated $110 billion that Clinton’s plan costs would be derived from repealing tax cuts to those earning salaries over $250,000 and by decreasing costs of care. Visit hillaryclinton.com/feature/healthcareplan for more.

The rising costs of premiums today are matched with decreasing coverage. Additionally, allowing the market to determine costs of health care places the burden increasingly on the sickest, who face a bottomless pit of debt and ruin should they choose to care for their own health. Universal health care is ultimately a question of moral responsibility. Do we want to continue to make a person’s health an issue of financing?

The February press conference stressed that universal health coverage can be achieved by “having businesses, government and individuals all contribute,” and this is what the Health Choices Plan does. Individuals are responsible for their own care, businesses are required to do what they can financially and the government provides a net that makes the costs of health care affordable.

There should be a standard of health in America, and the means required to make this happen are not as crazy, nor as liberal, as it might seem. Conservatives, if Lee Scott can be the new face behind universal health coverage, so can you.

Is your computer at risk at Whitman?

Every year, Whitman hires a security audit firm to try to break into its computer network.

Aside from trying to hack in, the company also tries to gain confidential information from individuals. Company workers will do this in a variety of ways, including pretending to be Whitman College Technology Services (WCTS) staff, bargaining for passwords and looking to see if passwords are written on sticky notes in various offices. After conducting a comprehensive investigation, they then deliver Whitman a report as to how secure their network is.
“The quote that we got from the security people last time is that we’re better than most banks and hospitals,” said Director of Network Technology Kevin Kelly. “While all that’s good, we still don’t want to let down our guard.”

The security audit firm is just one of the ways that WCTS works to keep Whitman’s network secured.

“Security is a never-ending process … it’s a loop where you constantly reevaluate and reapply,” Kelly said.

WCTS protects network-connected computers by using five or six firewalls, Kelly said.

Kelly also said that Whitman uses three kinds of virus scanning: local virus scanning, virus software provided for every college-owned computer and student-owned computer on campus and POSTINI, a program that checks all e-mail into campus from outside sources. POSTINI also checks incoming e-mail for spam, and students can choose to activate or deactivate the spam filtering and to adjust its level of aggressiveness.

“You don’t want to have just one single thing that’s supposed to stop a particular attack,” said IT Services Consultant Matt Pearson. “You want to have multiple things, so if one barrier breaks, hopefully the next barriers will stop it.”

Another barrier that Whitman uses to protect its security is by separating the network into about 40 different sections. Only certain administrative computers have access to certain sections, which may include confidential information such as financial and medical records. Because these parts of the network are separate, they can be given a higher level of protection and monitored more closely, said Middleware Analyst Mike Osterman.

Students using Whitman’s wireless network have safeguards set up for them, too, said Kelly.

A wireless network uses a radio transmitter, enabling other people to potentially capture the “conversation” between a computer and a network. But all Whitman Web pages containing sensitive information—passwords, grades, medical records, etc.—are encrypted. This means any outside source viewing these conversations will essentially see only gibberish. An encrypted Web page is indicated by “https://” in the address bar and a lock symbol on the bottom of the page.

“We’ve been working to get to get all that information encrypted for five or six years now. It’s actually quite a long process,” Kelly said.

The WCTS staff is less concerned about computers being broken into or contracting viruses than about people falling for scams or “phishes.”

Phishing involves aggressors contacting would-be victims with fraudulent situations, requesting money or personal information. A common phish involves an e-mail pretending to be from a bank, requesting that the recipient follow a link and supply their bank account and pin number.

“We’ve had one staff member that we know of who has had their bank account emptied here, about a year ago,” Kelly said, describing the chilling consequences of phish scams.

Shannon Callister, Director of IT Support Services, said that just last week she received an e-mail claiming to be from the Whitman support team, asking for her log-on password.

“Be highly skeptical of everything you get in an e-mail,” Kelly said. “There is absolutely no reason to give personal log-in information to anybody, any more than there would be a reason to give people a copy of your home key.”

There are so many different ways people ought to stay safe on the Internet, said Kelly, that “you can write a book or have a year-long class on how to do all this.”

Darfur: no more empty promises

Since early 2003, the Arab government of Sudan has persecuted, raped, murdered and forced the removal of non-Arab, Muslim ethnic groups such as the Fur, Zaghawa and Masaalit in the northwestern region of Sudan known as Darfur.

Around 200,000 people have died from violence, disease and starvation. More than two million more have been forced from their homes, their villages burned, and all their worldly possessions stolen. The government-sponsored Janjaweed militia responsible for these attacks has been systematically targeting villages throughout the Darfur region. Thousands of villages have been targeted and destroyed in this way.

Darfur is the home of 30 ethnic groups, all of which are native African ethnicity and all are Muslims. The Janjaweed are recruited, armed, trained and supported by the government of Sudan and come from a few nomadic groups who claim Arab backgrounds.

The United States Department of State, the United Nations and several non-profit human rights organizations have reported firsthand that the violence is done on a perceived racial basis. They have also confirmed, according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum genocide watch, that the Sudanese government is responsible for inflaming ethnic conflict, impeding international humanitarian access, resulting in deadly conditions of life for displaced civilians, bombing civilian targets with aircraft and murdering and raping civilians.

All of these offenses listed above are cause for the declaration of “genocide” in Darfur, a distinction the international community has been reluctant to place on the crisis.
Their reluctance stems from the Holocaust.

After that horrible tragedy, the international community said “never again.” To insure that it never happens again, the United Nations, as well as other national governments, put into place protocols to be enacted in the case that genocide is declared to be occurring. For this reason, the international community must respond to the crisis if it is declared genocide but are not obligated to respond if it is just killing.

It is ironic that one terrible event can cause the international community to strive to prevent further genocide in the world, and yet at the same time prevent the international community from recognizing other acts of genocide.

During this past week, international aid organizations including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Save Darfur Coalition finally decided this has gone on to long. Rallies were held this last week in 30 major cities around the world including London, Paris, San Francisco and New York.

Each city had different memorial events taking place through the course of the day to bring attention to the crisis. Among the notable activities was people who wore blindfolds under the message “don’t look away.”

Demonstrators in Rome wore t-shirts with a blood stained hand on it. There was also a peace torch passed around which they said was lit in Chad, the home of thousands of Darfur refugees.

In London, demonstrators carried around signs saying, “Rape, torture, murder. How much longer for Darfur?”

Actor Matt Damon and supermodel Elle Macpherson, among others, were featured in a video made just for this event. The video was made to show the horror of the events taking place in Darfur.

These rallies were held because of an important meeting of UN officials scheduled to meet next week about the issue of Darfur. The point was to show that the world supports action against the Janjaweed.

Many people believe the UN will adopt a policy to support the affected people of Darfur. However, the Sudanese government is unwilling to allow any foreign aid organizations into their country. The government has allowed limited number of African Union peacekeepers in but no non-Africans.

The message of these rallies is clear, though. It is time for the world to respond to these problems, despite the Sudanese government. The UN’s verdict is expected late next week.
The world once said never again; it is time for them to follow through on that promise.

Saving face on personal level doesn’t solve Iraq problems

As the war in Iraq trudges forward, many early supporters of the endeavor have begun to jump ship. First there was Francis Fukuyama, the neo-liberal poster boy who once declared that the fall of the Berlin Wall signaled the “end of history,” meaning that we had arrived at the end of human political evolution. More recently, Canadian politician and former Harvard professor Michael Ignatieff renounced his initial support for the war in a New York Times Magazine article.
Ignatieff was an early supporter of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, having seen firsthand the terror of the Hussein regime in 1992 on a tour of the northern regions of the country, especially Kurdistan. His Iraqi-exile colleagues further convinced him that only the removal of Hussein could bring justice to this troubled region, and with this in mind, he threw his full support behind President Bush and the pending war.
This spring, the war will reach its fifth anniversary; America wasn’t even in WWII that long. With each year, it has become increasingly apparent that the administration did not have a viable plan for how to manage the country. As Ignatieff himself notes, the answer to the question “Can Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites hold together in peace what Saddam Hussein held together by terror?” quickly resolved itself into a resounding “No.” He admits that he was personally blinded by the words of his exile friends, not realizing the degree to which their emotions were regulating their words and actions.
He goes on to detail further reasons for his support of the war, as well as some vague musings about the hardship of being in public office at such a time. However, he fails to make any sort of structural conclusions about the war and why it happened. From reading the article, you get the sense that our current situation is nothing more than a “whoopsie,” a well-intentioned mistake on the part of a president who, nonetheless, had the courage to see beyond his critics and pursue what he felt to be the righteous path. He admits to a mistake but then proceeds to qualify his way out of any responsibility.

As such, this is sort of a non-admission. Ignatieff admits that he was mistaken, but he piles the excuses on so high that it no longer really matters. He shies away from any real criticisms of the overall neo-liberal project that is at work here attempting to forge a new American Empire overseas. His analysis does not move beyond the surface level and, as such, is rather worthless. All he has done is acknowledge that things have gone badly (which, to be fair, is better than many war supporters who still maintain that we are “making progress on the ground”) and that our idealism with regards to our “liberating mission” was deeply flawed and misplaced.

What lies at the heart of it all is Ignatieff’s respect for a leader who is unswerving in his convictions regardless of public criticism. Clearly, the ability to stand up for one’s principles is an important leadership quality. However, the Iraq War is not a case in this. It is more arrogance than strength of character. President Bush and fellow hawks correctly realized that they could sneak their colonial project by the public as long as it was couched in the correct terms. Ignatieff and other conservative intellectuals played right into this, supporting the war with the usual rhetoric of liberating an oppressed people and delivering them to freedom. Remember, the operational name of the 2003 invasion was “Iraqi Freedom.” Not exactly subtle.

This article reveals Ignatieff for what he really is; a neo-liberal intellectual blinded by his so-called “realism.” His withdrawal of support for the war is purely tactical; the war is not going well, the occupation was badly planned, etc. He has nothing to say about why we entered Iraq in the first place, or what it is about the current administration’s mindset that led us into the untenable situation we are now faced with. Indeed, by renouncing his support now, he is seeking to wash his hands of the whole affair, and we, the public, are left to wonder just what exactly it is that should be done about this mess that we have created.

2007 farm bill: changing the system

If senators want to prove their ability to cross the partisan divide, they’ll make real changes to the draft of the farm bill that the House passed to them. If they want to use their constituents’ taxes wisely, they’ll change that bill. But they have to be willing to make real change for the better in America and the world.

I, for one, can state categorically that I do not want ANY of my tax dollars going to subsidies for millionaires. And yes, I am one of those accursed “tax and spend liberals,” but believe me, my heart’s not bleeding for everybody. One of the changes that the Senate needs to make to the farm bill is to lower the eligibility for subsidies further than the House did.

The House lowered it from $2.5 million yearly sales to $1 million. The Senate needs to actually accept the Administration’s proposal of $200,000, because at that income level farming is still difficult. Small farmers with sales of under $100,000 a year often end up in the red. These are the people who need subsidies, not big agribusiness. The House barely came in under the spending cap for this bill; they could help themselves out by cutting more subsidies.

The Walla Walla area is a case study in conflicting interests when it comes to the farm bill. Wheat is one of the commodities that may lose subsidies if the Senate tightens up the bill, and even though wheat prices are up, farmers still want money available for when those prices drop again. Wheat is a powerful lobby, but outside of our familiar wheat fields, Washington actually produces more currently non-subsidized crops like vegetables and fruit.

Joel Huesby of the organic Thundering Hooves Pastured Meats in Walla Walla wrote to the Union-Bulletin to support changes to the farm bill. He wants to see more money to help farmers switch to sustainable farming practices, pointing out in his letter, “These programs are not meant to create a new ‘culture of dependence,’ but to provide competitive, shot-in-the-arm incentives.”

Huesby was on Ankeny field during lunch last Friday, talking to supporters of Campus Climate Challenge about the upcoming farm bill and the challenges of local farming today. All his livestock is grass-fed, so he doesn’t have to worry about the rising cost of fertilizer for grains, which goes up as oil gets more expensive. He’s concerned, though, that it is getting harder and harder for new farmers to enter the market as more small farms are pushed out of business.

Small farms are crucial to local food networks, which, as Lisa Curtis pointed out in her article last week, may be the future of agriculture as oil prices rise and we become less able to bounce our food around the country as if it were an air hockey table. If we’re going to stop pretending that oil will last forever, we need to create the infrastructure now for the future.

The good news is, now is an opportune time to make real change in our farm system. The fiscally responsible and the environmentally responsible are lining up with the champions of small farms and rural America to support the same changes I’ve outlined here. Commodity prices are up, partially because of corn-based ethanol (not necessarily a good thing), which makes it easier for Congress to cut subsidies. Pressure is high and visible from groups like Oxfam America to cut subsidies that harm farmers in the rest of the world. Political columnists from Kansas to New York City are calling for change. The Senate should respond.

We can respond by e-mailing and calling our senators, urging them to support sustainable farming and cut subsidies for commodities. We can respond by supporting Bon Appetit in buying local and by heading to the farmers’ market on the weekends to buy direct. Come on, Whitman. Make it happen.

Daily Market Cooperative seeks to raise $150,000 for full-time store

The Daily Market Cooperative is attempting to become a full-time operating store. Formally known as the Sweet Onion Co-Op, the Daily Market will offer a wide range of local, organic and fair trade fruits and vegetables from over 50 local vendors as well as locally produced honey, applesauce and air freshener. There will also be meat, dairy, eggs and wine for sale.

To open as a full-time grocery store, they need to raise $150,000 in base capital for a down payment. This money will come in the form or member shares. The membership kick-off event was held at Verve Coffee & Art House on Sept. 20. It was the first time people could become members-owners of the Daily Market. Shares cost $140 plus a $10 yearly member equity. In effect, owning a share is like owning a piece of the co-op itself. Member-owners will have a say in what is stocked in the store.

Community member Christy Clark feels a co-op in Walla Walla has “been a long-time coming.” Clark grew up in the valley before changing locations for several years. When she returned, the changes to the town were incredible. Now there is local and organic food available in several locations; however, “It still feels like it’s missing something. I think the co-op is just what we need,” Clark said.

“With all the tourism coming through, the co-op would be a great way for people to see what we’ve produced locally and it’s not just wine,” said new Daily Market member Brenda Criss. “Sometimes I want something like fresh basil and it wouldn’t be available. With the co-op, that will change.”

Walla Walla citizens like Criss and Clark feel the Daily Market becoming a full-fledged store will encourage community members to join. The Sweet Onion Co-Op had close ties to Whitman as it started as a student-run business project and was founded with a grant from the Associated Students of Whitman College (ASWC). The name was changed to “Daily Market Cooperative” to appeal to a wider clientele.

“I’m so impressed with how many people were at the Verve from the very beginning,” said senior Kari Martin. “There were so many people from the community too, not just Whitman students.”

Martin and her household have a membership. Having a household own a share is a practical way for money-strapped students to get involved in the co-op by splitting the cost.

The Daily Market will have one public event every mouth to reach out to the community and gain member-owners. The goal is to have one thousand member-owners by the end of the year. The next event is a Harvest Party and Hoedown on Oct. 13 at the Welcome Table Farm.

To become a member-owner one may sign up online at dailymarket.coop using a credit card, apply and pay on location at 508 East Main Street or download an application off the Web site and mail it with a check.

Power companies propose low emissions energy plant for WW area

Home to 15 million year old basalt flows, southeastern Washington’s Wallula Gap has interested a conglomerate of power companies now proposing the site for a $2.2 billion low emissions coal energy plant. Proponents are enthusiastic about the application of a new method of basaltic carbon dioxide capture, a technology projected to cut typical coal plant emissions by nearly two-thirds. Successful implementation of the project could redefine the future of coal energy by limiting the source’s now significant contribution to climate change.
The basaltic method is the first of sequestration technologies to do more than merely store the greenhouse gas underground. Studies have shown that liquidized CO2 injected into basalt will permanently mineralize into harmless calcium carbonate inside the porous volcanic rock.

If on-site testing goes well, the power plant, hopeful to be operational by 2013, will generate baseload power of 600 megawatts, enough to satisfy one-third of Seattle’s electricity needs.
The plant’s generation methods will also help to reduce the CO2 of combustion by converting the coal to synthetic gas. The technology called IGCC, Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle, harnesses more energy by optimizing the combined energy cycle with the gasification of coal energy into a cleaner burning, more thermally efficient syngas. Since carbon is easily removed during gasification, IGCC is ideal for carbon capture. Due to high costs and concerns over reliability, only two of these plants are operating in the United States today. Still, the Wallula proposal is one of several pending confirmation by 2012 and with improving technology energy experts project a greater influx over the next decade.

Leading the country in CO2 regulatory measures, Washington State recently introduced a ceiling on baseload emissions to 1,100 pounds of carbon dioxide per megawatt hour, an emission equal to that of modern natural gas plant. Therefore, without the success of the sequestration project, coal has no future in northwest power. Meeting these guidelines will require the Wallula Power Project to sequester 65 percent of regular coal combustion emissions.

Executive Director of the Port of Walla Walla Jim Kuntz is enthusiastic to work with the Wallula Resource Recovery LLC, telling Danielle Dixon of the Union-Bulletin that the project’s combination of cutting edge technologies holds “incredibly neat implications for environmental stewardship.” In an era of climate change and higher energy consumption, scientists in highly populated nations like coal rich India and China are watching for the outcome of Wallula Energy Resources’ feasibility pilot study beginning within just a few weeks.

The study will involve drilling a 4,000 foot well at the proposed site and injecting 3,000 to 4,000 tons of liquid carbon dioxide into selected basalt layers. Monitoring the chemical reactions and potential leaking will take a couple of years; in the meantime experts will consider cost effectiveness. Sequestration is an expensive method and before construction will be approved, project proponents will need to consider costs of the entire process: initial construction, rail shipment of Powder River Basin coal, conversion to synthetic natural gas, existing transmission capacity and the actual sequestration. Highly dependent upon power purchase agreements and federal subsidies, funding will also take time.

While some community members fear increased industrialization of the area and the altered landscape of a unique geological formation, the project is predicted to provide 800 jobs during peak construction and at least 100 jobs paying upwards of $50 an hour during operation.
Skeptics, like those at Earth Justice and the National Resource Defense Commission, point to the remaining emissions (still equal to natural gas burning), an unknown CO2 capacity of the basalt plateau, the continued reliance on non-renewable resources and the environmental damage of the coal mining itself. For many, this proposal is not a solution, only a temporary mainstay against the inevitability of pollution and depletion. While applauding the focus of CO2 capture, Professor Bob Carson said, “Our focus still needs to shift from the construction of new plants and increased generation. The solution lies more in finding ways to curb consumption.”

Indeed, facing challenges of increased power demands, generation costs and emission regulations, power companies have taken to promoting and actually subsidizing conservation. A willingness to invest in conservation parallels the fast increasing environmental necessity and economic viability of newer technologies like this one of CO2 siphoning and sequestration.

Walla Walla police crack down on wheat fields shenanigans

Walla Walla police officers are cracking down on students hanging out in private wheat fields.

On Saturday evening, Sept. 15, police confronted two different groups of first-year students in separate incidents.

The first group of seven Whitman students had ridden their bikes out to wheat fields north of town

“Well, a bunch of us went biking out to the wheat fields…. Originally we went for the sunset but we were way too late. We didn’t know that [walking through the fields] was illegal,” said first-year Paige Devlin, who was one of the seven students present.

The students were sitting and standing along the edge of the road with their bicycles near a large pile of hay bales, waiting for a friend to pick up an ill member of the group when the police arrived.

According to Taylor Overturf who was also present for the encounter with the police by the time the police showed up it was “basically dark.”

“The first [officer] had his lights flashing” when he showed up and a second officer showed up “shortly after that,” said Devlin.

“I was wondering why there were two police cars instead of just one,” said fellow biker, first-year Gabby Brandt. “We weren’t causing any trouble.”

Despite the seemingly unnecessary extra cop car the interaction between the students and the officers was largely non-confrontational.

“I mean, [the cops] had a good reason [for confronting us], because if people leave trash it could ruin the tractors, and if people are smoking near the hay bales it could start a fire, said Overturf.

“And it was private property,” added Devlin, although all the students present agreed that there was no ‘private property’ or ‘no trespassing’ sign anywhere to be found.

“[The officers] said there had been incidents on the other side of town involving Whitman students and hay bales—whatever that means,” said Brandt.

Just the same, the interaction left several students disillusioned.

“I thought that every Whitman student [went to see the sunset in the wheat fields] when they got here,” said Overturf. “It’s sad that good, old-fashioned fun has disappeared in place of getting sued.”

“I kind of think [the police] just don’t like us because we go to Whitman,” said Brandt.

“I feel like they were really trying to make it into a learning experience,” said Devlin.

“They didn’t ask for our names or anything. I didn’t feel like we were being interrogated or
anything. They were nice,” said Overturf.

Taco Truckin’: A guide to the great taco trucks of Walla Walla

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Walla Walla County was 16.9 percent Hispanic in 2006. Due to farming interests in the surrounding area that population continues to grow.
Walla Walla’s community provides a unique and changing dynamic to Whitman students, and the city’s taco trucks are tasty representations of that. As the appeal of dining hall food wanes, let this be a guide to Walla Walla’s comida culture.

La Monarca

Recommended: Everything

In front of John’s Wheatland Bakery

This truck, located in front of John’s Wheatland Bakery, provides a wide array of fresh ingredients and a clean atmosphere. A colorful mural covers the front of the truck.
I wait in line as several men order their food in lightning speed Spanish. I listen, hoping to catch a hint about what to order. The burrito asada consists of fresh tomatoes, onions, guacamole, and a sharp bite of cilantro. The asada has a stroganoff texture, but retains the chewy tanginess of your typical fajita. The lettuce—crunchy, but nonetheless tasteless iceberg—was the only disappointment. The best taco truck salsa in town, the green salsa, offers a lemony zest to those unable to handle the red, spicy salsa. Despite the excellence of my burrito, I start to eye the sweet onion taco of the man next to me.

“I never tried the taco wagon, but I’ve eaten here every day for the last week.” said Alan Jones, a Walla Walla native. “I think there’s a connotation Anglos have about this food, but this is a high quality clean operation, and the food is fantastic.”

Tacos Zapatan

On the corner of Rose and 10th .

Recommended: Tortillas and Asada Note: Authentic, so be ready to speak Spanish if you have a special request.

A little off the main road, this rather plain white truck is worth the trip. The tortillas, still warm from the hand press in the truck, were worth their weight in gold, and considering the lard, that’s a fair amount. The taco asada had a strong salty flavor that left a delightful, tingly aftertaste throughout the sinus system. The exceptionally fresh onions and cilantro further complemented the flavor.

This truck wasn’t the social establishment that some of the others were. A red sports car pulled away as I got there, but other than that I was the only customer, However, a few tables and some folding chairs make staying and enjoying the food—and the big smile of the Hispanic woman who runs it—worthwhile.

Los Taquitos

Across from the Courthouse.

Recommended: Anything asada

Note: Watch out for thorns in the parking lot.

This truck provides a festive atmosphere similar to that of La Monarca as a constant stream of families, couples and trucks full of men came and went. The Asada taco was a highlight, though the chicken lacked intensity and the avogada, a beef with red sauce, was nothing special. Also, the horrchatas were watered down versions of a higher standard. Still, this seems to be a local favorite and has a convenient location for Whitman students.

El Taco Loco

Recommended: The pollo taco

Location: In the parking lot of Melody Muffler, on the corner of Chestnut and 9th.

For heavy eaters, or anyone looking to supply themselves with dinners for the next week, El Taco Loco provides huge burritos and generously sized tacos. The burritos are loaded down with nonessentials, such as sour cream and lots of iceberg lettuce, but the chicken, in anything, is excellent. As for the asada, it doesn’t have the punch of the other trucks.

Curbside recycling contest Walla Walla Community going green

As of Sept. 17 a new kind of contest began in the city of Walla Walla: The Curbside Recycling contest. The rules of the contest are very straightforward and anyone can participate. You simply compile all of your recyclables in the green recycling bin provided by your City Council and place it on the curbside for pick-up each week. Following these simple instructions enables participants not only to win a $25 gift certificate to be spent at a local grocery store but also help this community and your environment. A new winner is chosen at the end of each week and is picked entirely at random. The contest continues until November 23rd.

The contest is designed to target all people, not just seasoned recyclers, and as such there are two numbers you can contact with recycling related issues: (509) 524-4474 or (509) 524-2626. The contest is organized by the City of Walla Walla Resource Conservation Committee, the City of Walla Walla, and Walla Walla County. It was made possible by the sponsorship of Albertson’s, Grocery Outlet, Walla Walla’s Harvest Foods, Safeway-Plaza, Safeway- Rose, and Super-1 Foods.

The overarching goal of this project is to “increase participation and awareness by residents of the importance of conserving resources,” said Sandra Cannon, chair of the Walla Walla Conservation Committee. The contest is part of a larger movement by the Walla Walla Waste Management Division to promote the green movement and environmental activism in the greater community. The committee, in collaboration with other local organizations such as the Conservation Committee, tackles a number of environmental issues each year. “The city recently initiated a green waste collection program utilizing special green containers and our automated side loading collection trucks. Green waste is diverted to the recently opened compost facility operated by the City at the Sudbury Road Landfill,” said Richard Dudgeon, the sanitation supervisor for the city of Walla Walla. More information regarding past and current green projects or for information on how you can get involved may be found at ww202.bmi.net/recyclngrev.htm.

According to Dudgeon, “So far, the reaction to the Curbside contest seems to be generally positive; our participation rates have climbed a small amount in the past few weeks and requests for recycling bins have increased.”

Community Center for Youth uses grant money to expand, leave Armory

The Community Center for Youth is moving this month from its original location in the Walla Walla Armory to Paine High School after receiving a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The CCY program has been housed in the Armory since it started in 1999, and is looking towards their new location at Paine as an opportunity to expand and shift its focus from a largely recreational-based program to “meet the needs and desires of students, parents and community members,” said CCY executive director Catherine Broyles.

The process was initiated several years ago, when a board member made contact with a representative of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. When Broyles starting working at CCY last November, her first task was to complete the grant. “What we are doing is moving to a place where we are asking, how many times a week are we seeing these kids? What kinds of activities are they engaging in? What’s happening with their school attendance, with their grades. What’s happening with their self-esteem?” said Broyles.

The grant money is enabling them to expand their hours, and in doing so, to provide skill-specific programming, like Excel to Excellence, a college readiness program that will enable CCY kids to work one-on-one with college students. “A lot of them don’t know a lot of people who have been through college so [this program makes it] much more accessible to them.” With the grant money they were also able to buy new vans, which will make possible college-centric field trips each month.

A video production class will be offered, which is going to teach the kids basic filming and editing techniques and culminate in a series of videos that are going to run on MTV and ESPN.
Art classes, a theatre program, soccer clinics, cooking classes: All of this will be possible at their new location, which offers smaller rooms that will serve to facilitate the development of skill-specific activities. “Here [at the Armory] we have a huge, huge gym, but what we don’t have are smaller rooms where we can do these small group activities,” said Broyles. “We’re going to have an actual computer lab, and green space. This is just so huge.”

Programming designed specifically for girls will also be offered in the new location. CCY has just added an all-girls soccer team, and is looking to have a lacrosse team next spring as well. “I am actively looking for a couple folks to come in and do that,” said Broyles. “Our girls tend to be a bit more mellow, they might not be the first to throw their hand in there…a lot of it means creating an emotional space for girls to really explore.”

One facet of program expansion is the “Youth of the Month” and “Youth of the Year” awards. Each month CCY volunteers, in conjunction with CCY programming coordinator Max Coleman, will be honoring one CCY kid as the “Youth of the Month” with a banquet. The Community Service House (The Co-Op) on campus has been working to raise money that will go toward a scholarship for higher education that will be given to one child at the end of the year as the “Youth of the Year” award. The Co-Op will be instrumental in the selection process, interviewing potential candidates and working with both Broyles and Coleman.

CCY is interested in heavily recruiting from Whitman for volunteer, hourly and work-study positions. “The volunteer spot works well for students because they can come in for only an hour a week and still have a really great experience and get to know a small group of kids,” said Broyles. All volunteers are required to participate in an 8-hour comprehensive training program that covers issues like sexual assault, drug and alcohol abuse, and gang and youth violence in the Walla Walla area. Broyles has worked in the past with groups on campus, enabling a sorority, fraternity, or club for example to volunteer specific skills and work around time constraints.

According to an employee that works in the Armory, there have been problems in the past working with the CCY program. There were several reports of drug-related incidents, specifically drug-delivery at the Armory. Coleman said, “I can say with 110% confidence that is not a problem now.” There was also recurring damage sustained to the building from stray basketballs and footballs in the gymnasium, which played a role in the decision to remodel. It was speculated that CCY was moving to avoid paying for damages, though this claim was not confirmed. “The construction definitely catalyzed the move. It was anticipated to be finished last May,” said Broyles. “It’s probably better for the kids to be at a school anyways,” said the employee.

CCY has been the only long-term program housed in the Armory, since it started in 1999. The space is typically rented out for special events, like quinceaneras, traditional birthday celebrations honoring Hispanic girls’ transition into womanhood on their 15th birthday.

“These are large-scale renovations,” Broyles said of the construction. “It was anticipated at the start of the project that it would be done last May, but my guess is that it won’t be finished until next year.”

“But at the same time we are outgrowing our space. We are excited about the opportunity to cater to some of our older youth that really want to hone some specialized skills. And having green-space is just going to be phenomenal for us.”

“We get a lot of non-traditional learners, a lot of them think really outside of the box. It is amazing to see what the world looks like through their eyes.”
If you are interested in volunteering for CCY call (509) 526-2571 and ask to speak to programming coordinator Max Coleman.

Students cuddle up at Drive-In Movie

Hundreds of Whitman students, armed with warm clothing, blankets or heavy-duty sleeping bags, flocked to the Reid side-lawn for a paired showing of “The Incredibles” and “Dr. Strangelove” Saturday night.

This event, known as the biannual “Drive-in Movie,” is put on each semester by the Campus Activities Board (CAB).

An e-mail sent out by Katie Phelps prior to the event suggested, “Bring blankets and a cuddle buddy, and we’ll provide the popcorn, cotton candy and two awesome movies.” One group of first-years took this suggestion further and zipped together five sleeping bags. This seems to reflect the idea of togetherness promoted by the event.

It also helps provide extra warmth, as nights outside in Walla Walla can get quite cold, and many students, albeit bundled up, were shivering through the movies.

The theme of this year’s pair of movies was “The end of the world.” According to CAB Chair, Phil Lundquist, “Dr. Strangelove” was selected because it is ranked number five on the Whitman Facebook Network. “Mrs. Doubtfire” was originally chosen to be paired with it, but could not be shown due to technical problems with rights to the film.

“The Incredibles” was then selected as another popular option that had come up during brainstorming and that CAB felt could complement “Dr. Strangelove” well. This more family-friendly film was shown first for the benefit of young children who might potentially come to the event.

Attendance was relatively high for “The Incredibles,” although it went down as the night went on. But Lundquist felt the event was fairly successful.

“It wasn’t quite up there with the big guns,” like a previous pairing of “Mean Girls” with “Batman Begins,” Lundquist said.

“[But] it’s a good way to spend time with your friends on a weekend night that doesn’t involve drinking or partying.”

Poet Witt reads to full house: Visiting prof. kicks off VWR series

He strolled onto the brightly lit podium dressed in a black leather jacket and a pair of slim blue jeans, with locks of unruly brown hair tumbling over his forehead. His tranquil eyes gazed out into the audience from behind a pair of thin-frame glasses. He looked every inch the scholarly biker, except instead of a length of chain, he wielded a portfolio of poetry in his hands.

His name is Sam Witt and his performance last Thursday night at Kimball Theater kicked off this year’s first session of the ongoing Visiting Writers Reading Series hosted by the Whitman English department. Witt read to a full house audience poems from his two published collections as well as select pieces from his new manuscript.

The Visiting Writers Reading Series is the brainchild of poetry professor Katrina Roberts, who created the program nine years ago and has been serving as its coordinator ever since. Although it has a limited budget, the VWRS has drawn many accomplished authors and poets to campus since its inception, boasting such names as Tim O’Brien (“The Things They Carried”), Mary Karr (“The Liar’s Club”) and Robert Hass (“Sun Under Wood”). The mission of the VWRS is to offer students of literature opportunities to be inspired by and benefit from the collective experience of established as well as emerging writers across the country.

Witt is currently acting as a one year visiting professor at Whitman, taking over duties for Roberts, who is on sabbatical. He was born in Wimbledon, England and moved to North Carolina when he was 7. Witt first began writing poetry seriously as a senior in high school while taking literature classes at Wake Forest University. He received his MFA from the Iowa Writer’s Workshop and has dabbled in a variety of occupations over the years, including working in an environmental fund-raising group, writing as a freelance tech journalist and
teaching at colleges all over the country. He has also spent a year abroad in Russia and enjoys the works of many acclaimed Russian poets. Witt admitted that his nomadic tendencies may have had a detrimental impact on his personal and professional life, but for Witt, the writing always comes first.

“I’ve sacrificed a lot of personal concerns to become a better writer, a more committed writer,” said Witt. “The writing is, in a way, my mistress. Sometimes by the end of the week, when the weekend rolls around, I feel kind of exhausted, like I’ve given everything of myself to my writing classes and my own poetry.”

“But the writing gives me a lot,” said Witt. “And at the end of the day, it feels like it’s worth it.”

Witt has enjoyed poetry since early childhood and many of his boyhood heroes have been poets, but he didn’t set out from the very beginning to turn his love of poetry into a career. He explained that like many people, he “went through a string of potential identities for [himself]” during his adolescent years, harboring fantasies ranging from becoming a rock star, to winning the Olympic gold medal for gymnastics, to becoming the President of the United States.

“But these were all false motivations,” said Witt. “And I remember that always in the back of my head I had this kind of reassuring leitmotif that came in the form of a chorus, and it was something like, ‘well, if none of that works out, I can always be a poet.’ What strikes me now as I look back on that is that I never thought to myself that I would be a great poet. It was always about the poetry, just being a poet, didn’t have to be great. In short, it wasn’t a fantasy, it was a real thing for me.”

“I’ve always loved poetry,” said Witt. “Poetry can’t be paraphrased … it deals with the peculiarities of existence, it deals with the moment, it deals with the problem rather than the solution. Poetry always brings us back to the real. Poetry is the art form that best catches physical movement, and thus is one of the few art forms that can display real transformation in real time. Also, I love music, and I just love the music in the language.”

Fans of Witt’s poetry frequently remark on its dark subject material. Witt agreed that his poetry does tend to lean towards the darker and more disturbing facets of human nature and it’s a quality that many readers pick up on immediately. He explained that while it’s true that his personal life has been checkered by a number of traumatic experiences, poetry as an art generally tends to “attach itself to moments of intensity.” Witt said that while such moments are usually moments of crisis, they can sometimes be moments of ecstasy. Consequently, many of his poems embrace more positive themes like love and physical intimacy. Witt maintains a strong interest in and draws a lot of his ideas from historical events and the modern day political collective as well as catastrophic climate changes.

“The poet is naturally drawn to instances of injustice in our world,” said Witt. “It has to do with an affinity for language making you more sensitive to the suffering of other people. A big part of poetry is transmuting or mediating suffering into pleasure. Though [my] poems be dark, I hope that they’re not unpleasant to read. Aristotle put it best: Catharsis is the result of sympathetic pain, sympathetic suffering.”

Witt explained that the benefit of attending an author’s reading rather than simply perusing a book of poetry at home has to do with the nature of poetry as an art sprung from the oral tradition. According to Witt, there’s something tangible to be gained from hearing a poem read aloud in the voice of the poet, from receiving the poem through the ear rather than the eye. He presented an example in Shakespeare’s “Hamlet,” where the king, the titular character’s father, is murdered by poison poured into his ear. Hamlet suspects his uncle Claudius of the deed and attempts to accuse him by staging a mimed play.

“But it doesn’t work, because there are no words,” said Witt. “It’s all acted out. [The play] is obviously about Claudius and Gertrude, but they don’t get it. A lot of scholars and critics have argued that it has to come in through Claudius’s ears, the way the poison came in through the king’s ears. The sound of the accusation, it has to come in through one’s ear in order to be real, to be fulfilled.”

“There’s something to that, if you can borrow that image and apply it to a poetry reading, to the oral tradition,” said Witt.

Witt has recently finished his newest collection of poems, entitled “Occupation: Dreamland,” and looks forward to trying his hand at prose and fiction somewhere down the road. Whatever the future sees fit to deliver to his front step, he hopes that “it involves a lot of writing, and a fair amount of teaching, too.”

Witt’s advice for aspiring poets: read a lot. Take writing classes. Be prepared to re-evaluate your definition of happiness and success, because while poetry may be a lot of things, what it isn’t is a surefire vehicle for making money. Be patient. And most of all, read a lot.

KWCW provides aural diversity

KWCW, Whitman’s student and community-run radio station, has resumed programming for the fall. The schedule places new DJs alongside experienced broadcasters from Whitman College and the surrounding community. A peek into what a few DJs, new and old, have to offer:

Kayla Hudson and Michael Hui, both seniors from Walla Walla High School, are going to “make it a point to find the most bizarre news worldwide to showcase for our bizarre news segment.” Their show is called Pretty Alright Radio and airs Saturdays from 2-3 p.m.

First-years Nicole James and Nathan Eberhart will play “international modern music—the stuff that is insanely hard to find in this country.” Both DJs have international backgrounds and see it as their “job to unite the internationally-deprived music lovers with exactly what they are longing for: awesome songs from other countries.” Their show, Polyglot-a-Cracker, airs at 7 p.m. on Fridays.

Senior Ben Stevens will be bringing back his I Love the ‘80s show for a second semester, playing music from “the most criminally underrated decade in music.” I Love the ‘80s airs Friday nights at 9 p.m.

Several shows plan to focus on classic rock, one of which is Six Crooked Highways. Speaking for his group of fellow Highway-ers, Junior Leor Maizel is excited to play “tons of incredible music by influential artists who get ignored by mainstream radio because it’s too obscure. Our show is a venture into obscurity.” Listen in on Fridays from 2-3 p.m.

For more information about KWCW, check out kwcw.net to stream the station as it airs, watch the webcam, read reviews written by DJs, see what’s been played recently and catch up on station news.

Mentalist amazes students with mental, physical illusions

Mentalist Craig Karges performs in a packed Reid Ballroom on Tuesday, Sept. 18. Karges amazed students with illusions such as a table-lifting routine and several variations on mind-reading. Named Entertainer of the Year six times by the National Association for Campus Activities, Karges offers “$100,000, payable to charity, if anyone can prove he uses stooges, confederates from the audience or hidden assistants to accomplish his demonstrations,” according to craigkarges.com/biography.html.

Dining hall options slim for campus weight watchers

The Napkin Comment Board, a wall in both Prentiss and Jewett Dining Halls where students can leave suggestions, asks for “more meat” next to a request for “more vegetarian entrees.” Even some vegetarians disagree.

“The chefs relay heavily on carbs like pasta for their vegetarian options,” said vegetarian Nicole Pexton. “It can be difficult to find alternatives to the meat main course. Sometimes there is a soy option but when there’s not I’m left to scramble to find something to eat.”
Erin Kaufman, also a vegetarian, feels she eats well on campus but acknowledges the concerns that Pexton raised.

“My concern with eating in the dining hall is that I feel like I eat more here than I would at home,” said Stephanie Silver. “It’s partially to do with the large portion sizes but it’s also ‘Prentiss is closing in fifteen minutes, I have to go’ rather than listening to my stomach.”
Lyman Dining Hall provides a good option for people concerned with portion sizes because you can serve yourself. However, the limited time window Lyman is open makes it a challenging place to eat.

“It’s also challenging to eat healthy or lose weight with an infinite supply of dessert available at breakfast, lunch and dinner,” said Kaufman. “‘Do I want a cookie or frozen yogurt? Both!’”
Ana Salazar-Walsh, who grew up in Spain, was surprised by what she perceives as a low obesity rate at Whitman. “You always hear on the news in Spain about the huge problem with obesity,” said Salazar-Walsh. “They would say that soon we’re going to be as bad as the United States with a 50 percent obesity rate. Then I come to college in America and it’s not like that at all.”

Moving off-campus has the allure of a healthier diet, but that doesn’t always follow through. “My friend [who lives off-campus] has made stir-fry every night for the past week,” said Kristianne Chavez. “And once the all the dishes are dirty they start eating things like potato chips and applesauce.”

Members of the Environmental Interest House who are responsible for the recycling from the dorms, noticed that College House, whose residents are not required to be on a meal plan, always has a large amount of tin cans in the recycling.

BY THE NUMBERS: Eating disorders

15: Percent of young women who adopt unhealthy attitudes about food.

10: Percent of all those who suffer anorexia and bulemia that are male.

60: Percent of Americans who are overweight.

34: Percent of Americans who are obese.

72: Percent of alcoholic women younger than 30 that also have eating disorders.

14-25: The most common age range for the onset of eating disorders in females.

52: Percent of girls in the US who say they began dieting before they were 14.

$32 billion: Yearly profit reported by the diet industry.

1 in 10: Number of surveyed women who said they would abort a child if they knew it had a
genetic tendency to be fat in 1997.

3: Ranking of eating disorders as common chronic illnesses among adolescent girls.

12: times higher the death rate associated with anorexia nervosa alone is compared to the overall death rate among young women in the general population.

SOURCES: The National Institute of Mental Health, ANRED, Health Magazine, NEDic, US News and World Report

to review: the ear weighs in on recent releases

Throughout his decade-plus career, Aesop Rock has always seemed to be a man who followed his own muse. Even when he essentially became the Def Jux label’s flagship MC a few years back, he still retained a very distinct identity, never really feeling like a mere appendage of the label, unlike, say, El-P or Cannibal Ox. Most telling of his iconoclasm, perhaps, was his 2003 release, “Bazooka Tooth.” After the very positive response to 2001’s “Labor Days,” Aesop decided to produce most of his next album himself, ending his two-album run with producer Blockhead, and ended up with one of the least accessible (though quite interesting) rap albums this side of cLOUDDEAD. If “Labor Days” had attracted a following, “Bazooka Tooth” almost seemed like an attempt to shed those new fans.

In light of this history, “None Shall Pass” is quite a surprise in its immediacy. Blockhead returns to the production seat in a big way, helming half of the album’s 14 tracks (five of the

Even if nothing has changed in his words, “None Shall Pass” contains some of the best songs Aesop has ever made. The title track, “Bring Back Pluto,” and “No City,” all of which were produced by Blockhead, are fantastic and stand with some of Aesop’s all-time greatest songs. El-P shows up for two songs, “39 Thieves” and “Gun for the Whole Family,” the latter of which he produced, and their collaborations are as satisfying as they always are. The album’s best song, though, is “The Harbor is Yours,” a pirate tale (who doesn’t love pirates?) featuring Aesop Rock’s clearest storytelling lyrics since “Labor Days’” “No Regrets,” a great stuttering vocal line and a deliciously funky beat from Blockhead. Also of note is the final track, “Coffee,” which features, oddly enough, John Darnielle of the Mountain Goats. Best of all, unlike many hip-hop albums, the momentum is kept up throughout the album and the last half doesn’t drag much.

Despite the strong track list, somehow “None Shall Pass” feels like it lacks cohesion. While “Labor Days” (perhaps because it was a concept album) and his pre-Def Jux albums all felt like unified wholes, “None Shall Pass” feels more like a slightly unfocused collection of tracks, albeit very good ones. This, admittedly, is something of a minor gripe and is only really apparent if you’re familiar with Aesop’s earlier work. Even if you are, though, it’s hard to argue with the quality of the songs here, especially after the relative disappointments of “Bazooka Tooth” and the “Fast Cars, Danger, Fire and Knives” EP, released in 2005. All in all, “None Shall Pass” feels like both a return to form and a consolidation of Aesop Rock’s (and Blockhead’s) strengths. And if it feels a little thrown together, that doesn’t change the fact that it’s one of the best albums of Aesop’s career and certainly one of the best hip-hop albums to come out this year.

grade: a-

Ben Stevens

Bowerbirds − “Hymns for a Dark Horse”

There is a particular tremor of feeling that all music fans search for, the shudder that begins in the ears and trickles on through the rest of the body. It is the joy of discovering a new sound, of hearing a band take familiar elements and make them new again. In their modest way, that is the accomplishment of alt-folk group Bowerbirds on their debut album “Hymns for a Dark Horse.” Using guitar, accordion, drums, violin and pleasing vocals, the band creates a kind of jazzy folk that is dark, compact, and glittering. A hunk of obsidian in a forest clearing. Everything is driven forward with powerful melodies and a confident beat, quiet moments of musical doodling nicely balanced with loud, exuberant choruses. The lyrics revolve around environmental issues, calling humankind out for its disrespect and destruction. That may sound impossibly heavy-handed on paper, but set to their delicate, propulsive, and beautiful tunes it is the most natural thing in the world.

grade: b

MIA – “Kala”

Maya Arulpragasam has released one of the year’s most accomplished pop albums and proved that, even with allegations of terrorist sympathies, you can get major label distribution in America. Standout tracks like “Jimmy”, three and a half minutes of loopy, saccharine disco, showcase M.I.A’s sonically ambitious style and remarkable talent for incorporating an eclectic array of influences within the framework of a cohesive album. Arulpragasam traveled extensively during the recording of the album, and as a result, it resembles a sort of musical travelogue—including Bollywood samples, a collaboration with Australian child-rappers Wilcannia Mob, production credits from Baltimore’s Blaqstarr, and the recurring lyrical motif of Africa. All of these factors render a final product that is conceptually fascinating, but more importantly, a lot of fun.

grade: a

bryan sonderman

Minus The Bear − “Planet of the Ice”

It’s official: Minus the Bear are stuck in a serious holding pattern. 2005’s “Menos el Oso” failed to break any new ground on the catchy, pseudo-math rock they had developed so well on their first album and two EPs, but usually such water treading is limited to one album for most bands worth hearing. Sadly, “Planet of Ice” continues along exactly as the previous albums did. The band almost feels afraid to try anything new, as little glimpses of experimentation periodically surface throughout the album, but are never allowed to develop. Granted, this isn’t a bad album, some of the songs are actually quite nice, it’s just stagnant and a letdown considering how good “Highly Refined Pirates” and their two EPs were.

grade: c+

ben stevens

Le Loup – “The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nation”

The best way to describe Le Loup, a septuplet from Washington D.C., is with this mathematical equation that is just about as complex and
long winded as their debut album title: Arcade Fire + Sufjan Stevens+ rhythmic experimentations + Animal Collective= Le Loup. The album is titled after artist James Hampton’s life long work, which I encourage you to check out. “Le Loup (Fear Not)” is the centerpiece and easily one of the best songs on the album; a song that begins with the twanging of the banjo followed by the swelling of layered vocals, guitars, samples, handclaps, and other instruments. And this seems to be the formula for every song on the album. “The Throne” is short and the banjo and the prentiousness of it all becomes tiring. After listening to Le Loup, I just want to listen to more Animal Collective.

grade: c-

matt coleman

New Pornographers – “Challenger”

Call it “mature,” if you want. I call it boring. “Challengers,” the newest album from Canada’s sweethearts the New Pornographers, has made a change for the demure that is ill at ease when played for fans of their older, more fun-loving sound. A personification of this change: old songs = walking to class in the sun and dancing. New songs = background fodder for conversations in long car rides. Neko Case, one of the two lady singers for the pop outfit, takes a backseat for this album, which only hurts the effort. The lack of her intense vocals makes too much A.C. Newman just sound whiny, and even the well-honed harmonizing this band excels at can’t take away the annoyance factor in the many overly-repetitive hooks throughout “Challengers.” Where before the Pornos were young at heart and playful, fewer instruments and less creative production make their new sound simply sophomoric. Only a few of the songs here are really actually bad, but even the best doesn’t match up to the worst song on 2003’s “Mass Romantic.”

grade: c+

katie presley

DOWN – “The Ill Over The Under”

Rising like a stoner-metal Swamp Thing from the bayous of Louisiana, Down delivers a bottom-heavy bludgeoning with “Over the Under,” their first release in five years and finest since 1995’s poser-disposer masterstroke “NOLA.” Comprising the frontman and bassist of legendary ‘90s metal gods Pantera, alongside dope-worn scum-fucks culled from Corrosion of Conformity, Eyehategod and Crowbar, Down purveys a particularly weeded brand of Southern-fried metal played at, like, point-five BPM. It works so well by reasoning that, kind of like a Band-Aid, slower hurts a lot more. With the crushing stomp of “N.O.D.,” “On March the Saints’” AC/DC-meets-heroin swagger and the 9-minute bong rip “Beneath the Tides,” Full Metal Phil and crew wreak havoc like a slow-motion hurricane.

grade: a

Lead review: Caribou, “Andorra”

Will somebody please make Dan Snaith an honorary Whittie? This is the guy whose moniker “Caribou” was the product of an acid-induced vision quest in the wildest of Canadian backwoods. This is the same guy who earned his Ph.D. in algebraic number theory, just to belittle academics everywhere with claims of making gold records in his spare time. Snaith’s fascination with nature and foreign countries continues on the remarkably lush “Andorra”, but this time he’s thrown people into the equation; girl people, specifically. However, don’t mistake his transition from hammerhead sharks to women named Desiree as losing his edge. These are some of his fiercest songs to date.

There are some humble artists out there that never want to admit that they knew which of their songs would be the hit single. Ben Bridwell of Band of Horses thought people would really dig “Wicked Gil”, but the captivating crescendos of “The Funeral” have become their calling-card. I can’t imagine this naiveté would be possible with the lead track “Melody Day” on “Andorra”. The pulsing, infectious ditty is unmistakably a hit. It’s the aural equivalent of playing the Rainbow Road level in MarioKart64 well into the early hours of the morning. I challenge you to avoid imagining butterflies, birds, or some other cute shit when you hear the twittering flutes and jangling guitars. Snaith has really hit his stride with his vocals too; his voice gently reverberates across each sonic landscape he constructs. And he seems to be inviting the awkward concert round-of-applause-before-the-song-is-actually-over with a late-song lull only to return more ferociously than before. Suffice to say, goodness gracious.

Andorra is one of the sunniest albums you’ll hear all year. Snaith takes the best parts of every post 60’s musical era, and condenses them into roughly four and a half minute audio collages. There are elements of the Beatles (imagine ?uestlove on the drums instead of Mr. Conductor from Shining Time Station) and a heavy dose of psychedelic influences. The rampant use of heavy reverb lends an eerie, ethereal tone that can only described as a true stardust fantasy. Each meticulous arrangement is entirely his own, as Snaith notoriously maintains a death-grip on the production of each song, start to finish. Surprisingly absent are the drums on one of the album’s finest tracks “Desiree”. Barring a few clangs of a triangle, Snaith’s complex, signature drumming is replaced by strings and a hypnotic chant of the stripper-esque moniker. The percussion on “Irene” is entirely drum machine and coupled with the slightly off-kilter melody, it is enjoyably haunting.

It’s remarkable to think that the man formerly known as Manitoba has been able to produce such a consistently excellent level of music on each of his albums. It seems as if he uses any instrument he can get his hands on and seamlessly incorporates it into a distinctly Caribou song. As an album, “Andorra” does not disappoint. Each song seems to exist naturally and cohesively with the rest. My only advice is to play this record before summer’s end for maximum effect.

concert reviews in heat

SHOUT OUT LOUDS: brooklyn, ny
grant margeson

The Luna Lounge is nestled only one subway stop up from the famed hipster capital Bedford Ave. in Williamsburg (for those pretending not to know, that is in Brooklyn, NY). A little way off from the bars, music stores, and people on Bedford, the Luna Lounge — which lacks the same garish signs that some other venues have — is actually kind of easy to miss. That is, unless there is a show. Then the Beford-ites and East Villagers swarm like bees to their Indie music honey. With a capacity of nearly 400, that is quite a lot of thick black-rimmed glasses and skinny jeans. The saving grace is, of course, that it is a 21+ venue, so it bars the being-young-and-living-with-my-parents-sucks hipsters of the next generation.

Upon entering the venue, you immediately encounter the crowd around the bar, which is understandable given the relatively cheap drinks the Luna serves. The venue is basically one big, plain, rectangular room with minimal seating on the sides and a slightly sloped floor down to the elevated stage. The view for the stage, therefore, is pretty good anywhere. In fact, the only real problem with the layout is that the soundboard is in the middle of the floor.
Saturday Looks Good To Me opened up for the Shout Out Louds, and played a solid set to the capacity crowd. This Detroit-based group played nice country, soul, and blues-inspired rock with some of the best guitar licks I have ever seen played live. Somewhere between the lead singer’s frequent stories about Detroit and the guy from Big Star he knew and the mounting excitement for everybody’s favorite Swedes to take the stage, the set was ruined. I thought the group was rather good, so I thought it was a bit unfortunate.

The crowd redeemed itself when the Shout Out Louds took the stage. This might be the best point to mention the fact this is the goddamned best looking group I have ever seen. Every single member, except perhaps for the David Cross look-alike drummer, is unreasonably attractive. Since the band is mixed-gendered, a person with any sexual orientation can rest assured that they will be satisfied with some great eye candy. What makes the band members look even better is their dress. It is modern and hip, yet classy and refined in a sort of business-chic way.

As well as being fuckable, the Shout Out Louds put on a great show. The mix of Swedish Pop, crowd interaction, and band energy combined to make an unforgettable experience.

JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE: tacoma, wash.
katie presley

Justin Timberlake is a confused guy. His concert at the Tacoma Dome on September 8th was nothing if not deeply conflicted. As is to be expected from a show entitled “FutureSex/LoveShow,” everything was bright and exciting and sexy. However, Justin is caught in a series of contradictory positions: Is he a credible musician or a showy boy-bander? Is he a grownup or a teenager? Is he over Britney or isn’t he? The answer to all of these questions is yes, which made the entire concert-going experience one big sexyback-bringin’ sociological study.

Over the course of the night, Justin played several of his own instruments: guitar, keyboard, piano, and some drums. He beatboxed, avoided lip-synching, and had well-dressed, racially diverse backup singers. Justin clearly wants to be taken seriously as a performer. And he ought to be: he played all of his instruments well and has a fantastic voice. Over the top of all this legit singer-songwriter business, though, were huge light displays, a laser show, and enormous projection screens with elaborate holographs and at one point a backup gospel choir. I smell bleach blonde curls and lying about virginity…

In other words, Justin has not gotten the theatricality of his former life out of his system.
The peak of JT drama took place in the closing lines of “What Goes Around…Comes Around,” his Britney-bashing, Timbaland-collabo’ed video extravaganza. He picked up a small camcorder and sang to it angrily while his distorted image swirled on the big screen. He zoomed in on his crotch. He scowled. And finally, he flipped off the screen and threw the camera onstage. The crowd went WILD. Everyone loves someone else’s nasty breakup, after all. I laughed out loud for this entire portion of the show. It’s not really acceptable, I think, to bank on the public implosion of your relationship as part of the excitement of your show. Everyone knows what that song is about; he could have just sung it. That being said, I liked looking at his crotch and if anyone understands what a voyeuristic crowd wants to see, it’s Paris Hilton. But if it’s NOT Paris, it’s Justin Timberlake.

Slip into melodrama #2 was when Justin took a shot at the beginning of the show and said ‘fuck’ as many times as possible. We listened, and duly took him seriously as an adult. He is 26 years old, after all. But then he did his choreographed dance moves to songs about having me naked by the time he was done singing, and we all got confused again. Justin, who are you? What do you want from me as a faithful fan? You need to keep playing instruments, get out of stadium shows, and give up the lasers. I know you love the lasers. But you’ve got. To let them. Go.

CAPITOL HILL BLOCK PARTY: seattle, wash.
keith cushner and bryan sonderman

If you’re from Seattle, you’ve probably already heard of the Capitol Hill Block Party. If you’re not from Seattle, but you read Pitchfork, then you’ve probably heard it’s the shit. This year the event featured such notable acts as Spoon, Aesop Rock, Girl Talk, and Blue Scholars as well as a handful of others. We were only there on Saturday, so we missed Girl Talk’s supposedly life-changing set, but Saturday had its share of face-melting performances.
When we initially got to the Block Party, we made our way immediately to the Beer Garden which was relatively empty at 1 pm. After getting our much needed wristbands, we headed to the Vera Stage where Tina and Gina, two overtly-feminist hipsters turned-b-girls, were “enlightening” a scattered crowd of Broadway rejects on the wonders of Foucault, lip gloss and their liberal arts educations. The next four hours were spent in limbo, perusing the many early-afternoon drink specials that Capitol Hill has to offer. When we returned, we were just in time to catch the tail-end of John Vanderslice, who played some stripped-down renditions of songs off his newest album, “Emerald City,” and although his set was not the most entertaining of the night it was still great to hear “Cellar Door” in a live setting. Somewhere towards the end of the Vanderslice set, we heard about free cigarettes and beer, so we promptly stumbled over to the Camel booth and sold our souls for a quick fix. We then caught Aesop Rock on the mainstage, who closed off a stellar set with a surprisingly genuine version of “Daylight” (a song which he has publicly denounced in the past).

Against Me! took the stage next and, as a result, forced our crew to evacuate to the nearest sanctuary a.k.a. Taco Time. We were happy to fill our bellies without missing any good music in the process. We arrived back to see Spoon’s roadies prepping the stage for what would be the best performance of the day.

The crowd had grown in size throughout the day and it was at its peak when Spoon started off their set with the first track of their latest album, “Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga” (“Don’t make me a target”). Much to our surprise, Spoon played a varied set with a majority of their set coming from “Girls Can Tell” and “A Series of Sneaks.” Their setup was relatively barebones, but all of the essential elements were there, and the band played flawlessly through their encore. Notable moments included “The Underdog” (their newest single) and “The Way We Get By,” which made all the girls cheer as they had just put in on their Ipod running mix.

Afterwards we hit Neumo’s for the nightcap, which featured a DJ set by Devlin and Darko of Spank Rock. After we got sick of the three-dollar Dewars and Coke, we headed out and ran into Brit Daniels and Jim Eno (the core members of Spoon) and drunkenly asked them to come play Whitman, which they politely considered, although they were happy to hear they were number one at KWCW. While the Block Party treated us well, we could have just gotten drunk at a Spoon show and had as much fun.

HOT CHIP: portland, ore.
keith cushner

Do you know what I love? Synthesizers. Goddamn, do I love synthesizers. If you love said musical instruments as much as I do, then catching Hot Chip’s live show is highly recommended.

Hot Chip is a quintet from London that plays electronic music without samples. So all of the individual parts are played live and then looped onstage while the song is being played. Each member of the band has multiple keyboards in front of them, as well as some auxiliary percussion instruments and guitars. They play a unique brand of catchy dance music with vocals as smooth as butter over the top.

Having been a huge fan of Hot Chip, especially after their most recent album “The Warning” dropped, and seeing them for the first time, I was incredibly excited for the show. After missing the first opener, Datarock, and sitting through the second, Planning to Rock (who was very appropriately named), I was ready to have my mind blown. So were the rest of the crowd at the sold-out Wonder Ballroom.

Much to my surprise and delight, Hot Chip chose a path that is incredibly rare for commercially successful artists: they played their studio tracks completely different in a live setting. It took the crowd a good two minutes to figure out they that were playing “Boy from School,” but once everyone figured this fact out the place exploded. The band’s set actually consisted of about 70 percent new material, which the crowd didn’t seem to mind as it was all danceable. All of the of-agers crowding the bar and pounding their $3 PBR’s didn’t mind either, although, obviously, older tracks like “Over and Over” and “No Fit State” were crowd pleasers.

Amid the breaks between songs, random drum sounds were quite audible as the beats for the upcoming song were being looped. However, the band was quite subtle about setting this up. The two most entertaining members of the band were definitely Alexis Taylor, the lead vocalist who slightly resembled a short, hip, English Steve Urkel who could solo on a set of bongos like you wouldn’t believe, and Owen Clarke, who plays lead (and only guitar), and, simply put, balls hard. Both of these members provided for some great visuals, as did the random people in the crowd (it would prove very difficult to imagine the amount of hipsters grinding on each other like it was their 9-5 on Wednesday). The band filled the stage well and the light show was not particularly elaborate, but that fit the band well as it was easier to actually see what each member was doing. Hot Chip’s set lasted a good hour and forty five minutes and it was all equally entertaining. It is rare that a band can play a set filled with so much unfamiliar material and hook a crowd well, but they did so flawlessly.

DAFT PUNK
david kanega

Daft Punk is getting ready to release a live album of this year’s tour in a few months. If you go to your computer and search out “coachella set 2006,” I imagine you’ll be able to download what is essentially a lo-fi version of what they’re packaging in pretty plastic for holiday purchase. And if you listen to it, you’ll likely be very impressed. And then, when you are told that they performed this same set about a dozen times in the last two years, you’ll likely be slightly less impressed by their lack of characteristics that define a good band. And if you are slightly less impressed, it is likely because you did not have the opportunity to, or chose not to, see them in concert this last summer.

I did see them, and post-concert, the idea of criticizing the show for having been musically almost identical to something I had already heard was absurd. Sure, it can’t have been too hard to do what they were doing on the stage—playing loops from all of their songs on top of each other, and occasionally mixing things up with a glorious crowd-appeasing one-second glitch-fill—but virtuosity of performance was not what was important here.

Rather, it was virtuosity of preparation. In a way, the concert had the appeal more of something packaged than of something live. That is, almost all of our crowd-wonder came from the fact that we were witnessing masculine hard-set truths prepared to a point of perfection. The music was already perfect for the Coachella set. Why change it? To mix things up?

Bah! Is it still 1920? No—sound was perfect. Check. Now the lights: they were the same at Coachella, too. And they were perfect. Check. Light up robot lines? That’s new—throw em in, mix em up, give these babies what they want. Glitch fills—yes. More please.

What we have is a rigorously prepared, rigorously structured show. A show that cannot possibly be recreated on paper. A show that cannot possibly be recreated on November’s “Alive 2007” CD. A show that cannot possibly be recreated on a concert DVD…..and yea, I know you must be thinking “well, uh, aren’t uh all shows uh lika lika that? I saw the mountain goats last year, and it changed my life, uh.” The answer is no. I didn’t see the mountain goats, but they sucked compared to Daft Punk. You can pretend you like Godard more than Star Wars, but honestly….do you really think you’re that smart? Money translates well into emotions.

A lot of dough went into the Alive tour, and it shows. Pretty lights. Good sound. Pretty images. Yea, it was moving—touching. Production value was everything.

So pick up the CD when it comes out. And look at pictures of the concert on the internet. Look at those robot lines. I haven’t explained anything here. I’ve only been mean—I’ve only been a critic. You can’t expect me to recreate the show—although I guess I probably could do that if you gave me enough money.

worth noting: The past few weeks in music news

Mac guru Steve Jobs announced Apple’s plans to start selling the new iPod Touch last week, which is essentially an iPhone without a phone. The new iPod is completely touch-screen and has wi-fi Internet access, but at only 16GB capacity it runs with a $400 price tag. So, like most women, the new iPod is probably too expensive for you touch no matter how bad you want to.

On the charts this week, the “High School Musical 2” soundtrack held on to number one for the third week straight, proving effectively the contract between Walt Disney and the Devil is still valid.

Bono, of U2 fame, has gotten off his high horse long enough to play the role of Dr. Robert in the new Beatles-inspired movie musical “Across the Universe.” In it, he will sing a rendition of “I Am the Walrus”. There, now you have no excuse to see this movie. Bono. Seriously?

Radiohead have finished recording their latest album, even though Thom Yorke said it won’t come out this year. I think it’s safe to say this will be your new favorite record ever and will change your life at least twice.

Bjork is releasing another new album before the year’s end / still gives me boners.

Rapper Yung Joc collected $100,000 based on a bet he made with his management team by losinh 35 pounds through cutting alcohol and late-night fast food binges. In case you’re curious that means that Yung Joc officially made $2,857 a pound last week.

The Game has been ordered to stand trial on three felony charges after he pulled a gun during a pickup basketball game at an educational center in Los Angeles. If the “Game” he takes his name after is who can be the most super ironically stupid person ever, then he is winning for sure.

The R. Kelly child pornography trial, which has been pending for FIVE years, has been postponed yet again because the prosecutor has had a baby. This marks the third major delay in the trial, which include such memorable events as when Kelly needed emergency surgery for a burst appendix on the original first day of trial and when the judge fell off a ladder, causing multiple fractures, last summer. The new date scheduled for the R. Kelly’s trial is on the release date of Chinese Democracy.

On a final note, famous opera singer Luciano Pavarotti died at the age of 71 due to complications from pancreatic cancer.

professor playlist: nadine night (english)

1. The Kelly Bell Band − I’m from Baltimore, so I have to start the list with a hometown
favorite. They describe their sound as “phat blues music,” and what a sound it is. I
recommend their live album, “Live From the Recher” for a good survey of their groove.
Best songs: “Homegrown” and “Dear Maggie.”

2. Carbon Leaf − These guys hail from Richmond, VA, but I don’t hold that against them.
Tracking the evolution of their sound from Celtic and Appalachian folk to more of a
rock sound has been fun. They play some great jams during live shows (and they usually
play Seattle a few times a year). There is not a single bad song on their 2004 album
“Indian Summer.”

3. Rockwell Church − Completely obscure, and they might even be defunct at this point.
But they were a staple on the Philly-New York-Boston coffeehouse scene for years, and are an amazingly talented folk duo. For an encore they always do hilarious covers of Brittany Spears or Christina Aguilera, but their own songs tend to use words like “transmogrify,” which should delight English majors. The song “Tend To Your Head,” from the album “Inches From the Ground,” is an all-time favorite of mine.

4. John Brown’s Body − Seriously, the best reggae you will ever hear coming out of
Ithaca, New York, of all places. Their roots sound is right at home in Jamaica, and they’ve held their own at the famed Reggae Sunsplash. I like their early album “Among Them,” though I adore the song “Forward Always” off their later album, “Spirits All Around Us.”

5. Toots and the Maytels − Living legends. I have to mention the guys who coined the
term “reggae.” Plus, I once danced onstage with Toots himself, one of the greatest
experiences in my life to date. Buy any album that has both “Reggae Got Soul” and
“Pressure Drop” on it. Bonus if you also get their cover of John Denver’s “Country Roads.”

6. Ulali − A trio of First Nations women of Tuscarora, Mayan, and Apache heritage. For a mostly a cappella group, the amount of power they generate is astounding. They seem to have only ever put out one album, though they do still tour. That album, “Mahk Jchi,” is a mix of both traditional and contemporary songs, and has rarely left my CD changer in
the 10 years I’ve owned it.

7. Kathleen Edwards − Canadian alt-country-rock. She’s a great songwriter, and there are
times when I really appreciate her songs written by and for an angry woman. I give the
slight edge to her first album, “Failer,” for the songs “12 Bellevue” and “Six O’clock
News.”

8. Great Big Sea − Also Canadian, from what they claim is the “tropical isle” of
Newfoundland. They veer gleefully between aggressive, high-speed Celtic and Newfoundland traditional music and more radio-friendly pop/rock. It makes for a high energy, extremely fun live show. Their song “Ordinary Day” reminds me to stay cheerful.

9. Seven Nations − The best band you will ever hear that features the bagpipes as a major
instrument. Like pretty much everyone else on this list, they put on a phenomenal live
show. The live recording of their song “Our Day Will Come” has been a great consolation during many bouts of schoolwork-related despair and late-night writing.

10. Koffi Olomidé − A friend introduced me to Congolese music last year, so I’m just
starting to learn about it. But the tracks I have by Koffi Olomidé are rapidly becoming
staples in my CD player, particularly the song “Affaire D’état.”

A Lifetime show by the numbers

705: miles I drove round-trip to see the band. That same distance would’ve gotten me to northern California, or pretty deep into Montana.

1997: the year Lifetime broke up.

17: age I first heard Lifetime, about five years after they released their genre-defining swan song “Jersey’s Best Dancers.” I’m 22 (and a half, for math’s sake) now. Therefore:

25: percent of my lifetime that, uh, Lifetime has been one of my absolute favorite bands. Considering I only really got into music in general at around the age of 13, it’s closer to half of my life. Thus, how I justified dropping:

96: dollars in gas (generously averaging it at $2.75 a gallon). The carbon footprint for my punk-rock weekend was pretty large, but come on. Fucking Lifetime!

7.50: dollars TicketsWest wanted to charge me in service fees to pre-order tickets. Nah, brah.

1: times I gave a shit during Seattle generi-core snoozers Sinking Ships’ opening set (for about a minute, during the dynamic, melodic and, thankfully, set-closing “Ghost Story”).

7: times I’ve seen Shook Ones, the wonderfully Lifetime-aping outfit to whose newest full-length I devoted 1200 words in one of last year’s Ears. With non-stop stagedives, sing-a-longs and songs pulled from all across their discography, it was by far the most fun I’ve had seeing them.

1: stagedives Lifetime guitarist Dan Yemin attempted during Shooks’ final song, at the band’s incessant behest. Kids were stoked.

1: stagedives I attempted during Shooks’ final song, at absolutely no one’s behest. No one was stoked.

11: songs included on Lifetime’s self-titled comeback album, controversially released on Fall Out Boy bassist Pete Wentz’s imprint Decaydance.

0: songs included on Lifetime’s self-titled comeback album that, in any way, tarnish their reputation. Though it lacks the rough-hewn, basement-show charm of their older records, it’s still really, really good.

1: songs they played off this new album before launching into “Turnpike Gates,” “Dancer’s” classic opening song.

1: songs they played before I bum-rushed the stage, howled the lyrics in singer Ari Katz’s face and more or less lost my shit at seeing one of my favorite bands ever. (Translation: when they played “Gates,” I lost my shit).

ALL: classic bangers from their two ‘90s albums Lifetime played, sprinkled with a few choice jams from the new one. Seriously, this was some “Live at Budokan” shit as far as amazing live setlists go.

50: percent of stagedives attempted throughout the night that were successfully completed (one out of two, during Lifetime’s final song “25 Cent Giraffes.”)

0: times I had stagedived before that night.

2.5: number of high-fives given to members of Lifetime. One was administered to Yemin during a song, but while I went for the open-handed, standard five, he went with the closed-fist “pound.” He adapted, and the high-five was completed. Ergo, one and a half. The second came after the show, as Katz exited the club to smoke. The high-five was given, and Katz yelped in agony. I’m not that strong, so I inquired why it hurt so badly. He showed me how he’d punctured his finger with a nailgun. Turns out I’m not that strong. My bad, dude.

1: spot Lifetime has taken on my list of all-time, most fun shows I’ve ever attended. If that’s what growing up looks like in the arrested-development culture of hardcore punk, then I’ll see you there.

rant: dollyrots

While everybody else was either interning or traveling the world, I decided to take up a lucrative job in retail at a Kohl‘s in Arizona.

There’s nothing wrong with working retail. Aside from the occasional asshole who decides to ask you when you’re “going back to Iraq” (because my Arab descent makes me look like a terrorist, you see), being a cashier at Kohl’s was fairly mundane. For the first few days, at least.

Yet, as I eased into month two at Kohl’s, I started to notice the music that piped through the speakers. This wasn’t the standard “muzak” that plays instrumental re-workings of famous songs. Kohl’s, instead, had actual music playing on what they call their soundtrack. This ran the gamut from syrupy pop ballads to awful covers of “Blue Monday” (as sung by She-Wishes-She-Was-Regina-Spektor) to Michael Bolton. Horrible, yes; but very harmless otherwise.

Except for “The Song.”

I called it that for a long time. The first time I heard it, I was busy helping a young girl check out. She was buying Candie’s, a clothing line that I’ve nicknamed My-Little-Hooker Wear. “The Song” pipes up with a wild strumming of an electric guitar before devolving into a scream-fest courtesy of a female singer shrieking about how everyone’s “a leader” and “a winner” and that this is “awesome.” Imagine Avril Lavigne walking down the street flashing gang signs at various people. Then I picture Avril Lavigne suddenly being attacked by ten raccoons who just happened to fall out of the sky (via divine intervention) and the screams poor Avril makes as a raccoon bites into her cooter. “The Song” is all that and a flat, warm six pack.

I thought nothing of it at first. Bad songs come and go. Yet, this one kept coming. It’d play a second time. Then it’d play a third time. Then a fourth. And a fifth.

I concluded that this was punishment from the boss who had it in for me because I wasn’t getting enough people to sign up for Kohl’s charge cards as they checked out.

I was obsessed with “The Song.” As much as I hated it, I had to know about its origins.
So a cursory Google search enlightened me with a name: The Dollyrots.

The Dollyrots are comprised of singer Kelly Ogden, guitarist Luis Cabezas, and drummer Chris Black. As Wikipedia tells me, The Dollyrots were originally formed “for fun” but decided to “go professional” after the 2000 US Presidential Election. As Ogden explains it:
“We were watching the 2000 presidential election results, and at four o’clock in the morning, when we found out that George W. Bush had won, Luis and I were like, ‘The world’s probably gonna end anyway, and I don’t want to go to med school,’ so we thought, ‘Let’s just do the band . . . So that’s when it happened. We had no future anyways, so let’s just be in a rock band!’”

It’s telling that they call themselves a “rock band” since The Dollyrots sound more like a “pop” band. “Because I’m Awesome,” the song I heard all this summer (and the Kohl’s corporate theme song), is syrupy without the sweet; a power ballad for the unappreciated. It’s a song tuned especially for those kids who don’t, like, conform, man. Either that or it’s tailored for teenagers who never shower.

The video for “Because I’m Awesome” reaffirms this sentiment. The low-budget video parodies every aspect of “American Idol.” The band sings while contestants of varying “hilarity” compete in front of judges who are obviously Randy, Paula, and Simon even though they’re not. The rejected are the unglamorous and untalented, while the pretty and vapid race on to Hollywood. The video wants you to hate the pretty and vapid, but I found this to be relatively hard when the underdogs looked like caricatures. The video culminates in The Dollyrots’ lead singer crashing the auditions and leading a throng of rejected singers into the audition room to overthrow the judges, all leading to a shot of a Ryan Seacrest clone peeing in his pants at the sight of so many ugly people.

Personally, despite the images of nonconformity presented throughout the video, I just found it sweaty. Everybody’s sweating in this video. I imagine that the director decided to dunk the band in chicken fat before shooting to make them look so edgy and countercultural. But really, it just makes me want to take a shower.

The video also confirms what I have been thinking about The Dollyrots all this time–they embrace shit music. Why are all those kids you made fun of during high school being rejected on American Idol? Because they can’t sing, and we like people that can sing–even if what they sing about is inherently shallow and vapid.

The Dollyrots, though? They’re really not “Awesome.”

rocks or reeks: Animal Collective’s “Strawberry Jam”

ROCKS

The first ten seconds of this album will not sound like “typical Animal Collective” to long-time listeners, but then again, by this point, “typical Animal Collective” shouldn’t mean squat to long-time listeners. Animal Collective have now become well-known for their inability to stay static, whether it is seen in their tours in support of albums featuring no songs from those albums and mainly new material, or the way that the content of their “Campfire Songs” album sounds completely different from their last album “Feels.”

“Strawberry Jam” continues in that tradition, and finds a band that has always been interested in shifting and pushing their sonic boundaries once again creating remarkable payoffs for their risks. So what changes are found on the oddly named but ever stunning “Strawberry Jam”? Well, out goes the etherealness, and up front comes the vocals, as the animals make their way deeper into the forest of demented pop songs.

What is bound to catch the most attention on this album is lead singer Avey Tares’ choice to not mask his vocals in effects and layers and other obstructers, to the point where one can actually hear the words he is singing. While on past Animal Collective records, it was the innovative sound of the music that was more important, with the lyrics never playing much of a role other than knowing when to “whoop” at the right time, “Strawberry Jam” gives a very rewarding shift. The quality and uniqueness of the music is still very much there, but on top of that listeners get clever, sincere, and sing-along-able words. For example, on opener “Peacebone,” Avey Tare sings “When I feel like I’m stealing, I can keep myself from hearing God,” a beautiful line that would have been lost in the chaos of “Sung Tongs.”

The great part is “Peacebone” is just the very tip of the iceberg; in nine tracks, the album explores a wide array of sounds and ideas, all while seeming more cohesive than Animal Collective records past. This album definitely feels like it has the same driving pulse throughout, sprinkled with excellent comedowns, which can all be attributed to the seamless
sequencing job. For example the undeniable centerpiece of this album, found fittingly at the center, is “Fireworks,” a contender for my favorite song of the year. In about seven minutes, the song dives into so many aspects of the band’s aesthetic without wasting a second, and prove why Animal Collective is one of the best bands making music today. At over 20 listens this song can still manage to give me goosebumps in the best way possible, and continues to sound fresh.

Ultimately, the thing about this album is that you have to really be willing to give yourself to it if you want to enjoy it for it for its full potential. This is not a record one can feel “meh” about; it is either a magical Narnia you enter or simply a non-descript wardrobe. As Avey Tare says for himself (audibly!) on another stand out track “Winter Wonder Land”: “If you don’t believe in fantasy, then don’t believe in fantasy”. Simple as that.

NADIM DAMLUJI

Look. I’m not trying to make a big deal out of this or anything. I just think if there’s one band that’s seriously overrated these days it’s Animal Collective. Fine, they mix it up. I give them that. They surprise you. Sometimes there are moments where you think, “That was a really great musical moment.” But mostly I think they got lucky cultivating a few really obsessed fans who write novel-long reviews about how great their albums are. And those people were all so well dressed and disaffected that all the wannabe well-dressers and disaffected types decided they’d like Animal Collective, too, because that’s what all the cool kids were doing. Someone(in Diesel jeans) would be like, “Have you heard the new Animal Collective?,” and then someone else (in Levis so obviously from the discount rack) would be like, “Ooooh, yeah. It’s so good.” But they’d have no idea, really. And then they’d buy the album and maybe a T-shirt for good measure, and so the revolution begins. Kind of like The Cure, only different.

“Fireworks” is a pretty good song. I liked it. I’ll put it on my iPod. But just that one.

SOPHIE JOHNSON

Women’s soccer’s Berndt ‘determined’ to win

Whitman’s women’s soccer (3-2-1) won their home opener 1-0 over Warner Pacific on Sept. 7, with sophomore Corina Gabbert heading in the first goal of the season nearly eight minutes into the game.

The Missionaries played dominantly, having 15 shots on goal compared to Warner Pacific’s one. Three of those shots on goal were from senior forward Kristen Berndt who has led Whitman in goals each of the past three years.

Berndt appears to be picking up where she left off last year when she led the Northwest Conference in shots per game at 5.12 and was second in scoring. In her sophomore season, Berndt led the conference in shots per game and finished third in scoring. Both years she was voted to the All-Northwest Conference First Team. The biggest honor, though, came after her junior year when D3Kicks.com chose her as a First Team All-American in addition to being named Outstanding Junior Female Athlete at Whitman.

Even after all the awards, Berndt stays humble.

“Every year I come back just happy to be playing soccer again,” said Berndt. “I’ve loved every single year.”

All the individual awards don’t get into her head, though, as Berndt is team-oriented.

“I think you get such a feeling of family within your team,” she said.

Her immense gifts have not gone unnoticed by Coach Scott Shields.

“The best thing [about Kristen] is her determination to win, as well as her desire to be on a team,” said Shields. “She can be down 100 goals to zero, and she’d still think she could win.”
Berndt’s teammates also appreciate the way she helps them out.

“She’s a really good motivator. Never gets down on anyone,” said first-year Audrey Tehan.
The one negative aspect facing Berndt in her final year is that she has to play injured, which has been a nagging issue throughout her career. She’s twice had to have surgery and will have to have another one after the season.

“It’s a struggle,” said Berndt. “I was hoping that when I was coming out of season that I’d be where I was the last three years.”

Despite injuries, Berndt already knows what she wants out of the season.

“We’ve been fourth in conference every single year I’ve been here. I’d love to be in the top two in conference,” she said.

Soccer is not all that defines Berndt. During the spring semester of her junior year, she studied abroad in Botswana. While she was there she taught kids in the town of Molepolole who were in the equivalent of fifth grade in the United States. She specifically worked with the kids on mathematical angles.

“I had them take a quiz on angles and that day they all got nine out of 10 and 10 out of 10,” said Berndt.

When the kids were studying under the teacher before her, they only scored around three or four out of 10. Her talent as a teacher may continue as Berndt is in the process of applying
to Teach for America.

A personal highlight from her time in Molepolole is when she got to play soccer with some men from the town. She stuck out as the only white person and the only woman playing with them, but they all encouraged her on. However, it ended with a surprise.
“As I’m leaving the field a guy says to me, ‘Hey, next time don’t play with the prison team,’” said Berndt.

Apparently, she had jumped in on a game between inmates during their recreational time in the park.

Back at Whitman, Berndt is preparing for her oral examinations as a senior history major. Her topic is on music as a form of protest. She is also a member of the Delta Gamma sorority, having twice been an officer within the sorority. Berndt was also a member of the Student Athletic Advisory Committee as a sophomore and junior.

Before she leaves, Berndt has a few words of advice for her younger teammates.
“I would just say work hard. The beauty of playing at a D-3 school is that the opportunities are endless,” she said.

Ultimate Frisbee hopes to ‘get as close to nationals’ as possible

Many players on the Whitman Ultimate Frisbee team have a raw dedication and passion for the sport.

On the men’s side, first-year Colin Smith also plays for Rhino, a club team based out of Portland, Ore. Smith started playing ultimate during his first year in high school, not knowing much about the sport. Since then, Smith said, “Ultimate has become one of the most enjoyable things I do. It’s definitely worth the time commitment, and I had a really tight group of friends who I played with in high school.”

Smith makes the drive from Walla Walla to Portland to catch about half the practices for Rhino. Three Whitman ultimate players—first-year Jeremy Norden, senior Micah Jarnot and senior Jonathan Loeffler—also play for Voodoo, another Portland based club team.

In the fall, practices are mostly pick-up style, with guys and girls playing together about three times a week. The ultimate season officially starts in spring, and the men’s and women’s teams practice separately to work towards the Ultimate Player’s Association hosted tournaments: sectionals, regionals and nationals.

“Our goal is to get as close to nationals as possible. We play against a lot of national caliber state schools, like the University of Oregon, and it’s hard to play against them because the schools are so much bigger,” said Smith.

Several members of the team have already played a tournament in Santa Cruz. Although the team doesn’t have a coach, the captains are organizing several trips around the northwest, as well as a possible trip to Atlanta.

“The fall is less of a time commitment and more laid back than the spring,” said Jarnot. “Another thing is, a lot of people who join the team didn’t play in high school, so all of the starters are kind of on the same page.”

New volleyball coach ‘loves’ Walla Walla

The Whitman volleyball team (5-5) won their conference opener at home against George Fox University on Friday 3-2 (18-30, 30-24, 30-22, 22-30, 15-12) in front of a raucous crowd of 150, most of them extremely vocal students. The game was new Head Coach Carolyn Papineau’s first home win and first conference win in her first try.

Papineau came to Whitman after spending three seasons as head coach of the U-14 team with the Washington Volleyball Academy. Previously to that, she was head coach at Ingram High School in Seattle for five years after serving as an assistant at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colo., in the early ‘90s.

However, the decision to come to Whitman was an easy one to make.

“I love Walla Walla,” said Papineau. “I had wanted to come to a slightly smaller community than Seattle.”

The system run here was also similar to that at the Washington Volleyball Academy, where she established solid connections with high school players that will assist her when she begins recruiting here.

Aiding her in making the transition is Assistant Coach Michael Villanueva, who was a player for Walla Walla College and most recently assistant coach for the men’s team there. Specifically, Villanueva is helping take stats of Whitman’s players during practice, which is a brand new system Papineau is implementing this year.

“It is so necessary to have someone at practice, taking the stats and interpreting them,” said
Papineau.

It doesn’t hurt that Papineau inherited a talented team, either.

“When I ran a short practice for my job interview, I could tell they were an athletic, mobile,
enthusiastic and competitive bunch of young women,” said Papineau.

Such a type of player is needed for Papineau to implement her style of coaching where the practices are close to the pace of the game. The team does this in order to make the transition into game situations an easy one.

“I’m a coach that asks my players to be both mentally and emotionally focused on the game,” said Papineau. “I’m definitely looking for competitive athletes who are willing to take some risks and play out of their comfort zone.”

So far, her team has been impressed with her ability as a coach and have responded well to her style of coaching.

“She’s really technical. She knows about the game,” said senior Leslie Compean.

“We have a lot of players with a lot of talent. [Her coaching] is helping us refine our skills,” said sophomore Alex Graves.

As a result, her players believe in the team’s potential to go far this season.

“From what I saw last year, and knowing what our team can do with this coach, I think we have a chance at winning conference,” said Graves.

Their coach echoes that sentiment.

“I’d like this team to be regular contenders for the league championship and qualifying for the NCAA tournament,” said Papineau.

However, with all the expectations going into this season, Papineau doesn’t forget that the young women on her team are students as well as players.

“My goal is always to take what kids are learning on the court and take that into their lives,” said Papineau.

And if the team keeps winning five set thrillers like they did against George Fox on Friday, then Papineau will be around long enough to see that happen.

Sex, drugs and… (Republican) politics

The G.O.P was struck by another ill-timed scandal, as it was revealed to the media on Aug. 27 that Larry Craig, senator from Idaho and one of two senate liaisons for Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign, had pleaded guilty earlier that month to misdemeanor disorderly conduct charges stemming from a sex-sting operation in a Minneapolis airport restroom. This is the latest in a string of G.O.P ethics scandals to have broken over the past year and the second to involve an individual with direct ties to G.O.P presidential campaigns.

Sen. Craig was arrested in June as part of a police sting operation targeted to prevent the solicitation of homosexual sex in the airport restrooms. According to the police reports, an officer was stationed undercover in one of the bathroom stalls attempting to encourage solicitations for sexual activity. The senator entered a toilet next to the officer and proceeded to tap the officer’s foot with his own, finally sweeping his hand under the stall. The officer then flashed his badge under the divider and proceeded to arrest Craig.

Craig later submitted a guilty plea to the Hennepin County District Court affirming his culpability, where it was confirmed and filed on Aug. 8.

It was not until Aug. 27 that the story came to light, with news of the guilty plea being published by the Congressional newspaper Roll Call. Within four days, Craig had been asked to step down from his committee positions and was no longer working for the Romney Campaign. On Sept. 1, he announced his tenuous resignation at the end of the month, but in recent days has come out with a much more aggressive posture, stating that he plans on fighting any ethics charges leveled against him. Furthermore, Craig has stated through his lawyers that if they can get a judge to throw out the guilty plea, there would be no obstacle to Craig retaining his seat for the remaining 16 months of his term. This reversal in stance has caused further consternation among the party elite, eager to put the incident behind them and get it out of the headlines. It appears unlikely, though, that he would seek to regain his office at the end of his term. As a former chief of staff and Craig family friend George C. Casey revealed to the New York Times, “What he is trying to do is to get the maximum leverage to clear his name for himself and his family, as a human being, and that’s the plan he has.”
This crisis comes less than a year after another prominent G.O.P sex scandal in which Rep. Mark Foley resigned after a series of explicit IM conversations between himself and underage male pages were made public and it was revealed that he had been having inappropriate relations with underage members of his staff. In addition to Foley, several other prominent Republicans have been caught violating the various ethics standards they claim to champion (both Foley and Craig supported bans on gay marriage and Foley spearheaded various anti-child-pornography initiatives). Thomas Ravenel, former South Carolina state treasurer and Rudy Giuliani’s campaign manager in South Carolina, was indicted for possession of cocaine less than a month after Craig’s arrest. Following that, Sen. David Vitter, R-LA, was identified in July as a client of the Washington prostitution ring operated by Deborah Jeane Palfrey, aka the “DC Madam.”
To be sure, the bad behavior is not limited to the right side of the aisle. Prominent democratic donor Norman Hsu, who made sizable contributions to both the Clinton and Obama campaigns, was arrested earlier this week on fraud charges. It appears that Hsu had outstanding warrants for his arrest stemming from several investment schemes he had executed over 10 years ago. Both campaigns are donating to charities the funds they received from Hsu. However, the Democrats are not in the same political bind as the Republicans, and violations such as the Hsu scandal are unlikely to affect the outcome of the 2008 elections in a prominent way.

At a time when the Republican Party is struggling to reconcile an unpopular war, mounting immigration concerns and an unstable financial market, it would seem logical to turn to the moral base of the Republican identity that Ronald Reagan forged in the 1980s and George W. Bush rode to victory in 2000 and again in 2004. However, as the ethics violations mount, to do so may come across as increasingly hypocritical to voters who are quickly becoming disgusted with the “culture of corruption” that has been revealed over the course of Bush’s second term in office. It seems that with the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales earlier this summer and the failure to forge any significant consensus on the immigration issue, the Bush administration is starting to feel its lame duck status.

These new scandals, however, go beyond the current administration. Both Craig and Ravenel have strong ties to G.O.P presidential hopefuls, and several Republicans have had to return funds donated to them by Foley’s campaign. To voters, this could appear to be a sign that the corruption and hypocrisy goes beyond the current administration and that the party itself is seriously in jeopardy of losing its coherence and legitimacy.

Sources of Information:
All information and quotes were obtained from one or more of the following sources

New York Times (directly quoted)
The Nation
The Washington Post

Our Greatest Threat: A reply to ‘What is at Stake’

On Aug. 24, 2007, Professor Shampa Biswas delivered an address at Whitman’s convocation ceremony. Entitled “What is at Stake,” her address was a fiery and eloquent call to action against forces she described as threatening the very mental sanctity the university was built to cultivate. As a conservative at Whitman, I am used to disagreeing with the public wisdom, but her speech troubled me less for what she included than what was left unsaid.

I agree that the calling of the modern university is to push students to think for themselves, to question their assumptions, and Professor Biswas outlined several very real threats to that calling. The growing corporatization of academia, the pushes from several interest groups to punish academics who question the accepted wisdom and the targeting of particular professors by certain radical groups to suppress their ideas are all unacceptable.

But when she mentioned the Academic Bill of Rights I bristled. The Bill was written by an admittedly partisan David Horowitz, but the tenets themselves are fairly uncontroversial.

They demand that professors be hired and students be judged on the basis of their competence instead of their ideology, and that a diversity of viewpoints be presented when it comes to controversial subjects both in the funding of speakers and the selection of class reading lists. (The full bill can be found on Wikipedia.)

When I sat down to discuss this with Professor Biswas, she told me, “In principle it’s a good idea. If the attempt is to make a case for representing different ideological positions, if the case is for freedom of speech, of course I support it” but that in practice it was being used by Horowitz to gun for professors whose views he wants to silence, a practice she called “witch hunting.”

I can understand her concerns, and I admit there are issues with the bill as a piece of legislation (Horowitz wants the government to enforce it), but the Academic Bill of Rights is a response to a very real threat.

To begin with, conservatives are vastly outnumbered on college campuses today. A survey reported in the Washington Post found that 72 percent of teachers at American universities described themselves as liberal and just 15 percent conservative. The report’s abstract further discovered that after adjusting for professional accomplishment and other factors, conservatives on average teach at lower quality universities than their liberal peers.
Given the disparity, it is unsurprising that many campuses have become hostile to conservatism. In a separate survey of students, 42 percent strongly or somewhat agreed that some courses were one sided, 22 percent felt there were courses which professors made hostile to certain political or social opinions, 21 percent felt that there were certain viewpoints on campus that were “off limits” and most terrifying of all: 29 percent felt there were courses in which students had to agree with the professor’s political or social views to get a good grade. That’s obscene. To be fair the report did not ask whether these instances of one sidedness were liberal or conservative, but in most categories when the report broke respondents down by political affiliation, concerned conservative students outnumbered liberal students by a 2 to 1 ratio. On the last question over half—52 percent—of conservative students agreed. Over half.

Nor are administrations friendly to conservatives. In this state alone, the University of Washington shut down a bake sale the College Republicans were using to protest affirmative action after a student tore down the price sheet and started a fight. One Washington State University student received negative evaluations and had to undergo “diversity training” after telling a professor he was a conservative Christian. WSU has since recanted. Even Gonzaga tried to discipline their College Republicans for “hate speech” after the group put up fliers promoting a conservative speaker. This is not protecting diversity, this is thought control.

Despite all of this, I don’t think giving the legislature control over the classroom is the answer. There is no reason to think they’d be any more objective, but the threat the Academic Bill of Rights was written to address is a real one, and we must all work to confront it.
It is not a pro-Israel lobby or a right wing pundit. It is not the proponents of empire or the Bush administration. Nor is it liberalism, which deserves its place at the table no matter how much I disagree with most of it. The threat to academia we face is the loss of faith in the idea that the people we disagree with still have something to contribute, that we should listen as well as talk, and admit that we are not so certain that we can afford to silence certain points of view. What we as a society are losing in the modern university are our academic rights and, with them, our educations.

Former Pakistani PM back after seven year abscence

In a highly controversial move, former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif returned to Pakistan after a seven-year exile to challenge the government under General Pervez Musharraf.

Musharraf lead a military, but bloodless, coup d’etat against Sharif and took power on Oct. 12, 1999, in the wake of the coup. His first action in power was to exile Sharif for 10 years. The supreme court of Pakistan recently ruled that it was legal for Sharif to return after only seven years in exile.

Musharraf’s government has been under harsh criticism for the past several years for many reasons. Musharraf declared when he was reelected into the office of president that he would end corruption in Pakistan.

If anything, he has done the opposite.

Especially in the last year, the corruption has reached unusually high amounts, even by Pakistani standards. In 2006, the Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index ranked Pakistan at 142, placing it only 22 spots from the final entry. By comparison in 2001 Pakistan was ranked 79 on the same index, meaning Pakistan dropped 63 places in five years.
This is what has led to Sharif’s move to return to Pakistan three years early. His goal is to challenge the government under Musharraf and rally the people’s support against him. His task has been made easy by the corruption under Musharraf.

In a joint poll, done by CNN-IBN, Indian Express and Dawn News, the majority of Pakistan’s people believe that corruption has increased under Musharraf. According to an International Republican Institute survey, as of August 2007 64 percent of the population of Pakistan does
not want to see another term granted to Musharraf.

Musharraf did not meet Sharif’s return kindly. Within hours of Sharif’s arrival in Pakistan last Monday, Sept. 10, 2007, he was arrested and deported back to Saudi Arabia, where he has served the majority of his exile.

Musharraf took police action to prevent Sharif’s supporters from meeting Sharif at the airport. In the chaos of the moment, the police fired several shots into the crowd. It is reported that several people were hurt, but there are no reported deaths. This move has caused outrage at Musharraf, who is already facing low popularity.

The implications of this may have a global effect. Because of the outrage this has caused, there may be a change in power soon in Pakistan, but nothing is certain.

The supporters of Sharif are contesting the legality of Sharif’s deportation with the supreme court. The supreme court is likely to rule in favor of Sharif.

There has been tension between the supreme court and Musharraf since Musharraf tried to sack the top judge on the supreme court.

Benazir Bhutto, also a former prime minister of Pakistan, has said she will return to Pakistan on Oct. 18 after a self-imposed exile. Bhutto exiled herself after being charged for corruption. The charges are likely false.

Bhutto has been trying unsuccessfully for some time to reach a power-sharing deal with Musharraf.

“Pakistan is a military dictatorship, led by a sitting chief of army staff,” Bhutto told BBC radio.
She is intending to offer opposition to this government, just as Sharif is. Bhutto is trying a more democratic route than Sharif, which has met much less opposition than Sharif’s stance.
“The ball is now in General Musharraf’s court. If he wants to hold fair, free and impartial elections, I think he really needs to do a deal with the opposition,” she said.

Bhutto is also working off the advantage of not being barred from reentering the country. Pakistani officials have said that Bhutto will be allowed to return but will have to face corruption charges in court.

“I’m not worried about these false charges,” she said in response to these remarks.
It will be interesting to see what comes of these oppositions to the current government under Musharraf. It is likely that there will be radical change in Pakistan in the next few years, which will affect the entire world.

Iowa Electronic Markets best poll data in accuracy

I am a person who hungers for the day my telephone rings and a pollster is on the line, asking me if I have a few minutes to answer some questions. Polls are used to gauge the sentiments of America, and the idea that one can reliable do this based on the opinions of a sampling of a few hundred people is fascinating. Even more so is the accuracy of political betting markets such as the Iowa Electronic Markets (IEM), where you can place bets on candidates and elections months in advance. Whereas polls can tell the current attitudes of the populace, the IEM can, with startling accuracy, predict the outcomes of elections.

A study done by the University of Iowa College of Business Administration titled “Results from a Dozen Years of Election Futures Markets Research” outlines some of the reasons for the impressive track record of the IEM. According to the report, “Traders are not a representative sample of likely voters; they are overwhelmingly male, well-educated, high income and young.”

Why, then, is the IEM a useful forecaster? The report says it is because traders are thinking differently about elections and politics than those answering poll questions. They are putting their money on the line, creating an incentive for thinking critically about the current political environment. They are less likely to ask themselves who they’d like to win and more likely to ask who other people would like to win—then place their bets on the latter judgment.

The study offers a complete analysis of the presidential election of 1996 as an example of the long-term accuracy of the IEM. Clinton’s margin of victory over Dole comes to around nine percent; just after Super Tuesday (Mar. 15) the IEM was predicting a Clinton victory by a margin of seven to eight percent. The IEM stayed in the five to nine percent range through Apr., while Gallup polls were predicting a Clinton victory by 13 to 22 percent, and Harris polls were predicting a 22 to 30 percent margin of victory. The IEM markets were significantly more accurate.

As the campaign progressed, the IEM fluctuated around the nine percent mark, but never over- or under-shot by more than six percent. Polling data spent months off by an average of 12 percent (with outliers much above that and a little below).

The IEM prediction for the 1996 election “diverged from the correct outcome in the final days close to midnight on eve of the election with prices further from the election outcome than they had been since the Super Tuesday primaries in March.” The study cites a “large cash influx by new traders” placing last-minute bets as the source of the inconstancy.

Last-minute inaccuracy is not the norm. In the 1988 Presidential Election, the IEM had a 0.2 percent error the night before the election, whereas the polls had a 2.7 percent error. The IEM also bettered polls on the eve of the 1992 presidential election with a 0.4 percent error to an average poll error of 4.4 percent.

The IEM can be cautiously used as a predictor for election outcomes over both the long- and short-term. Now, then, the all-important question: What is the IEM saying about the current election? As of this writing, the favored Democratic presidential nominee is Hillary Clinton, at 65.80 dollars, followed Barack Obama at 20.70 dollars. John Edwards trails in third place with 7.80 dollars. On the Republican side, Rudy Giuliani takes the lead with a price of 31 dollars even, followed by Mitt Romney with 26.40 dollars and Fred Thomson with 24.40 dollars.
Best of all, the IEM currently favors a Democratic presidential takeover 59.60 dollars to 40.30.

Campus Climate Challenge looks towards an energy-efficient future

“Climate change is the problem of our generation,” said sophomore Sarah Judkins. “It’s a social problem. It’s a scientific issue that affects everyone who lives on this planet.”
Judkins and senior Katie King are this year’s co-chairs of the Whitman Campus Climate Challenge, a group that has been campaigning to achieve carbon neutrality on campus.
According to King, “Campus Climate Challenge is part of a national campaign to address global warming and educate local communities about the issue and its solutions. One of the primary goals of the Campus Climate Challenge in particular is to encourage our school to get a clean energy policy especially focusing on climate neutrality.”
It is widely believed that global warming is in large part caused when human activity increases the atmospheric concentrations of certain greenhouse gases. The major greenhouse gases are water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane and ozone. The combustion of fossil fuel for cars, factories and farm equipment has led to the highest carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere in 20 million years, according to Nature, a weekly science journal.
Renewable energy sources, such as wind power and solar energy, do not release carbon dioxide into the air. When an organization pledges to use renewable energy sources to avoid, reduce or offset all greenhouse-gas emissions, that organization is said to have become “carbon neutral.”
“Universities have an obligation as institutes of higher learning to be leaders in the climate change movement,” said King. “If the Campus Climate Challenge is successful at setting up the climate neutrality plan here at Whitman, we could have a huge effect not only on the greenhouse gas level but also on an educational level. A lot of students pass through this institution. They would become more conscious about global warming and will go on to share that consciousness with the rest of the world.”
The Whitman branch of the Campus Climate Challenge was founded fall semester of last year and boasts over 50 Whitman students, faculty and staff. It aims to “persuade the College administration to adopt a plan to achieve climate neutrality within 10 years,” according to the group’s Web site.
More than 380 other colleges and universities have already made similar pledges as part of the American College & University Presidents Climate Commitment. A few schools, such as the Evergreen State College, have already achieved complete carbon neutrality.
As is typical in many environmental debates, “The chief hesitation [preventing the Whitman administration from signing a carbon neutrality pledge] is monetary,” said Judkins.
“That’s a legitimate concern and we’re really supportive of addressing those issues,” said King. “That’s why energy efficiency is a huge part of our campaign. If we can get Whitman to consume a lot less energy, then it would cost a lot less to go climate neutral.”
Right now, Whitman gets more than 20 percent of its energy from renewable sources. Our most important renewable energy source is wind power from the numerous wind turbines near the Whitman campus. In addition, the Hall of Science is heated and cooled by geothermal energy, a type of renewable energy that is obtained by harnessing heat from miles under the earth’s surface. The Outhouse uses solar energy from the panels on its roof.
Campus Climate Challenge would like to ensure that the college continues to invest in energy-efficient initiatives.
“Whitman is already doing great things for green initiatives, but we want to see more. And we want to see it in the sustainable energy direction,” said King.
“Now is the time we need to act,” said Judkins.
The Campus Climate Challenge meets Tuesdays at noon and welcomes new members. Their Web site can be accessed at whitman.edu/climatechallenge.

Whitman Hiking Club Presents: Take A Hike

Walla Walla is located in the midst of breathtaking natural scenery. Senior Jack Ferrell and sophomore Sarah Judkins, both members of the Whitman Hiking Club, share their favorite trails for both day and overnight trips.

Harris Park
“One of my favorite hiking memories is waking up on a ridge top in Harris Park and seeing a herd of elk on the next ridge over,” said Ferrell, founder of the Whitman Hiking Club. Harris Park, 14 miles southeast of Milton-Freewater, has a beautiful trail hike up a creek valley in between rolling hills—“and there’s blackberries!” said Judkins. The more ambitious, said Ferrell, can take a steep off-trail hike up the hillside for better views of the woods and fields. For a longer hike or a backpacking trip, the ridge tops provide great camping spots.

North Fork Umatilla
Wilderness
Located 30 miles east of Pendleton, the North Fork trail follows the Umatilla River through the Blue Mountain range in Oregon. Ferrell says it’s a little hard to find by car but worth the trip. The close proximity to Walla Walla makes it a good day hike; it’s also a popular fishing spot.

Juniper Canyon
Juniper Canyon is only a 40-minute drive west of Walla Walla, which makes it a good place to spend an afternoon. There’s a sand dune on a hillside above a creek where hikers can both climb and relax. Ferrell says there are plans to dam the creek, which would destroy the wetlands and canyon.

Eagle Cap Wilderness
Eagle Cap, part of the Wallowa mountain range in northeastern Oregon, is about a 2.5-hour drive from Walla Walla. Both Judkins, who hiked Eagle Cap in fall, and Ferrell, who went in March, emphasized that there were no other people for miles around. The trail is above the tree line and winds through meadows, alpine lakes and, in winter and early spring, snowy peaks. Judkins and Ferrell recommended Eagle Cap as a good destination for a longer backpacking trip.

The Whitman Hiking Club provides opportunities for all levels of hikers to get out of Walla Walla and into the wilderness. The Whitman Outdoors Program has gear to rent for longer backpacking trips.

2007 Farm Bill: Can small farming be economically feasible?

Old McDonald doesn’t exist anymore. That is, the Old McDonald who had a farm and on that farm he had a pig, cow, et cetera has probably sold off most of his property and moved to the city.

According to the Carsey Institute, less than 6.5 percent of the U.S. labor force is engaged in farming. Since 2000 migration from farming counties has accelerated and population losses are now widespread.

Poverty in these rural areas is equally widespread. Between 1994 and 2001, the federal government spent two to five times more money per capita on urban rather than rural community development. The largest single source of governmental support to rural communities is agricultural subsidies.

These subsidies are traditionally allocated every five years through the Farm Bill. The 2002 Farm Bill passed in an election year when crop prices hit rock bottom and critical votes lay in farm states.

The 2002 Farm Bill doled out about $20 billion worth of commodity subsidies to farmers. Of the $20 billion, about 90 percent goes entirely to five crops: corn, wheat, rice, cotton and soy.

The U.S. subsidizes these crops so heavily that it lowers global market prices. This hurts many countries that rely on agriculture as their means for development. Worldwide, 1.2 billion people live on less than $1 a day; about 75 percent rely on agriculture as a means of income.

This economic favoritism is also responsible for the disappearance of many small farmers, leading to the collapse of local food networks and a reliance on carbon-intensive, long-distance transport of food.

A study conducted at the University of Michigan estimated that it takes an average of seven to 10 calories of input energy to produce one calorie of food. Most of our food is transported in diesel trucks that get only two to five miles per gallon and most food travels 1500-2000 miles to land on your plate. The study estimated that 10 percent of the energy used annually in the United States was consumed by the food industry.

Subsidies and artificially low energy prices are what make large-scale factory farms economically feasible. Cheap oil will not last forever; world production has already peaked. As the price of oil rises, we’ll be forced to reevaluate our food systems and place more emphasis on less energy-intensive agricultural methods, like smaller-scale local and organic agriculture.

The new 2007 Farm Bill has the potential to stop these government hand-outs and make small farming more economically feasible.

The bill has already gone through the House but the resulting bill didn’t change the system of commodity subsidies. The Senate vote is coming soon. In anticipation, students from the University of Washington and Vassar College are organizing a National Student Day of Action for an Equitable Farm Bill this Friday, Sept. 21.

In support of this movement, Whitman’s Campus Climate Challenge is holding an event this Friday on Ankeny Field from noon to 1 p.m. They will be encouraging students to sign letters to their senators in support of a more just farm bill.

In addition to reforming subsidy allocation, the 2007 Farm Bill attempts to address a number of environment issues. The letter will ask senators to boost conservation programs that help farmers protect our natural resources.

Into the Woods: What does your backpack say about you?

The Backpack Test sprang from a contest I saw once posted in American Girl Magazine. “What’s in your backpack?” the posting read. Show them, and three lucky winners would be featured with short biographies. As a ten-year-old, I dumped out my burgundy GAP backpack for my very first test: Five-Star brand folders, a glue stick and sprinklings of pretty rocks I had collected, now gray from rolling around in a backpack. Nothing that could interest magazine editors looking for kids who packed their bags with curious relics. No Nerf balls, no slinkies, nothing Weird Al would approve of, like weasels or bear claws or 10-pound bowling balls. Not even left-over sauerkraut. I knew those editors sought the eclectic happenstance of life rolled into a portable sack. I aspired right then to create such a blend. They were looking for kids who were Interesting!

It had to happen casually. I knew I couldn’t just raid our house. American Girl Prize Winner Totes Japanese Fan, Pop Tarts and Her Mother’s China Doll Collection. It just wasn’t believable. The Backpack Test rated Interestingness by one’s unconscious grouping of often-used objects.

I went on to use the Backpack Test on prospective friends and lovers. Sometimes it’s a purse instead of a backpack, every once in a while a shopping cart. It’s surprisingly telling about morals, fetishes and basic standards of hygiene. Some people sport their eyelash curlers. Some, soccer cleats. Or taco truck wrappers. I live with a woman who comes home with basil sprigs in her purse.
What’s in your backpack? I’ll bare my soul to y’all and tell you what’s in mine.

1. An onion. A Walla Walla Sweet, for that matter. I met Jenny Gilbert at the crosswalk yesterday carrying them home from the Farmer’s Market. Oh delicious Farmer’s Market. “Want one?” she said. Of course.

2. Ah! A spider! As I sit and write, it has dropped from the ceiling. Ah, get it out! Do spiders like onions?

3. India ink. I hope to God it doesn’t spill, because when I paint I stick clothes in my backpack and expect them not to get ruined. I love India ink. It’s like eyeliner for art. Seductive, sweeping and makes the colors pop on everything it outlines.

4. An Ampad notebook, nine-and-a-half inches by six. When I studied abroad, you couldn’t find big notebooks like American students use. So now I buy them tiny.

5, 6, 7… a crumpled marigold, a butter knife, nail clippers, half a pink crayon; a metal clip museum pass from the Walker in Minneapolis; Iridescent Medium for watercolor, three types of black pens, a plum pit from the organic garden. An old Pio from which I cut words to make a Dadaist poem in art history. A blue paper crane, Venus razor refills, and a butterfly made out of a tea bag.

Your backpack tells stories you’ve already forgotten. Take the test.

Gendered orientation workshops spark controversy among first-year males

Two sexual misconduct workshops were held because Mike Domitrz, the traditional Opening Week “Can I Kiss You?” speaker, was not scheduled to present until Sept. 13. This meant first-year orientation did not incorporate any sexual misconduct event.

“There was no way we could not have an Opening Week discussion about this topic,” said Associate Dean of Students Barbara Maxwell.

The goal of the women’s event, led by Maxwell, was to promote awareness of the issue and identify risk-reduction strategies. The men’s workshop, led by Sean Gehrke, assistant director of Residence Life and Housing, and George Theo, former director of student activities, focused on awareness and prevention strategies.

Conflicts arose when some participants in the men’s session questioned aspects of the policy.

“They were trying to get around the policy, just to prove a point that they could,” said first-year Matt Coleman.

Although Coleman did not believe that these men were actually interested in taking advantage of policy loopholes, he said, “It was a big waste of time in the end, because they’re going to follow the policy—they have to.”

“I think there were comments and questions looking at more semantic things and language things and trying to get down to the nitty-gritty of what the policy did and did not cover,” said Gehrke. He did not feel that conflict ever escalated to a point of concern.

Maxwell said that this kind of conflict was anticipated. “There’s always one point where it sticks when you’re talking about this, especially with young men, and it always has to do with the combination of alcohol and responsibility,” said Maxwell. She felt that many of the male students didn’t realize how few reports are made a year and that it’s not a matter of one sip of beer.

“What they want is this really clear line,” said Maxwell. “The problem is, when you deal with alcohol, there’s no such line, because that line moves every single time you’re in a situation. And that’s what makes it really challenging.”

She described one incident in which the female student was vomiting, the male student was holding her hair back from her face, and then they had sex.

“He thought that was okay,” said Maxwell. “Well, she didn’t even remember what the heck happened the next day.”

Maxwell feels that this kind of alcohol impairment is characteristic of sexual misconduct hearings and that these kinds of specific examples should be used in future years to make the program more effective.
Gehrke saw positive outcomes from the debate.

“I think it provided a good opportunity for people to voice their opinion and have their peers confront them,” Maxwell said. “I think it did a good job of making them feel comfortable talking about [sexual misconduct].”
First-years Patrick Miller and Adrian Tuohy both agreed that the workshop was effective.

“It’s important that everybody gets introduced to [the sexual misconduct] policy right when they get here,” said Miller. “This was a great medium, I thought, of doing that.”

Gehrke felt that the workshops also provided a good context for Domitrz’s presentation. Maxwell agreed, emphasizing the idea of “dosage.” She viewed “Can I Kiss You?” as a good follow-up for the Opening Week workshops. She wants this kind of programming to have a more consistent and visible presence on campus.

One thing she thinks will help with that is bringing the comedy group “Sex Signals” to campus in the spring.
Gehrke also hoped to create more programming on campus. Something he believed has been attempted at Whitman in the past is the creation of a “men against rape” or “men against sexual assault” group like those established on many other college campuses. He hopes another attempt will be made to create such a group on campus this year or in the near future.

“[Sexual misconduct], while it’s not reported very often, is actually occurring very frequently. It’s kind of like the iceberg, and oftentimes we can see the tip of it sticking out of the water, but we don’t see all the stuff happening below the surface,” said Maxwell. She hopes to make the bottom 99.9 percent of the iceberg more visible on campus.

Sweet Onion Co-op to open within 18 months

The Daily Market Co-op, formerly the Sweet Onion Co-op, was formed four years ago with a grant from the Associated Students of Whitman College (ASWC). Since then it has become a community owned, democratically run food co-op that operates as a buying club. The buying club offers a wide range of natural, organic, fair-trade and locally grown foods, which can be purchased at the Daily Market’s office at the Cinderella House (508 East Main Street), every Monday through Friday from 1 to 5 p.m.

The Co-op has recently changed its membership structure. While members once paid a yearly fee, they will now purchase a share in the Co-op. A share costs $150 and is payable in installments. It is also refundable because students are able to sell their shares back when they leave Walla Walla.

The main reason behind this change is that the Co-op is pushing to open a full-service community grocery store that is owned by the people who shop there. “The vision for the Co-op is and always has been to become a full-fledged store,” said senior Kari Martin.

Last year the Co-op received a grant to do a feasibility study in the community and found that it would be quite possible to open a successful cooperative grocery store in Walla Walla. “The majority of Co-op members and volunteers are from the community,” said senior Alice Bagley.

“The aim of the Daily Market is to fulfill the needs of our members,” said Bagley, “and we really want to focus on creating a local food system in which food grown in Walla Walla is eaten by the people of Walla Walla.” One of the goals of the store is to have a much larger selection of locally grown foods.

The plan for the Daily Market Co-op is to open within the next year and a half. However, this depends of the support of its members.

“The sooner we get lots of members, the sooner that we can open,” said Bagley.

The Co-op welcomes everyone to attend its Membership Kickoff event on Thursday, Sept. 20. The hour-long event will be held at Verve. Drinks and snacks, all of which can be purchased through the Co-op, will be available starting at 7 p.m. At 7:30 p.m. there will be a presentation about the current state of the Daily Market and its goals for the future.

“We want to pack the Verve with people who are interested in the Co-op, people who have already been involved with the Co-op and people who have never heard of it,” said Martin.

“We want people to get together and eat good food together,” Bagley said. “We’re really all about eating good food all of the time.”

Whitman, Walla Walla synagogue combine to observe Rosh Hashana

Last Wednesday at sundown, Jewish communities worldwide began ringing in the Jewish New Year. Rosh Hashana marks not only the celebration of the creation of the world and the start of another year, but also ushers the Days of Awe, a 10-day period of penitent introspection culminating in Yom Kippur, a final day of atonement.

Blowing the traditional shofar, an instrument made from a ram’s horn, awakened believers offer ancient prayers and poetry heavy with themes of relief and repentance in order to reconcile sins of the past year and to start anew.

Twenty-five members of Whitman’s own Hillel Shalom took part in services at the Congregation Beth Israel in Walla Walla. The group is affiliated with the national organization of Jewish college students of the same name and works in an active partnership with the community congregation. This year’s holiday was celebrated both at the synagogue and on campus.

Following prayers at the synagogue on Wednesday evening was a traditional reception, an omeg, in which apples and honey covered banquet tables inviting guests to get a sweet start to a sweet year. Visitors greeted one another with “Shana Tova Umetukah,” a wish that translates as the wish of “A Good and Sweet Year.”

The holiday lasted until Thursday at sundown. That morning, prayers were offered again at the synagogue, punctuated with the call of the shofar. Intended to wake sinners from their sleep and reinvigorate their faith, the shofar calls, “Wake up from your sleep. You are asleep. Get up from your slumber. You are in a deep sleep. Search for your behavior. Become the best person you can. Remember God, the One Who created you.”

In the afternoon, believers organize observances of tashlikh near natural water. The practice involves reciting prayers near the water and then throwing pebbles or bread into the water to symbolize the “casting off” of sins. And so as Jews in New York City cast their sins and bread off the Manhattan and Brooklyn bridges and Orthodox Jews in Jerusalem found isolated fish ponds to do the same, Whitman’s own Jewish group participated in the sacred ritual at the shores of Lakum Duckum.

Deeming this year’s observance a success, Rachel Stein, president of Hillel Shalom, is already looking forward to additional programming for Jewish students.

“Every year the campus has more and more active Jews and other people just interested in learning about what we do.” Stein also says the group plans to work with others on campus sharing similar intercultural focuses.
This is a busy time on the Jewish calendar—Yom Kippur is fast approaching and Hillel Shalom is already planning for the upcoming sukkot festival. Prayer offerings and a break-fast are scheduled at the synagogue for Yom Kippur and Whitman’s group is possibly taking on the construction of a traditional sukkah to be placed on the Reid side lawn. The harvest celebration involves the construction of these booths in which Jews dwell in during the holiday.

“It’s a chance to sleep outside,” Stein describes, “you can see the stars through the roof and decorate with harvest symbols like pumpkin and squash. It also makes for a great public display to help us educate the student body.”

Hillel Shalom meets every Friday at 5p.m. and encourages all who are interested to come and learn more.

Crytser’s Corner: How to choose your major successfully

“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge,” exclaims the prophet Hosea in his fourth chapter, and thousands of years and miles from the sinful Northern Kingdom, the same lament rings true. We are blinded by pride and can not see the truth, be it ever so apparent.
Yet, there is hope: Even if knowledge of wisdom and justice is outside of our reach, we can still refine our exploitation of physical and mental delights. Even the sinful can reach some approximate truth, and even the wicked can detect, albeit only partially, the divinity of beauty.

Even if we follow Luther in labeling reason as “the devil’s harlot,” we still recognize the immediate animal need of defeating boredom. As long as we are confined in study to the evil of worldly knowledge, we might as well have fun. To that end, I offer this manual for successfully determining a major course of study.

Does learning about the way our economic system adapts and operates interest you? Or how about studying the way money and markets, or resources and research, interact? What about analyzing the effectiveness of investment strategies, or the relationship between the private and public sectors? What about wealth, and its effect on consumer choices? Then leave this place, and never darken our door again. On failing to do that, polish off an “economics” degree, thou black heart.

We all read through roughly the same sequence of books in Core, from the daring brilliance of James Patterson’s “Violets Are Blue” to the dark introspection of Michael Crichton’s “The Andromeda Strain” to the heady, passionate lyricism of Panati’s “The Pleasuring of Rory Malone.” Despite completing the course, many students wish to read these immortal classics again, this time in the original language (usually Greek or Latin, sometimes Hebrew or Cajun). A “classics” major equips every would-be translator with the tools necessary to read some of the oldest, driest and, presumably, most magical texts in the world. Whether it’s Greek, Latin, or some pointless and indecipherable combination of the two, you’ll never want for textual analysis with a classics major.

So far, these points have emphasized the intellectual at the expense of the physical pleasures. Still, there are many students whose talents do not extend beyond having a keen sense of timing, or a commanding stage presence, or an explosive maddening vanity. What good can games of speculation do for such disciples of the flesh? The “theater” degree offers all of the fun of court intrigue, Depression-era suffering, and Southern Gothic insanity with none of the real blood. While violence, pain and insanity commonly befall theater students, particularly those endowed with a certain prideful quality called hubris, modern technology has reduced their casualty rates to below 50 percent. Also, theater students are by federal statute guaranteed a “living wage” of melodrama, substance abuse and illicit sex. The only downside is this: Eventually, you will graduate.

If you do not fit into any of the above categories, I apologize. It’s not easy being you, and perhaps you can solace yourself with a drink or an “English” major. Probably not. But then that’s why they invented “psychology.”

Students, staff learn from new Core curriculum

Though many Whitman first-years may not be aware of it, Antiquity and Modernity has undergone a major overhaul since last year.

Core professors voted on two curriculum options for each semester of the class last spring, eventually selecting a set of works for this school year that introduces six new works this fall and nine in the spring.

General Studies Professor Jennifer Mouat, now in her third year of teaching core, has been pleased with the results of the new core plan’s implementation.

“I’m excited about the changes,” Mouat said. “I’m really enjoying teaching these texts. I’m looking forward to ‘Wuthering Heights’ in the spring and ‘The Bacchae’ this fall, especially.”

This year’s core curriculum was created by the Core Curriculum Committee with Power (CCCP), the same group that presented the list of works for the vote last spring. According to Mouat, there were a variety of factors that contributed to the alteration of core, including a faculty questionnaire that asked teachers to evaluate the existing curriculum.

The questionnaire information was used to work toward a curriculum that better met both student and faculty desires.

Mouat said that the CCCP pursued, among other goals, the creation of a curriculum that represents world views from a wider range of geographic regions.

CCCP member and General Studies Professor Zahi Zalloua said his committee did the best they could to meet these desires when creating the new curriculum.

“We have very open-minded colleagues,” Zalloua said. “We were motivated by the greater good. We wanted to create contrasts between these texts … we won’t pin down the ideal syllabus because the ideal syllabus doesn’t exist.”

The first two texts have already pulled first-year students away from the Western world. The first, the “Epic of Gilgamesh,” is set in ancient Babylon. Written around 1700 B.C., long before other works of antiquity, the epic poem is one of the world’s oldest.

Herodotus’ “Histories” has also been added this year and, despite its Greek origins, the text serves to add diversity to core in its own way. In its telling of the story of the Greeks and the Persian war, it reveals much about Persian and Egyptian cultures of the fifth century B.C.

The new works seem to be going over well with the student body. First-year Nigel Ramoz-Leslie said he missed seeing “The Odyssey” on his syllabus, but “Gilgamesh” proved a worthy substitute.

“I thought ‘Gilgamesh’ was a great text to start the year off with. It was a good read, and it offered a lot for casual discussion,” Ramoz-Leslie said.

Mouat said that switching texts from year to year in core can present a challenge for teachers as they have to learn new material themselves.

“It is a stretching experience for me to learn each new text, just as it is for the students. I think it’s valuable, however, for students to see how faculty handles something new and unknown. In a way, it makes us more alike as I feel like a first-year teacher (and student) again this term,” Mouat said.

Nonetheless, professors seem to have the works well in hand, according to first-year Tegan Klein.

“[Prof. Jana Byars] leads us to a lot of good places in discussion and makes a lot of good points. She keeps the discussions lively,” Klein said.

Until last spring, Whitman professors had found changing the core curriculum a lengthy process. Unified decisions were difficult to attain, especially with different professors strongly attached to different texts.

The solution was for Core professors to create the CCCP and agree to trial-run the committee’s new core curriculum during the 2007-’08 school year.

While that means a new list of works for professors, it has also meant diversification of core texts and the opportunity for students and faculty to make new corrections between works.

For Zalloua, this year’s changes represent a move in the right direction for core classes.

“Ideally, I would love to globalize Core even more … this is not a timeless syllabus, it is in perpetual flux,” Zalloua said. “I think these texts will complicate a certain understanding of Western values, and complication is not necessarily a bad thing.”

Walla Walla sexual assault resources come to campus

Domestic Violence Services Officer Chalese Calhoon and YWCA Director of Client Services Danielle Hill will begin having open office hours Thursdays in Reid Campus Center’s meeting room 110, starting Sept. 20, from 3:30 to 4:30 p.m.

These open office hours will offer Whitman students the chance to come and talk to Calhoon and Hill about any questions related to sexual assault in a confidential and low-pressure atmosphere. The office hours evolved from discussions between Calhoon, Hill and Sexual Misconduct Response Coordinator Barbara Maxwell.

“The three of us have been trying to figure out how to make resources in Walla Walla more available to Whitman students who might want to take advantage of them in cases where they’ve experienced any form of sexual assault or sexual violence,” Maxwell said.

Last semester, Maxwell issued a comprehensive safety survey for students to take for the first time ever. It got her thinking about the safety services that Whitman offered and where there was room for improvement.

“One of the things that I think we’re really, really good at is the support services that we offer to students if they have been sexually assaulted. Where I think we’re weak is sort of the preventative efforts before something happens,” Maxwell said.

Maxwell also wants the office hours with Calhoon and Hill to be an opportunity to dispel the misperception that “the college tries to hide incidences of sexual violence.”

“That’s really untrue,” Maxwell said of that viewpoint. “We started working together to help educate the campus so that they’re aware that there are local resources and that the college not only knows that they’re there, but the college is active in promoting them.”

Calhoon said that the office hours will be an informal, confidential resource for students.

“We can provide outreach to the students so they know we’re out here if they need something like temporary shelter or medical attention,” Calhoon said. “We have no agenda. We just want to let people know we’re here to help with whatever questions you have and to make that an easy process.”

The office hours can put students in touch with other resources, including the police. But, Calhoon stressed, there is no pressure to report a criminal offense.

“Sexual assault is obviously a crime, and we want to give victims the opportunity to at least consider if they want to pursue a criminal case and see what that looks like,” Calhoon said.

Assistant Director of Residence Life and Housing Sean Gehrke thinks that Calhoon and Hill’s office hours will be a good resource for the campus.

“They’ll be able to provide a lot of insight about any issues that people have questions about, so they’re good resources and expert opinions, if you will,” Gehrke said. “People can come to ask questions, whether it’s around issues of sexual assault or just anything they’re curious about.”

Sophomore Julie Grimm believes that the low-pressure atmosphere of the office hours is valuable.

“Some people might not feel ready to come to the police with an accusation, but to talk to them in a more laid-back setting that’s not pointing fingers might be really good and helpful for people,” Grimm said.

Junior Brianna Sullivan agreed.

“I personally appreciate any effort the Whitman community makes to help people who’ve been victims of sexual abuse,” Sullivan said. “People think it won’t happen to them, and people think that it doesn’t happen at Whitman, and those are both wrong.”

“What can it hurt to have one more resource?” added Sullivan. “If that resource can help just one more person through a traumatic experience, then I think it’s worthwhile.”

Calhoon agreed, but she wants to put more emphasis on prevention of sexual assault.

“How do we motivate females to use our voices?” said Calhoon. “I think we’re so groomed to be polite and nice, and when it comes to sexual assault and date rape, it’s like we’re paralyzed to say anything or hurt anybody’s feelings by telling them ‘no.’”

Calhoon pointed out that the office hours are available to any Whitman student, not just to females. The office hours are also not strictly for questions relating to sexual assault; Calhoon welcomes any questions relating to parking tickets, DUIs, alcohol, friends in jail, employment opportunities or research papers.

The office hours will continue for at least this semester and will be renewed depending on how often they are used.

What did YOU do last weekend?

Time travel! Right? Time travel? Oh, you went to the all-campus frat parties. Well, so did we…IN TIME!! No, but seriously, the all-campus parties are a hallowed and time-honored tradition that have been around for longer than anyone at Whitman cares to admit. We took a casual jaunt through some wormholes to bring you an exclusive report on this oh-so-often neglected facet of small private liberal arts school Greek life history.

Spice Up Your Local Newspaper!

So, I assume you all read last week’s issue of the Pio, right? Well, I hope you did, otherwise these jokes are already deader than that huge petrified forest in California. But anyway, you probably noticed that there’s not exactly earth-shattering news going on most weekdays in Walla Walla… at least, there aren’t any lip-synching controversies with one of the a cappella groups or accusations of human-rights abuses during pinging. Hell, there hasn’t even been a proper listserv debate so far this year. You can probably understand that it’s up to good old journalistic voodoo to pique your extremely short attention spans with a news story in the Pio, and that’s where an age-old skill comes into play: the sensationalistic headline! Take a gander at a few of these choice headlines from last week’s Pio after they’ve been sensationalized and tell us you wouldn’t choose them over some dry old issue of the New Yorker any day of the week.

Accreditors to visit Whitman’s campus, evaluate assessment standards

Three years ago, Whitman faculty members went to Seattle to attend a conference on to learn about what it meant to be accredited.

“The first year our heads were spinning because we were just getting introduced to all of this, and it felt like they were giving us this monster,” said English professor Jean Carwile Masteller, who helped to write a report on Whitman College for the Northwest Commission of Colleges and Universities (NCCU).

Eight members of the NCCU will visit Whitman in October to evaluate and report on various aspects of the College in a decennial process called accreditation. The NCCU evaluates on nine specific standards and makes recommendations and commendations for areas of excellence and areas which need improvement.

For three years a committee of Whitman faculty has worked to write comprehensive reports on Whitman’s compliance to these nine standards. Associate Dean of Faculty Tom Callister chaired the committee.

“Something I don’t think people understand is that on the one hand it is a nice snapshot of college, but on the other hand it is through someone else’s lens,” said Callister. “These reports are written with real constraint.

There are things that don’t make it into the report that are really great aspects of Whitman, but they don’t fall under any of the standards.”

Despite constraint, the committee that wrote the report chose to write it in two volumes, allowing each academic department to address their unique ways of dealing with course material.

“Putting all the department reports together allowed us to show how different people go about assessing what they do, and how they go about incorporating that into our program,” said Carwile Masteller. “We learned an awful lot.”

Accreditation is important because it affects students’ eligibility to be accepted to graduate and further undergraduate programs, faculty members’ ability to receive grants or federal funding and college’s ability to do different programs.

“It’s a stamp of quality,” said Callister. “If Whitman wasn’t credited, you wouldn’t be able to go to graduate school.”

Carwile Masteller and Callister agreed that there is no real danger of Whitman not being accredited, but the quality of the report is still important. In recent years, more and more schools up for accreditation have received recommendations in areas of assessment—that is, the measurements a school uses to asses its students in various ways.

“Some of [the emphasis on assessment] comes out of the No Child Left Behind mentality of accountability. Some of it comes out of the notion that accreditation is a one-size-fits-all thing,” said Callister. “There’s a very prevalent idea that most things can be measured.”

While Whitman has ways of evaluating to ensure that students are learning what they’re supposed to be learning, its liberal arts philosophy sometimes deals with assessment in unconventional ways.

“One of the things we decided very early on was that [Whitman] assesses all the time, but we rarely call it assessment—if ever—and we rarely quantify it, with the exception of student grades,” said Carwile Masteller.
Students will be invited to participate in the accreditation process on Tuesday, Oct. 2 at noon, when there will be an open forum for students to answer questions asked by the committee. Similar sessions will be held for Whitman faculty and staff.

Findings will be reported at 11 a.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 2. The committee will read a list of commendations and recommendations, citing the standards for reference. President George Bridges will comment on the report as well. The meeting should last about 15 minutes.

The accreditation process won’t end until January when Callister and Bridges will go to Seattle to stand before the commission, where they will be told how various commendations and recommendations were interpreted in terms of severity.

“I think we have written a solid report,” said Carwile Masteller. “We may not say everything there is to say, but we address the standards.”

Point-Counterpoint!!! Happiness Vs Tree(s)

Everyone knows we’re the happiest people on Earth AND that the Princeton Review are the best, most controlled poll-takers anywhere. Look it up, it’s a fact. Eighty six percent of you believe that, too. But what are we more proud of, our record-setting smiles or our record-setting Catalpa trees? What, you didn’t know that “Seven record trees can be found on the Whitman College campus” as declared in Robert Van Pelt’s Champion Trees of Washington State? Champion! That means at some point another tree had to pack up its dreams and go home because our tree KICKED ITS ASS! So who’s better?



Happiness: I’ma kill you, tree.

Tree: That’s completely beside the point. In a question of who brings more prosperity to Whitman, it’s me. Not only do I harbor the wildlife that our students know and love, but—

H: Shut up. You know why people come here? Because of our L.L. Bean-quality poster shots of teenage U.N-delegates laughing at the empty space between them on Ankeny or other quirky locations. You think we could make those things if our students were just “content”?

T: I’m on those posters too.

H: Yeah, but you’re not a feature player—no one says, “Look at that tree! I’m going THERE.”

T: Well, what about all the dissatisfaction with the statistics about fraternities and their paint-related activities? Where does that come from if you’re really doing your job?

H: I can’t control what happens over at Phi Beta Miserable.

T: That’s not real.

H: Neither are termites.

T: Yes they are! They are very, very—

H: Shut up. Just shut up before I give you termites.

T: You can’t do that.

H: I’m Happiness, you soil-depleting moron! Termites eat because they’re happy eating!

T: I just, just…I don’t feel like this conversation is going anywhere.

H: You’re not going anywhere, you’re a friggin’ tree! AH HA HA, BURN IN HELL!

Editor’s note: Following the conclusion of the debate, Happiness got overconfident and promptly destroyed itself by joining the debate team. Tree got depressed and metamorphosed into one of those whomping shitberry trees around campus that smell terrible.

Volunteer Fair connects students with community groups

The Fall Volunteer Fair was held in the Reid Campus Center Young Ballroom on Tuesday, Sept. 11, during lunch. Twenty-three local agencies set up tables to present their volunteer opportunities to students; the fair also included sign-up sheets for Service Sunday—held Sept. 16—and applications for the Whitman Mentor Program and Story Time Project.

Lina Menard, coordinator for the Center of Community Service (CCS), was impressed with the amount of interest Whitman students showed in giving time outside campus.

“Many students have specific interests or skills: health care, Spanish or working with children,” said Menard. “It’s exciting to be able to give them this opportunity to use those skills to help the community of Walla Walla.” This is Menard’s first year at the CCS.

Seth Bergeson, the Community Outreach Project intern, both helped plan and attended the Fair.

“We had 139 students come to the Fair, which is less than I wanted to see,” said Bergeson. “The students who were there showed a lot of interest, though, and we handed out a lot of Mentor and Story Time applications.”

Six community agencies were new to the Fair this year: the Daily Market Cooperative, the Downtown Foundation, Girl Scouts, the Sustainable Living Center, the Walla Walla County Waste Management Division and the Walla Walla Native Plant Society.

“The agencies are interested not only in sharing their projects with students but in networking with other community organizations at the Fair,” said Menard.

An important upcoming volunteer event is Make A Difference Day on Oct. 27, which offers several opportunities for students to get involved in community projects. More information can be found at the CCS office in Reid 219.

Walla Walla’s VA granted expansion

After 50 years without major improvements to the campus of the Jonathon M. Wainwright Memorial VA Medical Center, Walla Walla’s veteran community is looking forward to receiving care at the new state-of-the-art 96,000 square foot outpatient clinic to be built on-site. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs recently approved the preliminary plan to co-locate primary, specialty and mental health care services into a single complex.

Formerly the cavalry post of Fort Walla Walla, Wainwright Memorial was named on the Historic Register in 1974 and still uses 15 of the original 19th century structures. The medical center is comprised of nearly a dozen one-story buildings connected with a covered walkway and the shape and layout of the site is still very much in the style of the early fort. The campus looks as much like the tuberculosis treatment center that stood here in the 1930s and 40s as it does a modern hospital that provides primary and long-term care for veterans in a wide variety of areas from psychiatry to gastroenterology.

The VA has made the best of their humble surroundings and are proud and appreciative of the sense of community and tradition such a layout fosters. Veterans from the nursing home can walk outside and admire the bronze statue to the Medal of Honor recipient for whom the hospital is named and remember the tens of thousands of veterans served at Wainwright Memorial over the last 80 years. Maintaining this historical site during the construction of the new complex is a prerogative of both the community and the VA.

While final budget submissions for the new clinic will not be considered until 2012, the multi-million dollar project has reinvigorated a veteran community that has spent the better part of the last 10 years fighting just to keep the medical center open.
As recently as 2004, Wainwright Memorial faced the threat of closure by the recommendation of a named Capital Asset Realignment for Enhanced Services (CARES). The commission reviews VA sites and recommends allocation of funds according to “the accessibility and cost effectiveness of care.” Closure was one possibility among many, including the termination of crucial in-patient services like geriatric and psychiatric care. It took the tenacity of numerous veteran advocate groups, a special task force chaired by Duane Cole and vociferous legislators from the Pacific Northwest like Sen. Patty Murray to publicize the benefits of the VA and demonstrate the lack of alternatives, especially those involving psychiatric care in Walla Walla. The community has its own members to thank for bringing the region’s sole veteran’s medical center back from the brink of forced governmental foreclosure.

Wainwright Memorial has struggled financially in the past, so much so that several of the old cavalry buildings can neither be used nor adequately preserved because of hazardous lead paints and the cost of labor and materials to restore them. The hospital also strains, like medical centers nationwide, to attract qualified staff.

Still, Walla Walla’s VA serves an impressive 13,000 veteran patients annually and has recently hired 29 employees with pending start dates this month.

“It’s all about fiscal responsibility,” Associate Director Chris Martin said. “We just don’t have the kind of demand to warrant certain services.” Instead, the VA frequently refers acute care situations and often dentistry to civilian medical centers. The veteran’s benefits still apply in these referral scenarios, and the majority pay nothing save a small co-pay even when they choose their own doctors and dentists. The new facility, while expanding the scope and quality of care provided, will also be run along these lines, allowing veterans to visit clinics in their own communities.

To the 65,000 veterans served by Walla Walla’s VA medical center, the building proposal and its reassurance of the medical center’s survival is a welcome relief. Stretched across 14 rural counties of Washington, Oregon and Idaho, these veterans worry about extending commutes to VA hospitals in Spokane, Portland or Seattle.

Fortunately, with Wainwright Memorial’s additional funding and expansion, the hospital now emphasizes outreach to those veterans in rural communities. The parent organization to Community Based Outpatient Clinics (CBOCs) in the region, Walla Walla’s VA can encourage veterans to seek care in Lewiston, Richland, Yakima or La Grande. Furthermore, veterans with need of routine checkups and tests can participate in the VA’s Telecare program. Without cost to the patient, in-home machines specifically monitor certain chronic conditions and can substitute frequent commutes to the VA hospital.

Such programs are among the most innovative in healthcare today. Martin has worked in the administration of VA hospitals nationwide and was proud to say that the Veterans Health Administration is at the forefront of medical research and healthcare development, especially in the areas of diabetes treatment and prevention, orthopedics, and cardiac health.

Walla Walla’s VA, Martin said, boasts an award-winning wound care research team and a highly respected mental health program, two specialties that make Wainwright Memorial ideal for veterans from Iraq who, under other circumstances, may be considered untreatable.

Much of this is possible due to the increased budget awarded by Congress last May. The decision awarded the Department of Veterans Affairs with a 10 percent budget increase amounting to approximately $3.2 billion. And to what do we owe the increased funding? Martin cites war in Iraq, but partly credits the sensitivity regarding veteran care after the Walter Reed scrutiny early this year.

“Interest in veterans fluctuates with the demand of care and with the public awareness of that demand,” Martin said. Martin explained that veterans’ need for care is constant and that an emphasis on their needs can be difficult to maintain in Congress. Of the upcoming presidential election, Martin says it’s “anybody’s guess” as to how well the VA will be funded in the future. With a whopping 24,000 soldiers wounded already in Iraq, hospital administrators like Martin hope that the expanded budgets keep coming.

In the midst of planning, hiring and budgeting, the hard-working staff at Wainwright has not lost enthusiasm for the cause at hand.

“I don’t know how anyone could not be excited about what we do here,” said Jake Shaw, both a former patient and the current Public Affairs. “We like to say ‘it’s now our turn to serve.’”

Counseling Center lends an open ear to Whitties

Counseling Center, Richard Jacks, 22 percent of the Whitman student body was seen in some capacity by a counselor last year. That’s a little over 300 students. Students at rigorous schools like Whitman often complain of the stress of college life, so the question is why more aren’t taking advantage of the mental health resources offered to them. In most cases it seems to be because no one knows what these resources actually are.

First-year Lissa Erickson heard about the Counseling Center “during opening week, mostly about sexual misconduct.” When asked what she knew was offered there, she replied “I know there’s counseling for free.” She’s referring to the half-hour sessions students can get with a therapist, eight per semester free of charge. The Counseling Center currently employs four clinical psychologists and one religious counselor.

One senior, who asked to be quoted anonymously, pointed out that eight free sessions is sometimes not enough.

“Whitman does not, in my experience, do a satisfactory job in accommodating low-income students (or middle class, as we’re known in the real world.) This unfortunately extends to my not being able to afford more than the eight free sessions per semester.”

This particular student had been seeing Dr. Jacks to help manage depression he had recently
developed. He added, “I do realize [the free sessions] are still a lot better deal than I would get at any other counseling office.”

The point remains that both of these students, and presumably many others like them, are not being made aware of the other services the Counseling Center offers. Listed on the Web site and in literature available in the office are the following (in this case taken from an office pamphlet):

*Individual, confidential counseling

*Group counseling, specializing in sexuality and grief

*Workshops on self-esteem, hypnosis and body image

*A Resource Library of books, handouts, videos and tapes available for check out

*Referral program for students or staff members concerned about someone close to them

*Open hour, when students who need to be seen immediately may walk in without an appointment

*Lights for Seasonal Affective Disorder therapy

*Confidential Peer Listening with another Whitman student

The Center also accepts suggestions for how to improve their offerings.

Students who do visit the Center enjoy their time. A member of a group of senior women, who also asked to remain anonymous, said, “The Counseling Center is the cornerstone of Whitman’s mental health system.”

Another added, “It’s actually the only part of Whitman’s mental health system.”

Both felt that the Center was adequate, saying “everyone here would be cuckoo bananas if there were no Counseling Center.” The two present who had been inside described the Center positively, calling it “really nice inside, and the staff is great.”

Some Whitman students would like to make regular appointments with counselors but can’t due to time constraints. One senior said she hadn’t gone yet in her time at Whitman despite wanting to because she knew, “There are only four counselors, and I feel like if I went I would be taking time from someone who needs it more.”

When told about the more readily available peer listening option, another student present said, “No one uses that. Why would you do something like that at a school this small?
Everyone knows everyone and [the listener] would know all the people you mentioned.”

As in any counseling center, all information passed through the office at Whitman stays entirely confidential and is only released to specified sources through written student consent. Counselors at Whitman can also refer students to other professionals in the area.
Whitman’s Counseling Center is located at 502 Boyer Avenue, and can be contacted at (509)527-5195 or at whitman.edu/content/counseling

This week in ASWC

ASWC Oversight Chair Shayna Tivona announced her intention to resign her post last week, stepping down after serving for the first two weeks of her second term.

Tivona, who held the same position last year, was planning on retiring after her first term, but then Director of Student Activities George Theo, who advised ASWC until his departure from the Whitman community this summer, convinced her to stay.

Sophomore Jordan Clark, who sat on the oversight committee last year, will fill the vacancy left by Tivona’s resignation.

Because the Oversight Committee runs all elections, including the first-year elections held on Sep. 17, Tivona’s resignation will not be effective immediately.

“Really, we’re phasing me out,” Tivona said. “I’m still running elections and coming to meetings to make sure the transitions go smoothly.”

Tivona has no doubt about Clark’s ability to take over her place. “I have total faith in Jordan and his ability to chair the Oversight Committee,” Tivona said.

Clark, meanwhile looks forward to taking over the committee chair. As Oversight Chair, he will be responsible for overseeing ASWC and ensuring that the codes spelled out in the ASWC Constitution and its by-laws are followed. The Oversight Committee, which is selected from a pool of applicants who are not on ASWC Senate, runs all disciplinary or impeachment proceedings for ASWC.

“A big part of my role is to be a sort of fundamentalist,” Clark said. “I need to oppose changes to the by-laws unless there is a really specific reason to do so.”

Clark has already set forth various goals for himself and his committee. He hopes to see a stricter application of ASWC’s attendance policy. Also, he wants to increase the efficiency of ASWC meetings by ensuring that all senators and officers are well versed in Robert’s Rules, which spells out standards of procedures for ASWC sessions.

Clark’s primary goal is to improve communication between the oversight chair and the students. “They need to know we’re here,” said Clark. “Their senators are here to listen, and oversight members are, too. Any complaints you have. We almost never get complains outside of the ones we get from senators or EC.”

Members of the executive council have updated the Web site (whitman.edu/aswc), which now includes current contact information for all ASWC representatives and officers, schedules for future committee and senate meetings, and other resources and information for anyone curious about the inner workings of the association that spends your student fee on your behalf.

GETTING NAKED: Whitman students want to take it all off

“It’s about acceptance,” said senior Zac Strode.

“It’s a way of claiming space,” said sophomore Lisa Mattson.

“It makes you feel at one with nature,” said sophomore Devon Spika.

“It’s a major right of passage to college,” said sophomore Camila Thorndike.

“It’s a bonding thing,” said sophomore Spenser Meeks.

“It lets you toy with social norms,” said senior Clint Kalan.

Different students have different reasons for getting naked. Regardless of the reason, it is not uncommon to find naked students roaming Whitman’s campus. Although not technically legal, many students maintain that not wearing clothes is not really that big of a deal. “Everyone’s nude under everything,” said sophomore Cassie Lee.

College and nudity often go hand in hand. “It’s a part of popular college culture. In movies it’s usually college kids that you see getting naked. That’s not why I do it but I think that this is a unique time in our lives that offers considerable social freedom and choices, more so than perhaps any other stage in life,” said Thorndike.

“I was really uncomfortable with my body and with getting naked all the way up until college. A lot of guys worry about getting naked because it will show everyone the size of their penis. I finally realized that just because someone sees it doesn’t make it any smaller and wearing pants doesn’t make it any bigger,” said Strode.

Body issues prevent girls, too, from getting naked. “Girls have to deal with the whole sexual object thing. You’d rarely find a picture of a naked guy in a girl’s dorm room, but I’ve definitely seen them in guys’ rooms. We take off our clothes and some guys interpret that as sexual,” said Thorndike.

Social norms also must be overcome. For many nudity-lovers, once they get rid of their own fears about getting naked, they still have to deal with the qualms of others.

“With one group of friends at Whitman I’d get naked right away. But with a different group I wouldn’t, because I wouldn’t want to make them feel uncomfortable. I try to do everything I can to make people feel comfortable,” said Strode.

Strode then told a story a night when he, Spika and Thorndike were hanging out on campus naked and a pair of freshmen walked by.

“We asked them if they wanted to get naked but told them they didn’t have to. They didn’t, but they still hung out for a bit,” said Strode.

“Surprisingly, a lot of people didn’t notice us, either because they didn’t care or because they were too wrapped up in their own lives,” said Thorndike of her experience wandering naked across Ankeny.

Lee noticed the Thorndike and Spika as she was walking to the library. “It was kinda weird that it was just two people instead of a team streaking, but everyone is pretty open to nudity at Whitman, so I guess it wasn’t that weird, they were probably just drunk,” said Lee.

Actually, the pair was sober. Spika believes that it’s more genuine that way although she acknowledges that drunk streaking is fun, too.

“Alcohol allows you to forget a lot of your body image issues, but I think that [getting naked] is still just as liberating,” said Meeks.
“I’ve only streaked sober, and it’s nice,” said sophomore Krystina Andrews.

In many other parts of the world, it is not uncommon to find people sober and naked hanging out in broad daylight.

“I lived in Europe for five years where nudity isn’t an issue,” said Spika. “There are no shower curtains and at the beaches there are lots of topless or naked people, young and old. At first, I felt uncomfortable showering naked with a bunch of people, but I think it was actually more awkward to be standing there in a bathing suit than to just get naked like everyone else.”

Unfortunately for some, America has certain laws regarding nudity. Washington law states that a person can be found guilty of indecent exposure for “intentionally making any open or obscene exposure of his or her person.” It becomes a gross misdemeanor if the person exposes him or herself to a person under 14.

Walla Walla municipal code follows along the same lines but adds that this applies to any area open or visible to the public.

Whitman Security Officer Terry Thompson cautions students that this means that if a student were to streak through Reid or Penrose and there was a person under the age of 14, the student could potentially face serious consequences.

Many students believe that the amphitheater is a “clothing-optional” zone.

This is just not true. “There is no clothing-optional place on campus besides your dorm room,” said Thompson.

The area around the amphitheater used to have taller trees, so perhaps that rumor began when it was more secluded. However, a couple of years ago Thomas found evidence that someone had been hiding in the bushes, pleasuring himself.

“We have to think of your safety. You put yourself at risk when you’re naked, especially if you’re alone,” said Thomas.

Although Whitman prohibits “lewd, indecent, obscene expressions or disorderly conduct,” Thomas said that Whitman security officers are unlikely to chase down students they see streaking. However, if the police become involved, it’s a different story.
Sergeant Mike Moses of the Walla Walla police department says that if the police catch Whitman students on campus and the nudity is not “overly offensive,” then most likely “we’ll just tell them to put there clothes back on and go home.”

However, if the nudity occurs downtown, the person is more likely to get a ticket and be required to go to court.

Legal consequences aside, some people just like getting naked.

“Regardless of the shape or form of someone’s body it raises the level of their beauty when they display enough courage to throw down their societal tethers and get naked,” said sophomore Larsen Close.

Stress is dead.

I have decided that I don’t believe in stress.

This revelation, which came to me sometime last week, has been overwhelmingly unpopular among the Whitman students I’ve shared it with:

“I’m stressed out,” someone will say.

“Oh. I don’t believe in stress,” I’ll respond.

Then there’s a pause and a blank stare. So I’ll continue:

“I just think stress is a relatively useless emotion. I find it unnecessary, often fabricated, counterproductive and I just don’t believe in it.”

“Yes, but how can you not believe in stress?”

“I just don’t. I refuse to.”

“That’s fucking bullshit, Sophie. I need a cigarette.”

I guess I have to grant stress the validity of existing, at least to some degree. The feeling is unmistakable: there’s a certain shit-oh-shit-oh-shit-oh-shit buzz that creeps up on you, usually at around 2:30 a.m. in the library on a week night. I suppose you can call that stress.

What bothers me is the sheer volume of students who let stress rule their lives, time and time again.
Evolutionarily, stress must exist to motivate us; to put a sense of urgency in our blood in order to get our adrenaline going and our feet moving. Other species must feel stress, too. Like, when a rabbit sees a wolf six feet away and licking his lips, the rabbit is bound to feel kind of stressed out, right?

But there’s no way that turning your paper in late, skipping your 9 o’clock because you just don’t have it in you to go, or sitting on the sidelines during practice is ever going to get you eaten alive.

After a double-all-nighter fueled by literally dozens of two-shots-in-the-darks and nausea-inducing energy drinks, this realization finally struck me. I sat on my bed, closed my eyes and thought, “There is no way this can be healthy.”

And I was right.

Here’s a quick lesson in health: According to medical researchers all over the world, stress is a huge risk factor in infectious disease and has even been said to cause cancer. In fact, the U.S. Center of Disease Control and Prevention says that 75 percent of all health problems reported to doctors in the U.S. are stress-related. This is no new discovery: Stress has been the subject of over 20,000 studies in the last 20 years. That’s how serious it is.

And yet, people take pride in their stress. Stress is supposed to make you tougher. Stress is supposed to demonstrate your strength and wit. Maybe enough stress will even get you laid (“Oh Jenny, I saw Sam on Ankeny this morning and he looked soooo stressed. I wanted to have sex with him there and then”).
That’s strange considering it’s comparable in health to obesity or cigarette-smoking.

Regardless, everyone gets stressed out. One might argue that it’s unpreventable. Every once in a while, you just need to feel stress. It pushes you forward. I’ve met many people of many different walks of life, and all of them have been stressed out at one time or another.

What’s amazing to me, though, is that out of every group of people I’ve ever come into contact with, college students exhibit by far the most stress. More than journalists on deadlines; more than actors before shows; more than businessmen after Wall Street took a major hit last summer; more than women on welfare living in housing projects in Chicago. College students are the most stressed out. Now that’s just silly.

College is supposed to be fun. This is the opportunity of a lifetime, folks: Most people in the world never get four years just to learn. Interested in jazz music? There’s a class for that! Like to dabble in book arts? You’re in luck! Really, it’s like we’ve won the ultimate lottery. We get to sit around all day and read and write and explore and grow.

And still, you can’t go to the library and say, “Hey, how are you?” without getting at least one “Stressed out,” as an automatic response.

Ultimately, I think too many students try too hard to be perfect. That ‘A’ on your transcript is just not as important as you think it is. As long as you’re doing something you love, it should never stress you out. If you’re not doing something you love, you shouldn’t be doing it.

Obviously it’s not that simple. Sometimes you know you want to learn the stuff on the syllabus, but the work it takes to get there is just so daunting, and the professor is just such a tough grader, and you don’t even know what an Oxford comma is, so how are you ever going to get the paper done? When I hit those moments, I try to put things into perspective. I take a deep breath, remind myself that I actually want to learn this stuff and if I don’t get the best score in the class I won’t tear myself up over it. I’m not going to take my ‘C+’ home and drown it in a box of PBR.

That’s one thing I can’t understand at all: I get the impression that there are a number of people on campus who party as hard as they can on Friday and Saturday night just to make the stress dissipate for two nights. What’s that all about? Doesn’t that just exacerbate the problem? On Sunday you’re just nursing a hangover and Chaucer is even less appealing than he was in class.

There’s a fine balance to being in college. We have to simultaneously take advantage of being academically pushed to our limits and of being in a unique social climate of like-minded people forced to coexist. Frankly, all the opportunities can be overwhelming.

Take them in moderation. Relax. Observe. Enjoy.

I was telling my freshman year roommate about my theory on stress, and to my surprise she said,
“Yeah, I don’t believe in stress, either.” She told me while she was studying abroad in Mexico she didn’t feel pressure to be perfect because all her classes were in Spanish and that was everyone else’s first language but not her’s. She just let it all go and did what she could. The experience kind of freed her.

Ultimately, life is short. College is shorter. Take the classes in the course catalogue that you wish you could take but they don’t fill any of your distribution requirements. Be able to laugh at yourself when you don’t succeed. Stress doesn’t have to be the Lord and Savior you pay your homages to: Just stop believing.

Gnomes: Why ASWC isn’t working

ASWC legend tells of a recognized club in ancient lore. The way I heard the story is this: A group of industrious community builders decided that ASWC was ineffective—that it was a bureaucratic machine that had outlived its usefulness. To illustrate this fact, they came up with the most pointless club they could: the Friends of Gnomes. They gathered the minimum of 15 signatures and applied for recognition from ASWC, which would in turn gain them all $150. After a long, hard-fought battle, the defenders of gnomish rights won out, took their $150 and ran.

They were right. They would still be right today. ASWC has a lot of problems: The senate spends time debating whether to recognize clubs like Friends of Gnomes. Once the Friends lose recognition because their representative didn’t come to a joint session (where they would most likely spend their time doing homework), the senate debates whether or not to forgive them. The senate enacts resolutions like CODA (a symposium planning committee resolution from last year) and their resolutions have no effect on the campus environment. The question that has material significance here is “why?” Why is ASWC ineffectual?

For one thing, senators need (to some extent) to take themselves seriously. Obviously, the senate doesn’t oversee Bon Appetit or Residence Life, but they can have an impact on the community we have. If the senate seeks to be a body advocating student rights, it needs to act like it—enact legislation that positively affects campus life.

An example? One piece of legislation in the works does have that kind of legitimacy: a textbook rental program. Programs like this have cut costs by as much as 70 percent at other schools on books offered as rentals, and the senate is looking into supporting this kind of a program here.

The problem is this: They must take it seriously and put in the hours to work with the administration, the bookstore and the financial institutions at play here at Whitman. They can’t let themselves get pushed around. They need to tell these people that the students want this and that they’ve got a mandate to seek it. That’s the function of the senate—to tell the other agencies on campus what the students want. The senate may not have the power to implement a textbook program, but it can call for one. A large part of what made CODA ineffective was that, as I wrote last week, the Bridges administration ignored it. The senate needs to assert itself as the representative leaders of Whitman students, and Whitman students need to back them up if/when the college fails them.

There’s one other thing that needs to fall in line if ASWC is going to be significant at all: you. You play a large part in all of this. If ASWC is to be effective, you need to support and to some extent invest in it. If you want to lead the symposium, you have to assert the leadership that the senate is trying to garner for you. If you want to have a textbook rental program, you need first to talk to your senators: Tell them to get it done. Then, once it is done, you need to follow through with it: Ask your senators what happened with it. Ask the bookstore staff what happened with it.

Of course this isn’t going to fix everything. Senators will sometimes be elected because they’re attractive, the college administration will sometimes discount their policies and some students won’t care about either of those things. At the end of the day, ASWC is still a student government. My question is this: Can’t it be an effective student government?

Goodwill fire forces store’s temporary closure

For more than three weeks, the Walla Walla chapter of Goodwill Industries International on 217 E. Alder St. has been closed due to a mysterious fire sparked on the night of Aug. 27. The fire destroyed a Goodwill donation truck, caused smoke and water damage that devastated half the building and racked up more than $100,000 in total property damage.

Although the cause is still unknown, the fire was determined to have originated at approximately 1 a.m. from a stack of boxes piled up in the alleyway behind the building. The truck parked out back and the cargo inside it were completely obliterated before firefighters arrived on the scene, but a much more catastrophic disaster was narrowly skirted as the fire was contained before it could ignite a nearby gas tank. The Goodwill building is currently undergoing extensive renovations and all donations are being received around the corner at 36 Spokane St.

Whitman sophomore and Pioneer editor Alex Kerr was on the scene the night of the blaze and
called it in when he realized what was happening.

“I was meandering to Safeway, and downtown was utterly deserted,” Kerr said in an e-mail. “I smelled firecrackers and saw this plume of brown smoke that I thought looked too dispersed to be a real building on fire. But as I got to about the pub, I could hear crackling, and the smell was strong enough I thought I should run to check it out. I came around the Odd Fellows building and saw a pile of trash on fire with flames about 10 feet high.”

“I called it in, a cop came, then another, then a fire truck and they had it under control less than 15 minutes after my call,” Kerr said. “It was like clockwork. They were all very calm about it, but incredibly focused.”

Store manager Holli Davis was notified of the incident at 6 a.m. the following day and came to work to find the building in shambles.

“It was a mess, a nightmare,” said Davis. “You pull in on a normal day and everything’s fine, you’ve got power, you can get in, and that day, the back alley was blocked off, there’s caution tape all over the place and the power lines were down. It was just a mess.”

“We were very lucky that [the fire] did not get inside [the building],” said Davis. “It was mostly smoke and water damage from the effort to put out the flames. We lost a lot of stuff in the warehouse, we lost a good 20 to 30 boxes of donations, we lost furniture and we lost electrical equipment. The next day, even firefighters that were in training came down to take a look at the damage.”

Davis said that the city fire department has ruled the fire suspicious and the possibility of arson is being looked into. A city fire official stated that the investigation is still open and pending.

The employees at Goodwill have been sent to work temporarily at other Goodwill outlets in the local chain until the store is rebuilt. Although Goodwill is still accepting donations, the quantity of donations coming in has been cut in half since the fire, and many of the donations that would have gone to Goodwill have instead been redirected to other community thrift stores in town, such as the Blue Mountain Humane Society and St. Vincent de Paul. Davis explained that these stores are currently getting overloaded by donations and have been forced to turn away some donors due to lack of space.

The fire and its aftermath have taken a toll on the Goodwill staff.

“I’m exhausted…I’m ready for my store to be back, honestly,” said Davis. “I’m frustrated and I’m angry at whoever did this. I miss working with my clients. We have four of them here and I miss every single one of them. I don’t get to see my employees but for five minutes a day, and then I have to send them to other stores to work. Some people aren’t even working, which is heartbreaking because a lot of people depend on this check. Not only that, we’re a family here, so it’s like not seeing your mom every day.”

Goodwill has been a landmark of the town since the 1970s and this is the first time in history it’s ever been forced to close its doors for a non-business related reason.

Vandalism is occasionally a problem for the store, but never has the extent of the property
defacement been severe enough to warrant shutting down operations.

Davis has been the store manager at Goodwill for eight months and described her time as a “wonderful experience.”

“We support people with disabilities and help them achieve a higher employment opportunity,” said Davis. “Working with our clients, that’s rewarding in itself when they come in and they look forward to seeing us every day and doing their job, and the smile they get on their face, the confidence that it gives them to be part of the work force…that right there is worth everything.”

Davis hopes that Goodwill will be able to open its doors again sometime in early October. The interior of the building is currently experiencing a complete overhaul, new carpeting and paint are slated to go up and the store is expected to have a whole new look and style upon its grand re-opening.

To students who wish to lend a hand to help Goodwill get back on its feet, Davis encouraged, “Donate! And [when we open again], just come in and shop…shop, have fun. If you guys have ideas, let us know because we want to know what we can do to appeal to you to come here, and we love to take ideas.”

Tea is for Tuberculosis

“TEA AND BREAD, MOMMIES?”

These are maybe the first words I hear sitting in this hospital, the first sounds that aren’t machines beeping and babies crying. In the case of my baby, the sound of breath gurgling through a nose tube. The sounds of exhausted mothers cooing to piles of blankets. These are the words I hear.
“TEA AND BREAD FOR THE MOMMIES! COME ON, MY MOMMIES!”

I am at the Red Cross Hospital in Rosebank, South Africa. This is a suburb of Cape Town where I am living, and I find myself in the dehydration ward with a tiny child sleeping under my palm. To this day, five months later, I don’t know his name because the records in the hospital are so poorly kept.
After all, it’s hard to keep track of orphans.

This baby is a charge at Baphumelele, the orphanage I work with while living in Cape Town, and he has arrived at Red Cross severely dehydrated. Without fluids he can’t receive his TB medication. He is almost six months old. When babies get sick at Bap, they are dropped off at the hospital and volunteers stay in shifts until the child is admitted and treated. More often than not, the waiting period takes days. By the time I get there, my baby has been waiting for 30 hours.

I use the phrase ‘my baby’ very deliberately. While I am with him, he is my child. I have the authority to sign forms as his guardian and advise on his treatment. His medical history is entirely available to me. My first job upon releasing the exhausted-looking volunteers from last night is to pester a nurse until she replaces the nose tube the baby has pulled out. For the third time. It hurts him, and the tube gets caught in the IV through his hand.

I hate that IV.

Two weeks before my night at Red Cross I was in a hospital in Botswana, this time as a patient. I had an IV in my hand and was in fact, like this boy, severely dehydrated. That needle was excruciating. I take shots very well, but something about this needle taped to the veins in my hand was different. And here is this tiny little being, this sick baby, this love of mine, and he has grown accustomed. I would not tell you for a second I am the stronger of the two of us.

So here we sit. I am watching him sleep and occasionally glancing over at the woman to my left who has fallen asleep with her head bent into the crib holding her little girl. And then I hear the tea lady.

“TEA AND BREAD! YOU MUST STAND, MY SWEETHEARTS!”

She said mommies. I clearly stayed seated. No one’s mother am I. A few other women, the ones who are awake, shuffle up. One woman has three children here in one crib. They are attached to a vitals monitor. They are clasped to each other as they sleep.

The baby stirs under my hand, starting to sweat under his blankets. He hasn’t slept more than six hours since he’s been here. I hope to all there is that he doesn’t wake up. For now, he does not. For now, there is only tea and bread.

She really wants me to take some.

“My lovely, you want tea and bread?” She asks me specifically, as her cart is parked in front of our crib. I am not a mother. But there is this baby here below me who pulls at my hair and stares so deeply. Today we have each other, and today I am sleeping with my head bent into his crib.

The tea tasted sweet. The bread was buttered.

A whole new octopus: Inland changes look, re-opens doors

“My kids love it here,” said Walla Walla mother Cindy as she browsed the Inland Octopus toy store on Main Street. “We come here all the time.”

Inland Octopus held its grand re-opening this Saturday, Sept. 15, after undergoing some changes, with an additional 300 square feet to accommodate its growing inventory. The store stayed open during the expansion.

The event was well attended and featured a radio station, a live band (Irish group The Rogues) and complimentary food. “Sparkly the Clown” also entertained children and festive balloons and costumes created a fun atmosphere for the many children present.

With the expansion, the store has increased its book section and now has a section of Christmas toys and supplies. Also in the back is a large model train display that owner Bob Catsiff made himself in only 20 days “out of Styrofoam and a steak knife.”

Inland Octopus opened in 2004, when Catsiff quit his job as a quality assurance manager and decided to do something more fun. That year, the local branch of KB Toys shut down and Catsiff hurried to fill the gap in the market. The store was almost immediately a success. “We were in the black very quickly,” said Catsiff.

Catsiff said his mission statement is to provide toys that “inspire thought, activity and
happiness through accomplishment.” He attempts to sell toys that bigger stores like Wal-Mart don’t carry. “We don’t butt heads with the big boys. We survive well under their radar,” Catsiff said.

Instead of the action figures and electronic games that dominate the toy section in Wal-Mart, Inland Octopus sells many educational and hands-on toys. “A lot of people come in and see things they’ve never seen before,” said Catsiff.

“My kids really like their science kits,” Cindy said, as her son Quinn eyed an X-Stream Air Rocket kit. “It’s like no other place in town.”

The store is also heavily involved with the community. Following the Christmas parade each year, children wait in line at Inland Octopus to see Santa and participate in other festivities.
Inland Octopus is located at 220 E. Main and is open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday.

Toy Spotlight

Toy:“Professional Cartoonist” kit
Price: $19.99
Thoughts: Awesome. This kit includes pens/pencils, a guide, animation strips, flipbooks and an animation zoetrope.

Toy: Pirate Hide-Away
Price: $19.99
Thoughts: After careful examination, I have discovered that this is actually some sort of bath toy, featuring a “soapy volcano” and several plastic pirates. Looking at the giant picture on the box, I’m wondering how this will fit in a tub with the kid. Long gone are the days of simple rubber ducks… oh wait, those are down the next aisle.

Toy: Play at Home Saxophone
Price: Unknown
Thoughts: This plastic saxophone has 18 songs that play when you press buttons, a good alternative to shelling out hundreds or thousands for an actual saxophone? Maybe. Plus, it looks like you can turn down the volume.

Toy: Disgusting Anatomy Brain
Price: $19.99
Thoughts: “Make a Gross Life-size Brain. With Bonus Eyeball Kit!” I wish everything I purchased came with a bonus eyeball kit, don’t you? Why didn’t my biology professor use this as a teaching device, anyway?

Fair trade coffee, something to sip on

I’ve had some questions about Fair Trade for a while. Isn’t it kind of like a boycott? And if so, isn’t it not going to work unless everyone boycotts? What about the non-Fair-Trade farmers? Do they suffer because of Fair Trade? Why on Earth would we try to improve working standards through the market any way rather than politically? To get some answers to these questions, I delved into the economics articles of Penrose Library and interviewed Brittany Smith, Chloe Tirabasso and Bethany Sutro, members of Fair Trade on Campus.

To be certified under a Fair Trade Label, a farm must be part of a cooperative that meets standards for sustainability and working conditions. Once it is certified, farmers are paid a “fair” price for their product, which never falls below a set floor, and contains a five-cent premium to be used for whatever community project the cooperative decides.

As Sam Cornell of the Santa Barbara Independent points out, this cooperative system is controversial because it leaves out plenty of farms that may otherwise meet standards. Brittany Smith believes that eventually the cooperative requirement may be abandoned and that “if checks and balances can be maintained, then the more people to be certified the better.”

The Economist, in a provocative article last year, predictably took a critical free trade perspective on FT, citing concerns that paying some coffee farmers a guaranteed above-market price will depress the market for the rest of the farmers, particularly the poorest ones who work on plantations and can’t be certified for fair trade. Jeremy Weber of the Cato Journal disagrees, pointing out that “Most Fair Trade certified producers sell a fraction of their coffee to the Fair Trade market and the rest to the conventional market.”

The price floor does create a surplus in the Fair Trade market, however, and has for the last 10 years. That surplus is a barrier to getting certified; because Fair Trade already has an oversupply, it can’t let in as many new members as it might otherwise. Weber points out that the way to increase demand is to sell to larger retailers, something that makes some Fair Trade activists uncomfortable.

But if we can’t be comfortable with large companies Starbucks supporting Fair Trade, how can we expect to raise labor standards through the market? Knowing of this oversupply does make Starbucks seem less virtuous when only 3.7 percent of their coffee is Fair Trade, but at least they’re projecting seven percent within the next few years.

The alternative to the market is international treaties to raise labor standards and, yes, these would be a more direct way to make change happen for the better. But they come with their own obstacles, some of which we create. Many poor countries with the worst labor standards can’t afford to improve them because the world market is so heavily skewed toward rich countries.

If we want to improve labor standards in poor countries, we need to remove the subsidies for our goods so that all countries can compete on a level playing field. As it is, trade talks go nowhere and, depressingly, it may actually be faster to work through the Fair Trade market than to wait for our governments to do anything. (And if we bought more local food, maybe our farmers wouldn’t need as many subsidies to survive.)

Chloe Tirabasso emphasized that most supporters of Fair Trade are “not under the illusion that Fair Trade is perfect” but rather that Fair Trade is young enough to be flexible and that as it grows, it will work out some of its problems.

So what can you do? You can buy the fair trade coffee and tea that Bon Appetit provides for us. You can go into Starbucks and ask for a cup of fair trade coffee, see what happens. And you can get involved with Fair Trade on Campus, a campaign under the Campus Greens umbrella. They are working to bring more FT products to campus, including FT sports equipment, and sweat-free clothing in the bookstore. My verdict after a week of research? Go ahead and buy fair.

Petraeus-Crocker report slaps America with harsh reality of Iraq

All United States citizens recently received a slap across the face. Whether you felt it or not depends on your idea of the current situation in Iraq.

Early last week, General David Petraeus and our own Ryan Crocker ‘71, ambassador to Iraq, provided us with their much anticipated progress report on the efficacy of the military surge. This military surge was employed by President Bush at the year’s onset in order to “buy time” for the al-Malaki government to get its act together and become a cohesive, legislating unit.

The progress report was, in and of itself, a false hope. A false hope in providing the American public with a truly transparent view of the situation in Iraq. A false hope in outlining for the American public a sensible strategy for the months to come. And, above all, a false hope in assuring the American public of the righteousness of keeping our preeminent citizens in a country that is all but an apartheid between Sunnis, Kurds and Shi’ites.

On this point even the ambassador himself agrees with me. He unfalteringly noted that “no longer is an all-powerful Baghdad seen as the panacea to Iraq’s problems.” If a strong central government is what Bush sought and if the purpose of the surge was to facilitate the creation thereof, then why are we still funneling $10 billion a month into sustaining this sectarian struggle?

Unfortunately, Iraq will become all but a cylinder of immiscible liquids, kind of like that cool cylinder containing water and several types of oils that you saw in seventh grade science class. Iraq won’t even become a federalist state—that is, a central government acting as a flimsy umbrella over the more independent regional governments of Kurdistan, the Sunni Triangle and the predominantly Shiite southeastern Iraq. This is because theological differences dating back to middle of the seventh century cannot be solved in a matter of mêlées.

These differences probably won’t even be settled in our lifetime, so it would be unwise to bet otherwise.
Reverting to the Petraeus-Crocker report, among all the points made the most notable was the prediction that by the summer of 2008 the troop level in Iraq could drop by 30,000. Though appealing, this would merely return us to the status quo. In a New York Times editorial last week, the analogy was made that the surge has been “the rough equivalent of dropping an object and taking credit for gravity.”

Of all the arguments set forth by Gen. Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker, that which was most bought by Congress and the American public was the overall reduction in violence. Many Republican moderates like Lindsay Graham of South Carolina who believed that the Iraq strategy was flawed from the beginning, now—because of this argument—consider or fully support a plan to keep the military in Iraq. During Petraeus’ report, he cited that because of the added troops, Iraqi deaths over the past three months have declined. What he failed to point out with his large, computer-generated, multicolored graph was that the deaths have declined from 1,600 a week to over roughly 1,000 a week—this doesn’t describe a 37.5 percent decline in deaths, but rather that there are still 1,000 people dying every week. Moreover, they do not describe geographically where deaths occur most. In Baghdad, for instance, the rate of casualties has flatlined since mid-2007.

The fact that many middle-of-the-road Republicans wholeheartedly believe Gen. Petraeus’ idealism and now will not use their vote to put an end to this war is very troubling. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell once said, “Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.” By this decree, many Republicans staunchly stand. The problem we face today is that our multiplier has all but dwindled to zero.

If you believe that the surge is actually working and that staying the course will ultimately result in a democratic Iraq, held together by one central government where people are not oppressed or do not live in fear of being shot while casting a ballot, held together by a blooming economy led by a strong middle-class of working Iraqi men and women and held together by a common interest that places the good of the state above any individual pious ideal, then you didn’t feel the slap dealt last week. For you, pain is a sign of weakness and staying the course is a necessity, no matter how dire the realities are.

For the rest of us who don’t believe the surge is actually working and believe we should change our strategy in Iraq, we felt the slap dealt to us last week by Gen. Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker. And it hurt.

Population soars in Walla Walla, local institutions shift

Large signs and billboards advertise “beautiful new homes” while bumper stickers scattered throughout Walla Walla emblazoned with the anti-development message “Don’t Bend Walla Walla” represent perhaps today’s most pressing issue for Walla Walla: growth.

“The population [of Walla Walla] was relatively stable for a long time (20,000 or so, as I recall),” said Bob Carson, geology and environmental studies professor who has lived in Walla Walla since 1975 and whose wife, Clare, grew up in Walla Walla.

“It was about the same size as when Clare was a kid when I first got here, but then the population finally started growing. When I first got here there were three wineries. Now there are over 100,” Carson said.

Walla Walla, largely stagnant for decades, has seen a renaissance of growth in the past 15 or so years. A revitalized downtown coupled with Walla Walla’s new-found identity as a wine town has left the town overwhelmed as Walla Walla tries to determine what it hopes its future will look like.

“As far as businesses, Walla Walla grows very slowly. It’s very slow to adopt any kind of changes,” said junior Jared Burns, who has lived in Walla Walla since age 10.
However, Burns said, “Wine has definitely changed the face of Walla Walla in the past 10 years. There has always been some wine around, but for whatever reason, it’s gotten really big in the last 10 years.”

Senior Aaron David has noticed changes to the city over the course of his four years in Walla Walla. “It seems like every time I come back to school after the summer there’re more restaurants [downtown]. It seems like in the last few years it’s also gotten more expensive,” David said.

Affordable housing, or lack thereof, has been thrown into the spotlight as a result of recent development (and proposed development) in Walla Walla.

“In the last five years prices of land and real estate have skyrocketed,” said Burns. “People who work jobs like Wal-Mart and other retail jobs can’t really afford to live here anymore. I know people who commute from Waitsburg or Touchet where housing’s more affordable.”
The environmental impact of development also continues to be a vital issue.

“When you fly here you can see that Walla Walla is in the middle of a desert so that could put some strains on the resources,” said senior Annelle Mendez.

“As the community does grow, a big challenge would be finding water,” said David. “We don’t want to take too much water out of the aquifer. I think that’s a challenge that will need to be addressed.”

The influence of corporations, government and citizens plays an important role in defining Walla Walla’s future. Carson worries about the way recent decisions by the city council along with the county commissioners have affected Walla Walla’s path.

“The county commissioners—none of them are very progressive. For example, they just banned rock climbing at the Two Sisters where I taught my two kids how to rock climb, despite the fact that the Army Corps of Engineers gave the land to the county for a county park for that express purpose,” said Carson.

Carson believes that the city and county government “is basically a good ol’ boys network” which “fortunately or unfortunately [represents] the views of people in this area who basically want low taxes.”

“This town was based on the people who live here, not the government,” said first-year Susannah Frew, “and if you get the government involved it could become just another plain town.”

“I personally don’t want to see all the farms turned into subdivisions,” said David. “But I don’t think growth has to be inherently bad; it’s just a matter of managing it properly. The community needs to decide in a thoughtful manner how that’s going to happen. It needs to be the people who are real stakeholders in the community, not just the real estate developers making the decisions about growth.”

Junior Luke Sanford echoed David and Frew’s advice. Walla Walla needs to “make sure that growth comes much more from local initiatives with less of a corporate influence,” Sanford said.

As Walla Walla grows, the general cultural atmosphere has the potential to change as well.
“[Walla Walla] has definitely become more upscale, but I still see a large segment of the town is rural—the rural agriculture population is still a big part of the community,” said David.
City planners, according to Burns, want to make the Walla Walla vibe into “more of a preppy-wine retirement kind of thing,” which has resulted in “a lot of people who are just pissed off about this at the city.”

As Walla Walla looks to the future, there are no easy answers.

“I worry a lot about what the port commission [a local organization in charge of economic development for Walla Walla County] is doing. Their desire for growth isn’t always healthy,” said Carson.

“I also worry about the city council and the planners,” said Carson. “There were five alternatives to the current recycling system in the Union Bulletin the other day. More than one involved getting rid of curbside recycling. It also took an extra vote to get curbside recycling to be approved by the council after the people voted ‘yes’ for it. Saving money in the short term seems to be their main priority.”

Yet at the same time, Carson believes Walla Walla is on the right path. “I strongly believe that things have gone right in Walla Walla—we have a great public transportation system and a lot of really wonderful parks.”

“Growth in most places is kind of inevitable,” said David. “What makes it good or bad is how it’s planned.”

Diversity on campus: Figment of Whitman’s imagination

This is not a politically correct article. This article is a step towards removing the veil of political correctness to hopefully arrive at the TRUTH.

In last week’s issue, Gillian Frew wrote a news story titled “Happiness aside, Whitman lacks diversity.” This news story brought to our attention the limited view of diversity and its effects.

Having diversity on campus is obviously an important value at Whitman College. According to our college’s Web site, College Trustees gathered at their 2005 November meeting to endorse a statement—compiled by overseers, alumni, students, faculty and staff—on the value of diversity at Whitman. George Bridges posted a 300-word diversity statement online. Students and faculty even collectively received Mellon Grants to begin projects at Whitman for diversity initiatives.

So what does “diversity” mean to the Bridges administration and our school?

According to whitman.edu, diversity is the culmination of different people in categories of “race, color, sex, gender, religion, age, marital status, national origin, disability [and] veteran’s status.”

In Frew’s article, it is apparent that the school is on the verge of embarrassment for not having “scored”—as Frew so put it—high enough in the ranks of racial diversity. We, sadly, have not gathered enough of “the other” breed.

In “Orientalism,” Edward Said argues how Western culture constructs the Orient without their consent, and by doing so, the West loses true Oriental culture, mind and the identity of its people. Said writes, “My contention is that without examining Orientalism as a discourse one cannot possibly understand the enormously systematic discipline by which European culture was able to manage—and even produce—the Orient politically, sociologically, militarily, ideologically, scientifically and imaginatively” (Introduction).

In the same way, Whitman and most other colleges have not examined diversity as a discourse—meaning they have lost the true meaning of diversity as they repeatedly use it in their means of advertisement and in various discussion groups. Because it does not examine diversity as a discourse, Whitman does not understand the enormity of the “systematic discipline” of gathering prospective students who qualify as “diverse”—mainly those of skin colors and ethnicities other than Anglo-Saxon.

This leads us to Said’s usage of the word “imaginative.” We, as people, have constructed races so methodically that we have developed stereotypes and structures of thinking that are imaginative. In this, we have lost the individual identity and characterize those who are not white as “diverse” and distinct in experiences and ideologies.

The Whitman administration repeatedly emphasizes race. Sociology Professor Ann Finan said in Frew’s article, “I do wish that my students had more exposure to people different from themselves, especially racially and ethnically.” This implies that races and ethnicities bring something different or “exotic” that the white person needs to know to fulfill their life experiences. Is this ignorant or racist because it presupposes that different races think alike?

This “exotic” mode of thought creates the following assumptions: 1) white people aren’t exposed enough to “the other,” 2) “the other” has something unique that the white person is not and 3) those who are “exotic” carry similar reasons for being “exotic.” Again, think of this in the context of the United States.

The human experience is unique for everyone. To judge by skin and culture rather than the content of one’s character will always separate people rather than bring them together on a common ground of one race: the human race.

The diversity policies at Whitman do not reflect this concept. Although Whitman cares about the welfare of all past, present and future students, there are other intentions. We then ask ourselves: Do the members of the Bridges administration truly care about minority students? Yes, they do. Are they pushing for diversity purely because they care about minorities? No, they are not.

The truth is diversity has a lot to do with prestige. In the United States, some of the top colleges and universities (e.g. Berkeley, Stanford, Harvard, Howard, Michigan, Duke) are also the leaders of the revolution of minorities. As these top-notch institutions lead the way in “diversity” policies, other schools, such as ourselves, often emulate these policies (and politics) to creep their way up the ladder of prestige.

Kevin Dyerly, Whitman’s director of admissions, said in Frew’s article, “It’s always nice to be recognized by a third party as an institution that, among other things, creates a close-knit community where relationships are valued and differences are embraced.” What “differences” is he talking about?

Diversity has become propaganda. We see this primarily on the Whitman Web site as our college continually reiterates again, and again, and yet again the importance of diversity, which is largely based on skin color, ethnicity and economic background.

We’re not writing against diversity; diversity is a good value. Unfortunately, it has become a meter for colleges and universities to see how many of their peers are reaching out to the “poor, helpless” minorities.

As Whitman reaches out to minorities across the nation to include them in their diversity statistics, they often forget the pressure and responsibility placed on the minority students within the academic and social realms.

Making the initial adjustments to college is already hard. As white students struggle with classes and college life, minority students—who are Whitman’s physical embodiments of how Whit[e]man isn’t racist—struggle with the burden of needing to bring something “exotic” to the table. As they struggle with being constantly singled out and looked to as “the other” perspective, they find comfort from their frustration in each other.

This creates segregation, which leads to our next question: Are we truly engaging in diversity? As “diverse” students gather in groups that sit exclusively together in Prentiss and Jewett (look around, you see those minority tables), the interaction between races is not achieved. Those who are already racist are thankful for this and those who aren’t find it bizarre. Why can’t those minorities just congregate with everyone?

Minorities aren’t the only ones who bring something different; everyone brings something different. Individuals think differently. That is diversity. We need to stop assuming that our differences are on the outside, when in truth, they lie on the inside. Our skin, our race, our ethnicity do not automatically determine the outcome of our lives and our opinions.

Now ask yourself: Is everybody similar here? If so, why? Is it the color of our skin? Yes, could be. Is it the granola atmosphere? Hmm, makes sense. Or is it the fact that intellectually we are so uniform? Even further, have diversity initiatives caused more racism at Whitman? Less? Are we creating a new racism of our age? Ask yourself and then let’s start talking about diversity.

More to come next week. Please respond and say if you wouldn’t mind being quoted in our next article. Remember, this is the beginning of a discussion, and we hope to discover new solutions and further expose problems. Please comment freely.

Saffron: Walla Walla’s newest restaurant a Mediterranean Kitchen

An upscale restaurant has just opened in Walla Walla and has already risen to be the second most popular restaurant in town.

Chef and owner Christopher Ainsworth, formerly of the Fish Club in Seattle, and his wife are transforming the corner of West Alder and Third; having just opened Saffron, they are soon to open a Vietnamese restaurant next door.

Slightly off of Main Street, Saffron Mediterranean Kitchen is a hidden jewel. Early on a Friday night, Saffron was already starting to fill up with a well-dressed, wine-loving crowd.

The inside of Saffron is magnificent with dark wood and cozy lighting. As the sun was still out, however, we chose to sit out on the patio under large red umbrellas.

The patio had a distinct European feel. But instead of a small cobble-stoned road, the tables were next to busy Alder Street. Those seeking a quieter dining experience should opt for the glass-covered tables inside.

Our waiter came out immediately. As she poured us water, she told us the special was a buccitin a la raza, a garden-hose pasta cooked Roman style so as to incorporate the flavors. We puzzled over the seemingly self-important pasta as she brought out olive focaccia bread and Moroccan flat-bread. The dip was roasted garlic in olive oil. The delectable combination of the two led to the bread’s disappearance even before we had decided on what to order.
Saffron has an impressive array of local wines, typical of most restaurants in Walla Walla. Unfortunately, being under 21, we stuck to water and ordered appetizers instead. Saffron has a vast number of appetizers or tapas.

The prices range anywhere from $6 for a simple mixed greens salad to $14 for a Moroccan grilled quail. We chose three appetizers. The seasonal gazpacho was the best of the three, a unique, lightly spiced soup that tasted like heaven. The falafel bites were good; the falafel itself was without strong flavor but the curried mint yogurt dip was delicious. The mezze plate of homemade spreads and grilled flatbread was quite good, the best spread being the “spicy” feta to which there really wasn’t a strong spice.

It would have been easy to order a meal simply consisting of appetizers. Instead, we clutched our wallets and dove into the entrees.

The entrees arrived in small, well-presented portions on square white plates. The gnocchi, a goat cheese pasta, was deliciously buttery, while the paella rojo was spicy and contained a wide variety of animals, ranging from rabbits to octopus. Note to vegetarians: You might have to stay away from most of the entrees at this restaurant.

One of our party ordered squab, a pigeon before it has taken flight. The squab was purposefully undercooked and surprisingly tasted of citrus. Both the paella and the special tasted strongly of seafood, almost to the point that you remembered how far Walla Walla is from the ocean.

The dessert was by far the highlight. A chocolate buchon made of pumice flour, it was small in size but rich in flavor. The consensus among our table was that while some of the food was outstanding, other entrees were perhaps not worth the high price tag, amounting to roughly $40 per person.

Block Party features activities diverse as Interest House Community

The Interest House Community Block Party consisted of an assortment of activities as diverse as the Interest House Community (IHC) itself.

Cookie decorating was one of many options available to attendants of the event. “The cookie decorating was awesome. I made a tie dye cookie with the most amazing frosting ever,” said first-year Lauren Cuykendall.

There was a variety of food: fruit drinks with ‘tropical pearls’ at the Asian Studies House (ASH) booth, a variety of cheeses to be sampled at the French House (La Maison Francaise) booth, a variety of cuisine at the Japanese House (Tekisuijuku or TEK) booth and, of course, the taco truck.

Other activities included bracelet making with alphabet beads in a variety of languages, face painting at the La Maison booth, playing hangman on T-shirts at the Fine Arts House (FAH) booth or jumping rope at a jump-athon to benefit the Community Center For Youth. The a cappella groups and the Seattle band Barcelona also performed.

The Interest House Community, a living option popular among sophomore students, consists of houses with various themes. These houses range in size from five people in the ASH and Multicultural House (MECCA) to 10 people in La Maison.

“I love it,” said Hannah Main, who lives in La Maison. “I love that we speak French as much as we do. We only speak French at meals, and we have an ‘only French in the kitchen’ rule.”
The event, which was moved to fall semester from spring after it was rained out several years in a row, gives the IHC a chance to spark students’ interest.

“Our house isn’t full, so this gives a chance to increase interest and hopefully applications,” said Edwin Shoaf of the ASH.

“I like that the event is in the spring now,” said Main. “Right now we all just moved into our houses and are really excited about it.”

For many, the performers were the highlight of the event.

“I like the music, but I wasn’t impressed with the taco truck. The booths had good activities, but they weren’t very informational about the actual activities,” said first-year Liz Sieng.

Barcelona, a “Seattle melodic rock quartet” according to their MySpace profile, concluded the event. Between 30 and 50 people gathered on the lawn to listen and dance to songs from Barcelona’s new CD as well as a cover of Hall and Oates “Rich Girl.”

“For me, the band was the best,” said Cuykendall. “I walked around, but I didn’t go to that
many booths.”

Review: Barcelona’s ‘absolutes’

Weaving melodic lines throughout all tracks on their soon to be released album “absolutes,” Barcelona has scored a hit with the mainstream indie-pop crowd. Within the first few days of listening to the album, Barcelona quickly climbed to the top of my playlist and started to regularly provide a soundtrack to my life.

While no track on the album is likely to stick with me and be an aural marker for remembering this point of my life, they let my mind wander just enough to make writing that last paper a little less painful. The ability to transcend the moment is the band’s strength, and the songwriting and majority of musical accompaniment play to it.

Barcelona’s sound is haunting and addictive. Their unsettling melodies are usually laid upon a driving beat providing a sense of purpose to their music. However, on a few tracks like “Please Don’t Go” and “Get Up, Get Up, Get Up” the melody is left to stand on its own. It is on these tracks Barcelona stumbles slightly, trying to take a page from Radiohead’s book, but crumpling it in the process.

On the tracks that have the support of a groove, Barcelona shines. “Absolutes’” tracks are reminiscent of a mash-up of Keane, the Stereophonics and Coldplay. The driving beat anchoring the tracks like “Falling Out of Trees” and “Stars” will instantly feel familiar to Death Cab fans. These tracks, among others, were the ones I returned to again and again.

To address the indie snobs who just read the previous paragraph and have completely discounted my taste in music as well as this band, I say just give it a listen. Like Death Cab and previously Coldplay, Barcelona precariously straddles the no man’s land between mainstream and indie-pop sounds. This mainstream influence is not a reason to rule out this band. Songwriter Brian Fennell excels at articulating abstract feelings in his lyrics. Fennel’s eloquence is unsurpassed in pop and, arguably, in the entire indie gene as well. Through these expressions, Barcelona is sure to speak to many who otherwise flee at the mention of Death Cab and their Atlantic Records existence.

So set your preconceived notions of indie-pop aside and shove “absolutes” in your CD player after its Sept. 25 release and give it a chance. While the experience might not be earth-shattering, it will be pleasurable and you’ll probably hit repeat.

Rating: 7.5/10

Campus programming group gears up for activity-filled semester

Any student who has been to a Whitman-sponsored event probably has the Campus Activities Board (CAB) to thank.

CAB is the largest volunteer group on campus that puts on programs for the Whitman student body. These programs include movies, dances, musical performances and other forms of entertainment. CAB also does a good deal of co-sponsorship with other groups on campus, providing programming knowledge as well as volunteers for advertising, set-up, participation and clean-up.

On Tuesday, Sept. 18, CAB brought mentalist Craig Karges to Whitman. On Saturday, Sept. 22, CAB will be showing “The Incredibles” and “Dr. Strangelove” on the Reid side lawn as part of their once-a-semester drive-in movie event.

Like all of CAB’s programs, the drive-in movies are free of charge to the Whitman student body, including complimentary popcorn and cotton candy. This event is free for all community members as well.

“The Incredibles” will be shown first, at dusk, so that attendees and community members with children can enjoy the earlier show. The two movies were chosen as part of an “End of the World” theme, and are also on the “Top 10 Movies” lists for Whitman students, based on Facebook statistics.

The programs that CAB puts on aim to provide fun, free entertainment to all students.
“CAB offers alternatives events to just drinking on a weekend, and it’s open to the entire campus and put on by their peers,” said Nights and Weekends Chair, sophomore Nadim Damluji.

“We’re really trying to open ourselves up this year to be more receptive to people who fill out request forms,” Damluji said. “CAB is completely volunteer-based, and that’s the reason why I think it’s such a great group. It shows that the students are really committed to making things happen on this campus.”

“You don’t have to go through a lot of the bureaucracy of ASWC, and it’s not a paid position, so you can give as much or as little as you want,” said CAB Vice Chair, junior Tom Bugert.
Bugert, along with other CAB members, choose to “put in a lot,” spending time planning the events, as well as devoting their weekends to helping prepare for them and set them up.
Board members encourage students who have ideas to be a part of the club.

“It’s a completely campus-decided committee,” said CAB Marketing Chair, junior Katie Phelps. “Even though we have executives, everybody votes as a group. So if you’re a student who wants to bring a specific event or speaker or film festival, you can show up at a CAB meeting and make it happen.”

All interested students are invited to attend CAB meetings, which take place Wednesdays at noon in Room G02 in Reid Campus Center’s basement. Phelps pointed out that students can have give their input on upcoming events, such as the Cobweb Ball that CAB is sponsoring with the Fine Arts House in October, or the visit from top 10 finalists in the National Comedy Competition that are coming to campus in November.

Retooling education

Most students who drop out of high school do so because they are bored, but can we really blame them? Lots of people love to belittle these kids, calling them lazy and pathetic, and if deriding these kids will help these people feel better about dropout rates, then good for them, but they’re not going to solve any problems.

Such an overwhelmingly universal cry should warrant some attention; if these people who are so quick to scorn the dropouts would merely poke their noses into many a high school classroom these days, they might understand. In such a horribly underfunded organization as our public education system, incompetency runs unchecked. This results in unstructured curriculums and teachers who don’t know the subject matter any better than their students, and as such present it in the most uninteresting way possible.

It’s understandable, then, that students get fed up with all of the b.s. and feel like dropping out is their only option. Of course, as many of their detractors would be quick to point out, they are then left to decide between a life of crime or a career flipping burgers.

Instead of trying and failing to provide these students with a traditional high school education—which is of little use in an occupation without continued higher education—the public school system should have given them the opportunity of technical training.

Middle school is when students usually begin to become frustrated with the system and bored with their classes. Because of this, middle school is usually a critical turning point. At this time, a student will decide either to take academics seriously or that education isn’t worth the boredom. When they choose the latter, chances are good that they’ll end up dropping out

And while it’s unfortunate for politicians and averages and percentages that these kids drop out, the only difference it really makes for them is that they don’t have that diploma to show off when they go to look for a job. They weren’t going to learn anything applicable to the real world in those last few years of high school. If they had already decided back in middle school that school is boring and not worth it, there’s no way those last few years of high school are going to make any difference. We might as well hand them a diploma when they drop out.

Here’s what the public school system should do:
1. Starting in middle school, divide the school system into academic and vocational systems.
2. Continue to provide the same sort of traditional college preparatory education to students in the academic system but reorganize and improve it.
3. Provide comprehensive technical training to students in the vocational system.
4. Within this system create many separate job “tracks,” which would train students for a specific job, set them up with an apprenticeship in that job and ultimately make it very easy for them to apply for work in that field.
5. Create a detailed process to determine which system a student will enter. It should bring into consideration the student’s wishes, the student’s past academic performance, the parent’s wishes, the family’s ability to pay for college and a teacher’s recommendations, among other factors.

Not only would this system provide comprehensive and quality job skills that would allow high-school graduates who might otherwise drop out to be much more competitive in the job market than they could have been with a traditional diploma, but it could solve other, larger problems as well.

Despite the desires of the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation and many others who subscribe to their school of thought, every child cannot go to college. Sorry. It’s just not possible. Here’s proof: Temporarily ignore all the obvious reasons why everyone can’t go to college and consider an alternate reality where everyone does.

First of all, it wouldn’t work to begin with because there aren’t enough spots in every university and college for all high school graduates now, let alone in this magical world where 100 percent of students graduate.

Secondly, all students don’t want to go to college, no matter how much of a positive affect it could have on their lives. As this is a free country, we sadly have to accept this: Higher education cannot be mandatory. The vocational system would offer a workable substitute to this lofty and unachievable goal of sending everyone to college.

‘Stardust’ embodies best genre qualities

Sitting in the movie theatre, lights at half-mast for the pre-show proceedings, I occasionally reach a moment of panic. Right around the third preview, I begin to worry that the movie I have probably paid too much money to see will fail me, that it will turn out to be a disastrous folly filled with poor acting, worse direction and an incomprehensible plot line. I experienced one of these moments this weekend as I prepared to watch “Stardust,” a film adaptation of one of Neil Gaiman’s novels. A preview for some film executive’s warped idea of “Beowulf” was flitting across the screen, making me wish that all those involved in the making of that film could be sent back to medieval times as a punishment.

However, when the lights dimmed and the feature began, my initial concerns were swept away. “Stardust” is a combination of all the best qualities of the fantasy genre. Like “The Lord of the Rings,” it feels epic in scope, but like “The Princess Bride,” it doesn’t feel the need to take itself too seriously. There is plenty of magic and romance, and the swashbuckling fight scenes will make you wish that the makers of “Pirates of the Caribbean” could have taken a cue from these guys.

Tristan Thorn (Charlie Cox) is a young shop boy who dreams of greater things, or, more accurately, he is a young dreamer who just happens to be a shop boy. When he sees a shooting star fall down to earth, he decides that he will find it and bring it back to his hometown of Wall in hopes of winning the heart of a girl who hardly sees him as marriage potential. Little does Tristan know that his quest for the fallen star will lead him into a magical and dangerous world that will transform his life forever.

The star, in fact, has transformed into a beautiful young girl named Yvaine (Claire Danes), who is quite unhappy with Tristan when he decides to capture her and bring her back to Wall. Yvaine, however, is safer in Tristan’s hands than in the hands of those who seek her out for their own dark purposes. Three princes seek the star in order to determine who will be the next king, and a very wicked witch indeed named Lamia (Michelle Pfeiffer) desires the star’s heart in order to make herself young again. Tristan and Yvaine must work together to avoid dangerous traps and deceptive strangers along their journey, and in doing so discover that they were destined for things they had never thought possible.

A story like this, with multitudes of characters and several plot lines braided together, could have been a mess in lesser hands. Yet, and much credit must be given to Gaiman here, the storytelling in “Stardust” is deft, with a well-earned sense of urgency behind each narrative.
In addition to this urgency, though, there is a gleeful sense of absurdity that runs throughout the film, acknowledging the fact that the tale is fantastical, and making it all the better for such an acknowledgment. Robert De Niro makes a brilliant and hilarious appearance as a cross-dressing pirate called “Captain Shakespeare,” both for his love of theatrics and his crew’s belief that he is saying, “shake” (grunt) “spear!” Cox is devastatingly charming as Tristan, and Danes is surprisingly good in a role I expected her to be unsuited for. As beautiful as Michelle Pfeiffer is, she has a face made for evil, and she clearly had a great time playing Lamia in one of her first film roles after a five-year hiatus from acting.

Despite a few corny lines and syrupy moments near the end of the film, “Stardust” is quite an achievement in filmmaking. The pacing is excellent and the cinematography is interesting and varied. Director Matthew Vaughn and crew somehow manage to suspend all disbelief and take their audience on an extraordinary, whimsical adventure. Maybe they know a bit of magic themselves.

Typical summer blockbuster pales in comparison to classic ‘2001’

Summer movies suck. I still go see them. Whatever. However, two contrasting movie-going experiences from this most recent shit-fest served to cement in my mind what exactly it is that bothers me so much about the Hollywood blockbusters that are served up to the apathetic and aesthetically crippled audience that is the summer movie crowd. I’ll begin with the negative example.

I went to see “Transformers.” I hate (director) Michael Bay so much, it is hard to articulate. This was not a film, it was a series of shifting metal things exploding and crashing, interrupted by formulaic acting from that Disney Channel kid and the requisite eye-candy (who, admittedly, managed to be much more badass than the usual hot-girl-in-action-movie). John Turturro was funny as a neurotic government agent, but that’s about it.

That’s not to say that I don’t understand the appeal, I really do. However, this movie made over $600M overseas. It made $150M in its first weekend in the U.S/Canada. This is bad. This is not “Snakes on a Plane,” one of those times when pop culture gets really excited about something purely for its tongue-in-cheek absurdity, only to realize that such films are usually funny for about … 20 minutes. This is something more insidious, more revealing of the perverse track that our society is following. Whoa! What a surprise. That leads me right into

Movie Experience #2.

Two weeks after the above incident, I got to see “2001: A Space Odyssey” as part of the Northwest Film Center’s Stanley Kubrick tribute series, held at their theater in the Portland Art Museum. The screen size and surround sound quickly made me recall the brilliant, beautiful simplicity of this movie.

Rumor has it that Kubrick wanted Pink Floyd to do the soundtrack, but they turned him down. No offense to Roger Waters and company, but I am glad that he did so. The pairing of a completely classical score (save a creepy/sad version of “Daisy” sung by the computer) with long, slow shots of spaceships moving about gives the feeling of a sort of space-dance, as if the machines themselves were engaging in an epic waltz. Floyd, I think, would have ruined the effect of this ironic yet powerful combination.

It amazes me how Kubrick can convey so much with nothing but image and music, and all of that with the technology of 1968. The oft-discussed time-warp sequence, in which astronaut Dave Bowman is hurtled through a tunnel of flashing, shifting light, is still awe-inspiring today. The attention to the meaning of image, rather than the image itself, jumps out at you. This movie forces you to pay attention to the entirety of the image it presents, but only by depriving (liberating?) you of the constant barrage of light and sound that we come to expect from many films.

In doing so, Kubrick allows you to engage with the subjects of the film as he creates and exposes them. Take the respective lead-machines in the two movies: Optimus Prime on the one hand, the HAL 9000 supercomputer on the other. Optimus Prime is all that is the ideal liberal/American subject: strong yet kind, possessed of an unerring moral compass (albeit one that points in only two directions) and totally ass-kicking in every sense. Also, he is really huge. While pleasing, this is merely a robotic version of the standard action hero that we have been seeing since the beginning of film.
HAL, on the other hand, has no physical form (huh?). He is a supercomputer, supposedly infallible in every respect. In a sense, he is God, all knowing, all seeing (the only visual image of HAL is his red “eye” that is seen throughout the ship, monitoring everything). Yet He fails, and eventually conspires to kill the crew. God fails, and man has to kill Him before He destroys that which has become dependant upon Him. In doing so, man frees himself from God and continues his journey into the unknown. Truly great stuff, yet only because Kubrick took the time and thought to create a set of images that allow the viewer time to extract meaning from them.

This, I think, is at the heart of why movies like “Transformers” bother me so much, and I started to realize it shortly after “2001” was over. The way that the two directors approach their subjects is fundamentally different. Both movies are ostensibly “science fiction.” Both deal, in some way, with machines. That, however, is where the similarity ends. For Bay, his subjects are merely base visual tools. Consider the plot of the movie: There are giant war-robots. Some are good, some are evil. They fight. A lot. In the end, the good robots win. That’s it. Thank you, Michael. That was enlightening. The entire time, you are bombarded by sound and flashing images, gunfire and explosions, the works. The Transformers themselves appear to be constantly in flux, never static. Continual motion drives this movie, and keeps the audience in their seats.

In “2001,” perhaps the most notable visual feature is the lack of motion, at least on the surface. However, this leaves the audience free to contemplate the totality of the image being presented, i.e., the spaceship arriving at the monolith as a symbol for the act of conception (something Kubrick comes to a lot). Without the simplicity and subtlety of the images presented, layers of meaning such as this are simply washed away in the white noise.

HJT director strives for balance, variety

Nancy Simon, director of Harper Joy Theatre, chooses the plays performed each season. “I chose them with great difficulty,” said Simon. Students, faculty and staff give suggestions, but Simon makes the final decision.

Since the company ranges between the ages of 17 to 22, Simon tries to choose age-appropriate plays for students. “We try to run fewer plays about the elderly and the middle-aged,” said Simon. Gender is also a factor in choosing the plays. “We try to provide equal opportunities for men and women,” said Simon.

Simon balances classics, new plays and original student writing. She tries to balance comedy, drama and music in addition to a balance of plays requiring big sets and small sets.
This variety of plays is seen in the four productions running at HJT this semester. “I am pleased with how well the audience has responded already,” said Simon. Season tickets, which are available until Oct. 31, have been selling well at the box office.

The theater’s first production, “From Inner Rooms,” runs Sept. 26-30. “Isn’t It Romantic,” written by the late Pulitzer Prize winner Wendy Wasserstein, runs Oct. 18-21. “The Ghost Sonata” by August Strindberg runs Nov. 7-11. The final production of the semester, “Così fan tutte” by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Lorenzo Da Ponte, runs Dec. 6-9.

“From Inner Rooms” is written and performed by the Autobiographical Writing for Performance Workshop led by veteran performance artist Dan Kwong. Kwong graduated from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1977 and is the Resident Artist at the 18th Street Arts Center in Santa Monica, Calif.

The Autobiographical Writing for Performance Workshop is a four-week special topics theater class. Ten students enrolled in this class and will perform 10-minute autobiographical pieces in the final production.

Sophomore Kelsey Yuhara, a participa