Friday, March 17, 2006

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 2006

Volume CXLI, No. 36 LOUNGE LIZARDS Housing crunch forces ResLife to place some students in temporaily converted lounges CAMPUS NEWS 5

RUE-DE AWAKENING The Resumed Undergraduate Students Association is working to increase the presence of RUE students on campus CAMPUS NEWS 5

Student recovering after fall from 3rd-floor Buxton window BY REBECCA JACOBSON SENIOR STAFF WRITER

A female student fell out of a third-floor Buxton House window early Thursday morning, sustaining minor injuries, according to University spokesperson Molly de Ramel. Two Department of Public Safety officers responded to the incident, which occurred at about 3 a.m. The student was taken to Rhode Island Hospital with “minor injuries,” de Ramel said. Local fire and rescue officials also responded to the scene. The incident occurred after the student and friends returned from Fish Co Bar and Grill, according to John Shields ’07, a Buxton resident. Shields, who had been at Fish Co with the student, said she “had been drinking a bit.” Shields accompanied her to the hospital after the fall and remained with her until 10 a.m. yesterday. As of last night, the student was still recovering in

SMALL TALK Eric Perlmutter ’06 encourages sports commentators and athletes to express their inner voices SPORTS 12

the hospital, Shields said. He declined to provide details about the student’s injuries, but said he expected her to suffer “no permanent damage.” On returning to Buxton from Fish Co, the female student entered a women’s restroom, while others waited outside. After several minutes, Shields said he entered the restroom, which was empty. He said he saw the open window and went to look outside, where he saw the student lying on the grass about 30 feet below. Shields said he ran downstairs, yelling for people to call emergency services. Before DPS and local fire and rescue officials responded, Shields said he supported the head of the student, who he said was breathing, but added that she could not move her feet and was bleeding. De Ramel said the student was alert enough to tell the officers that the fall “was an accident.” — with additional reporting by Eric Beck

ing a criminal enterprise, who presided over one of the most corrupt governments in the city’s history. Both made Providence the city it is today. Buddy I and Buddy II Cianci, a native of the Silver Lake neighborhood of Providence and head of the Organized Crime Unit in the state attorney general’s office, was first elected mayor in 1974, running as a Republican to take advantage of a split in the Democratic Party machine. His campaign posters announced he was “the anticorruption candidate,” ready to clean up City Hall as Providence’s first Italian-American mayor. Cianci clashed often with the Democratic-dominated City Council during his first period in office — popularly known as Buddy I — but brought an influx of federal funding into the city. Re-elected in 1978, Cianci steered Providence through a fiscal crisis in 1980 and ran for re-election again in 1982 as an Independent. He won, but even as he did, the FBI was moving in on corruption in City Hall. Patronage, bribes and city employees being required to buy tickets to Cianci fundraisers were all investigated, leading to the indictment of 24 city officials and the jailing of 19, including several top Cianci aides. Rita Williams, who now represents Ward 2 on the City Council, remembers being on a grand jury for six weeks during those investigations.

Editorial: 401.351.3372 Business: 401.351.3260

TOMORROW

mostly sunny 36 / 23

Meg Boudreau / Herald

The Fusion Dance Company is performing its annual dance show March 15 through March 19 at Ashamu Dance Studio.

see ARTS & CULTURE, page 3

‘Elegant’ revamped admissions mailings greet accepted students

The fall of Buddy Cianci and the rise of cleaner city government

More than anything else, Providence over the past three decades has been defined by one man: Vincent “Buddy” Cianci. Cianci was the longest serving mayor in the city’s history, elected PROVIDENCE to six terms and serving TODAY: a total of 21 Fifth in a series years in office. When Cianci first took office in 1975, Providence was a decaying industrial town, blighted and failing. He left it in 2002 as the “Renaissance City,” a modern city with a rebuilt downtown and, perhaps more importantly, a thriving sense of civic pride. “There was no one more brilliant or more dedicated. He was just incredible,” said a former Cianci aide who asked not to be identified. “I think one of his major contributions was drawing everyone in and making everyone feel like they had a stake in the city.” But, as U.S. District Judge Ernest Torres said when he sentenced Cianci to 64 months in prison in September 2002, “there appear to be two very different Buddy Ciancis.” One was the beloved visionary who uncovered the river, moved the railroad and remade downtown into a more attractive, safer place. The other Cianci was the felon convicted under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act in 2002 of head-

TODAY

sunny 42 / 21

INFUSED

Providence after Plunder Dome BY BEN LEUBSDORF METRO EDITOR

www.browndailyherald.com

An independent newspaper serving the Brown community since 1891

“I remember hearing things about the stolen things at (the buddycianci.com Department Buddy Cianci at of Public the post-verdict Works) and press conference, the corrup- as shown in the award-winning tion there,” d o c u m e n t a r y W i l l i a m s “Buddy.” said. She said her grand jury made indictments that led to convictions. Cianci had legal troubles of his own. On March 20, 1983, he summoned a man he believed was having an affair with his ex-

BY MELANIE DUCH SENIOR STAFF WRITER

Mailings from the Office of Admission got a makeover this year. About 2,400 accepted students from both the regular and early decision applicant pools will receive a “stylish” and color-coordinated assortment of written materials and a car decal in their forthcoming deliveries from Brown, according to Dean of Admission Jim Miller ’73. Michael Goldberger, former director of admission and current director of athletics, said

see CIANCI, page 4

admissions mailings became more and more weighed down with information over the 20 years he worked in the admissions office. He added that this trend caused “all sorts of problems” with coordinating the individual packages sent to accepted students. Miller, who was appointed dean of admission last year, brought up the possibility of revamping the packets several months ago, and others in the admissions office were receptive to the idea. see ADMISSIONS, page 6

Singing group to provide outlet for students with eating disorders BY ALISSA CERNY STAFF WRITER

As any campus tour guide will tell you, Brown already has more students in a cappella groups per capiFEATURE ta than any other school. But that number grew this Wednesday when Menia Pavlakou started a new singing group for students with anorexia and bulimia. The group will provide an outlet for students suffering from eating disorders, and its activities and impact will also be the subjects of Pavlakou’s the-

sis project. Pavlakou currently holds a courtesy appointment with the Department of Music after completing one music degree in Greece and a master’s degree in music psychology at Sheffield University in England. “I am very interested in the everyday effect of music outside of therapy, and how people use music to consciously alter their moods,” Pavlakou said. Because singing involves the entire body, Pavlakou said she thinks a singing group will provide a friendly, safe and noncritical atmosphere where students with anorexia or bulimia

195 Angell Street, Providence, Rhode Island

are free to explore their voices and bodies. Heather Bell, a nutritionist at Health Services, said she was familiar with the concept of expressive art therapy. “Arts and music can be very emotionally powerful and people have the potential to communicate thoughts and feelings through art that they are unable to articulate verbally, and that means in a good — or potentially vulnerable — way,” Bell said. “People can feel opened up and very exposed.” see SINGING, page 6

News tips: herald@browndailyherald.com

THIS MORNING THE BROWN DAILY HERALD · FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 2006 · PAGE 2 Jero Matt Vascellaro

WEEKEND EVENTS “VARIETIES OF CAPITALISM IN EUROPE: DO THEY STILL EXIST? CAN THEY SURVIVE?” Friday, 4 p.m., (McKinney Conference Room, Watson Institute) — Peter Hall, professor of European studies at Harvard University, will deliver a lecture.

KLEZMERPALOOZA! 2006 Saturday, 2 p.m. , (Alumnae Hall) — The 8th annual intercollegiate klezmer festival will feature world-renowned clarinetist David Krakauer and members of Klezmer Madness!

2ND ANNUAL CHINA CARE BROWN BENEFIT DINNER Friday, 7 p.m., (Alumnae Hall) — A semi-formal fundraising dinner with performances from the Jabberwocks and the Lion Dance Team. Student tickets are $15. All proceeds will benefit the Weifang City Orphanage in Shandong, China.

CHORUS CONCERT Saturday, 8 p.m. , (Sayles) — The 13th Annual William R. Ermey Memorial Concert, featuring the Brown University Chorus under the direction of Conductor Frederick Jodry. Featuring works by Bach, Brahms, Lasso and Schumann.

Chocolate Covered Cotton Mark Brinker

M for Massive Yifan Luo

MENU SHARPE REFECTORY

VERNEY-WOOLLEY DINING HALL

LUNCH — Noodle Kugel, Chicken Fingers, Oven Browned Potatoes, String Beans La Belle, Roasted Eggplant and Tomato Sandwich, Kielbasa, Butterscotch Layer Cake, Chocolate Chip Cookies

LUNCH — Vegetarian Caribbean Black Bean Soup, French Onion Soup, Chicken Fingers with Sticky Rice, Vegan Vermicelli with Garlic Sauce, Savory Spinach, Chocolate Chip Cookies

DINNER — Corn Pudding, Colcannon Potatoes, Carrots Vichy, Corned Beef, Colcannon Potatoes, Baked Sweet Potatoes, Grilled Cheese, Braised Cabbage, Irish Soda Bread, Strawberry Jello, Cherry Pie

DINNER — Vegetarian Caribbean Black Bean Soup, French Onion Soup, Corned Beef, Grilled Chicken, Vegan Roasted Vegetable Stew, Colcannon Potatoes, Carrots Vichy, Braised Cabbage, Irish Soda Bread, Cherry Pie

Homebodies Mirele Davis

RELEASE DATE– Friday, March 17, 2006

C Times R O SDaily S W Crossword ORD Los Angeles Puzzle Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis ACROSS 1 Bottom line 4 Kent classmate 8 Light up 13 “__ see it ...” 14 Subj. concerned with bioregions 15 Phrase with page or corner 16 Bulletin board lineup? 19 Bed neatener 20 “Just watch me” 21 Victim of a 1994 strike 23 Stable noise 25 Building group 26 Mythological libertine 28 Bear witness 30 Vague sensations 31 Golfer Sabbatini 32 URL starter 36 Place to get off: Abbr. 37 Architectural groove 38 Carnival site 39 Anasazi descendant 41 The Star Wars films, e.g. 42 Blond comic strip teenager 44 Without a downside 46 Trendy tie 47 Kind of fatty acid 50 It may be rare 52 ’90s winner of back-to-back Best Actor Oscars 54 Corresponds 57 “I, __” 58 Timely subject of five mix-ups in this puzzle 60 Vatican vestment 61 Tony’s cousin 62 N.L. East team, on scoreboards 63 Cuts 64 Blasts, in a way 65 Absorb, with “up”

DOWN 1 Part of NAACP: Abbr. 2 Morales of` “Bad Boys” 3 Aid for a commuting insect? 4 Flat figures 5 Part taker 6 Opposite of sou’ 7 Smooth-tongued 8 Some Rijksmuseum paintings 9 Spa treatment 10 Church keys? 11 Proposed, perhaps 12 British nobles 17 Lake Victoria’s eastern tip is in it 18 Magician’s assortment? 22 “Bye!” 24 Fruit pie selections? 26 Pane holder 27 Turnpike roller 29 Spelling et al. 33 Tout’s offering?

34 Martinez of baseball 35 __ l’Évêque: pale-yellow cheese 37 Small finch 40 Not solvent 42 Ophelia’s brother 43 Allegheny, as of 1979 45 Declaims

47 Work on the cutting edge 48 Irish lullaby start 49 Put in jail 51 “Truth is more of a stranger than fiction” writer 53 Pull the plug on 55 Comeback 56 Cap’n 59 Gp. focused on pins

Freeze Dried Puppies Cara Fitzgibbons

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:

Silentpenny Soundbite Brian Elig

xwordeditor@aol.com

3/17/06

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD Editorial Phone: 401.351.3372

The Brown Daily Herald (USPS 067.740) is published Monday through Friday dur-

Business Phone: 401.351.3260

ing the academic year, excluding vacations, once during Commencement, once

Robbie Corey-Boulet, President

please send corrections to P.O. Box 2538, Providence, RI 02906. Periodicals postage

during Orientation and once in July by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. POSTMASTER

Justin Elliott, Vice President Ryan Shewcraft, Treasurer By Geri Hagborn (c)2006 Tribune Media Services, Inc.

David Ranken, Secretary

3/17/06

paid at Providence, R.I. Offices are located at 195 Angell St., Providence, R.I. E-mail herald@browndailyherald.com. World Wide Web: http://www.browndailyherald.com. Subscription prices: $179 one year daily, $139 one semester daily. Copyright 2006 by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. All rights reserved.

ARTS & CULTURE THE BROWN DAILY HERALD · FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 2006 · PAGE 3

Fusion changes directions, upholds high standard BY KATE GOLDBERG CONTRIBUTING WRITER

The 23rd annual Fusion Dance Show underscores the benefits of moving beyond past traditions to deal with changing circumstances. As articulated by co-director Heather McLeod ’06 REVIEW in the show’s program, “When the rules of the past no longer apply to us in the present, you must change.” The ability to change requires both mental and physical flexibility and knowledge of past traditions and possible alternatives. Throughout the show, change is demonstrated in the versatility of its dancers and pieces. Performances range from classical and ballet-like dancing — such as “Winter,” choreographed by Divya Kumaraiah ’07 — to the fast-paced and sharp movements of “Genocide License,” choreographed by Oneca Hitchman ’06. The talent of the company begins to truly shine in “Jamaican Dance Clip” and “What’s Right is Right and What’s Wrong is Wrong…” In “Jamaican Dance Clip,” a number that is both aweinspiring and engaging, Dianna Anderson ’09 and Hitchman, who choreographed the dance, move with great elegance while also picking up on the fun aspect of the music. On the other hand, in “What’s Right is Right and What’s Wrong is Wrong…” choreographed by McLeod, it is only the freestyle words of rap artist Talib Kweli that serve as a basis for the movements of dancers Anderson, Christina Boursiquot ’08, Karina Ikezoe ‘09, Alexander Leydon ’07, John McCutcheon ’06, McLeod and Ramel Murphy ’06. Despite the absence of music, the dancers are able to express the pulsating rhythm of Kweli’s words through their pointed motions. The second act is as varied and as strong as the first. The second number, “Samba Dance Interlude,” directed by guest choreographer Russell Monk and performed by Murphy and Wen-Chuan Dai ‘06, combines sheer talent with grace and ease to produce a truly spectacular interpretation of the sexy Latin dance. In “A New Life for Me,” Murphy, who choreographed the dance, wrote in the program that his own range of emotions served as the basis for the piece, describing it as “a representation of the energetic, uplifting and aggressive feelings I have when I dance.” Combining a wide variety of dance genres — including African, hip hop, dance hall and house — the performance perfectly demonstrates the company’s talent and range. Ultimately, audience members are left in awe by the creativity they have just witnessed and fully inspired by the power of change. The high-caliber tradition of the Fusion Dance Company is certainly maintained by this year’s performance. The show continues Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. in the Ashamu Dance Studio.

www.browndailyherald.com

New film festival calls for humanitarian action BY ALLISON EHRICH BERNSTEIN STAFF WRITER

Before last night’s screening of “Darfur Diaries,” Jen Marlowe, one of the film’s three creators, described her experiences visiting genocide-torn Darfur, a region in western Sudan, in October and November of 2004. Marlowe — who traveled with colleagues Aisha Bain and Adam Shapiro to collect stories and testimonies from refugees and survivors — cited the trio’s “responsibility to the people who trusted us with their stories.” Following the screening, which took place in List 120, she spoke further about the political situation in Darfur, saying, “Let’s take the focus off of what to call (the genocide in Sudan) and look at how to end it.” Marlowe’s statement could serve as a slogan for the entire first annual Human Rights Film Festival. Lisabeth Meyers ’06, the events chair for the Darfur Action Network, conceived of the idea for the festival. “I knew of (‘Darfur Diaries’). I had been to some of the Human Rights Watch Film Festival in New York this summer, and I had seen this movie ‘Seoul Train,’ which we’re showing, and I knew I wanted to bring it to Brown,” Meyers said. Others in DAN suggested films as well, but “Seoul Train,” which traces North Korean refugees’ attempts to escape to South Korea, would need alternative sponsorship, given its lack of connection to Darfur. Meyers started contacting various public service organizations across campus for support and suggestions, and the Human Rights Film Festival was born. Meyers had already been in touch with Carly Edelstein ’08, the chair of Tzedek Hillel, a community service and social action umbrella organization. “I had this idea of focusing on more educational ideas — we’ve had lectures and film nights (this year, but we) had

people interested in Darfur,” Edelstein said. She and Meyers ultimately became the driving force behind the festival, along with a committee of about eight student leaders from various organizations. One of these leaders was Andrea Titus ’08, president of Brown’s chapter of Amnesty International, a group that was mainly responsible for the festival’s massive budget. “Amnesty held a small (film festival) last year with only a few films, and not many people came. So we’re hoping to attract people from many different service groups on campus,” Titus said. Grant money for the festival, in addition to various oncampus sponsorships, went to a variety of outlets. Screening rights for the films cost $300 to $500 each, Meyers said, and each film is accompanied by a topical speaker — in several cases one of the film’s makers — who had to be brought to campus. “Born Into Brothels” — which won director-producer Ross Kaufman an Academy Award — and “Devil’s Miner” are both accompanied by talks from their acclaimed creators. “Devil’s Miner” filmmaker Kief Davidson will arrive fresh from his film’s New York City premiere to attend the screening in List 120, Edelstein said. The festival’s planners focused on “finding speakers who could bring the cause back to Brown.” The hardest aspect of planning the festival “was money — both raising it and having all the groups bring in their money. It’s all working, but it’s just been an obstacle with such a big coalition of groups,” Edelstein said. Meyers also recalled the difficulty she and her peers faced in both finding films and securing screening rights, often from major distribution companies. The festival’s organizers “tried to choose films that (exhibited) diversity of issues and geography (and) appeal,” Meyers said.

Though neither Meyers, who is graduating, nor Edelstein, who plans to study abroad, will be present next year, they hope to establish the festival as an annual event. “Next year, we’ll have more legitimacy; (it will be) something that’s been done before,” Meyers said. DAN, Tzedek Hillel and several other heavily involved organizations, she added, have students ready to assume leadership roles for the second annual festival. The festival runs through Monday night and concludes with a closing panel on filmmaking and activism, which Meyers said she hopes will provide some courses of action for student viewers. Monday’s events will also feature a screening of “Pasajes de Junín,” a short film co-directed by Jessica Weisberg ’06 while working in Apuela, Ecuador, on a Swearer International Fellowship. The film, which Weisberg made with Williams College senior Benjamin Brown, explores the community of Intag and its resistance to the influence of and potential overrunning by mining companies. “Pasajes de Junín” has been screened at various colleges and universities with people who “have connections to the area,” which is “one of the most biodiverse areas in the world,” said Weisberg, who leapt at the opportunity to screen the film during the festival. Overall, the festival’s organizers hope to “inform and inspire,” said UNICEF co-chair Katherine Campo ’08. After each screening, there will be what Edelstein calls an “activist table” with information for students interested in learning about and doing more for the issues featured onscreen. “There are so many different ways to get involved,” Meyers said. Titus concurred. “We want students to know there are public service organizations; they can act on these issues.”

PAGE 4 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 2006

Cianci continued from page 1 wife to his house at 33 Power St. just off of Benefit Street. He beat the man with his hands for hours, tried to put out a lit cigarette in the man’s eye, attempted to hit him with a log from the fireplace and threw an ashtray at him. Cianci pled no contest to

felony assault charges, was given a suspended five-year sentence and was forced to resign from office in April 1984. During his time out of office, Cianci became the host of a toprated radio talk show and invested in real estate. But he didn’t stay away for long — in 1990, Cianci again ran for mayor, under the slogan, “He never stopped caring about Providence.” He was elected again and took

Fill in the grid so that every row, every column and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 through 9.

Solution, tips and computer program at www.sudoku.com.

office in 1991, beginning a 12year administration known as “Buddy II.” But some were skeptical of his motivations. “He comes in saying he’s changed, he’s reformed,” said Williams, who was first elected as a Democrat to the City Council in 1990. “You know, I have to say, I didn’t trust him at all. I was very leery, very cautious about having too much of a relationship with him.” The 1990s saw a dramatic revitalization of Providence, especially downtown. “The mayor used to say that you could stand on Westminster Street and throw a bowling ball down the street and hit nothing, because people were afraid to come downtown at night,” said the former Cianci aide. “It was just not a place that attracted anybody except vagrants.” With help from the state and federal government, the city made progress. An arts district — the first in the country — was implemented downtown. Streets were rebuilt, the river was uncovered, unsightly railroad tracks were relocated and WaterPlace Park was built. The city gave tax breaks and loans to restaurants and provided seed money to projects such as the river project. “(Cianci) saw the arts as a driving force and a force to be celebrated (as well) as a part of the city, not removed from the city,” said the former aide. “It was a matter of pride to work at the time and place, when things were exploding with creativity and a vision for the city.” Corruption and change At the same time, the city was rife with corruption, as detailed in “The Prince of Providence,” by Providence Journal reporter Mike Stanton. In his book, Stanton describes Providence under Cianci as being run under a system of patronage — with no-show jobs given to political allies and unqualified residents given important posts — and bribes, intimidation and mayoral interference with the police department. In 1980, Stanton recounts, when Brown rejected one of Cianci’s nephews for admission, the city delayed issuing zoning ordinances for the University to build the Olney-Margolies Athletic Center. In 1992, Williams and other council members who were considering voting for a city tax freeze were berated by Cianci for two and a half hours in his office. When Williams went on to vote for the freeze, Stanton writes, Williams’ husband’s city job was eliminated, he was trailed by city police and was fought by the city over his efforts to collect worker’s compensation after double-bypass heart surgery. The FBI’s investigation of corruption in City Hall in the late 1990s — codenamed Operation Plunder Dome — led to a number of indictments, beginning in mid-1999 with city tax officials and culminating with the indictment of Cianci and four other city officials for corruption in 2001. A jury convicted Cianci on one count of RICO conspiracy — a charge originally intended to prosecute organized crime bosses not directly involved in crimes

committed on their behalf — in July 2002. Cianci was sentenced to five years and four months of jailtime in September of that year and left office, reporting to Fort Dix Federal Correctional Institution in New Jersey in December. He is eligible for release in July 2007. In the wake of Cianci’s conviction, then-State Rep. David Cicilline ’83 was elected mayor in a landslide on a platform of anticorruption measures and neighborhood development. “I’ve described the work that we’ve done to change the culture of government in Providence as akin to rebuilding an airplane in mid-flight,” Cicilline said. “I think the citizens of Providence had lost faith in their city government.” Cicilline said he created a five-year fiscal plan — making “some very serious reductions in personnel” to close a $59 million budget gap — and instituted a new data analysis system for the city “so we can hold ourselves accountable.” He appointed an ethics task force to draft a “comprehensive” ethics code for the city, which is currently pending before the City Council. Cicilline said he hired leadership in city departments based on merit and “professionalized the hiring process,” adding that he has tried to separate politics from city governance. “I refused during my campaign and during my term to accept campaign contributions from city workers or city vendors,” he said. The result, Cicilline said, has been a government that is “honest, transparent and dependable.” Progress and problems Cicilline’s reforms have garnered praise. “Certainly in the new administration … ethical standards have been improved,” said Gary Sasse, executive director of the Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council. “Under Cicilline, the business of the city is transacted in a more regular matter than it was previously,” said Gregory Smith, a Journal reporter on the city desk. “There are policies and procedures in place to govern what happens rather than ad hoc decision making.” Additionally, Smith said, “Cicilline is much more of a policy wonk than Cianci ever was” and has a much different style of governing. “I do not detect any feeling any longer that you have to pay people off in City Hall to get things done,” said M. Charles Bakst ’66, a former editor of The Herald and political columnist for the Journal. “I don’t see policemen holding fundraisers for Mayor Cicilline,” he added. “City politics have become much more honest and straightforward,” said Darrell West, professor of political science and director of the Taubman Center for Public Policy. “I think the current mayor has brought professionalism to City Hall that was not there before.” But concerns remain about political appointments to city posts. “I think that there’s been a lot of political hiring — people are hired because of who they know,”

Williams said. “I’m not a part of that, but I sense that has happened with this mayor as well. … Especially early on, I heard there were some hires in (the Department of Public Works) that really sounded questionable,” she added, noting that the council has not received any personnel reports on hirings and firings from the city in three years. But, Cicilline said, “When I hire someone to lead a department or they hire someone to work in the department, they are people who are the most qualified people for the job.” District 3 State Sen. Rhoda Perry P’91 agreed, saying that “as long as the person has the qualifications and the education and the experience,” a level of political justification for appointments is understandable. She praised “the people who are leading City Hall” for being “sterling as far as their credentials go.” Buddy’s legacy Cianci has often declared his love for Providence — it was said he had the city as a mistress — and he has been credited with its “Renaissance” by marshalling state and federal aid with local tax breaks and benefits to “develop the central core and also connect it to the neighborhoods,” as his aide noted. But the reforms in how the city is governed since Cianci was jailed, Cicilline said, have led to a “trust dividend” — an explosion of private investment in Providence over the past three years. Though he acknowledged, “there were a lot of things done a decade ago that were really projects of the city, state and federal governments,” Cicilline said the Cianci administration drove away private investors. But the Cianci aide said Cicilline gives too little credit to Cianci. “There’s a lot of smoke and mirrors, I think,” the aide said. “I don’t see why anyone can’t say, ‘He really did a good job and we’re moving on from there.’” As far as Cianci’s legacy goes, people must reconcile the great strides Providence made during his tenure with the pervasive corruption he oversaw. Cianci’s “ability to promote the city and his vision for developing the city” were paired with “running a government that was not exactly efficiently managed,” according to Sasse. “The rebuilding of the city, downtown, is in large part attributed to Cianci. He could be, at times, very affable. He was a witty and wry speaker, people enjoyed hearing him and listening to him. And he certainly was a hard worker in his own way,” Perry said. But, she added, “I think he had a lot of personal characteristics that were bad. He could frighten people. He would threaten people. If anyone stepped out of line, politically, from what he wanted, he would say, ‘I’m going to get you.’” The former Cianci aide has calculated that, under state law, Cianci will be eligible to run again for mayor in the 2014 election. But the aide does not think Cianci, who would be 73 in 2014, will return to politics. “I think he will hopefully try to enjoy the last years of his life,” the aide said.

www.browndailyherald.com

CAMPUS NEWS THE BROWN DAILY HERALD · FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 2006 · PAGE 5

RUE group forms board to enhance presence on campus BY JEAN YVES CHAINON CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Juliana Wu / Herald

Lounges converted to dorm rooms are still in use to accommodate an ongoing housing shortage.

For some, housing shortage means living in a lounge BY ROBIN STEELE STAFF WRITER

While many students are preoccupied by the stress of trying to obtain an ideal room for next year in the housing lottery, others are still coping with less-than-ideal living spaces this year. Housing shortages in the past few years have caused the Office of Residential Life to house some students in converted lounges. “It’s concerning, but it’s not a big number,” said Rosario Navarro, assistant director of housing. She attributed the housing shortage to fewer students living off campus as well as the decrease in the number of students going abroad due to recent world events. Converted lounges are generally located in buildings in Wriston, Keeney and Vartan Gregorian Quadrangles. While Navarro said no Vartan Gregorian Quad lounges are being used as student rooms this year, she said “all Keeney lounges were used (for housing) at some point.” The rooms typically house two students, although there are four quads and six triples available, Navarro said. While some of the lounges have attached kitchens, the majority do not, she said. Typically students live in converted lounges for a single semester, Navarro said. ResLife tries to move students living in temporary housing to permanent housing within the first couple of weeks of the semester when some students who are expected to return do not, she said. Navarro said not all temporary housing consists of lounges. Other options include smaller-thanaverage doubles, rooms that have a small window or those that have been taken out of the housing lot-

tery for some other reason. These options are generally used before ResLife turns to the lounges, she said. ResLife has also tried to solve the housing crunch this year by placing students in rooms that usually serve as libraries for Greek and program houses. For example, Interfaith House’s library was used for temporary housing last semester, Navarro said. “Actually (it) ended up working out really well,” Navarro said. “They loved the temporary (housing). The students actually requested to be in there all year, but we needed to return the library space back to (Interfaith).” While students in converted lounges face unusual challenges, some like their housing situation. One transfer student, Julia van De Walle ’08, currently lives alone in a converted lounge in Keeny’s Jameson House. She shared the space with two other students last semester. see LOUNGES, page 9

Though there are often fewer than 10 Resumed Undergraduate Education students admitted to the University each year, members of this segment of the Brown community boast a wide variety of backgrounds and life experiences. With an average age significantly higher than most undergraduates — The Herald reported in October that the program includes 35 RUE students ranging in age from 25 to 50 — the RUE population contains students who are married, have children or have served in the armed forces. Despite their unique stories, some administrators and student leaders feel RUEs are among the least visible students on campus and are at times separated from the rest of the Brown community. “Students’ usual reaction is: ‘Who’s that old guy?’” said Jeremy Bedine ’07, a 28-yearold RUE student who served in the Israeli Army and previously attended the University of Colorado. Bedine, who is the new president of the Resumed Undergraduate Students Association, said RUSA formed a board to initiate “a pretty widerange agenda” with the goal of larger visibility in mind. The board will try to have a reception table at Commencement in May and is investigating the possibility of communicating RUE students’ own advice and experiences in collaboration with the Career Development Center. In addition, Bedine is also working to become an associate member of the Undergraduate Council of Students to give RUSA a voice on the council. Many of the board’s ideas remain in the planning stages. “I have not yet been involved in any proposals,” said Perry Ashley, executive associate dean for academic advising and support and dean of the RUE program. Ashley said he has spoken with Bedine a number of times and appreciates his motivation. Still, “(the RUSA board) just had the elections and he’s brand new,” he said. “Maybe a year from now there will be a lot more” improvements, he

said. RUE students have often been the ones working toward increased visibility, but administrators have also made efforts recently to improve the program. Prompted by the urging of Teresa Tanzi ’07, RUSA’s former president who stepped down this semester to give birth to her fourth child, the Office of Campus Life and Student Services has attempted to increase its financial contributions to the program. Though “Brown has shown that the RUE program is important … there are resource constraints,” Bedine said. Due to these limitations, there are no substantial plans to change the size of the program in the near future, said David Greene, vice president for campus life and student services. Previously, faculty have pushed to enlarge the RUE program, “but it has not been as involved” recently, Greene said. Both Greene and Bedine said the entire Brown community can benefit from an increased presence of RUE students. “We have something to contribute to the Brown community

that other students don’t have,” Bedine said. “Overwhelmingly, those who have contact with non-traditional students have benefited from that contact.” Greene echoed the idea that RUEs offer a unique perspective that benefits the entire University community. “It’s clear how returning students enrich discussion in class,” because “diversity of life experience really matters,” he said. “For a long time there was hesitancy on the part of administrators to impose commitments on RUE students,” Bedine said. But “we’re not asking the school to be left alone. We’re asking to be involved,” he said. But RUE students’ unique experiences can sometimes also hinder their on-campus visibility. There are 30 students officially enrolled in RUSA, but many of them “do have to prioritize,” Bedine said. He himself has to balance between on-campus commitments and time with his wife. Despite these obstacles, “We came to Brown to play a part in enriching a community,” Bedine said.

PAGE 6 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 2006

Singing continued from page 1 A veteran of several a cappella groups herself, Pavlakou said she personally has found expressive art therapy to be therapeutic and liberating, providing her the opportunity to learn more about herself. As a graduate student in England, Pavlakou led a short singing workshop called Sing Out Project, also for students struggling with eating disorders. Students in the group told Pavlakou they had learned things about themselves and gave her positive feedback, she said. The group at Brown is currently unnamed. Higher Keys member Emily Borromeo ’09 said she benefits from her group’s dynamic and the freedom of a cappella singing. “When you’re singing, you don’t have to think about classes or anything but making beautiful music,” Borromeo said. “It’s just a completely separate, carefree and therapeutic experience.” Pavlakou said she chose to study the effect of music on students with eating disorders in part because of her experience with friends and family who have suffered from eating disorders. She is also interested in using music to relieve the stress that can overwhelm students in a highly competitive intellectual atmosphere. To combat these forces, students will work together and individually, Pavlakou said. “In a singing group, everyone’s contribution will be important and there won’t be a need to compete and feel in control,” she added. Beverly Williams, a psychotherapist who works in Psycho-

logical Services, said she is hesitant to list Brown’s atmosphere or academic competition as causes contributing to eating disorders. “Eating disorders have a complex nature,” Williams said. “I think that body image and food become an issue for billions of different reasons because everyone is unique in their circumstances, childhood, media exposure and genetic predisposition.” Pavlakou emphasizes that the singing group is not a form of therapy and that she is not a trained therapist. “My focus is on the group as a musical project and anything else that may happen to come along with it, including how the members feel,” Pavlakou said. Despite these disclaimers, Pavlakou’s lack of psychiatric training has raised some concerns from members of Health Services and Psych Services. Williams said she was wary of endorsing any program that did not use a therapy-based methodology. “I’ve been trained as a clinician. I tend to set things up with a clear outcome and therapeutic context. As a psychologist on Brown’s campus I’m concerned for the well-being of students,” Williams said. “If something positive happens I would be very happy, and if it isn’t positive we will try to be helpful in healing and treating students.” Due to Pavlakou’s lack of psychiatric expertise, Bell recommended she enlist the assistance of a psychiatrist as a resource and support to supervise certain aspects of the group. “When you create a group for people with a certain issue and plan to process this issue, even if there is no intent of therapy, there can still be significant psychological content,” Bell said. “If

you are someone with no background in psychology you may underestimate potential triggers, and you may find yourself overwhelmed as well.” A music student herself, Bell said singing requires listening to, being aware of and responding to the body, which could be overwhelming for someone simultaneously trying to address an eating disorder. Pavlakou said the results of the group are difficult to predict. “I suppose it will affect people on whatever level they allow it to, whether it’s solely to relax, to express their emotions or to admit that they have a problem,” Pavlakou said. Diaries, questionnaires and voluntary interviews will allow Pavlakou to collect information for her thesis. Pavlakou plans to move to the United States permanently and said she will continue the group next year if there is significant interest. In contrast to Pavlakou’s workshop in England, this group is open to both men and women and may include a performance aspect, if there is interest. “At Sheffield people told me they wished there had been a performance because it would have been nice to have a goal to work towards. I’m not planning to do anything except see what the members of this group want the objective to be,” Pavlakou said. “Obviously it’s a very sensitive subject so I’m not starting a performance group.” Advertising in Morning Mail, the Sarah Doyle Women’s Center, the Swearer Center for Public Service as well as through the Daily Jolt and the graduate student listserve has already yielded responses from a dozen students interested in joining the group.

Admissions continued from page 1 “We’re going to try to make the admission package a littler cleaner. We have been putting a lot of appropriately beautiful stuff in there,” Miller said. Among the items undergoing changes are the folders and the acceptance letters, which Miller said would be more “elegant” than before. “We’re trying to coordinate whole presentation … color, style, tone,” Miller said. Accepted students will also receive admissions certificates this year, which Miller said are “sort of official.” The office also added Brown car decals in the initial acceptance letters, all of which were purchased directly from the Brown Bookstore. David Pagliaccio ’10, who was accepted early decision to Brown but also received acceptance letters from Brandeis and Drew universities, said he did not really notice Brown’s admission letter because all the letters he received were “pretty similar.” He did, however, appreciate the car decal, though he did raise one complaint about it. “They left the price tag on,” he said of the decal, which cost $1.09. Miller said he was unaware of the prices being left on the stickers. “Whoops,” he joked. “That’s really classy. Here’s your bumper

sticker for 84 cents.” The price tags are printed directly on the decal and are therefore probably difficult to remove, Pagliaccio said. Another reason Pagliaccio did not really pay much attention to his admission letter was because he already knew he was admitted when he received it, having checked his decision online several days before. Because admissions letters are often mailed the same day the decisions are available online, “almost everybody” chooses to check the admissions office’s Web site rather than wait for the mail, Goldberger said. The office’s Web site also underwent changes this year. “The presentation of the decision hasn’t changed but the admitted students Web site is undergoing renovation,” Miller said. Though the upgrades may please many future Brunonians, several undergraduate students were upset about the new acceptance mailings, saying they felt forgotten. “I think they should consider reparations,” said Krishna Chokshi ’09. Despite all the changes made, Miller said the cost of the admissions packages was not dramatically higher than in previous years. Miller said he believes as long as students are accepted, presentation probably matters little. “I think if you get good news it probably doesn’t matter what (the admissions mailings) look like,” he said.

Mourners file past Milosevic coffin BY DANIEL WILLIAMS WASHINGTON POST

BELGRADE, Serbia-Montenegro — A line of mostly elderly mourners filed by Slobodan Milosevic’s coffin Thursday, and though the turnout was light, the government was accused of allowing the late war crimes defendant to receive what was, in effect, an officially sanctioned wake. The wooden casket lay in the Museum of Revolution, an outof-the-way place once devoted to the communist leader Josip Broz, known as Tito. The location on a hill above the Serbian capital of Belgrade required something of a hike, yet several hundred mourners climbed the snowy steps to the hall where wreaths and Milosevic’s Socialist Party comrades flanked the closed casket. The site is within a few hundred yards of the presidential residence where police arrested Milosevic in April 2001. The government later extradited him to the United Nations war crimes tribunal in The Hague, where he died Saturday of a heart attack. Outside the museum on Thursday, the waiting crowd had angry words for the tribunal. “Murderers! Traitors!” old women in shawls, roses in their hands, shouted at television cameras. “We had everything taken from us when they turned him over to The Hague,” said Sava Darmanovic, 82, a retiree. “He fought for his people. The stories about the crimes were inventions of the West and Serbian mercenaries.” Darmanovic entered the museum, bowed to Milosevic’s photo, then kissed the coffin.

There were fewer mourners than Socialist Party organizers had predicted. But officials said thousands more admirers of Milosevic would gather in Belgrade on Saturday, when the party hopes to place the casket for two hours outside the parliament building. It will then be transported 50 miles east to Pozarevac, Milosevic’s home town, for burial. Socialist Party leaders criticized Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica for trying to keep the funeral out of the public eye. “They bowed to Western pressure, but we are managing to give Belgrade a chance to pay its respects,” said Alexander Vulin, a top party official. So far, no flags on government buildings have flown at halfmast. The government sent no representative to the viewing. But after television footage showed a government official inspecting the museum before Thursday’s wake, anti-Milosevic politicians attacked Kostunica for allowing the wake to take place. Ljiljana Cetinic, the museum director, complained that the place had been “turned into a funeral parlor” against her will. “There is no precedent for this,” she said. As night fell, text messages began to circulate on cell phones calling on citizens to mount an anti-Milosevic demonstration in Belgrade on Saturday, after the body’s departure from the city. “Milosevic was the creator of all the conflicts in the Balkans,” declared the Civic Alliance party, one of an amalgam of groups that helped overthrow Milosevic see MILOSEVIC, page 8

WORLD & NATION THE BROWN DAILY HERALD · FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 2006 · PAGE 7

Many Catholic bishops relent, allow meat on St. Patrick’s Day BY MICHELLE BOORSTEIN WASHINGTON POST

WASHINGTON — Corned beef and cabbage will be on the menu Friday. Call it a gift from Saint Patrick. Despite the Vatican’s prohibition against eating meat on Fridays during Lent, Catholic bishops in about one-third of the country’s 197 dioceses have issued a one-day waiver of the rule, citing the benefits of IrishAmerican tradition and community. After all, what do you wash down with green beer if not corned beef and cabbage? “I think it’s marvelous,” said Pat Troy, who moved to Virginia from Ireland and runs a pub called Ireland’s Own in Alexandria. “It took the hardship away from people.” On the subject of economic hardship, he noted that his business attracts more than 2,000 people on St. Patrick’s Day and that tables have been booked since last week. The culinary identities of the non-Irish are also at stake, especially in an area as diverse as Washington. The Rev. Jose Eugenio Hoyos, a Colombian who ministers to Salvadorans in Northern Virginia, has the Irish holiday to thank for the pork pupusas he will be serving tomorrow night. “That’s great news! I can change the menu!” he said Wednesday when he heard that Arlington Bishop Paul Loverde had waived the no-meat rule.

Earlier Hoyos, who heads the Spanish Apostolate at the diocese, had planned to serve lobster at a dinner party he is hosting for a group of Central American ambassadors. For centuries, the Vatican required Catholics to abstain from eating meat on all Fridays to observe the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. Forty years ago, it decided that Catholics needed to follow that rule only during Lent, the period between Ash Wednesday and Easter. The bishops who waived the rule for this St. Patrick’s Day said that Catholics eating meat should offset their action by making another sacrifice Friday or on another day during Lent. All Christians are called upon to pray and perform acts of charity during Lent, a solemn period of penance. Among Catholics, there has been more focus in recent years on doing good deeds rather than on giving up something pleasurable, said Monsignor Kevin Irwin, dean of Catholic University’s School of Theology and Religious Studies. “In the last 30 years, there has been an emphasis on the positive — giving money for food, working at a soup kitchen — not worrying so much about amounts of food we eat and instead about how we can help others eat,” he said. Irwin said he has childhood memories of his father, who was a plumber, going to confession

during Lent and asking the priest for dispensation from the meat ban. The priest always granted the request. “His work required him to ingest enough to sustain his work,” he said. “I’ll never forget it.” That resonates with Manuel Aviles, who was born in El Salvador and lives in Arlington, Va. He said that although he might not get around to celebrating St. Patrick’s Day, he will have a busy day at work and needs the extra energy meat gives him. “I agree with the dispensation. It gives people the opportunity to celebrate as a family, and that’s the most important part of the church, so praise God,” Aviles said. The talk was more of fish and chips in dioceses where bishops opted to leave the ban in place, including Columbus, Ohio, Sioux City, Iowa, and Harrisburg, Pa. Mike Larkin of the Ancient Order of Hibernian, an Irish organization, in York, Pa., said he was surprised by the decision of Harrisburg Bishop Kevin Rhoades. “Isn’t he Irish?” Larkin said of Rhoades. Larkin said that he usually follows the rules and doesn’t eat meat — and that he would observe the ban this year as well if he weren’t headed to the St. Patrick’s Day parade in New York. The ban on meat has definitely been lifted there, as Saint Patrick is the city’s patron saint.

In Mexico City, paradise is a parking spot BY MANUEL ROIG-FRANZIA WASHINGTON POST

MEXICO CITY — It is 10:30 a.m. Grimy green Volkswagen taxis grind forward, arms punching from drivers’ windows to wave away pedestrians. Horns screech. Somebody screams, “Muevete!” — Move it! A man jumps frantically out of an ancient, exhausted Toyota and tries to edge it to the side of the road. Behind him, handcarts piled high with stringy green onions seem to lurch and stop on their own, levitating amid the chaos, the drenched men who push them hidden by mountains of produce. Gridlock. Nothing moves. At the edge of El Mercado de la Merced, Mexico City’s sensory feast of a downtown market, the tangle is getting ridiculously tangly. But somehow, above it all, two magic words ring out: “Viene, viene!” The meaning, in Spanish, falls somewhere between “Come on!” and “He’s coming!” But everyone in this spectacular morass knows what it means: A parking spot has opened. Juventino Villegas Alvarez, his jacket slung cavalierly over his shoulder, blows his whistle and shouts again, raspy and loud: “Viene, viene!” Somehow, impossibly, order is restored. Villegas sternly halts one of the edgy taxis with

his outstretched arm, pulls away an old crate and waves a brown sedan into a parking space. The driver steps out, greeted by Villegas’ outstretched palm, and dutifully hands over 10 pesos, about $1. Villegas is a “viene, viene” man, one of thousands in Mexico City. It is nearly impossible to park on public streets here without sliding a few pesos to one of his brethren or their counterparts, the “hombres del trapo rojo” — red rag men, so named because they draw parkers by waving a red rag. Their work is not officially sanctioned. No government entity grants them domain over their street corners. But they are universally accepted. Some get by on their charm, their rapidfire shtick. But there also is a sinister undercurrent to their streetlevel economy: People who don’t pay often return to find their windshield smashed. Villegas runs his stretch of asphalt — 100 feet of prime parking space across from a guy who sells scorching guajillo chilies by the kilo — with restless, mesmerizing efficiency. At 10:45, a lumbering delivery truck tries to sneak in without his permission. Villegas is apoplectic. “Para!” he blares. Stop! His cheeks puff out, expelling a series of gusts through his whistle. A woman standing nearby covers her ears.

For a split second, all is still. Vendors turn to Villegas. The truck driver pounds his brakes. Eyes ablaze, Villegas points to his left. There, wedged next to a pole, is a baby stroller. Two tiny brown eyes are all that is visible amid the mass of blankets. “Somebody get that baby out of here,” Villegas yowls. “We’re going to have a tragedy.” No one, including the truck driver, hesitates to follow his instructions. This is Villegas’ realm, and while he is not menacing, he is clearly in charge. He has worked this chunk of Mexico City for 15 years. When he leaves in the afternoon, a nephew of his takes over. Villegas’ voice catches as he looks around his little empire, waxing about the generations he’s rolled into parking spaces — fathers growing old and giving way to sons. “Everything that begins in life has to end,” he says, his eyes becoming red. “I’ll be here as long as God’s willing.” A shrill horn shakes him out of his reflection. Villegas looks up and beams. Juan Zamora, a squat taxi driver, idles a few steps away. Zamora is an old pal, a customer from way back. He gets special treatment. Zamora tosses Villegas his keys. He’s not just handing over a car, he’s handing over see PARKING, page 8

Gaza clinic a lesson in anatomy of chaos BY SCOTT WILSON WASHINGTON POST

GAZA CITY — Few theaters have showcased as much of the Israeli-Palestinian drama as Shifa Hospital, a gated compound among food stands and flower vendors at the center of this city. Poor, crowded and governed by rules that no one follows, the Gaza Strip’s primary public health center is a nearly perfect reflection of the rough world outside its walls. Now, with Gaza’s own gates shut more often than not, Shifa is suffering the debilitating consequences of official corruption, sealed trade passages and the recent victory of the radical Islamic group Hamas in parliamentary elections. Life in its cancer wards, operating rooms and outpatient clinics has become a regimen of compromise, diminished expectations and poor prognosis, the story of Gaza six months after the Israeli evacuation. Elective surgery is being delayed to preserve anesthesia for emergencies. The staff of hundreds received last month’s paychecks more than two weeks late, and prospects for this month are not encouraging. Patients must beg for blood as transfusions substitute for dialysis because of a lack of necessary drugs. Chemotherapy has been reduced because of shortages, but sending cancer patients abroad for treatment has become a luxury for the nearly bankrupt Palestinian public health system. Gaza’s gunmen have stepped into this unruly triage, demanding at rifle-point that friends and relatives receive scarce medications or costly transfers to Egypt or Israel for care. The deputy health minister reacted to recent threats by fleeing to the West Bank. “There is no money, no medicine and no man higher up to sign my orders for more,” said Ibrahim al-Habbash, Shifa’s general director. “So the problems always return.” As foreign donors seek ways to keep the Palestinian Authority afloat without financing Hamas’ political program, the public health system is sinking. Preserving it after Hamas installs its cabinet later this month will present a challenge to the Bush administration and other foreign donors now planning to channel future humanitarian aid to the Palestinians through nongovernmental organizations. Foreign governments have demanded that Hamas, whose charter calls for Israel’s destruction, renounce violence, abide by agreements backed by the defeated Fatah movement and recognize the Jewish state to continue to receive nearly $1 billion in annual aid. Hamas, known formally as the Islamic Resistance Movement,

has refused to do any of this. As a result, Israel has halted monthly tax transfers to the Palestinian Authority, and the United States has frozen development projects. Half of the Palestinian Health Ministry’s $2 million monthly budget, excluding salaries, is covered by foreign assistance. But a recent United Nations humanitarian assessment stated that “it is not possible to transfer responsibility of the public health system to the U.N. or NGOs,” while warning that a reduction in aid would “hamper service delivery and prevention activities including immunization and mother and child care.” Israel, citing threats of a possible Palestinian attack, has closed the main passage for goods and supplies to Gaza for more than five weeks this year. Following dire warnings from U.N. humanitarian monitors, Israel began allowing sugar, flour, cooking oil and other staples into Gaza for the first time in more than two weeks. But the first trucks did not carry any of the two dozen items on Habbash’s list of medications and supplies that have run out at Shifa or will in the next few days. And on Tuesday, the Israeli military closed the crossing again. “The health system could collapse if we do not get money,” said Ghassan al-Khatib, the acting health minister. A tour of Shifa’s wards last week provided ample evidence of the problems ahead, from the ethic of lawlessness apparent on the hospital grounds to the lack of resources available for the more than 600 patients who fill waiting rooms on a typical day. Habbash, a pale man with a blaze of short red hair, spent his morning in the cancer ward with a group of gunmen. A harrowing and increasingly common aspect of the health care system here, the gunmen demanded that a woman with stomach cancer be transferred to Egypt for treatment. The Health Ministry had rejected the request for a lack of money. “Security inside the hospital is terrible,” Habbash said. “I can’t emphasize this enough.” Signs posted at hospital entrances and along corridors warn that weapons are prohibited. But like many other rules here, the ban is neither heeded nor enforced. In the ward for respiratory disease, a visitor smoked cigarettes a few yards from suffering patients. The lime-green corridor turns a corner into the cancer ward, where a young man draped with the black-andwhite scarf of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades stood outside a room shared by three patients. The man grew angry when asked to explain his AK47 assault rifle.

PAGE 8 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 2006

Heinhuis continued from page 12 cause my dad played it and always wanted me to try. Does your family get to see you play a lot? My freshman and sophomore years they came about twice a year. … This year, they were there for the opener and against Cornell and for a week when we went to the allstar game. The last couple of weeks they’ve been coming a lot more, because it was hard to know when my last game would be, but it was great to have them at our last home games against Dartmouth and the (ECACHL) finals. What was it like to see past teammates on the ice at the winter Olympics? It’s always emotional, but especially so since two of them were seniors when I was a freshman. It means you know you can play with them. You know you’re almost at that level, and it’s inspiring. You’re also so proud of them because that’s such an unbelievable accomplishment. You have people like Kathleen Kauth (’01) who has given up everything for the past four years to train for this. Are you going to play after college? I actually just found out

yesterday morning that I have the opportunity to play with the Toronto Aeros (a team in the National Women’s Hockey League) next year. I’m really excited and am looking for a job now in Toronto. I’ll be playing around all of the Olympians, and because I know I have so much more in me, to have the opportunity to play with the best women hockey players in the world is an opportunity you can’t give up. What sort of jobs are you looking at? What is your concentration? My concentration is international relations, but right now I want to get into marketing, advertising and public relations. That’s one good thing about athletes, is you can teach them anything, and they’ll be able to pick it up quickly. If you could trade places with your coach for one day, what would you do? Trade with Dig? Wow. Well, I would pick the day she got to coach the women’s team at the NCAA finals the year before I came. I would want to have that experience. And if you could make her take your place for a day, what would you make her do? Listen to her screaming from the bench. Not as much this year, but my freshman and sophomore years it was intense. I’d want her to have to experience her own wrath.

Parking continued from page 7 his livelihood. “Eh, I just trust the guy,” Zamora says before dipping out of the sun and into the cool, dark market. Villegas double-parks Zamora’s green taxi. But within minutes someone wants to get out from behind it. Villegas jumps into the taxi’s

Milosevic continued from page 6 more than five years ago. “Disregarding strong opposition by the huge majority of the Serbian people, Kostunica is providing amnesty, not only for Milosevic, but also for his family members.” The reference to the family concerns a court decision to allow Milosevic’s widow, Mirjana

Colelli continued from page 12 Press Sportswriters Poll or the ESPN/USA TODAY Coaches Poll, teams are often ranked in front of schools they have lost to, and a few people vote for squads at the tail end of the rankings in part because of politics. One would think these problems would not arise in tennis, a sport that does not generate the publicity and hype that college football and basketball do. It seems plausible that the NCAA could generate some more accurate, less partisan rankings. It also seems like its current rankings system fails that test. The rankings are calculated by some obscure mathematical formula that collegiate tennis’ Web site fails to explain. The top overall team in the country, with 101.6 points, is the University of Georgia. Brown has 15.09 points. The Dawgs are 15-0 and have beaten seemingly the rest of the top 10, so I will assume that Georgia is the top team in the

M. lax continued from page 12 “We actually have gone into the season with the understanding that we’re underdogs,” Cotter said. “Our offense is relatively young, and I think a lot of teams will overlook us. Our defense will control the game and our youth will help us.” Much is also expected from a loaded midfield unit, led by cocaptain Will McGettigan ’06 and Kyle Wailes ’06. After establishing himself as a face-off specialist last year, McGettigan has polished his overall offensive game this year. He already has nine goals and three assists through four contests this season. Wailes, who was third in the country with 30 assists last season and will play both midfield and attack this spring, has already tallied six goals and three assists. Joining McGettigan and Wailes in the midfield will be Alex Buckley ’07, co-captain Grant Derkac ’06, Ben Donoghue ’06 and Tom Pitcher ’06. Buckley, who has been slowed by injuries to start the sea-

driver seat and turns the ignition. A weak, rattling sound stirs in the engine. He tries again. And again. Nothing. Ruben Dominguez Garcia appears. Dominguez works the streets by the market, too, carrying a bag of tools that he uses to hammer out dents on the spot. He is a busy man in this zone of constant fender benders. Two other guys run up. They lean into Zamora’s car, shoving it out of the way, giving it just enough momentum to coax the

engine to life. Villegas glows. He has 130 taxfree pesos in his pocket, more than twice the minimum daily wage of 48 pesos. It is only 11:30, but his day is almost done. He claps Dominguez on the shoulder and the two break out in song. They croon “Marta,” a melodramatic bolero, gloriously off-key. But their celebration is interrupted by a tooting horn. A man in a fat truck wants a place to park.

Markovic, to enter Serbia for the funeral without being arrested on a long-standing corruption warrant. “It’s a scandal,” said Vesna Pesic, a democracy activist and a leader the 2000 revolt. It remains uncertain whether Markovic will come to Serbia from Russia, where she now lives. Milosevic’s brother, Borislav, the former Serbian ambassador to Russia, will not attend the funeral because he is recovering from heart problems

in Moscow, news reports said. Defending the decision to allow Milosevic’s body to lie in the museum, a government official said Kostunica simply wanted to provide a “civilized” funeral without any suggestion of official endorsement or sympathy. “We made some arrangements available, but we believe Milosevic is too controversial a figure to provide a state funeral,” he said. “He was unique, so his burial is going to be unique.”

nation. Of course, the disparity between No. 1 and No. 20 in the rankings is 60 points. I am not sure if that is large or small, but it seems that if the No. 20 team in the nation is that far behind the first team, the NCAA should not even bother playing the rest of the schedule. It should just give Georgia the top spot now. I reserve the right to hold my final opinion on the absurdity of the college tennis rankings until after this weekend’s Blue/Gray National Tennis Classic. Brown could possibly face four teams ranked in the top 40 in the nation in four days if it reaches the finals — not that outlandish of a proposition. It will be very interesting to see how high the Bears climb if they win a few matches, and even more interesting to see if they drop out of the rankings if they win a few matches. Based upon the rankings system, you can never tell.

squads. Captain Amber Smith ’06 and Sarah Durning ’08 both picked up conference awards following their performances in a close loss to the University of Pennsylvania, one of the league’s top teams, and a thrashing of West Chester University. Smith was named the ECAC’s player of the week after her best performance of the season — a 37.1 all-around score at Penn. Making her season debut after spending the first half of the year rehabbing an ACL injury, Durning picked up the Coach’s Award. Of the 15 competitors on the Bears’ roster, six have now won league honors this season. Earlier this year, Rachel Foodman ’09 nabbed a Specialist of the Week award, while classmate Brittany Anderson ’09 has two Rookie of the Week awards to her name so far. Sarah Cavett ’06 was a Coach’s Award recipient in January, and Jennifer Sobuta ’09 was Specialist of the Week in February.

Gymnasts earn more ECAC honors The gymnastics team very well might be the most balanced of Brown’s 30-plus varsity

son, was Brown’s fifth-leading scorer last year with 15 goals and five assists, while Derkac, Donoghue and Pitcher are all well-established players at the defensive midfield. “Guys bring a lot of different aspects to their game and that’s definitely helpful,” Derkac said of the midfielders. “We have a couple guys with experience and a couple guys that don’t, but I’m confident, judging from the first couple games, that we’re starting to gel. With the return of Buckley and (Michael) Bernard (’07) from injury we’re going to have something.” The midfield’s ability to contribute on offense will go a long way toward Brown’s success this spring, as the Bears’ lack experience at attack. However, Bruno does return Dave Madeira ’07, who led the team with 23 goals last season. Several candidates will need to step up in order to fill the void left by All-Ivy attackman Chazz Woodson ’05. Whoever does will benefit from the presence of Wailes, who switches back-and-forth from midfield to attack. The pieces are in place to bring

Stephen Colelli ’08 is a specialist in bracketeering.

Brown back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 1997. Standing in its way will be an extremely tough Ivy League schedule that all of Brown’s veterans know the rigors of. “I feel the Ivy League is the most competitive in the nation,” Derkac said. “Each team realizes that they can beat any other team in the league on any given day, which is what makes it really exciting. You may seem like a really big underdog and you can still walk out with a victory.” As in years past, the team’s ultimate goal is an Ivy Championship and the automatic berth to the NCAAs that comes with it. The Bears are fully capable of getting there, as they possess a quiet confidence that belies their underdog status. “Going to the NCAA Tournament is a realistic goal because we feel that we have the talent,” Derkac said. “It’s been a while since we’ve been there, and I feel like this could be the building blocks for years to come in that it’s a real possibility that the program could turn itself around and make a statement on the national stage.”

FRIDAY, MARCH 17 , 2006 THE BROWN DAILY HERALD PAGE 9

Lounges continued from page 5 According to van De Walle, there were ups and downs to living in a converted triple. “Obviously it is tight to have three people in a room, in terms of sleeping times and noise and all of that,” she said. On the other hand, van De Walle is very happy to have a kitchen. “I cook myself breakfast every morning and it’s very relaxing,” she said. “I have enough space to do whatever I want and I have a lot of storage space. I still have all the closets and everything. I’m pretty lucky.” Also, the room is carpeted, which is not typical of Keeney rooms, she said. Navarro said she does not think the converted lounges are worse than other housing options. “I don’t think that they’re less nice,” she said. “I just think that they’re different.” Converted lounges contain the same furniture as other housing, but the rooms are much larger, she said. Residential Council Chair Brendan Hargreaves ’06 said ResCouncil has not taken a strong stance on the issue of converted lounges because it recognizes the necessity of housing students during the housing shortage. “They do try to make sure there are common spaces, so at the moment, ResCouncil is more resigned to the fact that it’s a necessary evil,” he said. “The housing shortage is not necessarily the fault of ResLife,”

Hargreaves stressed. “They do not determine who comes here, they just have to house them all.” Hargreaves said he has asked ResLife why it has not put up walls in frequently converted lounges to turn them into permanent doubles. “In their view, ideally those will be lounges again,” he said. It is uncertain whether van De Walle will be moved out of her room to free up lounge space. “I actually was told that this might be temporary housing … but I guess that that never happened,” she said. “I think this is pretty much permanent housing.” Navarro said ResLife begins to notice in July whether the number of returning students looks particularly high. But ResLife does not assign converted lounges until it becomes certain no other regular housing will be available by the start of the semester, she said. “We don’t put (lounges) into play until the very, very last minute.” Navarro said though ResLife grants off-campus permission to additional students if a housing shortage seems likely, she thought students who did receive permission in the summer often have trouble finding apartments, and therefore need on-campus housing. Navarro said for the last two years, transfer students have been assigned housing based on semester level, rather than automatically being put into temporary spaces. ResLife attempts to assign juniors to singles, she said. “Most of the students … that get assigned … to (temporary spaces) are rising soph-

omores and are on the waitlist, or (are) returning students who hadn’t committed to come back until the last minute,” Navarro said. Van De Walle has a different sense of the situation. “It seems like a lot of transfers live in rooms like this all across Keeney,” she said. “I don’t know of anyone other than transfers living in a converted lounge.” Aubry Bracco ’08, another transfer student who lives in a converted lounge in Keeney, said she has also been pleased with her living arrangement this year. Bracco said after she first found out about her housing arrangement, “I was a little afraid, but I was open to anything and happy that there were three other girls in there and the other three were transfers as well.” The lounge — which she continues to live in this semester with two of her three original roommates — came with a full kitchen, including her favorite element, “a little retro, 50s-ish booth thing.” The downside of the arrangement was living with three other people, she said. “Four people in the room meaning four beds, four sets of drawers, four desks, four armoire things, four bookcases — there were only so many ways to arrange the furniture,” she said. In addition, Bracco said, there are not many electrical outlets. Bracco said she was lucky in her roommate assignments. “They are some of my best friends here,” she said. “Surprisingly, we don’t want to kill each other. We don’t hate each other.”

Perlmutter

“Where is the smarmy, continued from page 12 snide, honest athlete? The Let me begin with the interactions between athletes and rehearsed culture of sports commentators. Interviews with athletes are, generally speaking, a joke. Who was the last sideline journalism beats him down.” reporter that got anything useful out of a coach or player in a halftime interview? Interviews are no longer about teasing out sound bytes that are insightful or interesting, but rather aim at getting responses that simply make sense, or vaguely refer to players’ emotions so that the viewer at home feels connected. After Team USA’s loss to Korea in the World Baseball Classic last Tuesday, third baseman Mark Teixeira astutely noted that, “any time you lose, there are things you could have done better.” No kidding. Most athlete interviews aren’t actually entertaining or gripping, but just satisfy some minimum standard of English and logic. It’s as if a food chain’s proud selling point is that their product ends that annoying hunger in your belly by taking up the empty space. (Come to think of it, Taco Bell does exactly this. Looks like we’re in deeper trouble than I thought.) Where is the smarmy, snide, honest athlete? The rehearsed culture of much of sports journalism beats him down. Interviews aside, the analysis by professional play-byplay and color commentators is sub-par and often way too sensational. How often have you heard an announcer suggest that a certain player “is happier to be on the field than anybody,” (Brett Favre gets this one a lot), or that there is “no question” that the wrong call has been made despite argu-

able replays? Sunday Night Football commentator Joe Theismann can’t help but declare something earth-shattering with every play; but don’t you love his voice? New York Yankees radio personality John Sterling is so eager to spout his home run call that on any deep fly ball, he’ll launch into his shtick and neglects to give any information about the play at hand (too bad the ball was caught 15 feet in front of the warning track, though). And yet, both of these men have recently received contract extensions and increased scope of coverage. Unfortunately, this trend seems to be getting worse as the prepackaged, grab-n-go, speed-overquality modernism continues to percolate all aspects of our culture. Luckily, some athletes and coaches are fighting back for us and saying what they think. Boston Red Sox pitcher David Wells, who’s never been afraid to say what’s on his mind, is one such “renegade.” Just this week he gave Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig a verbal spanking, saying that “nobody likes him” and suggesting that he Googles himself regularly. And New York Knicks Head Coach Larry Brown is currently transcending the usual tit-for-tat media battles between players and coaches by calling out Stephon “Starbury” Marbury. Brown insisted that he “never left a team in

worse shape than (he) got it. Not once … think about me and think about (Marbury). All right?” Now that’s some hot fire. Who knows if that’s good for the team, but it sure is refreshing for fans. Admittedly, honesty and frankness are mere factors in a messy professional calculus. One can’t be sure when these players and commentators learned to suppress their inner voices, but it’s probably when they realized that any deviance from the norm might cost them their salaries. If that’s the case, then we’ve got a long way to climb out of this hole. Until then, watch games with the volume off, send your least favorite commentators nasty letters and keep fighting the good fight.

www.browndailyherald.com

EDITORIAL/LETTERS THE BROWN DAILY HERALD · FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 2006 · PAGE 10

STAFF EDITORIAL

Diamonds and coal A cubic zirconium to “fabulous” Sharpe Refectory renovations. Wheelchair accessibility is a plus, but it would be really fabulous if the forthcoming elevator takes you to a floor where salmon provencal and steamed vegetable mélange are only talked about — not actually attempted. Speaking of exquisite seafood cuisine, a diamond to the Fabulous Life of Ruth Simmons, which evidently includes nightly servings of pollack and crab entrees. We only hope that the architectural style of her home — Gregorian Revival — does not reflect any impending changes in administrative leadership. A diamond to the study that revealed Brown to be the seventh most preferred school in the country. But coal to the fact that its authors aren’t planning to repeat the study anytime soon. With glossy new brochures, fancy admissions certificates and car decals (!), the Office of Admission’s new mailings would have surely launched the University to number one. Coal to crime, but a diamond to Ben Donahue ’09 and his badass Hap Ki Do skills. Though some suggested that fighting back is not cool, we’re pretty sure Jack Bauer would disagree. A diamond to Swarthmore College and other schools that have kicked Coca-Cola off campus. We would suggest Brown do the same, but we get irritable and depressed when we go too long without Coke. Coal to Travis Rowley ’02, who plans to keep the first edition of his new book criticizing Brown’s liberal climate “local.” Though your exposure to an undergraduate population that is evidently “Machiavellian, immoral and dishonest” may have dampened your spirits, at least you retained your ability to coin a euphemism for “unpublished.”

JASON LI

LETTERS It’s Friday —know what that means?

A diamond to students who forgot to enter the housing lottery. That’s a tough break, but by giving bright-eyed first-years a better shot at nice digs, you can take solace in the friendships you’ve potentially saved. And, after all, there may be a plush Keeney lounge — complete with a “a little retro, 50s-ish booth thing” — in your immediate future. A cubic zirconium to Robert Coover, an adjunct professor of literary arts and a passionate protestor at the bookstore rally who compared the bookstore to the “Bengal tiger and the great horned owl.” We appreciate your enthusiasm, but perhaps there’s a more appropriate venue to experiment with complex metaphors and potential book titles.

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD EDITORIAL Robbie Corey-Boulet, Editor-in-Chief Justin Elliott, Executive Editor Ben Miller, Executive Editor Stephanie Clark, Senior Editor Katie Lamm, Senior Editor Jonathan Sidhu, Arts & Culture Editor Jane Tanimura, Arts & Culture Editor Stu Woo, Campus Watch Editor Mary-Catherine Lader, Features Editor Ben Leubsdorf, Metro Editor Anne Wootton, Metro Editor Eric Beck, News Editor Patrick Harrison, Opinions Editor Nicholas Swisher, Opinions Editor Stephen Colelli, Sports Editor Christopher Hatfield, Sports Editor Justin Goldman, Asst. Sports Editor Jilane Rodgers, Asst. Sports Editor Charlie Vallely, Asst. Sports Editor PRODUCTION Allison Kwong, Design Editor Taryn Martinez, Copy Desk Chief Lela Spielberg, Copy Desk Chief Mark Brinker, Graphics Editor Joe Nagle, Graphics Editor

PHOTO Jean Yves Chainon, Photo Editor Jacob Melrose, Photo Editor Ashley Hess, Sports Photo Editor Kori Schulman, Sports Photo Editor BUSINESS Ryan Shewcraft, General Manager Lisa Poon, Executive Manager David Ranken, Executive Manager Mitch Schwartz, Executive Manager Laurie-Ann Paliotti, Sr. Advertising Manager Susan Dansereau, Office Manager POST- MAGAZINE Sonia Saraiya, Editor-in-Chief Taryn Martinez, Associate Editor Ben Bernstein, Features Editor Matt Prewitt, Features Editor Elissa Barba, Design Editor Lindsay Harrison, Graphics Editor Constantine Haghighi, Film Editor Paul Levande, Film Editor Jesse Adams, Music Editor Katherine Chan, Music Editor Hillary Dixler, Off-the-Hill Editor Abigail Newman, Theater Editor

Allison Kwong, Night Editor Oliver Bowers, Sara Molinaro, Copy Editors Senior Staff Writers Simmi Aujla, Stephanie Bernhard, Melanie Duch, Ross Frazier, Jonathan Herman, Rebecca Jacobson, Chloe Lutts, Caroline Silverman Staff Writers Justin Amoah, Zach Barter, Allison Ehrich Bernstein, Brenna Carmody, Alissa Cerny, Ashley Chung, Stewart Dearing, Hannah Levintova, Hannah Miller, Aidan Levy, Taryn Martinez, Kyle McGourty, Ari Rockland-Miller, Chelsea Rudman, Kam Sripada, Robin Steele, Spencer Trice, Ila Tyagi, Sara Walter Sports Staff Writers Sarah Demers, Amy Ehrhart, Erin Frauenhofer, Kate Klonick, Madeleine Marecki, George Mesthos, Hugh Murphy, Eric Perlmutter, Marco Santini, Bart Stein, Tom Trudeau, Steele West Account Administrators Alexandra Annuziato, Emilie Aries, Steven Butschi, Dee Gill, Rahul Keerthi, Kate Love, Ally Ouh, Nilay Patel, Ashfia Rahman, Rukesh Samarasekera, Jen Solin, Bonnie Wong Design Staff Adam Kroll, Andrew Kuo, Jason Lee, Gabriela Scarritt Photo Staff CJ Adams, Chris Bennett, Meg Boudreau, Tobias Cohen, Lindsay Harrison, Matthew Lent, Dan Petrie, Christopher Schmitt, Oliver Schulze, Juliana Wu, Min Wu, Copy Editors Chessy Brady, Amy Ehrhart, Natalia Fisher, Jacob Frank, Christopher Gang, Katie McComas, Sara Molinaro, Heather Peterson, Sonia Saraiya

Time to write a letter! send letters to: letters@browndailyherald.com

send guest columns to: opinions@browndailyherald.com CORRECTIONS POLICY The Brown Daily Herald is committed to providing the Brown University community with the most accurate information possible. Corrections may be submitted up to seven calendar days after publication. C O M M E N TA R Y P O L I C Y The staff editorial is the majority opinion of the editorial board of The Brown Daily Herald. The editorial viewpoint does not necessarily reflect the views of The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. Columns, letters and comics reflect the opinions of their authors only. LET TERS TO THE EDITOR POLICY Send letters to letters@browndailyherald.com. Include a telephone number with all letters. The Herald reserves the right to edit all letters for length and cannot assure the publication of any letter. Please limit letters to 250 words. Under special circumstances writers may request anonymity, but no letter will be printed if the author’s identity is unknown to the editors. Announcements of events will not be printed. A DV E RT I S I N G P O L I C Y The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. reserves the right to accept or decline any advertisement at its discretion.

OPINIONS

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD · FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 2006 · PAGE 11

Learning to love the taxman Proposals to allow taxpayers greater say in how their individual taxes are spent are naive and undemocratic BY JOEY BORSON OPINIONS COLUMNIST

Last month, President George W. Bush proposed his 2007 federal budget, which, in sum, comes to about $2.77 trillion. This total will surely grow to an even more incomprehensibly large number as supplementary funds for Iraq and Afghanistan are incorporated and Congress adds its own programs and pork barrel spending. What programs and policies will my taxcontributions, which total less than onebillionth-of-a-percent of the budget, go toward? I have no idea. My tax dollars could buy a few hundred 7.62 mm NATO-issue bullets, pay for three weeks worth of coffee at an Environmental Protection Agency regional office or contribute to the salary of a Department of Justice prosecutor. Not all state and federal taxes are as untraceable as income taxes. Some, such as gasoline taxes, are dedicated to legally defined purposes, such as highway maintenance and construction, and should probably be considered more as “userfees” than anything else. For me, not knowing exactly where my personal contribution goes, even if I understand the entire budget, makes paying taxes far more palatable. If there is a politician I abhor, I can be comforted with the hope that I may not have paid for their vacation. Conversely, I can always tell myself that I played a small part in funding a program I love. This state of blissful ignorance could change, however. There are numerous proposals on both the state and federal

level designed to ensure that individuals and groups would know precisely what projects they are and aren’t funding. One of the more prominent is known as the Peace Tax Fund, which calls for legislation “enabling conscientious objectors to war to have their federal income taxes directed to a special fund which could be used for non-military purposes only.” These types of regulations, known as tax credits, also include programs that allow individuals and corporations to choose specific schools or educational institutions to be the effective recipients of nearly all of their tax dollars. Instead of checks being written out to the Internal Revenue Service, they would now be written out to a private school to pay for tuition or books. On one level, I can understand why pacifists would be hesitant to fund nuclear weapons or fighter aircraft, or why people would want their taxes to directly fund private or religious schools they consider worthy of support. But allowing taxpayers to directly choose what programs they fund is a profoundly flawed idea. These types of tax credit schemes have several faulty assumptions. The first is practical: the accounting logistics of funneling specific monies to specific funds is daunting, and administrative waste would be consider-

able. Moreover, how would you define “non-military purposes?” Would hospital ships or National Guard firefighters qualify under that category? For that matter, who would decide what type of “school” counted as a school? Would home schooling expenses, which are educational but not necessarily federally funded, be included? Besides being inefficient, allowing taxpayers to decide where their individual

and balances. The Constitution sets a framework that ensures that all citizens contribute towards federal expenditures, under the assumption that having a military or a public infrastructure benefits everyone. To that end, paying taxes is a fundamental responsibility of citizenship, not a symbolic or political act akin to the right to speech or assembly. Taxation is about public actions and policies rather than individual beliefs, and therefore taxation lies at the very heart of government. In a democratic government such as ours, those policies are determined through the consent of the governed, and that consent is given through the long and deliberative process known colloquially as checks-and-balances. The financial support of government policies through taxation is an extension of this democratic process. If we, as a society, want a government that broadly serves the needs of everyone, we need to ensure that our priorities and policies are chosen through representation — not by each person deciding what they themselves want to do with their individual dollars. Otherwise, there’s not much point of government at all.

Allowing taxpayers to decide where their individual taxes go is anathema to the conception of government as serving the many, not the few. taxes go is anathema to the conception of government as something that serves everyone’s interests and not merely those of the stakeholders of a few programs. The separation of lawmaking powers between the executive and legislative branches ensures that any government policies have the support, or at least tolerance, of a solid majority of the country. Choosing not to fund the defense department, or directing tax dollars towards nongovernmental institutions such as religious schools, which would bring up difficult issues of separation of church and state, is a rejection the concept of both majority rule and checks

Joey Borson ’07 wants his tax dollars going to a cheesesteak fund.

Smoking as scapegoat Anti-smoking legislation ignores larger health threats and sources of pollution BY LAURA MARTIN OPINIONS COLUMNIST

On March 1, 2005, Rhode Island became the seventh state to implement a statewide smoking ban, prohibiting smoking in virtually every work place in the state. The ban is enforced under the 2005 Public Health and Workplace Safety Act and applies to all businesses except the state’s two gambling parlors, Newport Grand and Lincoln Park. Businesses must be entirely non-smoking, and the Department of Health recommends that patrons who wish to smoke should stand 50 feet away from the doorframe. The fine for smoking violations is $250 for the first offence, $500 for the second and $1000 for each subsequent violation. The business owner is solely accountable for paying the fine. The smoking ban raises serious questions about how we prioritize public health decisions and who is responsible for environmental pollution. It is quite obvious, of course, that smoking and second hand smoke are linked to heightened cancer and asthma risks. An amazingly successful public health campaign has lead to a heightened awareness of the risks associated with smoking. Beginning with Mississippi in 1994, states starting filing individual lawsuits with the top four tobacco companies on the premise that they should be able to recover the costs of treating illness caused by tobacco use. This led to the Master Settlement Agreement of 1998, in which R.J. Reynolds, Brown & Williamson, Lorillard

and Philip Morris agreed to pay the states $206 billion. The settlement was a critical turning point for the anti-tobacco movement. However, while smoking has become “demonized,” officials and academics have failed to discuss the public health effects of car exhaust and industrial pollution. Other environmental externalities, such as exhaust pollution, pose an enormous health threat, one which seems more urgent and widespread than second-hand smoke.

much easier to implement than trying to cap industry emissions. Secondly, smoking is propagated by one overarching industry — tobacco companies — while industrial and traffic pollution is caused by a whole array of industries. Finally, it is much easier to prove the relationship between cancer and smoking in an epidemiological study than it is to prove the relationship between cancer and pollution, which comes from an unquantifiable number of sources.

Because the environment is considered an externality in our economic system, it is hard to hold individuals responsible for pollution. Car exhaust contains carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide, sulphur dioxide, suspended particles less than 10 microns in size, benzene, formaldehyde and polycyclic hydrocarbons, among other compounds. The laundry list of toxic airborne compounds released by car use and by industrial practices is nothing short of terrifying. If these airborne pollutants are so noxious as well, then why has the government pursued the banning of cigarette smoke so persistently at the expense of regulating greater health risks? There are three simple answers. The first is that enforcement of smoking bans is

The difference between banning cigarette smoking and decreasing emissions is that it’s easier to blame a huge, visible industry than it is to blame ourselves. In reality, each and every person contributes to local air pollution through driving and day-to-day energy consumption. We affect every other citizen with our consumption, but the environment is an externality in our economic system for which no one group or individual is solely responsible. Many towns have a flat fee for household trash removal, but there is obviously no fee on the individual for “environmental impact.”

The fact that citizens are often left without a choice but to contribute to local air pollution is the greatest obstacle standing in the way of reducing noxious emissions. People must drive in order to get to their workplaces, and public transportation does not provide a viable alternative for the majority of suburban populations. Citizens in most towns are also not held accountable for the amount of trash they generate. By charging perpound for trash removal, legislation could have a profound impact on the amount of waste generated. Analogous policies for fuel consumption might help reduce air pollution. The tobacco industry and smokers do not deserve to be demonized for threatening our public health. In 1995, the Rhode Island Department of Health survey found that 62 percent of companies in the state were smoke-free, while another 23 percent had “highly-restrictive” smoking policies. In comparison to the deplorable number of superfunds in the state, smoking in public spaces seems like a lesser threat. Discussion must be extended to the carcinogenic and asthmatic effects of local air pollution. Just as states have sued big tobacco in order to account for money spent on treating sickness caused by smoking, states must further pursue lawsuits against other industries such as the automobile and transportation industries that also cause detriment to public health.

Laura Martin ’06 knows that exhaust fumes are the ultimate high.

SPORTS WEEKEND THE BROWN DAILY HERALD · MARCH 17, 2006 · PAGE 12

Skewed ranking does not reflect accurately on m. tennis Most fans on campus know that the men’s tennis team is one of the top teams in the country. Apparently, though, the people who rank the nation’s college tennis teams do not. Last season, Brown was ranked as high as No. 36 STEPHEN COLELLI in the Fila Collegiate Tennis RankBROWN SUGAR ings. This year, the Bears have picked up where they left off, reaching as high as No. 41 in late January and, again, two weeks ago. Since dropping a match to then-No. 27 Clemson University (the Tigers are now No. 5), Brown has rolled off eight straight wins — and fallen to No. 53 in the nation. As bizarre as that seems, it is even more unfathomable when one considers the schools that have leapt in front of Brown in the past two weeks. Virginia

Tech University, despite being demolished 5-2 by the Bears three weeks ago, sits four spots in front of them at No. 49. The University of Pennsylvania, whom the Bears have not lost to in five years, is No. 41, the same spot Brown was in two weeks ago. The University of Southern California, and its illustrious 6-7 record, is ranked 46th. A few voters must have thought Reggie Bush also wields a racket in his spare time. What is the point in having rankings if they do not reflect the performance of the teams evaluated? Although the 81 Bears have not played the most challenging schedule to date, they have performed better than those teams ranked 10 to 15 spots in front of them. Of course, a rankings controversy is nothing new to college athletics. Year in and year out, the NCAA Division I football polls are littered with questionable rankings. Whether in the Associated see COLELLI, page 8 Ashley Hess / Herald

Both athletes and commentators tend to speak often, say little Two years ago, a buddy of mine and I came upon the “Ask a Dolphin” section on the Miami Dolphins’ Web site. Expecting terribly banal commentary from the players themselves, we followed the links and found ourselves reading some Q&A ERIC PERLMUTTER with tight end PERL MUTTERS Randy McMichael. Luckily for us, we got what we came for. Check out this gem of a response to a question regarding his will to make the Pro Bowl: “The only thing I really want to do is help this team win. But at the same time, I want to have a big year. I want to go out to Hawaii. That’s my ultimate goal.” It is rare that one is forced to reconsider the true meaning of the words “only” and “ultimate,” but I guess that is

a power exclusive to Randy McMichael. The point of this nugget of mental density is that it is a shining example of today’s sports dialogue. One often finds many equally incoherent and contradictory statements from players, coaches and even the commentators, who are supposed to dissect and analyze the game in a way the average fan cannot. Sports commentary and dialogue have become so diluted with meaningless stock phrases and interviews that it’s practically painful to follow along. From an area of entertainment that is so big, particularly in its manifestation on television, talk on sports offers us too much kitsch and surprisingly little substance. I’m not asking for prose at the level of the Federalist Papers or selfpsychoanalysis — after all, many professional athletes didn’t graduate from college. I only ask for something that is not sickeningly familiar. see PERLMUTTER, page 9

David Madeira ’07, who scored four goals against Hartford last week, is one of Brown’s many options in the offensive zone.

M. lax set to battle No. 7 Minutemen on Saturday BY CHRIS MAHR SPORTS STAFF WRITER

For the men’s lacrosse team, the 2006 season can hopefully make up for last year’s frustrating 6-6 campaign. Last year, after solid wins against the likes of Hofstra University and Ohio State University and a close-call against then-defending national champion Syracuse University in the season’s first month, Brown faltered in April and May, finishing with a losing record in the Ivy League. “For a while last year, we were in contention … but we didn’t play well down the stretch,” said Head Coach Scott Nelson. “We had won a couple big games early and looked very good, then lost a couple tight ones. In Division I lacrosse, you have to win tight games.” With a solid combination of experience and up-and-coming talent that Nelson says “is going to get better all year long,”

Athlete of the Week: W. icers’ Myria Heinhuis ’06 BY JILANE RODGERS ASSISTANT SPORTS EDITOR

Defender Myria Heinhuis ’06 closed out a stellar career in the ECACHL fi-

nals this weekend against Harvard. Though Bruno lost a hard-fought battle 4-3, Heinhuis earned second team allECACHL honors. She ranked 11th this season in the conference for defensive scoring and has not missed a game or practice in her four years at Brown. Earlier in the season, she was named first team All Ivy for the second time in her career. Herald: How did you feel about the end of this season? Heinhuis: It’s always bittersweet to lose, especially to Harvard. We’ve played them 10 times over my four years and lost to them eight of those times. It was nice to make the finals, because it was something we hadn’t done in my time here, so that was a good way to end it.

Ashley Hess / Herald

Myria Heinhuis ’06, one of the most physical defensemen in the ECACHL, totaled 101 penalty minutes this season.

ers as the unsung hero of the hockey team. Being a defender, most of your work isn’t in the headlines. What are the perks? I like that you have to work harder to get your name out there. It’s more fun that way. As (Head Coach Digit Murphy) always says, “Defense wins the games.” It’s great to be back there, being a solid part of the team and taking your chances to score when they come. And you get to hit … to a certain extent. If you could switch it up and play another position for one game, what would it be? I don’t really know if I’d switch. I’ve always played defense, and maybe center a bit. Defense is what I know and enjoy.

Do you have any superstitions before games? I have to put my left equipment on first. Left skate, my left shin guard, left elbow pad. It doesn’t feel right unless I do that.

How about playing a different sport? I used to play soccer, volleyball and basketball when I was younger. I played lacrosse in high school and my first year at Brown. If I were to pick up a new sport, I’d go with squash be-

You’re regarded by Herald Sports Staff-

see AOTW, page 8

the Bears have the ability to win the close games this time around. Bruno stands out the most on defense, where they are anchored by All-Ivy goalie Nick Gentilesco ’06. In 2005, Gentilesco earned a reputation as one of the best goalies in the Ivy League, leading the Ancient Eight in both goals against average (8.06 per game) and save percentage (.568) in nearly 600 minutes of action. “Nick is a difference-maker in that he makes saves he’s supposed to and throws in some incredible saves,” Nelson said. “As a defense, we have to make sure he’s not always making incredible saves. If the defense stays together and plays well as a team he’ll get shots he can save.” Cohesiveness should not be an issue among a group of defensemen that features mainstays Bobby Shields ’07 and cocaptains Rob Cotter ’06 and James Faello ’06. The trio was a key component of a defense that yielded just 9.42 goals per game in 2005, and this year marks its final season of playing together. “In terms of last year, we had a very tight-knit group that had known each other for a while and played with each other for a while,” Cotter said. “It just worked out very well. Defense is a matter of trust and learning how to play with each other.” With Shields having garnered preseason All-American honors, expectations are certainly high for a repeat of last year’s performance. Despite that, the defense is expecting most teams to overlook them — something it hopes to use to its advantage. see M. LAX, page 8 BROWN SPORTS SCOREBOARD THURSDAY, MARCH 16 M. TENNIS: No. 32 Boise State 4, No. 53 Brown 2 (at Blue/Gray National Tennis Classic) FRIDAY, MARCH 17 W. LACROSSE: at Temple M. TENNIS: at Blue/Gray National Tennis Classic (Montgomery, Ala.) W. WATER POLO: at Harvard SATURDAY, MARCH 18 EQUESTRIAN: at Johnson and Wales M. LACROSSE: vs. No. 7 UMass-Amherst, 1 p.m., Stevenson Field M.TENNIS: at Blue/Gray National Tennis Classic SUNDAY, MARCH 19 GYMNASTICS: vs. Southern Connecticut, Yale and Rhode Island, 1 p.m., Pizzitola Center W. LACROSSE: at Delaware M.TENNIS: at Blue/Gray National Tennis Classic