WEDNESDAY SEPT. 22, 2004 Vol. 126, No. 10
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ELECTION COUNTDOWN
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DAYS UNTIL ELECTION DAY DAYS UNTIL THE DEBATE
INSIDE
STUDENT LIFE T H E I N D E P E N D E N T N E W S PA P E R O F WA S H I N G T O N U N I V E R S I T Y I N S T. L O U I S S I N C E 1 8 7 8
Candidates agree n But does the CPD? University still has not received official confirmation By Jonathan Greenberger Editor in Chief Finally, it’s official. Or is it? Nearly ten months after fi rst being proposed, the three presidential debates and one vice presidential debate seemed Monday night to be in limbo no more. An agreement released then by the Bush-Cheney and Kerry-Edwards campaigns featured a debate schedule that mirrored the one proposed by the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD). But by Tuesday night, Washington University officials still had not heard official confi rmation of the debate’s status, and the CPD had not publicly signed off on the agreement. If the agreement of the campaigns
agreement calls “soft Kerry” supporters, while the remaining 50 percent will be “soft Bush” supporters. Originally, the town-hall participants were to be “undecided” voters who have no allegiance to either campaign, unlike the “soft” supporters who will be leaning toward supporting one candidate. The elimination of the undecided voters was not entirely unexpected, given the Bush-Cheney campaign’s reported concerns that partisans might masquerade as undecided voters. Still, the switch from undecided to “soft” voters caught some by surprise, with the campaigns refusing to defi ne what a “soft” supporter is and nobody knowing for sure what prompted the
is accepted by the CPD, it will mark the ending to long negotiations about the schedule and format of the debates. Of the four debates, the one at Washington University had reportedly been the most controversial. A Bush-Cheney spokesperson denied it yesterday, but published reports had indicated that members of the president’s reelection campaign were concerned about the town-hall format proposed by the CPD. Monday’s agreement addressed those questions about the format, making slight modifications to the CPD’s original proposal. Both Bush and Kerry will still be questioned by audience members selected by Gallup, an independent polling organization. Fifty percent of the 100-150 questioners will be what the
See DEBATE, page 5
KRT CAMPUS
Both Sen. Kerry and President Bush will attend the Washington University debate. As agreed, it will be a town-hall style debate.
Students wonder about petition’s impact By Sarah Kliff Contributing Editor
Comeback kids: Women’s volleyball overcomes two losses for a 3-0 win.
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Gone streaking: Women’s soccer is on a roll with another win.
Will it bring us big bucks? Now that the debate’s on, what kind of economic impact will it have?
PAGE 4 You’d think the guys would want to see the girls: What happened to Title IX?
PAGE 6 INDEX 1 6 8 10 12
hectic,” said Givens. “We’ll start getting visits from the campaigns who want to come look at the space. Networks will want to scout out locations for broadcast. We’ll meet with NBC to show the facility. We’re making sure that everything will be in place.” While administrators kept focused on planning for the debates, students took a more proactive stance in ensuring that Bush and Kerry make it to campus. The most visible effort made by students was the “Letter of Enthusiasm” headed up by Student Union and Project Democracy. Students had mixed opinions about the impact of the “Letter,”
in which University students expressed their “wish to dispel any notion that Washington University’s 2004 Presidential Debate will not occur.” The petition, which contained 35 pages of student signatures, was sent to both campaigns. Senior Teresa Sullivan, president of Project Democracy, seemed most hopeful about the petition’s impact. “I think that when any group of people gets together and makes its voice heard like that, someone is going to pay attention,” said Sullivan. “I think the candidates took it into account. It shows a lot about campus and how much young people
See LOCAL, page 5
Southpaw and former Witness EIC join forces By Kelly Donahue and John Hewitt News Staff
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News Forum Calendar Classifieds Sports
While students spent the past week wondering whether a presidential debate would come to campus, Washington University’s preparations continued on without hesitation. “Nothing really changed,” said Steve Givens, assistant to the chancellor. “We’ve been moving ahead all along. We haven’t said, ‘Okay lets go,’ because of the confirmation. We’ve been going all along.” Givens noted that though the University has still not received official confirmation from the Committee on Presidential Debates, he
remained confident that the debate would occur. “I really wasn’t surprised,” said Givens. “I thought that it would happen all along.” Steve Hoffner, director of operations, had a few more doubts as the negotiations proceeded. “I was somewhat surprised, but definitely pleasantly surprised,” said Hoffner. Both Hoffner and Givens emphasized that no preparations, large or small, had been put off due to the negotiations. Regardless of the new announcements, Givens said that the next two weeks will be extremely busy ones. “Obviously it will get a lot more
Political views from left to right will soon merge as leaders from two prominent political papers on campus combine forces. Sophomore Ben Tramposh, editor in chief of the liberal Southpaw publication, will join forces with sophomore Michael Bowers, former editor in chief of the conservative Washington Witness to create an as-yet-unnamed nonpartisan publication that the staff of Southpaw will be folded into. “In the past there has been some bad blood [between the publications that] has caused a lack of professionalism and caused bickering rather than a discussion of politics and ideas,” said Tramposh. According to Tramposh, both he and Bowers get along despite their differences in political opinion. “We’ve managed to put past issues in the background as far as leadership is concerned,” said Tramposh, which led to the idea of creating a joint publication. “In the interest of both our publications, we started early in the year to tentatively pursue the idea of combining papers and making one campus political paper in the hopes that it would increase readership, interest and the professionalism of both of our [publications],” he said. According to senior Jay Newman, associate editor
STUDENT LIFE
for Southpaw, the concept of the joint publication will be to move beyond rhetoricbased politics and focus on the issues. “The idea behind the new publication is to salvage campus political debate,” said Newman. “Better research, more news and not just straight ideology. The new leadership is enthusiastic about their new project. “This is a really exciting time,” said Brian Nakash, the former Witness business manager who left the paper along with Bowers to work in a similar position at the new paper. “There is a lot of interest around campus. We’ve been doing some research, and we have yet to see anything like this at any other university.” The new publication will hold its first official meeting on Sunday, Sept. 26 to begin preliminary planning after which more information about the paper will become available. According to Bowers, the first issue should go to press within the next three weeks, before the presidential debate currently scheduled to occur at Washington University. At a meeting of the Conservative Leadership Association (CLA) last Thursday, the Witness’s then-editor in chief Bowers asked members of the CLA—the campus political group associated with the Witness—to vote on joining with Southpaw to create one political campus paper. Under the merger, the Wit-
See SOUTHPAW, page 4 One Brookings Drive #1039 #42 Women’s Building St. Louis, MO 63130
DAVID BRODY | STUDENT LIFE
Participants in the Roll Over Cancer event roll tires for a world record at Francis Field on September 20. A record-setting 139 people rolled the tires 100 yards in this charity event for cancer awareness.
Rolling over cancer n Tire roll breaks Guinness World Record for “largest
group tire roll,” supports cancer awareness By Mary Bruce Contributing Editor On your mark, get set… roll your way to cancer awareness. At 11:30 a.m. on Monday morning, 139 physicians, members of the local community, and cancer survivors “rolled over cancer” as they broke the Guinness World Record for the largest group tire roll. As brightly decorated tires made their way around the Francis Field track, the Alvin J. Siteman Cancer Center—in coordination with the Department of Surgery’s Premier Billing Network (PBN) at the Washington University School of Medicine—educated the community about cancer and Newsroom: (314) 935-5995 Advertising: (314) 935-6713 Fax: (314) 935-5938
cancer research. “We do a lot of crazy things!” said Vivian Boyd, director of Billing Services for the Department of Surgery and one of the originators of the idea to break a world record. “We found a record that seemed like it was pretty easy to break.” Although the record was ultimately defeated, there were a few moments of hesitation when the event fell short of the 138 participants needed to break the record. Fortunately the roll was allowed to proceed with the help of five construction workers convinced to sacrifice their lunch break for a good cause and a local jogger
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See CANCER, page 3
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