This Week In Fake News:
December Arts Calendar
The Middle Eastern campus food Surviving the end of the days, one show cart solution—out of reach? at a time. + ARTS, pages 4 & 5 + PAGE TWO University of Wisconsin-Madison
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Weekend, November 30-December 2, 2012
Israel-Gaza conflict and study abroad Middle East violence causes safety concerns By Ben Siegel The Daily Cardinal
on campus
What’s in a name?
Civil rights pioneer Vel Phillips visits her namesake dorm Thursday night to talk to students about her life leading up to being the first female and black person elected Wisconsin Secretary of State. + Photo by Wil Gibb
SSFC delays decision on contentious MCSC budget After hours of debate and nearly 40 amendments, the Student Services Finance Committee delayed its vote Thursday on the Multicultural Student Coalition’s 2013-’14 budget following a proposal to consider minimally funding the group. According to SSFC Chair Ellie Bruecker, the committee can vote to minimally fund a group if it does not meet a set of required funding criteria within SSFC bylaws. Bruecker said minimal funding is determined to be the “minimum amount to function,” and would be around $10,000. SSFC Rep. Jeff Ehlers first proposed the committee consider minimally funding MCSC due to “signifi-
cant changes” to the group’s programming since its eligibility hearing, saying a number of programs had been removed entirely. However, Rep. David Vines said while what is in the budget is “significantly different,” the group is still providing the same direct services that led to its approval for eligibility. After discussion on Ehler’s proposal, the committee considered tabling MCSC’s budget decision to allow representatives to take a closer look at the required criteria. Rep. Sarah Neibart disagreed with postponing the decision, saying the
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Record three million Wisconsin voters turn out in Nov. 6 election Wisconsin voters turned out in record numbers Nov. 6, casting over three million votes in the 2012 General Election, according to the Government Accountability Board. Votes cast for the president ticket totaled 3,071,434, the most votes cast for a single office in a statewide election in Wisconsin’s history. “This record turnout reflects the voting public’s deep-rooted commitment to participate in the selection of their governmental
leaders,” Wisconsin’s chief election official Kevin J. Kennedy said in a press release. In addition to the record number of votes cast, Kennedy noted the percent of voter turnout, up slightly from 2008, was one of the highest percentages in recent history. “Wisconsin’s turnout rate of 70.14 percent of eligible voters casting ballots in the presidential race was the fourth-highest percentage since records have been kept going back to 1948.” Kennedy said.
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Milwaukee city officials ask UW to drop adidas The Milwaukee Common Council voted Wednesday to support University of Wisconsin-Madison activist groups in urging Chancellor David Ward to terminate the university’s contract with adidas. The issue began January 2011 when a factory contracted by adidas suddenly shut down without compensating over 2,700 Indonesian workers. The UW-Madison Labor Licensing Policy Committee and the Student Labor Action Coalition have lobbied university administration to cut ties with the company since December 2011. Milwaukee Ald. Tony Zielinski, District 14, said he is passionate about preventing the abuse of workers for economic gain, and that adidas’ actions
“Study abroad is a great way to regain a sense of the world outside of this campus,” reads one student’s testimony on the website of University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Study Abroad Office. For those studying abroad in Israel this semester during the assassination of Hamas leader Ahmed Jabari and the ensuing week of rocket exchanges between Hamas in Gaza and the Israeli Defense Forces from Nov. 14-21, the experience in a society both at war and under siege was less out of a brochure in the Red Gym than a front page of The New York Times. Rockets have flown back and forth between Gaza and southern Israel since 2001, but have never threatened the populations of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, Israel’s first and third largest cities, as they did this November. As tens of thousands of the Israeli armies’ called up reserves gathered at the Gaza border, the memory of 2008’s three-week invasion of Gaza loomed large. It was under this backdrop that New York University suspended its Tel Aviv
program, evacuating all students and academic staff to London Sunday, Nov. 18. “We did not think our students and personnel were in proximate or imminent danger. We wanted to avoid a situation where the students would get [to] the end of the semester and have difficulties returning home,” NYU’s Vice-President for Public Affairs John Beckman said in an email to The Daily Cardinal. “Given that consideration, the high priority we always place on student safety … we thought this was the prudent course.” UW-Madison’s safety policies for students studying abroad are largely determined by the advice and travel advisories of Cultural Insurance Services International, which provides insurance to study abroad students, and the U.S. State Department, according to UW-Madison Communications spokesperson John Lucas. The two UW-Madison students in Israel this semester are studying in the northern city of Haifa, effectively putting them out of harm’s way, Lucas said, adding that the university was in “frequent” contact with them via phone and email. “[Student’s safety] is something that we’re always monitoring from Madison … whether it’s a larger situation like the Arab Spring, or a
Graphic by dylan moriarty
need to be more vigorously addressed. “These corporations have to get the message this type of behavior won’t be tolerated,” he said. “If the chancellor at UW-Madison continues to support [adidas] in spite of their abuse of workers, it’s less likely they will change their policies. Zielinski said he met with members from UW-Madison SLAC Wednesday night to assure them he would continue to work with them in protesting UW-Madison’s contract with adidas. In July 2012, UW-Madison asked a Dane County Circuit Court to decide if adidas had violated its contract with the university. The case is currently in the Dane County Court System.
“…the great state University of Wisconsin should ever encourage that continual and fearless sifting and winnowing by which alone the truth can be found.”