Serving James Madison University Since 1922
Vol. 87, No. 19 Monday, November 1, 2010
Sunny n 56°/ 32° chance of precipitation: 0%
ELECTION
POLITICS
Comedians rally thousands The Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear brings left and right to middle in Washington, D.C.
Campaign cover-ups exposed By AMANDA CASKEY The Breeze
By JEFF WADE The Breeze
WASHINGTON — Late into Saturday’s “Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear” comedian Jon Stewart showed the attendees that the solution to defeating the increasingly polarized nature of political discourse is one and the same: a little bit of sanity. The rally, which attracted more than 200,000 people to the event, brought “The Daily Show” ’s Jon Stewart and comedic foil Stephen Colbert to the National Mall in Washington, D.C. to combat and/or satirize the hyperbolic nature that they believe is a byproduct of a 24-hour news cycle. Brianna Speacht, a sophomore art history major who went to the rally. Speacht said more people than expected came to the event. “You could tell from Stewart’s reaction that he didn’t expect that many people at the event,” said Brianna Speacht, a sophomore art history major who went to the rally. The rally combined both elements of political activism and entertainment and attracted more than just college students to the event. “It was such a cool experience to go down there,” said Kelly McKew, a senior media arts and design major, who went to the rally with her friends. “There was such a diversity of people, not just college kids; it was middle aged
parents with their kids.” Not all attention was focused on the stage, however, as the throngs that turned out said as much about the rally as any performer did. The number of signs that littered the visual landscape showed that a lot of people had things to say. “Protest” signs tended to fall within a very specific range of categories. There was the standard assortment of “Colbert Report” in-jokes and Internet memes. Speacht said she saw people with various signs both protesting the government on both sides of the political spectrum. “If you had any problem with the government, they used this rally to let it be known,” Speacht said. Stewart spoke to the crowd that spanned across geographic and demographic lines. By the time he arrived at his core message, the crowd spilled out past the Mall and overflowed onto the stairs of the nearby museums. “The speech at the end that Jon Stewart gave was really enlightening,” said Molly Greenhood, a junior media arts and design major. “It was a nice end to the rally for him to talk about people working together even though it doesn’t happen in Congress.” During Stewart’s speech, he spoke about people living their ordinary lives see RALLY, page 4
PHOTOS BY PAUL JONES / THE BREEZE
Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert’s rally drew a crowd estimated in the hundreds of thousands to D.C.’s National Mall.
The problem with election campaign finances lay in donations from outside organizations, according to Sheila Krumholz, the executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics. This is particularly true for organizations that do not have to disclose where the money came from, how much they donated or what it is for. “It’s not comforting we don’t have evidence,” Krumholz said. “It just means we’ve been denied the truth.” “Who’s Paying for this Election?” was the title and topic of Krumholz’s lecture Thursday night to a large crowd in Miller Hall. The purpose of the presentation, which featured three political science professors — Valerie Sulfaro, Marty Cohen and Tim LaPira — was to educate attendees on campaign finance regulations, reform proposals, the Tea Party movement and predictions about the mid-term elections and what it means for the 2012 presidential election. “I thought it’d be kind of cool to see what [Krumholz] had to talk about tonight,” said junior political science and history double major Jordan Descovich. “I knew there was going to be a panel so I wanted to hear what the panel had to say.” Krumholz presented facts and figures about current campaign finance regulations, the history of reform and challenged students to question the information they are given. “Voters need to be able to make a rational decision,” Sulfaro said. “In politics, you can’t do that if you don’t know where ads are coming from.” The CRP is a nonprofit and nonpartisan watchdog organization that tracks money in federal politics and its effect on elections. Its website, opensecrets.org, provides campaign funding information of candidates for federal offices in every state. Krumholz quickly moved through the history of reform, from the Tillman Act in 1907, which prohibited contributions to national campaigns by corporations, to the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act in 2002, which prohibited political party committees from raising funds not subject to federal limits and set limits on issue advocacy ads. In between were such historical events such as the 1976 Supreme Court case Buckley v. Valeo, which compared setting limits on campaign contributions to exercising one’s right to free speech. The Court also gave candidates the right to contribute an unlimited amount of money to their own campaign as part of the ruling. “We were no longer going to allow
see MONEY, page 4
CROSS COUNTRY
Dukes steal title
JMU women break the Tribe’s seven year streak Saturday marked a changing of the guard in Colonial Athletic Association women’s cross country as the JMU team ended the College of William & Mary’s bid for an eighth straight conference title. The Dukes regained the title after winning it last in 2002, the year before the Tribe started its streak of dominance. Led by three-time CAA Runner of the Week senior Alison Parris, JMU had seven runners finish in the top 23 out of 95 total competitors active at the tracks in Wilmington, N.C. The win clinched a berth in the NCAA Championships for the Dukes, as they will lace up for the NCAA Regional race on Nov. 13 in Louisville, Ky. Five runners for JMU — Parris, junior Jess Zozos, and sophomores Stacey Nobles, Katie Harman and Katie Gorman — earned All-CAA medals by placing in the top 12. The
Dukes finished with 28 points, a solid margin over the 46 earned by William & Mary. Parris stole the show by winning the 6-kilometer women’s race. Despite all her accolades, it was the first time she has won the race in her career. Nobles was a distant second, 26 seconds behind the Dukes’ leader. Harman was fifth, Gorman was eighth and Zozos was 12th in the race. Senior Kelly Jemison and freshman Erin Lopresti also finished strong for JMU, as they took 22nd and 23rd place, respectively. Sophomore Annie Reiner and seniors Lynne Colombo and Mariah Hagadone also finished donning purple and gold. The JMU squad will race again Friday at the Cavalier Open in Charlottesville in preparation for the national tournament. — staff reports
11/1 INSIDE 3 NEWS Just average JMU falls in the middle for faculty pay.
RYAN FREELAND / THE BREEZE
Pretty in Pink
Dukes participated in “Pink Out” for Breast Cancer Awareness Month during Saturday’s football game. On the field, coaches and staff wore pink polos, football players wore pink shoe laces, male cheerleaders wore pink T-shirts and female cheerleaders had pink bows. Support filled the stands as well with pink thundersticks, shirts, painted pink bodies and pink streamers.
5 College aid decreases OPINION Election Day
with dwindling collegeaged voter partcipation.
7 Students take to the water 9 Dukes suffer a fourth during scuba event. loss to the University LIFE Underwater lesson
SPORTS Minutemen find time
of Massachusetts.