WE
One hundred four years of editorial freedom
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Friday
March 10, 1995
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I.Advisory committee begins national search for provost
By Cathy Boguslaski
Daily Staff Reporter
A committee to advise President James J.
Duderstadt on a replacement for outgoing
Provost Gilbert R. Whitaker Jr. held its first
meeting yesterday.
Whitaker, who is also the University's
xecutive vice president for academic affairs,
nnounced in December that he will not seek
reappointment. Whitaker's five-year term ends
in August.
The Provost Search Advisory Committee
is composed of 15 members, including two
students - one undergraduate and one gradu-
ate.
The committee will conduct a national
search for provost candidates, said Kenneth
E. Warner, chair of the search committee.
"Hopefully we will
be able to identify a siz-
able pool of applicants,"
he said. "Clearly, it's
s central to find a dynamic
individual who can pro-
vide real excellence of
Whitaker vision for academics and
can handle a sizable bud-
get."
The committee will be soliciting input
from students, faculty and staff for nomina-
"It could very well be that we could have
someone in place by ,September."
- James J. Duderstadt
University president
tions as well as the qualifications a provost
should have. The committee's mission is to
identify a group of applicants for further con-
sideration by Duderstadt and the University
Board of Regents, Warner said.
Because the committee is not a decision-
making body, its meetings do not fall under
Michigan's Open Meetings Act and will be
closed to the public, said University spokes-
woman Kim Clarke.
The president would like to see a list of
candidates by July, Clarke said. The regents
will make the final selection of a provost.
In a February interview, Duderstadt said
that if the new provost is selected from within
the University, he or she may be appointed as
early as September.
"My suspicion is that the search process
itself will take about six months," Duderstadt
said. "It could very well be that we could have
someone in place by September."
But if the new provost comes from outside
the University, the appointment may not come
until January, and Whitaker may continue to
serve as provost in the interim, Duderstadt
said last month.
Warner said students, faculty and staff
may forward comments about the provost
position or nominations to the Provost Search
Advisory Committee in care of Ejner Jensen,
special counsel to the president.
House GOP
sends tax cut
plan to floor
The Washington Post
WASHINGTON - House Ways
and Means Committee Chairman Bill
Archer (R-Tex) yesterday dismissed a
barrage of Democratic and Senate GOP
warnings and presented a costly tax
plan that includes a $500-per-child tax
credit, a deep cut in the capital gains tax
and a cornucopia of business and cor-
porate tax breaks.
The package reflects practically all
of the tax provisions in the House GOP
ing, Archer predicted House Republi-
cans would pass the tax package to
fulfill a key provision of the "Contract
with America."The plan, he said, would
provide crucial incentives to strengthen
families, deliver long-awaited middle-
class-tax relief and bolster the economy.
"We have done exactly what we
promised we would do - no ifs, ands
or buts," Archer told a cheering gath-
ering on Capitol Hill. "I challenge the
anti-growth Democrats to stop throw-
JUDITH PERKINS/Daily
Panel members take questions from the audience at last night's "Beyond Jake Baker" forum in Hutchins Hall of the Law School.
Panel addresses Iternet policy issues
By Lisa Poris
Daily Staff Reporter
In a packed Hutchins Hall, five panelists
debated the legal ramifications of the informa-
tion superhighway last night.
The 2-1/2 hour discussion, "Beyond Jake
Baker: Policing the Internet," was sponsored
by the Michigan Telecommunications and
Technology Law Review.
University Law professor Catharine
MacKinnon said, "Words and pictures in
cyberspace do what words and pictures any-
Vhere else in society do. I don't think that the
Internet is different from other forms of
speech."
The issue of pornography was brought up
repeatedly throughout the discussion, particu-
larly by MacKinnon. The professor discussed
pornography in relation to Baker's case.
"(The woman named in Baker's stories)
has been pimped to the world to be mastur-
bated over," MacKinnon said.
Baker, an LSA sophomore, faces charges
temming from stories he posted on the Internet
and e-mail correspondence he had with other
Internet users. In one of his sexually explicit
stories he named a University student as his
victim.
At several points, MacKinnon restated her
opinion on pornography and broader topics
raised by the case. American Civil Liverties
Union associate director Barry Steinhardt ques-
tioned the validity of her opinions.
He said MacKinnon was probably afraid of
the Internet, which affects her beliefs. He fur-
ther went on to say, "I think that Jake Baker is
a very unusual incident. Baker is by far and
away the exception."
MacKinnon rebutted by saying how it is
impossible to know exactly how many women's
names have been posted on the Internet.
"Mr. Steinhardt has no way of knowing
how many real women are out there in pornog-
raphy," she said. "It's hard to know how many
Lisas and Jennys aren't real."
At various points the audience broke into
applause following MacKinnon's rebuttals.
University Law student Robbi Sackville
said, "MacKinnon brings out in this discussion
the very real possibility of harm to the women
on this campus."
See PANEL, Page 7
MacKinnon advising
woman in messages
By Josh White
Daily Staff Reporter
University Law Prof. Catharine MacKinnon said last-
night she is advising the woman who LSA sophomore
Jake Baker named in one of his sexually explicit Internet
postings.
Despite MacKinnon's call to adopt "civil remedies"
for Internet attacks against women, she said -she is not
representing the woman in court.
"The woman is represented by a U.S. Attorney and the*
governmeint in a criminal case," MacKinnon said. "There
is no civil case being brought on behalf of the woman."
MacKinnon said the woman has no desire to express her
opinions because "everything about her is confidential."
"But it is not all that difficult to imagine what a
person's feelings in her case would be," she said. "Think
about any woman you know and insert her name in the
story, then you will know how this woman feels.
"The shock is that this woman is not a no-one, not just
a name. She is somebody, and the horror is that she could
be anybody."
"Contract with:
even further byi
that was de-
signed to assure
that corpora-
tions do not to-
tally escape pay-
ing corporate in-
come taxes
t h r o u g h
writeoffs and
loopholes.
Elimination
of the corporate
alternative
America" and goes
repealing a measure
44 N M
ing roadblocks in
who want to try a
we nave done
exactly wha we
said we promised
we would do - no
ifs, ands or buts"f
- Bill Archer (R-Tex.)
Ways and Means chair
the path of those
new way - those
who seek to
help our em-
ployees by
helping our em-
ployers."
"I challenge
them to cease
the class war-
fare and their
scare tactics,"
he added.
But House
Democrats and
minimum tax would greatly benefit
capital-intensive industries, such as
Texas oil and gas companies that
heavily invest in equipment.
Many of the provisions would be
a boon to middle and upper income
families, such as the $500 tax credit
for families earning up to $200,000 a
year, a separate credit to help defray
the cost of adopting children, and a
new Individual Retirement Account
that would chiefly benefit middle and
upper income families that don't cur-
rently qualify for IRA tax benefits.
But the proposed tax credits are
"non-refundable," which means they
are of no value to families that have
little or no tax liability.
All told, an estimated one third of
the overall tax benefits for individuals
would go to those earning more than
$100,000 a year, or roughly 5 percent
of all families and individuals.
In a speech to the conservative Fam-
ily Research Council yesterday morn-
the White House immediately tagged
the $189-billion, five-year plan as a
windfall for wealthier Americans and
businessmen and a direct violation of
an earlier pledge by House Majority
Leader Richard K. Armey, R-Texas,
and House Budget Committee Chair-
man John R. Kasich, R-Ohio, to out-
line, approve and bank spending cuts
before putting tax cuts on the table.
GOP leaders have promised to make
offsetting cuts in-the 1995 budget and to
make other savings in welfare programs
and Medicare to pay for the tax pack-
age. House appropriators recently
slashed more than $17 billion of current
spending, including heating assistance
and nutritional programs for the poor,
to help pay for the tax package.
However, some Democrats and
key Senate GOP leaders have argued
that, in light of growing anxiety about
the deficit, that the tax package should
take a back seat to efforts to balance
the budget.
African American task
force to sponsor events
" Leadership, time
management to be
addressed in
workshops
By Spencer Dickinson
Daily Staff Reporter
The University's African Ameri-
can Programs Task Force tomorrow
dill sponsor the first in a series of
events "to address the cultural, social
and academic needs of African Ameri-
can students."
Michael Jones-Coleman, a task
force co-chair, said, "These events
should be of interest to students of
color, and anyone interested in racial
issues."
The first event, a leadership con-
rence, will take place in the North
Campus Commons from 8 a.m. to 5
p.m. tomorrow.
Barbara Reynolds, a noted journal-
ist and author, will deliver the keynote
address, titled "Pieces of a Dream: Our
Ancient America," and has edited
several books dealing with Blacks in
history.
The speech is co-sponsored by the
University's Minority Engineering
Programs Office and the Center for
Afroamerican and African Studies. It
begins at 4 p.m. in the Michigan
League Ballroom.
The following weekend, the task
force will present a musical called
"Our Young Black Men Are Dying
and Nobody Seems to Care."
The play will address issues rang-
ing from gay-bashing to homicide
using "humor and music to address
these issues with determination and
hope."
A question-and-answer period will
follow the play, which starts at 5 p.m.
Sunday, March 19 in the Power Cen-
ter.
Aspiring Black business people
are invited to attend "Business Acu-
men for the 21st Century" at 6:30
n~ m Anril 6 n the Mrhurnni,,mnn'c
Circuit Court to hear
city, YMCA dispute
By Maureen Sirhal
Daily Staff Reporter
Ann Arbor City Council is realizing
the worst-case scenario in its dispute
with the YMCA over a five-year-old
loan, as Washtenaw County Circuit
Court today will begin hearing the first
of several lawsuits in the case.
In the case of Great Lakes Bancorp
vs. the City of Ann Arbor, the YMCA
and the law firm of Miller, Cflfeld,
Paddock and Stone, the city heads
through the legal system today at 10
a.m. in Circuit Court.
The case comes after years of hag-
gling over funding .of the YMCA's
Canfield stated, "As long as a public
purpose was being met, then it would be
appropriate" to back the YMCA.
After hearing the law firm's opin-
ion, City Council unanimously passed
the loan agreement into action.
The YMCA then contracted with
Great Lakes Bancorp to obtain
$1,640,000 to cover the estimated
construction costs. After the loan was
approved, Miller, Canfield then rep-
resented the bank in legal matters
including modifications to the loan.
The agreement stipulated that if
the YMCA should fail in its repay-
ment, the bank could call upon Ann
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