4A - The Michigan Daily - Wednesday, January 8, 1997
hbe A hbign gaiI
420 Maynard Street
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
Edited and managed by
students at the
RONNIE GLASSBERG
Editor in Chief
ADRIENNE JANNEY
ZACHARY M. RAIMI
University of Michigan Editorial Page Editors
Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of the majority of the Daily :s editorial board. All
other articles, letters and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily.
FROM THE DAILY
Book bargains
Student Book Exchange offers alternative
NOTABLE QUOTABLE
'Both Regent Varner and Regent Baker
were hoping for an Elmo doll.'
-Interim President Homer Neal, joking at last month
regents meeting about parting giftsbfor Varner and Baker
who no longer serve on the Board ofRegents
JIM LASSER SHARP AS TOAST
//-Kc / p A, --
VIEWPOINT
Students can help secure regent
oday is the last day - to put your old
and mangy textbooks up for sale at the
Student Book Exchange.
Once upon a time, students could return
used texts to a bookseller in the Michigan
Union. About 10 years ago, that bookseller
shut down; right away students organized
and formed the Student Book Exchange.
Initially, the all-volunteer group borrowed
money from the Michigan Student
Assembly piggy bank to set up shop with
shelves and other operating supplies. By
:now, the exchange is entirely self-support-
ing with its 15-percent cut of the profits.
Why not sell books back at the friendly
campus textbook supplier? When students
sell books back that way, they get no choice
in the amount of money they receive. The
bookseller sets the price and often will not
accept many titles. It's the same story when
students buy books from the larger stores
- the publisher and the seller set the prices.
Even used books are often close to the cost
of the new copies.
The best part of the Student Book
Exchange is that students, who can set their
own prices, get the other 85 percent of the
profits. Since Monday, students have been
bringing books to the exchange. Tomorrow
and Friday, students can buy books they
need for this semester at discounted prices
- giving the profit back to fellow students.
Sunday, student sellers can pick up
unsold books and their checks from sold
books. The exchange is operating out of the
Pendleton Room on the second floor of the
Union from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Exchange books are sorted by subject,
such as political science or math, but not by
course number. One things is required of
. Strong p
Veto puts too much
R elations between the Republican-con-
I trolled 104th Congress and President
Clinton were strained and tempestuous at
best. The two sides often clashed over pub-
lic policy and politics; in fact, it led to a
partial government shut down last year.
But one area where the parties found
common ground was the line-item veto.
Now, however, a federal court may declare
this law - one of the few the 104th
Congress passed that the president actually
signed - unconstitutional. Six members of
Congress, including U.S. Sen. Carl Levin
(D-Mich.), recently filed a federal lawsuit
claiming that the Line Item Veto Act, which
took effect last week, is unconstitutional.
The Congress members' basis for the law-
suit is solid - the federal district court
should agree.
The line-item veto gives the president
the power to cut, or veto, specific tax and
spending measures in certain federal legis-
lation. Previously, the president would have
to veto an entire bill, even if he disagreed
with one or two specific spending mea-
sures. The act, then, gives the president
more power to rid bills of unnecessary
spending. Supporters of the law argue that
it will lead to less pork-barrel spending -
the president will weed out frivolous expen-
ditures that lawmakers often include. In the
students buying from the exchange: they
must know which books they need.
Potential buyers should check the listings at
main booksellers before going to the
Pendleton Room.
This, of course, is contingent on profes-
sors having their acts~together. The earlier a
professor turns in the book list, the more
options students have. Some professors also
post syllabi on the World Wide Web; those
who don't should consider this convenient
option, as it makes both students and pro-
fessors less dependent on the booksellers.
Coursepacks, of course, can be a stu-
dent's downfall. With the wars over royal-
ties, some professors send their coursepa-
cks to a copier that ignores the rules. If not,
depending on the publisher's whim,
coursepacks can cost students extra money,
time and delays. Sometimes it is worthwhile
for students to look for an actual book if the
coursepack contains most or all of it.
Students who don't find the books they
need at the exchange, but find themselves
in a financial pinch, could check out the
many used bookstores in Ann Arbor, the
Harlan Hatcher Graduate Library, the
Shapiro Undergraduate Library or the Ann
Arbor Public Library. (Anyone with a utili-
ty bill or a lease in his or her name - and
an Ann Arbor address - is eligible for a
card to this expansive resource; students
who can't prove they live here can pay for a
library card, which is cheaper than many
textbooks.)
It takes a little extra work, but a deter-
mined student can find many alternatives to
the regular bookrush trends. Options are
plentiful and students can save money by
seeking them out.
iresident
power in one branch
BY ANDY SCHOR
Do you think that the stu-
dents at the University should
have a say in what happens to
the money that they pay in
tuition and fees?
If you answered yes, then
you are in support of a stu-
dent member of the
University Board of Regents.
Currently, the students don't
have a constant voice at the
table.
What we do have is an
address twice a year to the
regents and the hope that they
will solicit input from the
MichiganStudent Assembly
president when they make big
decisions.
Does this always translate
to mean that the student body
Schor is the Student
Regent Task Force co-chair
an MSA representative and
an LSA senior
has a voice with the regents?
No is the answer.
MSA has empowered a
task force, called the Student
Regent Task Force, to investi-
gate and implement a way to
make a full-voting student
regent.
The task force currently is,
speaking with legislators in
the state Legislature about
introducing a constitutional
amendment to the Michigan
State Constitution to provide
for a student regent.
The legislators, like the
students, feel that the students
should have input on the
board. They know that every
other school in the Academic
Big Ten, as well as many
schools around the nation,
have a student sitting on their
equivalent to the Board of
Regents and that the
University should also.
What can you do'?
Well, the answer is simple.
A bill will be introduced into
the state Legislature soon.
You can call or write your
state representative and state
senator and ask him or her to
co-sponsor the bill.You can
also urge them to vote for the
bill and to discuss it with their
peers in the Legislature, as
well as with their con-
stituents. How can you help
MSA to get a student regent?
E-mail Andy Schor
(aschor@uimich.edu) or Sara
D e ni e w e t h
(sarajden@umich.edu), the
chairs of the Student Regent
Task Force, or call them at
763-3241.
There is much work to do
and little time, but it is time
for the students to have their
voices heard on the Board of
Regents.
MILLER ON TAP
Cleanse the
celebrity culture
with the gift
of heroin
t's really my own damned fault. In
. the dead hours of mid-afternoon
New Year's Eve, too early to go to
party, too late to
go back to bed. I
made the mistake
of watching a
batch of end-of-
the-year TV spe-
cial.
Most of them
weren't that bad.
The History
Channel did an
hour on each year JAMES
from the early MILLER
'60s to 1989. It
was fairly intelligent TV, perhaps a lit-
tle revisionist. ("After the '84 conven-
tion, Mondale's campaign began to
pick up momentum.")
But MTV's Year In Rock was partic-
ularly rank this year. I've seen it a few
times before and typically they have
been harmless wads of fluff. C*
O'Donnel and Ray "Wish I was
Pacino" Liotta getting =out of limhos
wearing sunglasses at 9:30 at night.
Madonna proving my theory that luck
and a lack of self-respect can super-
sede talent. You get the picture.
This year's chum had a decidedly
different odor to it. The MTV retro-
spective was all a-twitter with stories
of heroin use. Even MTV's ugly step-
child, VHI got into the act.
The last half hour of the show w
given over to heavy, lugubrious sacks
of woe about the rich, famous and, of
course, the pretty, dancing the night
away with Lady H. It took several min-
utes before I could give a reason for
the bile creeping up the back of my
throat.
For each member of the empty-head-
ed L.A. glitterati that had wrecked his
or her life due to spoon candy, th
was always a good explanation as
why we should pour our condolences
upon them: They are celebrities.
What the hell is it with Americans
and celebrities? Are we so devoid of
stimulation in our own lives that we sit
with baited breath in front of "Hard
Copy" for topless princess Stephanie
photos?
What does it say about us that there
is an entire group of people we have
elevated to the position of secu@
sainthood solely because they are
more attractive than we are and are so
shallow that they devote their lives to
getting attention from people they
never met?
Be it Robert Downey Jr., or Shannon
Hoon from Blind Melon, or any one of
a hundred unnamed fashion
models/refugees, the source of our
empathy is their fame. "Oh isn't th
just awful" we say, shaking our hea.
in dismay. "Such a nice young man.
Another life ruined by those horrible
drugs. What a shame."
What shame? So somebody OD'd.
So attalentless, tattooed sneering
punk-pop waste of oxygen croaked in
a hot tub.
Why does the entertainment com-
munity expect us to have any kind of
pity for someone who pumps their
body full of poison because they'
bored?
We finance their horrible movies,
buy their horrible records and listen to
their snide condescending diatribes on
award shows.
Keith Richards is doing anti-drink-
ing ads on TV now. What is going on
around here?
So heroin is sweeping through the
fashion model community.
Good. Maybe God really does exi
Maybe, just maybe, this is sweet
revenge on the club rat, trend-sucking,
New York-worshipping pack of CK I
swillers who think a spread-eagle 14-
year-old in her underwear is appropri-
ate advertising and whoibless thou-
sands of even younger girls with eat-
ing disorders every year.
Celebrity drug use has one redeem-
ing quality, and boy, is it a doozy. It
shines the light of human frailty on tl~
rich and shameless and forces certai
shall we say "slower" members of our
culture how weak and sad the famous
really are.
After arwhile even the dullest cable
junkie is bound to think, "Hmm, my
Aunt Thelma has been married eight
times and everyone thinks she's a
whore.
"Liz Taylor has been married eight
times and everyone thinks she's cla
personified. Wait a minute! I thinkT
see a hole in our logic!"
If we seewlarge numbers of our
famous and wealthy dying or wasting
away in droves because they are just as
capable, usually more capable, of
screwing up their lives as the rest of
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
shifts vast amounts of power to the presi-
dency - power the Constitution does not
necessarily grant.
Moreover, the line-item veto undermines
the central tenets of the American democra-
tic process. Normally, the president sends
Congress a budget; then, Congress alters it.
After, the two sides negotiate to create a
consensus budget. Essentially, each branch
of government serves as a check against the
other. But the line-item veto circumvents
this check-and-balance system - which is
central to American democracy. If the line-
item veto is the law of the land, then the
presidency ends up with too much power,
reducing the role of Congress in the bud-
getary process.
The power compares to that of a "strong
mayor," but the jurisdiction is far greater.
Despite claims of pork-trimming, some
president down the line will likely abuse the
act.
Usually, lawmakers try to secure federal
funds for their districts, some of which is
frivolous or unnecessary. However, the line-
item veto does not guarantee that the presi-
dent won't use it for political reasons. For
example, the president could veto specific
spending measures intended to benefit the
opposite political party. Or, the president
could threaten to veto specific spending
measures to coerce members of Congress.
Again, the president gains an unfair advan-
tage in the political and governing process.
Many observers, as well as the plaintiffs
and the law's supporters, say they are
expecting a court battle that may lead to the
Supreme Court. In fact, such an advance
would be welcome. It is the duty of the fed-
eral judiciary to protect the Constitution; it
chrlMr, IP r, T1 teTip, .tr Ant+
Conlan helps
Blue win
TO THE DAILY:
1 would like to commend
the Daily staff and especially
John Leroi for the excellent
piece on Travis Conlan in
(,Big Blue win all due to
heart" 12/9/96). Conlan
deserved all of the recogni-
tion that he received.
As I watched the game
against Duke, I saw Conlan
do a lot of the things he has
been doing this year, but then
also stepping up the rest of
his game as well. This entire
season,vConlan has been a
defensive force for the
Wolverines, as evidenced
especially by his superb per-
formance marking up Duke's
Trajan Langdon.
But Conlan really stepped
up his game when the team
needed him with those three
critical 3-pointers. Each one
came at a time when everyone
on the team was beginning to
get down on themselves.
When the normally exu-
berant Tractor Traylor was
looking tired and frustrated;
and when Louis Bullock
couldn't find any open shots
with Duke's stifling perimeter
defense! and with Maurice
Taylor on the bench with
three fouls, Conlan found a
way to hit a three with one
second left in the first half to
give the Wolverines some
momentum heading into the
lockerroom. Each of his
threes came in these sort of
circumstances, and Conlan
took each one with a look of
confidence that we have
rarely seen in him from
behind the arc.
When he's on the floor,
Conlan is the guy who Steve
Fisher looks to set up
Michigan's offense and
r#Pf.ncP While Rnmi.nn
Wolverine's season to this
point, it would have to be
"improvisation."' They
improvised their way to some
hard fought victories against
heavy underdog squads like
Cleveland State, Bradley and
Detroit.
With Maurice Taylor play-
ing all of 16 minutes and
with Maceo Baston still not
100 percent, the Wolverines
stomped the Blue Devils 16-3
in the final 10 minutes. of the
game. Michigan's defense,
led by Conlan, stifled Duke,
and their offense found a way
to get the ball in the basket.
Travis Conlan and the
Wolverines showed an inten-
sity that has rarely been seen
so far this year, an intensity
that the Wolverines will need
to keep running on all cylin-
ders if they hope to remain at
the top of the NCAA rank-
ings.
However, one shouldn't
overlook some other things
that went on in this game. In
the first half, it was Louis
Bullock who saw the game
getting ugly for the
Wolverines; he responded by
getting the team riled up in
the huddle on one end of the
floor, and then walking the
ball up the court and knock-
ing down a 3-pointer.
This shot came at a point
in the first half when the
game was already beginning
to slip away from the
Wolverines. In the second
half, it was Tractor Traylor
taking the reigns of the squad
at one point; before leaving
the game for a substitution,
Tractor yelled at his team-
mates vividly, and let them
know that the game could
still be won.
And that was the key,
because despite the baffling
12 point deficit with just 10
minutes left, the Wolverines
played like they could still
win nnrl th,,'c wh,, they di
Bus service
needs help
To THE DAILY:
Recently, a few letters
have been published in the
Daily with regard to the Bus
Service between North and
Central Campus. Overall,this
service is excellent. If I ever
need to go between the two
campuses on a weekday, the
transportation is there. On a
weekend, it is a much differ-
ent story. I live in Bursley
and commute often. This is
not such a big deal for me on
days that I have classes.
However, there are many
times when I need to go to
Central Campus on the week-
end, and the transportation
just is not there.
According to the Bus
Schedule, the buses should
come by every 20 minutes,
except for six different times
during the day. Already, this
means that they come on
average about every 30 min-
utes, but there is more. Out
of about 10 times that I have
had to wait for the weekend
North Campus bus this
semester, at least seven of
those times have been for
almost 40 minutes, once even
50. This is absolutely unac-
ceptable. Several times, there
have been so many people
waiting for the bus that it
hardly fit all of them by the
time it came around. This is
not fair to the students.
If the University really
has the students' interests in
mind, it will see to it has at
least an adequate form of.
transport between the cam-
puses on the weekends.
I am sick and tired of
being late for different activi-
ties because I have had to
wait for the buses on the
weekends. I am sick and tired
of havingnto nlin an ;,;iting
end, supporters claim that the government
will become more fiscally responsible.
While possible benefits of less superflu-
ous spending cannot be overlooked, the act
is plainly unconstitutional. The lawsuit's
plaintiffs claim the line-item veto gives the
"president, acting alone, the authority to
'cancel' and thus repeal provisions of feder-
al law." But the Constitution only allows the
nrar' n td a-.. nr c antrf 1lillc* not~