4A - The Michigan Daily- Wednesday, February 14, 2001 beN Birb igrti Eiaiyg 420 MAYNARD STREET ANN ARBOR, M 48109 daily. lettersI9 umich. edu Valentine's day through the ages - my thoughts, BRANDEN SANZ ROPPING THE HAMMER EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN SINCE 1890 GEOFFREY GAGNON Editor in Chief MICHAEL GRASS NICHOLAS WOOMER 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. o, I'm not going to bore you with yet another column on why Valentine's Day sucks, as we've already been there and done that k together ("St. Valentine: Capitalist or just plain evil? You tell me," 2/15/99). This is simply an honest- to-goodness look at how romance, relationships and Valentine's Day change as we get older. Strange but true fact: I have never in my life been out with someone (and by "someone" I mean someone of the opposite sex) on Valen- tine's Day. Why, you ask? Well, I'm not really sure. But let's take a closer look. Maybe this brings back some memories ... Elementary school. Probably the first time I was ever actually aware that there was some sense of romance attached to the 14th of Febru- ary. V-Day back then was "totally rad," as we used to say. Everyone brought little envelopes with Valentines and those annoying little can- died hearts with the messages on them and dis- persed them anonymously throughout the classroom. Every year there was one girl who had caught my eye and was secretly rewarded with a large card and an assortment of the big can- died hearts. You remember, the ones made by Sweetarts that were the grade-school equivalent of crack? It's funny how I still remember the names of all those girls, sort of a pre-pubescent version of the modern-day focus girl: Tracy McGrath in 3rd Grade, Ariana Moreno in 4th, Heidi Stark in 5th and Renee Stalter in 6th. Weird. Junior high. Not as fun as elementary school during V-Day, but not as bad as high school either. Hormones are in full-bloom, but the fact that nobody has a car makes for an interesting situation: For probably the only time my life there was no distinction between going out with someone and "going out" with someone, if you get my drift. You talked, you flirted, you pooled your friends for their vast knowledge of the female gender (pathetic as it was at this early age), and eventually you sucked up your courage and asked the fair maiden those irrevocable words: "Will you go out with me?" Thankfully, she said yes the first time and my fragile little adolescent ego was spared a disaster of monumental proportions. But V-Day just wasn't a big deal. You either had a girl- friend or you didn't, the only difference being the fact that (after your parents and hers had first talked to each other) your curfew was extended by two hours. Oh, did I mention the Sweetart hearts? Never underestimate the power they have over a 12-year old, my friends. High school. The absolute low point in a guy's V-Day career. As my friend Kevin once put it so eloquently, "Dude, Valentine's Day sucks the dick of death." For whatever reason, throughout four years of high school, I never seemed to have a girlfriend during the month of February. Just one of those quirks of fate I guess, but it was torture at the time. And in high school, you could never just ask a girl out on a date during V-Day, because that would imply too much interest and, once the inevitable rumors made the rounds, you were tagged as a soft, sentimental guy. You know, a "nice" guy - the kind of guy that all the cute, popular girls avoided like the plague. Adulthood. For me, the first years after graduation were spent in the Army and again, through a strange twist, come V-Day, I always seemed to be out on maneuvers. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy crawling around in the tropical mud of disease-infested Third World countries as much as the next guy, but there's definitely a level of coincidence here that borders on the absurd. Then came college. I figured that once I entered the hallowed halls of the University would never again be dateless on V-Day. After all, with 17,000 women in attendance, it should be easy to find one that would say yes. But then my old friend Mr. Murphy (of Murphy's Law fame) intervened once again and has managed to schedule me for work on V-Day three years running. Not that it's really a big deal anymore. You see my friends, there is a great equalizer for the dateless on V-Day and it's called "The Bar." A good friend of mine pointed out to me a few years back that an inordinate number oW girls got dumped every year on V-Day (and who says God doesn't have a sense of irony?). He reasoned that a large portion of these dumpees would grab their dateless friends and venture down to the local watering hole in an effort to drown their collective misery over a large quantity of adult beverages. He further reasoned that the defenses of said dumpees would be down and, once properly identified, would be easy pickins' for a sexy biyatch (hi* phrase - not mine) like himself. Now let me tell you that personally, I have no empirical evi- dence on this subject, but from what I saw, he was right on the money. So go out tonight and have some fun, with or without a date. Me? I'll be at work. Do you think Branden Sanz is a sexy biyatch? If so, e-mail him at hamrhead(Lumich.edu or post a message at www.michigandaily.com/orum. AATA takeover will not benefit students TO THE DAILY: I have been driving a bus for the University since 1982 and although I think (perhaps mis- takenly) that my own job is not in jeopardy, I'm sure that our bus system is. We should be proud of this University's system. Very few schools provide a bus every ten minutes on a campus this large. The advan- tages for the Ann Arbor Transportation Author- ity are obvious, their system is dependent on federal, state and local dollars which are doled out to them according to their ridership num- bers. More riders, more money. The disadvantages for the University com- munity may not be so obvious, but let's not wait for hindsight. More than half the drivers employed by Transportation Services are Uni- versity students, each of them working sched- ules that are designed around their class schedules. This is a win-win from mission con- trol. They can drive a couple hours in the morn- ing rush and still make their 10 a.m. or 10:30 class. They come back at 3 p.m. for the after- noon rush. They work their way through school working a schedule that is less than ideal for older drivers with houses, spouses and children. There are questions we should ask about this proposed change in our system. Will the spouses and partners of students who live on campus have to pay to ride the bus? What about the children and grandparents? Will each child and grandparent have to show identification? It's hard for me to visualize 85 students rushing to morning class, who normally jump on the bus at Bursley Hall, instead filing on, one by one, front door only, to show their M- card to the driver. The AATA needs these ridership numbers to justify their outrageous spending. The Uni- versity has had a terrific bus service for a very long time, this deserves to be acknowledged and considered carefully before dismantling it. BARBARA BROWN Transportation Services Can a sorority girl, honor student wear Mavi Jeans? TO THE DAILY: I would like to sincerely thank the Daily for widening the breadth of my educational expe- rience here at the University, most recently through Caitlin Friedemann's riveting explana- tion of Mavi Jeans ("Mavi Jeans - so many varieties," 2/12/01). While I often find myself informed by the few pieces of real news you offer, it was refreshing to see an entire article devoted to the most trivial yet important aspect of a student's life: Denim choices. I am sure many an inexperienced freshman has wan- dered into Bivouac, no doubt bewildered by the staggering fashion possibilities - but thanks to Friedemann and the cunning decision by the Daily editors to actually print her article, trendy shopping has been made easy. By weeding out the trivial jeans like Sutters and Diesels and providing an obsessive analy- valtcxlyV Dad. ktf Q C.nA 2. It.ek o, CAO* R ko k cr0 (a crossover? gasp!), am I thus restricted to Mavis? How can I make room in my life for Silver Jeans, whose Hipster Sly style flatters most figures with its fit-n-flare? Please help. JESSiCA COEN LSA junior Status cost water poio key coach TO THE DAILY: I was happy to read J. Brady McCollough's ("Welcome to the limelight," 2/12/01) and Kristen Fidh's ("Opportunity arises, Michigan welcomes water polo," 2/12/01) articles because little to no attention is ever paid to Uni- versity of Michigan water polo. In describing the women's team and their successful and respectable program, one name was missing from the articles. Scott Russell, Michigan men's and women's coach of many years left after last year after spending a long time build- ing the Michigan program to what it is today. However, after all his work when it came time for Michigan women's polo to be promoted to a varsity sport, Russell was not a candidate for the coaching job. Although Title IX has done great things for women's sports, it also has an ugly side. Scott Russell is not the coach of the team he built because he is a man. Ann Arbor lost a great water polo family when Russell and his wife Candice, former coach at Ann Arbor Huron, left. Many of the players on Michigan's team hail from either Ann Arbor Pioneer or Huron high schools and through either playing under Candice or playing over the summers with both Candice and Scott at Wolverine Water Polo, became the respectable players they are today. DAVE SIMISON RCfirst-year student Errors marred Bush tax cut editorial TO THE DAILY: I feel I should correct a few inaccuracies in the Daily's editorial "Divided We Fall," (2/9/01). First, the estate tax burden does not only apply to "upper-class landowners." Currently, the estate tax exemption is only $675,000 and the tax rate on the remainder is as high as 55 Gone are the days when only the wealthy owned stocks. Now, stocks and stock-based mutual funds are an element in practically everyone's investment portfolio. A cut in the capital gains tax will help parents who invest in the stock market to pay for their childrens' college education. Admittedly, a cut in the cap- ital gains tax rate helps the wealthy more, but is that alone a reason to deny this tax relief to middle and working-class families as well? Third, there is a fundamental flaw in the Daily's math relating to the proposed cut in the federal income tax rates. Indeed, President Bush proposes to cut the top marginal rate from 39.6 percent to 33 percent, and the bot- tom tax rate from 15 percent to 10 percent. A decrease from 39.6 to 33 is a 17 percent decrease. A decrease from 15 to 10 is a 33 per- cent decrease. This means that under the Bush plan, individuals in the lowest tax bracke receive the higher percentage tax cut. The Daily's mathematical error renders this part of the analysis in the editorial irrelevant. It is perfectly fine to assail Bush's tax cut plan, but please make sure that the facts con- tained in your editorials are accurate. MICHAEL RIELA Law School third year student Cheney head of state, get used to it To THE DAILY: How does Stephen Lund ("Comparison of TV's West Wing, real one utterly ridiculous," 2/13/01) dare to call Mike Spahn's column ("If only Jed Bartlett were the real president ...," 2/12/01) "ridiculous" when his letter to the edi- tor is lunacy of the sort which adjectives cannotW describe?'Is Lund really naive enough to believe that a man who, by his own admission, does not like to read, says things like "we can- not let terrorists and rogue nations hold this nation hostile or hold our allies hostile" and whose outstanding accomplishment in life is quitting drinking, is capable of executing the duties of chief executive of the most advanced and powerful nation in the world? Dick Cheney is the head of state now and Lund should get used to it, because the rest of us have to. Sure, some countries have a similar system, where the president is largely a figurehead and the prime minister runs the show, except that this isn't how American government is sup- posed to work. Lund should also learn to differ- entiate between what he finds "objectionable"