4A - The Michigan Daily - Thursday, January 20, 2005
OPINION
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ANN ARBOR, MI 48109
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EDITED AND MANAGED BY
STUDENTS AT THE
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
SINCE 1890
JORDAN SCHRADER
Editor in Chief
JASON Z. PESICK
Editorial Page Editor
Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of the majority
of the Daily's editorial board. All other pieces do not
necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily.
NOTABLE
QUOTABLE
Has Airbus
designed an aircraft for
itself rather than for its
customers?"
- Charles Miller, the European spokesperson
for Boeing, commenting on the unveiling of the
Airbus A380, the first commercial jetliner to
surpass the dominant Boeing 747-400 in size,
as reported yesterday by The New York Times.
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COLIN DALY T HE MICHIGAN DALY
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The only band that cuts taxes
ZAC PESKOWITZ THE LOWER FREQUJENClES
A
Conor Oberst, the lead
singer of the Nebraska band
Bright Eyes, unleashed a
brain-dead ditty entitled
"When the President Talks
to God" in his performance
at the Michigan Theater
Tuesday evening. As a gen-
eral principle, there is noth-
ing more unctuous than a
20-something rock star who believes he is per-
forming a public service by posing political - a
species that seems to be multiplying quite rapidly.
What is to be done?
ager to fill the vacuum of hardcore
punk rock and Republican politics on
the nation's airwaves, the scions of four
Manhattan investment banking families, all
products of the Upper East Side's mean streets,
united to form the Reaganauts. Consisting of
high school friends who had all grown dissat-
isfied with their workaday worlds in corporate
law, IT consulting and accounting, the band
started small in the summer of 2005 with its
debut single "Lawrence Summers is my Favor-
ite Democrat."
From the band's first scratchy recordings,
the Reaganauts immediately distinguished
themselves with a unique blend of overpower-
ing percussion, distortion-heavy guitars and
advocacy for supply-side economics. Decked
out in their trademark uniform of khaki pants,
Brooks Brothers button-down shirts and blaz-
ers, the band members hit the road for their
maiden tour and left enthralled audiences of
College Republicans in their wake.
In addition to the strength of its signature
sound, the band also relied on gimmicks to
achieve stardom. The band members performed
under the names of their favorite conservative
heroes. Bassist Newt "Knuckles" Gingrich had
originally proposed that the Reaganauts dress
up in the style of their namesakes, but drum-
mer Adam "The Annihilator" Smith objected
on the grounds that a powdered wig wouldn't
fit with the band's overall ethos.
Throughout its storied career, the Reaganauts
maintained a propensity to experiment with
unorthodox instrumentation and the frequent
use of guest musicians to supplement the band's
stripped-down sound. The whimsical Milton
"The Fiddler" Friedman often appeared on the
road playing his Montenegrin gusle while Fried-
rich "The Hammer" Hayek would contribute
stunning dulcimer solos to the band's studio ses-
sions. Hayek's appearances on the Reaganauts'
second album, The Minimal State is Inspiring
(As Well As Right), vaulted the band to hitherto
unknown heights of fame. With this release, the
Reaganauts branched out from the social conser-
vatism that marked its early efforts and experi-
mented with libertarian lyrics.
The band's popularity ignited a minor huff
at the American Enterprise Institute when intel-
lectual property expert Claude Barfield was
caught with a bootlegged .mp3 of a Reaganauts'
show on his AEI desktop. The band's general
counsel suggested suing AEI and Barfield, but
these efforts were eventually abandoned when
no lawyers could be found in the United States
due to the successful passageof ,President
Bush's tort reform efforts. Sadly, controversy
would continue to follow the band in the future
and eventually prove to be its undoing.
The Reaganauts received buckets of praise
from music critics, but struggled to make
inroads to a wider audience and maintain
its relevance in a fickle music industry. In
an attempt to influence the political system
directly, the Reaganauts headlined 2008's
Vote for Status Quo Tour. Jenna and Barbara
Bush finally atoned for their terrible taste for
Kid Rock by cheering on the Reaganauts as
they tore up the country in support of Uncle
Jeb's bid for the presidency.
As the critical accolades kept piling up, the
band's most serious crisis was brewing. What
began as the first rock opera about internation-
al financial markets would soon end in tragedy.
From its first release their track, "Bring Me the
Head of the Head of the SEC," was denounced
by the National Association of Securities
Dealers and Tipper Gore for its use of violent
imagery and support for the deregulation of
hedge funds, respectively. But a much graver
situation emerged when reports surfaced that
the Treasury Department contracted with the
Reaganauts to write the song in exchange for
a $241,000 lump-sum payment. The ensuing
firestorm forced a series of contrite apologies
from the band members. In the aftermath of
the scandal, the Reaganauts mutually agreed
to leave music to the liberals and decided they
would take Washington in its stead.
Peskowitz can be reached at
zpeskowi@umich.edu.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Supporting the MCRI will
honor MLK more than
affirmative action
To THE DAILY:
I was disappointed when I read the staff edito-
rial For Dr. King (01/14/2005) in Friday's edition
of the Daily. This editorial encouraged students
to "continue the important work of defending
affirmative action." I must, however, question
the value of a blatantly racist institution such as
affirmative action.
The Daily was correct in its assessment that we
have not learned to live together. But how does
affirmative action solve this problem? Designed
to correct undeniable inequalities in primary edu-
cation, affirmative action instead thrusts unpre-
pared minority students into an academic world
in which they are unlikely to succeed. It also cre-
ates animosity between races as white students
feel discriminated against, and minorities who are
actually prepared for university academic life feel
looked down upon.
The fact is that dealing with unequal primary
education in the college admissions process is too
late in the game to be effective. To quote Mar-
tin Luther King Jr. from his 1963 sermon titled
Strength to Love, "All progress is precarious, and
the solution of one problem brings us face to face
with another problem." Affirmative action tries to
solve education problems for minorities, but mere-
ly manages to create new ones.
Instead of opposing the Michigan Civil Rights
Initiative's attempt to end affirmative action in
Michigan, we should be encouraging it. Academic
life is only as good as the students who live it. We
cannot honestly expect that denying qualified stu-
dents entrance into Michigan's most rigorous uni-
versity on the weak claim that "all diversity is good
diversity" will benefit anyone in the long term.
I believe we can learn to live together and to
celebrate our diversity. However, I do not think
that date is going to be reached until we actually
decide to treat each other as equals. To do that, we
must fix our primary education system, but we
cannot afford to continue pretending that affirma-
tive action is the solution.
Allison O'Leary
Engineering freshman
MCRI deceitful; petition to
defend affrmative action
age all proponents of affirmative action and inte-
gration to sign as well.
MCRI has not passed all the legal hurdles
necessary to appear on the Nov. 2006 ballot.
Preventing the initiative's appearance in front
of the Michigan electorate is still possible, but
it depends on the development of a mass politi-
cal and social struggle against it. The new peti-
tion is designed to express the broad support for
affirmative action programs around the state and
demand that the Michigan Election Commis-
sion bar MCRI's appearance on the 2006 bal-
lot because of its deceptive language. Students
can act-to defend the University's U.S. Supreme
Court victory for affirmative action by signing
and circulating the new petition. Petitions can be
signed online, downloaded and printed at www.
bamn.com.
Ben Royal
Kate Stenvig
The letter writers are graduate students in the
School of Education and BAMN organizers.
Hold Bush accountable lying
before the Iraq war
TO THE DAILY:
In recent days, the Bush administration
has acknowledged that it has concluded its
search in Iraq for weapons of mass destruc-
tion, having found nothing to indicate that
a WMD program existed.
I believe the citizens of this great nation
deserve an explanation as to how our gov-
ernment could be so wrong about an issue
of such importance. Further, if our country
is to be taken seriously in the future, some
officials must be held accountable for this
terrible error.
It is time for the Bush administration to
address this issue and explain why top aides
misled our country and the world into war
with Iraq.
Oz Hazel
Law school
Emergency contraception
should be more accessible
To THE DAILY:
If used promptly, there is a drug that
is up to 89 percent effective at preventing
pregnancy when taken within 72 hours of
on campuses that serve mainly students are not
open on the weekends or evenings, which is
when young women need access to emergency
contraception most.
Therefore, responsible women need access to
emergency contraception 24 hours a day, seven
days a week. We need emergency contraception
available over the counter, as it already is in nine
other countries, and we need more education on
the benefits of using emergency contraception for
doctors, teens and young women. I hope you will
join me in urging the Food and Drug Administra-
tion this month to offer emergency contraception
to women over the counter.
Therese Hustoles
LSA junior
The letter writer is the campus representative
for MARAL.
Pole vaulting not dangerous;
headline misrepresents sport
To THE DAUmy:
Pole vaulting is a very safe sport when
coached properly. We do not "risk safety to
excel" (Pole vaulters must risk safety to excel,
01/19/2005).
Every sensational and false headline that
is printed places our sport closer and closer
to extinction. How many more parents will
never let their kids try the event, now that
they feel the event is more dangerous than
they previously thought?
It's a shame because this article was a
fairly positive one, but most people just
glance at the headlines and never even read
the article.
Please stop slandering our sport to sell a
few more newspapers.
Becca Gillespy
The letter writer is a member of Pole Vault
Power.
LETTERS POLICY
The Michigan Daily welcomes letters
from all of its readers. Letters from University
students, faculty, staff and administrators will
be given priority over others. Letters should
include the writer's name, college and school
year or other University affiliation. The Daily
will not print any letter containing statements
that cannot be verified.
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