ON CAMPUS
Author to speak
on Christianity
and gay marriage
David Myers, co-author of
"What God Has Joined Togeth-
er: The Christian Case for Gay
Marriage," will speak in room
3909 of the Michigan Union
from noon to 1:30 p.m. today.
Myers is a professor of psy-
chology at Hope College. The
event is free.
Prof to help you
imagine seismic
waves
Jeroen Ritsema, a professor in
the Department of Geological Sci-
ences, will deliver a lecture on
"Imagining Earth's Interior with
Seismic Waves" today at 4 p.m. in
the Founders Room of the Alumni
Center.
A reception will follow the lec-
ture.

NEWS
WHERE'S THE ELEPHANT?



Friday, October 6, 2006 - The Michigan Daily - 3A

Kerkorian may
not be done

Kent Brown, the husband of state representative candidate Pam Byrnes, walks his donkey on the Diag
yesterday afternoon. The donkey made an appearance to go along with the College Democrats' voter
registration effort.
O~mmittee o Uhrn re 1 1n

NRIME t
NOTES

Investor has a
number of options
after GM halts talks
WASHINGTON (AP) - Bil-
lionaire investor Kirk Kerkorian
has a decision to make now that
General Motors Corp. has decid-
ed against pursuing a three-conti-
nent alliance that he had sought
Should he continue his attempt
to buy additional shares in the
company, seek a proxy fight
to take control of GM's board
of directors or simply sit back
as GM pursues its turnaround
plan?
Some analysts said yesterday
they expect Kerkorian to keep the
pressure on GM Chairman and
Chief Executive Rick Wagoner
as he works through a multiyear
plan to make the world's No. 1
automaker profitable again after
losing $10.6 billion last year.
"I would be surprised if (Ker-
korian) took his money and went
home;' said Kevin Tynan, an
automotive analyst with New
York-based Argus Research. "He
is an activist and I think he would
be somewhat unfulfilled if he
doesn't elicit some sort of change
in this company."
Tracinda Corp., Kerkorian's
investment company and the
owner of 9.9 percent of GM, said
Wednesday it was disappointed
by the automaker's decision
to halt talks with Renault SA
and Nissan Motor Co., a court-
ship that the 89-year-old former
movie mogul set in motion last
spring.
An alliance would have
"enabled GM to realize substan-
tial synergies and cost savings"
and Tracinda said it regretted
"the board did not obtain its own
independent evaluation of the
alliance." Tracinda spokeswoman
Carrie Bloom declined comment
yesterday.
The decision by GM's board to
scrap the talks was unanimous,
meaning it included the support

of board member Jerome York,
a Tracinda adviser. Kevin Reale,
research director for Boston-
based AMR Research, said that
indicated "Kerkorian is presdnt-
ing some level of confidence in
Rick Wagoner and his team to
be able to drive the turnaround
plan."
York, a former chief fina-
cial officer at Chrysler and IBM
Corp., has served on the board
since February. Tracinda said fol-
lowing York's election that it had
amended his consulting agree-
ment to clarify that York wouldtn't
share any confidential informa-
tion about GM with Tracinda.£
Kerkorian, who unsuccess-
fully tried to take over Chrysler
Corp. in 1995, said last monthlle
was interested in buying up. to
12 million more shares of GM.
The move would bring Tracinda's
ownership to 12 percent, but they
would need regulatory approval
because GM owns banking and
insurance interests.
Tynan said Kerkorian was less
likely now to go through with
those plans, especially with the
company's stock trading near is
52-week high of $34.
"I think that carrot of asdi-
tional shares was based upon the
possibility of an alliance being
formed. Now what's his cata-
lyst?" Tynan said. He expected
Kerkorian to await GM's third-
quarter earnings report later this
month before making his next
move.
Morgan Stanley analyst Jona-
than Steinmetz said in a note to
investors that Kerkorian and York
"face a fork in the road." He said
they could stand pat and monitor
GM's turnaround, sell the shares
or attempt to increase their pdsi-
tion within the company.
One way of increasing its posi-
tion would be through a proxy
fight against GM's management
or an attempt to develop more
support among shareholders. But
the move would carry some pit-
falls.


Credit accounts
used in La.,
Mexico
Several University Hospital
staff members' credit accounts
were used to make unauthor-
ized purchases in Louisiana
and Mexico on Wednesday, the
Department of Public Safety
reported. Police are conducting
an investigation.
Witness reports
hit-and-run in
parking structure
A witness saw a vehicle back
into a parked truck and then
speed away in the Palmer Drive
Parking Structure on Washt-
enaw Avenue on Monday at
about 11:30 a.m., DPS reported.
The witness wrote down the
license plate of the car. Police
are conducting an investigation
into the identity of the driver,
which could result in an arrest.
The truck was not damaged. The
other car's taillight was broken.
Report of stolen
Rolex turns out
to be mistaken
A woman called to report that
her Rolex watch had been stolen
from the women's locker room
from the Frank Lloyd building
at Domino Petting Farm, DPS
reported. Forty minutes later,
she called back to say that she
had located the watch.
THIS DAY
In 'U' History
Greek leaders
approve new
standards
Oct. 6, 1923 - Representa-
tives from 35 campus fraternities
approved a new set of standards
last night that will tighten scholar-
ship requirements for initiation and
social activities.
The rules will be submitted
to the interfraternity council for
consideration at its conference on
Oct. 18.
One of the established rules
states that students cannot be ini-
tiated into a fraternity unless dur-
ing the preceding semester they
took 14 credits or more, passing
at least 11 of those credits with
a C average. If they took less
than 14 credit hours, they have to
pass with a B in at least one class
and no less than a C in the other
courses.
Students wishing to join a fra-
ternity must obtain a certificate of
eligibility issued from the college
in which they are enrolled.
Additionally, fraternities as a
whole will be required to main-
tain a C average. If they fail to
do so for more than one semester

they will be placed on probation,
which prohibits them from par-
ticipating in social activities and
initiating new members.

* Report calls for
requiring course in
'reason and faith'
BOSTON (AP) - Harvard
University, founded 370 years ago
to train Puritan ministers, should
again require all undergraduates to
study religion, along with U.S. his-
tory and ethics, a faculty commit-
tee is recommending.
The surprisingly bold recom-
mendations come after years of
rancorous internal debate over
what courses should be required of
all Harvard students. The current
core curriculum has been criticized
for focusing on narrow academic
questions rather than real-world
issues students would likely con-
front beyond the wrought-iron
gates of Harvard Square.
The report calls for Harvard to
require students to take a course
in "reason and faith," which could
include classes on topics such as
religion and democracy, Charles
Darwin or a current course called
"Why Americans Love God and
Europeans Don't."
"Harvard is no longer an institu-
tion with a religious mission, but
religion is a fact that Harvard's
graduates will confront in their
lives," the report says, noting 94
percent of incoming students report
discussing religion and 71 percent
attend services.
"As academics in a university
we don't have to confront religion
if we're not religious, but in the
world, they will have to," Alison
Simmons, a philosophy profes-


sor who co-chaired the commit-
tee, said in a telephone interview
Wednesday.
The report, which has been cir-
culated to faculty and whose con-
tents were firstreported Wednesday
by The Harvard Crimson student
paper, also says Harvard students
"need to have an understanding
of American history, American
institutions, and American values"
calling for a requirement to study
the United States in a comparative
context with other countries.
The recommendations are the
latest chapter in a lengthy, tumul-
tuous saga over revamping the uni-
versity's core curriculum, which
dates to the 1970s. Former Presi-
dent Lawrence Summers made
reform a priority in 2001, but the
work of several committees bogged
down and initial recommendations
were criticized as weak. Summers
resigned earlier this year, forced
out by faculty anger at his handling
of a range of matters, including the
curriculum review.
Harvard's core has shied away
from the "Great Books" approach
to general education, focusing on
"approaches to knowledge" rather
than "bodies of knowledge." But
the report notes few Harvard stu-
dents plan to become academics,
while more than half plan to attend
business, law or medical school.
The new recommendations are
clearly geared toward rounding out
the liberal arts education of those
students.
In addition to ethics, "reason
and faith" and the "United States
and the World," students would be


required to do coursework in two
other areas: science and technol-
ogy, and "Cultural Traditions and
Cultural Change."
The recommendations also
include making writing and ana-
lytical reasoning part of the gen-
eral requirements, and retaining
foreign language work.
The recommendations, by a six-
member faculty panel, offer only
general guidelines about the kinds of
classes that would count. The draft
may be revised and wouldbe adopted
only after passing a vote by Harvard's
Faculty of Arts and Sciences.
The State University of New
York and George Mason Universi-
ty have adopted general education
requirements that include manda-
tory American history.
In the Ivy League, Columbia
University has a significant core
curriculum with courses that
include material on religion, and
Dartmouth currently requires a
course in the analysis of religion,
though that will change next year,
according to its Web site. But Har-
vard would be the only school in
that group requiring students to
take courses in both religion and
U.S. history.
Public colleges in Colorado,
along with Ohio University and
Arizona State, are among the other
universities currently reviewing
general education requirements,
said Anne Neal, president of the
American Council of Trustees and
Alumni, a generally conservative
academic group that has urged uni-
versities to toughen general educa-
tion requirements.

I

Mich.
resident
dies 1in
Iraq
DETROIT (AP) - A 32-year-old
Baptist minister's son who wanted
to follow his grandfather's example
and join the Marines has died in
a noncombat vehicle crash while
serving in Iraq.
Career Marine Capt. Justin D.
Peterson, a father of three, died Sun-
day from injuries he received in
an accident in Anbar province, the
Defense Department said. It said the
incident was under investigation.
He was from the unincorporated
community of Davisburg in Spring-
field Township, about 35 miles north-
westof Detroit.
Peterson was a supply officer
assigned to 1st Tank Battalion, 1st
Marine Division, I Marine Expedi-
tionary Force, in Twentynine Palms,
Calif. He had been in Iraq for six
months, his family said.
Peterson's grandfather,Don Wood-
worth, had been a warrant officer in
the Marines, wife Patricia Peterson
said yesterday.
"From the time he was old enough
to talk about a career, Justin wanted
to follow in his grandfather's footsteps
and be a Marine," his family said in
a statement released by Harrison
Funeral Home in Springfield Town-
ship. "Justin was proud to be an offi-
cer in the U.S. Marines."
The son of a Baptist minister, Peter-
son enlisted in the Marine Corps out
of Southfield Christian High School
in 1992, his wife said. He later earned
a business degree at Taylor University,
an evangelical Christian school in
Upland, Ind., and received an officer's
commission.

Live Acou&tuic -On Wedsat 8-10 B
IIEANER'S
BUY -3drink wwbenrco
G ET fre Mon Fr -12 am
Good at this location only. Not good with any other offer. No copies of this coupon will be accepted

To play: Complete the grid so that e%
and every 3x3 box contains the

for more information call 734/615-6449
The Department of Geological Sciences presents
a public lecture and reception

u

Jeroen Ritsema
Henry Pollack Professor of Geological Sciences


Friday, October 6, 2006,
4:] Oprmh
Alumni Association=
Founders Roors

LSA

*_

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