The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com

Wednesday, November 1, 2006 - 3A

NEWS BRIEFS
BEIJING
North Korea agrees
to join six-nation
nuclear talks
The U.S. and Chinese govern-
ments announced yesterday that
North Korea agreed to rejoin
six-nation nuclear disarmament
talks, a surprise diplomatic break-
through that comes only three
weeks after the communist regime
conducted its first known atomic
test.
The agreement was struck in a
day of unpublicized discussions
between the senior envoys from
the United States, China and North
Korea at a government guesthouse
in Beijing. The U.S. negotiator,
Assistant Secretary of State Chris-
topher Hill, said the six-nation
negotiations could resume as early
as November or December.
"We took a step today toward
getting this process back on track.
This process has suffered a lot in
recent weeks by the actions the
DPRK has made," Hill told report-
ers afterward. DPRK stands for
Democratic People's Republic of
Korea, the North's official name.
The agreement is one of the first
signs of easingtensions since North
Korea conducted the underground
detonation on Oct. 9, defying warn-
ings from both the United States
and Japan and its staunchest ally,
China.
CAPE CANAVERAL
NASA backtracks,
plans to repair
Hubble telescope
NASA will send a space shuttle
to repair the 16-year-old Hubble
Space Telescope, agency Adminis-
trator Michael Griffin announced
yesterday, reversing his predeces-
sor's decision to nix the mission.
Griffin's announcement was
greeted eagerly by astronomers
who feared Hubble would deterio-
rate before the end of the decade
without new sensors and replace-
ments for its aging batteries.
The rehab mission, likelylaunch-
ing in May 2008 using space shut-
tle Discovery, would keep Hubble
working until about 2013. Its esti-
mate cost is $900 million.
The Hubble telescope has cap-
tured some of the most spectacular
images of the universe, popular-
izing astronomy while at the same
time advancing our understanding
of space.
BAGHDAD
Mal1ki orders lifting
w of checkpoints
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki
yesterday ordered the lifting of
joint U.S.-Iraqi military check-
points around the Shiite militant
stronghold of Sadr City and other
parts of Baghdad - another appar-
ent move to assert his authority
with the Americans and appeal to
his Shiite support base.
U.S. forces disappeared from
the checkpoints within hours of
the order, setting off celebrations
among civilians and armed men on
the edge of the sprawling slum con-
trolled by the Mahdi Army militia
run by radical anti-American cleric
Muqtada al-Sadr.
WASHINGTON
Wages and benefits

soar over summer
Wages and benefits paid to
American workers rose in the July-
September period at the fastest
pace in more than two years.
The Labor Department reported
that its Employment Cost Index
was up 1 percent in the third quar-
ter, compared to a 0.9 percent rise
in the April-June period. It was the
biggest quarterly increase since a
similar 1 percent rise in the second
quarter of 2004.
The increase, which was above
the 0.9 percent rise that ectnomists
had been expecting, was led by a
big jump in the cost of employee
benefits such as health insurance
and pensions.
- Compiled from
Daily wire reports
"TABLE KU .
140
The age Medical School
Prof. Richard Miller believes
some will reach if scientists
can perfect a pill mimick-
ing calorie restoration. The
pill, which would have an
anti-aging effect, would be
cheaper than cancer vaccines
and stroke treatments.
Though the pill is promising,
not all scientists agree with
Miller's sunny projection.

UNLIKELY VOTER

Sex myths debunked
in recent global study

Researchers hope
findings will shape
future public policy
LONDON (AP) - In the first
comprehensive global study
of sexual behavior, British
researchers found that people
aren't losing their virginity at
ever-younger ages, married peo-
ple have the most sex, and there
is no firm link between promis-
cuity and sexually transmitted
diseases.
The study was published yes-
terday as part of a series on sex-
ual and reproductive health by
the British medical journal The
Lancet. Professor Kaye Wellings
of the London School of Hygiene
and Tropical Medicines and her
colleagues analyzed data from 59
countries.
Experts say the study will be
useful not only in dispelling pop-
ular myths about sexual behav-
ior, but in shaping policies that

will help improve sexual health
across the world.
Researchers looked at pub-
lished studies on sexual behavior
in the last decade. They also used
data from national governments
worldwide. Wellings noted that
since the survey results were
based on self-reporting, they
could be susceptible to error.
Wellings said she was sur-
prised by some of the survey's
results.
"We did have some of our pre-
conceptions dashed," she said,
explaining they had expected
to find the most promiscuous
behavior in regions like Africa
with the highest rates of sexu-
ally transmitted diseases. That
was not the case, as multiple
partners were more commonly
reported in industrialized coun-
tries where the incidence of such
diseases was relatively low.
"There's a misperception that
there's a great deal of promiscu-
ity in Africa, which is one of the
potential reasons for HIV/AIDS
spreading so rapidly," said Dr.

Paul van Look, director of Repro-
ductive Health and Research at
the World Health Organization,
who was not connected to the
study. "But that view is not sup-
ported by the evidence."
Wellings says that implies
promiscuity may be less impor-
tant than factors such as poverty
and education - especially in the
encouragement of condom use
- in the transmission of sexually
transmitted diseases.
The survey found that single
men and women in Africa were
fairly sexually inactive:onlytwo-
thirds of them reported recent
sexual activity, compared with
three-quarters of their counter-
parts in developed countries.
The study also found that con-
trary to popular belief, sexual
activity is. not starting earlier.
Nearly everywhere, men and
women have their first sexual
experiences in their late teens
- from 15 to 19 years old - with
generally younger ages for
women than for men, especially
in developing countries.

AARON HANDELSMAN/Daily
Governor Jennifer Granholm embraces 3-year-old Jackson Fribley, an Ann Arbor
resident. Granholm spoke at Sweetwater Cafe on West Washington Street yes-
terday afternoon.
Chargles in governor's
race can sometimes
fudge the truth

Poll: GOP outreach to blacks
seems likely to be spurned

DeVos says no China-
made Alticor product
is exported to U.S.
LANSING, Mich. (AP) - Have
you seen the ad with the teddy
bear yet? The one that accuses
GOP gubernatorial candidate Dick
DeVos of not telling the truth?
It's not the only charge being
made in the governor's race that
fudges on the facts. Whether it's a
question of whether the governor
went after a Honda Motor Co. plant
or talk of investments in China, the
campaigns= as well as their sup-
porters - have shoveled out their
share of half-truths and differing
interpretations of the facts.
Take the latest ad being run by
Democratic Gov. Jennifer Gran-
holm, who has repeatedly criti-
cized Devos for cutting jobs in
Michigan and opening a factory in
China while he was head of direct
marketer Amway Corp. and its par-
ent company, Alticor Inc.
The Devos campaign has said
several times that no Chinese
product made by the company is
exported to the United States. But
Democrats were able to buya teddy

bear made in China from Quixtar,
the Internet sales company run by
Alticor.
The bear wasn't made by the
Amway factory in China, as the ad
implies. Instead, it was made by
another company and sold through
Quixtar.
Quixtar "is much like Amazon.
com. On the same invoice the Gra-
nholm for Governor campaign has
on their web site demonstrating the
purchase of the teddy bear ... the
campaign also purchased a Mizuno
travel bag," Michigan Republican
Party spokeswoman Sarah Ander-
son said in a release.
"As I am sure you are well aware
(Quixtar) does not own Mizuno.
Nor dothey ownApplebut they sell
iPods. Nor do they own Remington,
but they sell their shavers. ... These
companies all manufacture prod-
ucts in China and sell them across
the world. Alticor does not manu-
facture these products," she said.
The Granholm campaign sticks
by its contention that the DeVos
campaign is now saying something
different from what it said before.
"They're constantly trying to
change things, and this ad holds
them accountable," Granholm
campaign spokesman Chris De
Witt said yesterday.

Bush's approval
ratings even lower
with black voters
WASHINGTON (AP) - So
much for the Republican charm
offensive toward minorities.
Black voters are far less likely
to approve of the way President
Bush is doing his job than vot-
ers generally and they are more
likely to feel that the country is
on the wrong track, dishearten-
ing news for a Republican Party
that has been trying to curry
favor with minority voters in
recent years.
In what could be a particularly
bad sign for Republicans in next
week's midterm elections, black
voters also are more likely to say
that the Iraq war was a mistake
and that recent disclosures of
scandal and corruption in Con-

gress will be very important to
their vote, according to an Asso-
ciated Press-AOL Black Voices
poll conducted Oct. 23 through
Monday.
Black voters have historically
voted Democratic, and their votes
are criticalto Democratic hopes to
win tight Senate contests in Ten-
nessee, Missouri and Virginia.
Unhappiness among black vot-
ers is reflected by L.C. Washing-
ton, a 41-year-old Democratic
graduate student from Montgom-
ery, Ala., who says Bush is "the
worst president in history," not
to mention "the dumbest presi-
dent I've ever seen - he's the
devil." Washington lays blame
for a laundry list of ills at the
Republican Party's doorstep.
"Republicans are trying to
win over black voters," says
Washington, but "not doing a
good job. Doing a poor job - the
war, gas prices, job losses and
the layoffs."

Even among black Republi-
cans, there clearly still is work
for the GOP to do.
"I don't think Republicans are
doing any kind of reaching out
to African-Americans," said 71-
year-old L.D. Harper of Spring-
field Gardens, N.Y., who's been a
Republican since he was 18.
While black voters say Repub-
licans have done a poor job of
representing their interests, they
also have misgivings about the
Democratic Party. Almost half of
black voters said the Democratic
Party takes their vote for grant-
ed; about a third said the party
has done a poor job of represent-
ing their interests.
About a fourth of blacks said
they weren'tconfident their votes
would be counted accurately.
On the issues, black voters
were most likely to rate the econ-
omy and health care as extreme-
ly or very important to them
personally.

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