The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com Thursday, November 16, 2006 - 3A NEWS BRIEFS WASHINGTON Lott wins back leadership slot in Senate GOP caucus Mississippi Sen. Trent Lott, ousted from the top Senate Repub- lican leadership job just four years ago because of remarks considered racially insensitive, won election to the chamber's No. 2 GOP post yes- terday. Asked whether he feltvindicated by the 25-24 secret ballot vote, Lott deferred to newly-elected party leader Mitch McConnell. "The spotlight belongs on him," Lott said of his Kentucky colleague. McConnell, who was uncon- tested and will succeed Sen. Bill Frist of Tennessee, predicted that he and the rest of the newly elected GOP team will provide a muscular opposition to the new Democratic majority. "We will be a robust minority, a vigorous minority, and, hopefully, a minority that is only in that condi- tion for a couple of years," McCon- nell said. BAGHDAD Kidnappers free scores of Iraqis Kidnappers released about 70 peoplesnatchedinamass abduction by suspected Shiite militiamen who answer to a key backer of the prime minister - a sign the militants went too far and Iraq's leader may be yielding to intense U.S. pressure to crack down on sectarian violence. But Prime Minister Nouri al- Maliki clearly has more work to do. Iraqipolice, hospital and morgue officials reported 105 new violent deaths yesterday; 54 of the victims were tortured and shot, their bod- ies dumped in Baghdad. The quick release of many of the captives - less than 24 hours after the abductions - was surprising in a country where hundreds of Iraqis have been kidnapped, murdered and dumped in streets or rivers each month. In two recent mass kidnappings, both of about 50 peo- ple, the victims were never heard of again. WASHINGTON US Airways makes $8b offer for Delta US Airways Group Inc. made a hostile $8 billion cash and stock bid for Delta Air Lines Inc. yesterday, a deal that would create one of the world's largest carriers. The move came despite Delta's repeated statements it isn't interested in a merger. The offer to buy Delta once the Atlanta-based airline emerges from bankruptcy protection by the middle of2007 would give Delta's unsecured creditors $4 billion in cash and 78.5 million shares of US Airways stock. Delta has yet to file its own plan of reorganization. As it stands now, Delta's common shares are likely to end up worthless when it exits bankruptcy. LANSING Unemployment drops to 6.9 percent Michigan's unemployment rate dropped to 6.9 percent in October, state officials said yesterday. The latest seasonally adjusted rate was below September's rate of 7.1 percent but remained among the country's highest. The national jobless rate was 4.6 percent last month. Michigan's October rate was a half-percentage point higher than the October2005 rate off6.4 percent. The national jobless rate decreased by a half-percentage point over the same period, the state said. - Compiled from Daily wire reports U.S. general says not to pull out THE CHAMPION Abizaid rejects push for Iraq withdrawal in Senate hearing WASHINGTON (AP) - The top U.S. commander in the Middle East warned Congress yesterday against setting a timetable for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq, rejecting the arguments of resurgent Democrats who are pressing President Bush to start pulling out. Gen. JohnAbizaidinsteadurged quick action to strengthen Iraq's government, predicting that the vicious sectarianviolence in Bagh- dad would surge out of control within four to six months unless immediate steps were taken. "Our troop posture needs to stay where it is," and the use of military adviser teams embedded with Iraqi army and police forces needs to be expanded, Abizaid told the Senate Armed Services Com- mittee. It was the first hearing on Iraq policy since last week's elections gave Democrats control of both houses of Congress starting in January. The voting last week has been widely interpreted as a public repudiation of Bush's policies on the war, which has left more than 2,850 U.S. troops dead and more than 20,000 others wounded. Democrats have coalesced around the idea of starting to remove American troops in the next few months, and increasing numbers of Republicans have been openly critical of the war. The day after the election, Bush expressed an openness to considering fresh ideas on Iraq and announced the departure of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. MSA From page IA contested March election, when a president and vice president will be elected. There are nine LSA seats to be voted on today and tomorrow, four Rackham Graduate School seats, three College of Engineering seats, two Business School seats and one seat each in the schools of nursing, pharmacy, social work, medicine and public health. For those students who want more information before voting, the online ballot features links to several candidates' platforms. Below is a rundown of each of the four parties competing for these coveted spots: DEFEND AFFIRMATIVE ACTION PARTY Platform: Fight racial harass- ment and preserve and increase minority enrollment on campus. LSA candidates: Stephen Bar- rett, Amber Williams, Roland Frohman III, Yousef Rabhi, Alex Smith, Sarah Barnard and Mari- cruz Lopez. Candidates from other schools: Karen Tabb, School of Social Work; Julia Redd, Clinique Brundidge, Nicole Campbell and Catherine Jones, Rackham; and Mahdi Chad- houry, engineering. HUNGRY HUNGRY COEDS.COM PARTY Platform: Change MSA proce- dures so student organizations can use money distributed by MSA to provide free food at their meetings more easily LSA candidates: Ben Grimshaw, Steven Schwartz, Daniel Ray, Joe Degnan, Tom Gannon, Mera Keen- an, Pooja Varma, Brant DiChiera and James Pomerantz. Engineering candidates: Saa- mir Rahman, James Anderson and Wessam Ibrahim. MICHIGANACTION PARTY Platform: "Protecting your wallets, protecting your rights and taking action for you." LSA candidates: Michael Moses, Shakim Beamon, Marcus Wil- liams, Jennifer Hsu, Nicole Vitale, Max Lebowtz-Nowak, Sabrina Shingwani, Ryan Sloan and Lauren Washington: Candidates from other schools and colleges: Robby Hogle and Arvind Sohoni, business; Ashley Schneider, Kyle Goszyk and Brian Steers, engineering. STUDENT LIBERTY PARTY Platform: Reform the race and ethnicity graduation requirement so more classes qualify, discourage the assembly from taking stances on political issues and enable stu- dents to allow a dollar of their MSA student fees to go toward a student group of their choice. LSA candidates: Chris Fitzpat- rick, Lisa Ferro, Lukasz Wietrzyn- ski and Bryan Kelly. Candidates from other schools and colleges: Lisa Treumuth, phar- macy; Scott Cackowski and Elliot Kruk, engineering. INDEPENDENTS Two candidates are running as independents: Tim Hull, LSA, and Ari Siegel, business. Hull said he wants to make MSA more relevant to the average stu- dent. Siegel said he wants to expand options for BBA dual degrees, change all campus printing defaults to double-sided, increase green energy use on campus and make MSA more student-friendly. Eastern Michigan University student Ben Powers wins a chicken wing eating contest last night at Buffalo Wild Wings on State Street. The contest was sponsored by UM Stars for the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Powers ate a dozen wings in about 90 seconds. [that's not how we used to do it.] W7 Univesit Unions DD YU KOW FOR FRESH BREATH ON THE - RANGE,YOUCAN CHOMP ONA 7 7 1 MINT GOLF TEE For 25 cents,you can - -- - get rid of foul breath with a flavored golf tee. The flavors available range -814 from mint to grape. Two U.S.inventors, John Packes and Ramon Peralta, came up with ....... the idea for Tasty Golf Tees while walking down the fairway, Reuters reported. The inventors realized the possible profitability of fla- vored tees when they saw golfers chewing on tees on their way to the next hole.