NEWS
Wednesday, Sept. 6, 2006 - The Michigan Daily - 7
DEFENSE
Continued from page 1A
Judging by the initial reac-
tion, it seems like this may
be a poor business plan for
the site. Anger enough users,
reason follows, and you won't
be the seventh most visited
site on the Internet anymore.
The question is whether the
voices of the angered are
simply louder than the voices
of the pleased.
Are the majority of stu-
dents happy with this change?
Are they going to check their
accounts more frequently?
That's clearly what the
Facebook staff is banking
on. After all, did you become
more or less interested when
the site added a feature that
shows you which of your
friends have recently tagged
photographs?
They're betting on our
innate curiosity. Martha
Stewart once said that if you
don't like gossip, you don't
like people. This is instant
gossip. You don't have to wait
to hear until lunch Sunday to
hear about what your friend
did at party Saturday night.
Now you can have immedi-
ate documentation, often
involving photographs and
blog posts. It won't be long
before there will be video
and audio, too.
I should use this sce to
urge you to join the otest,
to go back to the daywhere
you could only post o pho-
tograph, usually one ithout
decadent sexual, alcollic or
narcotic-laden undtones.
That's what I'd do if were
listening to my consence.
Except I'm too buscheck-
ing the site.
As of 4:55 p.m.Aman-
da Freebeck left t' group
"Sex and the City. As of
11:26 p.m., Kaitl Ford
has removed "Bar lntheon
Wandering arouns Rome
for hours and hos at a
time" from her infests. As
of 11:38 p.m., she is put it
back.
IRAN
Continued from page 1A
affected by secularism for
the last 150 years. But, he
added: "Such a change has
begun."
It was not clear whether
Ahmadinejad intended to
take immediate specific
measures, or was just urging
the students to rally.
Ahmadinejad, in his
role as head of the coun-
try's Council of Cultural
Revolution, would have
the authority to make such
changes himself. But his
comments seemed designed
to encourage hard-line stu-
dents to begin a pressure
campaign on their own,
thus putting a squeeze on
universities.
"This is the beginning of
a so-called cultural revolu-
tion. Ahmadinejad and his
allies plan to sweep their
opponents from the uni-
versities," said Saeed Al-e
Agha, a Tehran University
professor. "They want to
rule the brains of youth
there."
"Ahmadinejad wants to
settle scores with the most
important center of critics
and opposition and close the
door to any opponent before
municipal elections in late
November," said Kouhyar
Goodarzi, a human rights
activist. "But his move may
prompt a new round of stu-
dent unrest."
Liberal and secular pro-
fessors teach at universities
around the country, but they
are a minority. Most are
politically passive and do not
identify with either the hard-
liners or the liberal camp.
Public opinion is difficult
to gauge because of a lack of
independent opinion polls.
But Ahmadinejad must tread
carefully among various fac-
tions, and strong moderate
voices remain.
Hard-liners increasingly
control the top rungs of gov-
ernment but still encounter
resistance from some mem-
bers of the public. Moderates
also remain in government.
Even among conservatives,
there are different goals and
powerful political factions.
It remains unclear, for
example, how tightly Ahma-
dinejad controls the govern-
ment, or the exact nature
of his relationship with the
country's supreme leader,
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Ahmadinejad surprised
his conservative backers
in April by deciding that
women could attend soccer
games, but Khamenei didn't
agree and the supreme lead-
er's view prevailed.
Shortly after the Iranian
revolution, Tehran fired
hundreds of liberal and left-
ist university teachers and
expelled many students.
It had a brief period of
reform in the 1990s under
then-President Mohammad
Khatami, but hard-line fac-
tions cracked down then,
too, especially on university
students, dissidents and jour-
nalists.
"It's horrible. I did not
expect at all that Ahmadine-
jad ... would try to deprive
others of their jobs because
of political differences,"
Reza, a university graduate
who did not wish to be iden-
tified further for fear of retal-
iation, said of the president's
statement Tuesday.
In spite of Ahmadinejad's
bluster, the purge has not yet
taken place, a human rights
activist pointed out.
"At the moment, these
words haven't been followed
with actions;" said Hadi
Ghaemi, a researcher on
Iran for the New York-based
Human Rights Watch. But
they could signal a coming
crackdown, he added.
Ghaemi cautioned the
international community not
to be "fixated" on the Irani-
an nuclear issue. "We should
not forget about human
rights violations within the
country," he said.
FACEBOOK
Continued from page 1A
Although the technology is new, par-
ent and student concerns are not. Levy
said complaints have also been based on
information ranging from the roommate's
address to comments made during phone
conversations.
No room changes have beengranted
based on Facebook-related concen, Levy
said.
The University is attempting todapt to
students using Facebook and sinsr sites
by sending them their roommates'iforma-
tion earlier than ever before, givingtudents
a chance to get to know their roomates in
July instead of September.
Bush: Without
U.S. in Iraq,
Osama would
be like Hitler
President tells voters that
terrrorist threat is not diminished
from five years ago
WASHINGTON (AP) - Quoting repeatedly from
Osama bin Laden, President Bush said yesterday that pull-
ing U.S. troops out of Iraq would fulfill the terrorist leader's
wishes and propel him into a more powerful global threat in
the mold of Adolf Hitler.
With two months until an Election Day that hinges large-
ly on national security, Bush laid out bin Laden's vision
in detail, including new revelations from previously unre-
ported documents. Voters were never more united behind
the president than in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks,
and his speech was designed to convince Americans that
the threat has not faded five years later.
Democrats have been increasing their criticism of the
president's policies in Iraq as the congressional elections
approach, with the latest salvo coming in a letter Monday
that suggested he fire Defense Secretary Donald H. Rums-
feld.
The White House rejected the idea, both in a written
response from chief of staff Joshua Bolten and in a lengthy
verbal rebuttal from spokesman Tony Snow.
"It's not going to happen," Snow said. "Creating Don
Rumsfeld as a bogeyman may make for good politics but
would make for very lousy strategy at this time:'
To make the administration's strategy more clear, the
White House yesterday published a 23-page booklet called
"National Strategy for Combating Terrorism," which Bush
described as an unclassified version of the strategy he's
been pursuing since Sept. 11, 2001. The booklet's conclu-
sion: "Since the Sept. 11 attacks, America is safer, but we
are not yet safe."
Democrats dismissed Bush's actions as a public relations
strategy that avoided real solutions.
"A new glossy strategy paper doesn't take the place of
real change that will make our country safer" said Sen.
Russ Feingold, D-Wis.
"If President Bush had unleashed the American military
to do the job at Tora Bora four years ago and killed Osama
bin Laden, he wouldn't have to quote this barbarian's words
today;' said Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass. "Because President
Bush lost focus on the killers who attacked us and instead
launched a disastrous war in Iraq, today Osama bin Laden
and his henchmen still find sanctuary in the no man's land
between Afghanistan and Pakistan, where they still plot
attacks against America:'
Bush's speech was the second in a series linked to next
week's anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. It was delivered
to the Military Officers Association of America in a hotel
ballroom filled with U.S. troops, including several injured
in the war, and with diplomatic representatives of foreign
countries that have suffered terrorist attacks.
Later, the White House said Bush was extending for one-
year the national emergency he declared following the Sept.
11 terrorist attacks because the "terrorist threat continues"
and measures adopted to deal with that emergency must
remain in effect.
Bush planned a third speech today from the White House,
laying out his plan to change the law so that detainees held
at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, can be tried for crimes before
military commissions.
The administration also was expected to brief lawmakers
today on a new Army field manual that would set guidelines
for the treatment of military detainees. Congress passed
legislation late last year requiring military interrogators to
follow the manual, which abided by Geneva Convention
standards.
Bush argued yesterday that history will look favorably on
his currently unpopular war strategy.
"History teaches that underestimating the words of evil and
ambitious men is a terrible mistake" the president said. "Bin
Laden and his terrorist allies have made their intentions as
clear as Lenin and Hitler before them. The question is: Will we
listen? Will we pay attention to what these evil men say?"
To make his case,the White House cited previously unre-
leased documents including a copy of the al-Qaida charter
found by coalition forces in Afghanistan that says hostilities
will continue until everyone believes in Allah.
One document Bush cited was what he called "a grisly
al-Qaida manual" found in 2000 by British police during
an anti-terrorist raid in London, which included a chapter
called "Guidelines for Beating and Killing Hostages." He
also cited what he said was a captured al-Qaida document
found during a recent raid in Iraq. He said it described
plans totake over Iraq's western Anbar province and set up
a governing structure including an education department,
a social services department, a justice department and an
execution unit.
The White House also unveiled a letter from bin Laden
to Taliban leader Mullah Omar in which he wrote about
plans for a "media campaign to create a wedge between the
American people and their government" so the people will
pressure leaders to retreat in the fight.
This June 2006 photo provided by Devon Energy Corporation shows the Jack 2 el located in the Gulf of Mexico, approximately 170 miles
southwest of New Orleans in approximately 7,000 feet of water.
Oil com say tests may
mean significant discovery
* Find could be the biggest in
U.S. in 38 years, but fuel yield is
still far away
WASHINGTON (AP) - Move over, Alas-
ka. Geoscientists have made what may be the
nation's largest oil discovery off the coasts of
Louisiana and Texas.
It could be the biggest domestic oil find in 38
years, but production is years away, and even
then it won't reverse America's growing reli-
ance on imports or have any meaningful effect
at the gasoline pump.
A group led by Chevron Corp. has tapped
a petroleum pool that lies 270 miles south of
New Orleans - and almost four miles beneath
the ocean floor - in a region that could hold as,
much as 15 billion barrels of oil, or more than
Alaska's Prudhoe Bay.
"It confirms a new frontier, a new horizon in
the ultra-deep water," said Daniel Yergin, chair-
man of Cambridge Energy Research Associates
and author of "The Prize," the Pulitzer Prize-
winning history of the oil industry. "It isn't
energy independence," he added.
Nevertheless, the announcement of a test well
that sustained a flow rate of more than 6,000
barrels per day is a boon to Western oil compa-
nies at a time when they are finding it harder and
more expensive to gain access to countries such
as Russia and Venezuela, and when foreign sup-
plies are increasingly at risk because of political
unrest across Africa and the Middle East.
The proximity of the Gulf of Mexico to the
world's largest oil consuming nation makes the
new discovery extra attractive to hindustry;
however, analysts said the new fin ould bring
pressure on Florida and other state tsrelax lim-
its they have placed on drilling in hir offshore
waters for environmental and touisn reasons.
Chevron estimated that the 30-square-mile
region known as the lower tertivy, a rock for-
mation that is 24 million to 65nillion years
old, contains between 3 billionind 15 billion
barrels. The upper end of that Inge would be
enough oil to expand the count's reserves by
50 percent. But the first drop f oil from the
lower tertiary isn't expected tchit the market
until at least 2010 and at best will only slow'
the decline in annual U.S. prodction.
Some analysts urged cautionn inferring too
much, too soon.
"One well doesn't tell you lot of informa-
tion," said Matthew Simmons, Houston invest-
ment banker and author of Twilight in the
Desert: the Coming Saudi O Shock and the
Global Economy."
At its height in 1988, the Iudhoe Bay field
produced an average of 1.6 nilion barrels per
day; in 2005, it yielded less tha 400,000 barrels
per day. (An Alaska wildlife riuge the industry
has sought to drill is believeto contain some
10 billion barrels.)
Output from the lower tesary could even-
tually reach 750,000 barrelsa day, or more,
analysts said, but it won't sigificantly dent the
country's energy imbalance.
"It's a nice positive, but theJ.S. still has a big
difference between its consuiption and indig-
enous production," said Art sith, chief execu-
tive of energy consultant JohS. Herold. "We'll
still be importing more thar0 percent of our
oil needs."
While the industry was mostly upbeat about
the potential of this new discovery, it also
acknowledged some challenges, including a
dearth of rigs capable of drilling in such deep
water and the long lead times required to drill
and complete deep-water wells.
The U.S. consumes roughly 5.7 billion bar-
rels of crude-oil in a year, while its reserves
currently exceed 29 billion barrels, according
to the U.S. Energy Department. To put that
into perspective, Saudi Arabia's reserves are
believed to exceed 250 billion barrels.
Chevron's test well, called "Jack 2," was
drilled in about 7,000 feet of water. Chevron
has a 50 percent stake in the field, while part-
ners Statoil ASA of Norway and Devon Energy
Corp. of Oklahoma City own 25 percent each.
The financial implications of "Jack 2" and
other prospects in the lower tertiary are most
significant for independent oil and gas producer
Devon, which is the smallest of the three part-
ners. Devon's shares soared about 15 percent on
the New York Stock Exchange.
"Relative to its size, Devon has one of the
greatest exposures to the deepwater Gulf of
Mexico," said Oppenheimer & Co. analyst
Fadel Gheit.
That said, many companies, including BP
PLC, Exxon Mobil Corp. and Anadarko Petro-
leum Corp., stand to benefit from their own proj-
ects in the lower tertiary. "If the current thinking
is correct, this is only a beginning" Gheit said.
The well was drilled in the Walker Ridge area
of the Gulf, 175 miles off the coast of Louisiana.
It is an area the industry has been exploring for
about five years.