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January 17, 2007 - Image 4

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4A - Wednesday, January 17, 2007

The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com

L74 CMidi igan JaI*I
Edited and managed by students at
the University of Michigan since 1890.
413 E. Huron St.
Ann Arbor, MI 48104
,.,,,tothedaily@umich.edu

i

We have to change our politics and come
together around our common interests and
concerns as Americans."
- Sen. BARACK OBAMA (D-Ill.) in a video on his website announcing his
candidancy for the presidency.
JOHN OQUIST |

DONN M. FRESARD
EDITOR IN CHIEF

EMILY BEAM
CHRISTOPHER ZBROZEK
EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS

JEFFREY BLOOMER
MANAGING EDITOR

Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily's editorialboard. All other signed articles
and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.
Worth fighting for
University should continue battling Prop 2
A fter being ultimately denied its request for a delay of the
enactment of Proposal 2 and publiclyquestioning the legal
and social viability of the ballot measure now on the state
constitution, it appears the University will have to just to play ball.
It held out two months, but an e-mail to the campus community
last week from University President Mary Sue Coleman and Pro-
vost Theresa Sullivan announced that admissions have resumed
after a one-week postponement and will abide by the stipulations
of the law for the rest of this cycle.

YOU'VE HEARD THE OLD ADAGE, "THE MORE WE H
THINGS CHANGE, THE MORE THEY STAY THE RAPIDL
SAME?" LOOK AT THE WORLD TODAY. WE'RE WHAT
STILL DIVIDED BY RELIGION AND WE STILL VIDEO
HAVE THE MOST PRIMAL OF MENTALITIES. WE T
HAVEN'T CHANGED IN A THOUSAND YEARS.
(rt

HAVE NEW TOOLS WITH WHICH TO>
LY DISSEMINATE INFORMATION AND
DO WE PROPAGATE? IMAGES AND
DOF EXECUTIONS. LYNCH MOBS ON
HE MOST MASSIVE OF SCALES.

'

SADDAM HUSSEIN'S HALF- ...THEN WE
BROTHER WAS DECAPITATED ONLY HAVE TO
DURING HIS HANGING. WE'RE WAIT SEVERAL
LIVING IN THE DARK AGES. HUNDRED YEARI
FOR ANOTHER
ENLIGHTENMENT

4

i

The bank of Wal-Mart

Although admissions officers are no lon-
ger permitted to consider race when mak-
ng their decisions, the University has not
removed questions concerning race from
applications, simply asking instead that
admissions officers disregard the answers.
Is that slightly dubious? Yes, but the Uni-
versity is hardly to blame. While universi-
ties in other states have been granted stays
until the next admissions cycle, the courts
decided to deny Michigan's public universi-
ties the benefit of similar sensibility. While
we may disagree about the viability of Pro-
posal 2, even its strongest backers - like
Republican Attorney General Mike Cox
- agree that implementing it immediately
is illogical and unfair because it changes
rules in the middle of the game.
The University was compelled to comply
with a questionable law in the inopportune
present. The law will hurt the University
by diminishing the quality of education it is
able to provide and, if the University gives
up now, also tarnish its reputation as a har-
binger of academic diversity.
Monday's Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Symposium reminded onlookers that the
University is still a leader at recognizing
and tackling prevalent social issues that
others are all-too happy to overlook. By
continuing to contest the Gratz and Grut-
ter cases challenging the University's use
of race in its admissions process all the
way to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2003, the
University demonstrated that it believes a
diverse campus community is a vital part of
a good college education.

The University has to comply with the
most recent court ruling, but Coleman has
insisted the legal avenues of contesting Pro-
posal 2 will continue to be explored. She also
has declared that in the absence of race, the
admissions office will look at personal expe-
rience, special talents, geographic diversity,
civic engagement and socioeconomic status
in attempting to create an adequately rich,
diverse campus community. Also, in Febru-
ary, the Diversity Blueprints task force will
issue its findings, detailing possible addi-
tional ways to build a diverse student body.
It is reassuring that the University admin-
istration is so focused on this issue, but we
must also continue to challenge legally Pro-
posal 2, not simply work around it to unpre-
dictable results.
The law has the potential to disintegrate
much of what has been built up over the
last several decades, both in the dynamics
of American society and the complex com-
munity the University has created. The Uni-
versity successfully defended its practices
in front of the high court in the affirmative
action cases mentioned above, and it should
be prepared to go that far again.
In order to further the fight, the Uni-
versity should remain vigilant on the legal
front, use the help of Gov. Jennifer Gran-
holm, who will step in to clarify stipula-
tions of the law come February, and keep
up the public relations campaign to inform
people of why continued challenges to Pro-
posal 2 are necessary. The University has
worked too hard to be undone by a handful
of clueless federal judges.

hen I look at Wal-Mart, I see
an American success story.
The retail giant started in
the backwoods of Arkansas and, over
thelasthalf centuryhas grown intothe
largest retailer in the world. Sam Wal-
ton, the company's deceased founder,
was a true vision-
ary. He developed
business meth-
ods that would
expand his com-
pany while con-
tinuing to attract "
consumers with
low-cost mer-
chandise. As they
did with virtually
every other suc- JOHN
cessful American
business, liber- STIGLICH
als have targeted
Wal-Mart for annihilation.
Liberal complaints about Wal-
Mart's business practices are too
many to detail here, but the latest
objection is gaining some momentum:
Wal-Mart wants to destroy Ameri-
can banks. After delaying its deci-
sion six months, the Federal Deposit
Insurance Corporation is expected to
decide this month whether or not to
issue Wal-Mart a banking charter. In
light of the growing fears over what
the retail giant's entry would do"to
the health of the American banking
industry, the FDIC is likely to cave
under the pressure applied by the
anti-Wal-Mart crowd and deny the
company's application.
During the summer of 2005, Wal-
Mart applied for a banking charter
in the state of Utah to establish an
industrial loan corporation. ILCs are
commonly used by retail companies
to offer consumers an in-house cred-
it-purchasing alternative to the third-
party debit and credit cards already on

the market. Ideally, consumers would
pay for their purchases with credit
cards issued by the retail company's
ILC, making the cost of third-party
credit transactions insignificant.
You might be asking yourself,
"Why on earth would Wal-Mart want
its own bank?" Well, in case you did
not know, every time you pay for an
item using your credit or debit card,
the company you are purchasing from
loses fractional amounts of money to
your bank or credit card company.
To a mom-and-pop operation, those
losses are small, but for retail giants
like Home Depot, Wal-Mart and Tar-
get, they are substantially more con-
sequential.
While the anti-Wal-Mart crusad-
ers are using the bank application as
a soapbox for their usual whining, the
banking industry's complaints are at
least economically based. It fears the
company's enormous size will per-
mit any bank Wal-Mart operates to
charge lower prices for services and
lower interest rates, forcing smaller
banks to exit the market. The concern
is that once those smaller banks are
gone, Wal-Mart could increase the
costs of services and interest rates to
consumers.
Wal-Mart's principal rival, Target,
received the blessing of banking reg-
ulators for its ILC in 2004 with nary
a protest from the banking industry.
The lack of concern over Target's
charter led Wal-Mart to believe bank-
ing regulators would quickly approve
its ILC application. Unfortunately
for Wal-Mart, there are many double
standards in Washington.
Now that Democrats control both
chambers of Congress, liberal poli-
cymakers can dictate the fate of Wal-
Mart's banking charter. According
to The Wall Street Journal, the new
chairman of the House Banking Com-

mittee, Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.),
plans to introduce legislation that
would ban retail companies from
applying for banking charters. How-
ever, retail companies that already
operate ILCs are allowed to keep
their banks.
Frank's legislation details how
unfairly Wal-Mart is treated by the
Left. First, if the presence of retail
firms in the banking business really
threatens the overall health of the
industry, why allow previously estab-
lished retail ILCs to continue operat-
ing? Second, Target does not employ
union labor, yet its ILC charter was
dealt with in a fair manner and subse-
The Left holds
Wal-Mart to
different standards.
quently approved. What gives?
Simply put, Wal-Mart is the New
York Yankees of the retail industry -
everybody loves to hate them, but they
secretly hope their team could be just
as successful. Through the years, other
retail giants from Target to Best Buy
have copied Wal-Mart's business plan
and implemented many of itslabor
strategies but experienced minimal
criticism from retail watchdogs. Yet,
when Wal-Mart develops a strategy to
save its customers money, protestors
line up to register their objections and
their cronies in Congress voice their
support. Never has the liberal vision
for America been so clear - it's OK to
be successful, as long as you don't be
the best.

U
I

4

MAGGIE WESTON
Teach for equality

John Stiglich can be reached
at jcgolf@umich.edu.

Marian Wright Edelman, founder and chief
executive officer of the Children's Defense
Fund, and Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), while
speaking at the Teach For America summit
last year in Washington D.C., argued that the
fight for educational equality will become the
civil rights battle of this generation. As an edu-
cator who chose the Teach For America path,
I can say with first-hand knowledge that they
are right: We as a generation can no longer
afford to remain silent about the disparities in
academic achievement that exist between low-
income, mostly minority students and their
middle- and upper-class counterparts.
We have failed to live up to the expecta-
tions set forth by Brown v. Board of Education.
Fifty-three years later, our urban and rural
schools are in disarray - failing to live up to
the expectations of No Child Left Behind, fail-
ing to attract and retain qualified teachers and
failing our students in the quality public edu-
cation mandated by the Constitution.
In my southwest Michigan high school, by
1998 all of our teachers had an e-mail account
and used the Internet to submit attendance.
My science classrooms were equipped with
snazzy lab equipment, and we were centri-
fuging DNA and doing electrophoresis in
biology. Our disadvantage was limited to
sharing a football field with our cross town
rival high school.
In the Baltimore classroom where I taught
- in a building condemned by the Health
Department - it took six months to receive
a computer for my classroom. My students
weren't allowed to do science experiments
because of a lack of supplies, inadequate
teacher training and administration reserva-
tions about allowing students near Bunsen
burners. And while we had our own dirt foot-
ball field, the Baltimore police were always
present to prevent neighborhood violence.
The stark difference between my own edu-
cation and what my students received wasn't
limited to resources. The quality of teachers,
difficulty of courses and general school and
home expectations also contrasted. My senior
students read at a sixth-grade level, and I had
several students who were essentially illiter-
ate. When doing SAT practice problems, my
students needed calculators to perform basic
arithmetic. Only those enrolled in the admin-

istrative assistant trade program knew how
to type and save documents on floppy disks.
While the majority of my students had post-
secondary education aspirations, few were
prepared for college-level work. Somewhere
along the way, their teachers, schools and com-
munity had failed them.
But things don't have to be this way.
While the Ivy League schools have increas-
ing percentages of graduates joining Teach
For America, the University is the largest sup-
plier of Teach for America members. I encour-
age you to go to www.teachforamerica.org and
learn more about the organization and the
fight for educational justice.
Most graduate and professional schools
and major corporations like JPMorgan allow
accepted corps members to defer their school-
ing or career for the two-year commitment
because they believe in the Teach For Amer-
ica mission and its impact on both our stu-
dents and corps members. Leading graduate
and professional programs in law, medicine,
business and public policy, as well as lead-
ing companies, like Goldman Sachs, Google
and Wachovia, specifically recruit Teach For
America alumni for the same reasons. What-
ever your long-term career interest may be,
Teach For America is an asset because you
gain real world experience and learn first-
hand about the challenges of our country.
Teach For America afforded me the oppor-
tunity to see and live the real difference
between suburban and urban education.
Before joining it, I wasn't sure about my future
career interests. I had majored in English here
at the University and only knew that I wanted
to make a difference and that not everyone had
grown up as I did. My students have dramati-
cally impacted my life and further deepened
my passion to make changes in education. My
experience in Baltimore has fueled the urgen-
cy of my current studies in public policy and
passion for larger changes. I felt and fought the
injustice in the classroom for two years and am
now gaining a new toolset to fight the inequali-
ty at the district, state and federal levels. I now
ask you to consider doing the same.
Maggie Weston is an LSA and Teach For
America alum currently pursuing a master's
degree at the Gerald Ford School of Public Policy.

A little notice would be nice

ith the exception of some
inclement weather, the
semester seems to be com-
ing together for me. For the most part,
I've memorized my new schedule, pur-
chased the majority of my textbooks
and coursepacks and have begun
looking forward to my approaching
graduation. Despite all my worrying,
things are falling into place and, like
a locomotive starting slow, the term
is gradually pick-
ing up steam as f
the gears shrug
off the lethargy
and sleepiness
of a two-week
vacation. Two
weeks into the
new term and ;
everything's
back to normal.
Well almost RAFI
everything. You MARTINA
see, just days
into new semes-
ter, the city of Ann Arbor rather
gracelessly took a prized parking
spot from the residents of Elm Street,
converting it - seemingly overnight
- into a handicapped spot. Although
the city was tight-lipped about who
requested the new spot, it didn't take
us long to figure out that the elderly
homeowner across the street (yes,
there are indeed permanent residents
in the student ghetto) had rather cun-
ningly won himself an exclusive park-
ing spot.
What had for months been the
subject of so much coveting and com-
petition had with one stroke been
taken out of our reach. Not that the
gentleman was for want of parking
- indeed, his driveway was typically
less crowded with cars than any other
on the street. And from all appearanc-
es, the man owned (and rented-out)
the house next door, providing him

with additional parkingwhen needed.
What's more, the man was ostensibly
able-bodied - at least enough to regu-
larly walk his dog around the neigh-
borhood.
And yet for all my frustration and
griping, I cringe at questioning his
putative disability. After all, who am
I to second-guess the doctor who
judged him needing of a handicap
permit? Moreover, I'm a little embar-
rassed over the entire episode; if one
of my grandparents thought it neces-
sary to request a handicapped street
parking spot, would I want some snide
college kid sneering over the petition?
Some say disability rights are the new
civil rights. If that's the case, I haven't
the stomach or the mind to play the
modern-day Orval Faubus, obstruct-
ing the rights of the disabled as that
notorious character in history sought
to obstruct the implementation of
Brown v. Board of Education.
No, the real culprit here figures to
be the city of Ann Arbor. Installing the
handicapped parking signs without
the slightest notice to any of the resi-
dents of Elm Street, the city once again
bullied student compliance without
even the most half-assed of attempts
at weighing resident opinion. No leaf-
lets. No letters. Nothing. My room-
mate even received a ticket for parking
in a spot that hadn't been marked as
handicapped when he parked his car
there the previous evening.
Are the interests of students so
inconsequential to this city as to pre-
clude even the most lukewarm atten-
tion from city government? Sure, the
city seems to take notice of us, as
pimps invariably take notice of their
whores and swindlers carefully take
notice of those they swindle. Much
like its esteemed company, the city
takes notice of us merely in its desire
to make a buck.
Addressingthe concerns of disabled

Ann Arbor residents is undoubtedly
a priority. As a potentially vulner-
able and underrepresented group,
disabled persons deserve the city's
resources and attention. ButI daresay
another potentially vulnerable and
underrepresented group enters the
equation in the situation presented
above. Students in this city are con-
stantly preyed upon by the avarice of
landlord and shopkeeper (particular-
ly bookstore owners). And while the
bevy of privileged students capable of
owning cars (like my roommates and
I) or paying high rents might obscure
their view, numerous less-privileged
students also call this city home.
In A2 neighborhoods,
students are the ones
who lose out.
Has the city become so calloused
by the financial incentives of business
and high-property value taxpayers as
to forget about those other residents?
For all the progressive labels the city
adorns itself with, it still hasn't got-
ten around to simple progressive
issues like rent control or investigat-
ing price-fixing and the lack of com-
petition among bookstores. But then
again, those concerns don't particu-
larly afflict the white-collar home-
owners who glowingly pat themselves
on the back for living in such a pro-
gressive, liberal town like Ann Arbor.
What this city truly needs is a slap
in the face. That or an Eliot Spitzer to
really shake things up. Will someone
be kind enough to give the city notice
before the changes are undertaken?
Rafi Martina can be reached
at rmartina@umich.edu.

Want to join Daily opinion? Of course you do. Come to our
mass meeting Thursday at 7:30 p.m. at 413 E. Huron.

Editorial Board Members: Kevin Bunkley, Amanda Burns, Sam Butler, Ben Caleca, Devika
Daga, Milly Dick, James Dickson, Jesse Forester, Gary Graca, Jared Goldberg, Jessi Holler,
Rafi Martina, Toby Mitchell, Rajiv Prabhakar, David Russell, Katherine Seid, Elizabeth Stanley,
Jennifer Sussex, John Stiglich, Neil Tambe, Radhika Upadhyaya, Rachel Wagner

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