The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Friday, March 16, 2007 -- 8
Maneuvering
begins on tax hike
LANSING (AP) - Even though
Republicans largely have come out
against Democratic Gov. Jennifer
Granholm's proposed 2 percent tax
on services, they set it up for a pos-
sible vote in the GOP-controlled
Senate next week.
Majority Leader Mike Bishop
decided yesterday to discharge the
measure and bring it to the full
Senate because he felt Democrats
broke an agreement to keep details
of negotiations secret until a deal
was reached.
The Rochester Republican said
he's bringing up the tax plan in the
-GOP-controlled Senate - where
it's almost sure to fail - because
:the House has failed to act, even
though Democrats hold the major-
ity there.
"You've got the governor's office
and you've got an entire chamber
of this Legislature and nothing has
been done to move that plan for-
ward," he said. "Why? Because you
don't have the votes."
Democrats leveledsimilar charg-
es as the two sides wrangled over
how best to address the $900 mil-
lion shortfall in the current budget.
Minority Leader Mark Schauer
(D-Battle Creek) said Republi-
cans say they want to make up the
entire shortfall with cuts, but won't
say publicly what those spend-
ing decreases should be. He heard
Republicans may propose cutting
the payments that communities get
from the state for police, fire and
other services by 20 percent, as well
as reducing aid to K-12 schools.
"It could have devastating
impacts on our communities,"
Schauer said. "I don't think they've
got the votes for it. ... That's why
they've not been willingto put their
plan on the table."
GOLDEN APPLE
From page 1
University Teaching.
Bronstein and three other
SHOUT members then descended
the stairs of the lecture hall in the
Dennison Building, a bouquet of
maize-and-blue balloons in hand,
to present Markovits with the
17th -annual Golden Apple Award,
given each year to the teacher a
student committee selects as the
best professor on campus.
"If I had known this, I would've
put on a jacket," said Markovits
- clad in a pair of brown cordu-
roys and a merlot-colored hooded
sweatshirt - after the strong
applause of his students died down
and he had a moment to collect his
thoughts.
Once the honor had sunk in,
Markovits returned to the day's
lecture on the history of the
National Hockey League in North
America and its wider global sig-
nificance, which he delivered,
seemingly from memory, as his
notes lay spread before him on the
large lab table at the front of the
room.
"I thought someone didn't like
what I said about the Red Wings,"
he said in an interview once most
of his students had left the lecture
hall after class. Just before the
SHOUT team appeared, he had
mentioned the Detroit Cougars,
who wouldn't become the Red
Wings until 1932.
Later, in his office, where bulg-
ing shelves of books line the walls,
Markovits reflected on the after-
noon's excitement.
"I'm so flattered, and I'm so
humbled, and I'm so honored," he
said.
"It was perfect that it happened
inthe sports class," Markovits con-
tinued. "I love that class. Sports is
still not treated with the same aca-
demic respect. I am very commit-
ted to fighting that."
Markovits called himself an
"LSA man," referring to his joint
appointment with the German and
political science departments and
his partnership with the sociol-
ogy department in developing the
sports course.
"I'm using sports as a vehicle to
explain and illustrate larger social
and political phenomenon," Mar-
kovits said. "You can do this with
film, once can do this with pretty
much anything that you study at
a university. It so happens that
sport, to me, is a very good vehicle
to look at all these things."
"It's not just a class about
schmoozing about the Yankees,"
he said.
Still, the topic attracts students
to the class in droves.
Rackhamstudent JeffreyLuppes
is one of two GSIs who are assist-
ing Markovits with the course for
the second time and was one of the
students who nominated Markov-
its for the Golden Apple. The com-
mittee accepts nominations from
the student body.
Luppes said that the first few
weeks of the class are hardest on
the GSIs because of the number of
students who want to enroll. He
said it isn't uncommon for waitlists
for discussion sections to include
more than 10 people each.
"His excitement is genuine,
and it's infectious," Luppes said of
Markovits's passion for his mate-
rial. "He makes students want to
learn more about the topic and
understand it like he does."
Luppes said Markovits extends
this enthusiasm beyond the class-
room and is quick to write a rec-
ommendation for a student.
"Everyone knows him in the
German political world, so if you
have his recommendation, you'll
probably get what you're applying
for," he said. "His voice carries a
lot of weight."
According to Bronstein, though,
Markovits popularity doesn't come
from letting students slack off.
"Students look to him because
he is challenging," Bronstein
said, citing the nominations that
SHOUT received on behalf of Mar-
kovits.
In addition to his mid-lec-
ture visit, Markovits received an
assignment from SHOUT: to give
his ideal last lecture. Bronstein
explained that this is a corner-
stone of the Golden Apple award
because it gives all students the
opportunity to listen to a profes-
sor who they may never have the
opportunity to take a class with.
Markovits will deliver his ideal
last lecture on April 12 at 8 p.m. in
Rackham Auditorium.
Recent recipients of the award
include English professor Eric
Rabkin in 2006, English profes-
sor John Rubadeau in 2005 and
history professor Matt Lassiter in
2004. The Golden Apple has been
awarded since 1991, when psychol-
ogy professor Drew Westen won
the first one.
STOCKWELL
From page 1
as Mosher-Jordan and Stockwell
undergo major renovation and
North Quad - U-M's first new
residence hall since 1968 - is con-
structed to carefully review and
assess all of our current residential
configurations and demographics,"
Levy said in an e-mail interview.
He said officials probably won't
make a decision for at least a year.
A community learning center
will replace Stockwell's dininghall.
Students will be able to eat in the
Hill Dining Center, which will be
connected to Mosher-Jordan Hall
when it reopens in Fall 2008.
Stockwell's renovations will
also include work on the building's
plumbing and electrical systems.
Air conditioning, updated fire
alarms and fire sprinklers will also
be installed. The building will also
have wireless Internet in common
areas and faster Internet access in
the dorm rooms.
Housing officials said the resi-
dence hall will hold about 415 stu-
dents after the renovations, about
the same number it does now.
The bathrooms will also be rede-
signed.
"The infrastructure has probably
exceeded its lifespan," Levy said.
The final schematic designs for
the renovation will go in front of the
regents in early 2008, said Kathy
Comisiak, a housing capital planner
for University Housing. Parts of the
dining hall will probably become
an informal performance space,
music practice room, a lounge, and
a laundry room, she said.
The building's historic exte-
rior will remain mostly the same,
Comisiak said. Goody Clancy &
Associates, the same firm that is
managing the renovation of Mosh-
er-Jordan Hall, will design the
Stockwell renovations.
Comisiak said focus groups Uni-
versity Housing conducted with
students indicated a demand for
the features of the new Hill Dining
Center, like increased variety and
longer hours.
"You can offer those in a dining
center venue a little better than
individual halls," Comisiak said.
The design team is considering
putting kitchenettes on each floor of
Stockwell and a larger kitchen else-
where inthe building, Comisiak said.
LSA freshman Sarah Yi, who
lives in Stockwell, said she thinks
the dorm needs updating. She said
the paint in her room is chipping
and the screen on her window won't
stay on. Yi also recommended com-
pletely rebuilding the bathrooms.
"A bigger study area would be
good," she said.
LSA freshman Husnah Khan,
who also lives in Stockwell, said she
doesn't think Stockwell needs to be
renovated. She said the noise from
the Mosher-Jordan renovations
has bothered her this semester.
College of Engineering sopho-
more Mary Kay DuBay, who has
lived in Stockwell for the past two
years and plans to live there again
next year as a resident advisor, said
it would be inconvenient to have to
walk next door for meals.
"Students want this food ser-
vice that looks like a cafeteria in
a shopping center or something,"
said DuBay, who serves asa student
coordinator in the Stockwell dining
hall. "It's impressive, but really it's
kind of inconvenient."
Levysaid students won't care about
the shortwalk once they see whatthe
Hill Dining Center has to offer.
"We think the contrast between
the old and the new will take care
for most students of any concern
about a short walk," said Levy.
LEBANON
From page 3
said.
Abssi has recently taken on a
communications adviser, Abu al-
Hassan, 24, a journalism student
who dropped out of college to join
Fatah al Islam. His current project:
a newsmagazine aimed at attracting
recruits.
The arc of Abssi's life shows the
allure of al-Qaida for Arab mili-
tants. Born in Palestine, from which
he and family were evicted by the
Israelis, Abssi, 51, said he stopped
studying medicine to fly planes
for Yasser Arafat. He then staged
attacks on Israel from his own base
in Syria. After he was imprisoned
in Syria for three years on terror-
ism charges, he said he broadened
his targets to include Americans in
Jordan.
The Times arranged to speak
with Abssi through a series of inter-
mediaries, who helped set up meet-
ings in his headquarters at the Nahr
al Bared refugee camp. Abssi, a soft-
spoken man with salt-and-pepper
hair, was interviewed in a bare room
inside a small cinderblock building
on the edge of a field where train-
ing was under way. About 80 men
were in the compound, performing
various tasks, including one who
manned an anti-aircraft gun. As
Abssi spoke, two aides took notes,
while a third fiddled with a subma-
chine gun. Abazookaleaned against
the wall behind him.
In a 90-minute interview,his first
with Western reporters, Abssi said
he shared al-Qaida's fundamental-
ist interpretation and endorses the
creation of a global Islamic nation.
He said killing U.S. soldiers in Iraq
was no longer enough to convince
the American public that its govern-
ment should abandon what many
Muslims view as a war against
Islam.
"We have every legitimate right
to do such acts, for isn't it America
that comes to our region and kills
innocents and children?"Abssi sad.
"It is our right to hit them in their
homes the same as they hit us in our
homes.
"Wearenotafraidofbeingnamed
terrorists," he added. "But I want to
ask, is someone who detonates one
kilogram a terrorist while someone
who detonates tons in Arab and
Islamic cities not a terrorist?"
When asked, Abssi refused to say
what his targets might be.
This week,Lebanese lawenforce-
mentofficials saidthey arrested four
men from Fatah al Islam in Beirut
and other Lebanese cities and were
charging them with last month's
bombing of two commuter buses
carrying Lebanese Christians. Abssi
denies any involvement and says he
has no plans to strike within Leba-
non.
FERTILE SOIL FOR
MILITANTS
Inside the Palestinian camp,
Abssi seems to be building his oper-
ation with little interference.
Maj. Gen. Achraf Rifi, general
director of Lebanon's Internal
Security Forces, said the govern-
ment does not have authority to
enter a Palestinian camp - even
though Abssi is now wanted in Leb-
anon, Jordanand Syriaonterrorism
charges.
To enter the camps, Rifi said,
"We would need an agreement from
other Arab countries." He said that
instead the government was tight-
ening its cordon around the camp to
make it harder for Abssi or his men
to slip in and out.
Palestinian refugee camps in
Lebanon .have long been fertile
ground for militancy, particularly
focused on the fight against Israel.
But militants in those camps now
have a broader vision. In Am el
Hilwe camp, an hour'sdrive south of
Beirut, another radical Sunni group,
Asbat al Ansar, has been sending
fighters to Iraq since the start of the
war, its leaders acknowledged in
interviews.
"The U.S. is oppressing a lot of
people," the group's deputy com-
mander, who goes by the name of
Abu Sharif, said in a room strewn
withKalashnikovs."Theyarekilling
a lot of innocents, but one day they
are getting paid back." A leading
sheik in the camp, Jamal Hatad, has
a television studio that broadcasts
12 hours a day with shows rang-
ing from viewer call-ins to video of
bin Laden's statements and parents
proudly displaying photographs of
their martyred children.
"I was happy," Hamad Mustaf
Ayasin, 70, recalls in hearing last
fall that his35-year-old son, Ahmed,
had died in Iraq fighting American
troops near the Syrian border. "The
U.S. is against Muslims all over the
world."
On the streets of the camp, one
young man after another said dying
in Iraq was no longer their only
dream.
"If I had the chance to do any
kind of operation against anyone
who is against Islam, inside or out-
side of the United States, I would do
the operation," said Mohamed, an
18-year-old student, who declined
to give his last name.
Hussein Hamdan, 19, who keeps
a poster of Osama bin Laden in the
bedroom he shares with two sisters,
is a street tough attuned to religious
fundamentalism. He dropped out of
school at age 10, spent 18 months in
jail on assault charges, and earlier
this month -- "just to make a state-
ment," he said -- took a razor and
repeatedly slashed both his fore-
arms. "I want to become a mujahe-
deen and go to jihad in any country
where there are Jews or Americans
to fight against them," he said.
Lebanonhasincreasinglybecome
a source of terror suspects. One of
the Sept. 11 hijackers came from
Lebanon, as did six men charged
with planting bombs on German
trains last summer. Two other Leb-
anese men and a Palestinian were
among those accused last spring of
plotting to blow up the PATH train
tunnels beneath the Hudson River
in New York.
Rifi said officials were trying
to learn as much as possible about
Abssi's operation from sources and
surveillance, but it was clear that
their information was limited. In
questioning people, security offi-
cials are showing a photograph of
Abssi that is 30 years old, though it
displays his most distinctive feature
- two moles, one on each side of his
nose.
The apparent inability to appre-
hend Abssi provokes fury in the men
who are hunting him. A security
official in one of the countries where
he is wanted scowled when asked
why Abssi was operating freely: "I
can go lots of places to grab people,
but I can't grab him."
Inthe interview with The Times,
Abssi said he had been largely
warmly received in the Palestinian
camp, and that he was optimistic
about his cause. "One of the rea-
sons for choosing this camp is our
belief that the people here are close
to God as they feel the same suffer-
ing as our brothers in Palestine," he
said.
"Today's youth, when they see
what is happening in Palestine and
Iraq, it enthuses them to join the
way of the right and jihad," he said.
"These people have now started to
adopt the right path."
Parks
estate
to be
split
DETROIT (AP) - A settlement
reached last month between two
groups fighting over Rosa Parks'
estate stipulates they will have to
work together to control the mar-
keting of the civil rights icon's lega-
cy, according to a published report.
A gag order imposed in the case
has been lifted, and terms of the
settlement were sealed Monday by
Wayne County Probate Judge Fred-
die Burton Jr.
But the Detroit Free Press, citing
people familiar with the settlement
that it did not name, revealed some
of the details of the settlement on
Thursday, including that a portion
of proceeds from the sale of Parks'
likeness will go to her heirs for col-
lege tuition and scholarships.
The newspaper also said the fam-
ily will represent her during dedica-
tions of memorials or when schools
and parks are named for her, and a
Detroitnonprofitshe co-founded will
receive outside oversight in the hope
of returning it to financial solvency.
Parks' 13 nieces and nephews
have feuded for years with the
people she appointed to handle her
affairs. The relatives filed a legal
challenge to Parks' will in May. She
died Oct. 24, 2005 in Detroit at age
92.
BEER
From page 1
different beers their distinctive
looks and flavors.
Greff pointed out one called a
caramel malt.
"It tastes a little like Grape Nuts,"
he said.
It's the time of year for Guinness,
with its distinctive black color.
Stouts - Guiness among them
- are loaded with specialty malts,
Greff said.
Roasted malt is barley that has
been treated like coffee, he said.
It's no accident then that this grain
smells a little like fresh coffee
beans.
Chocolate malt - which, as Greff
said, has nothingto do with choco-
late other than the color - and black
malt are also added to the mixture
to give certain beers their distinc-
tive dark color.
What distinguishes these grains
from their paler counterparts is
simply the amount of kilning they
get. That's what gives Guinness and
other stouts their dark color.
These malts are mixed in the
proportions the brewer desires
with 150-degree water in a metal
vat known as a "mash tun." ABC's
mash tun holds 7 barrels, which is
217 gallons.
The hot water causes the
enzymes to break down the starch-
es in the malt into fermentable sug-
ars. The malt steeps for about an
hour, Greff said, after which the
liquid, nowcalled the "wort," filters
into another metal tank called the
"brew kettle."
Here the brewer adds the spice of
his product - hops.
Hopsarefloweringplants.Greff's
have been ground and formed into
pellets for easier shipping and stor-
age. In general, hops are what give
beer its bitterness.
Greff said that he mostly uses
a variety called "cascade" hops,
which give his beer a citrusy fla-
vor. While the wort is boiling for an
hour, Greff adds his hops. Putting
them in the mix earlier releases
more acids from the hops, he said,
creating a bitterer brew.
Adding them later, however, pre-
serves the grapefruit-and-flower-
like aroma common to beers like
pale ales.
After an hour, the mixture is
cooled to about 75 degrees and sent
to fermenting tanks. Yeast is added,
which feeds on the sugars released
from the malt during the mashing
process.
Greff said that as the yeast mul-
tiplies, it creates two byproducts
- carbon dioxide and alcohol. The
yeast creates so much carbon diox-
ide, in fact, that some has to be vent-
ed during fermentation.
At the end of the process, Greff
closes the valves to the tank and
the carbon dioxide is trapped in the
beer, creating the carbonation.
After about a week in the fer-
menter, the now-alcoholic and bub-
bly mixture is sent to serving tanks
in the basement, where it cools and
waits for you to come order a pint.
A mixture of carbon dioxide and
nitrogen creates pressure in the
servingtanks, so when the bartend-
er pulls the tap handle, the cold,
bubbly beverage travels up from the
basement and into your glass.
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