The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Tuesday, February 5,2408 - 3
NEWS BRIEFS
DIMONA, Israel
Palestinian suicide
bomber kills Israeli
woman, injures 11
A Palestinian bomber blew him-
selfup yesterday in this desert town
near Israel's nuclear reactor, killing
an Israeli woman and wounding
11 people in the first suicide attack
inside Israel in a year.
Police killed a second attacker
after a doctor found a suicide vest
while treating him for wounds suf-
fered in the blast.
The attack fueled Israel's fears
that Gaza militants would exploit a
border breach with Egypt to sneak
into Israel. Militants claimed the
bombers entered Israel through the
porous Egyptian border, about 35
miles from Dimona, and said more
militants were inside Israel waiting
to strike.
In Gaza, gunmen fired in the air
and relatives of the bombers passed
out sweets to celebrate the bomb-
ing.
WASHINGTON
$3.1 trillion budget
plan would cause
deep federal deficits
The record $3.1 trillion budget
proposed by President Bush yes-
terday would produce eye-pop-
ping federal deficits, despite his
attempts to impose politically
wrenching curbs on Medicare and
eliminate scores of popular domes-
tic programs.
The Pentagon would receive a
$36 billion, 8 percent boost for the
2009 budget year beginning Oct. 1,
even as programs aimed atthe poor
would be cut back or eliminated.
Half of domestic Cabinet depart-
ments would see their budgets cut
outright.
Slumping revenues and the cost
of an economic rescue package will
combine to produce a huge jump in
the deficit to $410 billion this year
and $407 billion in 2009, the White
House says, just shy of the record
$413 billion set four years ago.
GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba
New details emerge
in Canadian terror
suspect's case
A Canadian terror suspect was
shot twice in the back by U.S. forces
during a 2002 firefight in Afghani-
stan after he allegedly killed an
American commando, according to
a U.S. fighter's eyewitness account
revealed yesterday.
Omar Khadr, who was 15 at the
time, already had been injured by
shrapnel in his chest and was fac-
ing away from the fight when he
was shot inside an al-Qaida com-
pound, according to the unidenti-
fied U.S. fighter.
Defense attorneys said the new
details would help them make a
case that Khadr should not be tried
before a military tribunal because
his alleged offenses occurred in
a combat setting - and there-
fore should not be considered war
crimes committed by an irregular
"enemy combatant."
LANSING
Services set for
ex-Mich. politician
Services have been set for former
Democratic Senate Majority Leader
William B. Fitzgerald Jr., who died
Sunday from colon cancer at his
home in Grosse Pointe Farms at the
age of 65.
Mass will take place at 10 a.m.
Thursday at St. Paul on the Lake
Catholic Church in Grosse Pointe
Farms. He will lie in state from 9:30
a.m. until Mass begins.
Visitation will be held from 1 p.m.
to 9 p.m. Wednesday at Chas. Verhey-
den Funeral Home in Grosse Pointe.
Fitzgerald was one of the most
visible figures in Michigan politics
throughoutthe 1970s,whenheserved
in the state House and Senate.
- Compiled from
Daily wire reports
3945
399.
Number of American service
members who have died in the war
in Iraq, according to The Associ-
ated Press. The following death
was identified yesterday:
Spc. Matthew F. Straughter, 27,
St. Charles, Mo.
Businessman Romney paying
commission to student fundraisers
McCain assails Vomnev's
cOnservatism during speech
Some critical of
GOP candidate's
effort to court
young voters
By DANIEL STRAUSS
Daily StaffReporter
In an effort to entice college
students to support his run for
the presidency, former Massa-
chusetts governor Mitt Romney
is paying students a 10 percent
commission when they raise at
least $1,000 for his campaign.
The programis amove to attract
young voters, a demographic that
has favored fellow presidential
candidate John McCain on the
Republican side and Sen. Barack
Obama on the Democratic side.
While more than 400 college
students from campuses across
the country have raised money
for Romney and received divi-
dends in return, none were from
the University of Michigan.
Amy Drumm, chair of the Uni-
versity's chapter of Students for
Romney, said the program has
caused more students to become
involved with the Romney cam-
paign, but that the group has only
raised a few hundred dollars.
Because it hasn't raised $1,000
yet, the University's chapter
hasn't received any funds from
the Romney campaign.
Drumm attributed the small
amount of funds raised to lack-
luster student involvement.
She said student volunteers
often go door to door or make
phone calls to garner support for
their candidate, but that they usu-
ally don't contribute financially
to campaigns.
"You don't generally look at
students and think, 'Oh they'll go
out and raise a lot of money for
me,' " Drumm said. "So I think
that (Romney's plan) was kind
of the push to get them more
involved in the campaign."
Drumm said the lack of student
fundraising on campus stems
from the fact that many students
are involved in other extracur-
ricular activities besides political
groups.
Rarely have presidential candi-
dates offered fundraising incen-
tives as explicit as Mitt Romney's,
which some are calling a busi-
ness-style approach to politics.
Political Science Prof. Kenneth
Kollman said the fundraisingplan
reflects Romney's background as
the business-oriented politician.
"I think it just reflects the way
he thinks about the world," Koll-
man said. "He's been a very suc-
cessful businessman. It's maybe
unusual. I don't think it's all that
different than paying someone a
salary on your staff whose job it is
to raise money for you. It's just so
overtly along the lines you would
use if you were trying to sell shoes
at Macy's."
Some representatives from
other campus student groups
think Romney's fundraising
strategy won't translate into sup-
porting among young people.
"I think it's innovative, yes,"
LSA senior Kelly Bernero, chair
of the University's chapter of
Students for Hillary, said. "How-
ever my criticism of the program
is that he has not energized vot-
ers by his rhetoric or his policies.
He's energizing them by handing
out money," Bernero said.
Most National polls show
McCain as the frontrunner for
the Republican presidential nom-
ination, with Romney in second
place.
LSA senior Allison Schneider,
chair of Students for McCain,
could not be reached for comment
yesterday.
Both McCain and Romney will
be campaigning throughout the
day - known as Super Tuesday
- as 21 states vote in Republican
primary elections.
If McCain is largely success-
ful today, he could secure the
Republican Party's nomination.
He delivered a blow to Romney
last week, winning the Florida
primary.
(AP) --Republican John McCain
assailed Mitt Romney's conserva-
tive credentials on the eve of the
Super Tuesday presidential pri-
maries, going on national televi-
sion with a new campaign ad that
claims Romney "was against Ron-
ald Reagan before he was for him."
McCain had eased up on his
criticism of the former Massa-
chusetts governor since winning
the primary in Florida last week
and had begun acting like a gen-
eral election candidate, focusing
his harsh rhetoric on Democratic
rivals.
But with hours to go before
voting began in more than 20
states from coast to coast, McCain
unloaded on Romney.
The 30-second ad airing on
national cable television shows
Romney distancing himself from
Ronald Reagan, patron saint of
modern conservatism, in a 1994
debate when he was challenging
Democratic Sen. Edward M. Ken-
nedy of Massachusetts.
"Look, I was an independent
during the time of Reagan-Bush.
I'mnottryingto returnto Reagan-
Bush," Romney says in the ad foot-
age. An announcer then intones,
"If we can't trust Mitt Romney on
Ronald Reagan, how can we trust
him to lead America?"
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Google could
play a role in
Microsoft's
bid for Yahoo
SAN FRANCISCO (AP)
- Microsoft Corp.'s $41 billion
takeover bid appears to have
backed Yahoo Inc. into a corner,
leaving the struggling Internet
pioneer with the unpleasant
choice of selling to a detested
rival or pursuing other agoniz-
ing alternatives likely to require
the help of an even fiercer foe,
Google Inc.
At least that appeared to be
the consensus emerging among
analysts yesterday as Wall Street
awaited Yahoo's response to last
week's unsolicited offer from
Microsoft.
Yahoo says its board is going
to take its time reviewing Micro-
soft'sbid alongwithother options
that could keep the Sunnyvale-
based company independent.
"At the end of the day, I don't
think they are going to be able to
turn down Microsoft," predicted
technology investment banker
Peter Falvey of Revolution Part-
ners, echoing a widely held senti-
ment.
But if Yahoo spurns Micro-
soft, analysts believe it probably
will have to swallow its pride and
forge an advertising partnership
with Google if the alliance could
win antitrust clearance.
Under this scenario, Yahoo
would rely on Google to run
its search engine while join-
ing thousands of other Web
sites that depend on the Inter-
net search leader for a steady
stream of ad revenue generated
from text-based links that pro-
duce commissions with every
click.
But getting Google's adver-
tising help probably wouldn't
be enough to trump Microsoft's
offer by itself.
To placate shareholders,
Yahoo probably would have to
line up enough money to pay a
special dividend or perhaps even
take the company private in a lev-
eraged buyout.
Going private might be even
more painful for Yahoo's 14,300
employees than a sale to Micro-
soft.
To help repay the more than
$20 billion debt that would be
incurred in a leveraged buyout,
Yahoo would likely have to fire
about 4,500 employees, or 31
percent of its work force, Stifel
Nicolaus analyst George Askew
estimated yesterday.
Yahoo also probably would
have to sell about $12.5 billion
worth of investments in sev-
eral promising Internet compa-
nies, including Alibba.com and
Yahoo Japan.
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The University of Michigan College of Literature,
Science, and the Arts presents a public
lecture and reception
Five Filmings of an Historical Novel
D. R. Shackleton Bailey
Collegiate Professor of Greek and Latin
Tuesday, February 5, 2008 4:10 pm
Rackham Amphitheater