4A - Wednesday, November 5, 2008
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
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I will never forget who this victory truly
belongs to - it belongs to you."
- The 44th President of the United States, Barack Obama, in his acceptance speech last night.
ROSE JAFFE E-MAIL ROSE AT ROSEJAFF@UMICH.EDU
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ANDREW GROSSMAN
EDITOR IN CHIEF
GARY GRACA
EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR
GABE NELSON
MANAGING EDITOR
Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily's editorial board. All othersigned articles
and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.
A 21st century Michigan
Stem cell research will help state's economy and reputation
F or the third election in a row, Proposal 2 asked Michigan
voters to prove they are open-minded and willingto advance
their state to the progressive forefront of this country. And
for the first time, it looks like a majority of them has accepted the
invitation. With almost all precincts reporting at press time, it looks
like Proposal 2 - the ballot initiative seeking to allow otherwise-
discarded embryos to be used for stem cell research - will nar-
rowly pass. For a state trying to court the businesses that will move
it into the 21st century, this is a strong affirmation that Michigan
residents are ready to move forward, too.
C
D
Though Proposal 2 looks like it will pass
by a narrow majority, getting to this point
was a tough fight. Bankrolled by ultra-con-
servative organizations and thousands of
shadowy donors who may never be identi-
fied, the initiative's opposition tried shame-
lessly to lie its way to victory. First, there
was the claim that the initiative would
allow human cloning; then the false argu-
ment that it would raise taxes; and final-
ly, the outrageous comparison between
embryonic stem cell research and the rac-
ist, tragic Tuskegee Syphilis Study.
It would have been easy for people to
believe these lies - or at least fail to see
through the muddied waters. But to vot-
ers' credit, they saw this initiative for what
it really was: a question about whether we
should simply discard the embryos from
our fertilization clinics or use them for life-
saving and economically beneficial embry-
onic stem cell research. And they rightly
chose the latter.
Scientists in Michigan can now move for-
ward with research into a biomedical area
with almost limitless potential. In a biolog-
ical sense, embryonic stem cells are liter-
ally a blank slate - potentially able to form
any other type of cell. By using embryos
that would have been otherwise discarded,
scientists can now potentially cure some
of our worst diseases like Parkinson's and
Alzheimer's.
Almost equally as important, Michigan's
stumbling economy stands to gain. If the
federal government loosens its restrictions
on stem cell research - as many expect it to
do now that Barack Obama is president and
Democrats control both chambers of Con-
gress - a lot of federal money could pour
into Michigan to support this research.
Along with that money, universities like
our own can now attract and retain some of
the most innovative faculty in the country,
bringing jobs and brains to our state.
On a symbolic level, passing this initia-
tive also shows how serious Michigan is
about opening itself up to new industry
and the changing world. Though Gov. Jen-
nifer Granholm has been trying to attract
the high-tech businesses that will bring
Michigan out of its Rust Belt recession,
this message never rang true when Michi-
gan residents were overwhelmingly voting
against the progressive measures that show
its open-mindedness, like same-sex mar-
riage and affirmative action.
Regardless, any day in which reason
defeats fear and lies is a joyous one. Today
is one of those days.
Avoiding the easy path
n day one, President Barack
Obama will arguably face one
of the most daunting situa-
tions of any U.S.
president in the
past six decades.
Everything is in
shambles: our econ-
omy, our interna-
tional prestige, our '
military strength '
and, especially, I
Americans' belief
that their govern- GARY
ment can fix these GRACA
things. In -"four-
years, Obama is
expected to fix it all
- or face the wrath of an electorate
that doesn't often understand that
some of these things take time.
And a majority of Americans
thought he has the skills and leader-
ship to do it, despite his inexperience.
That's a pretty strong mandate for
a candidate who was barely known
only two years ago.
But this isn't a column about how
bad things are or how Obama has
the right stuff to turn it all around.
This is a column about how the way
Obama goes about doing these things
will matter almost as much as what
he does. Come Jan. 20, Obama will
have one really easy way of doing
business and one impossibly difficult
one - and like any human would, I
expect him to take the easy route, at
the expense of unifying our country
and protecting the Constitutioh.
As you might have guessed, the
easy route runs through the over-
whelming Democratic majority in
Congress. For at least the next two
years, Obama will not only have a
Democratic majority backing him up
in both the House of Representatives
and the Senate, he will only be a few
Republicans away from a filibuster-
proof majority in the Senate.
And if the current Democratic
Congress is any indication, there
will be a lot of members willing to
obey orders instead of use the pow-
ers granted to them by the Consti-
tution. Remember what happened
with those once-lauded timetables
and funding cuts for the war in Iraq?
What about our $700 billion bank
bailout? In both cases, Congressio-
nal Democrats were pretty good at
being toothless when they had every
reason not to be.
Couple that unprecedented sup-
port in Congress with the executive
branch's already bloated amount of
power, and we might as well just king
Obama instead of inaugurate him.
That's not to sayI think Obama will
intentionally stretch the Constitu-
tion's limits or avoid the tough checks
from Congress. He has spoken time
and time again about how he believes
the Bush administration's constitu-
tional excesses in the war against
terrorism have chiseled away at our
most important document. And as a
constitutional law professor, Obama
respects the Constitution - hell, he
has spent a lifetime studying it.
I worry that Congress won't have
the gall to challenge an Obama
administration, and Obama won't
have many bipartisan paths for
doing business. For both Obama
and Congressional Democrats, tak-
ing the easy way out will just be too
tempting.
A lot of my worries hinge on what
the remaining Republicans in Con-
gress will look like. As best as any-
one can guess, they will be a radical
group. Several pundits, including
New York Times columnist Paul
Krugman, have astutely observed
that the Congressional Republicans
who abandoned their seats this year
were from the relatively moderate
wing of the party. Left behind in the
House are the entrenched Republi-
cans from Newt Gingrich's Republi-
can revolution. In the Senate, there
will be representatives from only the
safest Republican states.
At least in the House, these repre-
sentatives haven't been particularly
well known for their ability to work
with others. They're betterknown for
throwing wrenches into the system.
Just look at how House Republicans
doomed their own party's presiden-
tial nominee by blowing up the bank
bailout he helped construct. With
nothing to lose, these people can be
ruthless.
And these are supposed to be the
representatives Obama forms bipar-
tisan relations with - people willing
to sacrifice our economy and one of
their own for ideology? How do you
realistically work with that?
Why bipartisanship
will be a lot harder
than Obama thinks.
The truth is most people don't. You
ignore these people when they aren't
being reasonable, especially if you're
a pragmatist like Obama who is tired
of blindly ideological solutions. And
when that doesn't work, you let your
colleagues go a little further - maybe
allow them to effectively corner the
ideologues out of important policy-
making processes like Hillary Clin-
ton did in 1993. Or maybe you use
your executive powers a little more
broadly.
That is tempting to do. And Ihavea
feeling Republicans won't make it any
less tempting come January, when
the most obnoxious of them will take
the reigns of the party.
I hope Obama has the patience to
resist the temptation.
Gary Graca is the Daily's editorial
page editor. He can be reached
at grgraca@umich.edu.
6
EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS:
Nipa Amilineni, Emad Ansari, Elise Baun, Harun Buljina, Ben Caleca, Satyajeet Deshmukh,
Brian Flaherty, Matthew Green, Emmarie Huetteman, Emma Jeszke, Shannon Kellman,
Edward McPhee, Emily Michels, Kate Peabody, Matthew Shutler, Robert Soave, Eileen Stahl,
Jennifer Sussex, Imran Syed, Radhika Upadhyaya, Rachel Van Gilder, Margaret Young
SATYAJEET DESHMUKH I
Restoring America's prestige
When your grandparents reminisced about
historical milestones like John F. Kennedy's
election in 1960 or the Civil Rights Act of 1964,
you probably hoped you would get to see his-
tory in the making sometime during your life-
time. Well, you just did. For the first time in
America's 232-year history, its people elected a
black president, Barack Obama.
Besides this historic value, what makes
Obama's election even more special is the fact
that so many students contributed to it. Col-
lege students should take pride in the fact that
they led America down a path it had never
taken before. People should also beproud that
they've injected a much-needed dose of change
into the country's highest office, a change with
consequences that will be felt well beyond the
shores of the United States.
It is no secret that the last eight years under
George W. Bush have been a foreign policy
disaster for the United States. Eight years of
blatant interventionism, countless instances of
hypocrisy, unwarranted economic arm-twist-
ing and two largely aimless wars have made the
United States akin to a middle school bully. It
comes as no surprise then that the internation-
al community closely followed this election. A
poll reported by Newsweek magazine conclud-
ed that there's more interest in the U.S. presi-
dential election in Japan than in the United
States itself. Countries like Pakistan, Uganda,
Kenya, Indonesia and numerous others have
shown what international radio broadcaster
Voice of America has called "unprecedented
interest" in the election.
When Obama visited Germany in July, a
crowd of nearly 200,000 gathered to listen to
his speech in Berlin. Compare that to the larg-
est crowds he drew at home: the 100,000 peo-
ple who went to see him in St. Louis and then
in Denver. This shows what kind of weight the
president of the United States carries inter-
nationally. After eight years of the Bush doc-
trine, the world wants a president who will
solve problems without creating bigger ones
- a president who won't impose U.S. military
strength on smaller, less powerful nations. In
the words of Malaysian Foreign Minister Rais
Yatim, the world today needs to see the United
States represent "a more universal political
attitude."
By electing Obama, Americans have elected
a manwho believes inthe power of negotiation,
which is wiser than unilateralism no matter
what his critics say. They have elected a man
who will try to transform America's interna-
tional image from a bully into a friend.
To his credit, John McCain fought a hard
battle. Unfortunately, he had little success in
convincing people that he was much different
from Bush. What's even more unfortunate is the
fact that despite being a seasoned politician, he
showed bad judgment on numerous occasions.
His joke-gone-bad fiascos, his numerous on-air
gaffes, his campaign suspension gimmick and
most of all, his choice of an unqualified, out-of-
the-blue running mate took the attention away
from his glorious career and experience as a
U.S. Navy officer and a senator.
With Obama at its helm, America looks pre-
pared to head in a new direction. Even though
his success as president remains to be seen, you
can at least be proud of the fact that an effort
to bring change has been made. America voted
without prejudice to try and get the country
back on track.
Americans should be proud that they did
what the international community also thought
was best and showed the world why the United
States calls itself the greatest democracy in the
world.
Satyajeet Deshmukh is an
Engineering sophomore.
I
MATTHEW SHUTLER I
Hillary in 2016
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Contrary to the prevailing attitude of the country,
there is more than one influential Democrat walking
under our spacious sky. Don't get me wrong, I supported
Barack Obama as much as any 17 year old could without
actually being able to vote for him, and he was certainly
deserving of his party's nomination and last night's win.
But truth be told, S was always more of a Hillary Clinton
guy. I don't know if it was her pantsuits or her policies, but
sometime during her campaign she won me over. So now
that Obama has been elected to lead our country into the
future, it's important to remember everything that Clin-
ton has accomplished.
Clinton fought valiantly throughout the Democratic
primaries and put "18 million cracks" in the glass ceiling
that has stopped many women from even running. For
this reason, she is among the most influential candidates
in history. She has received wide praise for her efforts
- Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said it best: "Sen.
Clinton has advanced the cause of women in government
and her candidacy has been a very positive tonic for the
country and had a very wholesome effect on the political
process."
After months of fighting and debating, Clinton bowed
out of the race as the woman with the largest number of
supporters in our country's history, not to mention the
second highest of any Democrat after the nominee him-
self. This shows the promise and determination Clinton
possesses and the millions upon millions of hopes that
were placed on her shoulders. It would be a shame if she
didn't give these people another fight.
Unfortunately, this strong and commanding voice for
our nation says the chances of another run for the White
House are slim. "Probably close to zero," Clinton said
when asked about running for president again. She also
gave a similar answer to whether she would want to be
nominated to the Supreme Court, saying: "I have no inter-
est in doing that." However, let me point out that "close to
zero" does not mean "zero." I can only hope that Clinton
gives the matter further consideration.
While her White House aspirations seemed to have
cooled, her aspirations to help the country are still red
hot. "I'm not seeking any other position than to be the
best senator from New York that Ican be," Clinton said on
"Fox and Friends."
Nevertheless, while I must respect her decision, I
would like to express my hopes that the future will bring
about another change in this New York senator. Her cour-
age, voice and character are completely unique and what
I feel our country will need in the future. She exemplifies
the spirit of our country: never giving up and fighting for
what you believe in.
Furthermore, all Clinton supporters, whether men or
women, young or old, working class or not, should contin-
ue to back her. Under the new leadership of Obama, Clin-
ton will have the opportunity to help our country in more
far-reaching and long-lasting ways. By standing behind
President Obama as he takes office, Clinton supporters
are in turn standing behind the beliefs that were funda-
mental to her campaign. With the theatrics of this politi-
cal year finally coming to an end, we all must do what we
believe is right for the country. And with her position as a
New York senator - she was re-elected in 2006 - Hillary
Clinton says she looks forward to working in Congress
with an Obama administration.
A senator now and, hopefully - it's a small hope, but it
still exists - a president inthe future. Scan live with that.
Is it time for Hillary to hang up her now infamous pant-
suits? I certainly don't think so. In any case, I would like
to be the one to jumpstart her next campaign.
Vote Hillary Rodham Clinton for president in 2016.
Matthew Shutler is an LSA freshman.
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