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QUOTES OF THE WEEK
Needless to say, the eighth
was a surprise to us all,
but a blessing as well."'
- KAREN MAPLES, a doctor at the Kaiser
Permanente Bellflower Medical Center in Cali-
fornia, delivering a statement from the uniden-
tified mother who gave birth to octuplets last
week. According to the woman's mother, she
already has six children aged 2 to 7 years old
"Perhaps after 34 years, it's
time for us to confess we
invented 'cello scrotum.'"
- ELAINE MURPHY, a prominent British doctor,
admitting in a letter to the British Medical Journal
that she and her husband lied about the existence
of 'cello scrotum,' which they claimed was an ail-
ment that could result from cellists repeatedly
rubbing the instrument against their genitals. They
wrote the original letter in 1974, and decided to
confess after a recent article discussed the ailment
M
ILLUSTRATIONS BY JOHN OQUIST
Back to school charcoal editorial cartoons, ink-pen
Th elwhpthat lets pro renderings of journalism bigwigs
Theafellowship and atableholdingeverymajorpub-
journalists attend classes lication you can think of, Wallace
House radiates journalism.
It's sort of like a movie about a The work of Pulitzer Prize-win-
successful, career-oriented person ning political cartoonist Patrick
who, stuck in a rut and tired of rou- Oliphant cover the walls on the first
tine, gets the chance to go back to floor. Caricatures of a big-toothed
school and start all over again. Sarah Palin and a curvaceous Hil-
You mighthave seenthem in your lary Clinton hang above the couch.
psychology lecture or your sports Over the fireplace is a big-eared ren-
management class. They sit near dering of President Obama on the
the front and chat jokingly with the face of a nickel, and in the corner is
professors as if they know a secret an image of Henry Kissinger's head
we could only figure out with time on a plated fish.
and experience. ThehouseisnamedforMikeWal-
* They're the Knight-Wallace lace, a University alum who worked
Fellows - a group of mid-career as a correspondent on "60 Minutes".
journalists who take off one aca- Wallace and the Knight Foundation,
demic year to attend classes and do which gives grants to foster the field
research at the University - and if of journalism, founded the fellow-
you listen, they could teach you a ship about 30 years ago.
thing or two. Along with the posh hangout,
Each year, about two dozen jour- the Fellows enjoy the company
nalists from around the world are of colleagues hailing from major
accepted into the fellowship, which publications across the world. It's
allows them to audit University just like the social dynamic of the
classes and go to school for the sake dorms, except no one has to sneak
of learning and growing rather to buy alcohol and everyone has
than the grade. more totalk about than high school
"(It has) given me a chance to memories.
take a step back from journalism, "There's sort of like a "Real
and get back to the day to day, use World" or"Survivor" dynamic to it,"
my brain in different ways," said said Knight-Wallace Fellow Rona
Knight-Wallace Fellow Richard Kobell, a reporter for The Baltimore
Deitsch, who is a special projects Sun. "You put 12 people from differ-
editor at Sports Illustrated. ent backgrounds together and see if
The Fellows are able to audit any they can get along."
class- some take the chance to actu- Knight-Wallace Director Charles
ally study rocket science without Eisendrath has seen many a Fellow
the risk of failing - but the official come and go, but said what always
reason for their stays are individual remains is the family-like chem-
research projects. istry of the house, including the
Having covered the 2008 Beijing funny moments.
Olympics, Deitsch is now stepping "When we first got the grand
back to analyze the dynamics of piano donated, (we) went to pick it
the games. But for many of the Fel- up at a little recording studio with
lows, anything they could see here a U-Haul and a case of beer, just a
must pale in comparison to some of bunch of Fellows," he said. "When
their experiences on the job - like we got it into the house, no one
being inside the hole that Saddam really thought about how much a
Hussein was found in, which Robin piano weighed, and it went right
Pomeroy experienced as a corre- through the floor,"
spondent for Reuters. It might seem like a dozen glo-
Fellows generally take up private betrotting journalists would tire of
sublets around Ann.Arbor, but when life in a college town, but many of
they're not rubbing elbows with stu- the Fellows said they've taken to
dents, they meet up at the historic Ann Arbor.
Wallace House on Oxford Road. "I've just been impressed by it,"
Adorned with decades-old pho- Deitsch said. "It's just less sleepy
tographs of past Fellows, large than I thought it would be. Reminds
f1
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IL5TAI5 YLUA5AA/5I
TALKING
POINTS.
Three things you can talk about this week:
1. Unpaid taxes
2. Iraqi elections
3. Stimulus packages
And three things you can't:
1. Obama sans suit jacket
2. Rod Blagojevich
3. Bong-hitting Phelps
"Ah, fundamentally true. The specifics aren't quite right."
- TED HAGGARD, founder of New Life Church, responding to Larry King about allegations made
by Grant Haas, a 25-year-old man who said that Haggard masturbated next to him in a hotel bed in
2006. Haggard resigned from New Life in 2006 after admitting to having sex with a male prostitute
me a little bit of New York in that
whatever you're passionate about,
you can find it here.
"But the weather sucks," he
added.
Some of the Fellows said it could
be a little jarring to don a book bag
for the first time in decades and
walk into a classroom where even
the lecturer seems to be younger
than you.
Kobell was not surprised that
the presence ofther and the Fellows
on campus confuses some Univer-
sity students.
"When I went to school here,
the fellowship wasn't very known,"
she said.
Deitsch, who has written for
Sports Illustrated for 12 years, said
the introductory creative writ-
ing workshop he took was a novel
experience.
"We had to write and get our work
workshopped around the room," he
said. "What's more fun than get-
ting ten 20-year-old girls telling you
what's wrong with your writing?"
Pomeroy, a Rome correspondent
for Reuters, took a screenwriting
class and realized just how differ-
ent his life experiences have been
compared to the average University
student.
"I've heard a couple oftheirscript
ideas, and it's very interesting to see
what they write about," he said. "I'm
not American. I'm not 20 years old.
And there's just such a huge differ-
ence. They write about kids in high
school or kids in high school who've
just come to University."
The fellows attend a seminar
at Wallace House twice per week.
Such notable speakers as Madeleine
Albright, Bill Cosby, Ira Glass, Steve
Forbes, Michael Moore and Gloria
Steinem have given talks beside the
house fireplace.
There are similar programs as
this at Stanford and Harvard, but
the University of Michigan's fellow-
ship stands out for its emphasis on
travel. Each class of Fellows takes
two domestic and two international
trips. Already this year, the Fellows
ILLUSTRATION BY LAURA GARAVOGLIA
have been to Buenos Aires and sat
down to talk with Argentinean Vice
President Julio Cobos. Later this
month, they'll be in Moscow and
chat with Mikhail Gorbachev, the
last president of the Soviet Union.
One thing to be noted of the
Fellows is their cultural and jour-
nalistic. Former Fellows include
journalists like Jill Abramson, a
managing editor The New York
Times, and ABC News anchor
Charles Gibson.
This year's Fellows hail from
publications like the BBC and The
Washington Post and from as far
away as Madrid, Moscow, Prague,
Buenos Aires, London, Seoul and
Israel.
It might confuse the typical
University student who's itching
to study abroad in Italy, but Pome-
roy said he has enjoyed the change.
from his normal post in Rome.
"Already it is life-changing, and
I've only been here three weeks,"
he said.
-ZENAIDA RIVERA
BY THE NUMBERS
Number of people in Zimbabwe who have
been infected with cholera
Number of people in Zimbabwe who have died
from cholera since August 2008
Amount of time, in months, that foreign doctors and nurses in
Zimbabwe have been on strike due to salary complaints
Source: CNN
YOUTUBE
VIDEO OF
THE WEEK
A vegetable orgy
For some people, half the fun of
watching the Super Bowl last Sunday
was seeing the new commercials that
companies paid millions of dollars
to roll out. This adtthough, wasn't
among them. And that may or may
not be a bad thing.
This video presents a commercial
sponsoredbyPETA,the animalrights
organization, that NBC banned from
airing on Sunday. Let's just say that
it may encourage all those carnivo-
rous football fans to reconsider their
views of vegetarianism.
With a heavy metal guitar riff
slowly building in the background,
the video starts by showing three
different scantily-clad women seduc-
tively undressing themselves. Once
they're wearing nothing but lacy bras
and panties, the music climaxes and
the debauchery begins.
The women each start caressing
and fondling different vegetables.
One woman rubs a stalk of broccoli
up her leg, another provocatively
licks the curvaceous side ofa pump-
kin. The third woman pretends she's
thrustingasparagusintoherself.Dur-
ing this vegetable orgy, the women
are illuminated by the soft glow of
candles. And halfway through the
video, a message appears: "Studies
show vegetarians have better sex."
Pamela Anderson is a PETA activ-
ist, so perhaps this ad isn't so odd.
-BRIAN TENGEL
See this and other
YouTube videos of the week at
youtube.com/user/michigandaily
THEME PARTY SUGGESTION
Welcome back, Kwame! - Kwame Kilpatrick,
Detroit's favorite felon and former mayor, was
released from the clinker Tuesday after 99 days in
an isolated cell. Kilpatrick has already high-tailed it
to Dallas, but you can still celebrate with a Kwame-
style party of your own. Get out the champagne and
the motorcycles. Make a stripper disappear. Then
claim the expense on your income tax. Remember,
it's not a party unless it's on the taxpayers' dime.
Throwing this party? Let us know. TheStatement@umich.edu
STUDY OF THE WEEK
Boys with unpopular names more likely to be felons
Boys in the United States with less popular names' like Ernest or
Ivan are more likely to commit crimes than boys with popular names
like Michael or David, according to a study recently published in the
Social Science Quarterly by researchers from Shippensburg University
in Pennsylvania.
In the study, the researchers examined the first names of male
juveniles compared with the first names of male juvenile delinquents.
Then, they generated a popularity-name index (PNI) for certain names.
Michael, for example, has a PNI of 100, meaning that it was the most
popular name during the time of the study. David has a PNI of50. Names
like Alec, Earnest, Ivan, Kareem and Malcolm all have a PNI of one.
The researchers concluded that juveniles with unpopular names are
more likely to engage in crime, regardless oftheir race.While unpopular
names obviously don't cause crime, researchers said, they often result in
social isolation that canlead to crime.
- BRIAN TENGEL