The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
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Monday, November 26, 2012 - 5A
The Michigan Daily - michigandailycomW S Monday, November 26, 2012 - 5A
UMHS
From Page 1A
Martoma, a portfolio manager
at CR Intrinsic, a unit of the SAC
Advisors hedge fund. Officials at
POT
From Page 1A
Ypsilanti, Kalamazoo and Flint
- voted to
decriminalize marijuana in
various capacities.
In the city of Ann Arbor, pos-
session of marijuana is decrimi-
nalized and punishable with a
$25 fine, with no jail or proba-
tion. However, University Police
enforce state law on campus
property. State law regards pos-
session of marijuana as a misde-
meanor, punishable by one year
in jail and up to $2,00 in fines.
Most recently, the Commit-
tee for a Safer Michigan, a group
pushing for legalization, started a
petition to put a proposal on the
2012 state ballot to legalize mari-
juana. Though the group collect-
ed 50,000 signatures, it fell short
of the about 323,000 required for
a ballot proposal.
Thomas Levine, an attorney
with Cannabis Council and direc-
tor of the committee, said the
main reason the campaign failed
was due to a lack of funds, as
opposed to lack of interest.
"I don't-think it was a sign that
people were not ready for this -
it was just a matter of being able
to pay petitioners so we're going
to be revisiting this in 2016 and
we're going to be raising money
between now and then," Levine
said.
However, Michael Traugott,
a political science and commu-
nications professor, pointed out
that the unwillingness of voters
to amend the state's constitution
in other policy areas in the recent
election, in which all six ballot
proposals were defeated, may
show that voters have trepidation
with altering the document.
"I don't think that given the
outcome of the 2012 election,
that many people are going to be
willing to amend the state consti-
tution to allow the sale of mari-
juana," Traugott said.
While some college students
have expressed excitement about
the possible legalization of the
popular drug, Traugott said
Michiganders shouldn't expect to
see much progress on the drug's
legalization anytime soon.
"I think the progress on this
is going to be very slow given
that the federal government still
objects to legalizing marijuana
for general consumption," Trau-
gott said.
State Rep. Jeff Irwin (D-Ann
Arbor) also presumed that a more
likely path for marijuana legal-
ization is through citizen peti-
tion and local initiatives, though
he noted it's an issue he would be
willing to discuss within the state
Legislature.
LSA-SG
From Page 1A
elections are focused on receiving
abroad range of ideas from a spec-
trum of new members. She added
that only one representative is
seeking re-election, though many
of the candidates have already
served appointed positions.
"This is an extremely good
thing, to be able to get fresh ideas
and fresh voices," Burns said.
LSA-SG is working on increas-
ingawarenessregardingitspolicies
and creating improved platforms
for student discussion, including
town hall meetings for students to
voice their ideas. Building a Bet-
ter Michigan - a student group
partially comprised of members
of LSA-SG dedicated to improving
campus facilities - is holding the
first such gathering on Dec. 6.
Burns added that future town
halls would deal with campus pol-
icies such as medical amnesty -
whichgrants studentsunder21the
ability to seek medical assistance
for themselves or an intoxicated
friend without receiving a minor
the U.S. Securities and Exchanges
Commission have deemed it the
largest insider trading scheme
ever caught by federal authorities.
Gilman signed a non-prosecu-
tion agreement with prosecutors
and has agreed to cede $234,000
"I'm certainly willing to talk
about improving our marijuana
laws ... and willing to bring those
ideas to (the) Legislature," Irwin
said. "But do I think there's going
to be a majority of legislatures
who are going to support that
move in the short term? Probably
not ... I think by and large politi-
cians ... don't want to take on con-
troversial issues."
Irwin said he supports legal-
ization because he feels it could
lead to a long-term reduction in
drug usage as a result of proper
regulation and education on the
drug, alluding to the success in
reduction of smoking in America.
"If you look at cigarettes over
the last 30 to 50 years, you now
see cigarette use has declined
pretty precipitously because of a
concerted information campaign
to communicate with people
what the dangers are of tobacco
use," he said. "Look at how much
more successful that strategy has
been in terms of reducingtobacco
use than for instance the drug
war has been in reducing mari-
juana use."
On the federal level, President
Barack Obama has previously
stated that he has no intention of
legalizing the drug. The White
House's Office of National Drug
Control Policy maintains that
use of pot is harmful, and that its
legalization would increase use,
encumber the criminal justice
system and fail to increase tax
revenue because of higher social
costs.
At the heart of some state
struggles to legalize marijuana is
the constitutional dilemma that
would put state law at odds with
federal law, making the status
of the popular street drug fairly
murky. Experts say that until the
federal government takes on the
controversial issue, states and
municipalities will face difficul-
ties in enforcement.
The confusion is rooted in the
2005 U.S. Supreme Court deci-
sion in Gonzales v. Raich that
ruled that, by the power of the
commerce clause of the U.S. Con-
stitution, federal officials have
the power to enforce federal mar-
ijuana laws even if it is considered
legal locally.
Public Policy lecturer Craig
Ruff said the decision in Gonzales
v. Raich has created a headache
for prosecutors and law enforce-
ment officials as they try to rec-
oncile the chnging local policies
with the federal interventions.
"A local policeman in Seattle
could avert his or her eyes from
seeing someone smoke mari-
juana on the street, (but) on the
other hand there could be a Drug
Enforcement Agency official
standing right next to the city cop
and the DEA official says 'Oh I'm
in possession charge - and the
University's sexual misconduct
policy. A draft of revised protocols
was released in October, and fol-
lows requirements established by
the U.S. Department of Education
requiring that colleges instigate
investigations of reported acts
of sexual misconduct, as well as
lower their burden of proof.
The platforms of LSA-SG can-
didates indicate that some of the
issues important to future repre-
sentatives include increasing the
quota of printing pages for LSA
students and making more classes
from other University colleges
available to LSA students.
The election ballot also asks
three questions of voters, which
include whether or not ROTC stu-
dents should be allowed to regis-
ter early, whether the LSA Course
Guide should allow students to
search for classes scheduled dur-
ing a particular time slot. It'll also
ask students ifthey'reaware of the
state of Michigan's adaptation of
the Medical Amnesty Act.
Burns said LSA-SG will use
the responses of students to fuel
future project development.
toward settling the case. His
lawyer, Marc Mukasey, acknowl-
edged that he will be cooperating
with prosecutors and the SEC.
Daily News Editor Adam
Rubenfire contributed to this report.
doing to arrest him,"' Ruff said.
This ability of the federal gov-
ernment to intervene also applies
to the Michigan Marijuana Act
of 2008, which allows use of the
drug for medicinal purposes.
Ruff said even with this limited
law, state and local officials have
found that enforcement and regu-
lation is challenging.
Opinions on marijuana reform
are somewhat divided along par-
tisan lines, with 53 percent of
Democrats, 30 percent of Repub-
licans and 49 percent of Inde-
pendents supporting the drug's
legalization, accordingto the Pew
Research Center
"There is a partisan divide ...
but it's also a cultural divide,"
Ruff said. "People who are very
religious, many of whom live in
rural areas ... are very concerned
that marijuana could lead to poor
health behavior and could lead to
a person being tempted by other
harder drugs."
Ruff noted there is also divide
in support among demograph-
ics and geographic areas. Ruff
explained that urban areas are
generally more favorable to the
legalization, partly due to greater
exposure to the drug.
"The fact that crime is higher
in cities makes a lot of urban resi-
dents say 'Why are we wasting
precious law enforcement dollars
chasing after people who are, you
know, smoking one cigarette a
day of marijuana when in fact we
have rapists and murderers and
robbers on our streets?"'he said.
Yashinsky said opinions inAnn
Arbor, East Lansing and other
college towns with a high popula-
tion of youth voters are not rep-
resentative of the views in other
parts of the state, adding that in
neighboring Oakland County,
elected officials are resisting the
Medical MarijuanaAct of 2008.
"You'd be surprised if you
never made it out here (to Oak-
land County) and spent your
time in Lansing or Ann Arbor or
Ypsilanti or Grand Rapids even
where you're used to seeing some
dispensaries there's nothing like
that here ... I think that's indica-
tive of the social aspect." Yashin-
sky said.
Ruff also pointed to a clear
age gap, with the majority of the
younger generations supporting
legalization and retirees gener-
ally opposing it.
Yashinsy said the dispropor-
tionate influence older residents
have on politicians given their
heightened tendency to donate
to campaigns contributes to the
resistance some politicians have
taken to the issue.
"People who get the ear of their
congressman are by and large the
people that are over 65," Yashin-
sky said.
"A lot of times administrators
don't respond to student initia-
tives alone, and they want to see
the data behind it," Burns said.
"We hope to get a lot of student
response."
LSA sophomore Kendall John-
son, the candidate running for
re-election, came up with the idea
last year to hold student debates
for prospective candidates. She
said despite low attendance, this
year's debate was "a great oppor-
tunity for constituents to let
students know what they are pas-
sionate about and what they are
running for."
Johnson also emphasized the
importance of increasing student
involvement during elections,
including getting students to LSA-
SG events in order to increase
voter turnout.
"I just hope that we can con-
tinue to be all that we can be and
continue to represent the students
and make changes to them that
are beneficial," Johnson said. "I
hope that (LSA) SG continues to
keep its name out there to make
collaborations and grow as an
organization.",
UNFINISHED
From Page 1A
came against teams who posted
a combined 40-56 record. The
Wolverines were favored in all
of their victories, they were the
underdog in every loss.
So, simply put, Michigan
performed to expectations.
But that doesn't leave anyone
feeling better. Team 133 had
four chances to make a state-
ment. They couldn't make a
single one; they couldn't beat
any team worth its salt, save
the miracle victory over North-
western.
Things could have gone much
differently. Two plays either way
could have seen Michigan finish
at 10-2 or 6-6. Last-second vic-
tories over Michigan State and
Northwestern could just as easily
have been losses.
And then there were inju-
ries. Standout cornerback Blake
Countess was knocked out of the
season opener with a knee injury
and never returned. Redshirt
junior tailback Fitzgerald Tous-
saint missed the last game of the
season after injuring his left leg
against Iowa. Senior quarterback
Denard Robinson sustained
an ulnar-nerve injury against
Nebraska and never threw
another pass. He scampered for a
67-yard touchdown in Columbus
CSG
From Page 1A
bylaws and CSG's governing
documents in its attempt to put
the question on the ballot, in
addition to other more general
violations.
The non-binding ballot ques-
tion asks if graduate students
would like RSG and other
graduate student organizations
to look into the possibility of
seceding from CSG. However,
if such a vote does occur, it's
unlikely the results will imme-
diately be made public.
CSG represents every stu-
dent on campus, and individual
schools and colleges have their
own student governments. In
September, RSG voted to cre-
ate an exploratory committee to
investigate student interest in
graduate student secession from
CSG.
At the time, RSG president
Michael Benson said an all-
graduate student government,
which would split the represen-
tation of more than 40,000 stu-
dents on campus into two major
student governments, could also
resultinthe splitting of the $7.19
student fee that students pays
each semester. Secession could
result in CSG losing hundreds of
thousands of dollars it typically
receives annually.
CSG alleges in its suit that
RSG - which submitted the
question on Nov. 15, 12 days
before the start of the election
- did not follow its own rules
or CSG's rules for when a ballot
question needs to be submitted
for inclusion on the ballot.
According to the CSG Com-
piled Code segments cited in
the suit, ballot questions must
be submitted 25 days prior to
the election and the RSG bylaws
cited in the suit state that ballot
questions must be sent 14 days
prior to an election.
"Twelve days is simply not
enough time for adequate cam-
paigning to take place," the
suit states. "Furthermore, this
smoke and mirrors approach by
the RSG board to place the lan-
guage on the ballot on its first
read, while violating the dead-
lines, almost amounts to elec-
tion fraud."
CSJ chief justice Ryan Ger-
sovitz, a University Law School
student, said in an interview
Saturday that discussion of the
injunction is speculative at this
point, but if CSJ isn't able to ren-
der a decision by the time the
election commences, the results
of the poll could be withheld
pending CSJ's decision.
"We'll probably talk with the
parties and figure out the best
thing to do," Gersovitz said. "I
on Saturday, his first touchdown
in 355 minutes of game time - to
recap, Robinson, whose 91 touch-
downs are a Michigan record,
wentjust eight minutes short of
not scoring for half a season.
But maybe performingto
expectations wasn't so bad.
What if Michigan just isn't built
yet to compete with the nation's
elite? Perhaps the Wolverines,
by coming within a touchdown
of beating teams like Ohio State
and Notre Dame - and even
Nebraska, with a healthy Robin-
son - were outperformingtheir
talent level.
Now, no one inside Schem-
bechler Hall will agree with that.
But look at this. Alabama's
offensive line and entire defen-
sive corps is NFL-bound. Notre
Dame has future top-20 draft
picks like Heisman Trophy-
candidate Manti Te'o. Ohio ~
State, Nebraska? They're simply
more talented from top to bot-
tom, though there certainly are
outliers.
Who from Michigan's senior
class will hear his name called
in the NFLdraft? Robinson,
surely, though who knows when
or at what position. Jordan
Kovacs? Will Campbell? Roy
Roundtree? Kenny Demens?
There are plenty of guys who
might well geta tryout with an
NFL team next summer, but the
only surefire draft pick in this
can only speculate, but maybe
that would just mean that
instead of enjoining (the ques-
tion) being on the ballot, we
would enjoin the release of the
results until after so thatrway we
could have the hearing on Tues-
day or Wednesday for instance,
which would give Rackham a
little more time to prepare."
Gersovitz said withhold-
ing the results of a vote would
ensure that if CSJ sides with
RSG, midterm ballot results
would still include responses
to the ballot question, rather
than removing the question
entirely and delaying a vote
until next semester. He added
that if CSJ sided with CSG, it
would most likely state that the
question wasn't "properly" put
on the ballot, and RSG would
likely alter the question for next
semester's ballot.
Still, Gersovitz stressed that
this case has no bearing on
whether or not graduate stu-
dents will able to secede.
"None of these claims are say-
ing that Rackham can't secede,"
Gersovitz said.
CSJ is only scheduled to
have a closed-door meeting on
Monday, but Gersovitz said the
group isn't planning on schedul-
ing the hearings at that time.
"Part of it will be (dependent
on) how prepared the Rackham
Student Government is," Gerso-
vitz said. "If the Rackham Stu-
dent Government is ready and
prepared to go ASAP, then CSJ
will as well, but we haven't got-
ten a chance to get in touch with
them."
On Saturday night, Benson
declined to comment on wheth-
er or not RSG would able to
respond to the suit by Monday,
noting he still has to contact
other members of the RSG exec-
utive board.
At its Nov. 15 meeting, RSG
unanimously approved the
inclusion of the secession ques-
tion on the ballot. RSG also held
a vote to endorse voting "yes"
on the question, and the resolu-
tion to endorse the question was
voted down.
"That was defeated, with the
argument being as the sponsors
of the election we wantto keepa
neutral approach to the student
body as an organization and let
the students make up their own
minds," Benson said. "The ques-
tion itself, the ballot question,
was approved unanimously."
Benson said as of Saturday
nightthat he hasn't yet received
any communication from CSG
or CSJ other than an e-mail
regarding the injunction to CSJ.
"We're the respondents in
this so I think we'll certainly
hear from CSJ (Sunday) or Mon-
day, but I haven't received an
senior class is a quarterback
who certainly won't play quar-
terback at the next level.
That's not to take anything
away from the talent on Michi-
gan's roster, it's to emphasize
the caliber of opponents the
Wolverines battled against -
and lost to.
In two years, the talent level
on the Wolverinesideline will
be different, vastly different.
Though Michigan coach Brady
Hoke's metric for success - a
Big Ten championship - won't
necessarily change, perform-
ing to expectations will look
different. Then we'll be able to
adequately judge the Michigan
coaching staff for how it has
shaped the team. If Michigan
lost these same four games two
years from now, then there
would be reason to panic. Not
now. Not yet.
Is 8-4 a disappointing
record? Sure it is. It always will
be at Michigan. But each loss
was a legitimate loss. Michigan
didn't give away any game, per
se, it just didn't steal any ban-
ner matchups either.
They had every opportunity
to beat the best, but they're not
quite there.
Not yet.
Nesbitt can be reached
stnesbitt@umich.edu or on
Twitter at @stephenjnesbitt
e-mail from them," he said.
Though CSG filed the injunc-
tion six days before the election,
Law School student Jeremy
Keeney, chair of the CSG rules
committee, said the filing was
not done out of malice.
"We could've waited until
Sunday, but we did have every-
thing ready to go by Wednesday
and we wanted to make sure
that both the Rackham Student
Government and the CSJ had
enough time to thoroughly read
through all of the complaints
and respond to them so that
RSG has a fair shot at this," Kee-
ney said.
He added: "We're not trying
to do anything under the cover
of darkness. We want to make
sure everyone's on the same
page here and hoving forward."
Gersovitz said this hearing
would be different from the
court proceedings that lasted
for 12 hours, severely delaying
the election last March.
Though RSG sent the ques-
tion 12 days before the start
of the election, the election is
described as taking place on
Nov. 27 through 29 in the suit,
meaning that RSG sent the
question 14 days before the
end of the election. The lan-
guage in RSG's bylaws cited by
the suit does not make clear at
what point in the election bal-
lot questions need to be submit-
ted 14 days before. While RSG
would still be in violation of the
CSG Compiled Code, the suit
does concede that "CSG has
plenary authority to regulate
the petition deadline."
The suit also alleges other
violations unrelated to the ques-
tion's filing date. It argues that
RSG has parts of it bylaws at
odds with the governing docu-
ments of CSG and that consis-
tently vacant seats in the CSG
assembly set aside for Rackham
students is a violation of the
University of Michigan Student
Body Constitution.
LSA junior Lukas Garske -
who had been working on the
issue with members of the CSG
executive board, including Law
School student Jeremy Kee-
ney, Business junior Michael
Proppe, the assembly chair, and
Rackham representative Patrick
O'Mahen - said the injunction
was a response to these viola-
tions, not to RSG's intentions.
"We're not trying to dis-
qualify them on any technicali-
ties here," Garske said. "There's
multiple violations - they've
modified their constitution in
an attempt to gain supremacy
over the all-campus constitu-
tion; they've failed.to collabo-
rate with CSG by failing to fill
the Rackham seats on Central
Student Government."
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