The Michigan Daily - Monday, June 19, 2006 - 5 STANDPOINT A COLUMN FROM A MEMBER OF THE DAILY'S STAFF Keeping up with the Whartons BY CHRISTOPHER ZBROZEK stood on the fourth floor of Lorch Hall a few days back and stared out a window, transfixed by the demoli- tion next door. Over and over, a great mechanical claw thrust out over the remains of the west half of the business cam- pus, ripping another chunk out of Davidson Hall. Light fixtures dangled on their still-intact wir- ing, swinging through the swirl- ing dust over the piles of rubble below waiting to be hauled off to a landfill. The scene was captivat- ing and almost beautiful, in that train wreck sort of way. Understandably, there's been little criticism of Stephen Ross's extraordinary donation to his alma mater, newly re-christened the Ste- phen M. Ross School of Business. It's not polite to look a gift horse in the mouth, especially one worth $100 million. And yet it's difficult to walk past the construction site at Hill and Tappan streets and not see something terribly wasteful. If there's a serious argument that the School of Business desperately needed new facilities to replace an ancient, collapsing infrastructure, I haven't heard it. Davidson Hall, built in 1948, might not have been the newest structure on campus, but it's the only one of the three business school buildings being torn down that might remotely deserve its fate. I went to see Sen. Carl Levin speak in Assembly Hall several months back, and I didn't exactly walk away with plaster flakes in my hair from a crumbling ceiling. And the Pat- ton Accounting Center, barely 30 years old, was hardly decrepit. Neither does there appear to be a real argument that business students were facing a pedagogical predica- ment in their old digs. To accommo- date the collaborative projects that characterize many classes in the business school, the new classrooms will include small rooms for group work. As one student told a Michi- gan Daily reporter when the plans were announced, "It's really annoy- ing when you're doing group work and you hear other groups talking." Clearly, this is a problem in need of a $145 million solution. The main reason for putting up a brand-new structure in the busi- ness school, it seems, is simply to have a brand-new structure. Image counts for a lot in business, and that goes for business schools as well. If the University wants to attract top students and fac- ulty to the Ross School, it needs a shiny new building. After all, the Wharton School of Business built a new high-profile structure a couple years back; how else are we to compete with them? Aging, if perfectly adequate, buildings might remind visitors of the col- lapse of Michigan's manufactur- ing base. A new building paid for largely by a wealthy alum says that the Ross School and its grad- uates are awash in post-industrial prosperity, even if those old auto firms (and who needs them, any- way?) do go belly-up. I'm not sure exactly what the great reverence with which mem- bers of our nation's business class regard mere image says about their priorities and values, but I'm pretty sure it isn't anything good. Superficial business luxuries are nice - but aren't they also, in a strict economic sense, an ineffi- cient misallocation of resources? Expense accounts, Armani suits, airplane seats with actual legroom and, above all, executive compen- sation packages that seem to bear no relation either to a company's performance or to the amount of money a reasonable person could spend in a lifetime - yep, the market is unforgiving, and the competition sure is cut-throat. Never mind that the old build- ings in the way of the Ross School's future could have been put to any number of good uses, or the fact that unnecessarily tearing down completely usable buildings makes the University's case that cuts in state appropria- tions over the past five years have hurt it look silly. Projecting an image of prosperity is apparently a key component of a top-notch business program; I sup- pose in another 30 years, the build- ings that $75 million of Ross's gift are earmarked for will become an embarrassment and an new alum will have to step up to give the business school another makeover. That might strike me as frivolous, absurd and wasteful - but, hey, I never had a head for business. Zbrozek is afall/winter editorial page editor. He can be reached at zbro@umich.edu. Incumbency protection schemes JOHN STIGLICH STIGGY SAYS P oliticians Finance Reform Act (you know it better tisements clogging up your 'Will & love it when as McCain-Feingold) drew upon public Grace' time? I'd be happy to take care scandals that concerns over the "appearance of corrup- of that for you." question the legiti- tion" with many politicians in Washing- We can still take steps toward bring- macy of our elec- ton. Senators John McCain (R-Ariz.) and ing - accountability back to the federal tion system arise. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.) blamed the cor- government without losing our right to Because of the high ruption on all the money floating around free speech. The most immediate step demand for imme- in town that just so happens to find its is to urge elected representatives not to diate action created way into the coffers of politicians. They renew the Voting Rights Act. The pro- by such scandals, concluded the campaign-finance system, visions that protect against the second they can craft incumbency protection not the greedy politicians, was at fault. coming of Jim Crow are already perma- schemes while selling the public on the What came out of BCRA was the nent, and too many of the renewable pro- "virtues" of the proposed solutions. You largest infringement of free-speech visions are being used by politicians for don't believe that politicians are that con- rights since the Alien and Sedition Acts. alternative reasons. niving? Let's review two examples. Your right to speak freely on behalf of a Next, we should organize, state by The Voting Rights Act of 1965 - candidate - yes, money is speech - is state, a mass referendum that would take portions of which are up for renewal this limited to $4,000 per household per the power to redraw Congressional dis- year - contains a section that doubles federal candidate. If you wish to adver- tricts away from those who have clearly as both a method of ensuring minority tise for or against a candidate, you bet- abused it. Iowa currently utilizes a sys- representation in Congress and protect- ter hire a lawyer to comply with all the tem, passed through referendum, where- ing incumbents. Section five of the act restrictions BCRA put in place. by an independent body redraws the stipulates that new redistricting plans I spent last semester in Washington Congressional districts after each cen- (crafted by state legislatures) cannot D.C. interning in the United States Sen- sus. Incidentally, Iowa is home to some reduce the number of minority voting ate, and one of the first structural aspects of the closest Congressional contests. districts. This clause has served both I noticed was the amount of time off the Finally, we need to repeal all of political parties very well. Senate calendar affords its members. BCRA (the appearance of corruption is When Democratic state legislators But instead of using that time to talk to not corruption itself). We have plenty of redraw Congressional districts, their constituents, senators have to spend the institutions - the most important being goal is to pack the minimal amount of vast majority of it at fundraisers. The the media - that can hold scandal-rid- minorities necessary to create a majori- fundraising restrictions of BCRA gave den politicians accountable. We should ty-minority district while distributing the every member of the Senate a reason to be allowed to contribute as much as we rest of the minority voters in suburban request more time off because without like to candidates for federal office on districts. Thus, the section five require- even medium-sized donors (five-figure the condition the candidate updates his ment is met, and Democratic candidates donors), reaching your fundraising goal publicly accessible website every night have better odds of winning in predomi- requires more time. with the name of and amount contributed nately Republican suburbia. No government or politician can say by each contributor. Any large donations The Republican strategy has always with a straight face that they believe in that warrant scrutiny would most surely been to pack as many minorities into as protecting political freedom while vot- be noted by the Fourth Estate. few Congressional districts as possible, ing for the regulation of the contents, Only then can we finally enjoy leaving the rest of the districts safely in timing and funding of campaign adver- democracy's full potential - free, open Republican hands. You need only look at tisements for freely assembled groups. and accountable. the Congressional district map of Michi- But this goes to the heart of the politi- gan to see the realization of this strategy. cian's motives and the voter's priorities: Stiglich can be reached at The 2001 Bipartisan Campaign "You don't like all those political adver- jcsgolf@umich.edu. Would you like to order a boy or a girl? CHRISTINA HILDRETH WELCOME TO MY's'L BLE E ver see the movie "Gattaca"? It was a strange, half-sci-fi thrill- er, half-drama released in 1998. It asked what would life be like for people conceived "the old way" in a time of genetic engineering? Though it didn't make any major waves, the movie por- trayed a world in the not-too-distant future where discrimination was no longer based on gender, race or sex- ual orientation, but on genes. Babies born through science were clean, dis- ease-free and expected to live long, healthy lives. Parents could select the gender of their child at the moment of scientific conception. Ladies and gentlemen, the "not- too-distant future" is now. On Thurs- day, the Associated Press reported that "medical tourists" from all over the world are coming to America to take advantage of an in-vitro fertil- ization option that's banned in their home countries. According to the report, doctors in some American clinics are selling the opportunity to select the sex of a baby for close to $20,000 per child. There are several reasons this is banned in other countries. First, it opens the door to something like "Gat- taca" becoming a reality. If we get. desensitized to the idea of choosing a baby's gender, why not choose a baby's eye color, hair color, height or skin color? Why not give your son a strong jaw and broad shoulders, or your daughter a slim waist and long legs? It's all a matter of choice, isn't it? Yes, genetic manipulation can do beneficial things, like screen out debil- itating diseases. As genetic science advances further, there may come a day when genes for Alzheimer's, diabetes, heart failure and even forms of cancer can be prevented by simple selection of embryos. That in itself is not a bad thing. The problem is that this tech- nology is not available to everyone. Its immense cost yields the possibil- ity where, in another not-too-distant future, the rich could all be genetically healthier, taller, smarter and more beau- tiful. Imagine what the gap between rich and poor would be then. There would be much fewer stories of people overcoming socio-economic hardships to achieve success because the poor would literally not have it in them. Debate over affirmative action would be taken in a whole new direc- tion. Estate taxes would do nothing to prevent the establishment of a new, bio- logically superior aristocracy. This is not an unrealistic fiction; it's the logical extrapolation of the current practice. Dr. Jeffrey Steinberg, who offers the gender-selection service at his fer- tilization clinics in Los Angeles and Las Vegas, defended the practice in the article, arguing that it all balances out in the end because just as many customers choose boys as girls. This still doesn't cover the larger problem of gender discrimination. Steinberg admits in his article that his custom- ers' gender choices are segregated by country. According to his quote in the article, "The Chinese like boys. Canadians like girls." It appears as if his practice has the potential to create not only socio-economic problems, but demographic ones as well. This is not the plot of a movie. It's real life. The wealthy can actually choose the sex of their baby. Scientists and lawmakers should consider tough restrictions on this practice to protect our reality from becoming a movie conspiracy theory. Genetic technology can do a lot of good, but like with any great power we may wield, we must exercise responsibility. Hildreth can be reached at childret@umich.edu. CHiw ouTTIE Poow DAL.Y OPINON'S SLOG, BY VISMIG JT pI APJC*AAY. comIL oG&IHEODPJMV ORt cLKK ON THE Poiw AT Tie DALY's HomEPAGE (WWWMIC HGAFALY.COrM).