I 8 Monday, August 6, 2012 The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com Monday, August 6, 2012 The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com I5 Michael Phelps: gold, but not maize Noise at the polls ALICIA KOVALCHECK E-MAIL ALICIA AT ALIMARKO@UMICH.EDU. As the 2012 Summer Olym- pics approached, I had the fun task of compiling a list of the Michigan ath- letes that were headed across the pond to compete. So I checked out MGoBlue. com's roster of all the Michi- COLLEEN gan affiliates THOMAS headed to London and found a list of 28 names complete with their countries, events and affiliation with the University in a simple table on the website. Copy, paste, add a brief bio and publish the story, right? Not so fast. -While it's important to recog- nize that Michigan coaches going to London put in the same amount of time and effort into training their athletes, it's essential to celebrate the athletic accomplish- ments of the student-athletes who will run, swim and vault in the Summer Olympics instead. That eliminates a number of coaches, assistant or otherwise, leaving a handful of names. And I thought to myself, "I wonder if the Michigan athletic community embraces Michael Phelps as a Michigan athlete, since he trained in Ann Arbor for several years." I scrolled down to the swim- mers and saw Phelps' name on the list. But beside his name was his affiliation with the University: a volunteer coach from 2005 to 2008, not 'varsity letterwinner.' That nixed his name from my list. True, Phelps came to Ann Arbor to train with coach Bob Bowman after Bowman was hired as the men's swimming coach in 2004. True, Phelps did enroll in classes at the University - but not to pursue a degree - and served as the volunteer coach while training with Club Wolverine under Bowman. Phelps was a student, yes, but not a student-athlete. Phelps was never offered a scholarship to Michigan, nor was he ever recruited to swim for the Wolverines. He never took to the pool for a Big Ten meet, and he never experienced the camara- derie and teamwork that Peter. Vanderkaay or Connor Jaeger felt when they competed for national titles in a Michigan swim cap. So if Phelps was never actually on the swim team despite being a student, why should he be includ- ed in the list of Michigan athletes at the Olympics? He shouldn't. Many people and places - including Bentley Historical Library's page compiling the entire list of Michigan athletes' all-time Olympic appearances - claim Phelps as a Wolverine, citing his block 'M' tattoo on his lower abdomen and his brief stint taking classes in Ann Arbor as. reasons why he should be a part of the list. It's almost like the Michigan community is calling Phelps one of its own just to boast the most decorated Olympian ever as a fel- low Wolverine. Because of that slight connection, an average fan or old alum can say they have a connection to Phelps that every- one else doesn't, and that Michi- gan has the "leaders and best" because Phelps is just like them - a true Wolverine. But Phelps wasn't among the thousands of student-athletes who put in innumerable hours in the pool, not to mention the countless hours sitting in the Academic Center or the UGLi doing homework. Those student- athletes are not only training for their Big Ten seasons, but also working hard for a degree that many of them will actually put to use once their days as an athlete are over. I'm not trying to undermine Phelps' athletic talent at all - he is an exceptional athlete, no doubt, and has achieved a feat that will probably never come close to being matched. Phelps swam his way to 22 Olympic medals and countless world records, but for the Michi- gan fan base to claim him as one of their own is unfair to the rest of the true student-athletes that don the maize and blue both in the classroom and on the field. - Thomas is still #TeamPhelps. She can be reached at collthom@umich.edu or via Twitter : @colleenthomas_. It seems that one cannot walk across campus without being approached by someone who wants to register Michigan vot- ers. I recently heard somebody tell the man who was try- ing to register her that she did not feel com- fortable voting MATTHEW because she feltZAK too uninformed. ZABKA The man then tried to con- vince her of how very important it was for every sin- gle eligible American to take advan- tage of his or her right to vote. Society seems to chide those who are eligible to vote but choose not to: P. Diddy's "Vote or Die" cam- paign comes to mind, for example. The stigma, however, is greatly misplaced. The uninformed voter's checkmark on a ballot doesn't serve the republic, and society shouldn't reproach uninformed non-voters. Rather, the sigma should be against being uninformed altogether. In statistics, random variation in a system - like random votes in an election - is called "noise." This term seems particularly appropri- ate considering a growing percent- age of us get our information from biased shows, with people like Sean Hannity or Bill Maher yelling about how stupid they think the other side is. The ever-louder blubbering of these talking heads has led to more statistical noise in elections. The man who attempted to reg- ister the woman directed her to a website where she could inform herself. His suggestion - and I am not making this up - was President Barack Obama's campaign website. "Everything you need to know is there." Yes, everything she needed to know in order to vote exactly how the guy wanted her to vote. Informed voters examine issues and support policies based on what they think is best, but no voter should support a policy only because a particular candidate or political party has adopted that policy. It's scary to see how often a party can take two completely opposite posi- tions while-the party faithful hap- pily contradict themselves. Angry about the Iraq war, many liberals cheered as then-Sen. Obama declared, "The President does not have power under the Con- stitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a'situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation." After his election to the presidency, Obamatunilaterally authorized mil- itary attacks against Libya - and* the same liberals then cheered! Independent voters are a minority. Not to be outdone, many conser- vatives supported spending almost $1 trillion to topple the dictator of an oil-rich nation to protect civilians while a Republican was in the White House. The same.conservatives then opposed spending $1 billion to top- ple the dictator of an oil-rich nation to protect civilians while a Demo- crat was in the White House. Neither the Democrats nor the Republicans examined these issues and made informed decisions. Rather, they listened to their politi- cal party's leaders and talk-show hosts. When these leaders did a 180, these voters followed them in lock- step. I suppose living as one of these party faithful would be pretty easy. Why spend time informing yourself when Messrs. Reid or Boehner will tell you what to think? Perhaps scariest is the fact that independent thinkers are becoming a smaller percentage of the voting block. Some polls have indicated that Obama and Mitt Romney are fighting over the less than 10 per- cent of voters who areundecided. Meanwhile, according to Gallup, the budget deficit is the second most important issue in this elec- tion. Neither Romney nor Obama has presented a credible plan to deal with these unsustainable defi- cits, but incredibly 90 percent of voters have made up their minds. How depressing. It is every American's right to vote. There's a stigma in this country against people who do not exercise this right, but this makes as much sense as chiding some- body for not exercising his Second Amendment rights. Americans should instead be encouraged to stay informed and make their own decisions about what policies are best. As to how to achieve this, have you tried putting down the remote and picking up a newspaper? Matthew Zabka can be reached at mzbka@umich.edu. Follow him on Twitter at @MatthewZabka. <>~