According to Warren, her 
experience as the only female 
Democrat in the Michigan 
Senate for four years has 
made 
her 
realize 
female 
perspectives are essential. 
“We tend to fight amongst 
each other for one seat at the 
table, but we need to stop 
fighting for that one seat 
and 
start 
demanding 
the 
five spots at the table that 
we deserve,” Warren said. 
“Women’s voices at the table 
change conversations.”
Other 
panelists 
said 
it 
is often difficult to thrive 
in 
male-dominated 
fields. 
Warren said she was told 

repeatedly she was too young 
to run for office when her 
male rival was six months 
younger than her. Lasinski 
said she felt unable to wear 
a dress at her former job at 
DTE Energy because men 
would look up her skirt.
According 
to 
Lasinski, 
strong male allies can be 
beneficial but can also fall 
short of expectations.
“As I look across right now 
sometimes in the political 
world, you’ll see that the man 
has been a very strong ally 
for the woman until he feels 
that it is his turn,” Lasinski 
said. 
According 
to 
Lasinski, 
such microaggressions are 
harder to call out because 
they are more subtle and 

difficult to read directly. She 
said that’s why it’s necessary 

to 
have 
more 
women 
in 
positions of power.
Lasinski also said having 
women in positions of power 

in 
the 
government 
can 
change how bills are passed 
and 
addressed, 
especially 
bills which impact women.
“Having women in power 
is 
tremendous,” 
Lasinski 
said. “There are questions 
answered 
without 
being 
asked, 
issues 
brought 
up 
and recognized without it 
happening at the ninth hour.”
Warren 
agreed 
having 
everyone at the table would 
allow for broader and better 
legislation. She also pointed 
out the problem with labeling 
certain 
issues 
“women’s 
issues,” 
when 
oftentimes 
these issues are universal. 
She questioned what women’s 
issues 
exactly 
are 
and 
expressed her unwillingness 
to be pigeonholed.

“Every issue we deal with 
are all ‘women’s issues,’” 
Warren said. “I don’t ever 
want to be put into a box 
where I’m the only person 
who deals with this small 
subsection that you think are 
‘women’s issues.’” 
LSA 
sophomore 
Emily 
Baron said to The Daily after 
the event that she attended 
the fireside chat because she 
wanted to be exposed to a 
variety of ideas.
“I like to hear different 
people’s 
perspective,” 
Baron said. “I like to be an 
active listener; hearing the 
panelists is really inspiring 
even if it’s not something I’m 
directly interested in.”
LSA junior Sarah Stone, 
one of the organizers of 

the 
panel, 
explained 
the 
inspiration behind the event. 
Stone explained the event 
was 
supposed 
to 
address 
the broader conversation of 
female empowerment.
“As 
somebody 
who 
is 
not in the political field or 
track, 
learning 
the 
skills 
that women in high power 
fields experience and seeing 
how Rebekah (Warren) was 
a 
chemical 
engineer 
and 
completely changed her path 
to pursue her passion and 
take a stand and have become 
such an influential person; 
that’s 
something 
to 
take 
away,” Stone said.

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Tuesday, April 16, 2019 — 3

POLITICS
From Page 1

“Gene 
is 
a 
leading 
voice 
in 
progressive politics in the United 
States today.” Barr said. “...He’s been 
a hero to me in Democratic politics 
and policymaking for a long time. 
Gene has this wonderful ability 
to pull together deep substantive 
knowledge in policy with a great 
political sense of how to get things 
done and an ability to communicate 
with the public and the media 
that 
enables 
policy 
to 
become 
accessible to the public. I think it is 
an extraordinary gift to have those 
three sets of skills in one human 
being.”
In discussing his professional 
career, Sperling acknowledged there 
is often not a singular, linear line to 
success. After serving under Clinton, 
Sperling 
became 
a 
writer 
and 

consultant for the television series 
“The West Wing.” Sperling discussed 
how the dramatic environmental 
change from Washington, D.C. to 
Hollywood changed his life for the 
better when he met the fellow “The 
West Wing” writers for the first 
time.
“I sit in the open spot, and I turn 
to my left and introduce myself to 
the first writer on my left, and that 
is how I met my wife,” Sperling said. 
“The moral of the story is that the 
real West Wing is the best thing in 
my professional life, and the fake 
West Wing is the best thing in my 
personal life.”
Sperling 
said 
he 
admired 
Obama and Clinton for running 
their administration in a way that 
encouraged open discussions. 
“I think that feeling of having 
everybody around a table and letting 
everybody speak up, encouraging an 
active debate, not making anyone feel 
that they will be punished or hurt 

by disagreeing with the president 
… I thought that was outstanding,” 
Sperling said.
Sperling said he is currently 
developing his next book, focused on 
how and why economic dignity is a 
necessity which must be prioritized. 
He defined economic dignity as a 
concept that encourages refocusing 
the main goal of economics to 
address human need and wellbeing 
over 
economic 
indicators. 
He 
recently wrote an essay on this topic 
for the Democracy Journal. 
Similarly to his essay, Sperling’s 
book will address the three pillars 
he has created to define economic 
dignity. The first pillar focuses on 
how every person should have the 
capacity to care for their family 
and have a good quality of life. This 
includes health care, paid family 
leave and a standard for bereavement 
leave.
“We need to think about the 
importance of life,” Sperling said. 

“Being there for your parents, being 
there for someone you love that has 
cancer, being able to spend time with 
your child. Those are maybe some of 
the greatest joys in life … And they 
are unbelievably economic.”
The second pillar of economic 
dignity addresses how the pursuit 
of potential and purpose should be 
achievable to every person. Sperling 
discussed how the United States 
is often seen as a place for second 
chances, but the way the economy 
is structured can prevent economic 
second chances.
“Are we a country that the accident 
of our birth determines the outcome 
of your life?” Sperling questioned. 
“This is a central assault on the 
dignity of so many people … This is 
not lack of value; this is often a lack 
of luck.”
The third pillar focuses on how 
every person should be able to 
participate in the economy while 
being respected and not facing 

discrimination 
and 
humiliation. 
Sperling 
expressed 
disgust 
for 
how people often suffer silently 
while they pursue their economic 
potential.
“If the price for you pursuing your 
potential was sexual harassment, it 
is a pretty big damn issue,” Sperling 
said.
Public 
Policy 
junior 
Pranav 
Govindaraju was excited to hear 
such a prominent figure discuss 
the concepts he has been studying. 
Govindaraju said he resonated with 
Sperling’s ideas on economic dignity 
and thought these ideas would be 
important to implement.
“When we talk about economics … 
we reduce things to an equation. We 
don’t really think about economics 
in terms of its actual social impact,” 
Govindaraju 
said. 
“Looking 
at 
economics through this lens of 
improving the human condition is an 
idea I definitely agree with.”

ECONOMICS
From Page 1

At last week’s Senate Advisory 
Committee 
on 
University 
Affairs meeting, the assembly 
voted to unanimously support 
the efforts of the faculty who 
wrote the letter and encourage 
other faculty to support the 
letter. 
The 
resolution 
from 
the assembly would have been 
considered separate from the 
SACUA resolution.
Assembly members debated 
the 
possible 
resolution, 
considering 
changing 
its 
language 
to 
support 
the 
intentions of the letter. Ron 
Larson, College of Engineering 
representative, expressed his 
concerns with the letter.
“I’m probably very much a 
minority on this, but I don’t 
support this letter,” Larson 
said. “I think the issue is very 
complicated. For example, the 

definition of carbon neutrality 
… To me, we have a committee 
that’s looking at this carefully, 
and 
carbon 
neutrality 
is 
something very hard to define.” 
The 
assembly 
further 
discussed 
the 
March 
15 
Washtenaw 
County 
Climate 
Strike, 
during 
which 
10 
demonstrators were arrested 
and given citations at the 
Fleming 
Administration 
Building for trespassing after a 
7.5 hour sit-in. Emily Campbell, 
school 
of 
information 
representative, said she thought 
the assembly should encourage 
the police department to not 
charge the demonstrators.
Joy Beatty, U-M Dearborn 
representative 
and 
Senate 
Assembly vice chair, said she 
met with University President 
Mark Schlissel during the sit-
in. She explained it did not 
sound like the demonstrators 
would be charged.
“Schlissel said he had had 

experiences at Berkeley where 
they didn’t make people leave,” 
Beatty said. “I guess he had 
learned from that experience 
that you have to get people out 
of the building.”
After 
discussing 
their 
thoughts on the letter and 
possibly 
amending 
the 
resolution, 
the 
assembly 
made the decision to table it, 
although they have no meetings 
remaining for the duration of 
the school year. 
In addition to tabling the 
resolution, 
the 
assembly 
listened to a presentation by 
Runge. In his presentation, 
Runge focused on the future 
of 
the 
University 
Medical 
School and health care. He 
said the main areas of focus 
for the Medical School include 
research, education and clinical 
care, as well as emphasizing the 
importance of learning through 
discovery science.
“Many important advances 

in medicine have come from 
discovery 
science,” 
Runge 
said. “They weren’t necessarily 
targeted science … Discovery 
science today is driven by 
really some top investigators 
in a wide variety of fields that 
someone who’s doing research 
as a graduate student, (if) they 
feel like their focus is on cancer, 
that research may also turn out 
to be important in neurological 
diseases or vascular diseases or 
other areas.”
Runge 
also 
discussed 
increasing the comfort, value 
of care and cost of care of 
University 
health 
systems, 
highlighting two new Brighton 
and Ann Arbor health care 
locations. He said the medical 
system is working to improve 
and become a better institution.
“We 
want 
to 
have 
an 
accountable culture, we want to 
have a positive culture,” Runge 
said. “We want to have a culture 
that advocates for patients, 

advocates for respect, advocates 
for anything that makes us 
more diverse, more inclusive 
and recognize that we all have 
well-being issues. A big issue 
in medicine is a phenomenon 
called burnout … and that has to 
do with relieving the stress that 
we all render and how we can 
most effectively prevent those.”
Following 
Runge’s 
presentation, 
assembly 
members asked Runge questions 
regarding 
his 
presentation. 
Campbell said she has been 
volunteering at the hospital 
for 11 years. She expressed 
support for the ability to ensure 
the well-being of doctors and 
questioned 
how 
to 
support 
them.
“I’m very impressed with the 
focus on the patient and family 
care … I’m just really impressed 
with that focus on making sure 
that our doctors are people, too,” 
Campbell said. “But what I’m 
worried about is making sure 

that we’re asking people to be 
incredibly expert at something 
and also be human. How do we 
support doctors in that way and 
make sure they’re getting the 
self-care they need?”
At the conclusion of the 
meeting, 
Neil 
Marsh 
made 
closing remarks as the outgoing 
Senate Assembly chair. 
“One 
of 
my 
personal 
motivations for taking on this 
responsibility of chair in the 
Senate has been that I get to 
interact with a whole bunch 
of smart, interesting people 
where if I had just stayed in 
my department in chemistry, 
I’d never ever meet and never 
ever know,” Marsh said. “I 
think that’s a valuable thing, 
and I think the opportunity to 
interact with your colleagues 
who you wouldn’t be otherwise 
is a valuable reason for being on 
Senate Assembly.”

SENATE
From Page 1

We need to stop 
fighting for that 
one seat and 
demand the five 
spots at the table 
we deserve

Read more at 
MichiganDaily.com

“They 
were 
unarmed 
and 
peaceful and posed no threat to 
anyone. Yet they were killed. They 
were killed because as an ethnic 
minority, they looked different. 
They were killed because, as a 
religious minority, they prayed 
differently.”
There was then a moment of 
silence for the lives lost as a result of 
the Quetta attack.
The speakers at the event 
included 
ISA 
Social 
Co-chair 
Humza Hemani, LSA junior, who 
helped organize the event, as well 
as MSA Vice President of External 
Affairs Zoha Qureshi, a Public 
Policy senior. 
The third speaker, PSA Advocacy 
Chair Alezeh Mumtaz, an LSA 

freshman, spoke about the value of 
unity and compassion, especially 
during the times of these attacks.
“I’m not here to say a lot of big 
words, or spout about violence or 
this or that,” Mumtaz said. “I’m 
not here to share facts, I’m here to 
do what this vigil was created for: 
show and emphasize solidarity. 
All we need to know is that love 
and community are the things that 
matter, and the things that stand. 
So, we stand here today, in support 
of the innocent; we are gathered 
here, not on the basis of religion 
… but as believers of the power of 
good.”
In 
Qureshi’s 
speech, 
she 
spoke about how students at the 
University of Michigan should 
respond to these types of attacks 
— especially with the advantages 
students have.
“We should do all we can to 

support as college students at the 
University of Michigan with the 
privileges we hold and the power 
structures we live in,” Qureshi 
said. “Whether it be donating to 
a humanitarian cause, spreading 
awareness, standing in solidarity, 
spreading advocacy or simply 
offering a hand to a brother or sister 
who needs our support — we must 
come together.”
Qureshi 
further 
highlighted 
her experience at the vigil for 
New Zealand, and how the false 
active shooter threats made her 
reflect on those around the world 
who face these threats and attacks 
frequently impact.
“Just about a month ago, there 
was a vigil for New Zealand, and I 
remember being there and present 
and listening and mourning, but 
then moments later, running for my 
life in what I thought was an active 

shooter situation,” Qureshi said. “I 
am thankful that my peers and I 
are safe, but I remind myself that 
millions of people in this world do 
not have that luxury.”
Rizvi then opened the floor to 
those attending the vigil, offering 
them an opportunity to give 
speeches and express themselves 
at the ceremony. Several students 
and community members recited 
poetry in Urdu, the national 
language of Pakistan, and spoke 
about how they felt the attack 
impacted their lives and the lives of 
people they know.
Later in the event, Rizvi also 
highlighted the necessity for media 
coverage on the Quetta attack, 
and condemned the Pakistani 
government for failing to properly 
address the bombing.
“The lack of coverage of this 
event by the Pakistani mainstream 

media is absolutely unacceptable,” 
Rizvi said. “People are going to 
find out about this horrifying event 
one way or another, and when 
they do, they will not be happy. 
They will also not be happy when 
they find out that the government 
of Pakistan failed to address the 
issue, and offered neither adequate 
condolences, nor met with the 
people affected.”
After the event, Hemani spoke 
to The Daily about how he hoped 
those who attended the event 
gained more knowledge about 
the Hazara and recognized how 
their situation reflects of a larger 
problem of minority rights.
“I hope the attendees learned 
a little about the Hazara and their 
story,” Hemani said. “I hope they 
also saw this not just as an issue for 
Pakistan, but see it as part of a larger 
global issue of minority rights, and 

I tried to help push the focus of the 
event towards that minority rights 
in general.”
Over the past several days, 
about 200 Hazaras in Quetta and 
50 Hazaras in Karachi have been 
protesting and taking part in sit-ins 
as a result of the attack. Hemani 
believes the Hazaras are doing 
what they can to fight for the rights, 
but the power their community 
has alone is not enough to make an 
effective difference.
“I think the sit-in protests are 
effectively the only tool the Hazara 
have left to them,” Hemani said. 
“There is power in seeing an entire 
community come together to say 
something is wrong, but it hasn’t 
brought real change yet, and that’s 
why we need non-Hazaras to also 
speak out for them, because at the 
end of the day, the Hazaras don’t 
have a lot of political influence.”

VIGIL
From Page 1

Additionally, Spin will pay the 
city of Ann Arbor $5,000 for this 
license and $1 per day per scooter, 
for a total of $18,400. This is 
based on having 200 scooters 
operating in the city for three 
months. After the three-month 
period, the city must adopt an 
ordinance to extend or terminate 
the license.

While many students used 
Bird scooter charging positions 
as a form of revenue, Spin also has 
applications to become chargers. 
An Ann Arbor position has not 
been placed on their website as of 
April 15. 
The resolution to enter into 
the 
three-month 
contract 
with Spin passed unanimously 
among councilmembers with no 
discussion. 
The second transportation-
related 
resolution 
confirmed 
funds for the first two-way 

protected bike lane in Michigan 
to start construction in May. The 
protected bike lane, which will 
include barriers to protect bikers 
from passing cars, is a $1,329,964 
project to be built on William 
Street stretching from Fourth 
Street to State Street. 
The resolution is the first 
of its kind in the state. City 
Administrator 
Howard 
Lazarus says the investment is 
worthwhile because the Ann 
Arbor Downtown Development 
Authority — the authority that 

will construct this project — will 
split construction costs with 
the city. The DDA will cover 65 
percent of concrete resurfacing 
payment. 
In addition to the construction 
cost reduction, Lazarus says the 
progress it brings for the city is 
also important to consider.
“This does benefit the city 
as well,” Lazarus said. “I think 
there’s a tremendous amount of 
prestige, as we are one of the most 
forward-looking cities in many 
areas in Michigan. This would 

be the first two-way protected 
cycle traffic lane in the state of 
Michigan.” 
This resolution was raised 
as City Council acknowledged 
many residents bike around the 
city. There have also been alleged 
concerns from the University that 
too many bikes cut through the 
Diag, causing walking-pedestrian 
concern. The enhanced road 
safety for bicyclists provided 
by the protected lane is also an 
attempt to divert the bike traffic 
from the Diag.

Councilmember Julie Grand, 
D-Ward 3, said she bikes around 
Ann Arbor herself and does 
not feel safe with the current 
provisions for bikers on streets. 
“I work in Angell Hall and 
there are times where I’ll walk 
and leave my bike there because 
I don’t feel as comfortable biking 
from campus to City Hall,” 
Grand said. “Everyone does ride 
their bikes. I think this is a great 
example of a city-University 
partnership and making our city 
safer.” 

CITY
From Page 1

