“Leaders say the way members are elected and the way individuals seek seats make the organization fail to demographically or ideologically represent the student body.”

Hum… “the way members are elected” is failing us. Let’s ponder this for a second. The campus is split up into districts based on geography: south campus, mid-campus, north campus, etc… Students electing their own representatives somehow fails to be representative demographically or ideologically? Apparently, they’re claiming the districts are gerrymandered to return more conservative, male representatives than otherwise would be. How is this possible? At a school that’s overwhelmingly liberal and over 3:2 female to male, I’m not sure this is even possible.

The “way individuals seek seats” is also a trouble spot. Yes, attending a meeting, collecting twenty signatures, and putting up posters to garner votes is really the cause of a lack of representation. Holding elections? Man, so biased in favor of conservative males.

So really, the underlying claim is that democracy is failing us. Which is absolutely absurd.

Now, let’s consider the reason why they think democracy is not truly representative: because there aren’t enough women in Congress. No reason is given as to how this possibly affects Congress negatively. As I tried to point out in the article, the business that Congress conducts doesn’t have a male versus female perspective.

When Bounce magazine approaches Congress requesting money for the eight issues they publish a year, there isn’t a male-female divide on how much money to provide. If the event or item is vital to the mission of the organization, Student Congress must appropriate funds to them. The business of Student Congress is fairly objective. It’s not as if the “half-plus-one” rule for funding publications is a male construction and the addition of more females would alter that. Or is that really what the DTH is arguing?

That would be highly ironic considering the fact that, for the past few decades, extremist feminists have been trying to whitewash the fact that there are differences in the sexes, so apparently the DTH is allowing that fact. But, still, left unsaid is what differences would actually be…

That said, I think missing a post was definitely worth it. Both events were very successful. In fact, they were so successful that we’re already starting to make plans for our next batch of events.

Personally, I think we should branch out and try some innovative types of events. For instance, I think we could start with a Ronald Reagan Day, during which we honor the most important figure in American conservatism by speaking only in Reagan quotes. Everyone who chooses to participate will be required to find a famous Reagan line to fit each and every situation they are in throughout the day (though, for some conservatives, this won’t actually require any change in behavior at all).

I also think we should have some CR-specific events. I would like to have Chris Jones lead a “How to Survive the Apocalypse” seminar. However, as I reread that event title, I realize that I’m not entirely sure which side of the apocalypse issue Chris is on, so that might end up being “How to Start the Apocalypse.” Either way, it’s probably a good idea to know what weapons Chris favors.

And I would love to host an “Ask Crowder” event. I imagine Justin Crowder sitting in the middle of a circle of his peers, whom we invite to pick Crowder’s brain about any issues they find pressing. That might sound innocuous enough. But knowing both Justin and the student body, I envision it ending with Crowder being showered in a hail of flaming arrows while he defends himself with a twenty foot tall American Flag, all the while shouting phrases like, “the knavery of the scoundrels!”

Finally, I think we should have a Bryan Weynand and Nash Keune Bobble Head Day. Maybe we could just pass them out around campus or even distribute them at basketball games (I mean, the same world in which the CR would have bobble heads is the same world in which we would be able to pass them out at basketball games). For one thing, it would be a good marketing ploy. But more importantly, I’ve always wanted to play with a bobble head of myself (I wonder what a psychoanalyst would have to say about that…).

But, as always, I would love to hear any suggestions you have (maybe something a bit more topical than the apocalypse or bobble heads?).

Update: One of the online comments on the DTH article about the protest against the recent $2,095 appropriation to SDS likened the protest group, which was supposedly composed solely of members of the Carolina Review, to a “right-wing goon squad” (despite the fact that the leader of the protest is a Democrat and only three of the protesters are on our staff).

Now, no such entity actually exists. But, I really wish it did. After all, as one of the Editors of the CR, I would presumably be one of the heads of that goon squad- which would be awesome. And, I mean, if people are going to treat us like we have a goon squad, why don’t we just go ahead and form one?

Of course, before we start our goon squad we would need to have some sort of recruitment and initiation process (sort of like a rush for our reactionary cabal). We already have matching t-shirts for everyone to wear (by the way, we recently uncovered a hidden cachet of Carolina Review shirts; just let me know if you want one).

And, this would give the CR editorial staff the opportunity to haze new recruits. For instance, we could have a “minute of shame,” during which we shout truly awful, terrible, and reprehensible terms at our prospective members to test their mettle, like “open minded,” “multiculturalist,” or “tolerant.” Whew- I shudder just imaging having to call innocent people such thoroughly objectionable words. Anyone who could possibly survive such torture would definitely be able to face whatever might be in store for our goons.

Such a vacancy has been in existence since April 7th, 2009, with no action taken on the part of either the BOE or President Jones in accordance with Title VI.

Her action was filed October 8th, and the defendants have yet to respond by filing their answer.  Representative Danforth’s complaint may be viewed here.

This decision was made in conjunction with BOE Chairman Peter Gillooly according to sources familiar with the situation.  CAA will be left to resolve the situation on their own.  According to Courtney Brown of the CAA, they received the news October 9th and are unsure of how to move forward as the precedent was that the BOE funded the Homecoming Elections.

This also leaves open the question of how Student Congress elections will be funded for there are vacancies to be filled in the upcoming election.

However, the request was made without the knowledge of the Board of Elections because Student Body Treasurer Jennings Carpenter reported that the Board of Elections never contacted him about the elections, so this was actually initiated by CAA.  He had unsuccessfully tried to contact the Board of Elections, yet they had never communicated back.

The committee had the general feeling that the Board of Elections needed to get its act together before we could appropriate them money to disburse to candidates.  Carpenter countered that he could disburse the funds himself, but that raised questions of whether that was his prerogative, so Representative Alex Mills moved to report this request unfavorably to Student Congress.

As his motion passed, it would require a 2/3 vote of Student Congress to vote on the bill, so unless that obstacle is removed, the Board of Elections will not be receiving that money for the Homecoming Elections.

This also apparently, in his words, “raise[s] legitimate concerns about the way in which funding requests are handled within the finance committee.”

Clearly, Shah implies, this presents a conflict of interest and Mr Dexter and I are guilty of illegitimately directing funds to groups of which we are members.  That conflict of interest is “salient.”

His commentary would merely be absurd if it weren’t impugning our integrity and his accusations completely unfounded.

The facts: yes, Mr Dexter and I are members of Carolina Review and sit on the Finance Committee of which Mr Dexter is the chair. However, neither I nor Mr Dexter introduced the bill in committee or in Student Congress or voted upon any amendments or motions pertaining to the funding request, and we, in addition to Justin Crowder and Duke Cheston in full congress, abstained from voting upon the matter when the question was called.

Unless it is the stated policy of the Daily Tar Heel to publish untruths, they should have done more research before printing a letter chock full of assertions with no evidence to back them up.  I am disappointed that Mr Dunn would allow such a letter impugning someone’s honor to be printed upon such baseless accusations.

Gavel

Roll Call Voting Records from yesterday’s meeting. See how your congressman voted on the resolution titled “A RESOLUTION TO SUSTAIN THE RIGHT TO FREE SPEECH ON CAMPUS“:

Ayes: Tyler Aiken (South Campus), Kenneth Barshop (South Campus), David Conrad (Off-Campus), Justin Crowder (North Campus), Duke Cheston (Off-Campus), Anthony Dent (Off-Campus), Zachary Dexter (North Campus), Saang Lee (North Campus), Russell Martin (Greek Housing), David Murray (Off-Campus), Brittany Papworth (South Campus), Cody Poplin (Auxiliary Housing), McKay Roozen (Mid-Campus), Deanna Santoro (Granville), Carrington Skinner (Graduate)

Nays: Julianne Anderson (Graduate), Zachary Cobb (South Campus), Ben Danforth (Graduate), Emily Danforth (Graduate), Scott Freedenberg (Off-Campus), Trent Kool (Off-Campus), Joseph Levin-Manning (South Campus), Jeremy Martin (Auxiliary Housing), Alex Mills (Graduate), Maggie Zhou (Off-Campus)

Abstentions*: Mark Lachiewicz (Graduate), Elliott Robinson (Graduate) Dakota Williams (South Campus)

*Note: Excepting Congressman Lachiewicz (who, as presiding officer at the time properly abstained from voting), abstentions were effectively nay votes as they counted against the 2/3 needed to pass the resolution.

Daily Tar Heel

There were some inaccuracies in today’s DTH article concerning the resolution voted down in Congress yesterday. Miss Owens did an admirable job (far better than the usual DTH fare), but there were more nuances in the issue than her article let on.
First off, the title is misleading. We as Congress cannot “punish” people: that is left up to the judicial branch. We can’t pass bills of attainder of anything. The bill stated we shared the sentiments in the email Chancellor Thorp sent out on April 14th.

“Student Congress representatives couldn’t get enough votes to pass a resolution calling for the chancellor to discover and punish those involved in the April 14 protest of former U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo.”

We weren’t calling for Chancellor Thorp to punish people. We were merely reiterating the statements he made in his email. The resolution stated that we wanted “discover the identities and press criminal charges if warranted [italics mine]“, which is substantially what Chancellor Thorp said in his email.

“The resolution — which began as an affirmation of free speech but was amended to urge Chancellor Holden Thorp to strengthen his focus on investigating the incident — caused significant debate among representatives about the role of Congress and the feelings of their constituents.”

The primary “Be it resolved” clause in the bill already had language that affirmed Chancellor Thorp’s decision. The amendment merely strengthened that language by quoting from his email. It basically specified what part of the “immediate and appropriate response” (the original clause) we were affirming.

A slight digression- Apparently the latter was enough for Speaker Levin-Manning to say the following: ““There were a lot of different amendments to it that turned it into something that I did not intend it to be.  I submitted the resolution with the intention of it being a positive statement from Congress.”  Ironically, over the weekend he submitted a resolution saying exactly what was amended in this resolution.  How affirming Chancellor Thorp’s position is in any way not positive is beyond me.

Overall, the article was fair and accurate.  Well done Miss Owens.  It appears as if the era of DTH myth-making has come to an end. *knock on wood*