According to Tomcat down at the Ol’ Dirty, the grievance filed against Emma Kallaway for failure of her duties was dismissed.

I’ve remained unimpressed with the stated greivance against Kallaway since it was filed this summer. Really, I could care less if she turned in her stated goals on time. I don’t expect much out of the ASUO and I’ll be damned if they don’t deliver.

Also, the grievance was obviously filed out of spite and the entire chain of events has been blown out of proportion–did anyone really think the ASUO would remove a sitting president? Especially when the newly appointed judges were chosen by her own office?

If this is what is going to stand for controversy in the ASUO this year, I will welcome it with open arms. (But I doubt that will happen)

Let’s get back to business in the ASUO, shall we?

All expenses paid student conferences in Hawaii for everyone!

Apparently OSPIRG has been using the University of Oregon’s “O” symbol to help brand themselves among University of Oregon students.

The use of the symbol is undoubtedly an infringement upon the University of Oregon’s trademark, especially if OSPIRG is using it to solicit donations.

More importantly, the “O” is equated, especially in the malleable minds of young freshmen, with everything that is part of the University of Oregon. An outside group using the symbol for recruitment purposes immediately garners the respect and weight that symbol brings to the table. Since OSPIRG is not part of this university, OSPIRG’s usage of the “O” is incredibly deceptive.

This is just another offense in the long line of morally-vague decisions made by OSPIRG and its constituents. One wonders if the University will step up and stop the group’s marketing plan by mandating a cease-and-desist regarding the “O”.

Anything else should be considered an indirect endorsement of OSPIRG by the University.

(From left: Bryanna, Me, Drew, Ashton (CN Rep) and Tony Montana)

The Collegiate Network was nice enough to take us to dinner tonight. Our new CN rep, Ashton, treated us to delicious burgers and brews during trivia night at the Eugene City Brewery.

Guy Simmons proceeded to order the most expensive things on the menu, abusing our visitor’s generosity while simoultaneously offending the CN rep’s sense of fashion with his kickin’ suit.

We ended up dominating the competition during triva, with “Team Sudsy” coming in at first place. It didn’t do us a damn bit of good though–we only got $2 off our tab. At least we left with our honor.

Blog contest. Dodgeball. Nobel prizes. Trivia.

‘Nuff said.

“What you know about that, Obama?”

It was announced on Friday that Drew Cattermole, editor-in-chief of the Oregon Commentator, was awarded three Nobel prizes for his work in various fields ranging from the sciences to his work in humanitarian efforts.

“I pretty much expected this,” said Cattermole, “I mean, how could I not? Look at me.”

Cattermole’s prizes were delivered early Friday morning to his west university home after which, in true “Thunderlove” form, he promptly lost two of them.

“I’m not sure where the other two went but I think the last one is being used as a coaster by my roommate or something,” he said.

Although Cattermole couldn’t recall which prizes he had won, the Nobel Prize Committee’s website said he had taken home three of the most coveted prizes:

Nobel Prize List 2009-10

Nobel Prize for Geography: Drew Cattermole – “Has hoes in different area codes”

Nobel Prize for Tolerance: Drew Cattermole – “Can ingest three 40’s of PBR in a single hour”

Nobel Prize for Linguistics: Drew Cattermole – “Invented 340 new ways to use the word “chillin”

Cattermole said he planned to celebrate his success by, “Puttin’ it on a chain and flashin’ it all up in D’Andrea’s face.”

Congratulations Drew.

OSPIRG tabling outside of the EMU

Just when you thought you’d never see the annoying succubus we call OSPIRG, here they are once again getting in the way of your path to lunch at the EMU.

Although last year’s executive succeeded in pushing the group off campus for the 2009-10 school year, the lobbyist group remains here on campus. As Robert D’Andrea from the Daily Emerald pointed out a few days ago, the group remains in its office down in Suite 1 of the EMU. Its employees are being paid by the state of Oregon PIRG to continue to do their “good work”.

So far their “work” consists of bothering people on their way to Subway and handing out little yellow fliers during classes the first week of school.

What people need to remember is that OSPIRG is off campus for a reason. They have, for years, failed to prove that they return anything to the University of Oregon campus. Whether or not your opinion of the group’s “work” is good or bad, you need to realize that making OSPIRG part of the mandatory I-Fee for every student is ludicrous. Do you want tuition to go to pay for things outside the University of Oregon, or worse, Eugene? The answer is no, and we should make it clear that their organization is not wanted on this campus.

Let’s not forget the greed involved with this group as well, shall we? Last year the ACFC proposed a new budget for OSPIRG for this upcoming year at around $30,000 (give or take). OSPIRG balked at the idea, presumably because they thought they could get back their full $120,000 instead.

OSPIRG is preying on the fact that every year, kids graduate from this university and there is a fresh new crop of people who have no idea who they are and what they do. They are able to set up tables like the one above and brainwash kids into thinking the group is necessary. The next time you see someone talking to the guys at the OSPIRG table or holding one of those yellow fliers, stop them and tell them the real deal.

Tell them OSPIRG doesn’t belong on this campus.

Yes Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize.  Becoming one of a small number of Presidents who have won the award. Roosevelt and Wilson both won the award while in office and Jimmy Carter received twenty years after office. Obama becomes the first American to win the award since Al Gore shared the prize for his efforts to fight off ManBearPig. 

Now I don’t want the comments section to explode with Anti-Obama statements about him being a socialist and what not, because he was awarded this prize because of his international efforts. If you disagree with the decision give us your thoughts on who should have won the award.

Kari Chisholm at Blue Oregon muses about the err… surprising news that President Obama has, only months into his Presidency and with no particular achievements to speak of, been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. He comes to the conclusion that

… the Nobel committee sometimes awards the Peace Prize as a way of noting something they want to encourage.

Second, it’s crystal clear to me that it was the Nobel committee’s way of issuing a rebuke to the previous administration; a giant F#%! YOU to George W. Bush.

Err, alright then. I suppose that very well could be, though one also suspects that Mr. Chisholm could be engaging in a certain amount of projection. In any case, after tossing in some boilerplate stuff about Obama’s “collaborative” approach to international affairs being superior to Bush’s “cowboy diplomacy”, he concludes that the Nobel committee may be a bit “premature” in giving President Obama the prestigious award.

Quite.

On the other hand, at least now the President can claim to be in the same league as such world-historical figures as Henry Kissinger and Yasser Arafat, to whom awarding the Nobel Prize no doubt counted as a “giant F#%! YOU” to the world.

There are two things I learned from last night’s five hour senate meeting. First, the UO is one big pair of pants and the student groups are all different pockets. Secondly, covering the ASUO senate is a marathon, not a sprint.

The senates first priority was to approve Carina Miller to EMU board seat five, she was approved 16-0. Hailey Sheldon was next to be appointed, she was approved 17-0 to ACFC seat 8.

Next was the voting on senate chairs here’s a short summary of how it went down.

• Senate President: Nick Gower
• Senate Vice President Nick Schultz
• Ombudsperson: Alex McCafferty
• Treasurer: Lyzi Diamond
• Academic Chair Person: Amanda Hilts

Two special requests were passed. The first was the PRSSA asking for 3,735 in funds to go to a student conference in San Diego. The PRSSA received 2,475. The senate this year seems to be less lenient to grant whole funds requests for trips. If a student group wants to go on a conference trip with incidental fee money, they will have to get their act together. This means solid fundraising efforts and a real answer to how the conference attended by a small group will be able to affect the greater university community as a whole. The second request fund was $2,000 for Weaving New Beginings annual banquet. The request was fully funded and the banquet will take place next thursday. It starts at six in the banquet room and will honor local community heroes who have helped children reach higher education.

ConCourt nominees Andrew Washington, Casey Sanders and Casey King were all approved unanimously. The ConCourt nominees were chosen differently this year as President Kallaway removed herself from nomination process and abdicated her power to Vice President Getachew. All ConCourt nominees talked about the importance to make clear concise decisions while remaining viewpoint neutral.

Devon Duquette was elected to the PFC. Alison Brown approved to be the executive chair of the EMU board. Ben Eckstein was approved for the ACFC. Non of the executive appointments received a nay vote.

The executive special request for the New York Times was passed at $6,885 with a vote of 9-8. It does not look good for the future of the NYT on campus. The $24,000 request to keep the Knight Library open 24/5 passed 17-0, which will begin week 3 (next week).

Two down, twenty eight more to go.

The Oregon Daily Emerald‘s multimedia site recently posted a video in which students from the University of Oregon campus were asked what they thought about the possibility of concealed weapons on campus. With a few exceptions, most students responded as expected:

“I think that it shouldn’t be allowed, partly because I wouldn’t feel safe with some of the students who would bring weapons,” said one student (1:42).

Another felt that she didn’t feel guns were necessary, “It’s an environment where people are learning… and it’s supposed to be friendly and, like, a place where everyone can feel safe.” (1:51)

Only one person appearing on the clip addressed the true nature of the question and kudos goes to this girl for throwing her own self-interests to the wind in favor of recognizing the civil liberties of others, “The idea of people having concealed weapons scare me, but at the same time I believe a person’s right to have that weapon.” (1:32)

Apparently students on the campus of the University of Oregon have yet to take any course that gives them any common sense whatsoever, so hear this:

Civil liberties are not based on your own sense of justice, morality or preferences. They are based upon a document that is part of the foundation of these United States. To reason otherwise is against the nature of civil liberties in this country and against the Constitution.

Whatever your opinion on guns is, one must be careful to be mindful of the real issue here. The OUS has effectively taken up creating legislation all on their own, in defiance and violation of the laws of the state of Oregon. We cannot give them the power to do so, lest they expand their power beyond their current scope.

State laws allow the holder of a Concealed Hander’s License to carry anywhere in the state of Oregon except for federal courthouses and a few other areas. University campuses are not part of that list according to the state of Oregon. The ban on concealed handgun carry for holders of CHLs is therefore in direct violation of state law.

Of course, if you wanted to bring suit against the OUS directly you could always open-carry on campus. For those of you who don’t know, Oregon is an open-carry state meaning you are allowed to carry a gun at all times (less the places state or federal law prohibits) as long as it’s displayed externally.

Then again, you could let the OUS stomp all over your civil liberties. Apparently they enjoy it.

(Author’s Note: The Emerald staffer who made the opening panels might want to be careful how they word things next time. The second panel (0:04) said “The group seeks to eliminate the state’s ban on handguns…”. The “state” does not have a ban on handguns, dear Emerald staffer, the OUS does. Making a distinction between those two things is vital when you are trying to inform the masses.)

To be honest, I was looking for SPEW content.

That isn’t to say that I’m not opposed to the idea of finding something readable in the pages of our campus newspaper. I’m just not used to it. I happened upon a blog post by opinion columnist Greg Dewar about concealed carry on campus and it made me wonder:

Could the Emerald be good this year?

We’ve seen over the summer that opinion editor Robert D’Andrea has been able to levy fairly reasoned judgment on rather large issues–quite a difference from last year in which the opinion section of the Emerald resembled the diary of a 13-year old girl. “I just like, think we should, like, all get along and junk. You know?”

And not to toot our own horn or anything, but Commentator editor emeritus CJ Ciaramella has been lobbing intelligently written news pieces since day one–in fact, the first regular issue of the Emerald this school year had a front-page article by Ciaramella… not like that reflects well on the Commentator or anything… just saying.

The point is, with an opinion editor that seems to be able to regulate idiocy from his pages, a news team that’s gaining strength and an already top-notch sports section, we may be in for a good year of the Oregon Daily Emerald.

This is not a bad thing for anyone. This campus desperately needs a newspaper that isn’t filled with single-minded, prattling Obama lovers spewing all over its opinion page. The reporting on campus, since I’ve been here, has been atrocious as well–the AP feed the Emerald pays for should take a back seat this year with a precedence on local and campus news. Lord knows there’s tons of it out there, they just need to go and get it.

We all know that this campus has a major, respected journal of opinion. You can’t deny that fact. The Emerald needs to step up this year and deliver a real newspaper to run along side us.

I think they’re doing a great job so far.

Man Set on Fire During Assault

Case No. 09-17789

Eugene Police are looking for information regarding an incident early Saturday morning, in which a man was lit on fire by an unknown assailant.

At about 3:00 Saturday morning, an adult male reported that he was walking on the sidewalk near E. Broadway and High when he heard footsteps and was bumped from behind. As he turned around, there was the sound of fire quickly igniting and he was on fire. He said he stopped, dropped and rolled. After the fire was out, he walked to the Campus Inn, 390  E. Broadway, and called out for help from an employee. He was taken to a local hospital with what appear to be non-lifethreatening but painful burns on his hands and face.

In case you though that Blount was out of the picture after his apology letter today, you might be wrong.

I was looking at some Oregon Ducks sports news today when I came across an article on Foxsports that hinted at Blount’s possible return to actually playing for Oregon this year. That article led me to Rob Moseley’s blog post on the Register Guard website.

Oregon football coach Chip Kelly will address the status of suspended running back LeGarrette Blount with media following the Ducks’ walk-through today, UO officials said, including the possibility that Blount could play again this season.

Last week, a UO spokesman confirmed the Ducks had been in communications regarding Blount with an on-campus conflict management program.

Of course, being the Register Guard the story is vague and Moseley doesn’t really provide much evidence to prove that Kelly is actually going to put Blount back on the field.

But hey, it’s Eugene! Unsubstantiated rumors are what make this town run.

With the new freshmen finishing up their first week living at the UO, it remains skeptical why they would want to remain living in Eugene. With 2012 hovering upon us with zeitgeist zest it is impossible to ignore the warning signs of the apocalypse.

1. Tornadoes
2. H1N1 (more on that later)
3. Tsunamis

There could only be one person capable of curing these freshmen blues. Someone so intriguing they could  could work for both CBS and FOX. Only ELLEN could save us.

With all my fears being driven away by dry wit and observational humor, I forgot that torture was coming soon enough in the form of ASUO senate meetings. The meeting was more of a formality than anything, think of it as the senate meeting where they hand out the syllabus. Here are the things I learned.

• The meeting started off with a  H1N1 presentation by Andre Duke, who works with campus security. Not DPS but an actual University position ensures student safety. The University is taking Swine Flu very seriously and many classes have Swine Flu sections in their syllabus. Saying you have flu like symptoms now can get you out of class no questions asked. The University estimates that some classes may even loose 40% of attendance.
• The first half of the meeting was conflicted by a DJ playing rock music in the EMU amphitheatre. Duke gave his presentation with Korn and Limp Bizkit blaring in the background.
• Next  Oregon University Senate will be Oct. 14th.
• UO Jam Squad received $300 in a special request. The UO Jam Squad is the hip-hop dance team at the UO and is currently not a student group. This brought up the best quote of the night when the advocate for the UO Jam Squad told the ASUO “We just want to dance.”
• Next were senate nominations
• President: Sen. Gower and  Sen. Schultz were accepted their nominations, from each other it was cute.
• Vice President: Sen. Hilts and  Sen. Schultz accepted their nominations.
• ombudsperson: Sen.  McCafferty and Sen. Libadisos accepted their nominations
• Treasurer: Sen. Diamond, Sen. Griffin, Sen. Jones accepted their nominations
• Academic Chair Person:  Sen Hilts and Sen Stark Mcmillan accepted their nominations
• SRC Advisory Board:  Sen. Tipitino and Sen. Barkley accepted their nominations.

All in all it was a meeting full of start of the school year formalities. If anything the general public should care about is that swine flu is going to hit the university, vaccines should be at the University by mid October. Also Street Faire is next week.

[Incidentally, it’s Andre LeDuc. He’s the director of the UO’s Emergency Management Program. -ed.]