Today, Merriam-Webster’s word of the day is:

golden parachute (n.): a generous severance agreement for a corporate executive in the event of a sudden dismissal (as because of a merger)

Think the dictionary folks are trying to remind us of something?

Public affairs:

• Antics: First and foremost: a bunch of UO students went down a water slide!!!!! (KEZI)
• OSPIRG: The Emerald’s managing editor Lauren Fox writes a narrative about the recent history of OSPIRG. I think it can basically be summarized thus: “OSPIRG lost its funding at UO two years ago, but still wants to get it back and still pays someone to work on campus to get it. There are questions about Oregon Student PIRG’s relationship with Oregon State PIRG, although the article doesn’t make those entirely clear. Now, with Rousseau and Arora in power, they feel they have more hope. (Emerald)
• Embarrassment, dissected: Based on the fact that UO has risen in the U.S. News and World Report’s rankings, the Seattle Times calls Scott Woodward a liar. (Seattle Times)
• Lore: The UO offers students the chance to learn more than they can handle about Chinese folklore. (Ethos)
• ASUO: Since the ASUO Senate has been telling nominees they don’t have what it takes to be senators, the Emerald attempts to find out just what it takes; or at least that’s how the reporter explained it to me this evening. Takeaway quote: “a future concert, which is being designed to increase general student awareness of ASUO-related activities.” Way to take the fun out of a concert. (Emerald)
• Stodge: Here is an article about theories that does not explain theories. In that respect, it is reminiscent of the KCNA. (Emerald)

Opinion:

• Letters: In the Emerald, a UO student hypothesizes that the smoke-free campus means a campus where smoke is both unrestricted and nonexistent. Guard readers quibble with people and words and wish we were more like Japan.
• Editorials: The Guard is thinking about Washington, D.C., and the deficit; and it applauds the decline of metal thieves.
• UO Matters sneers at a piece of UO-flackery, uses “credibility” and “toilet” in the same sentence to describe UO,
• UO cheese Richard Lariviere shout-outs five veterans attending the UO and also Eugene’s resident war hero Don Malarkey in his official blog.
• A UO student says football’s a way to forget the misfortunes of our age. Panem, you say? And circenses? (Emerald)
• A “policy analyst” advocates a proposal like Lariviere’s, but with trees. (Guard)
• Jay-Z is probably on the devil’s payroll. Or maybe MC Hammer is. An Ethos writer is undecided. Another Ethos writer sees a cynical core in “Mao’s Last Dancer.” (Ethos)
• An Oregon Voice staffer’s mind is now open to the possibilities of Wednesday nights after a recent concert. Another at the Voice misinterprets Javier Mascherano‘s recent surprise appearance at  the UO. (Voice)

Sports:

• Oregon Football: will play its former offensive coordinator this weekend (Register-Guard); faces a team unbeaten at home this weekend, but then again this record includes poor teams (Emerald); is, by consensus between the editors of the Emerald and the Daily Californian, good (Emerald); will field its second-choice running-back, but not its second-choice quarterback if it can help it (Emerald); charging wall Carson York is embarrassed about liking a class with “women” in the name (Emerald); multi-use bulls-eye Lavasier Tuinei’s father was a football player (Emerald); has a cocky player (AP); thinks Steve Prefontaine was a chill bro (AP); will win against the Hated Bears, KVAL thinks (KVAL).
• Oregon Cross-Country: runner Luke Puskedra seems to excite people, despite an iron deficiency (Register-Guard); gets a do-over (heard that one from the Guard yesterday) (Emerald).
• Oregon Basketball (W): will actually be playing a real game against the Hated Wolves Sunday (Emerald, Guard).
• Oregon Basketball (M): will also play games that matter (or possibly “matter”) this weekend (Emerald, Guard).
• Oregon Volleyball: thinks it will probably beat the Hated Beavers this weekend, but finds them “incredibly scary” (Emerald).
• Other football: Andy Drukarev previews the Pac-10 games this weekend (Emerald).
• Emerald sports-whippet Patrick Malee believes in OF (Emerald).

Lauren Fox, along with a cavalcade of contributors (myself amongst them, though my role was fairly minor) from J483/583, penned a lengthy discussion of our old friends at OSPIRG in today’s Oregon Daily Emerald. What should really be noted is the story behind the story. During the day on Wednesday, a couple of high-profile OSPIRG supporters came out of the proverbial woodwork to express their dissatisfaction with the piece.

According to Emerald Editor in Chief Nora Simon, OSPIRG Chapter Chair Charles Denson paid her a visit to her office at about 2 PM Wednesday expressing concerns about his quotes in the story. Denson explained that one of the students in the class had told him that the material was for a class project and would not be published elsewhere. He said that he thought his comments were “too frank” for wider publication. Simon said that while he did not make any requests, she felt that there was a tacit implication in the conversation that he did not want the Emerald to run the story.

Later on Wednesday, former ASUO Political Director Robert D’Andrea visited Fox. According to Fox, he stood next to her desk until she engaged him. They then retired to the Editor-in-Chief’s office, where D’Andrea reiterated Denson’s concerns about the piece. D’Andrea, like Denson, did not explicitly state that he wanted the Emerald to not run the story, and Fox described their conversation as “very friendly.” At the conclusion of their discussion, Fox asked D’Andrea if he was involved in OSPIRG. Fox said that D’Andrea replied by saying “How do you define being involved in OSPIRG?”

Fox brought these concerns to the class on Thursday and each student involved in the story indicated that, though they had indicated that the project was for class, they never promised that the material would not be published.

So the real question is this: Why are the head of OSPIRG and a former high ranking ASUO official, who is still thought to be actively involved in the current administration and will not confirm his involvement in OSPIRG, trying to influence the operations and editorial policy of the Oregon Daily Emerald?

To all the men and women who have served and risked their lives for our great nation, the Oregon Commentator thanks you from the bottom of our hearts. Our lives would not be the same without you.

Public affairs:

• Face-egg: Developing on the Riverfront may be more difficult for the UO after the University Senate unanimously censured the development, since the UO violated an ancient agreement that it would consult people and develop in a certain way (Emerald). Evidently UO cheese Richard Lariviere performed the time-tested leave-early maneuver at the Senate meeting, while the UO has already begun running red excavators on the site (KEZI). Or maybe it won’t make a difference. The UO and city seem to believe the agreement is no longer valid (Register-Guard). A UO Matters reader makes dark suggestions about why this was only discovered now, when it’s arguably too late, and an old newspaper clipping UO Matters unearths suggests the same concerns existed in 1986. The Eugene Weekly also chimes in.
• ASUO Police: There’s a lot of the usual dross in descriptions of the ASUO Senate meeting, but at one point, DPS’ police force expansion is discussed. ASUO Sen. Erin Altman questions the financial aspects of a larger DPS. In response: “The DPS officers attending the meeting said they were not out to create a large police force and they would return the money they didn’t need.” What? Is this a thing that works? What does this mean? (Emerald)
• OSPIRG: The Oregon Voice’s Noah DeWitt has hard questions for Kitty Piercy at an OSPIRG junket. (Oregon Voice)
• What do numbers mean? The ones describing OSU’s enrollment are now higher than the ones describing UO’s (Register-Guard).
• Racism: A guy came to town to talk about environmental racism. (Emerald)
• Scheduling oops: There’s a parade set to take place during the Civil War football game. (KMTR)

Some very interesting opinion articles are below the fold, and so is sports. (more…)

It’s 1 a.m. in the Knight Library. You’ve been there for hours staring at a computer screen, and now your eyes feel like they’re going to jump out of your sockets and beat you to death. At this point you could barely care less about the impact of rice supply on the Tay Son Uprising, but you’ve still got another five pages to write. And a geology final exam to study for. Sleep? Maybe. Wasn’t there something about eating that was supposed to happen?

But your stomach can’t flunk you out of college; so you carry on – and pray that there’s a 24-hour coffee shop nearby. If not, there’s always 7-11 with its endless array of energy drinks and little bottles of 5-Hour Energy lined up in a row. Or, if you’re like a growing number of students, you take a little white pill prescribed by a doctor.

But does anyone really think this is a new phenomenon? The numbers may seem high or low. It’s an example of our addiction to better living through chemistry – but only if it’s the right chemistry. We are productive, hard-working Americans, after all.

(more…)

The ASUO Senate that is. Click Here to watch us descend into madness.

Public affairs:

• Archeology: Oregon Research Institute opponents say the development of the Riverfront Research Park development has violated a 1986 agreement (courtesy of UO Matters) requiring community input between the city and UO this whole time. It’s just nobody seemed to have a copy of the agreement on hand until anti-ORI activists uncovered it recently. The Eugene Weekly posted about this yesterday and I linked to it, but the import of the post did not penetrate the thick membranes of my skull (KVAL). Pretty much everyone who knows about architecture and the like seems to hate this thing (Emerald), which will make it one of many showdowns, seemingly, at the next UO Senate meeting, along with ones on parking, the post office closure, and policy seemingly regarding the Pacifica Forum. (UO Matters)
• Bootings: UO contract-toughs led 117 people from Autzen stadium during the Hated Huskies game. No word on how many were students, but I like to believe the number represents only well-heeled alumni with private boxes. (Register-Guard)
• Embarrassment, contd.: The University of Washington interim cheese, fresh from a contrite telephone conversation with UO cheese Lariviere, has demanded some grovelling from her athletic director after he publicly identified the UO’s academic spade as an embarrassing spade. UO mouths are staying shut. Maybe they are too embarrassed about their academics to talk. Down with candor, no? (Oregonian, Seattle Times, UW Daily)
• Meters: Business owners downtown are pretty happy with the city’s new parking policies, but the want more. (Emerald)
• Marshall backlash: In the 1940s and 1950s, we gave the Europeans a little help getting their economic house together and we’ve been answering for it ever since. Latest development: the gravity of some of those boatloads of dollar bills we shipped across the Atlantic back then is sucking two of the UO’s most promising students toward England. (Emerald)
• Invisible realms: Do you have problems in the invisible realm of human beings? There, evidently, you tell a doctor what’s wrong with you; the doctor then tells you a story and sends you on your way. (Emerald)

Opinion:

• Letters: The Guard’s mailbag includes someone who is in a searing rage over the UO’s driving on bike paths, while another letter writer accuses people who go to Israel of coming back brainwashed. An Emerald reader calmly spits on the paper’s anti-EmX editorial.
• Editorials: The Guard gushes with praise for the city’s new park purchase, but finds San Francisco’s kid’s meal toy ban ho-hum.
• The Emerald’s JoAnna Wendel ponders some miracles. Fucking turn-of-the-century Siberian explosions! How do they work? (Emerald blog)
• An elementary school kid’s mom cries bloody murder while the city’s schools cut their budgets.

Sports:

• Emerald freelancer Jackson Long continues a string of interviews with Oregon Football players, this time with multi-smasher Casey Matthews. Matthews comes across more as a clipped football automaton, which contrasts to the softer persona D.J. Davis revealed last week in response to Long’s questions. “It is hard to grow hair out; it is such mental discipline.” (Emerald)
• Oregon Volleyball player Kellie Kawasaki struggles to do her laundry. (Emerald)
• Ever wanted way more information than you could possibly stomach about Oregon Football fingertip-of-choice Nate Costa’s injury? Here’s a video containing that (KVAL). And Emerald sports-whippet Patrick Malee lauds the injured fingertip’s class (Emerald).
• Oregon Golf plummeted a rung in its competition. (Emerald)
• Oregon Wushu! The OC wrote about that issues ago, Ethos!

I’m sad to discover that the UO Senate has moved to a new website, much to my dismay. I liked the old UO Senate page, which in its ugliness reminded me of the internet fifteen years ago: ugly, sure, but utterly functional. The ugliness gave it the impression of depth: Here’s all this information about us, all of it right here, all at your fingertips. And the lack of bells and whistles made it dead simple to navigate.

I’ll get over it; after all, it’s seemingly been two months since I visited, considering it’s a two-month-old change. But I just learned and I’m dismayed for the moment.

Public affairs:

• Red-face: The University of Washington sport-czar Scott Woodward apologized for calling UO academics “an embarrassment.” The basic idea, though, is something with which most people seem to agree: that the UO’s quest for sporting greatness, and the Xbox-equipped lockers that requires, is in jarring contrast to an academic side where professors are paid five figures less than those at the schools with which the UO claims to rub shoulders. (Oregonian, Seattle Times, Associated Press, AOL) An Oregonian blogger wonders if Nike, which clothes Woodward’s teams, will come down on him hard.
• Car money: The UO makes a killing on some parking spots it’s renting. (UO Matters)
• Land & money: Here’s a run-down of some of the building projects the UO’s undertaking. (Emerald)
• ASUO: Some ASUO senators don’t like the idea of banning bottled water. (Emerald)
• Strutting: A couple of jurnos who have been embedded in Afghanistan got a chance to spin their yarns Monday night. (Emerald)
• Archeology: Opponents of the Riverfront development want people to join them at the UO’s next planning meeting to oppose the development. (Weekly)

Opinion:

• The Emerald‘s JoAnna Wendel: CHEMISTRY IS LIKE MAGIC, BUT IT’S HARD!
• Letters: Kevin Mannix writes in to the Guard, while other readers decry the tyranny of daylight saving time and call Art Robinson a terrorist plot.
• Editorials: The Guard says it was Greg Kord and Wes Wagner, along with Democratic efforts in Portland, that won John Kitzhaber the gubernatorial race. And it says cars are driving fast and people are dying.
• A charter school director says our schools would improve if only we could improve our community. (Emerald)
• Reasons the UO thinks you should give it money: Papa R. came down to Eugene this weekend to visit his son, David R., and learn drinking games, and then he volunteered, after a couple of beers, at the Oregon Football-Hated Huskies game. GTF Katie D., who is excited by the idea of interning in South Africa, took her students to visit the state pen. Antonia D. had a difficult week of mid-terms and a relaxing weekend with her mother. Korrin B. is enthusiastic about her environment and discovered she could get a massage at the Health Center. (Online UO Begging Bowl)

Sports:

• With Oregon Football fingertip-of-choice Nate Costa absent, who does the UO have in the way of backup quarterbacks? (Emerald)
• Oregon Football scampering gong-tempter LaMichael James is on the cover of this week’s Sports Illustrated. (KVAL)
• Emerald sports-lizard Robert Husseman takes us inside the post-match environment for journalists at Autzen Stadium.
• Oregon Soccer missed out on its tournament after defeats to Northern California schools. The OS season is now over. (Emerald)
• Oregon Golf is fifth in the tournament it’s currently at. (Emerald)

As my distinguished colleague Spencer Madison pointed out, sometimes guns hurt people. Because of this, Madison seems to think that guns are bad. He elaborates that the constitutionally enshrined right of this country’s people to own them is bad as well. He is confident that the recent events he discusses will not have significant influence, backing his point by deploying a brilliant non-sequitur: “because people are extremely forgiving of the liberties a bunch of entitled slave owners gave us.”

How this should be an argument against the constitutional right to own guns is beyond me.

(more…)

Public affairs:

• Old news: Somehow, I managed to miss UO cheese Richard Lariviere’s by-then ancient diagnosis with prostate cancer when I was putting together the last digest. I apologize for that if somehow my oversight led to your missing it too. So formalized is the vocabulary of offering sympathy in print when this sort of thing happens, that if I were to do so, I could only hope I was being sincere. Instead, in solidarity, since mustache-growth and fighting prostate cancer appear to have been equated by our culture now, I refuse to shave my upper lip until Lariviere is puttering around that office in good health again. The UO has promised Lariviere will recover swiftly and completely; Jim Bean will preside in the meantime. (Register-Guard, UO Matters, Associated Press, KTVL Medford, OC, Emerald)
• Shames: The University of Washington’s athletic director said this about the UO’s academics: “It’s an embarrassment what their academic institution is, and what’s happened to them as far as their state funding has gone. In my mind it’s a wonderful athletic facility but they’ve watched it at the expense of the university go really down.” Corr! Gah! (Sports by Brooks, UO Matters)
• Competitive medicine: Oregon blood banks are trying to harness the UO-OSU sports-hate to persuade us to try to outbleed our rivals. (Emerald)
• Car movements: Remember, Franklin’s going to be congested. (KVAL)
• Flooring and hardwoods: Over the weekend, a few journalists appear to have mistaken the Matthew Knight Arena floors for catnip. “Iconic … stories woven together … spectacular … innovative … unique … immediately recognizable … unlike anything in college basketball,” the Guard pants, adding “not orange” for good measure. “Art,” screams USA Today. (NESN, ESPN, etc.)

Opinion:

• Letters: The Guard‘s readers call for more suffering and less of the type of democracy that involves mail-in fliers. The Emerald indulges a Colorado resident’s desire for a brief weed-ramble.
• Editorials: The Guard makes some opaque noises about fiscal apocalypse, concluding that employment is more important than inflation; then it cheers on the possibility that state attorney generals might tear apart unscrupulous mortgage-foreclosers. The Emerald joins arms with EmX opponents.
• UO Matters criticizes the administration for not upgrading its computing sooner because of what it says about financial priorities.
• After years at the UO, Emerald editorial honcho Tyree Harris has finally met people who like their roommates. (Emerald blogs)
• UO student Teeona Williams blames income disparities for the disproportionate death toll breast cancer takes among black women. (Emerald)
• The director of a non-profit organization encourages people to adopt. (Register-Guard)
• Reasons the UO thinks you should give it money: Oregon Football gets Trafton B. a little misty eyed, and he also likes shooting pool. (UO’s online begging bowl)

Scene:

• There’s a new Oregon Voice out there, and I’m not going to give a bullet point to every article. OV honcho Noah DeWitt’s editor’s note (p. 2) bills it as “an alternative to the tired ethos (pun intended) of other campus journals.” I assume he means he believes half of his articles aren’t crudely written, his publication has demonstrated it is a viable target for advertisers, the editing has scrubbed and polished the text clean, ideas are not cribbed from other campus magazines, and the articles do not teeter on the edge of libel. If that’s his definition, the magazine is an utter failure. It is just another campus journal, subject to all the pitfalls that face the rest of them, and DeWitt’s holier-than-thou attitude is wholly unjustified, not that the Commentator’s holier-than-thou attitude is. But all things considered, it is actually a very good campus magazine.
• More OV: The best article in the issue is Grace Pettygrove’s (p. 18) about Lariviere’s proposal, which she rubbishes. She opens by criticizing the single worst article I ever wrote for the Emerald, which I’m fine with. Then she questions the degree of influence the proposal will give private donors. That’s something nobody, even Oregon’s most vigilant journalistic watchdog, Brent Walth, not only seems to have failed to ask, but seems not to have considered important. Who are these private donors meeting with candidates for the UO presidency telling them to privatize the school?
• Even more OV: Best of the rest of the articles: A hilarious, unhinged advice column (p. 6) that tought me a great deal about cats and flatulence. A biting critique of the school’s sports culture (p. 7). A jarring meditation on the subliminal promotion of cannibalism by cereal companies (p. 4). Worst of them: Tyler Pell’s article about Jews in campus media (p. 4-5), not because it mentions Lyzi Diamond’s religion (who cares, although the pull-quote is kind of non-classy), but because Pell doesn’t actually do the journalism to learn that the editor-in-chief of the Emerald is Jewish, or the writing to actually make a point (Unless he’s trying to satirize the laziness of people who make the Jews-in-media pronouncements, in which case it doesn’t come through clearly enough). An article about skateboarding that appears to be a Q and A with the writer’s interview subject when it is in fact a Q and A with the writer (p. 24)
• The Emerald’s Andrew Hitz starts comparing Restoration-era fops to modern hipsters. You think you know where he’s going with it, after a very redemptive column about hipsters and their obsession with American Indians a couple of weeks ago; then he changes course and appears to cheer the rise of the Tea Party. Were his intentions ironic? You be the judge.
• A string quartet has been in town! There was a play based on a movie! A movie was well-cast! A band you haven’t heard of is coming to town and you might not have the money to see it! People are pleased with (Emerald)
• Look at some Halloween costumes! Woody Allen’s new movie is better than Jackass 3D! Mushrooms are food! (Ethos)

Sports:

• Oregon Football’s fun was ruined by a Hated Huskies team that refused to play the “hapless victim.” Getting iron-tipped gazelle Kenjon Barner back was pretty chill for OF, but losing designated finger Nate Costa was felt by all to be kind of lame. (Emerald)
• There was a conference Double-Yoo for Oregon Volleyball this weekend. Then it got an Ell. (Emerald)
• Oregon Basketball (W) coach Paul Westhead gives his players a week to get it right after a jammy game against the Hated Warriors. “It might be an appropriate wake-up call,” he said. (Emerald)
• Oregon Basketball (M) got off to a shaky preseason start against the Hated Beacs. (Emerald)

We can now say, unequivocally, that the Oregon Voice staff are giant pussies.

In rejecting our drinking contest invitation, they have obviously faltered in the face of sheer greatness. Don’t worry, kids. I get it. We’re intimidating.

Maybe another time, when you find your balls.

(Also, mentioning my religion in order to get readers to pay attention is wholeheartedly unclassy.)

UPDATE:

I love the Oregon Voice. Truly. The new issue is really sharp, and tells a good story about life at the UO. Of course I disagree on a number of points, but whatever. I have respect for UO publications that actually publish, and with this issue, the OV makes the list.

The Student Insurgent . . . well . . . that’s another story.

Did your candidate lose? Did you fail a midterm? Throw yourself a pity party. Wrap yourself up in blankets and shut yourself away from the warmth of your family and friends, you freak. Why don’t you go watch yourself some reruns of LOST and convince yourself that your theories aren’t a waste of time. Hey, Christmas is coming up—why don’t you ask Santa for a new pillow to cry into? But fer fuck’s sake, put down that tub of “Chubby Hubby.”

If your self-loathing is truly complete you will stuff your disappointed face with ice-cream that tastes like an awful idea. Portland ice-cream cart Junior Ambassador’s wants a grant to make a full seven-course Thanksgiving dinner à la crème glacée.  Their proposed flavors include such abortions as waldorf salad, deviled eggs with bacon, and of course, turkey with yam and marshmallows.  But before the phrase, “Gag me with a spoon” takes on new literal merit, I want to address the best idea they proposed— “Pecan Pie and Ice cream Ice cream.” I cannot even begin to wrap my mind around the concept of ice cream tasting…wait for it… like ICE CREAM. Using reflexive properties in the culinary world is never, ever a bad idea.  I stand firmly behind Junior Ambassador in their quest to nauseate and (potentially) delight. But only to further science.