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The students’ voice since 1901 • Vol. 111 No. 17 • Thursday, February 23, 2012 • Check us out online. esubulletin.comONTHEWEB
Tianhai Jiang
Despite efforts of the Faculty Senate to provide more transparen-cy in the administration since last spring, President Michael Shonrock became the third president to reject the Administrator Evaluation Bill last week.
“Unfortunately, I am unable to approve the policy as written because it would allow the release of confidential personnel infor-mation in manner which is not in conformity with current law and other University Policies,” Shonrock wrote in an email to Kevin Johnson, which Johnson shared with the Faculty Senate.
The bill had been submitted to former President Michael Lane, and former interim President H. Edward Flentje last year, and both
vetoed the bill. Lane’s position on the bill was
that it was self-contradictory. He said that evaluations were confi-dential employee records and this disclosure would violate the Kansas Open Records Act and state and university policy, according to a letter Lane disclosed to the Faculty Senate last spring.
When Flentje rejected the bill last October, Faculty Senate President Kevin Johnson said, “It appears the rejection was not so much an opposition to the policy, but the main thing he stressed was he just did not want to saddle the next president with the bill.”
The bill aims to review the professional performance of admin-istrators and provide input to the reviewed administrator, his or her supervisor and the president of the university. It would make these
evaluations available for Faculty Senate executive committee review and allow administrators the opportunity to share the results of their own, individual evaluations with the faculty. Administrators may also choose to make a sum-mary of their own evaluations available for the entire faculty.
The bill states that the evalua-tions will “neither be made public nor available to any party out-side of Emporia State University without the consent of the evalu-ated administrator, the University President, or as required by law.”
“President Shonrock feels that personal information could be revealed by the bill,” said James Waegelein, accounting and infor-mation systems professor, who emailed Shonrock urging him reconsider signing the bill. “(The
SuSan WelTe
As of Feb. 13, the Human Relations Commission decided to “crack down” on rental properties and their safety regulations, according to Patty Gilligan, Human Relations Director. The plan the commission is going off of right now is just external issues of properties; however, Gilligan said internal issues can be a problem as well.
“We keep trying to remind them some of these houses are unsafe on the inside,” Gilligan said. “That is something we shouldn’t be overlooking.”
These internal issues include having to use space heaters due to improper heating, frozen pipes, bad wiring and overloading
electrical systems.“External issues are what City
Commission is seeing,” Gilligan said. “I’m seeing internal issues affecting quality of life of the people living inside.”
Instead of just fining a landlord
for neglecting poor housing conditions or taking them to jail, the city is proposing a “forced debatement” for the first time. If it passes, the forced debatement would allow for the city to fix the problem themselves and either fine the property owner or add it to their taxes.
“(We haven’t proposed this
before) because it’s going to cost some money,” Gilligan said. “It’s not going to sit well with people who don’t want to be told what to do with their property.”
This action to create a safer environment was taken due to the
lack of responsibility landlords have been taking for properties. Landlords are not being responsible for the safety of their residents, Gilligan said. Only 600-700 of Emporia State students live on campus, and the rest live off-campus, according to Residential Life.
“I think it really needs to be
pushed that the landlords and anyone that owns property need to be dedicated,” said Andrea Vertz, senior communications major. “Just because we’re college students doesn’t mean we don’t deserve to live in a safe and
hazard-free environment.”But some rental properties
already ensure that their tenants are living in safe environments. At The Villas, 1839 Merchant St., there is a guaranteed 24-hour turn around rate for maintenance requests and immediate response to emergency maintenance. For safety, there is also a “key fob”
at entrances, where tenants scan an electronic key to enter the residency after 8 p.m.
“We have high standards at The Villas, and we want Emporia to be a safe place to live,” said Kelly Young, property manager. “Often in university towns there are (older) homes that have been repurposed into apartments that don’t have the plumbing and facilities they need. Sometimes landlords will take advantage of students.”
Gilligan said the best thing students can do is make sure rental properties are safe before moving into them. If something’s not fixed when you’re being shown a property, she said, it probably won’t ever get fixed.
“Smart, responsible tenants equals safe living,” Young said.
luke Bohannon
Even though the weather did not quite match up with the frigid motif of the Polar Plunge, participants still dressed up and took the plunge to help raise money for the Special Olympics. On Saturday, 136 jumpers took part in the Polar Plunge at Mouse Lake in Emporia, and 25 “chickens” also donated to the cause, but did not jump in.
“It’s for a good cause…for the kids, they need this,” said Chase Nichols, sophomore elementary education major and member of Sigma Tau Gamma. Nichols was also in costume for the event, wearing a red “Angry Birds” outfit.
And Nichols was not the only plunger in costume. Several of the costumes included crayons, penguins and a bullfighter with a bull. One group went out as a banana, a gorilla and a safari guide. The banana taunted the gorilla while the guide watched. The gorilla then grabbed the banana and jumped into the water, followed by the guide.
“We know someone who participates in the Special Olympics…we’re doing it to be a support system for them and because we know it’s for a good cause,” said Veronica Aranda, sophomore elementary educa-tion major and Alpha Sigma Tau member. AST had a total of six
See POLAR ...PAge 6
Commission plans to make rental homes safer
Administrator evaluation bill canned for third time
Staff from Longbine Auto Plaza take the plunge into Mouse Lake Saturday afternoon. Yiqing Fu/The Bulletin
Turnpike Tussle ends
in lossPage 8
See BILL ...PAge 3
Polar plungers jump for Special Olympics
James Waegelein, accounting and information systems professor, reads an email addressed to President Michael Shonrock during the Faculty Senate meeting held Tuesday afternoon in Webb Lecture Hall. The email was in regards to the adminis-trator evaluation bill, which Shonrock did not sign. Julie Thephachan/The Bulletin
Workers from Newman Regional Health jump into Mouse Lake donning scrubs. Yiqing Fu/The Bulletin
Campus fights concealed carry bill
SuSan WelTe [email protected]
Imagine sitting in class and not knowing if the person sitting next to you has a gun on them or not. House Bill 2353, the Personal and Family Protection Act, would
force all state-run buildings to allow concealed carry of weapons, according to Blaise Plummer, city attorney.
If passed, this bill would allow concealed carry on the Emporia State campus in classrooms, at sporting events, as well as at the day-care center on campus. The bill is anticipated to be voted on this week by the Kansas House of Representatives.
But many in the state are opposed to the bill and some regard it as a safety violation.
“More guns doesn’t mean safer,” said Tyler Curtis, director of alum-ni relations and legislative liasion. “It means more opportunity to make bad decisions. If you’re in an emergency situation, and there’s a perpetrator with a gun and every-one’s drawn (their guns), by the time police come in, they don’t know who’s the bad guy.”
If the bill does pass, ESU, as well as other public campuses, will
“I would hate for students to go to a campus and to go through airport
security just to go to class. Our campus should be open and welcoming.”
– Tyler Curtis
See FIgHTS ...PAge 3
“Just because we’re college students doesn’t mean we don’t deserve to live in a safe and hazard-free environment.”
- Andrea Vertz
seek an exemption from the bill, Curtis said. But to be exempt, the bill will call for more than just a sign posted outside a building, Curtis said. Adequate security measures must be taken, including security personnel, as well as a metal detector at every
entrance.“I would hate for students
to go to a campus and to go through airport security just to go to class,” Curtis said. “Our
Photo Illustration by Jenny Pendarvis
newsPage 2 newsDolly Madison faces strike, closure
Hostess Brands, creator of the Twinkie as well as numerous other pastries, filed for bankruptcy Jan. 11. Now, the Dolly Madison plant at 1525 Industrial road may be shutting down.
“We’re concerned whenever we look at a loss of production and a loss of income,” said Casey Woods, director of Emporia Main Street. “We are hopeful that all sides can come to an acceptable resolution for the long term health and production of the plant.”
The Dolly Madison plant in Emporia employed 570 people as of February 2011, according to the Emporia Chamber of Commerce. More recent figures were not available.
No one from the plant was available for comment, but unions across the com-pany are preparing for a company-wide strike.
But if the plant shuts down, it wouldn’t be the first time Emporia has had to deal with a loss of jobs. When the Tyson plant downsized in 2008, roughly 1,400 employees lost their jobs – a $50-60 million downsize in the company’s payroll, said Dipak Ghosh, professor of accounting and information systems.
Ghosh also said that the loss of the people who would leave Emporia follow-ing Dolly Madison’s demise would have a large effect on the economic state of the community.
“It’s not just their pay, but it’s…a multiply effect,” Ghosh said. “They start
luke Bohannon
The Bulletin | February 23, 2012
Police Reports
Feb. 15Officer stopped KS Handicapped 8150 at I-35
and Merchant St. Verbal warning issued for a stop sign violation.
Officer stopped KS 791AFG at 11th and Market St. Verbal warning issued for speeding in 100 E 12th St.
Feb. 16Officer assisted Emporia Police Dept. with a call at
2nd and Merchant St.Female student requested to speak with an officer
in Morse Hall Complex.Officer contacted skateboarders in 1000 W 15th
St. and advised them of campus policy.
Feb. 17Rachel McCommon requested to speak with an
officer at S Hwy 25 in reference to a flat tire.Officers stopped KS 063DBH at 15th and
Wooster Dr. Verbal warning issued for a stop sign violation at same location.
Officers stopped KS 354AFJ at 105 W 12th St. Verbal warning issued for seatbelt violation at same location.
Officers stopped KS 602BYG at I-35 and Mer-chant St. Verbal warning issued for a stop sign viola-tion at same location.
Officers assisted Emporia Police Dept. with do-mestic problem at 1028 Mechanic St.
Feb. 18Officers admitted Max McCoy into Memorial
Union Sunflower Room to retrieve property.
Feb. 19Officer stopped KS 968ANP in 1200 Commercial
St. Verbal warning issued for defective headlight.Officer stopped KS PPM988 in 1300 Market St.
Verbal warning issued for a stop sign violation in 1300 Market St.
Officer stopped KS 562AGR in 1000 E 15th St. Verbal warning issued for stop sign violation at 15th and Wooster Dr. Citation issued for no proof of insur-ance.
Officer assisted Lyon Co. deputy with a car stop at 15th and Merchant St.
Feb. 20Parking Enforcement removed immobilizer from
KS XVP462 in Sector 7.Officer removed immobilizer from KS 908ELY in
Sector 2.Officer assisted Emporia Police Dept. with a suspi-
cious person call in 800 Commercial St.
Feb. 21Officer stopped OK B9574 in Kellogg Circle.
Verbal warning issued for improper left turn at 12th and Mechanic St.
Samantha Jacob reported a non-injury accident involving KS 554AXM in Sector 7.
Officer stopped KS 101CSX at 12th and Prairie St. Verbal warning issued for driving without head-lights at same location.
Officer stopped KS 477DVN at 12th and High-land St. Verbal warning issued for careless driving at 15th and Market St.
*Log for Feb. 22 not provided to The Bulletin by press time on Wednesday
Reports given to The Bulletin from ESU Police and Safety Department
CrimeStoppers
A Wonder Bread truck pulls into the Dolly Madison plant Tuesday afternoon. Dolly Madison’s parent company, Hostess, filed for bankruptcy in January. Jenny Pendarvis/The Bulletin
buying fewer goods, the stores, start buy-ing fewer supplies. It’s a chain reaction.”
Ghosh said that the possible effect the plant’s closure might have on the univer-sity is more uncertain.
“I think any job loss in Emporia right now would the crippled economy, would have a devastating effect on the Emporia economy,” said Luke Chiddix, junior political science major and fiscal affairs chair for the Associated Student Government. “I think also it will some-what hurt Emporia State’s economy within the university. At the same time I feel like that is protected just from the
way the university has secured it’s eco-nomic prowess for the future.”
Ghosh also said that the effect of a strike on the Dolly Madison plant in particular may or may not be effective and that it depends on how many people it would affect as well as how much pres-sure a strike would place on management to settle.
He compared the situation to the NFL and NBA lockouts last year and the pressure they created on the manage-ment, contrasting the varying pressures placed on the people involved in those cases.
SPURS challenges RSOs to sink or swim
In order to raise money for their community service events, Service, Patriotism, Understanding, Responsibility and Sacrifice (SPURS), a sophomore community service and honor group, will host their first annu-al cardboard boat races. The event is set for 7 p.m, March 9 in the HYPER building pool.
“SPURS is having a sink or swim event where (teams) build a boat out of cardboard, duct tape and other miscellaneous supplies,” said Hannah Rosenwald, sophomore sociology major and SPURS president. “We are going to supply all the cardboard and recycled supplies – the teams just have to bring their duct tape.” Rosenwald said the teams will consist of two to four people and the cost is $20 to reg-ister a team. There is one designated captain who wll ride in the boat, but the other teammates do not have to get in the water.
“It’s going to be a lot of fun,” Rosenwald said. “We’re going to have prizes for the team that wins, but also for the best dressed and most spirited. The boats probably aren’t going to work out so well. It’s going to be really funny because of how unrealistic is it to build a boat that is going to float to the other side and look perfect.”
For the prizes, Rosenwald said that there are gift cards or boat trophies for the swiftest ship, best boat design, most spirited crew and the Titanic award for the ship that goes down with the most style.
khaili ScarBrough
[email protected] “The reasons that we wanted to
have this event is to promote our group and get our name out there on campus, and since we are a smaller RSO we wanted other smaller RSOs to get out there, have the chance to win prizes,” Rosenwald said. “We just want to make sure that everyone is equally represented, so we thought that this would be a fun way to do it.”
The rules state that the captain’s body must stay in the boat at all times, and the boat must be human powered either by oars, which will be provided, or arms. There are also no inflatable devices allowed and no sinking other
teams’ boats on purpose. The fastest boat to reach the opposite side of the pool is the winner.
“I think (the boat races) will be awesome and so much fun,” said Ashley Langdon, junior political sci-ence major. “It sounds like, from what I have seen on TV shows, cardboard plus races and water just equals into hilariousness.”
SPURS hosts several community events throughout the year as well as coordinating homecoming and teachers awards. For a full calendar of events visit their webpage on Emporia State’s website.
Candice Brooks, sophomore elementary education major, registers for the Cardboard Boat Races. The registration fee is $20. Lingzi Su/The Bulletin
First lawsuit filed in outbreak linked to sprouts
IOWA CITY (AP) — An Iowa woman sickened by eating tainted sprouts filed a lawsuit Tuesday against sandwich chain Jimmy John’s, the first stemming from a recent outbreak of a foodborne ill-ness linked to the restaurant.
Heather Tuttle, 27, filed the lawsuit Tuesday in Des Moines seek-ing damages for medical expenses and pain and suffering. She became ill with E. coli poisoning after eat-ing a turkey sandwich with sprouts from a Jimmy John’s restaurant in West Des Moines on Jan. 3. Tuttle eventually required a series of medi-cal treatments for the illness, which included excruciating cramps and diarrhea.
Page 3newsThe Bulletin | February 23, 2012
Reading Recovery helps kids get back on track
FIGHTS... from page 1
For struggling first graders, Reading Recovery, a one-on-one reading instruction program, offers a chance to catch up with their peers and make it to the second grade on time.
“Finally, the government is put-ting money into education where it will make a difference – early learn-ing,” said Karen Gibbs, Reading Recovery teacher at Scott City Elementary School who joined in the program last fall.
Reading Recovery is an early intervention program developed by New Zealand educator and researcher Marie M. Clay, said Annie Opat, director of ESU’s Reading Recovery Center.
Emporia State shares a $46 mil-lion federal grant with 19 other institutions to train new Reading Recovery teacher leaders through 2015, Opat said.
“Too many of our children enter school so far behind that higher education will not be within their reach, despite our best efforts to
prepare them,” Gibbs said. “If our nation wants to increase the percent-age of our population with education beyond high school, we will have to do a much better job educating chil-dren in the early years.”
ESU received over $85,000 to train 16 teachers this school year. An additional $350,000 is estimated to be distributed to ESU for the next three years. Opat said she expected larger enrollment in the program in the future.
The money is part of a federal investing in innovation grant awarded last fall to the program’s lead partner, Ohio State University, and 19 other institutions including ESU, according to ESU media relations.
Opat said she and four teacher leaders instruct 101 Reading Recovery teachers in 48 systems, including 67 elementary schools in Kansas.
Individual teachers enroll at ESU and take seven graduate credits. The center usually had 10 teachers enrolled each year before the federal grant. But with the grant, Opat said she estimated the number of the total trained teachers may be doubled
within the next three years.Teachers sometimes will observe
apprenticeship classes through a one-way mirror.
“While the teachers are watching the real life lesson, they are discussing what they are observing with their peers. This inquiry model of instruc-tion is efficient and all participants are actively learning,” Opat said.
Each teacher works with four individual children for 12-20 weeks. Observation, record analysis, and reading authentic texts and writing are essential components in Reading Recovery, Opat said.
For the first 20 weeks of the 2011-2012 school year, Gibbs worked with four children on daily basis in 30-minute lessons.
“For those first four children in the program our results were terrific,” Gibbs said. “They have been suc-cessfully discontinued from the pro-gram, and I am now in the process of choosing four more students as second rounders. The goal of Reading Recovery is to dramatically reduce the number of learners who have extreme difficulty with literacy learning. In this first year, it is doing just that.”
Tianhai Jiang
BILL... from page 1
Annie Opat, director of ESU’s Reading Recovery Center, trains teachers to of-fer one-on-one reading instruction to first-graders identified as struggling with reading. Yiqing Fu/The Bulletin
campus should be open and wel-coming.”
Securing the three entrances of the Memorial Union alone would cost around $50,000, Curtis said, and the total cost to the school would be close to $1 million.
“It’s very difficult and expensive to secure a building,” Plummer said. “If the risk is minimal, the expense doesn’t outweigh risk. There isn’t justification for people to conceal and carry.”
However, Curtis said some feel it is against the second amend-ment to restrict anyone with a concealed carry permit from carry-ing weapons.
“Personally, I support concealed carry, the right to own guns,” said Luke Drury, legislative director of
Associated Student Government and junior political science major. “At the same time, it’s not really necessary to have that at a college campus.”
Last month, during Higher Education Day with the six other regent schools, students traveled to Topeka to lobby against the bill. In a recent survey done by ASG, 4 out of 5 students on campus oppose concealed carry on cam-pus.
According to a supplement note sent out by KBOR, only 20 out of 10,531 violent crimes occurred on a college campus in 2010. ESU was also recently named the safest campus in Kansas, Curtis said.
“It’s not a second amendment rights issue,” Drury said. “It’s a logical issue. Why are we trying to fix something that’s not broken?”
bill) specifically said no personal information will be revealed.”
Waegelein worked at the University of Kansas for 20 years, and he was involved in reviews for three deans. He said in each case the chancellor came down and met with the faculty after each review.
“At Emporia State, I’ve been involved in two dean’s reviews, and there was no dialogue with presi-dent after the review,” Waegelain said. “I believe the faculty do not feel their views were listened to, and there was confusion about the process.”
Shonrock has offered to meet with the senate or a senate com-mittee to further explain his deci-sion.
Career Services works to get students hired
In an attempt to spread the word about available campus internships, Career Services has teamed up with the marketing program and has scheduled a guest speaker, David Milford. Internship Toward Success will feature Milford and a panel of students talking about their expe-riences with internships at 4 p.m. today in Brighton Lecture Hall.
June Coleman, director of Career Services, said Emporia State has a lack of student involvement in available intern-ships, an issue she says is due to lack of time and knowledge about the programs.
“The purpose of these intern-ships is to gain experience in their career fields after college,” Coleman said. “We only have a small percentage of students here that do internships, but statisti-cally they are more likely to get hired right after graduation and often employers will pick full time employees from their intern pool.”
Some majors, such as soci-ology and psychology, require an internship for graduation, Coleman said.
“We use our connections with local business to set up these internships,” Coleman said. “We have a list of employers that we can contact when a student is interested, and sometimes it works the other way. Sometimes businesses come to us looking for interns.”
Career Services sets students up with internships both locally and nationally. According to Coleman, Kansas City hosts a lot of the interns, and businesses like Walgreens are common hosts.
Most of the interns that contact career services are accounting or business management majors, Coleman said.
Samantha Norris, senior communications major, got her internship with Emporia Main Street through Career Services last September.
“Emporia Main Street is a business of promotion, and we have a lot of events we do to help promote the businesses in town,” Norris said. “I do a little of everything here. I would say it is a great experience for any stu-dents and I feel that now I have done it and I have had my hands in an actual business, I am more prepared and more confident for interviews and jobs in the future.”
Christopher Kroh, professor of political science says there are two benefits of internships – see-ing things behind the scenes that you can’t learn in a textbook and opening doors for future employ-ment. Kroh interned for political candidates and has even interned with the state legislature.
“Internships have that aca-demic value, but they also have a professional value,” Kroh said. “They create great opportuni-ties for you to peruse your field, you get that on-hand experience and you also need that network, those contacts. Being sure you clearly identify your intent is very important, getting in contact with your university is important but you can also branch. Getting online information and even going to other universities can be helpful.”
Students interested in intern-ing can contact Career Services to help find work that is either paid or unpaid, and in some cases, students also receive credits for interning.
rocky roBinSon [email protected]
8-year-old critical after Wash. school shootingSEATTLE (AP) — An 8-year-
old girl was in critical condition Wednesday after she was shot in the abdomen at her elementary school near Seattle, and one of her class-mates was detained, authorities said Wednesday.
The injured third-grader was
airlifted to Seattle’s Harborview Medical Center, where she under-went surgery Wednesday afternoon so doctors could assess her injuries, hospital spokeswoman Susan Gregg said.
Police said a third-grade boy was being questioned and a firearm
was found in a classroom. The boy apparently shot the girl, though police provided no further details about the incident and said their investigation was just beginning.
The Bremerton Schools superin-tendent’s office said the girl was shot in the abdomen.
opinionPage 4
Shoot Down Concealed Carry BillSTAFF EDITORIAL
Cartoon by Ellen Weiss
The Bulletin | February 23, 2012
Fight fire with fire. This old adage might find a new place on college campuses in Kansas.
A new bill in the Kansas House of Representatives proposes that individuals with concealed carry licenses should be able to brandish weapons in government build-ings, which includes state owned universities. Another cliché comes to mind – you play with fire, you get burned.
Are we missing something here? True, most gun carrying Americans safely use their weapons, and, true, good people with guns have the potential to thwart acts of violence. We believe that it is not worth the risk to allow guns on campus.
This new legislation adopts the same phi-losophy of mutual deterrence adopted by the U.S. and Soviet Union during the Cold War. The ensuing arms race was seen as a means to prevent nuclear war. For the most part, it worked. Neither side launched. But it also created the incentive for other countries to join in the race. One spark would ignite a cascade of launches.
Substitute bullets for warheads and people for countries, and we find the status quo. We
should not be willing to risk a potentially brutal standoff because of miscalculation or accident between armed citizens.
The Cuban Missile Crisis is an example of how thinkable violence is. It should give us pause in engaging in a similar, albeit smaller, posture.
Proponents of the legislation cite recent school shootings as examples of when armed and informed citizenry could have prevented such tragedies. These “what if ” scenarios are a useless thought exercise without factual basis.
Campuses are relatively safe places, but a few disgruntled students have frightened us into reactionary mode. There is no guarantee that allowing guns on campus would do any-thing beyond creating a wild west like atmo-sphere.
Instead, there are measures beyond weap-ons that could protect students at ESU from a potential Virginia Tech style incident.
We should not forget that our foremost priority is the safety of students, faculty and staff. The increased likelihood of misfires or bloody quarrels make a concealed carry bill shortsighted and ultimately disastrous.
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“I’ll die on that hill.” This is what Republican can-didate Rick Santorum said when asked about his com-mitment to stop same-sex marriage.
Apparently, managing Americans’ personal love lives is a high priority on his political agenda. He wouldn’t die on the hill of improving foreign policy, or fixing the economy, or protecting the country, but fighting against the legal union of same-sex adults, an issue that would in no way improve the unemploy-ment rate, the rampant corruption in the government and the growing gap between the upper class and the working class.
This is an example of something that I have noticed about the conservative way – it has become a paradox. One of the tenets of their dogma is that there should be small government, which shouldn’t take their money, their guns or their religion. I would agree with some of that. The government should be checked, monitored and stay within its constitutional bounds.
And yet, for some reason, conservatives believe it is the government’s job to micromanage the most per-sonal aspects of people’s lives.
According to people like Santorum, it’s up to the government to make sure homosexuals are not allowed to marry, women shouldn’t serve in the front lines on the battlefield and they certainly shouldn’t have repro-ductive rights.
Even the pill is a political target. Yup. Contraception – something that I’m sure many of the college students of America are familiar with and use on a regular basis – is a no-no. People like Santorum
An Inconsistent Agenda
believe the government should have the power to take away a woman’s right to control her bodily functions. If that isn’t big government, I don’t know what is.
I’m not writing this to debate for or against same-sex marriage or abortion, but rather to point out that conservatism needs to pick a side. Either the govern-ment should be small, and stop interfering with the intimate details of people’s lives, or the government should be big, and they should stop complaining about taxes.
The conservative party should take a good, long look at its priorities and try to appeal to me again once they have their shit together.
ellen WeiSS
The grunting, sweating and machismo cloud my exercise. At 6:30 a.m., I head to the Student Recreation Center in hopes of becoming physically fit. I’ve been doing it since October. I still feel unwelcome. But that’s all changing.
Everyone in a weight room has an agenda. Some seek to look better. Others are there to release stress, and a few go because their health level is life threatening.
The athletic prowess of some of the SRC’s patrons is impressive – men bench pressing twice their body weight, women – in make-up no less – spending hours on an elliptical machine. It’s staggering.
And then there’s me. The pudgy nerd who let himself go for too long. It took getting winded on the Plumb Hall stairs to shake me into action.
In the beginning, my time in the SRC was tempered by glances of disgust and irritation at my inability to lift the requisite weight for a man my age. It was enough to make me question whether I’m a man at all. I stayed calm.
Ultimately, the brow-beaters have forgotten the point of exercise. The SRC is for people like me who are tired of, quite literally, moping about day-to-day. The gym-rats don’t need it as badly as I do.
Some say I should exercise at home. Hogwash. I pay for the SRC with my student fees. It is as much mine as it is any other student or faculty member.
I imagine the day when I lap the runners, out bench press the big men and do it all with the compassion of a formerly fat man. But let’s be realistic. I am no athlete. I barely passed Active Living. It would take many years for me to catch up.
They are not the point. I exercise because I am
The Politics of the Weight Room
young and I won’t live forever. I don’t delude myself into believing happiness comes from health. Happiness is a different kind of exercise altogether. I began exercising because the life that I chose demands it.
Our readership should interrogate their personal health. If you are unsatisfied, then find motivation and forget the scenery. For those elitists in the weight room, perhaps you should encourage rather than demonize the unhealthy.
Each morning I work hard for 45 minutes. I am lost inside the moment, blocking out the five different TV’s and the terrible rap music blaring from the aerobics room. This is my routine.
And if girls like the way I look, then that’s just an ancillary benefit.
MaTT cook
a&eThe Bulletin | February 23, 2012 Page 5
If you’re a fan of “Ghost Rider,” or just a fan of good movies in general, don’t look to “Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance” for a fix because you won’t be getting one.
Directors Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor were the minds behind the “Crank” films, “Gamer” and “Jonah Hex,” and they’ve continued their tradition of ruining what should have been great action flicks with the new “Ghost Rider” movie.
I’d like to say that this movie starts off where the first left off, but it seems to almost disregard everything from the first film entirely. We get a recap of Johnny Blaze’s (Nicolas Cage) life before he became the Ghost Rider and rather than a mention of the important events from his debut adventure, we get a quick anecdote about how apparently he did a 360 degree flip while his pants were down.
The main plot of the movie deals with Blaze trying to help save a young boy from becoming the vessel for the devil (Ciaran Hinds). The devil is helped out by the kid’s father, who he eventually grants some powers of darkness, just to keep things fair.
True to form, Cage is over the top in his performance, but it’s not in a good way. He giggles and makes goofy faces when he’s supposed to be in pain and struggling with the power inside him, which makes it pretty much impossible to take any of it seriously. The whole movie tends to follow this trend with awful humor being forced into scenes that should be serious.
However, “Ghost Rider” isn’t without its strengths. There are a few scenes that made it at least bearable to watch.
The title character looks like a completely different being from the last movie. Now, he’s covered in soot, his jacket burns and boils when he transforms, and he walks with a creepy staggering gait that reminds us that he’s a demon first. We also get to catch a glimpse of the Ghost Rider transforming other vehicles into dark versions of themselves including a truck and a massive piece of mining equipment.
Aside from the devil, Blaze has to go up against another old-school Ghost Rider villain known as Blackout (Johnny Whitworth). Blackout’s powers of decay and darkness are gruesome enough, but he starts off as a pretty useless bad guy who just happens to be working for the devil until he gets himself killed by the Ghost Rider, and the devil has to give him said powers.
Overall “Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance” is a big disappointment. The story is boring, the visuals are mostly bland and the acting is just plain weak. Don’t waste your time with it.
“Ghost Rider” disappoints
with vengeance
luke Bohannon [email protected]
Off the Reel
1 out of 5 reels
Music groups unveil piece by Ziek
The Emporia State Wind Ensemble performs Tuesday night in Albert Taylor Hall. The Badger Creek Brass Ensemble, ESU Brass Ensemble and ESU Trumpet Ensemble were special guests for the event. Yiqing Fu/The Bulletin
STeven edWardS
Comedy quells loud mouths at Natasha’s
On Friday, Natasha’s Bar and Grill, 627 Commercial St., hosted the first of what it hopes will be many upcoming comedy shows.
“It was a really great stand up comedy show,” said Chad Schmidt, attendee and local res-ident. “Both comedians tonight were hilarious. I haven’t laughed that hard in awhile.”
Bill Vilmos is a nationally touring stand up comedian, radio personality and blogger. Vilmos has been a comedian since 1992, and has been tour-ing nationally since 1995. Critics have described Vilmos’ comedic style as similar to “‘Steven Wright on steroids,’ in which he delivers his satirical view of life to audiences, leav-ing them gasping for air.”
“I really enjoyed performing here tonight,” Vilmos said. “We had a great audience tonight. There were a few loud mouths up front, but still, a great audi-ence.”
The Friday night comedy show was Vilmos’ first per-formance at Natasha’s, as well as in Emporia. But on stage, Dan Rock, the other performer for the evening, said he was no stranger to Emporia or Natasha’s. Rock took note of the new remodeling done to the bar and said last time he had performed at Natasha’s, there was a buffet bar right by the stage.
“I feel like tonight’s show went really well,” Rock said. “Natasha’s is probably one of my favorite venues for a com-edy show.”
Rock said despite a group of loud audience members directly
STeven edWardS
Several music ensembles with the Badger Creek Brass Ensemble played a premiere performance of Sinfonietta for Brass and Percussion, a piece composed by ESU director of bands Gary Ziek, Tuesday evening.
“I went through a long writer’s block trying to compose this piece,” Ziek said. “Until one day I was at the airport, waiting for my flight, when it first came to me. I immediately wrote down what I had on a sketchbook I had with me and began flushing out each
movement after I came back.” Ziek formed Badger Creek in
2008. He said the ensemble is a select group consisting of some of the finest brass and percussion per-formers in the state of Kansas, and that the group has faculty members from the University of Kansas, Kansas State University, Wichita State University and Emporia State, as well as members of the Topeka Symphony Orchestra and the Wichita Symphony Orchestra.
The night began with a per-formance of Giuseppe Verdi’s “Triumphal March from Aida” by Badger Creek and the wind ensemble. Badger Creek next
played Sinfonietta for Brass and Percussion, Ziek’s five-movement composition.
“I really enjoyed Dr. Ziek’s composition,” said Eileen Campbell, local resident and attendee. “I liked the use of the mutes for the second movement.”
The Trumpet Ensemble then joined Badger Creek to perform two movements from Henry V, “Touch Her Lips Softly and Part” and “Overture” by William Walton, followed by “Feierlicher Einzug” by Richard Strauss.
“The performances of the piec-es from Henry V were a real treat,” said Leslie Hahn, attendee and
local resident. “It was nice hearing them play something from one of my favorite movies.”
Following a brief intermission, Badger Creek was joined by the whole Wind Ensemble for perfor-mances of “Celebrations” by John Zdechlik, “Concerto for Timpani and Band” by Lee Actor featuring Tracy Freeze, associate professor of music, on timpani, “Song for Lyndsay” by Andrew Boysen and “Synergy Rising” by Ryan Nowlin.
The ESU Department of Music will be presenting a perfor-mance by the Emporia Symphony Orchestra in Albert Taylor Hall on March 1.
Bill Vilmos, comedian, performs his standup routine at Natasha’s Bar and Grill Friday evening. Vilmos, host of the com-edy podcast “The Green Room,” was one of two who performed that evening. Julie Thephachan/The Bulletin
in front of the stage, the show was a hit. Rock was able to suc-cessfully use his comedy to dif-fuse the situation and quiet the loud patrons during his act.
Vilmos is the creator and host of the popular online radio show The Green Room, also known as Green Room Radio. Vilmos said Green Room Radio gives the listener an inside look at the world and business of stand up comedy and how comedians view the world. The online radio show premiered its first episode on April 22, 2008, and has since produced 388 episodes with 214
different comedians.Before creating Green Room
Radio, Vilmos briefly hosted the show The Hungarian Help Line on the Todd & Tyler show on Z-92 FM in Omaha, Neb. The show featured Vilmos finding humorous solutions to tough problems that people face in every day life.
Vilmos said the content of the episodes’ topics ranged from dealing with children with behav-ior problems and husbands that watch too much football, to the awkward process of going from “just friends” to a relationship
and what to do when a female boss shows interest in her recent-ly-hired male employee.
Both Vilmos and Rock said on stage they were also from the Midwest. Vilmos grew up in Illinois and lived in Chicago until he moved to Colorado in 1986. Vilmos owned a comedy club in Denver from 2004 to 2009. Rock now lives in the Seattle area.
Vilmos and Rock are cur-rently on separate national tours. Natasha’s plans to have more stand up comedy shows in the near future.
SAFE... from page 1
newsPage 6 The Bulletin | February 23, 2012
Steve Huntsinger, junior health promotion major and a personal trainer at the ESU recreation center, helps his client Kara Wolford, senior administra-tive assistant for the English department, do stretching exercises. There are nine personal trainers at the Student Recreation Center. Lingzi Su/The Bulletin
Students get ‘personal’ with physical fitnessBrooke SchulTz
For Steely Davenport, senior health promotions major, helping others is the most rewarding thing about being a personal trainer.
“Watching peoples’ lives change is probably the best thing that I’ve witnessed,” Davenport said.
Davenport said she was very physically active in high school, and once she came to college, she began gaining weight during her freshman year. She then started working out more, lost weight and has continually been more active.
“I just wanted to show other people what the journey was like,” Davenport said.
Davenport has been a trainer at the campus recreation center for three years and is currently one its supervisors. She said that one of the many benefits of being a trainer is getting to use the facility so much and being up-to-date on all of the equipment.
“The whole gym atmosphere, I think, is a positive experience,” Davenport said.
Another trainer at the recreation center is Steve
Huntsinger, junior health promotions major. Huntsinger said that he has been a personal trainer at the recreation center for a year and currently has six clients, both students and faculty.
“I use a lot of circuit training, interval training,” Huntsinger said. “I just stress that this is a lifestyle. You have to be committed, you have to be consistent.”
Huntsinger said that what he finds most beneficial about being a personal trainer is seeing someone go through the change and being able to help them.
“If you want it, you just have to keep after it,” Huntsinger said.
Currently the recreation center has seven personal trainers on staff. Mike Wise, director of Recreation Services, said that the center is now looking to hire additional trainers. Students can sign up for a trainer free of charge, and the cost is included in a regular recreation center fee for faculty.
“Going in to the Christmas Break we had eight,” Wise said. “With the volume of people requesting the service, we have a long enough waiting list that we’re looking to hire two or three more.”
Wise said that when the facility first opened in 2000, there was only one personal trainer. As the interest has grown throughout the years, more trainers have been added to the staff.
“There are specific skill sets that we are looking for in personal trainers just to make sure that it’s a safe service offered to the students,” Wise said. “All the personal training staff that we have at this time are all health promotion majors through the university and are all upper classmen.”
Wise said that the department likes to give students the opportunity to gain practical experience, which will help them after they graduate from ESU.
“We kind of view our department as like a learning laboratory for several of the programs offered here on campus,” Wise said.
Davenport said that students who would like to take part in personal training can choose their own trainer by reading their biographies on the bulletin board in the recreation center. Then they need to fill out a request form at the front desk and a trainer will contact them to set up a time.
members jump in the event. Other Greek houses includ-
ed Alpha Sigma Alpha with 10 members and Sigma Tau Gamma with two members.
Taylor Bailey, freshmen elementary education major, said that she participates not only as part of her sorority’s philanthropic endeavors, but also because she has a brother who participates in the Special Olympics.
At last count, the event had raised $24,163, according to Jelinda Watts, Polar Plunge committee member. However, Watts also said that she expects that number to rise over the next week or two as more dona-tions are sent in.
The Polar Plunge was set up with the help of ESU’s football and soccer teams. Watts said that she wanted to extend her thanks to the teams for their assistance, both in setting up the tents and bleachers for the event, as well as helping with registration. She also said that the soccer team has helped con-sistently for the past three years and that both groups were a “tremendous help.”
“My father, his youngest son was developmentally disabled, so this is just something that I grew up understanding and knowing,” Watts said.
Watts also said that her favorite memory from her years working with the Polar Plunge is her first jump. This was Watts’ fifth year helping with the event, which is now in its sixth year.
Other groups that partici-pated in the Plunge included Longbine Auto, the Emporia Police Department, various groups from Emporia High and Detroit Diesel.
POLAR... from page 1
Members of the Polar Plunge committee dump buckets of ice into Mouse Lake Saturday afternoon. The weather was sunny and warm. Yiqing Fu/The Bulletin
‘Occupy’ to hold national conference in PhillyPHILADELPHIA (AP) — A
group of protesters affiliated with the Occupy Wall Street move-ment plans to elect 876 “delegates” from around the country and hold a national “general assembly” in Philadelphia over the Fourth of July as part of ongoing protests over corporate excess and economic inequality.
The group, dubbed the 99% Declaration Working Group, said Wednesday delegates would be selected during a secure online elec-tion in early June from all 50 states,
the District of Columbia and U.S. territories.
In a nod to their First Amendment rights, delegates will meet in Philadelphia to draft and ratify a “petition for a redress of grievances,” convening during the week of July 2 and holding a news conference in front of Independence Hall on the Fourth of July.
Any U.S. citizen or lawful per-manent resident who is 18 years of age or older may run as a non-partisan candidate for delegate,
according to Michael S. Pollok, an attorney who advised Occupy Wall Street protesters arrested on the Brooklyn Bridge last year and co-founded the working group.
“We feel it’s appropriate to go back to what our founding fathers did and have another petition con-gress,” Pollok said in an interview with The Associated Press. “We feel that following the footsteps of our founding fathers is the right way to go.”
In 1776, the Declaration of Independence was adopted by
the Continental Congress in Philadelphia and cited King George III’s failure to redress the grievances listed in colonial petitions as a rea-son to declare independence.
One man and one woman will be elected from each of the 435 congressional voting districts, according to Pollok, and they will meet in Philadelphia to deliber-ate, draft and ratify a “redress of grievances.” One delegate will also be elected to represent each of the U.S. territories.
Organizers won’t take a posi-
tion on what grievances should be included, Pollok said, but they will likely include issues like getting money out of politics, dealing with the foreclosure crisis and helping students handle loan debt.
Details of the conference are still being worked out, Pollok said, but organizers have paid for a venue in Philadelphia. Pollok would not identify the venue, but said it was “a major state-of-the art facility.” Pollok said the group planned to pay for the conference through donations.
Travel is goal for Soccer Clubrocky roBinSon
With nice weather on the way, the soccer club hopes to be back on the field soon to pre-pare for the fall season. Oladipo Olaonipekun, club president and sophomore information systems major, said his goal is to schedule games with other clubs around Kansas.
“Our biggest goal right now is to get games outside of Emporia,” Olaonipekun said. “Right now we are just trying to see how many players we can get for prac-tice. We are trying to find out how good we are and how far we can go.”
The club was created by for-mer president Emad Moqbel but did not receive recognition until late last year, and consequently was not able to schedule games with other soccer clubs. As the former secretary, Olaonipekun inherited the president’s job after representing Soccer Club to the Associated Student Government last year.
“We hope to have our roster and find league games by this fall,” Olaonipekun said. “Last semester we were supposed to play Salina, which is K-State, but they had to cancel. We were hop-ing to talk to them about getting into their league.”
Practices have been indoors at the Student Recreation Center due to the recent weather, but Olaonipekun said he hopes to move the practices outside soon, if the weather permits. The club practices Tuesdays and Fridays at
4:30 p.m.. “I just play for fun and
haven’t been on a team since I played for EHS (Emporia High School),” said Oscar Torres, fresh-man health promotions major. “I practice out here by myself a few times a week and heard about Soccer Club from one of my friends so I am hoping to join.”
The club has about 12 steady members that come to practice regularly, but Olaonipekun said anyone is invited to practice and the club has had numbers of about 20 show up to play. Olaonipekun said more people attend practice when the weather is better and practice is outside.
“I have been going to prac-tices acting as sort of a liaison for Gonzalo (Bruce), who is the advisor of the club,” said Stene Verhulst, assistant director of International Communication & Recruitment. “It is our job to make sure the club is on the right track. Recently we have been working with the rec center adviser to find a league we fit into. After that it will be all com-mitment from the players to take time out of their weekends to attend out-of town games.”
After doing a little on cam-pus advertising, Olaonipikun said more domestic students got involved in the club, making up over half of the steady members.
“Everybody is welcome to play,” Olaonipekun said. “We have people of all ethnicities come out and play, and when we scrimmage a lot of the interna-tional students that I play with regularly show up.”
Page 7The Bulletin |February 23, 2012 newsFaculty hone techniques in assessment forumkhaili ScarBrough
Emporia State faculty gathered in Webb Hall on Friday to better their teaching skills. The Faculty Assessment Forum featured a workshop lecture from author Linda Suskie, as well as a poster contest for faculty and students.
“(It) is an event that takes place every year that affords faculty an opportunity to learn about assessment from experts in the field,” said Anthony Ambrosio, director of the Assessment Teaching Enhancement Center.
Ambrosio said the forum is put together based on faculty input from surveys, as well as information gathered by ESU’s deans and assessment committee, who determine ESU’s need on campus. Then the enhancement center finds a speaker or workshop presenter to come in and address those needs.
Ambrosio said that ESU has had some of the top names in the field visit since the forums started in 2006.
“Faculty have a desire to promote student learning in their classroom and other environments, and it is very necessary to have the tools to do that,” Ambrosio said. “The
assessment forum gives them the opportunity to come in and learn about those tools.”
Suskie has been traveling and presenting for 10 years. She said her inspiration for her work goes back to a specific college faculty member. Friday’s workshop, “Understanding and Improving Student Learning,” was about teachers improving their teaching methods through grading.
“(The workshop was) about using all the information that faculty collect when they grade students’ tests, rubrics and projects,” Suskie said, “and using it not only to give grades to students, but also to reflect on what are students really learning well, what are we really proud of, what are some areas that we’d like to see students doing better in and talk about how we might make some improvements in those areas.”
In her presentation Suskie touched on points such as what success is, grading methods and how to reflect on students’ scores.
“We want every student here to get the best possible education. That is what Emporia is all about,” Suskie said. “You’ve got wonderfully dedicated teachers here, wonderfully dedicated faculty. I think we are going to find that a lot of faculty
Linda Suskie, an internationally recognized speaker, writer, educator and consultant on a broad variety of higher education assessment topics, speaks on “Understanding & Improving Student Learning.” The Assessment Forum was held last Friday in Webb Lecture Hall. Lingzi Su/The Bulletin
really are already doing this and that they just didn’t realize it.”
After the presentation, faculty and students were given an opportunity to present in a poster contest. Qiang Shi, assistant professor of math, received first place and $1000, Peggy Lane, Nicole Skala and Bill Barnes received second place and $750, and Jerry Liss and Susan Anderson received third place and $500.
“I think these posters reflect
the high quality of many ESU academic programs and reflect ESU faculty’s commitment to keep improving student learning,” Shi said. “I am truly honored and humbled to receive an award on one of the two posters I presented. I am glad that the judges and other colleagues recognized my work.”
Shi said that his winning poster presented the results of a 6-year long assessment on the math freshman seminar.
Garden City approves support of Amtrak route
GARDEN CITY (AP) — Garden City Commissioners are offering symbolic and financial sup-port to help persuade Amtrak to keep running a route through south-west Kansas and southeast Colorado, rather than beginning an alternative route that would not stop in most of the region.
The commissioners on Tuesday approved a resolution asking Amtrak to maintain the Southwest Chief’s route between Chicago and Los Angeles, which passes through Topeka, Newton, Hutchinson, Dodge City and Garden City. Lamar and La Junta, Colo., have adopted resolutions similar to Garden City’s.
The commission also approved spending up to $20,000 to help pay for federal lobbying efforts to keep the current route, The Garden City Telegram reported.
Amtrak is considering an alter-native route that would run south of Newton through the Texas Panhandle to New Mexico, citing conflicts with BNSF Railway over the condition of the tracks Amtrak uses in Kansas. It would cost an esti-mated $111 million in immediate costs and $300 million over the next decade to completely repair the lines, which would be feasible only for the federal government, City Manager Matt Allen told commissioners.
The alternative route would also bypass several southeast Colorado cities and at least one New Mexico city, Allen said.
“We’re fans of passenger rail. The communities west of Newton, we
have the highest levels of ridership,” Allen said. “Keeping passenger rail service is keeping it alive for freight rail, as well. ... We need freight rail options for industries we have and industries we want to recruit.”
Amtrak representatives said the costs of repairs and maintenance of BNSF’s rail are a “moving target” and they continue to talk with rep-resentatives from BNSF about the route.
“We have no plans to move and we have no desire to move,” said Marc Magliari, a spokesman from Amtrak’s Chicago office. “(BNSF’s) preference is that we move, but we don’t wish to. ... Their freight network is constantly shifting, and there’s a lot of unresolved issues.”
Magliari said symbolic support from communities such as Garden City is “helpful,” as Amtrak con-tinues to negotiate with BNSF and state agencies such as the Kansas Department of Transportation and Colorado Department of Transportation.
The $20,000 expense would help pay expenses for a Southwest Kansas Coalition, made up of offi-cials from Dodge City, Liberal and Garden City, to lobby on behalf of Amtrak.
Allen told commissioners that Alston & Bird, a Washington, D.C.-based legal firm, has offered communities in the three states’ legal representation at $12,000 per month. Former Kansas Sen. Bob Dole is a principal partner with the firm and offered to waive his fee for personal representation.
Kansas attracts 5 bidders for 3 Medicaid contracts
TOPEKA (AP) — Kansas offi-cials announced Wednesday that five companies have submitted bids for three contracts to manage Medicaid, but skeptics of Gov. Sam Brownback’s plan to over-haul the state’s $2.9 billion-a-year program saw it as another sign of potential problems.
The bidders all are out-of-state companies or Kansas affiliates of out-of-state firms. Potential con-tractors are being asked to provide managed care programs for the poor, disabled and elderly Kansans covered by Medicaid, while con-trolling costs for the state and improving the overall health of participants.
Brownback’s efforts to over-haul Medicaid represent the first time the state has attempted to cover the disabled and the elderly, including those in nursing homes, with a managed-care program. His administration expects to issue the contracts this summer, have them start Jan. 1, 2013, and have each company operate statewide so Medicaid participants have a choice of coverage.
“We are encouraged by such broad interest and quality bid-ders,” Lt. Gov. Jeff Colyer, a sur-geon who led the team developing the Medicaid plan, said in a state-ment.
Some legislators in both parties and advocates for the needy, dis-abled and elderly have questioned whether the Republican governor is moving too quickly. They’re skeptical that private companies can make an adequate profit while fulfilling the administration’s goals.
Sen. Dick Kelsey, a Goddard Republican who has called on the administration to delay the contracts for six months, said he expected more bidders. Initially, 15 companies expressed enough interest to send representatives to a mandatory conference for potential bidders in December, and Kelsey called five bidders “not very many.”
“It suggests that there are more problems with the situation than what is being acknowledged,” Kelsey said.
But House Majority Leader Arlen Siegfreid, an Olathe Republican, said five bidders are more than enough to provide a competitive selection process. And, in the past, the state has struggled to attract interest from potential managed-care contrac-tors because its market is relatively small, compared with other states’.
“It suggests that people who are bidders see this as good for them and, hopefully, good for the state,” Siegfreid said.
The bidders include Amerigroup Corp., of Virginia Beach, Va., and United Healthcare, of Minneapolis, Minn.
Another bidder is Coventry Health Care of Kansas, based in Wichita, affiliated with Coventry Health Care, of Bethesda, Md. The state also received a bid from Sunflower State Health Plan, of Topeka, a subsidiary of Centene Corp., of St. Louis. Also among the bidders is WellCare of Kansas, affiliated with WellCare Health Plans Inc., based in Tampa, Fla.
Some legislators were disap-pointed that Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas, the state’s largest health insurer, did not submit a bid. Blue Cross officials announced earlier this month that the company wouldn’t, say-ing the decision wasn’t a criticism of the Medicaid overhaul but an acknowledgement that participat-ing would require Blue Cross to make major changes in its business model by next year.
Sen. Laura Kelly, of Topeka, the ranking Democrat on the budget-writing Senate Ways and Means Committee, said the number of bidders indicates that companies could have difficulty living with the requirements of the contracts.
Romney, Santorum swap charges in fiery 20th debateMESA, Ariz. (AP) — Primed
for a fight, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum swapped heated accusations about the health care, earmarks and federal bailouts Wednesday night in the 20th and possibly final debate of the roller-coaster race for the Republican presidential nomination.
Texas Rep. Ron Paul chimed in, saying with a smile that Santorum was a fake conservative who had voted for programs that he now says he wants to repeal.
With pivotal primaries in Arizona and Michigan six days distant, the most animated clash of the evening focused on health care.
Santorum, surging in the presi-
dential race, said that Romney had used government funds to “fund a federal takeover of health care in Massachusetts,” a reference to the state law that was enacted dur-ing Romney’s term as governor. The law includes a requirement for individuals to purchase cover-age that is similar to the one in President Barack Obama’s land-mark federal law that Romney and other Republicans have vowed to repeal.
In rebuttal, Romney said Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator, bore responsibility for passage of the health care law that Obama won from a Democratic-controlled Congress in 2010, even
though he wasn’t in office at the time. He said that in a primary battle in 2004, Santorum had sup-ported then-Sen. Arlen Specter, who later switched parties and voted for the law Obama wanted.
“He voted for Obamacare. If you had not supported him, if we had said no to Arlen Specter, we would not have Obamacare,” Romney contended.
Santorum was the aggressor on bailouts.
While all four of the Republicans on the debate stage opposed the federal bailout of the auto industry in 2008 and 2009, Santorum said he had voted against other government-funded rescue
efforts.“With respect to Governor
Romney that was not the case, he supported the folks on Wall Street and bailed out Wall Street — was all for it — and when it came to the auto workers and the folks in Detroit, he said no. That to me is not a principled consistent posi-tion.”
The debate had a different look from the 19 that preceded it. Instead of standing behind lecterns, the four presidential rivals sat in chairs lined up side by side.
There was another difference, as well, in the form of polls that underscored the gains that Obama has made in his bid for re-election.
Page 8 February 23, 2012
Ben Jacks throws a pitch to a Loper hitter
Emporia uses big inning to sweep the Lopers
Sport Shorts
The Emporia State baseball team has moved up one spot in this week’s American Baseball Coaches Associa-tion Poll. The Hornets join Central Missouri as the only other MIAA team in the poll as the Mules dropped from #1 to #3 this week.
ESU’s streak of being ranked in the nation’s top 25 is now pushed to 36 straight weeks. The Hornets and Mules are still the top two South Central Region teams coming in ahead of #11 St. Mary’s, #20 Harding and #30 Tarleton State.
Hornet baseball moves to #7 in ABCA Poll
Emporia State baseball’s Ashton McCoy was named the South Central Regional Hitter of the Week by the National Col-legiate Baseball Writers Association. He is the second Hornet to win the award, after Dillon Hazlett won last year.
McCoy hit .385 with seven runs driven in and two stolen bases. In the first game against Nebraska-Kearney, he was two for four with two runs batted in, a double and one run.
In the second game, he was one for four. In the third, he was two for five and drove in five runs, including a two run triple. His two stolen bases tied for the team lead, and his seven RBI is also leading the squad. He also had several strong defensive plays from his shortstop position.
Hornet wins Regional Hitter of Week
The Emporia State Lady Hornets dropped two spots in this week’s ESPN/USA Today/WBCA National Top 25, checking in at #22 this week. This is the 201st poll the Lady Hornets have been in since first appearing in the 1997-98 preseason poll.
ESU has received votes in 218 of the 222 polls since then. The Lady Hornets are one of three MIAA teams in this week’s Top 25 with one more team receiving votes. A total of six teams from the South Central Region are ranked in the top 25, with four more teams receiving votes this week.
Lady Hornets continue streak in top 25
A representative from Rock Springs will be in the Union February 1, 2012!
Rock Springs 4-H Center, a nationally recognized Camp and Conference Center, is seeking 45-50 Summer
Staff employees for the coming summer. Must be energetic, enjoy working with youth and spending time
outdoors. Most positions are for recreation instructors in areas including teambuilding, horses, environmental
education, rifles, trap, archery, canoes, crafts, disc golf, and lifeguards. Positions are also available in foodservice,
maintenance and custodial departments.
Located south of Junction City, Kansas on the edge of the Flint Hills. Rock Springs, in addition to salary, housing
and meals, provides staff with free wireless internet, free laundry services, use of the activities when groups are not
in session, friendships to last a lifetime and the opportunity to make an impact on the lives of youth that will last
beyond your lifetime.
For an application please visit our website at www.rocksprings.net or for more
information you can contact Megan Page at [email protected] or 785-257-3221.
Summer
Jobs!
Internships with SALARY!
On-site Housing!
All Meals
Provided!
Feburary 28-29
For full coverage of last night’s games, visit our website at esubulletin.com.
Senior forward Kayla Krueger cheers on her fellow teammates as they play against Washburn last night at White Auditorium. The Lady Hornets came up short by one point, losing 52-53Yo Han Kim/The Bulletin
Hornets fall to Icabods
Senior forward and center Troy Pierce fights against Ichabod defenders for a layup last night at White Auditorium. The Hornets fell to the Bods, 60-68. Yo Han Kim/The Bulletin
