Thursday, November 4, 2010

Vol. 45 Issue No. 7

Facing the Music p. 12

p. 12
 Thursday, November 4, 2010
STAFF
Editors-in-Chief
Jenny Cain
Public Discourse
Arianna Puopolo
Who do you trust more, Steven Colbert and Jon Stewart, or real-life politicians?
Managing Editors
Rod Bastanmehr
Julia Reis Compiled by BELA MESSEX & NICK PARIS
Copy
Melinda Széll, chief
Molly Kossoff
Mimi Stroud
Grace Watson

Production
Hilli Ciavarello, design director
Rachel Adams
Emily Chisholm
Tess Goodwin

Campus News
Julie Eng, editor
Ryan Mark-Griffin, editor
Rosa Arce
James Austin
Dana Burd “Stewart and Colbert, because, unlike politicians, “Colbert, because he’s factual and satirical.”
Rosa Casteneda they don’t pretend to be religious.”
Kara Foran

City News DUSTIN WINSLOW KILEY DOANE

Sarah Naugle, editor GRADUATE STUDENT SECOND-YEAR, STEVENSON
Rosie Spinks, editor EARTH SCIENCES ASTROPHYSICS
Nicole Pritchard
Susan Sun
Mikaela Todd
Rosanna Van Straten

Sports
Joey Bien-Kahn, editor
Natalia Equihua
Asa Hess-Matsumoto

Arts and Entertainment

Alejandro Trejo, editor
Veronica Glover
Chelsea Hawkins

Politics and Culture

Blair Stenvick, editor
Stephanie Meade
Maja Vojnovic

Web “Stewart and Colbert, because they are interested “Stewart and Colbert, because they’re not trying to
Timothy Lindvall II, developer in raising awareness, while politicians are get elected.”
Photo/Illustration
interested in politics.”
Rachel Edelstein, editor SARAH JONES
Morgan Grana, editor MAXIMILIAN ROSA GRADUATE STUDENT
Isaac Miller, editor THIRD-YEAR, COLLEGE TEN PLANETARY SCIENCES
Andrew Allio
Scott Haupenthal, videographer
ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES AND ECONOMICS
Louise Leong
Bela Messex
Nick Paris
Molly Solomon
About Us
Rosanna Van Straten City on a Hill Press is produced by and for UCSC students.
Pat Yeung Our primary goal is to report and analyze issues affecting the
Precott Watson
student population and the Santa Cruz community.
Advertising We also serve to watchdog the politics of the UC administra- Contact
Ryan Ayers, manager tion. While we endeavor to present multiple sides of a story, we General Editorial Business
Alex Lattin realize our own outlooks influence the presentation of the news.
Prescott Watson (831) 459-2430 (831) 459-4350
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The opinions expressed in this paper do not necessarily reflect
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2 cityonahillpress.com
Thursday, November 4, 2010

Table of Contents
4 Cowell Dining Hall Nationally Recognized for Sustainability
by ROSANNA VAN STRATEN

5 Linguistics Professors Honored for Academic Achievement

by ROSA CASTAÑEDA

6 Dressed to Impress, Santa Cruz Trick-or-Treaters Celebrate

the City’s Most Popular Holiday in Safety
by SUSAN SUN

7 Event Calendar: What’s New in Santa Cruz

compiled by Tess GOODWIN

8 Local Farmers and Environmentalists Oppose Use of New,

Carcinogenic Pesticide on Local Fields
by ROSIE SPINKS

10 New Equestrian Coach Takes the Reigns to Help Team
Find Its Stride
by NATALIA EQUIHUA

11 Surfing Protégé Rides Wave of Success

by NATALIA EQUIHUA

12 Music Department Struggles to be Heard Above the Din

of Budget Deficit
by MIKAELA TODD

Molly Solomon

The Few, the Proud, the Slugs 14

by ASA HESS-MATSUMOTO

Through Our Lens 16

by ISAAC MILLER

Special Collection Spotlights the ‘Human Condition’ 19

by VERONICA GLOVER

California Has Spoken: Election Results 20

by BLAIR STENVICK
&
MAJA VOJNOVIC

A Giants Fan Tips Her Glass to the 2010 Champs 21

by JULIA REIS

Be Kind, Remind: Why the Video Store Matters 22

by ROD BASTANMEHR

Editorial: Of Puns and Pundits 23
Who the Hell 24
by JULIA REIS & MORGAN GRANA Prescott Watson

Cover photos by Andrew Allio

cityonahillpress.com 3
Campus
Colleges Compete to Win
‘Greenest’ Title
LEED certification of Cowell Dining Hall
kicks off 3-week conservation competition
By Rosanna van Straten
City Reporter
UC Santa Cruz is the 11th “greenest” college in the
nation, according to a ranking released by the Sierra Club
in August. On Monday, the university held the first ever
Sustainability and Resource Fair at Cowell College.
The event, which was sponsored by the Sustainability
Office, featured over 30 campus environmental organiza-
tions and a presentation by Chancellor George Blumen-
thal, who officially declared the new Cowell Dining Hall
a silver LEED-certified green building. LEED certifica-
tion, which stands for Leadership in Environmental and
Energy Design, is an internationally recognized green
building certification and has four different levels: certi-
fied, silver, gold and platinum.
Blumenthal is the first UCSC chancellor to declare
sustainability a priority in his two-year plan. The crowd
listened as he explained the importance of sustainability
on the UCSC campus.
“It is truly a mark of distinction, nationwide and
worldwide,” he said. “It says something about who we are
and what we are as a campus.”
Cowell Dining Hall is the second building on campus
to be LEED-certified, and one of the 12,000 LEED-
certified buildings in the country. Steps toward achieving
certification included maximizing natural light, conserv-
ing water, minimizing and composting waste, using com-
puterized ovens to save energy and installing completely
recycled and recyclable carpet and countertops.
The next campus buildings to be LEED-certified in-
clude several buildings at Porter, the biomedical sciences
4 cityonahillpress.com
Thursday, November 4, 2010
facility and the Student Health Center.
The crowd cheered when Blumenthal announced news
about the McHenry Library renovations, which will
feature an environmentally-friendly addition.
“When the new section of the library opens, there will
even be solar panels on the roof,” Blumenthal said.
The Sustainability and Resource Fair also served as the
kick-off for the COOL Campus Competition, a three-
week event with 40 universities competing to reduce
their resource consumption. UCSC is adding an inter-
college aspect to the competition, with Kresge, Porter,
Cowell and Stevenson each vying for the title of the most
energy-efficient.
The competition is sponsored by the Student Environ-
mental Organization, the Green Campus Group and the
Rosanna van Straten
Sustainability Office.
Cameron Fields, one of the event’s main organizers, CHANCELLOR GEORGE BLUMENTHAL reveals a
described the competition process, as well as the outreach LEED plaque in recognition of Cowell Dining Hall’s
effort, intended to promote participation. certification as a green building. The presentation of
“Meters have been installed in each of the four col- the plaque was part of the Sustainability and Resource
leges to measure their water and electricity usage,” Fields Fair on Monday.
said, “and students can check online to see how they
are doing, as it updates their electricity usage live and goes,” Fields said. “But I feel really positive about it, and
their water usage weekly. We’ve been tabling at colleges, students seem to as well. Raffles will be held for the next
knocking on students’ doors and posting flyers to try to three weeks as the competition continues. Students can
get students involved.” win iPods and other gadgets.”
The installation of the meters cost the school approxi- Blumenthal expressed his intent to further UCSC’s
mately $17,000 — including the cost of labor and the sustainable and environmentally friendly reputation and
setting up the website. Fields said that, although the cost reiterated the positive effects that the LEED certification
is high, the awareness that could come as a result of this will have in the future.
competition will outweigh the expense. “Thirty-two percent less lighting will be used, due to
“As this is a pilot event, it’s the first time we are do- computerized lights that adjust as the light changes in the
ing something like this, [and] we’ll have to see how it building,” he said, “and 62 percent less heating.”
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Linguistics Professors Receive
Honorable Recognition
Ladusaw and McCloskey made fellows of the Linguistics Society of America
By Rosa Castañeda
Campus Reporter
Studied through fields such as an-
thropology and computer science, used
in court cases, politics and in practically
every field imaginable, linguistics — or the
science of language — is incorporated into
almost every discipline.
When interim humanities dean Wil-
liam Ladusaw and linguistics professor
James McCloskey sat together in their
graduate-level historical linguistics class
at the University of Texas more than three
decades ago, they never imagined that one
day they would teach at the same institu-
tion, write research papers together and
receive acceptance into the Linguistics
Society of America.
The LSA was founded in 1924 to
advance the scientific study of human lan-
guage. Its goals are to further research in
linguistics and keep the broader linguistics
community informed through publica-
tions, presentation and discussion. The
organization has over 5,000 members, all
of whom were nominated and selected to
gain membership into the organization.
Ladusaw was born and brought up in
Louisville, Ky., where he got his B.A. in
linguistics at the University of Kentucky.
Linguistics was a much less widely
studied field at this time, Ladusaw said.
“When I started, it was a rather odd
thing to be a linguistics major,” he said.
“Most people in high school had never
heard the word,” he said.
Ladusaw recalls that the majority of
people at the time thought of linguistics as
grammar.
 He obtained his master’s degree in
computational linguistics and his doctor-
ate in semantics at the University of Texas.
This branch of linguistics, which stud-
ies meaning in relation to structure, was a
fairly novel field of study when Ladusaw
was in school.
 “At the time we were in graduate
school, semantics was the relatively newer
field in linguistics,” he said. “Traditionally
[it had] been part of philosophy.”
 Ladusaw said that semantics unmasks
how a person understands language.
Campus
“The reality is that what you under-
stand the meaning of something to be
is a very complicated interaction between
what you know in virtue of knowing your
language and what you can infer based on
reasoning about the fact that somebody
said that to you in that context.”
Ladusaw started teaching linguistics
at UCSC in 1984 and says that the major
has definitely “matured,” especially after
extending the field to a graduate program
in the late ’80s. Prescott Watson Photo Courtesy of James McCloskey
 His colleague McCloskey — who
came to UCSC in 1988 — focuses on
INTERIM HUMANITIES DEAN William Ladusaw (left) and linguistics professor
syntax, which is the study of principles
Jim McCloskey (right) were recently elected Fellows of the Linguistics Society of
and rules of the structure of sentences. The
America. Ladusaw focuses on semantics, the branch of linguistics that deals with
relationship between syntax and semantics
meaning, and McCloskey’s focuses is syntax, which studies the structure of lan-
— structure requires meaning, and mean-
guage. During their teaching careers, linguistics has expanded from a small study
ing requires structure — has allowed Mc-
to a large, well-known field.
Closkey and Ladusaw to work together.
Born in Ireland, McCloskey obtained
his first degree in linguistics at University
College Dublin and his doctoral degree at
the University of Texas. His dissertation
and career focus is on the syntax of the
Irish language.
McCloskey’s teaching career began at
University College Dublin in 1979 while
holding visiting appointments at the Mas-
sachusetts Institute of Technology and
UC San Diego. He spent a year as a fellow
of the Center for Advanced Study in the
Behavioral Sciences at Stanford before
becoming a professor at UCSC.
Currently, McCloskey is in Ireland for
sabbatical leave and conducting research
in the syntax of the Irish language. He
could not be reached for comment.
His webpage outlines his career
interests and the slow death of the Irish
language.
“I am necessarily and sadly interested
in issues of language death, language ex-
tinction and language revival,” McCloskey
said on his webpage.
 Both Ladusaw and McCloskey will be
officially recognized as part of the LSA
at the annual meeting in Pittsburgh in
January 2011.
cityonahillpress.com 5
City
Halloween Draws Major Crowds, Minimal Law Violations
Downtown law enforcement presence works to reduce crime during annual celebration
By Susan Sun
City Reporter
Marilyn Monroe, Neytiri, Bob Marley, Pikachu and
the Little Mermaid danced to the impromptu beats of a
drum circle on closed-off Pacific Avenue. People on stilts
towered over the crowd and a group of zombies per-
formed choreographed dance moves to Michael Jackson’s
“Thriller,” blasting from a boombox.
Thousands took to the streets of downtown Santa
Cruz on Halloween night — and helicopters, gang spe-
cialists and over a hundred police officers joined them.
Zach Friend, spokesman for the Santa Cruz Police
Department, said the turnout on Halloween has grown
exponentially over the past six or seven years.
“Halloween night is the largest unsanctioned event
we have in Santa Cruz,” Friend said. “This isn’t an official
organized Santa Cruz event. We usually have up to about
25,000 people here downtown on Halloween night,
which is about half the city’s population — in one square
mile.”
Police made 40 arrests this year, 32 of which were for
public intoxication. Other charges included drug posses-
sion, violation of parole and battery.
Santa Cruz resident Mark Ruiz, who attended the
event, said Halloween is “pretty crazy.”
“Pacific Avenue is generally pretty safe, but the side
streets are where things get shady,” Ruiz said. “I definitely
suggest walking in a group, because it can be very danger-
ous when you’re running solo, especially for a girl.”
6 cityonahillpress.com
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Public intoxication and rowdy crowds were common- ment presence lessened crime downtown on Halloween
place, but there were no reported cases of shootings or night. Attendees said they appreciated being able to feel
stabbings this year. There were seven gang-related stab- secure.
bings on Halloween of 2006 and two on the Halloween “This is my first Halloween at downtown Santa Cruz,”
of 2007. first-year Juliet Ulibarri said. “The vibes are really good
Over the last couple of years, police forces have from everyone, and I haven’t felt any sense of danger at
stepped up enforcement to maintain public safety, aug- any point of the night. I feel secure with the fact that
menting the security budget for the event to $60,000, up there are so many police officers roaming around every-
from about $40,000 last year. where.”
Costs cover lighting, police overtime and other ex-
penses for what is essentially one large downtown party.
This year, according to Friend, actual costs ran between
$45,000 and $50,000.
“Every police agency in the county is providing law
officers to patrol this event,” Friend said on Halloween.
“We have over 100 officers that are here tonight, which
includes probation and parole agents. We also bring in
some gang specialists from Santa Clara County and the
Salinas area.”
Police officers patrolled the premises all evening, at-
tempting to prevent violence before it could take place.
This year, the focus was on removing possible threats
before problems began. A unanimous motion by city
council allowed police to issue triple fine tickets to dis-
courage law violations. Molly Solomon
“If we see someone that’s intoxicated who may become THOUSANDS OF TRICK-OR-TREATERS flocked to
an issue, we get them off the street early before it rolls downtown Santa Cruz for the unofficial holiday last
into something else,” Friend said. “If you’re caught with Sunday. The city spent more than $45,000 on security
an open container, it’ll cost you about $500 tonight, so be measures for the event, including salaries for gang
sure to put your beers away.” specialists and over a hundred police officers.
The preventative measures and increased law enforce-
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Event Calendar
CITY
Thursday, Nov. 4
• Film: “Race to Nowhere.” Rio Theatre. 7 p.m.
• Free Concert: Paul Contos Quartet. Kuumbwa
Jazz Center. 7 p.m. $12 in advance, $15 at door.
• Film: “Race Against the Sky 2010.” Regal Cin-
ema 9. 8:30 p.m.
• Concert: Old Man Markley, Forrest Day, West
Nile Ramblers. The Catalyst. 9 p.m. $6 in advance,
$9 at door. Ages 21 and up.
• Concert: John Cragie, Patrick Cooper, Eliza
Rickman. The Crêpe Place. 9 p.m. $8.
Friday, Nov. 5
• Film: “MINE.” Rio Theatre. 7:30 p.m. $15 in
advance, $20 at door.
• Benefit: Lacy J. Dalton peformance benefit-
ting Second Harvest Food Bank. Kuumbwa Jazz
Center. 8 p.m. $21 in advance, $25 at door.
• Performance: Cheech and Chong. “Get it
Legal.” Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium. 8 p.m. $34
to 60.
• Concert: Steel Pulse, Lloyd Brown. The Cata-
lyst. 9 p.m. $26 in advance, $30 at door.
• Concert: John Miller & Jean Louise, Poor
Bailey, Electric Leaves. The Crêpe Place. 9 p.m. $8
in advance, $10 at door.
• Film: “Ed Wood. “Del Mar Theatre. 11:59 p.m.
$6.50. Event repeats Nov. 6.
Saturday, Nov. 6
• Festival: Sea Glass and Ocean Art. Coconut
Grove, Santa Cruz. 10 a.m. $3.
• Concert: Gala Gourd Evening. Kuumbwa Jazz
Center. 8 p.m. $15.
• Concert: Ribsy’s Nickel, Flea. The Catalyst. 9
p.m. $5. Ages 21 and up.
• Concert: Hillstomp, McDougall, The Drops.
The Crêpe Place. 9 p.m. $10. Event repeats Nov. 7.
Sunday, Nov. 7
• Concert: Archie Fisher. Kuumbwa Jazz Center.
7 p.m. $19.
• Concert: Sublime with Rome., Sexrat The
Catalyst. 8 p.m. $44 in advance, $49 at door. Ages
21+.
Monday, Nov. 8
• Concert: The Jeff Lorber Fusion. Kuumbwa
Jazz Center. 7 & 9 p.m. $25 in advance, $28 at
door. 9 p.m., half-price for students.
• Concert: Sublime with Rome; Sexrat. The
Catalyst. 8 p.m. $44 in advance, $49 at door. Ages
16 and up.
• Concert: Kisses. The Crêpe Place. 9 p.m.
Tuesday, Nov. 9
• Concert: Stars. Rio Theatre. 8 p.m. $18.
• Concert: The Supervillains; Ballyhoo!; Pour
Habit. The Catalyst. 9 p.m. $10 in advance, $14 at
door.
Event Calendar
Wednesday, Nov. 10
• Weekly: Downtown Farmers’ Market. Between
Cedar Street & Lincoln Street. 2:30 to 6:30 p.m.
• Community meeting: “Desalination Marine
Issues, Solutions and the Environmental Review
Process.” Louden Nelson Community Center. 6:30
to 9 p.m.
• Class: What Jazz Students Should Know with
Paul Contos. Kuumbwa Jazz Center. 7 p.m. Free.
• Performance: Open Mic Night. Gadgetbox
Studios. 7 to 9:30 p.m. $1-5 donation suggested.
• Concert: Borgore, Downlink Getter, Skriptah,
Rate P. The Catalyst. 8 p.m. $28.
CAMPUS
Thursday, Nov. 04
• Author reading: Irene Reti. Bay Tree Bookstore.
12 to 1 p.m. Free.
• Author reading: Ed Lin. Humanities building.
6 to 7 p.m. Free.
Friday, Nov. 5
• Performance: In the Waves. Theater Arts Sec-
ond Stage. 7 to 9 p.m. $11 to 12. Event continues
until Nov. 14. See santacruztickets.com for addi-
tional dates and times.
Saturday, Nov. 6
• Class: Underwater Robotics Workshop. Sey-
mour Center at Long Marine Lab. 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Free.
• Film: “A Night of Fun and Film.” Media
Theater. 6 to 9 p.m.
Monday, Nov. 8
• Daylight Savings ends. Clocks switch back an
hour. 2 a.m.
• Meeting: Friends of the Farm and Garden.
UCSC Farm Center. 5:30 to 8 p.m.
• Performance: Poetry Slam. Cowell College
Fireside Lounge. 8 to 10 p.m. Free.
Tuesday, Nov. 9
• Informational: Masters in Education Teaching
Credential Program Information Night. Alumni
Room, University Center, above College 9/10
Dining Hall. 7 to 9 p.m. Free.
Wednesday, Nov. 10
• Discussion: “Collaborative Printmaking.” Digi-
tal Arts Research Center, Room 308. 6 to 8 p.m.
Free.
• Performance: Open Mic Night. Porter Dining
Hall Mezzanine. 8:30 to 10:30 p.m.
Compiled by Tess Goodwin
cityonahillpress.com 7
City Thursday, November 4, 2010

Watsonville
Community
Opposes
Registration
of New
Pesticide

Local farming communities await a

decision on methyl iodide
Molly Solomon
STRAWBERRIES ARE a lucrative cash crop, ideal for the mild and cool mediterranean climate of the Central Coast. Soil fumigants like methyl bromide increase yields
while risking the health of farm laborers and locals exposed to the carcinogen. The California Department of Pesticide Regulation is reviewing the registration of a new
pesticide for strawberry production, methyl iodide, but opponents have criticized the new chemical as even more carcinogenic than methyl bromide.

By Rosie Spinks
City Editor

Strawberry production on the Central Coast is part of a $2 billion industry.

Of all the strawberries grown in the United States, 88 percent of the crop is grown in California, with
roughly 50 percent coming from the Watsonville, Salinas and Santa Cruz areas alone.
In the next few months, the Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) is poised to make a decision
on the registration of a new pesticide called methyl iodide. While the Environmental Protection Agency
has already approved the chemical at the federal level, local agricultural communities are demonstrating
a resistance to the new pesticide at the state level because of its dangerous health effects on schools and
residential neighborhoods nearby.

Ramiro Medrano is a grassroots organizer with the Brown
Berets, a youth empowerment and education program in Watson-
ville. He is part of an effort to educate the local community, which
largely comprises farm workers and their families, about the new
pesticide.
“The students are the ones who are most interested in this, be-
cause many of them go to school near these fields,” Medrano said.
“We tell them about the dangers, and they feel the responsibility
to take this on through educating their parents and their student
bodies about pesticides and methyl iodide.”
If approved, methyl iodide will replace the widely-used methyl
bromide, a chemical that is being phased out due to its deleterious
effects on the ozone layer, putting it in violation of the interna-
tional Montreal Protocol of 1992. Both the new and old pesti-
cides are soil fumigants, which means they are applied to the soil
before the crop is planted in order to sterilize it and kill any weeds,
organisms or other organic matter that might impede growth of
the crop.
Critics cite the potential health effects of the new pesticide as
the reason it should not be registered. Methyl iodide is a known
carcinogen under Proposition 65, according to a report compiled
by Susan E. Kegley, a consulting scientist for the Pesticide Action
Network. It is four times more neurotoxic than methyl bromide,
and up to 3.5 times more acutely toxic than methyl bromide.

8 cityonahillpress.com
Thursday, November 4, 2010

City
The DPR commissioned two teams of scientists, some from within
the department itself, along with eight independently contracted
scientists, to review the toxicity of the chemical. California Watch,
which is part of the Center for Investigative Reporting, reported that
after receiving the scientists’ findings, the DPR then set the level of
exposure 196 times higher than what their own scientists had recom-
mended.
The California Strawberry Commission (CSC), which is based in
Watsonville, represents a conglomeration of 600 growers, shippers and
processors in California. Its members include both conventional and
organic farmers, who pay 3.5 cents per tray of strawberries to fund
research.
Carolyn O’Donnell, the communications director for the CSC,
explained that the commission is waiting for the DPR to “complete
their regulatory process” before taking a stance on methyl iodide.
However, she did say that of the $13 million in research that the CSC
invested in finding an alternative to methyl bromide, much of it was
devoted to non-pesticide alternatives.
“The commission is looking into the future,” O’Donnell said.
“Research devoted to farming without fumigants gives strawberry
growers more options for sustainable ways to grow strawberries. There
are a variety of potential solutions, and they are not a one-size-fits-all
approach.”
Local assembly member Bill Monning is opposed to the registra-
tion of methyl iodide, and he is working with the community in the
Watsonville area to prevent registration of the chemical. Monning’s
dedication to this issue comes from his former work as an attorney for
the United Farm Workers’ Union, in which he was involved in litiga-
tion on pesticide-poisoning cases.
Monning explained that the DPR was designed to be a bit more
free-standing than the federal Department of Food and Agriculture,
but it still has various interests to represent and sometimes does not
take real-world farming practices into account.
“The department is charged with making objective and rational
decisions based on science, but it’s also a balancing act of balancing
Photos by Prescott Watson
the interests of agriculture and public safety concerns,” Monning said.
“You can have certain standards and requirements listed on a label,
but in the field, people don’t always follow the requirements. You have
wind, you have tarps that fail. You have to factor in human error at
some level.”
The education effort in Watsonville that Medrano and Monning
are part of includes community town halls, pesticide awareness clubs
in high schools, petitions and an effort to get local school boards and
city councils to adopt a resolution formally opposing the registration
of the chemical.
Last week, the Pajaro Valley Unified School District was the first
school board to adopt a resolution against the registration of methyl
iodide. School leaders emphasized the need for more scientific re-
search on the pesticide before it is used in fields that abut numerous
Watsonville school grounds.
While the school board’s actions represent a victory, Medrano said,
he expressed some frustration at the fact that those most affected
most by the issue — farm workers themselves — are the hardest to
reach.
“A couple of farmers at our last forum showed us their hands, WITH THE HELP of soil fumigants like methyl bromide increas-
and some of them didn’t have any [finger]nails because of exposure ing yields, the Central Coast produces 88 percent of strawberries
to pesticides. That, or their skin was very deteriorated because of the in the United States. Strawberry production in the Santa Cruz
same exposure,” Medrano said. “A lot of them, unfortunately, also have and Watsonville area is one of the highest per land area in the
a very low education. Unless we go out there and inform them, they country. Local farms are visible from over 4,000 feet in the air.
don’t know much about the danger.”
When it comes to an alternative to methyl bromide and methyl io-
dide, both Monning and Medrano stated that they personally believe focus should be on more, smaller growing operations and fewer large
organic agriculture is the answer. However, Medrano conceded, it is ones, as well as selecting more resilient varieties of the crop to grow.
probably not possible to produce the amount of strawberries grown “The varieties of strawberries that have been used since methyl
on the Central Coast without the use of fumigants. bromide have zero [natural] resistance to diseases,” Gliessman said.
“I don’t know if that’s a bad thing,” Medrano said. “A lot of these “Growers have been selecting varieties based on the [quantity of ] fruit
environmental agriculture jobs are very dangerous to the workers and
they produce, and not on their ability to resist disease, because they
the community.” didn’t need it.”
Steve Gliessman is a UC Santa Cruz environmental studies Gliessman cited the enormous economic investment that straw-
professor whose work as a farmer, author and teacher is centered on berry farmers take on as part of the reason why using pesticides in
agroecology and sustainable food systems. production can be so tempting to a grower.
Gliessman said that while implementing more sustainable meth- “There is so much risk in strawberry production: $25,000 to
ods of farming strawberries might mean a reduction in overall yield, $30,000 per acre,” he said. “Almost half of that is pre-harvest. That’s a
it doesn’t mean the loss of a lucrative industry altogether. He said the lot of money — you gotta get that back somehow.”
cityonahillpress.com 9

Horseless Equestrian Team
Rides Off Campus to Train
Club sport welcomes new coach,
access to riding facility in Watsonville
By Natalia Equihua
Sports Reporter
Members of the equestrian
team travel 14 miles from UCSC
to Watsonville in order to find
what they don’t have on campus:
a training facility, horses and a
coach.
The team hired Cassie
Belmont, who also coaches the
Monte Vista Christian School
horse riding program, this year.
For Martha Gustavson,
third-year Cowell student and
captain of the team, this marks
an important shift in the team’s
development.
“It makes it easier to be more
of a team, because they can all
ride together every day,” Gus-
tavson said. “They can work with
the coach as much as they want.”
Belmont has offered the
team the opportunity to use the
school’s facility in Watsonville at
almost half the price of a normal
lesson, which she said ranges
from $50 to $60 per day.
“Here I have a pretty big
program, and so I’m offering [the
team] a reduced fee so they can
come and ride,” Belmont said.
“I have lots of horses. It’s a good
partnership.”
Each member of the team
pays for his or her own riding
lessons. Training is required in
order to compete at the Intercol-
legiate Horse Show Association
(IHSA) championships.
10 cityonahillpress.com
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Photos Courtesy of Dana Frederick
MARTHA GUSTAVSON jumps at an Intercollegiate Horse Show Association
competition on Oct. 16. Since UCSC has no horses or equestrian training
facilities, the equestrian team goes to Watsonville to practice for competitions.
In the IHSA competition, others. one of only two within the UC tion, in which it got two second
the teams are not asked to own a Second-year Sarah Dennis, — along with UC Davis. place finishes: one for the open
horse. Instead, in each show, they a new team member, noted the “We only had six competi- varsity rider and the other for the
are provided with horses owned difference in UCSC’s equestrian tors on our team in these shows, intermediate rider in jumping
by the association. This form program compared to others. against teams with over 40 class. But the team is not quite
of competing means smaller “We’re one of the only teams competitors,” Alrich said in an where Belmont thinks it should
expenses than in a normal horse that doesn’t have [an on campus e-mail. “We knew we were a be.
show, in which the rider must facility],” Dennis said. brand-new team and we wanted “It would help if they didn’t
bring a horse to each competi- Formed in 2001 by former to make a lasting and positive have to drive 40 minutes to take
tion. College Eight student Allison impression at the IHSA.” a lesson,” Belmont said. “These
While riders fund their own Alrich, the team has struggled to The team continues to im- girls could be champions if they
training, Gustavson said that the grow. UCSC’s team remains as prove, as seen at its last competi- could only practice.”
equestrian team receives some
support from the university,
which pays for transportation,
horse show fees and team
apparel.
Other state universities,
like UC Davis — one of the
few public universities with
a barn — had to get rid of
more than half of the school’s
horses due to budget cuts,
according to the Sacramento
Bee.
Belmont said schools like
Stanford are hard to compete
against because “they have a
very high-quality facility on
the campus and lots of really
fabulous horses for their stu-
dents to practice on.”
In a couple of weeks,
UCSC’s team will face well-
equipped teams like Stanford,
as well as the University of
Nevada, Reno and the Uni-
versity of Santa Clara, among
Thursday, November 4, 2010
THE RISE OF A YOUNG SURFER
Local 13-year-old impresses national surfing community
By Natalia Equihua
Sports Reporter
On the windy beach at Pleasure Point, Nic
Hdez, 13, stands contemplating the waves. While
all of his friends are at school taking notes, Hdez
is deciding whether it is the right time to get into
the water. He needs to practice those flips for
next week’s competition, because he has made a
promise to himself: He will continue to be the best
amateur surfer in Northern California.
Hdez began his career as a competitive surfer
at local surfing contests when he was eight years
old. Last month, five years after his first surf, Hdez
competed at the O’Neill Cold Water Classic at
Santa Cruz's Steamer Lane. The competition is
one of the most important international surfing
competitions in the area, attracting surfers from all
around the world, most of them between 18 and
35 years old. Hdez was the youngest competitor.
One other Santa Cruz surfer, 17-year-old Nat
Young, also took part in the competition. He ad-
vanced to the semi-finals but did not make it past
that round.
“Other surfers got surprised that I got in,
because you need a certain amount of points to get
in and I didn’t have them,” Hdez said. “I got in as
an alternate –— someone didn’t show up.”
Hdez lost in the first round of this competition,
but for him it was a positive experience.
“It was hard to compete against [older surfers],”
he said. “I only got to do one round ’cause I lost,
but it was so fun — and hard to get waves against
bigger guys.”
Although Hdez has been competing for more
than four years in events around the California
coast, his commitments have become more de-
manding with every year.
“This year, he’s starting to do some of the
pro-junior events,” Anita Hdez, his mother, said.
Sports
“We’ve already been to Florida, New York, New
Jersey, Huntington Beach and Newport Beach.”
But defending a title and becoming a profes-
sional hasn’t been without its downsides. For
Hdez, becoming a competitive surfer has meant
competing on weekends, and it required his miss-
ing classes on Mondays and Fridays in order to
fulfill his sports commitments.
Four years ago, Hdez’s parents decided to pull
him out of public school to continue to support
his development in surfing.
“[The school] was giving us a hard time, so
we decided to start home-schooling him,” Anita
Hdez said.
Hanging out with his friends has become more
difficult, Nic Hdez said, as he is only able to spend
time with them after they get out of school.
Coming from Northern California has also
proved to be a challenge.
“It’s really hard for Nic to compete with the
Southern California crowd, because that is where
the industry is all located,” Anita Hdez said.
“Those kids always get a little more advantage
when it comes to exposure and sponsorship.”
Nevertheless, Nic Hdez’s talent has been
enough to capture the attention of many impor-
tant surf companies. He received a sponsorship Photo Courtesy of Jonathan Riise
from Billabong at the age of 10 — and now, some
NIC HDEZ DIPS IN WATER three to four times a day, practicing
of his other sponsors include Oakley, Nike 6.0 and
his surfing skills. After competing against the world’s prime riders
O.A.M.
last month in the Cold Water Classic, Hdez said, “It was so fun
For Hdez, surfing may be a golden ticket to
— and hard to get waves against bigger guys.”
other opportunities as well.
“In the future, I would like to go out and surf
good waves, go on surfing trips and check new
places. I want to go to Indonesia,” Hdez said.
“Once you start surfing and get the hang of it, you
just can’t stop.”
cityonahillpress.com 11
Feature
STUDENTS IN THE
wind ensemble practice
four hours a week. Although
the ensemble avoided
elimination last year, budget
cuts continue to threaten the
survival of the program.
Santa Cruz County and UC Santa Cruz experience cutbacks due to fiscal crisis
BY MIKAELA TODD, Jay Arms can’t play his music.
CITY REPORTER As a fifth-year in classical
guitar performance at UC Santa
ILLUSTRATION BY Cruz, he has seen prices rise for
BELA MESSEX individual lessons. Arms has also
witnessed multiple programs in
PHOTOS BY the music department, including
ANDREW ALLIO the classical guitar ensemble, ear
training and the piano program
get slashed and cut. He is quickly
realizing that his circumstances
are not about to change any time
soon.
“The cost of [music] classes
has gone up for me, and that’s
coming out of my tuition,” Arms
said.
Arms finds himself caught
up in the budget crisis and feels
especially targeted as a clas-
sical guitar student. Many of
the ensembles that he used to
participate in have either been
cut completely from UCSC
curriculum or don’t have enough
spaces to accommodate all of the
15 to 20 declared classical guitar
students on campus.
In 2009, Chancellor George
Blumenthal announced that the
university would be taking a hit
12 cityonahillpress.com
The Sound
of Silence
upwards of $28.7 million, an ap-
proximately 20 percent reduction
in funding. Those budget cuts
were passed down to the separate
divisions, including the music
and art division, which was told
to retrofit the music department.
Graduate student Camille
Chitwood, who studies conduct-
ing at the university, commented
on how the inaccessability to
teachers and lessons could inhibit
students who want to embark on
a career in music.
“It’s a hard career as it is, be-
cause we’re always going to have
to rely on outside [resources of ]
funding,” Chitwood said.
Budget cuts to music pro-
grams haven’t just affected the
university but programs in the
city of Santa Cruz and across the
nation as well. Taxes that would
fund music programs in Santa
Cruz elementary schools were
reduced by roughly $500,000.
As a result, teachers’ jobs are
being cut, and they are afraid that
without proper instruction, stu-
dents won’t be interested in the
arts anymore. Because students’
Thursday, November 4, 2010
learning improves with art and
music in their basic curriculum,
these cuts are having adverse
effects on students’ academic and
social skills.
Arms has tried to find ways
to get around music funding and
class cuts at UCSC to little avail.
“A lot of us got stuck with
Jazz Big Band, in which there
are only two open slots a quarter,
and the Early Music Consort,”
Arms said. “So what we do now
is play in a chamber music group
that we formed as a quartet. The
problem is we don’t get as much
time with an instructor as when
we play with a large group.”
By playing in a larger ensem-
ble, students get about four hours
a week with an instructor. In the
smaller ensembles, like the one
Arms participates in, they only
get about one.
“That’s not really enough time
to learn how to play with a group
well, so we’re just trying to figure
it out ourselves,” he said.
The piano program has
also been cut back, and the
piano placement exam that Arms
would have had to take if he had
entered UCSC a year before is
no longer required for his enter-
ing class. Arms said this was
disappointing because the basic
skills he would have gotten from
that exam could have helped him
later on in his music career.
Ensembles in the music de-
partment have been hit especially
hard by a lack of funding. The
two largest ensembles on campus,
the concert choir and wind
ensemble, were on the financial
chopping block until bridge
funding was made available at
the end of last school year.
Those bridge funds are sup-
posed to “bridge the school
through bad times,” said music
department chair and director of
concert choir Amy Beal.
The funding comes from
surplus pool money that was left
over in the division at the end
of the school year. There is no
way to determine if it will last
any longer than one year, so the
two large ensembles may be cut
eventually anyway.
“Music departments are really
Thursday, November 4, 2010
expensive to run,” Beal said. “You
need so much extra equipment.
People say that the only thing
more expensive than a music
department is a medical school.”
Beal says that a main reason
the department is expensive to
run is because all music students
receive one-on-one tutoring dur-
ing their time at UCSC. Teachers
are a large expense, and so their
hours have been cut, making it
harder for students to get the
required amount of instruction
needed to graduate.
Chitwood said the cuts make
it more competitive for students
vying for those few hours of
instruction.
“Of course priority goes to
people who have already been
here and have been taking les-
sons, which also makes it a little
unfair,” she said. “And I know for
a fact that there are some teach-
ers teaching students that they’re
only supposed to teach for a half
hour for an hour, because they
know that’s what the students
really need.”
Beal said that reducing
instruction hours is one of many
strategies for dealing with the
funding crisis.
“Layout design, layoffs, re-
duced hours — that’s how we’ve
dealt with the budget, but that’s
only part of it,” Beal said.
As department chair, Beal was
a part of redesigning the music
department’s curriculum for this
year in a way that she hopes will
save money. The department has
put classes, especially ensembles,
on rotation. Now, instead of
ensembles being offered every
quarter or every year, they are of-
fered every few quarters or every
few years.
Beal is trying to make the
most out of restructuring by
dealing with the budget crisis as
a creative opportunity for a new,
and hopefully better, curriculum.
She thinks the department is
secure for the time being.
“Things are stable,” she said.
“Things were bad last year, but
now they really have stabilized
and tightened. It’s been an
incredibly painful process, but it
looks like it’s going to be better.”
She also hopes that part of
the $3 billion granted to the UC
system for the 2011–2012 school
year makes its way to the music
department.
Wind ensemble director Rob
Klevan has a positive outlook as
well.
“I’m hoping the budgets will
improve and, you know, I’m
pretty optimistic, because it hap-
pened for us this year,” Klevan
said. “It happened at the last
minute, but we don’t care. We’ll
take it.”
Although the wind ensemble
was not cut for this school
year, Klevan has fewer students
participating because of circulat-
ing rumors that the ensemble
would be cut, he said. Students
signed up for other classes and
then weren’t able to change their
schedules when they found out
the ensemble was going to be of-
fered. Wind ensemble is down to
60, but it ended last school year
with close to 80 students.
Klevan has been teaching at
UCSC for 13 years and says he
stopped trying to recommend to
the department that the school
have two ensembles, one basic
and one more prestigious, even
though many colleges across
the United States do. He knows
there’s no money for it.
“It is unfortunate that we have
these funding restraints because
there’s so many things that could
be done here that would open
up new doors for repertoire,”
Klevan said. “We have the faculty
to do it, there’s interest from the
students, but there’s just a lack of
funding.”
Elementary through high
school art programs don’t look
any better. Significant cuts
to music programs have not
remained at the collegiate level,
but have affected public schools
K-12 throughout the country as
well.
Recently, band was cut com-
pletely from elementary schools
in the Santa Cruz County
School District. Sandy Cherk,
former arts coordinator for Bay
View Elementary, said she was
laid off because of a lack of
funding and that art and music
teachers at Bay View are
now struggling to find work
teaching.
“The teachers are
overwhelmed,
because now
they are teaching
multiple levels a
day,” Cherk said.
“Their hours have
been cut, and the
students aren’t
getting as much
instruction.”
Feature
FAR LEFT: UCSC’s concert
choir rehearses in the Music
Center every Wednesday,
under the direction of Nat
Berman. This may end soon,
due to budget cuts that
threaten to eliminate entire
sections of the music program.
LEFT: The 40th Annual Santa
Cruz Band Review brings
marching bands from all over
Northern California to march
from Santa Cruz High School
to the Beach Boardwalk while
performing their best songs.
These cutbacks are a result
of a number of financial factors.
Over the past few years, funding
from the Packard Foundation,
which has been offering grants
to Santa Cruz, Monterey and
Santa Clara Counties since 1997,
has shifted focus and no longer
offers money for art and music
in schools. Parcel taxes P and B2,
initiated by Santa Cruz voters to
pick up where the Packard Foun-
dation left off, have been reduced
from approximately $1,635,347
a year in 2005 to only about
$1,103,256 now.
The main concern for Cherk
is that the education elementary
students are receiving now, after
the cuts, is less than what is es- Continued on p. 18
sential.
“It’s not providing all the
tools necessary to give kids who
might have a talent for art
the chance to start early,”
Cherk said. “They cut
kindergarten classes
and those seem
pretty impor-
tant.
cityonahillpress.com 13
Feature
USMC at UCSC:
Sports Reporter & UCSC Officer Candidates School candidate
U.S. Marine Corps officer
candidate Andrew Perlik stands
at attention in front of his peers.
It’s 7 a.m. The early morning fog
is breaking and his breath is heavy
from all the running they’ve done
thus far. Reaching deep inside
himself to draw all the air his lungs
can muster, he bellows out at the
candidates, “What makes the grass
grow?”
“Blood, blood, blood!” the other
candidates return, their voices
echoing across the empty East
Field.
Joggers pause at the roaring, startled
that the quiet tranquility of the morning
has been shattered. They stare in a daze, a
mix of confusion and disbelief at the scene
unfolding before them.
At a nod from their candidate platoon
sergeant, Colin Campbell, Perlik bellows
once more, “UC Santa Cruz, ready to
fight, ready to kill!”
A hearty, guttural “Oorah!” is returned,
a common call phrase among Marines,
and the candidates are dismissed from the
morning’s physical training.
It’s easy to see how the Marine Corps
culture, centered around its combat infan-
try and substituting common words like
“yes” for “kill,” would have difficulty mesh-
ing with the free-spirited, counter-cultural
UCSC campus. The tension, having flared
up times before in clashes between mili-
tary recruiters and the student body, was
left to fester without proper closure.
They have no official club, organiza-
tion or group recognized by UC Santa
Cruz. Brought together by their common
interest and a desire to serve their country,
Campbell and Perlik are members of a
hard-lined few on campus that are work-
ing for more than just a degree at the end
of their four years.
“I had considered grad school, but I
stopped and asked myself, ‘What are the
experiences I want in life?’” Perlik said.
“The Marine Corps culture, being the
smallest [of the branches of the U.S. mili-
tary], combat specialization attracted me.”
Yet, as made evident by the display at
OPERS, candidates at UCSC find them-
14 cityonahillpress.com
Thursday, November 4, 2010
A Paradigm Shift?
By Asa Hess-Matsumoto
selves awash in the anti-military sentiment relationship to the Corps. have male and female candidates of all
that has been present on the campus since USMC Capt. Leo Tabilin, the officer ethnic diversities.”
student activism in recent years. selection officer responsible for the over- Over up to two summers at OCS, can-
In 2005, the student-led organization sight of the candidates at UCSC, finds didates are graded on numerous academic
Students Against War held a protest that that there is no certain type of person who tests including general military subjects,
reached a fevered pitch among the hun- applies for their program. land navigation and weapons and tactics.
dreds of students. This ultimately drove “Officer Candidate School offers They are also graded on numerous physical
military officer recruiters off campus. In our nation’s premier leadership training activities including the physical fitness test
2006 and again in 2007, the protest was opportunity,” Tabilin said in an e-mail. — a combination of timed three-mile run,
repeated, with recruiters retreating from “Whave candidates who have a long sit-up and pull-up tests — combat fitness
the campus or never showing up at all. legacy of family with military service, test, obstacle course and endurance course.
The on-campus activism spurred dis- and we have candidates who don’t know Unlike participants in similar officer
cussion and further action nationally on anyone who has served in the military. We programs, such as the Reserve Officer
both sides.
David Zlutnick, a former member of
SAW, said similar groups and organiza-
tions formed in colleges and universities
nationwide to push for a ban on school
recruiting.
As a result of the pressure, legal battles
over the application of the Solomon
Amendment flared up in the Supreme
Court in March of 2006. The amendment
allows the government to deny schools
and their students federal funding if
military recruiters are barred from their
campuses. Allegations that the Pentagon
was spying on SAW while collecting
documentation on its members arose. UC
Santa Cruz was even labeled as “a cesspool
of liberalism” by one commentator.
College students aiming to become
Marine officers must pass through the ar-
duous trials of Officer Candidates School,
the summer “boot camp” for becoming
officers. Students involved in every level of
the program are referred to as “candidate.”
OCS candidates at UCSC face stress
from three fronts, not only from being in
college and the Marine Corps, but also
by the misunderstanding their peers have
of the military and of the program, said
Eitan Sheer, a third-year Cowell student
and OCS candidate.
“[Unlike other universities,] the mili-
tary is not as appreciated here because
students don’t know what we feel,” Sheer
said. “They can’t relate to what we’re going
through. How could they? Nothing they
do is comparable to what [OCS candi-
dates] must overcome.”
Candidates condition themselves
physically and mentally for summers
away at OCS. Long hours, hard runs, Photo Courtesy of Eitan Sheer
weight training and classroom time with EITAN SHEER, a third-year Cowell student is one of the few OCS candidates from
their more knowledgeable peers and the UCSC. He said he would like to see relations between the military and the UCSC
occasional officer define the candidates’ community improve.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Training Corps (ROTC) found at other
colleges and universities nationwide,
candidates like Perlik are not obligated
contractually to serve. Rather, the com-
mission into the Marine Corps is only
extended to those who not only pass OCS
but graduate from college as well. Candi-
dates may walk away at any time up until
their commission, leaving only the most
dedicated, motivated candidates commit-
ted to leading Marines.
Colin Campbell, a UCSC alumnus
awaiting his commission, reflected upon
the grueling experiences he had at OCS
with a smile.
“You can expect three to four hours of
sleep daily the entire time you are there, at
most,” Campbell said. “[The drill instruc-
tors] dog you everywhere, all the time.
They are, hands-down, the scariest fucking
guys you’ll ever meet in your life. It’s the
most fun you’ll never want to have again.”
Ultimately, successfully passing OCS
is but one hurtle in a long line of hurtles
to follow after graduating college. Months
of follow-up training combined with the
experiences at OCS mold the fledgling
college student into a professional leader
of Marines.
Capt. Tabilin also underscored the im-
portance of displaying admirable leader-
City on a Hill Press conducted a
survey among 25 UC Santa Cruz
students of different genders,
ages and colleges regarding the
current UCSC community’s take
on the military.
“The military should not recruit from
high schools and colleges.”
Strongly agree: 24%
Somewhat agree: 24%
Somewhat disagree: 40%
Strongly disagree: 12%
Don’t know: 0%
“Joining the military is a mistake. There
are better ways of getting what you
want.”
Strongly agree: 4%
Somewhat agree: 16%
Somewhat disagree: 36%
Strongly disagree: 36%
Don’t know: 8%
“Military recruiters should not be
present at UCSC career fairs.”
Strongly agree: 8%
Somewhat agree: 12%
Somewhat disagree: 56%
Strongly disagree: 20%
Don’t know: 4%
“ You have seriously considered enlisting/
commissioning into one of the branches
of the military.”
Strongly agree: 8%
Somewhat agree: 12%
Somewhat disagree: 24%
Strongly disagree: 52%
Don’t know: 4%
Feature
ship above all else at OCS.
“[The candidate’s] ability to make
solid decisions under duress and the most
stressful conditions are an important part
of the evaluation process,” Tabilin said. “A
candidate may be physically fit and men-
tally prepared, but if he or she cannot lead,
they will not be a Marine officer.”
The Mountain View Officer Selection
Office, which oversees a wide variety of
schools in addition to UCSC, includ-
ing Stanford, Santa Clara University, Cal
Poly and all of the junior colleges in its
area, only sends 25 to 30 candidates to
OCS each year. Tabilin said the selection
process is extremely competitive.
Last year, there was only one UC Santa
Cruz candidate selected: Several were
medically disqualified before their ap-
plications could be submitted while others Prescott Watson
were rolled over to be considered for the
UPON COMPLETION, candidates at OCS receive a uniquely designed shirt
following OCS availability.
highlighting their experiences at OCS, as well as their immersion into its legacy.
OCS attrition rate can fluctuate from
year to year based on weather, staff and
candidates. Typically, however, over 30
percent of the candidates who go will not
complete OCS for a variety of reasons.
OCS candidate Sheer Yet said words
cannot fully describe the hardships felt
and faced by those going to OCS.
“It’s impossible to grasp precisely how
hard OCS is for someone who hasn’t
gone,” Sheer said. “For those that have,
they know precisely what I mean. It’s all
hard.”
Although Students Against War
(SAW) has dissolved over time, the effects
from the active years’ protests and demon-
strations are still felt by the OCS candi-
dates today.
“We wanted to propagate a local level
of change to show the nation that if what
we were trying to do could be done here,
we could apply pressure to affect the
system at large,” said David Zlutnick, a
2006 UCSC alumnus and former member
of SAW. “The university was meant to dis- Prescott Watson
cuss issues, not support an institution with
TELIA CAMANCHO of human resources, Staff Sgt. Lindsey, and Capt. Leo Tabilin
a proven track record of taking people’s
(from left to right) are core members of the USMC’s recruitment staff in the area.
freedoms, sovereignty, self-determination
Leo Tabilin is the officer selection officer responsible for candidate from UCSC.
and, in many cases, their lives.”
OCS candidate Campbell has a differ-
ent account of the protests. Perlik said he looks to his family for Visible change in attitudes, such as
“You couldn’t believe what was happen- support. the establishment in 2008 of both the Vet-
ing,” he said. “There were guys out there “I find myself constantly defending my erans Educations Team Support (VETS)
with signs and hoods chanting — it was choice, at UCSC or anywhere else,” Perlik and the UCSC chapter of Student Veter-
awful. It wasn’t good by any means.” said. “It’s a pretty contentious matter. I ans of America, may yet indicate a shift in
Even now, OCS candidates Andrew don’t really bring it up in conversations. how the campus community considers the
Perlik and Tiffany Dang express frustra- I’m not ashamed of my decision, just tired military’s presence.
tion in having to defend their stance of doing the same dance.” Politics professor Daniel Wirls, a
against many of their peers. Dang said For candidates who must already over- former member of Faculty Against War,
that while other issues, such as the come the enormous physical and mental speculates that there are a number of
economy, have distracted some, attitudes hurdles imposed by virtue of training to reasons why the campus has calmed. He
towards the military have hardly changed. become Marine Corps officers, dealing said the election of President Barack
“It’s hard to defend sometimes. It’s like with the UCSC community is just another Obama in 2008, the official conclusion to
talking to a brick wall,” she said. “I keep burden. the Iraq War and the mounting pressure
hearing things like ‘You’ll be a pawn of “There is no relationship between the nationwide to repeal the military’s “Don’t
the government’ and that my choice is a Marine Corps and UCSC,” said OCS Ask, Don’t Tell” policy may be partially
‘mistake.’ It’s just one of those things I just candidate Sheer. “But I don’t believe the responsible.
have to sit back and let the stigma run its campus should be viewed as anti-military “I think there are still plenty of people
course. To me, my choice is admirable, and as a whole. If there were a way for us to here at UC Santa Cruz who might still be
it’s frustrating to hear people just trash facilitate knowledge to the student com- concerned or distrust the military,” Wirls
those who work so hard to defend this munity — doing things not connected to
country.” recruiting — they’d see we’re not all about
stealing kids to the ‘dark side.’” Continued on p. 18
cityonahillpress.com 15
Photography Thursday, September 30, 2010

THROUGH
OUR LENS
Photography & Words by
Isaac Miller

There exists at UCSC a small

community of spear fishers. Often
comprising marine biology students
and SCUBA enthusiasts, these
aquatic-minded students traverse
the California coast in search of
rock fish and Perch. Having only
heard stories of this, I ventured with
recent marine bio graduate Brian
Repp up Highway 1 to Greyhound
Rock County Park, located just
seven miles past Davenport to
see for myself. Spear in hand,
Brian marches confidently into
the foamy surf. The three-pronged
spear he carries is propelled like a
slingshot and has surgical tubing
that stretches across the length of
his arm. When released, the tubing
flings the spear forward. After
several minutes, Brian emerges
empty-handed, defeated by the
rough, breaking waves. Brian did
not catch anything that day, but
come calmer waters, he’ll be back,
spear in hand.

To view more photographs from this week’s

Through Our Lens, visit cityonahillpress.com.

16 cityonahillpress.com
Thursday, September 30, 2010

Photography

cityonahillpress.com 17

Continued from p. 13
The Sound of Silence
Art affects the kids in how they learn, cogni-
tively and socially and in every other way.”
Elementary schools besides Bay View have
been able to salvage art and music programs
through active parent involvement. Westlake
Elementary School is one that has been able to
do just this.
Dorothy Franks, arts coordinator at West-
lake, said that her school fundraises for dif-
ferent types of art enrichment, whereas other
schools in the district are not capable of doing
this because they don’t have parent bodies that
are willing or able to do the same.
“It’s a little bit of a political hot-potato right
now,” Frank said. “Money was cut quite a bit.”
Vocal music is now only offered one hour a
week for fourth and fifth grade, whereas it used
to be offered two hours a week for fourth-grad-
ers, and fifth-graders were offered the choice
between vocal, strings and band. Now they
are only offered vocal, and even that provides
limited instruction.
“What is happening at the elementary
schools will affect us in a few years,” said
Christina Latham, band director at Santa Cruz
High School. “My job is not affected now, but
it could be in the future because if there’s not
students to take band, then there’s no students
to teach.”
Latham is worried that without proper
instruction, students will not be interested in
18 cityonahillpress.com
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Continued from p. 15
OCS on Campus
taking band in high school at all. As of this
said. “But now the suspicions experience with UCSC as being
year, two of five music teachers at the elemen-
about the military — its ex- “nothing but professional.”
tary and middle school levels were laid off, and
tended tours, psychological and “Volunteering to join the
hours of instruction have significantly dropped.
physical damage to our soldiers, military, especially during a time
Although the arts are still surviving in the
all the carnage — now it’s more when the nation is at war, is a
Santa Cruz County School District, UCSC
directed as concern for someone tough decision,” Tabilin said.
graduate student Chitwood does not see an
who they know is in or joining “The candidates we have at
easy way out of this crisis any time soon.
the military.” UCSC and all of our campuses
“Until the economy of California turns
Wirls notes that in his have my respect for them and
around, I just don’t think it can turn around
classes, some of which revolve for their decision to serve our
here either,” she said.
around the military and its post- country and to honor our legacy
Chitwood adds that she is proud of the
Cold War era policies, several as Marines.”
faculty at UC Santa Cruz and hopes that the
students are members of the OCS candidate Sheer,
department is not hit any harder than it already
armed forces or in the process of looking forward to completing
has been.
joining. his training this summer, sees
“It would be a huge shame if any of [the
“The class doesn’t become potential hope in establishing
faculty] were cut,” Chitwood said. “I think it’s
hostile or focused on them,” stronger ties between future
terrible that many of their hours have been cut
Wirls said. “To the contrary, I candidates and UCSC.
already.”
observe the students respecting “While I don’t expect the
Wind ensemble director Klevan believes
their point of view, which is not student body to completely un-
that public school districts like Santa Cruz
always positive precisely because derstand what it is we do, people
target arts unfairly, and that the city has not yet
they themselves were in the can come to recognize that our
realized that it is a mistake to do that.
military.” association with the Marine
“I could go on and on about how wrong it
With the dissolution of both Corps is just as professional
is,” Klevan said. “In California, we haven’t real-
Students Agaisnt War and Fac- and reasonable as any other
ized how arts can affect academics and other
ulty Against War, it may be that, career choice,” Sheer said. “The
social aspects of a student’s life and develop-
at least for now, both parties are university is meant to champion
ment. We continue to cut programs. It’s hard
extending an olive branch to knowledge and understanding,
for me to understand. My grandchildren will
one another. and that is still key to improving
not have the same quality education that I had
Capt. Tabilin describes his what the case is now.”
when I was their age, and that’s sad.”
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Honing in on the ‘Human Condition’
Private collection from Dean of Arts features multiple artists
By Veronica Glover
Arts & Entertainment Reporter
A combination of prints, pictures
and paintings from the private collec-
tion of UC Santa Cruz’s Dean of Arts
David Yager awaits art enthusiasts at
the Mary Porter Sesnon Art Gallery.
The gallery’s current show, entitled
“Human Conditions,” features a variety
of artists — among them Ansel Adams,
Diane Arbus and Robert Mapplethorpe
— and showcases different portrayals of
human experiences.
Among the works on display are
humorous Reagan-era references,
eye-catching experimental pieces and a
portrait drawn entirely with an artist’s
thumbprints. Each work of art is also
accompanied by a summary written by a
member of the UCSC art department.
Yager accumulated his vast collection
of artwork during his time working at
the University of South Florida and at
the University of Maryland.
Angelica Alamo, a Sesnon Gallery
employee, said that the exhibit has
received plenty of supportive feedback.
“A lot of people have had a positive
response to the show,” Alamo said.
“There are a wide variety of themes
present in all of the pieces. My favorites
are the photographs by Diane Arbus.”
Fourth-year art major Amanda Naz-
zal described the show as random.
“But that’s what the human condi-
tion is,” she said. “It’s random.”
Gallery curator Shelby Graham
spoke enthusiastically about Yager’s
accumulation of such a vast and diverse
collection of artwork.
“This is really an incredible collec-
tion,” she said, pointing out images in
which cadavers were used as models,
and a pop-up book done entirely in
silhouettes.
Graham discussed the wide selection
of mixed media pieces represented in
the art show, including etchings, photo-
graphs and lithographs.
“This is an opportunity for people to
see a variety of examples of mixed me-
dia, and this collection is truly impres-
sive,” Graham said.
Arts & Entertainment
The Sesnon Gallery also hosts panel
discussions to encourage community
involvement in events and to draw at-
tention to the importance of the arts in
the UCSC community. One discussion
was held on Oct. 19 on the topic of art
collecting. The next will focus on master
print-makers and will be held Nov. 10.
The discussion panels facilitate
knowledge of the arts, and the gallery
employees hope to shed light on the
printmaking process and what it entails.
“An exciting aspect of this exhibition
involves the artistic process of image
making and collaborations with limited
edition prints,” Graham said.
Taking into account the overall posi-
tive response of gallery visitors, Sesnon
employee Alamo said that “Human
Conditions” may have set a new campus
Nick Paris
standard.
“People have commented on how SHELBY GRAHAM, the woman behind
this is one of the best exhibits they’ve “Human Conditions,” discusses the art pieces
seen at UCSC,” she said. with interested visitors. The exhibit combines
Human Conditions will be on different techniques and media, ranging from
display at the Sesnon Gallery through massive prints to a photograph wrapped around
Nov. 20. a coffee can.
cityonahillpress.com 19
Politics & Culture
Election Review: California Propositions
By Blair Stenvick
Politics and Culture Editor
&
By Maja Vojnovic
Politics and Culture Reporter
PROP 19 — DID NOT PASS
Owning any amount of mari-
juana for personal use remains
illegal, though medicinal use
is still permitted. This means
that, although cannabis use is
prevalent in California, the state
government, and by extent, the
UC system, cannot tax the state’s
biggest cash crop.
PROP 20 — PASSED
The power to reconfigure vot-
ing districts has moved from
the Legislature to the Citizens
Redistricting Commission. This
commission comprises Demo-
crats, Republicans and Indepen-
dents. The aim of Proposition 20
is to eliminate gerrymandering,
the practice of drawing voting
districts specifically designed
to favor certain candidates. The
proposition’s passing has no
significant effect on the state
budget.
PROP 21 — DID NOT PASS
Vehicle registration fees will
remain the same, and state parks
and beaches will not receive
the extra funding they need.
However, the state will continue
spending about $200 million a
year to maintain the parks.
PROP 22 — PASSED
There is now a stricter hold on
money intended for transporta-
tion services. Whereas before,
legislators had the power to
repurpose the money for educa-
tion if they felt it necessary, that
flexibility no longer exists. This
means that receiving adequate
funding for the UC could be
even harder.
PROP 23 — DID NOT PASS
Voters preserved AB 32, a law
passed by the state legislature in
20 cityonahillpress.com
Thursday, November 4, 2010
2006 aimed at reducing green-
house gases by charging compa-
nies that emit them. This means
that California will remain
among the states with the most
progressive environmental policy
in the country.
Rachel Edelstein
PROP 24 — DID NOT PASS
THE VOTES from Tuesday’s election are in, and four of the nine propositions on the ballot passed.
The failure of the proposition The results will affect social, economic and environmental issues in the state.
maintains current tax laws that
allow businesses to use their loss-
es to reduce taxable profits and
transfer tax credits to a partner PROP 27 — DID NOT PASS
business are two of the recent
changes. Businesses operating in The job of drawing districts for state offices will remain in the hands of the Citizens Redistricting Com-
more than one state will contin- mission. In 2008, Propositon 11 created the commission to establish new guidelines for drawing district
ue to decide how they are taxed maps. Proposition 27 would have undone this change. The failure of the proposition means that savings in
in California. redistricting costs will not result.
PROP 25 — PASSED
This proposition will lower the
vote needed to pass the state
budget from the current two-
thirds to a simple majority, 50
percent plus one. State lawmak-
ers will permanently lose salary
plus living and travel expenses
for every day the budget is late.
This will stop opposition-party
lawmakers from controlling the
budget. The proposition does
not change the two-thirds vote
required for lawmakers to raise
taxes.
PROP 26 — PASSED
Many state and local fees will
now require a two-thirds vote
from lawmakers or local voters
to go into effect. Affected fees
include those regarding health,
environmental and economic
concerns. Before the proposition
passed, politicians could avoid
the required two-thirds vote on
taxes by calling them “fees.” En-
acting the proposition will close
that loophole. The proposition
keeps state environmental and
consumer protection laws intact.
Thursday, November 4, 2010

Column
Soaking in a
Champagne
Shower

By Julia Reis
Managing Editor

Illustration by Louise Leong

One Giants fan toasts the night away in honor of the 2010 champions

“We did it!” silly as it may sound to the casual fan, this
championship means as much to the play-
when he retired at the end of my junior
year of high school, his parting words to
ous column “For the Love of the Game”).
Our mutual love of baseball proved to be
ers as it does to the diehard fans like me, me were, “I’ll be thinking of you when a stepping stone to help build the sibling
These three simple words echoed
the hundreds of thousands of people who [the Giants] finally win it all.” relationship we have today, and I couldn’t
around the state and beyond on Monday
stood by their team amidst all the heart- Sure enough, I received an e-mail have asked for a better person to help me
night. They resonated from the shores of
ache and torture of the last several decades from him on Monday night that read: navigate through the ups and downs of a
McCovey Cove in San Francisco to the
of Giants baseball. “The agony began when I was in sixth baseball season and to celebrate a champi-
ballpark in Arlington, Texas and wound
For those of you who may not be privy grade and finally ended tonight. [It was] onship with.
their way through the bars and boulevards
to the Giants’ history since the team certainly an emotional evening for me — I All these thoughts continued to rumi-
of Santa Cruz. The improbable had at long
moved to the Bay Area from New York truly believed the Giants would never win nate in my mind as Michelle and I wound
last become a reality: The San Francisco
in 1958, it can be summarized rather suc- a World Championship in my lifetime.” up the evening on the front patio of 99
Giants had won the 2010 World Series.
cinctly with one word: zero. That’s because, But, if a lifetime of loyalty deserves a Bottles, tipping the remnants of cham-
I found myself repeating that three-
despite fielding some of the best players toast, so does the development of fandom pagne into paper cups that she snagged
word phrase over and over to myself as
in the history of baseball — Willie Mays, as a means of getting closer to people you from the restaurant. As Giants fans began
I stood in a deserted downtown parking
Willie McCovey and Barry Bonds, just to care about. So here’s a toast to my parents, to trickle out of bars at closing time, we
garage with my friend Michelle around
name a few — this franchise just couldn’t who at first tolerated my obsession with leaned back in our chairs for one parting
10 o’clock that evening. We had sought
win a national title on the West Coast. baseball and eventually got caught up in toast.
out this spot of seclusion to celebrate a
The few times the Giants did manage to the craze themselves. I loved seeing how “Here’s a toast to all the San Francisco
victory over half a century in the mak-
make the World Series since the westward emotionally invested my parents became Giants fans in Santa Cruz and around
ing by passing a bottle of $6 champagne
relocation, they were always sent home in every game this postseason as they went the nation who endured half a century of
back and forth, taking turns toasting the
empty-handed, thanks to some cruel twist along for the ride with me. My dad sud- torture and stuck by this team through it
players who performed best in the Giants’
of fate — a ball that was hit six inches too denly began texting me in-game commen- all,” I crowed.
postseason run. We gave kudos to Cody
low, an unprecedented bullpen collapse, a tary as he watched from home, while my Because, when it came down to it,
Ross and Edgar Renteria, lovingly lauded
tragic earthquake that delayed the World mom started high-fiving fellow orange- this championship wasn’t merely about
the pitching staff, and heaped accolades on
Series for over a week. and-black-clad fans in the grocery store obtaining bragging rights over the rest of
the coaching staff and front office man-
But, despite all the so-close-but-no- after a win. It felt great that they started to the baseball world for a year. Rather, it was
agement.
championship seasons, as well as the mul- support the team as a way to support me a testament to all the diehard fans of the
As our joyous voices bounced off the
titude of losing years, so many fans stayed as their daughter, then fell in love with the team who took decades of ridicule from
concrete walls and into the quiet solitude
true to the Giants franchise. The slogan scrappy Giants themselves. other spectators of the sport who told
of this early November night, I found
“Wait till next year” became a mantra of Speaking of how baseball can bring them that their team was cursed, a hope-
myself thinking back over a span of eight
the loyal and diehard spectators. people together, here’s a toast to my older less abomination, a train wreck waiting
years, to the point in my life where my
These are fans like my ninth-grade brother Ryan, who has accompanied me to to happen. This was for all the lovers, the
orange-and-black fanaticism first began
biology teacher Owen Lucey, who stuck roughly 20 Giants games over the past few dreamers and me.
until now, and about all the people along
with the team since the Giants first came years, including the first game of this year’s “To the World Series!” Michelle called
the way who encouraged — and toler-
out west when he was in middle school. I World Series in San Francisco. AT&T out, clinking her cup of bubbly with mine.
ated — my passionate and sometimes
spent countless afternoons in his class- Park was the backdrop for the start of our
dysfunctional love affair with this baseball
room discussing the previous night’s game sibling relationship back in 2007 after a
team. They deserve a toast as much as
these players do, I thought. Because, as
or evaluating an offseason acquisition, and lifetime of estrangement (see the previ- I’ll drink to that.
cityonahillpress.com 21
Column
Digital Killed the Video Stars
By Rod Bastanmehr
Managing Editor
W
hat scares you more about a bomb being
under a dinner table? Not knowing it’s there
and having it blow? Or knowing about it
and waiting anxiously for it to detonate?
Existential quandaries like these aren’t typical for a
pre-teen. They’re also not politically wise for a Middle
Easterner. But growing up, I was surrounded by films
that served as some bizarre window into the “real world”
— or at least my vague perceptions of it. Because of
this, I’ve adjusted to view these questions as being just
as, if not more, important than what to eat for dinner, or
when my deadline is for a column.
These questions came from the movies, but these movies came from
the video store. And the video store is slowly going the way of the dodo
— but that’s the price you pay for convenience.
From battle wounds to Communist take-overs, red has always been a color of cultural
dread. Now, the Redbox and the red Netflix envelope bring about a new threat. This
past September, Blockbuster Video filed for bankruptcy, and the company has closed
a reported 1,061 stores since 2008. Hollywood Video finds itself in a worse situation.
Mom-and-pop video stores — even deeper down the hole.
So then is the only way to preserve these places to remember them? Are these stores
really even worth remembering? The video store can be a cold place. Vast, often harshly
lit and constantly air-conditioned, but they offered us something that few places could:
escapism and enlightenment in unison.
And while film can often bask in elitism, a video store was an equalizer, a place to
peruse the latest and greatest the film world had to offer, or the cream of the crap that
the industry tried its best to forget. The video store was the fun of film made tangible.
I’ve written many times about this vague concept of “connection.” Of how we relate
to one another through vessels we never really pay attention to. So allow me to double-
dip this chip and declare that the video store is, perhaps, one of the foremost examples
of locations as the catalyst for connection. Record stores can be exercises in pretension.
Book stores only operate in hushed tones. But video stores provide release.
This is personal, of course. My mother, who raised me as a single mom for a good
nine or so years, used to take me with her to the café she once owned. But, as is the case
for most young ones, a carbonated beverage or two could only hold my interest for so
long. And it wasn’t long until I found myself spending inordinate amounts of time at the
video store next door, which became a daycare of sorts. There, I was sheltered. I made
friends with the regular customers. Chad, the man most often behind the counter, would
talk to me not as a kid, but as a fellow fan. We would talk about movies. We would
watch movies. He took me seriously because he saw what I see now: that regardless of
our age gap, we were both products of the video store. It held the same wonder for him
as it did for me. We were the same: We were fans. He would restock shelves — I would
wander the endless aisles of cardboard slipcases, each adorned with a larger and larger
floating head, always culminating in Sandra Bullock’s hilariously bloated face on the
cover for “The Net.”
22 cityonahillpress.com
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Why the demise of the video store matters
Illustration by Louise Leong
Those covers were art pieces in a museum. Of course, that is an exaggeration. This,
however, is not an exaggeration: Video stores are museums. Both preserve relics, and
both offer us shelter when it’s raining. Honestly, what else is a museum good for?
So should we keep the video store because every time I walk in, I feel like a kid
again? Because I remember Chad? No, that would be foolish — but it’d be very kind of
the general public.
What video stores do — did — is bridge the gap between art and consumer. This is
its gift. We have the chance to experience any film at any time. Consider some of our
generation’s most well-established filmmakers — the Scorseses and the Tarantinos. They
are the by-product of the video store, the prime examples of its notable alumni. The
people who rented movies also started making them.
There are also, of course, the practicalities. What to do when you want to spontane-
ously rent a movie without the hindsight of having added it to your queue two days
prior? True, instant streaming has taken the world by storm, but partaking in escapism
by using the very tool that you should be escaping from negates the experience. It’s like
if your parents started listening to rap music.
But, since the overwhelming desire for convenience killed the video store, I refuse to
let inconvenience be the reason for its demise. We should love the video store in spite
of its insistence on late fees. In spite of its requirement that we be physically present in
order to interact. In spite of its tendency to judge us for a bizarre urge to rematch that
Katherine Heigl movie that we’ve already seen.
We should love it because it loves us.
Because a recommendation from a stranger can lead to something else. Because we
are what we watch, and a film watched separately or together affects us, and when we
want a break from film, we require flesh, and the other way around as well.
There could be a moment at zero hour, right before the final store doors shut, that
we change our minds. That the owner of the store turns around after locking up one last
time to find the entire town standing there, ready to rent, save his business and recon-
nect with each other. This is possible. Unlikely, but possible. I’ve seen it happen.
I saw it at the movies.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
The Loudest People in the Room
Why the line between media and news needs sharpening. And who’s to blame?
I
t’s the end of the world. Do we want
to laugh or know what’s happening?
How about both? How about neither?
Television personalities Jon Stewart
and Stephen Colbert held the Rally to
Restore Sanity and/or Fear Oct. 30, an
event made in response to Glenn Beck’s
Restoring Honor rally. Stewart and Col-
bert’s rally, which started separately and
eventually unified, is serious about how
unserious American politics are — a bi-
zarre act of pop-political performance art.
For them, Beck’s rally was a joke. Theirs
is the punchline, and the only way to fully
understand the inherit ridiculousness of
his event is to host one in similar terrain,
only with self-awareness.
Here’s the thing, though: When you
are mobilizing the youth, when you’ve
become the beacon of bipartisan commen-
tary, when you’ve preached detachment
from political ideology, you’ve become
something aside from an entertainer:
you’re a pundit.
So what becomes of the satire? If satire
is the art of saying something fake and
pretending it’s real in order to make a
point, then what do we make of a rally
that is real but pretends it’s fake in order
to make a point?
This paradox is a problem. But it’s in-
dicative of a larger one: We can’t differen-
SLUG
COMICS
By Rachel Edelstein
tiate between what is opinion and what is
news. If your job is to entertain by making
fun of political rallies, what happens when
you then throw a political rally? How are
we left to distinguish between entertain-
ment and news?
The days of Cronkite are gone. We ig-
nore the unbias voices of reason in favor of
commentators who use extremity as a way
to gain trust. The layman logic is this: The
louder you are, the angrier you are. And if
you’re angry, then you must be right. So
what is the difference between Beck and
Stewart, especially now that they’re both
yelling? Stewart is making fun of those
people, sure. He’s reminded us on many
occasions that his show is meant to be
entertainment, that it’s merely making fun
of things that actually matter. His goal is
to “criticize the loud folks [who] over the
years dominated our national conversation
on our most important issues.”
But media is not news. News is not
media. They can throw parties at the same
time, but neither should be attending the
other’s. When a right-wing commentator
starts commentating, are they speaking on
behalf of their party or their opinion?
Stewart and Colbert are supposed to
be are the types of pundits who know
that pundits are meaningless. But while
they think they’re the answer, Stewart and
Colbert are, in actuality, symptoms of the
problem, where we don’t take our politi-
cians’ rhetoric seriously, so we instead turn
to our comedians looking for that serious-
ness. What we need is distance. We need
a gap between the people like Stewart
who understand the intricacies of satire
because they’ve made a career of pointing
out the existent ridiculousness in non-
satirists. This is the blending of new and
old media — of journalists who are here
to tell a story and personalities striving for
viral infamy.
They aren’t the news — they’re the
reactions to how others are dispensing
the news. They’re the critique. The com-
mentators they’re making fun of shouldn’t
be considered primary news sources. But
the comedians making fun shouldn’t be
holding political rallies. Here’s what we’re
supposed to know: The right is crazy and
always yells. The left is just as crazy, and
sometimes yells even louder. The middle
stays cynical.
Yet this sudden surge of right-wing
spectacle commentators is a response to
Colbert and Stewart having become me-
dia messiahs for the left. They’ve dominat-
ed the liberal youth, and the only way to
fight fire is with louder fire. So are Colbert
and Stewart commenting on a monster
that they’ve essentially helped build? Is
Illustration by Rachel Edelstein
Opinion/Editorial
Colbert helping their cause or hurting
it? And, most importantly, are these even
questions worth asking in a topsy-turvy
political climate?
We’ve become an era unable to distin-
guish between fantasy and reality — we
went from living on farms to living online
— and now our information is melding
into spectacle, all in the hopes that irony
will be its saving grace. We know to laugh
at something that’s wrong, but after we’re
done, how do we know what’s right? And
how do we know how to fix it?
Stewart and Colbert. Beck and Olber-
mann. These are not journalists. They are
not political figures. They are entertain-
ers: clowns in three-piece suits. The only
difference is that two of them know it,
and two of them
don’t. So why
is everyone so
loud?
cityonahillpress.com 23
 WHO
THE
HELL
“Anything by Katy Perry. It’s sticky for obvious “‘Paper Thin Walls’ by Modest Mouse. It’s the
reasons. ‘Teenage Dream’ is my jam.” combination of the excellent guitar and voices
charged with emotion.”
JASPER HITCHEN MATT BOITANO
THIRD-YEAR, COWELL THIRD-YEAR, STEVENSON
ASTROPHYSICS POLITICS

ASKED
YOU?!
What song is stuck in your head
right now, and why is it so sticky?
Compiled by Morgan Grana & Julia Reis
“‘Time of Your Life,’ from [the movie] ‘Dirty “‘Dangerous’ by Akon. It’s sticky because it’s
Dancing.’ The Black Eyed Peas recently made repetitive, so I can remember the lyrics and his
a remix of it, and when I was running, it was in voice is very distinctive and strange to me.”
my head.”
KAREN MARKS JANISE ZAYAS
FIRST-YEAR, COLLEGE NINE FOURTH-YEAR, COLLEGE TEN
UNDECLARED LITERATURE