Yale Bulletin and Calendar

November 5, 2004|Volume 33, Number 10

In the News
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"I don't like people who lie to me. But beyond character, there's the matter of adaptability. In a president who is going to offer programmatic and other forms of leadership, you must have the capacity to adapt, often to unforeseen contingencies."

-- John M. Blum, Sterling Professor Emeritus of History, "All Those Promises: Do They Really Matter?" The New York Times, Oct. 26, 2004.

"[South Africa's] educated youth carries the full burden of our restrictive labor laws. What started as a quest for fair labor practices ended up as protection against new entrants. SA's labor laws protect the status quo. They stifle change where change is demanded. The laws protect employee rights well, but in a post-apartheid era, where economic growth and job creation are the main goals, they have become a drag."

-- Mteto Nyati, postgraduate fellow at the World Fellowship Program, in his article, "South Africa; Youth Pay Price for Restrictive Labor Law," Africa News, Oct. 19, 2004.

"The right charges that the UN is soft on terrorism, tolerates dictatorial regimes, is prejudiced against Israel and still allows a country like France anachronistic veto rights. The left resents the domination of the world body by a mere five members of the Security Council, its incapacity to achieve greater global economic equity, the unchecked powers of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund and the failure to fulfil the visions so nobly expressed in the 1945 Charter. Neither side shows even the slightest understanding of why the UN is the way it is: because, 60 years ago, governments of the world decided to structure it along certain lines and deliberately made it difficult to change things afterwards."

-- Paul Kennedy, the J. Richardson Dilworth Professor of History, in his article, "UN Reform Is Stuck in a Catch-22," Financial Times, Oct. 26, 2004.

"Excessive weight gain [during pregnancy] is bad. It increases risk for diabetes, high blood pressure ... and for C-sections. Exercise is good for anybody. A two-mile walk everyday is a wonderful thing, but start slow. No marathoner would think about running a marathon without training, but many, many women think about doing labor and delivery without any training."

-- Dr. Mary Jane Minkin, clinical professor of obstetrics and gynecology, "Motherly Advice: Eat Well, Stay Fit and Don't Obsess Over Weight Gain," Connecticut Post, Oct. 23, 2004.

"Registration is a step in the right direction, but registration doesn't guarantee turnout. Many young people who are registered won't vote unless they are engaged by a friend or family member or member of a campaign."

-- Donald Green, the A. Whitney Griswold Professor of Political Science, "Move Over MTV: Connecticut Takes on Youth Voter Registration," The Associated Press, Oct. 19, 2004.

"Once you are obese, it is very hard to treat, so prevention makes sense. And when you focus on children, you get away from the libertarian arguments that adults are just doing this to themselves."

-- Kelly Brownell, professor of psychology, chair of the Department of Psychology and director of the Center for Eating and Weight Disorders, on the need to create nutritional education programs for children nationwide, "Obesity Gets Part of Blame for Care Costs; Early Intervention Is Key to Controlling Rising Health Spending, Study Author Says," The Washington Post, Oct. 20, 2004.

"Jimmy Carter, for example, was president four years and didn't get a single appointment. And it looks as if that will happen to President Bush, that he will have gone four years without an appointment. That's very unusual. It's only happened once before in American history. That was with Franklin Roosevelt's first term. And, boy, he made up for it in the second and third terms and got a lot of people on the court. And that really shaped the court for an entire generation, a kind of New Deal-Great Society coalition on the judiciary that was in place roughly from 1938 through 1970 or so, when Nixon began to shape it in a different direction."

-- Akhil Reed Amar, the Southmayd Professor of Law, "Supreme Court and Election 2004," "Paula Zahn Now," CNN, Oct. 26, 2004.

"What we're saying is that we can be responsible citizens by taking ourselves seriously and putting ourselves in a learning environment. ... [I]f you can't get Americans to spend a day thinking about our government, what is democracy about?"

-- Bruce Ackerman, Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science, on the concept behind Deliberation Day programs that bring citizens together to explore public policy issues, "On Deliberation Day Holiday, Americans Would Discuss the Issues," The Kansas City Star, Oct. 16, 2004.

"Until very, very recently, educators had debates about whether ethics could be taught. There was a sense among the faculty at many schools that it was like teaching Sunday school. Values were not the job of professional educators. What we have seen now is a growing sense that problem recognition in the business world is subtle. We can do a much better job of preparing people for that. Education is taking on much more of the feeling of detective work. Students are interested in the hidden stories behind the numbers."

-- Jeffrey A. Sonnenfeld, associate dean of the School of Management, "Asking Future M.B.A.s To Find the Red Flags," The New York Times, Oct. 24, 2004.

"It's slightly unnerving, but then admittedly pleasing, to realize someone has written your own memoir. That's all the more true if, like me, you were raised in the Midwest. It just doesn't happen that often."

-- Jon Butler, dean of the Graduate School and the Howard R. Lamar Professor of American Studies, History and Religious Studies, reviewing Garrison Keillor's new book "Homegrown Democrat," "Prairie Home Compatriot," New Haven Advocate, Oct. 21, 2004.

"[T]here should be appropriate care that no one is in the business of creating fetuses just for the purpose of getting stem cells, but there are going to be some valuable discoveries based on stem cell research, and the guidelines that we currently have limit the research to a small number of cell lines. We are going to be eclipsed by Europe and China in stem cell research. ... So I feel very strongly that stem cell research should be liberalized."

-- Richard C. Levin, University President, "Charlie Rose Interview with Richard C. Levin," PBS, Oct. 22, 2004.

"As soon as King George III was gone, the Founders took one look at the American people and became obsessed with how a republic ends. History showed them it can happen not with a coup but a smile and a friendly swagger, as soon as the people tire of the burdens of self-government and can be jollied along into servitude -- or scared into it, when they've become soft enough to intimidate."

-- Jim Sleeper, lecturer in political science and ethics, politics and economics, in his article, "By Gradual Paces," The American Prospect, Oct. 27, 2004.

T H I SW E E K ' SS T O R I E S

Yale scientists honored for their research

'Future of Animal Law' to be explored

In Focus: Epidemiology & Public Health

Yale senior starts to drive, using vegetable oil as his fuel

Grant to fund study of long-term effect of drug use on teenagers

Electronic records may improve care of children with asthma

Kaplan honored with election to the Institute of Medicine

Lecture to look at 'Iraq and Shadow of Vietnam'

Janet Reno to be keynote speaker at Law School symposium

Study: More exercise programs for breast cancer survivors needed

Partnership bringing together U.S. and Russian organizations . . .

Study: Risk of developing disabilities rises 60-fold . . .

Concert Band will stage 1943 Glenn Miller radio broadcast

Calhoun College to host talks by poet and Yale World Fellow

New tree a symbol of support needed to fight cancer

Campus Notes