Are we angry or not?

In the final seconds of the Jan. 17 game at RPI, which Cornell won 3-0, RPI's Erik Burgdoerfer delivered a big hit on defenseman Taylor Davenport that left him laying on the ice for a few minutes and resulted in a three-game suspension for Burgdoerfer.

It's important to understand the context of the hit. At the risk of violating copyright, the Ithaca Journal's Brandon Thomas has a good description of the final minute:

With 1 minute, 4 seconds remaining, RPI entered the offensive zone. As the puck approached the crease, Engineers forward Jordan Watts bowled over goalie Ben Scrivens.

"Going on top of the goaltender with a minute left with a fourth-line right wing and that kind of play at the end, there's no reason for it," Cornell coach Mike Schafer said.

A minor penalty was called. But rather than send out checkers to whittle away the remaining time, the Big Red responded by sending its first power-play unit onto the ice — something that clearly got noticed by the RPI bench.

...

After a give-and-go with Tyler Mugford along the boards, Davenport took a bad-angle shot that left him off-balance when Burgdoerfer sent him flying into the wall.

Whether or not the hit was warranted based on Cornell's play at the end of the game, this is the kind of thing that teams remember. When Davenport finally rose to his feet and skated off the ice, the team followed, without shaking hands with RPI.

The IJ article implied that Burgdoerfer was a marked man when RPI comes to Lynah next month:

"Our guys will have a long memory when they come back to Lynah," Schafer said.

Those absolutely sound like fighting words: if Burgdoerfer skates in that game, he'll have a target on his back.

But check out the article from today's Sun, entitled "M. Hockey Rejects Policy of Payback." Schafer sounds sympathetic to Burgdoerfer's position:

“[Cornell players] don’t have a grudge against the kid. Our guys know the kid pushed Davenport, but Taylor put himself in an awkward position and the kid did something,” Schafer said.

And:

"We’ll go out of our way to make sure we don’t do anything hard against the kid."

Jeez. Keep in mind that Burgdoerfer also received a two-game suspension last season for a dirty hit on Cornell forward Joe Scali. Maybe Schafer got some criticism for his quotes in the original Ithaca Journal piece, but now he sounds excessively tame.

How will Cornell respond? Will we retaliate? I guess we'll find out February 20.

Another corrupt Connecticut politician

Very similar to what Sen. Ted Stevens got in trouble for in Alaska, or the work former Conn. Gov. John Rowland had done on his cottage. This time, it's Hartford Mayor Eddie Perez. NYT:

A sober-faced Mr. Perez, 51, a Democrat who is in his third term as mayor, surrendered early Tuesday after being charged with three counts of bribery, conspiracy and falsifying evidence, following a 15-month investigation. He was freed without bail.

The best part of the Times article is its brief chronicle of political corruption in the Nutmeg State:

Hartford now joins a grim roster of Connecticut cities hit by embarrassing corruption scandals — and worse.

The former three-term mayor of Bridgeport, Joseph P. Ganim, is serving a nine-year sentence after being convicted in 2003 on federal charges of bribery, racketeering, extortion and mail fraud.

Also that year, the former three-term mayor of Waterbury [right next to Middlebury!], Philip A. Giordano, was sentenced to 37 years on federal charges involving sex with two girls, 8 and 10, while in office.

In 2005, former Gov. John G. Rowland [lives in Middlebury!] received a year-long sentence stemming from a federal corruption investigation.

Makes me proud.

No more rounding up: Cornell trims payroll costs

In response to what President David Skorton has termed a "persistent negative financial outlook sweeping the entire higher education sector," [read: loss of 27% of endowment] Cornell has been trying to cut costs across the board.

One area of cuts seems to be with the payroll system. Hourly employees (both students and full-timers) enter their "time cards" electronically through the Colts system. Until this week, the system was surprisingly generous about rounding up. If someone worked 3hrs, 1min one day, it would round up to 3.1 hours. Doesn't sound like much, but it might result in a little extra on each paycheck.

Not anymore. Colts now has a second decimal place, meaning that two days like the example above would only add up to 3.02 x 2 = 6.04hrs, not 6.2.

The new accounting policy is fairer, and saves the university money, so the change is perfectly understandable. It's just one more example of belt tightening on East Hill.

On letting go

As a former fraternity president, I've heard plenty of excuses from prospective members about why they aren't going to sign a bid. While we have rebuttals ready for pretty much anything freshmen might come up with, the one excuse that I just can't understand is the issue of parents.

"I really want to join, but my parents are against it."

So?

By the time they enter the rush process these young men are 19 and already have a semester of college behind them. With all due respect to the adults who raised an Ivy League student, at this point their opinions shouldn't represent the final verdict. Parents should trust their kids' judgment and believe that they can decide what's best for themselves.

If the kid says he wants to join a fraternity, but that it's not like the ones his parents might see on TV, and that he's sure he won't be hazed, and that the fraternity provides opportunities for scholarship, service, and leadership, and that Greek life is a foundation of the Cornell community... then who are his parents to disagree?

Maybe my situation was a little different. In contrast to my friends (many of whom are Greek) who speak to their parents daily, I might call home every couple of weeks. I had a curfew throughout high school, but once I went off to college my parents rightly assumed that I was capable of making my own decisions. Any organization I joined, any classes I took -- it was left to my judgment.

So why can't these other parents let go? If not now, then when will they let their kids make their own decisions?

Winning and losing in college hockey

Cornell lost its second game of the season Friday night, a 4-3 decision to Yale.

This wasn't particularly surprising, and I agreed with USCHO's prediction of a Yale victory. Cornell, then at 13-1-3, was sitting atop the pairwise rankings, giving it a huge target on its back. Yale had been having a good season, but ran into trouble last weekend with a one-point weekend at home. With Yale looking to rebound and everyone waiting for Cornell to falter, conditions were perfect for a Cornell loss.

In fact, the game really wasn't close. Yale outplayed the Big Red the entire game, with an aggressive neutral zone trap and strong defense near the net. Cornell had some defensive problems, particularly since they only skated 5 d-men after Justin Krueger's first-period injury. And Ben Scrivens didn't have his best game.

Still, there is little reason to be concerned as a Cornell fan. I used to get much more hung up about losses. But really, it's not that big of a deal. Even if we assume that on an average night Cornell has an 80% chance to win, meaning that if the teams played five games we'd expect them to go 4-1-0 or 3-0-2 or something, then in 19 games Cornell's chances of going undefeated are only (.8)^19, or ~1%. With an actual record of 14-2-3, there's no reason to be disappointed about how the season has gone.

More important than won-loss records are the pairwise rankings, which determine seedings for the NCAA tournament. If the season ended today, Cornell would receive a #1 seed and would probably be sent to the Bridgeport, Conn., regional, a convenient location for the fan base. (Assuming BU is placed in Manchester, Notre Dame to Grand Rapids, and Minnesota to...wait for it...Minneapolis).

The challenge for Cornell will be to continue to win with the target on their backs. Barring a monumental collapse they should finish the regular season in the top 4 of the ECAC, earning themselves a bye-week and a relatively easy home quarterfinal series. If they make it to Albany, that should be good enough for an NCAA at-large bid.

The team (and me) is on the road 3 of the next 5 weekends, so the chances are pretty good that they'll lose some more games. But this is still shaping up to be a great season and hopefully Saturday's easy rebound victory over Brown will get us back on track.

New Cornell Review blog says absolutely nothing

At the end of last semester, the Review debuted its "Cornell Insider" blog. So far it seems to be a mixture of ramblings about Cornell and short jabs at liberals, the Sun, etc.

I was looking forward to reading osheezie's post about freshman writing seminars, but I'm still scratching my head trying to figure out what his point is.

He opens with the usual conservative drivel about commie pinko Cornell:

I knew Cornell would most likely have, at very least, a politically correct, left-leaning faculty and student body. However, I thought that I would be able to tunnel under all of that by being in the College of Engineering. I had the image of myself working side by side with a politically inert genius physics professor, cranking away integrals and solving real life situations via complex mathematics.

Have things been as bad as you've expected?

So far this image has, for the most part, come to life (other than the word ’solving’ at times).

Nice. No problem here.

What I overlooked, however, are the Freshman Writing Seminars (FWS).

Uh, oh. What's wrong with the big bad writing seminars?

These classes I speak often cover subjects regarding women’s rights, African American studies, American Indians, white superiority and manifest destiny, as well as a class on the war in Iraq.

Oh no!! Classes that deal with current events or controversial topics! How dare they!

Being familiar with the political ideologies of most Cornell professors and students [did he personally speak to hundreds of professors?], it is reasonably safe to say that many of these classes will be taught from a slanted viewpoint.

So did this turn out to be true?

After my first class of the semester, I am confident that the instructor will present the material in an unbiased, open-forum way.

Oh, great. Nothing to see here.

Honestly, why write this?

Reason 234982374183 why Andy Noel sucks

Oh, come on now...

Hello Season Ticket Holders,

Cornell University promotes good sportsmanship and has zero tolerance for any profanity, racial/sexist comments, or other intimidating actions at intercollegiate athletic events. The penalty for violating this policy is expulsion from the game and revocation of season tickets. There are no verbal warnings or second chances given for violation of this policy.

Furthermore, the band will not be permitted to play "Gary Glitter" at Cornell men's ice hockey games if students continue to chant a profane version of "Rough 'em up, rough 'em up, go CU."

Thank you for your cooperation in promoting good sportsmanship and in creating an inviting atmosphere (no profane language) in Lynah Rink.

Honestly, with the university endowment plunging 25% in 6 months, the idiots over at Athletics have nothing better to do than to send threatening emails to hockey fans?

It began during the first home games of 2009, the Niagara series two weeks ago. Our favorite usher, who usually stands at the door to the A/B aisle, had been shipped off to Section N (the Lynah equivalent of Siberia). The new usher came over to us during warmups and inquired:

"Are you regulars?"

"Umm, yes."

"Oh, well then I should tell you that with the new year there is a new, no tolerance policy about swearing. If you swear, you will be kicked out."

We asked her who this was coming from.

"Andy."

Ha.

Virtually everyone agrees that there are plenty of morons at the Athletic Department, and they have been responsible for the idiotic policies to come out of Teagle/Bartels the last few years. Andy Noel is the chief moron. I didn't have much of an opinion of him until he spoke at a Student Assembly meeting last year. He was at the SA to help deliver some sort of boring NCAA-mandated report about minority admissions and sports. One of the SA members, seizing the opportunity to confront Noel in person, started with a series of weak questions about Athletics' policy of revoking an entire season's worth of tickets for saying "fuck 'em up."

Noel launched into a lecture, declaring himself an "old-timer" and stating his desire to see Lynah Rink transformed into a family-friendly atmosphere.

Of course, destroying 30-year traditions like fish throwing and stifling fans' ability to cheer are certainly steps any "old-timer" would appreciate.

At the risk of digressing, just remember what Cornell coach Mike Schafer told the New York Times about the fish tradition:

“When I was playing here as a freshman, I thought the sight of fish flying over the boards was hilarious,” Schafer said. “It’s still a fun tradition that has lived on over the years, and it is all a part of the same kind of electricity that a college basketball fan might find at a Duke-North Carolina game.”

By reliable accounts, Schafer himself spends much of the game yelling swears at officials, players, or whatever else. And as others have pointed out on eLynah, Cornell Cinema shows movies with profane language. Hell, I've had plenty of professors who swear in class.

Again, Mitch and I addressed these issues in the Sun op-ed last spring:

Director of Athletics Andy Noel can preach about creating a family-friendly atmosphere at Lynah, but overall, his administration’s hard-line policies have hampered fan enthusiasm and creativity.

[snip]

This criminalization of the Lynah Faithful extends to cheering, as students frequently lament that they are afraid to start new cheers or yell loudly for fear of having their season tickets revoked (and not refunded) by the administration. Ushers patrol the staircases and openly glaring at students, as if daring them to finish “rough ’em up …”

One member of the Lynah Faithful recently pointed out to us, “Few businesses treat their biggest customers with the least respect.”

I'll have to think about this some more and try to figure out a reasonable policy that everyone can like. We're actually meeting with Athletics on Saturday to discuss a plan of action. For now, I'll enjoy being treated like a criminal at hockey games. Because obviously there's no benefit to having a lively fan base, right?

From the Athletics website:

Whether they’re cheering for the Big Red or joining the pep band in their rendition of "Give My Regards to Davy," the Lynah Faithful reaffirm the old saying, "there’s no place like home." In fact, the Big Red has won nearly 72 percent of its games played at Lynah Rink since its opening, with a 82-17-14 home record over the past seven years.

6-0-1 at home this year.

Hockey revenue numbers released

As Mitch and I acknowledged last spring in our op-ed in the Daily Sun, we understand the need for the Athletic Department to make a profit on men's hockey. It is probably one of the few sports for which Athletics comes out in the black every year, although we argued that it should seek to increase revenue elsewhere:

Some have made the argument that Cornell must charge high ticket prices for hockey because it loses money on nearly every other sport, but surely the administration should be able to turn a profit on men’s basketball (22-6 this year), men’s lacrosse (25-4 last two seasons) or wrestling (eight all-Americans in the last two years). Why charge so much at Lynah yet pass out freebies next door at Newman?

Apparently the revenue numbers for 2007 were recently released, and someone over at USCHO made this handy Google spreadsheet with the finances for every D-1 hockey program from that year.

Cornell took in $1,458,405 revenue from its men's team, for a profit of $590,871. It lists the women's team as having broken exactly even for the year, which strikes me as bizarre. I assume that the women's team actually lost money (in fact, only one school reporting a non-$0 women's profit was in the black), and that some of the costs were hidden in the men's team expenses. This means that the men's hockey team made even more profit.

Remember also that 2007 was something of a down year for hockey, as the team didn't make the ECAC Hockey final weekend in Albany. From my recollection, they also had fewer televised games during that calendar year because the team wasn't as highly rated as during the 05-06 or current seasons. These factors would both lead to decreased revenue.

If Athletics could make $600k profit on a hockey down-year, I sure as hell hope they've been making a profit on men's basketball the last couple years. Just check out this email I received today about Saturday's basketball games:

This game will likely sell out, so guarantee your seat by getting an advance ticket...Tickets will also be available at the ticket office, while supplies last. Tickets are FREE with your Big Red Sports Pass, so make sure you reserve your seat in advance!
...
The Big Red Men's Basketball team is on a 16-game Ivy winning streak and has it's sights set on an Ivy League repeat in 2009! Cheer on your Big Red in the return of Ivy League Basketball to Newman Arena!

With sold out games and the Ivy championship last year, one would assume that Athletics is turning a healthy profit on the basketball team.

But...compare the price of student tickets for basketball ($0 per game) and hockey ($13). Or townie tickets: basketball ($20 for 4 tickets, 4 hot dogs, 4 sodas) and hockey (up to $27 per game for 1 ticket).

From the Sun op-ed:

As fans of Cornell sports in general, we cannot help but notice that hockey fans are treated much worse than supporters of other top varsity sports. Admission to football, basketball and wrestling contests are free for Big Red Sports Pass holders, and fans are often showered with free t-shirts, game previews and food as they enter the stands.

It's great to see the basketball and wrestling programs doing well, but part of me wishes more of the revenue burden was placed on those sports and removed from hockey. If they charge $13 per game for hockey tickets, I'm sure they could charge a couple dollars for basketball games.

Crazy weekend ahead

I have to go to CT this weekend for my cousin's bar mitzvah. Conveniently, the hockey games this weekend at Union and RPI are somewhat on the way to CT, so I'll be making it to both road games.

Still, it makes for a lot of driving:

Ithaca to Schenectady: 181 mi
Schenectady to Middlebury: 128 mi
Middlebury to S. Windsor: 41 mi
S. Windsor to Troy: 111 mi
Troy to Ithaca: 186 mi

Sorry for the lack of posting this week; rush week is hectic.

Earthquake! (and other Cornell classes)

Last spring, I applied to be a student blogger for Life on the Hill. I was rejected (their loss, right?) but as part of the application I had to throw together a few blog posts about different topics. Here's what I wrote about my "least favorite thing about Cornell." With classes starting a week from today, I believe it's appropriate.

Ask Cornell students what they dislike most about life on the hill, and there’s a good chance they’ll complain either about the weather or a Cornell phenomenon called prelims – night exams that occur several times over the course of the semester.

Not so for me. As a Connecticut native, I don’t mind the cold or the snow – in fact, it snows less in Ithaca than in my hometown. And as for prelims? As a Government major I have few exams and lots of papers, which is what I prefer. It’s safe to say that my workload is less than what my friends in the College of Engineering have.

So, what bugs me most about Cornell? Funky class names.

Cornell is one of the world’s best universities, but its departments often craft bizarre names for classes in an effort to pique students’ interest. For example, take Plant Sciences 201: “Magical Mushrooms, Mischievous Molds.” Earth and Atmospheric Science 122 is “Earthquake!” while Physics 201 is titled “Why is the Sky Blue?”

Some of these eye-catching names appear on my own transcript. The catchy name of my freshman writing seminar (“Is the US a Democracy?”) was enough to convince me to take the class, but imagine my disappointment when most of the semester was spent studying basic political theory. One of the best classes I’ve taken at Cornell was Government 366, “American Political Theory from Madison to Malcolm X,” but the course loses some luster when my transcript reads “Am Pol Th Madis To Malcolm X.” The winner, however, is a Spanish class I’m taking this semester: “Early Hispanic Modernities: Readings in Medieval and Early Modern Iberian and Spanish-American Literatures.” I can’t wait to see how that one gets abbreviated on my transcript.

I understand how Cornell’s diverse selection of departments and classes creates competition for students. (See here for a full list of academic fields.) I have no doubt that more people enroll in English 316 with its name “Beasts, Bodies, and Boundaries” than would if it were called “Medieval English Literature.” However, when potential employers skim my transcript to see what I’ve learned from four years at an Ivy League college, I can’t help but think they’ll scratch their heads at some of these class names.

Perhaps I’m the only one who dislikes catchy course titles. Part of me wishes more departments were like Mathematics, which gives its classes no-nonsense names like “Calculus II,” “Calculus III,” and “Linear Algebra.” Much has been made of mathematicians’ lack of creativity, but in this case I believe it’s a good trait.

In a phone interview last month for a summer job, I was mortified when my potential boss asked me about “Dinosaurs,” a one-credit course I took in the fall. As it turns out, this Congressional staffer was actually highly interested in paleontology and we discussed theories of extinction for several minutes. Though I haven’t heard back from him since, I’ll admit that in this one case, taking interesting-sounding classes may have helped. Regardless, these fun-sounding class names still annoy me. I’d much rather take an interesting class than a course with a cool name.

Note: Incidentally, my classes this semester all have boring names like "Major Seminar" and "Translating Spanish."

On the other hand, maybe things really are bad

My last post discussed widespread economic pessimism and quoted a few people who think things aren't going so badly.

Today, Meteor Blades has an interesting post over at DailyKos that seems to support my gloomy outlook. She notes that the government has changed the way unemployment is measured, and that this complicates comparisons between the current recession and other downturns:

Most economists ridicule the idea that what we're experiencing now could ever become anything like the Great Depression. And, says Reuters, they all point to the same statistic: 25% of Americans were out of work in the worst of the 1930s and we're nowhere near that disaster.

But the definition of joblessness has changed since then. Not just in 1994, but also under Lyndon Johnson in the late 1960s, when discouraged workers out of job for more than a year were erased from the statistics. Out of work, out of luck, and out of sight.

A Reuters article from Thursday supports Meteor Blades' opinion:

Figures collected for Reuters by John Williams, from the electronic newsletter Shadowstats.com, suggest that, while we are not there yet, the comparison is not as outlandish as it might initially seem.

By his count, if unemployment were still tallied the way it was in the 1930s, today's jobless rate would be closer to 16.5 percent -- more than double the stated rate.

"I expect that unemployment in the current downturn, which will be particularly deep and protracted, eventually will rival, if not top, the 25 percent seen in the Great Depression," Williams said.

16.5 percent sounds a lot worse than the current, official mark of 7.2 percent. And for certain minority groups, particularly in urban areas, unemployment has remained high throughout the booms and recessions of the past couple decades.

In an editorial today, the NYT seems to think continued high unemployment is inevitable:

Even with a stimulus plan, unemployment will remain uncomfortably high in 2009, and even after it bottoms out, it is likely to revive slowly. That calls for not only extending unemployment benefits but expanding them, so that they cover more workers. Currently, less than half of jobless workers collect unemployment compensation.

Given that we're on our way to Depression-like unemployment levels, the Obama stimulus must put a dent in these numbers.

Economy Follow-Up

I wrote the other day about how pessimistic I am about the economic future of the American economy.

Nate Silver over at FiveThirtyEight has an interesting post today about the chances of a depression occurring.

He notes that over at Intrade markets, traders currently think there's a 40 percent chance of the U.S. facing a depression in 2009.



He compares this pessimism to the views of economists, who expect nothing more than a 1-2 percent decline in GDP at most, which would fall considerably short of meeting the criteria for a depression.

Silver speculates that there might be a "pessimism bubble" driving down expectations:

What the Intrade traders may be betting on, in other words, is other traders becoming more pessimistic at some point between now and close of the contact -- a "pessimism bubble", if you will.

But here's the real question. Is there a risk of a "pessimism bubble" in the real economy? And if so, are the real markets and the professional forecasters adequately accounting for it?

The economic news is going to get worse before it gets better, so if Silver's bubble theory were true, people like me are going to stay pessimistic for a while. It won't be until the economy starts to move forward again that we come around and realize that things weren't as bad as we expected.

I hope he's right.

What happened to global warming?

No, this isn't the over-used joke that people make whenever cold weather hits. (Although we were hit by a pretty significant ice storm in the northeast today, with snow days for every town around us in Connecticut.)

Seriously, though, what's going on in the world of climate change? From the perspective of someone who follows political news first and environmental news to a lesser extent, it seems as though the environmental movement has lost steam.

As of a couple years ago, it seemed like things were going strong. Al Gore's efforts, including the release of An Inconvenient Truth, put climate change in the headlines for a while. Additionally, the previous year's hurricane season (2005) had been the most active on record, with oddities like a cyclone hitting Portugal...and Katrina, of course.

When I took EAS 268 (Climate & Global Warming) last spring, environmentalism was very much still "in." High gas prices helped push reluctant policymakers to state that something had to be done about our carbon emissions, if for no other reason than to reduce our dependence on foreign oil.

So, what happened? Here are a few of my ideas:

1. The environment became a non-issue in the presidential election. John McCain came out in favor of reducing emissions, etc. Even T. Boone Pickens was running ads, and he was about the last person you'd expect to "go green." Whereas the previous years had featured Gore & the environmentalists versus Bush & the polluters, 2008 didn't have any of these clear matchups. Even Bush, in his last few months, was making statements about the environment. Without conflicts between the candidates, the media focused less on this issue and more about foreign policy, tax cuts, and other more controversial things.

2. The economy skewed governments' priorities. As I quoted a few days ago from the must-read Telegraph (UK) column, with a collapsing economy, it was suddenly much less appealing to spend large sums on climate change mitigation.

3. It's been cold. Global temperatures were down this year, particularly over the last couple months, where it's been cold and snowy throughout much of the U.S., Canada, and Europe. While hardly a scientific measurement, what people observe outside their window dictates to a considerable extent how much of this global warming business they believe.

4. NASA has been blundering around. The agency declared that this October was the warmest October on record, due mainly to significantly above-average readings from parts of Siberia. In a highly embarassing incident, a blogger discovered that NASA had mistakenly plugged in Siberia temperature data from September, which was presumably warmer than the October numbers. NASA was forced to go back and correct their algorithm.

Despite all this, from my own education, it seems like there is no reason to doubt that global warming is occurring. A key point from EAS 268 was that temperatures do not need to increase each year to indicate a warming trend. We could see cooler temperatures for several more years, but this would not slow the increasing levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. We know that these gases will cause warmer temperatures. And any credible climate scientist will reach this conclusion.

Another interesting factor is a tremendous decrease in solar wind this year:

"The average pressure of the solar wind has dropped more than 20% since the mid-1990s," says Dave McComas of the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas. "This is the weakest it's been since we began monitoring solar wind almost 50 years ago."

Scientists aren't sure what the effect of this decrease will be, but it's worth considering that it might be contributing to the cool temperatures we've been seeing.

Taking one climate class doesn't qualify me to be a scientist, but as someone who follows the news I'm worried that our environmental issues may no longer carry the sense of urgency they require. As I wrote in an editorial for the Progressive in December, Obama's election won't by itself solve any of the major problems facing our nation, including the environment. I hope Obama will take advantage of historic Democratic majorities in both houses to address the environment.

Overrated

The polls don't matter, but why is Princeton (13-3-0) still ahead of Cornell (9-1-3)?

Quick analysis of their schedules:

Princeton (13-3-0)

Key wins:
Northeastern (neutral ice)
Minn State-Mankato (home)
Nebraska-Omaha (home)

Losses:
Cornell (home)
Mercyhurst (neutral)
Dartmouth (home)

Cornell (9-1-3)

Key wins:
Princeton (away)
North Dakota (away)
St. Cloud (neutral)
UMass (away)

Loss:
North Dakota (away)

Cornell has had some big performances away from home this season, and I don't think you can say the same about Princeton.

We'll see what happens this weekend. Cornell might have trouble getting four points against a Niagara team coming to Ithaca with nothing to lose, while Princeton will beat up on Onion and RIP at home.

Economic Pessimism

Despite Obama's victory, I've remained pretty pessimistic over the last few months about the direction in which our country is heading.

There was a great article (maybe from ABC News) in June or July that basically said: Americans have the sense that everything is going wrong, from a worsening economy to (then) high oil prices to problems in Pakistan/Afghanistan to global warming. The article painted a bleak picture of where we were going as a nation.

Since then, the picture has changed. Oil prices and global warming have moved to the background of our concerns. As the Telegraph (UK) writes in a provocative piece, given the economy,

suddenly it has become rather less appealing that we should divert trillions of dollars, pounds and euros into the fantasy that we could reduce emissions of carbon dioxide by 80 per cent.

The economy is above and beyond any other concerns. And I see no reason to be optimistic. In Paul Krugman's column today, he sums up what I believe will happen:

Here’s my nightmare scenario: It takes Congress months to pass a stimulus plan, and the legislation that actually emerges is too cautious. As a result, the economy plunges for most of 2009, and when the plan finally starts to kick in, it’s only enough to slow the descent, not stop it. Meanwhile, deflation is setting in, while businesses and consumers start to base their spending plans on the expectation of a permanently depressed economy — well, you can see where this is going.

I know the Obama administration will do everything possible to push through the right economic legislation, but the GOP is going to take advantage of Americans' concerns about throwing more money into bailouts and stimulus packages by blocking major Democratic efforts. Anything that goes through is going to be a compromise package that simply won't do enough.

Hopefully I'm wrong, but even with Obama's inauguration in a couple of weeks, I don't have high hopes for the future.

Colin McEnroe Signs Off

Colin McEnroe's ten-year-old afternoon talk radio show on WTIC 1080 was canceled at the end of December. He hasn't written much about the show's cancellation, with the exception of his poignant column today in the Hartford Courant:

I heard, in short, from Whitman's America. Crazy, hilarious, loud, passionate, earthy. AM radio is more of a bazaar than a salon. Products are hawked and the weather pondered and the traffic decried and the prevailing winds of life measured and discussed. Its heart is primal, and its mind is fey.

Radio stations are facing similar pressures as print media, with a drop in advertising and a loss of audience to satellite radio. Just as many quality journalists are losing their jobs in print media, so might other excellent radio personalities lose their shows. McEnroe still has his blog and column in the Courant, so he won't starve, but it should be interesting to see what he decides to do next.

Crying Wolf

Not exactly breaking news, but this 2001 article from the Scientific American is scary accurate about what would happen if a strong hurricane hit New Orleans directly:

If a big, slow-moving hurricane crossed the Gulf of Mexico on the right track, it would drive a sea surge that would drown New Orleans under 20 feet of water. "As the water recedes," says Walter Maestri, a local emergency management director, "we expect to find a lot of dead bodies."

New Orleans is a disaster waiting to happen. The city lies below sea level, in a bowl bordered by levees that fend off Lake Pontchartrain to the north and the Mississippi River to the south and west. And because of a damning confluence of factors, the city is sinking further, putting it at increasing flood risk after even minor storms.

As the Obama administration determines the kinds of public works projects it will fund as part of the next stimulus package, it would be wise to consider projects that might prevent tragedies like Katrina. If the government had heeded warnings about the New Orleans levee system, the apocalyptic scenario outlined in the SA article might not have come true.

Side note: The Cornell library system is in the process of unveiling a new website. The Passkey feature looks to be the most useful.

Injustice and idiocy at the Cornell Campus Planning Office

When I picked up my 08-09 Cornell planner in August, I quickly noticed a major problem: Acacia was left off the campus map. So was ZBT. Since last year, the map had been cropped on the northern and western ends, cutting out our two houses. [See the online campus map.]

This may not seem like much of a big deal, but it's a huge problem. Freshmen use their campus maps to figure out how to get to fraternity parties. If you drive around on a Friday or Saturday night, you'll see hordes of freshmen wandering around north or west campus, with at least one of them holding onto the campus map.

If we're left off the map, it's much harder for anyone to get to our house. And if fewer people come to our house during the fall semester, numbers will be down for rush. It's a direct correlation.

I called around to figure out to right person to whom to complain, and in mid-September I sent a polite email to the Campus Planning Office. Here's part of it:

[snip]
It appears that the top of the map goes directly through where our house would be (318 Highland Rd on north), but nothing is visible. We have never been cut out of a campus map like this before. Our house is no further north than Pi Beta Phi sorority on Triphammer, so I'm unsure why someone would decide to cut us out of the map entirely while leaving Pi Phi intact.

I recognize that space issues make it difficult to include every relevant building, but it is extremely unfair to include all but two fraternities. Either all houses should be on the map, or none. This puts us at an extreme disadvantage for recruitment, as freshmen looking at their planners will have no idea where we are located.

Several days later, I received a short response from Frank Popowitch:

Thank you for bringing this to our attention. The 2 houses you mentioned are both on the basemaps we maintain, but are not on the map at [http://www.cornell.edu/maps/large.cfm] for a simple reason. They are both physically outside the area covered. We are already looking at extending the map to the North for the next edition, that we plan to update very soon, so as to include more buildings.

Well, duh. They shrunk the map area from last year, and we were cut off. This was an unacceptable response. I stayed optimistic, however, since Frank said they were going to extend the map to the North "very soon." If they could at least update the online map, that would help us out a lot for rush.

Meanwhile, to add insult to injury, the housing map on the Campus Life website featured a comical blue bar at the top that blocks out our house -- and only our house.

Fast forward to December, and I still had not received any follow-up from Frank or anyone over at Campus Planning. The map had not changed. So I wrote again:

Three months later, there has been no resolution to this issue, and I find this unacceptable. The online campus map still leaves Acacia and at least one other fraternity off. I have talked to leaders from the other house and they have discussed taking legal action. I believe that is an overreaction, but I will ask again that you expand the online map to the northern and western limits of last year's map. Rush week is quickly approaching and if Acacia is not on the campus map, we will see fewer people come to our house and a significant drop in income for the next few years. It is bad enough that we were left off the version of the map that was included in every student planner. I don't think this is an unreasonable request.

I understand that we are the house that is furthest north, but in past years it has not been a problem to include us (or ZBT) on campus maps. Given how competitive the rush process is, it is simply unfair to exclude certain fraternities from the campus map. And it's not like the campus map limits itself to "important" buildings. It extends far to the east to include obscure vet school buildings, and south to include Sage House and Schuyler House.

Here was the response I received from Frank:

Good Afternoon,
I am forwarding this reply on to the Office of Web Communications(OWC). We are still in the process of the next update to the maps. OWC may be able to give you an anticipated date for the next update.

It does not look likely that the map will be updated before rush week starts in a week and a half. I don't care as much if freshmen have trouble finding our house for parties, but as I said, for rush week this can have tremendous consequences. If this map fiasco costs us even two fewer pledges in the spring, that works out to approximately $40,000 in lost revenue over the next three years.

All I ask is that the Campus Planning Office restore the limits of the map to what they were last year. I don't see why this change was made, but it is a clear injustice.

[If I were Metaezra, I would put up a banner at the top of my blog announcing how many days it had been since Acacia was cut off from the map.]