Now that I am no longer a senator, and just a regular guy again, i wanted to move all of my wiki-Senate stuff here. if you want to find my personal page, click here

I endorsed these people to win in the Winter 2005 ASUCD Election. In order -

I wrote a letter to the editor that was rejected for various reasonable reasons. I still want people to see it and tell me how they feel. So, here it is...

As independent senators, we commend the Aggie editorial board for its endorsement of independent candidates for senate. The Aggie's endorsements suggest that Independent senators deserve five of the twelve senate seats (with LEAD and Student Focus trailing with four and one, respectively). We're concerned, however, with the absence of Student Focus candidates from the endorsement list. We are independent because we want to see all candidates weighed on their qualifications – not affiliations. We feel that the endorsements, which represent the “collective opinion of the editorial board,” excluded qualified candidates just because of their slate affiliation.

We are not concerned with the Aggie's implication that Student Focus candidates are less qualified than the endorsed candidates are — that decision is the editorial board's prerogative. We are only concerned with selecting the senators based on a vendetta or trendy desire to see a whole slate fail. It's our shared opinion that candidates from Student Focus, namely Kai Savaree-Ruess, deserve an endorsement. We also feel that the barring of Student Focus comes from a desire to see that slate fail, regardless of the candidate's qualifications. Decisions made in spite and anger are not in the long term interest of ASUCD.

Adam Gerber and Keith Shively

Comments:

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2005-02-23 22:07:11   I agree with you that Kai deserved an endorsement. However, who knows what happened during his interview. He is a calm and collected individual, but you never know how people will perform when surrounded by the Aggie editorial board. I did rank Kai highly when I voted. —AdamBarr

2005-02-23 22:11:48   yeah, im a little disapointed that kai didnt get endorsed (obviously) but my issue has more to do with the general feeling towards Student Focus. There is a strong anti-SF sentiment on campus and i think that they are becoming the scape goat for all ASUCD problems. i just dont want to see candidates overlooked by the voters just because they feel that its cool to hate SF —AdamGerber

2005-02-23 23:44:22   I think there's a difference between scapegoating for ASUCD's problems, and just not liking Student Focus' agenda/just not feeling it's in tune with what the campus needs. We haven't had any seriously big problems in ASUCD like the 2001 rolling blackouts that prompted the gubernatorial recall, so there aren't really big problems that we're blaming on Student Focus. I think the general sentiment is just that Student Focus isn't in tune with what we want right now. But then again maybe I'm missing something. —KenBloom

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