Tuesday, October 09, 2007
Six days ago
Oh, minutes.
It turns out that not only does Vishal Gupta want those Gala tickets to be available first to elected officials, they already have compensated tickets. Which means the proposal is to give each elected official an opportunity to pick two folks to go before having to compete with the general student body.
The Senate was discussing a bill to provide meaningless support for the DREAM act, which gives money to illegal immigrants. Joel Aguilar says:
It was imperative for the Senate to pass the Resolution that evening. It will help out a lot of students who were struggling and help out communities and families, and provide a means to get better educated youth and better themselves, and have a better workforce. Mr. Aguilar said he came there as an undocumented student and came to Berkeley as a transfer student. Oh, people from other countries are so funny. Would passing a meaningless ASUC resolution really "help out communities and families, etc."?
The "Education is a human right" approach is an interesting one. It's not like these folks would have had the opportunity to get a Cal education if only they hadn't been smuggled across the border. Doesn't that mean we have to conquer Mexico or something, in order to provide this human right to all those who don't have parents willing to ship them to America?
Mr. Daniels said he wasn't present last week for the debate on the ASUC lawyer bill. He wanted to thank Sen. Duong for speaking on behalf of grad students. Mr. Daniels said he was a little bit upset with the proportionality of the Selection Committee. There were four folks from the ASUC and only one from the GA. It's done and was no big deal, but in the future, he thought that if there could be a two-to-one ratio, that would be most beneficial from the GA's perspective. I wonder if it occurred to him that the Senate is not supposed to be representing what's most beneficial to the GA. A two-to-one ratio between folks that are voted on by graduate students and those who are not? I dunno... I would hope that folks who are voted on by graduate students would have total control. That, of course, means no place for the GA, though.
Taylor Allbright's attempt to appoint Ashley Thomas as EVP Summer Chief-of-Staff turned out to be interesting, because she apparently provided neither a resume or a report of what she did to the Senate.
Mr. Rhoads moved to table the appointment until next week to investigate this constitutionally, and how it worked over the summer. The motion was seconded by Mr. Shams.
Ms. Allbright moved to amend the motion, to consider as a whole a motion to rescind every single stipend made that entire year, as those questions of legality would also apply. The motion was seconded by Mr. Galeon. Haha. The appointment got tabled. I like this new Senate dynamic.
The appointment of a Finance Officer failed, as the nominee, Allen Cho, didn't really have experience and only insisted that he would learn, eventually. Or something. It was pretty party line, with CalSERVE supporting it, and everyone else opposing it or abstaining.
Gabe Weiner tried to pull something from Consent Calendar, but apparently missed the call for objections. He tried later. CalSERVE wanted to let it stand and serve as a "warning." Taylor got overruled by the Senate, and she threatened a Judicial Council suit. The bill got pulled.
Roxanne Winston pretty much shows equal protection the door in favor of the loud with a comment on discussion for some highly-funded event:
Ms. Winston said public transportation was available to get there, and there will be a lot of interest in Conference. Also, it was privileged to talk about who was a Cal student and who wasn't because, it was privileged to be there. Part of the privilege of being a Cal student was to give back to the community. Also, she didn't think it was appropriate to compare different events.
Mr. Weiner asked how they'd be consistent and fair if they didn't compare events. Ms. Winston said they could listen to discussion and to people's opinions. If they compare this event to others, they should compare every event to every other event. "Listen to discussion and to people's opinions," of course, means "defer to loud activists."
Chad Kunert got up to talk against the DREAM Act with the usual arguments (displaces legal residents, incentive for illegal immigration, etc.). He told me that he was then effectively called a racist, but this may have taken place in the comments after the vote, and thus didn't appear in the minutes. Too bad. I was looking forward to those comments.
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