Brown and White Vol. 119 no. 16

              Vol. 119 No. 16
Friday, November 5, 2010
‘All the Lehigh News First’
THE BROWN AND WHITE
Lehigh University’s Student Newspaper Founded in 1894
SPORTS
Women’s soccer
to face Bison
Page 12
ONLINE
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A new vision
for Lehigh-Laf
Page 5
LIFESTYLE
By ANNAMARIA ANSELMO
The Huffington Post recently published a blog post from Jeremy Littau, professor of journalism and communication, which criticized the excessive media coverage of the mining accident and rescue in Chile.
It then led to an interview with Al Jazeera, an interna­tional news network.
He posted the blog the night of the rescue on Oct. 13, but he said he “didn’t think much of it,” and never predict­ed the attention the post would later garner.
However, the following day, The Huffington Post con­tacted Lehigh’s news bureau located at Goodman Campus, asking if it could syndicate the post on its website. After the blog was posted on the site, Littau was then contacted by Al Jazeera for an interview on a similar story it was featuring on the Chilean miners.
Jack Lule, professor of journalism and communication, said it “wasn’t surprising that one of [Littau’s] blog posts went viral” because “a lot of people were following him.”
In the blog entry, Littau raised a question about the number of journalists chronicling the story: “A big story and a great story, but does 1,300 journalists covering the Chilean miners have anything to do with reality?”
According to Littau, the British Broadcasting Corpora­tion alone sent 26 people there. He said the BBC spent $150,000 just to report on this solitary incident.
“We have an era where we can share newsfeed and save money to spend doing better journalism elsewhere,” Littau said.
Rather than flocking to this story and spending so much money and so many resources, Littau said he believes the media should also focus more on their own local issues that are more directly affecting the people they are serving.
“But on the media side, I see an industry chasing hits and page views by wasting valuable economic and human capital,” Littau said in his blog. “Let’s cheer for the miners, but let’s not forget that there is suffering here at home and it should get the same, if not more, resource allocation.”
Lule reiterated Littau’s message, stressing the overabun­dance of journalists and media outlets present at the mine before, during and after extraction.
“It’s not that they didn’t deserve [coverage], but they didn’t need repetitive coverage,” he said.
However, people were more attracted to the Chilean miners’ rescue because it was an endearing human interest story.
“The Chile story was great because it had a beginning, middle and end,” Littau said. “Stories like Haiti are difficult because there is no clear goal in sight.”
Littau also attributed the mass coverage of the Chilean miners to competition among the media.
“There is no instinct to collaborate,” he said. “Competi­tion is a part of the industry, but not in an era of cutbacks
Prof’s blog post jabs at media coverage
See MEDIA Page 3
B&W photo by CHAUCY DIXON
Bill Maloney, ’80, shared with students, faculty and staff on Oct. 28 in Rauch Business Center his experience with helping to extract and save the miners in Chile as part of the rescue team. Story on page 3.
By JOHANA BHUIYAN
At the close of Tuesday’s midterm elections, Republicans took control of the House of Rep­resentatives while Democrats maintained the majority in the Senate.
The number of Democratic governors in the country fell from 24 to 15, and the Republi­cans enjoyed an increase from 24 to 28.
In the Senate, the number of seats required to maintain the majority is 51, in which case Democrats just made the cut.
The final count for Senate is 49 Democrats, 46 Republicans, and two Independents.
The Republicans exceeded the minimum requirement for majority in the House by 17, bringing the final count of Republican seats in the House to 235. Democratic seats fell from 256 to 181.
In accordance with the Republican victory, Nancy Pelosi must give up her gavel and step down from the pulpit as House Speaker.
Many believe that John Boehner, a repre­sentative from Ohio, will take over Pelosi’s seat.
Pennsylvania, a state widely known for be­ing distinctly Democratic for decades, has be­come a Republican state.
Tom Corbett took over the gubernatorial office. Pat Toomey stole the Senate seat, and Republicans were able to seize 12 out of 19 House districts.
More than a handful of states that were once distinctly blue have transformed into an overwhelmingly red state.
This poses more obstacles for President Barack Obama to push forward his proposals and plans.
During a news conference on Wednesday, the president promised he would actively work
House changes from blue to red in elections
See ELECTION Page 2
University scores higher in
sustainability than last year
By ASHLEY SKIBICKI
The College Sustainability Green Report Card 2011 was released last Wednesday, marking Lehigh with a B-, a higher grade than in previous years.
Although only receiving an overall B-, there are several improvements Le­high is striving for in the near future.
According to the press release on the Sustainable Endowments Institute’s report card, the process of grading the schools entailed conducting research based on publicly available informa­tion, sending surveys to appropriate school officials and student groups, and assessing each school’s performance on more than 120 questions.
These questions included 52 indica­tors in the categories of administration, climate change and energy, food and recycling, green building, transporta­tion, student involvement, endowment transparency, investment priorities and shareholder engagement.
Dork Sahagian, professor of earth and environmental science, spoke about Lehigh’s improvements.
“Single stream recycling is a huge step, and it seems to be working,” he said. “It is a matter of changing the mindset of the students, staff and faculty to actually use the recycling bins, and they seem to be doing it. We also just hired a full-time sustainability coordinator.”
Sustainability coordinator Delicia Nahman said she believes Lehigh is capable of achieving an A in every category on the Green Report Card in upcoming years.
See REPORT CARD Page 3
Lehigh to the rescue