THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 2009
NEWS
3A
CAMPUS
Voting open for students in traditions T-shirt contest
BY B.J. RAINS
rains@kansan.com
Starting today students can vote on Kansan.com for the five finalists in the Kansan's "Search for The Shirt" contest after a committee chose five slogans from more than 300 entries that were received in the past two weeks.
The voting will end a week from today on Nov. 13, and the winner will be announced soon after.
The University Daily Kansan is teaming up with the Athletics Department, the KU Alumni Association and the Kansas Union to come up with an official game day shirt for students, alumni and fans to all wear at KU sporting events this year.
"We're trying to make this something that we can do year after year," said Katie Feeley, promotions manager for The Kansan. "We think its something students will like because not only did they submit the slogans, they are getting to vote on which one they want."
"The best thing about this contest is that it was by the students and for the students", said Mike
Harrity, assistant athletics director for Student-Athlete Development and Community Relations.
"It's a powerful thing to see the winning slogan on T-shirts on campus and at our athletics events. It shows the influence that students can have when they work together."
"They sold 150,000 of them last year and a made a lot of money for charity and stuff," Feeley said. "Obviously, this is our first year of trying to do something like that, so it won't be that big, but we're really trying to make it 'the shirt' for everybody to have."
A shirt was created last year to replace the Muck Fizzou shirts, but the group is now trying to start a tradition of having a new shirt selected each year.
Harrity said he hoped someday the project would get as big as Notre Dame's.
They took the idea from the University of Notre Dame, which is in its 19th season of holding a similar game day shirt contest.
"It's been inspiring to see the energy and enthusiasm the student leaders from various groups have
Students can vote for the five finalists on Kansan.com until next Thursday, Nov. 13.
- The Swagger is Back
- Rock Chalkin' your socks off since 1965
- My favorite subject in school was always Gameday
- The University of Kansas Majoring in Champion-
hiness 1997
- Fly like a Jayhawk, Sting like a beak
Feeley said the T-shirts would be in stores as early as the end of November. They will sell for $10.
invested to help make this project a success", Harriity said. "Notre Dame's project was started 18 years ago, and our group aspires to establish a tradition as strong as Notre Dame's has become."
— Edited by Brenna Hawley
ELECTION 2008
Obama selects chief of staff Illinois representative offered job, unclear if he accepted
BY DAVID ESPO AND
NEDRA PICKLER
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON — President-elect Barack Obama pivoted quickly to begin filling out his new administration on Wednesday, selecting hard-charging Illinois Rep. Rahm Emanuel as White House chief of staff while aides stepped up the pace of transition work that had been cloaked in pre-election secrecy.
Several Democrats confirmed that Emanuel had been offered the job. While it was not clear he had accepted, a rejection would amount to an unlikely public snub of the new president-elect within hours of an electoral college landslide.
With hundreds of jobs to fill and only 10 weeks until Inauguration Day, Obama and his transition team confronted a formidable task complicated by his anti-lobbyist campaign rhetoric.
The official campaign Web Site said no political appointees would be permitted to work on "regulations or contracts directly and substantially related to their prior employer for two years. And no political appointee will be able to lobby the executive branch after leaving government service during the remainder of the administration."
But almost exactly one year ago, on Nov. 3, 2007, candidate Obama went considerably further than that while campaigning in South Carolina. "I don't take a dime of their money, and when I am president, they won't find a job in my White House," he said of lobbyists at the time.
Because they often have prior experience in government or politics, lobbyists figure as potential appointees for presidents of both parties.
On the morning after making history, the man elected the first black president had breakfast with his wife and two daughters at their Chicago home, went to a nearby gym and visited his downtown offices.
Aides said he planned no public appearances until later in the week, when he has promised to hold a news conference.
As president-elect, he begins receiving highly classified briefings from top intelligence officials Thursday.
In offering the post of White House chief of staff to Emanuel, Obama turned to a fellow Chicago politician with a far different style from his own, a man known for his bluntness as well as his single-minded determination.
Emanuel was a political and policy aide in Bill Clinton's White House. Leaving that, he turned to investment banking, then won a Chicago-area House seat six years ago. In Congress, he moved quickly into the leadership. As chairman of the Democratic campaign committee in 2006, he played an instrumental role in restoring his party to power after 12 years in the minority.
Emanuel maintained neutrality during the long primary battle between Obama and Sen. Hillary
Rodham Clinton, not surprising given his long-standing ties to the former first lady and his Illinois connections with Obama.
The day after the election there already was jockeying for Cabinet appointments.
Several Democrats said Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, who won a new six-year term on Tuesday, was angling for secretary of state. They spoke on condition of anonymity, saying they were not authorized to discuss any private conversations.
Kerry's spokeswoman, Brigid O'Rourke, disputed the reports. "It's not true. It's ridiculous," she said in an interview.
Announcement of the transition team came in a written statement from the Obama camp.
The group is headed by John Podesta, who served as chief of staff under former President Clinton; Pete Rouse, who has been Obama's chief of staff in the Senate, and Valerie larrett, a friend of the president-elect and campaign adviser.
Several Democrats described a sprawling operation well under way. Officials had kept deliberations under wraps to avoid the appearance of overconfidence in the weeks leading to Tuesday's election.
They said the group was stocked with longtime associates of Obama, as well as veterans of Clinton's White House.
Quite apart from transition issues, Obama's status as an incumbent member of Congress presents issues unseen since 1960, when John F. Kennedy moved from the Senate to the White House.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Displaced Congolese protect themselves from a rain storm in the Kibati camp north of Goma, eastern Congo, on Tuesday. Congo's government rejected rebel leader Laurent Nkunda's demand for direct talks to solve the crisis in eastern Congo, where fighting between rebels and the government has left tens of thousands of refugees desperate for international aid.
INTERNATIONAL
Fighting in Congo forces locals to flee
BY ANITA POWELL ASSOCIATED PRESS
KIWANJA, Congo - Sporadic gunfire and explosions echoed Wednesday around this town in eastern Congo, as rebels fought pro-government militiamen for a second day, forcing thousands of people to flee.
In Kiwanja, 45 miles north of the main city Goma, clashes erupted Tuesday between rebels and a militia known as the Mai Mai, but the violence eased Wednesday afternoon.
A wider cease-fire between the rebels and the government was holding further south around the provincial capital, however, as diplomats prepared to assemble a regional peace summit Friday in Kenya. It was bringing together U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the presidents of Rwanda and Congo.
Speaking in an interview, warlord Laurent Nkunda accused Congo's army of fitting mortars toward rebel positions from behind militia lines during Wednesday's battles. He also said ethnic Hutu Rwandan militias linked to Rwanda's 1994 genocide were fighting alongside the Mai Mai around Kiwania.
On the edge of Kiwanja, hundreds of people took shelter at a rooftail, abandoned school beside
In nearby village of Mabenga, a Belgian journalist working for a German newspaper was kidnapped by the Mai Mai late Tuesday along with his assistant and three rebel fighters, according to local official Gilles Simpeze. He said the government was negotiating their release.
The army could not be reached for comment.
Associated Press journalists who visited Kiwanja at midday saw several thousand people on the roads, including mothers with babies on their backs, trying to find safety. As insurgents loyal to Nkunda searched houses, artillery fire boomed in the hills nearby, and rebels told the reporters to leave.
Nkunda claimed the army had also taken part in fighting Saturday in two other towns in the region: Mweso and Kashuga, breaking the cease-fire Nkunda unilaterally declared Oct. 29 three times.
"This morning they wanted to advance (past Kiwanja) ... but our forces fought them back," Nkunda said. "They were very well armed."
Few had time to gather up possessions. One man carried only his Bible.
In Kiwanja, the streets were empty except for refugees. Ramshackle shops were shuttered, wooden doors were padlocked. A few residents peeked out of their homes and ducked back inside.
a U.N. base manned by Indian peacekeepers. The soldiers, in blue helmets and flak jackets, crouched behind sandbags and a ring of concertina wire.
Fighting in Congo intensified in August and has since displaced around 250,000 million people, forcing exhausted refugees to struggle through the countryside, lugging belongings, children, even goats.
("The U.N.) should open up their gates to protect us," said Ntaganzi Sinzahera, a 30-year-old refugee.
But soon after, Sinzahera and everyone else at the school left, joining a large crowd of refugees streaming toward the adjacent rebel-controlled town of Rutsuru.
"Tonight we don't know where we're going," said 21-year-old Omar Issa, who joined the crowds leaving Kiwanja. "I didn't bring anything. We don't have any food."