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WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 9. 2009
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CAMPUS Student on life support after collapse at home
Ashley Mirsepasi, Olathe junior, is still on life support, her parents said.
Mirsepasi, her father, said Ashley was at home in Olathe on Monday when she felt a headache and, soon after, collapsed.
Justin Leverett
ety
He and his wife Shaheen took Ashley to a nearby hospital, where doctors told them she had suffered from a brain seizure.
"We're just hanging on for hope," he said.
An earlier report indicated incorrectly that Mirespasi had died Monday. Check Kansan, com for updates.
NATIONAL Yale pulls controversial Muslim art from book
NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Yale University has removed cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad from an upcoming book about how they caused outrage across the Muslim world, drawing criticism from prominent alumni and a national group of university professors.
President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama are greeted by France's President Nicolas Sarkozy and wife Carla Bruni-Sarkozy at Palais Rohan in Strasbourg April 3. A factory worker's allegation to a Belgian TV crew that she was chosen as a backdrop extrait at a Normandy plant that he visited she was short is making waves as an Internet video over a subject long sensitive for the French president; his height.
Yale cited fears of violence.
Yale cited fears of violence. Yale University Press, which the university owns, removed the 12 caricatures from the book "The Cartoons That Shook the World" by Brandeis University professor Jytte Klausen. The book is scheduled to be released next week.
A Danish newspaper originally published the cartoons — including one depicting Muhammad wearing a bomb-shaped turban — in 2005.
The following year, the cartoons triggered massive protests from Morocco to Indonesia. Rioters torched Danish and other Western diplomatic missions. Some Muslim countries boycotted Danish products.
Associated Press
INTERNATIONAL
Size did matter,says Sarkozy's extra
BY JAMEY KEATEN
Associated Press
PARIS — From elevator shoes to step-up boxes behind podiums, and even his own tippy-toes, Nicolas Sarkozy and his handlers have tried to compensate for his height — or lack thereof.
Now, a factory worker's claim that she was chosen to stand near the French president during a photo shoot because she is short is making waves on the Internet — and rankling Sarkov's office.
The brouhaha was sparked during a visit to an auto parts plant in Normandy last week in which Sarkozy laid out his support for industry and defended his controversial plan for a "carbon tax" to help the environment.
About 20 employees in white work smocks were gathered to stand behind Sarkozy on a riser as he spoke to about 600 workers at the new Faurecia automotive parts production site in Caligny.
"I've been told you were chosen on height criteria," a reporter for the Belgian TV network RTBF asked a dark-haired woman in the line-up. "Is that true?"
ASSOCIATED PRESS
"I've been told you were chosen on height criteria."
The reporter, Jean-Philippe Shaller, pressed on: "That you shouldn't be taller than the president?"
JEAN-PHILLIPPE SCHALLER Reporter
Two labor union leaders were quoted in the left-leaning newspaper Liberation on Tuesday as saying a hand-picked group of short workers had been requested. Neither Noel Djezari of the Communist-backed CGT union nor Jose de Sa Moreira of the center-left CFDT could be reached for comment, though labor unions have had tense relations with the conservative Sarkozy on many issues recently.
"That's right," she replied, then nervously looked away as other white-suited employees looked on.
Two presidential spokesmen denied the allegation, terming it "absurd and grotesque" and saying no such order had come from Sarkozy's office.
In a statement Monday, Faurecia said it alone had organized the appearance involving employees from four factory sites in the area, and denied the president's office made any specific requests.
Sarkozy regularly appears with crowds in the background, at times with people taller than he is. A spokesman said he didn't know the president's exact height, but said it is around 5 feet 7 inches.
Charles de Gaulle had to struggle to find a bed that would fit his 6-foot-5-inch frame when he was on the road, and Francois Mitterrand had a complex about
Height has been an issue for many leaders over the years, from the famously short — Napoleon is said to have been 5 feet 2 inches tall — to the towering.
looking small next to the 6-foot-4-inch German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, according to Jean-Pierre Friedman, the author of books on Sarkozy and the psychology of leaders.
Questions have swirled about the
exact heights of Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and President Dmitry Medvedev, and whether they try to appear taller than they are. Web chats dedicated to guessing their size compare them to other not-so-tall leaders, including Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, North Korea's Kim Jong II and Italy's Silvio Berlusconi.
Stage-managing presidential appearances is nothing new, and Sarkozy and his aides are known to skillfully craft his image. Photographers have caught him standing on boxes behind podiums or standing on his tiptoes — such
While Brunt told French television last year she is just shy of 5 feet 8 inches, other reports have put her at 5 feet 9 inches, and she is often photographed wearing flats in appearances with her husband.
Friedman said Sarkozy "has had a complex with his height that has given him a sense of inferiority ...
as during a photo op with his wife, former supermodel Carla Bruni, and Barack and Michelle Obama in Strasbourg in April.
so he has had to prove himself."
Take a look at the way he walks — it's very particular," he said. "It almost seems as though he has lifts in his shoes that seem to disrupt his balance."
Sarkozy's political rivals pounced on the Faurecia appearance while his supporters rushed to his defense.
"When the French president goes on official visits throughout France, the only thing that is actually directed by the Flysew is his security," said Frederic Lefebre, a spokesman for Sarkozy's conservative party.
Socialist party spokesman Benoit Hamon called the alleged stage management "shocking," telling AP Television News it amounted to "the politics of spectacle."
"Frankly, for me, it is a little ridiculous, yes, absolutely," said Paris resident David Charley.
NATIONAL
New Cheney International Center stirs controversy over namesake
BY MEAD GRUVER
Former Vice President Dick Cheney speaks at the National Press Club in Washington June 3. The University of Wyoming's decision to name its new international student center after him has sparked controversy because of his support for harsh interrogation tactics and the war.
Associated Press
ASSOCIATED PRESS
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — A decision by the University of Wyoming to name a new center for international students for former Vice President Dick Cheney is drawing criticism from people who say Cheney's support for the Iraq war and harsh interrogation techniques should disqualify him from the distinction.
The former vice president and wife Lynne are expected to attend Thursday's dedication of the new Cheney International Center on the Laramie campus.
Protesters plan to be there, too.
Protesters plan to be there, too.
The center is funded in part with $3.2 million the Cheneys donated to the university in several installments while he was vice president.
The university's decision to name the center after Cheney, a former Wyoming congressman, prompted a petition that collected more than 150 signatures. The petition said policies of the Bush administration were "very controversial" and the name will affect how people perceive the center.
Cheney's support for harsh interrogations — torture, some say — is one reason to oppose naming the center after him, said Suzanne Pelican, who began circulating the petition a year ago.
"We feel that by naming it the Cheney International Center, that the programs and UW can't avoid being identified with that ideology and that approach to global politics that the Bush-Cheney administration championed." Pelican said Tuesday.
Pelican also criticized the Bush administration "go it alone" strategy when several U.S. allies opposed the invasion of Iraq and didn't participate in the war.
Pelican is an extension educator in the university's College of Agriculture who plans to peacefully protest during the dedication.
A state program matched the Cheney's $3.2 million gift with $3.2 million in state funding. The university spent $3 million to renovate and expand an existing building for the center.
A phone message left with Cheney's assistant Lucy Tutwiler wasn't immediately returned.
A total of $3.4 million has been
Another Laramie resident opposed to the name is Nancy Sindelar, with the group Veterans For Peace.
allocated for scholarships for students to study overseas.
"Mr. Cheney is not the best example of demonstrating how nations should get along with each other," said Sindelar, who is retired.
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