Today from 9:00 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Focus the Nation, a “national teach-in on climate change,” was held on the UO campus, mainly focused in and around the EMU. There were a multitude of panels, lectures and booths to help assuage your horrible, consumer guilt … I mean, uh, ecological footprint. Lectures were held every hour on the hour by university professors, and a sustainability fair was set up on the first floor of the EMU.

Here’s ten ways you can fight climate change, according to a poster board at the sustainability fair (and some helpful additions from me):

1. Recycle (or let hobos recycle for you)
2. Reduce, re-use
3. Buy green energy
4. Replace your bulbs
5. Ride bikes and buses (I would have suggested something classier, like “Save the earth. Ride me.”)
6. Go vegetarian
7. Turn things off (including other people’s computers and televisions)
8. Use less heat (the earth’s warming up anyways, right?)
9. Don’t use plastic (which is why I only use condoms made from sheep intestine)
10. Shop eco-friendly (as opposed to eco-ambivalent)

More of my experiences in sustainability land after the jump.

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From the oppressive DC-8 piloting forces of Xenu the evil, ancient space emperor who is the cause of all of the world’s problems. Gawker has the full scoop.

Other than being a completely hilarious belief system, Scientology—the made-up religion of pulp writer/hack L. Ron Hubbard—is dangerously litigious and secretive organization. Known for creating “dead agent packs” to intimidate and silence their critics. The video of Cruise linked above is a fairly frightening window into the mindset of the organization through one of its most fervent supporters.

Yahoo’s coverage here.
Previous OC coverage of Scientology here.
Another trip down the rabbit hole here.

In “first on-the-scene study of college drinking behavior,” researches somehow manages to discover the above headline. Hold the phone.

The team observed 1,304 young adults (751 men, 553 women) at 66 college parties over the course of three semesters. The parties all took place in private residences close to an urban public university in southern California. The team noted party environment, surveyed attendees and collected blood-alcohol concentrations.

The researchers found that playing drinking games, having a personal history of binge drinking, attending a party with many other intoxicated people, and attending a themed event all predicted higher blood alcohol levels. The researchers expressed surprise over the finding that women at themed events drank more heavily than their male peers.

Astonishing.

So much hogwash to get to, so little time.  (more…)

From a press release just issued to the Daily Emerald and the Register-Guard:

The Oregon Commentator is proud to present its first annual Great American Smoke-in on Friday, Nov.30 from noon to 3 p.m. in the EMU amphitheater.

In response to the ever-increasing vilification of smokers on campus, the Oregon Commentator presents the Great American Smoke-in as an opportunity for students to join together and enjoy the pleasures of fine tobacco products. Says Oregon Commentator Editor-in-Chief Ossie Bladine: “This is really a community event, a chance for smokers to have a safe space and fight the institutional bias against them.”

The Commentator opposes a smoke-free campus and other draconian measures proposed by the Clean Air Project. Bladine says these efforts are part of a larger scheme to “discriminate against and marginalize smokers.” The Great American Smoke-in, says Bladine, is a chance for smokers “to make their voices heard.”

The event will be held, rain or shine, and all forms of tobacco are welcome, including cigarettes, cigarillos, cigars, pipe tobacco and the use of hookahs. Although the Commentator supports the legalization of marijuana, the event is for tobacco products only.

The ongoing quality issues that have plagued Chinese imports and spurred waves of recalls took a turn for the absurd recently, when doctors in Australia discovered that “Aqua Dots”, a brand of water-fusing bead toys, creates a chemical related to GHB, a banned “date rape drug,” when eaten by children. Apparently doctors thought that a kid had been roofied by his parents, before discovering that “an obscure industrial chemical used to prevent water-soluble glues from becoming sticky before they are needed” actually turned into GHB when ingested, which resulted in parents finding children with coma and seizure-like symptoms and vomiting beads.  Now, we all know that kids have the inalienable right to put anything they want in their mouths without ever running any risk of consequences, and we also know without a doubt that GHB is bad. So what do we do about this grave risk to our precious little future Americans? Several local fraternities have offered to buy up remaining stocks of the GHB-producing beads for “proper disposal.”

The Man Issue will be on the stands Monday Nov. 5, but you can check it out right now in pdf form. Inside we rip apart the AK47, do a lot of journalistic finger pointing and aide the good fight against the emasculation of men at the University. If you don’t like it, come tell us to our face.

Contest: The first person to name the lovely couple on page 16 gets a free sudsy tee or tank. (OC staffers cannot win.)

I think we all knew that this story would come back (the comments are a fun read), but who could have guessed it would have been so gleefully, spectacularly embarassing for everyone involved? That’s right folks, everyone’s favorite former Con Court justice Jerome Roberts promised that he would pay back the $375 he collected in stipends while he was not a student, but he has yet to send a solitary ducat back to the ASUO. According to the Emerald, Roberts was supposed to pay back $50 a month until the sum was redeemed. Let’s see now, the story came to light in May, so you have payments for June through October missing, that’s $250 the ASUO should have back in it’s gullible little mitts by now, instead of a big, fat bupkis. Oh well, it’s not that much money… hell, why doesn’t the Exec just have him work it off over at the Con Court? After all, it’s not like the court could become any more of a joke than it already is…

***UPDATE***

Awesome raging against the unfairness of making Roberts pay the money back here (scroll down), from everyone’s favorite Senator. Of course enforcing rules is the product of “personal bias” Nate… it has nothing to do with the responsibilities of fair play in government. Hell, why don’t you just go straight for your favorite chestnut and call the whole Senate racist again? Damn, just when you think a situation can’t become any more embarassing…

Happy Columbus Day! And to our friends at the Longhouse, Happy Indigenous Solidarity Day! The Ol’ Dirty had an article focusing on today’s event put on by the Native American Student Union and the MCC. For some reason Chuck Hunt is speaking at it.

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Despite our best efforts of being drunk every night and procrastinating our assignments, the OC staff presents its annual Back To The Booze issue under two weeks of the release of the Summer Issue. For those that think this is a sign of more responsibility and less boozing from this year’s staff, we assure you this is not the case. Enjoy.

And it’s already been sent to the printers, so you find any errors, we don’t care. Cheers.

Hey there. Just sittin around. It’s early. Not really doing much. Wondering how the day will…what the hell, the ASUO drafted a diversity plan? This can’t be any good. Let’s see, mission statement. Contact with diverse member of the community, sounds good to me. Encourage groups to participate in activities about diversity, not sure why that needs to be said, but ok. “Create ways for students to engage one another on issues of diversity.” Nice. Oh please let there me something about a central place for students to meet and chat like a bar or a pub or a tavern or a brothel.

Ooo, ten points to follow, maybe the bar is in there.

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If you are bored, and I mean really bored, check out the “true” makings of America at this link. Who would have guessed that there are over 20 complete zodiacs in Washington D.C.?

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If you picked up the Register Guard today, you probably noticed the headline “Council high on downtown ideas“. Somebody down at the RG must have been having a chuckle, or else they’ve never been downtown.

But I can see why they must have thought the city council was high. The story is about the multitude of proposals being considered by the council for developing downtown Eugene. Here’s the lead:

Condos. A four-screen movie theater. Restaurants. A grocery store. Even a 24-hour newsstand.

The Eugene City Council on Wednesday liked all of those ideas and more for revitalizing two blocks in the heart of downtown.

A 24-hour newsstand? God, they must have been baked. “Imagine, like, a newsstand … a newsstand that you can go to anytime, and the guy there will tell you what the news is, like, right at that moment. Whoa.” However, these were just a few of the 123 recomendations submitted by the West Broadway Advisory Committee, all of which sound totally awsome when you’re stoned. (more…)

Yes, we know that all the jumps go to the wrong page, but it was an executive decision to leave it as is. Enjoy.

 UPDATE: The new and improved summer issue is posted. You will be able to tell it’s the new one from the great new table of contents - now it zig-zags! Also, we fixed the jumps, most spelling errors, although we left a few in honor of the Bad Spelling artical in Best of, and after much thought even fixed Tim’s name.  Cheers.

As if the UO Athletic Department wasn’t already having PR issues, now their public face has been suspended for next weeks home game against Fresno State for delivering this brutal smackdown to the Houston Cougar. No word yet on why the Duck decided to run wild on the Cougar, nor why he felt compelled to savagely teabag his hapless victim as he lay quivering on the turf of Autzen Stadium. Needless to say, this comes as a blow to the ASUO’s much-vaunted (by them) “Classy Fan Initiative.”

Watch the Ducks teabag the Michigan Wolverines today at 12:30 on ABC.

Edit: If you missed this, it was quite the teabagging. Go Ducks!