11 December 2007 Issue ^>7," The newspaper of the I^ESU
The Beaver is printed on 100% recj'clod paper. Please recycle your copy.
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Students throw the book at the Libraiy
I Students demand return of 24 hour library
I Beaver survey reveals discontent at lack of essential texts and study space
Michael Deas
News Editor
Students are disillusioned with the LSE Libraiy on many fronts, a survey conducted by The Beaver has revealed. Students expressed their dismay at the withdrawal of the twenty-four hour opening, with seventy-nine percent of the 350 students surveyed calling for its return. Students also complained that the Library fails to provide adequate copies of essential readings, study space and computer facilities.
The Library was open twenty four hours a day during all three terms of the last academic year. This year the library will continue to close at midnight until twenty-four hour opening returns during the Easter holiday and summer term, with the school claiming that "resources could be better directed elsewhere".
However, many students have told The Beaver that the School has failed to understand the value of twenty four hour opening.
A second year undergraduate said, "I have a job, I can't study 9-5. Since the LSE is all about the reading list because there is so little contact time, library access is incredibly important. Having the library open after midnight helped me immensely last year."
The LSE Students' Union (LSESU) are launching a campaign to bring back 24 hour library access during Michaelmas and Lent terms. A document outlining the main arguments for longer opening hours is due to be presented to the school at the beginning of the year. The Union also hopes to organise a petition to demonstrate support for the campaign.
Fadhil Bakeer Markar,
LSESU General Secretary, said: "The overwhelming support for our campaign this survey reveals is great news. Our campaign hopes to win what the students want and enhance their experience on campus. Hopefully we will be able to address the concerns of those who don't yet support twenty four hour opening and win their support for this great campaign."
Peter Barton, a member of the campaign team, told The Beaver: "Students use the library after midnight because they have to. Some students work during the day and for others it is reassuring to know the library will be open for them when they really need it, no matter what time, even if that is only once or twice a term to meet an important deadline."
The cost to the School of opening the library around the clock during Michaelmas and Lent terms would be £74,704. Hiring security overnight costs £36,360 and extra Estates' costs such as energy total, £38,347. However, the campaign team argue that as the School pays these costs in keeping computer room A038 open twenty four hours a day as compensation for the removal of late library opening, it would instead be a better use of resources to keep the library open.
Furthermore, it is argued that £74,704 is a relatively low figure in context of an institution with a multi-million pound turnover.
However, many students said that twenty four hour library access would be excessive. But The Beaver understands that if the library were to close at 2am - as many students told The Beaver would be adequate - they would have to pay for security staff to travel
home in taxis rather than use public transport, eradicating any savings made by not staying open around the clock.
The Beaver's survey also asked students if - given that the school is citing cost as the main argument against extended twenty four hour opening - they would be prepared to pay a nominal fee (eg 50p) to use the library after midnight. Whilst 48 percent of respondents said they would be prepared to pay such a charge, many students met this question with anger.
One Masters student said, "I already pay £12,000 to study here. The LSE is already one of the most expensive universities in the world. It would be outrageous to charges us to use a service that most other leading universities provide for free."
But one third year said he was so desperate to be able to use the library he would pay towards keeping it open after midnight: "It would constitute another way in which students are being turned into cash cows, but at the moment, due to other commitments, I hardly spend any time in the library compared to last year, so I'd have to accept it"
Students who were not in favour of twenty four hour opening said that they feared that if money was spent extending opening hours that this would detract from investment in other areas such as extending course collections and increasing study space.
However, Barton told The Beaver: "There is no reason that a world class social science institution cannot have both top class facilities and round the clock access to them."
CONTINUED ON P. 3 EDITORIAL COMMENT R9
Always:
34%
Features: Find Your Own Funds, Son
JHindin ^Page 12
PartB: Interview
No/Not Bothered: 21%
Are you in favour of the library being open 24 hours a day?
Never: 12%
Do you have trouble finding essential readings?
l^iL 1 ill
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Sometimes:
Sports: A Christmas Carol
PartB Page 4 ^	Director
Paul Haggis


Pages 2
02 leaver | ii December 2007
In Other news
higher education news EducationQuardian.co.uk
Picture of the week
Please send your submissions for'Picture of the Week'to photos@thebeaveronline.co.uk to be featured here


This week in
1998
laise £2000 in their sleep
Students raise £2000 in their sleep
LSE students are set to raise £2000 for homeless charity Centrepoint following a successful sleep-out on Houghton Street last Monday. Around forty hardy students, armed with sleeping bags and take-aways, managed to survive in the near freezing conditions.
Amongst those who contributed to the sponsor fund was LSE Director Anthony Giddens. Although he declined to lay down his head outside Clare Market building, Giddens sponsored SU General Secretary Narius Aga, donating £100.
IN THIS ISSUE
The risks of twinning with China
UK Universities should be more careful when seeking partnerships with Chinese universities.
According to Prof Ian Gow, former head of Nottingham University's Chinese campus, quoted in a report by Agora, "China wants to be the leading power in higher education, and it will extract what it can from the UK".
British universities should not rush through agreements the way they currently do and think about "Sino-UK strategic alliances".
Many Chinese universities now teach in English, which means that "foreign students can now study in English in China much more cheaply than in the UK."
The report raises doubts that overseas campuses are a sure success.
IHl ttvu^
HIGHER
VmCATtUS
Stop Press: LSE not best campus in the UK
Undergraduates have been asked to rate their universities for a THES
survey.
The survey showed that students value the campus social life and extracurricular activities as much as quality of teaching. Loughborough University was rated best campus.
Shirley Pearce, the vice-chancellor, attributed this first place to "fantastic teams with a real commitment to excellence". Cambridge, Glasgow, Oxford and St Andrews Universities were also in the top 5.
Cambridge University Students' Union credited the college system for the ranking, saying that it added a "real community feel" to its university experience. The LSE was not ranked in the top 50.
Student .. _ Manchester UniBan Facebook
Facebook use has been banned in Manchester University. The move follows complains from angry students who could not use computers to write essays while others were checking Eacebook or their emails. However, the university is having problems implementing the measure due to a shortage of staff.
The Exeter University Students' Union previously tried to get Eacebook banned. But the motion was voted down because students thought that "the lure of online social networking was simply too overpowering."
NEWS	1
Students throw the book at the Library Palestinian student allowed back to Bradford Uni following huge pressure Twinning taskforce discuss exchange programme with Al-Najah SU
London students call for ethical investment policies
LSE RAG Committee elected
Bankside House suffers from severe power cuts Climate Change Week meets with cold front of indifference
LSE reluctant to spy on students despite Brown's warning
LSE Choir impresses at two Christmas Concerts last week
LSE Academic wins top
award in his fieldaward in
Robert Kagan dubs America "dangerous nation"
the E.U.
Waiting for the Tsunami Tuesday?
LISTINGS
dren
Kleenex for men crap cum cry Have a meriy Christ...Mess Remi Nicole The listings war The Hives Life is a laugh Tpujoui-s Tingo Kids on holidays vs life changing experience The mercy seat
NEWS
NEWS IN BRIEF
Beavers to benefit fix)m new nature reserve
A Scottish landowner plans to introudce Beavers into his new nature reserve. Paul Lister, owner of the Alladale Estate and Wildlife Reserve, 40 miles north of Inverness, plans to reintroduce 'lost' species such as Wolves, Elks, Lynx and Brown Bears which used to be native to the UK."
The Beaver is the LSE's mascot, apparently because of its industrious and social habits.
Students lead
Kosovo independence protests
Elected student leaders have been at the fore of recent pro-independence demonstrations taking place in Pristina, the capital of Kosovo.
At a press conference held on Sunday, students said that protests will march to the parliament building in the capital and wait until a member of the government comes out to give them the date for indepen-dance. "If nobody comes out we will wait until they do," said Burim Balaj, a final-year law student.
Peter Sutherland oversees The
Biggest Environmental Crime in History
BP is being accused of abandoning its "green sheen" by investing £1.5bn to extract oil from the Canadian wilderness oil sands using methods that use nearly five times more CO2 than regular oil extraction.
BP is part of a consortium that plans to produce crude oil from tar sands found beneath more than 54,000 square wiles of prime forest - an area the size of England and Wales combined.
The Independent has dubbed BP's announcement as 'The Biggest Environmental Crime in History.'
BP Chairman Peter Sutherland is due to become Chairman of LSE as of 1 January 2008.
The School has repeatedly dismissed suggestions that LSE will in any way be tarnished by bp's environmental and humanitarian record.
EU is coping without treaty says LSE academic
Helen Wallace, an LSE professor, has said that the EU's main institutions - the council of ministers, European Commission, European parliament and European Court of Justice -are functioning as well as ever without a new constitution or treaty.
"Established working methods and practices have survived the arrival of new member states" she said.
C&A
Speak no evil l^lk is cheap Listen and be heard Time for Thanksgiving Letters to the Editor . Hand in hand for peace
FEATURES
Red isn't dead:
How far can the Labour alienate the people Blue is true:
Locking up people without chaise is simply not acceptable Find your own funds, son!
IXmiing up the Heat on
Office Hours r week . The Beaver Collective Meeting Monday 7th
SPORTS
How's carol? She's fine,Ta. Just take a look for yourselves Have yourselves a little merry Carol!
PARTB
B1
In the valley of lost chil-
NEWS
leaver I n December 2007 03
Palestinian student allowed to return to UK following international pressure
Ruchika Tulshyan
News Editor
Palestinian	student
Khaled al-Mudallal has been allowed to leave the Gaza Strip to return to his studies at Bradford University following huge international pressure. Al-Mudallal, who was voted LSE Students' Union Honorary Vice President in Michaelmas term, was trapped in Gaza by Israeli occupation forces authorities for 6 months despite having a UK visa. He vrill complete his final year of study in Business and Management studies.
"This is not a victory", said al-Mudallal referring to the other 670 students still being prevented to leave Gaza to return to university. He spoke at a press conference last Wednesday	alongside
Ruqqayah Collector, National Union of Students (NUS) Black Students' Officer and Sarah Colborne, Chair of Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Brian Iddon MP tabled an Early Day Motion supporting al-Mudallal's case, signed by 50 MPs.
The Early Day Motion stated that according to Gisha "Mr A1 Mudallal has not been able to leave Gaza, not because he has chosen not to, but because he is being prevented from doing so." Twenty-two year old al Mudallal returned to his home in the Gaza Strip in June of this year, but was trapped after the Israeli Military closed oft the Rafah crossing border, the only way for Gazans to leave the Strip.
The case was one of many taken up Israeli human rights organisation, Gisha, in the
i'fit

Khalcd al-Mudallal was trapped in Gaza for six months by Israeli Occupation forces, pictured here with MP Brian Iddon
"This is not a victory... I have a right to education, a right to live and be free."
Khaled al-Mudallal
Bradford University Student
Israeli Supreme Court.
The claim by the Israeli embassy in London that al-Mudallal was free to leave Gaza but had chosen not to were refuted by him in a letter to the embassy.
"I have a right to education, a right to live and be free", said al-Mudallal who missed his exams and first term of university. The NUS' successful "Let Khaled Study Campaign" was backed by organisations such as "Jews for Justice for Palestinians" and the Palestine Solidarity Campaign.
"The scale of support for Khaled from students has been
very helpful in ensuring that he can leave Gaza but there are hundreds of students still trapped there," said Sarah Colborne, Chair of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign. The press conference also highlighted the dire situation of Palestinians requiring urgent medical health - UN statistics show that of 762 applications of permits to leave the Gaza Strip since June, only 100 permits have been granted.
Colborne and Collector emphasised their gratitude to the LSESU for electing al-Mudallal Honorary Vice President and for raising awareness of Palestinians who
Library needs more than just 24-hour access
CONTINUED FROM FRONT PAGE
The survey conducted by The Beaver revealed a wide variety of students' concerns with the library besides opening times.
88 percent of respondents had encountered problems
finding essential readings. One first year undergraduate said, "There was only one copy of a text needed for my course. One book for 200 students is ridiculous! We have since discovered that the one copy has been lost and not replaced."
Students have also
expressed concerns that given that study at the LSE puts a high emphasis on private study, provision of essential texts must be more adequate.
"Many universities offer three hour loans of essential texts. At my home university, there are copies of core texts that cannot be taken out on
loan," one General Course student explained.
A second year student said that multiple students requiring the same texts at the simultaneously was a huge problem, "I recently went to get some books out for an essay but my fellow students had beaten me to it and nearly all of the vaguely relevant texts were gone. How I am supposed to do my essay?"
Other students also complained about the lack of study space and computers. One third year student said, "People reserve computers and its nearly impossible to find a computer to work at most of the time. During exam time its just ridiculous"
Several students have also expressed their concern that whilst the LSE Students' Union (LSESU) embarks on a campaign to bring back twenty hour library access, they may be ignoring the plethora of other issues students have with the library.
"Its all very well having 24/7 access to books, but we need the books first" a first year told the survey.
Anybody wanting to take part in the campaign for the twenty-four hour library should	contact
su.gensec@lse.ac.uk
In Numbers £74,704
Cost of keeping the library open twenty-four hours during Lent and Micliaelmas terms
£55,000
Cost of Howard Davies" tiiree month sabbatical ieave of absence, the first the LSE has ever awarded to a non-academic
£149m
LSE annual income for the financial year ending 31 July 2006
14
Number of UK universities who have twenty-four hour libraries, six of which are in the Russell Group of leading institutions
350
Number of participants in The Beaver library survey. Surveys were conducted both online and in person
Union Jack
were stopped from returning to the UK to study. Al-Mudallal stated that amongst his priorities of sitting his second year exams and trying to bring his wife to the UK, he plans to continue campaigning for the other hundreds of students still trapped in Gaza. He stated that although the student support has helped his case, the involvement of the British government and other official bodies is required to help other students in similar situations.
Up to 700 Palestinians were allowed to leave Gaza last week.
Dough. Cash. Bills. Wonga. Dosh. Money. It gets this Union talking, it gets the School to run. It gets us fools a-begging, it gets our sabbs to come.
Given that all sentient beings in the Union live for the next cash fix and die by their cheque books, it is inevitable that an entire session of the Convention gets devoted to the mesmerising incantations of le Chancellor AUssie Meyer. And how the Convention was enthralled by her enchanting hymns of gold, glory and the gospel. The mystifying numerals she flashed before the eyes of her peers drew them ever deeper into the promised land. Her soothing voice easing them into a submissive trance, ready to do anything to her bidding.
But a happy few stood I alone, and they stood alone j together. Their battle-hardened I psyches impervious to psycho-I logical assaults and mental harassment. Their scarred minds and broken souls ready to brave the storm of steel that AUssie Meyer stood ready to unleash upon them. While the rest of the Convention slept in their seats, this band of plucky heroes kept their watchful eyes on the scheming AUssie, ready for any fiscal sleight of hand she might pull. The names of these valiant watchmen: Tory Davey, Peter Braton and, but of course, yours truly.
For the most part, Tory and Braton laid low behind the cover that were their snoozing comrades. Braton made some tentative overtures, trying to poke holes in AUssie's spreadsheets. But try as he might, his limp thrusts could not penetrate AUssie's watertight defences. Cue some Tory fury. The man could not hold his peace once the taboo topic of Palestine was broached.
AUssie never saw it coming. Even as she worked her magic to hoodwink the Convention, Tory was onto her in a flash. "The Palestinian Society is a political society!" His sudden outburst shattered AUssie's hypnotic spell. Ever the Scouse scum, Tory had made his treacherous mark.
But having surmounted the greasy pole with unparalleled fiscal nous, AUssie was far too crafty to fall prey to Tory's amateurish sniping. Sniffing victory, Tory forged on his assault with hope in his heart. Unfortunately, AUssie knew exactly how to excise Scouser cancer. With the panache of a maestro, Le Chancellor unveiled her trump card - the unfailing mantra, "there is only one John O'Shea." With this most potent of warcries, AUssie blocked the Tory inquisition with consummate ease and snatched victory at the death, condemning the upstart to a mortifying defeat.
Having witnessed Tory's ignominious demise, Jack knew better than to blow his cover. With so little to be gained by confronting the AUssie menace head on. Jack played a safe hand and retreated to his shady comer, where he continued to sharpen the most potent of weapons in his arsenal. His almighty pen shall haunt le Chancellor incessantly, with all of his incisive intellect and razor wit, from the safety of a weekly newspaper column.
04 leaver | ii December 2007
Twinning taskforce discuss exchange with An-Nai
Ziyaad Lunat, Chair of the LSESU Palestine Society, with Students' Union members from Al-Najah University
Estee Fresco
The taskforce mandated to determine the details of the LSE Students' Union's (LSESU) twinning with the students union of Al-Najah University in Palestine met last Friday to discuss the details of the arrangement.
Fadhil Bakeer Markar, Taskforce Chairman and LSESU General Secretary, stated that he believed the twinning should facilitate a cultural exchange between students in the LSESU and students at the Al-Najah
University and "promote a wider understanding of the [Israeli] occupation [of Palestine]
The meeting began with LSESU Palestine Society Chair, Ziyaad Lunat, describing his summer visit to Al-Najah University. He noted that it is difficult for the university to attract a steady student body, since many students who attend the university must renew their visas every three months. The same problem extends to the teachers at the university. Lunat noted that students at Al-Najah university
are eager connect to LSE students through teleconferencing and wish to set up a joint website with LSESU students. Palestinian students also expressed a desire to visit the LSESU.
The taskforce intends to create an online discussion between students at both universities, establish a "buddy system" between students. The taskforce also plan to establish an exchange for students. Concerning education, some of the activities the taskforce discussed were creating a photo exhibition about the situation
in the occupied territories and inviting Palestinian student Khaled al-Mudallal, who was trapped in Gaza and only allowed to return to his studies in Bradford University last week, to speak at the LSESUj Al- Mudallal is the LSESU's honorary Vice President.
Over ten students from a variety of departments attended the meeting. However, the taskforce met at a time when Jewish students who observe Shabbat could not attend because the meeting occurred after sundown on Friday
Bankside Hoiise suflPersfiDin severe power cuts
Henry Lodge News Editor
Problems with power supply have left LSE Halls of Residence, Bankside House, subject to intermittent cuts in heating and lighting over the coming few days.
Bankside House experienced a power cut that left rooms without heating and lighting for over three hours on Monday, 3 December. In an attempt to fix the problem. Initial Services turned off the power again on Wednesday 5 December, but were unable to restore power completely.
An email sent from Bankside	Management
informed student residents that "emergency electrical work" was to be carried out between the hours of 11 am and 6 pm on Wednesday afternoon/evening that would partially effect the building's lighting, power and heating.
However, a subsequent email sent on Thursday 6 December	explained:
"Unfortunately, the electrical problems we have been experiencing are worst than first anticipated" and warned that maintenance work to be carried out on Monday 10 December to Wednesday 12 December would cause "intermittent power failure to your room".
The lack of a 24 hours libraiy is likely to be felt this week as residents of Bankside House working on essays and problem sets due before the Christmas break were advised to "keep up to date with saving your work on [their] computer".
As questions of safety were raised, Ian Spencer, director of residences at the LSE, told The Beaver. "All our halls are covered by 24 hour provision for gas and electrical problems and the contractors arrived at site and began investigating
the fault as per our contract. Any situation involving the loss of an electrical supply is potentially serious which is why we have 24 maintenance provision. We would take this opportunity to remind students that they should take electrical safety extremely seriously."
Despite the recent problems, Bankside Hall remains one of the most popular LSE halls. One resident, Vedika Bhaskar, a first year Philosophy and Economics undergraduate commented: "If you changed the location of Bankside to that of High Holborn, you'd have perfect student housing."
"Any situation involving the loss of an electrical supply is potentially serious which is why we have 24 hour maintenance provision. We would take this opportunity to remind students that they should take electrical safety extremely seriously."
Ian Spencer
LSE Director of Residences
LSESU new RAG Qjmmittee Elected
Ruchiko Tulshyon News Editor
The Executive and General Committees of LSE Raising and Giving (RAG) were elected last week. After the motion was passed three weeks ago at the LSE Students' Union (LSESU) •Union General Meeting (UGM) to make RAG a separate constituent body, elections for 14 positions took place.
Jessica Catwright was voted President, while Charlie Samuda was elected Vice-President. Cartwright and Samuda were the co-founders of year-long RAG at the beginning of Michaelmas Term 2007. Cartwright said: "The RAG elections returned an incredible group of enthusiastic and energetic people. RAG now has the structure it craved and the buzz it needs to ensure that the future of RAG will be even bigger and even better, and that the events you'll get to enjoy from now on will be the best they can be."
The Executive Committee consists of five members, while the General Committee has nine members including Louisa Clare-Evans who will be in charge of a magazine to be published next term, LSESU RAG Mag.
The current RAG total stands at £8,891.17 raised from various events including RAIDs, Krispy Kreme Donut sales and a RAG Charity Ball earlier this term. This week RAG and the Austrian Society have teamed up to sell hot Austrian wine, Gluhwein, outside the library on Monday, TXiesday and Wednesday from 4-8 pm. Last year, this event was voted the best charitable event by the LSESU. This year, the wine sale will include baked Austrian treats accompanied by carollers.
The Committee have an extensive list of events lined up for Lent Term including a hitch hike to Dublin. The Lent Term line up will be listed in full on the RAG website over the holidays at www.lsesurag.com.
-
Phoi
/
LSESU BAG members at a RAID including newly elected President, Jessica Cartwright and Vice-President Charlie Samuda
NEWS
Beaver i ii December 2007
05
Climate Change Week meets with cold front of indifference
Henry Lodge News Editor
Climate Change Action Week's (CCAW) activities saw a number of speakers engage with students in the debate over how to solve global warming but also revealed the indifferent mindset of many LSE students.
Speakers such as Michael Meacher MP urged increased lobbying of parliament, whilst specialists such as Dr Andrew Boswell of campaign group Biofuelwatch analysed possible solutions to the impending energy crisis.
The launch of CCAW, attended by over 60 people, saw Aubrey Meyer of the Global Commons Institute perform on the violin before putting forward the Contraction and Convergence model, supported by many countries across the world as the post-Kyoto solution.
The week's events were tied together by a petition for LSE to run on 100 percent renewable energy which gathered over 400 signatures. Aled Fisher, the LSE Students' Union Environment and Ethics Officer, added: "to put things in perspective, it took several weeks to gather the 700 signatures for the Living Wage campaign."
The petition, whilst regarded as a success overall, revealed the divisive nature of the climate change issue among LSE students. Sasha Hoff, People and the Planet Society Climate Change	Campaign
Coordinator, who was petitioning, told The Beaver: "Generally, most people were willing to sign. There were of course a few people who said (the switch to renewable energy] was crazy, that they don't
support this and would not sign. I was not surprised when many people asked how this would be paid for and if our tuition bills would go up. A few people also flat out told me that they did not think [the switch] was possible, and that there was absolutely no way that the School would make the switch."
The concern over tuition fee increases to fund renewable energy is perhaps indicative of the larger problem of how to reconcile self-interest and the global warming problem. This was alluded to by Donnachadh McCarthy, former Deputy President of the Liberal Democrats, a guest at Thursday's eco-homes event. He said: "When people ask me 'can I afford to [help cut emissions]?' I tell them it's the wrong question. They should be asking 'how can I afford not to?"'
Dr Meyer Hillman, who spoke at the launch questioned the resolve of the student body, asking "great event, but why aren't three times the number of students here? Aren't they interested?"
It has been suggested that a number of factors other than apathy were to blame for the week's overall poor attendance, such as the increased workload students face towards the end of term and the bad weather However, this is the just the latest 'awareness' week to suffer from apparent student indifference, with LGBT week and Disabilities Awareness week seeing a fall in attendance on last years' figures.
Sasha Hoff commented: "Sadly, I got the feeling from many people that they don't think climate change will impact them and that they vrill have enough money to move to high ground or protect themselves from whatever cata-
ir t -t ;¦/

LSE students at the Campaign Against Climate Change march enroute to the American Embassy
strophic changes occur on the earth. This apathy is exactly what keeps people from taking the initiative to stop on their own for 50 seconds to sign a petition."
Students at the LSE appear out of sync with the general student population. Fisher told The Beaver. "I have received numerous emails and Facebook messages from external people saying [CCAW] looks great and that they will
promote it from the outside."
CCAW finished on the Saturday with a march of at least 5000 people from Parliament Square to the American Embassy in Grovesnor Square, organised by Campaign Against Climate Change. Fisher told The Beaver: "Around 20 LSE students formed a contingent on the march, and many more were there as part of other groups. I was proud to see so
many coming along on the wettest day in London for months!"
Despite the mixed response from the student body, CCAW successfully pressured LSE management. Following last week's 'Is LSE doing enough about climate change?' article in The Beaver, Chris Kudlicki, director of the Estates Division at LSE has contacted LSESU People and Planet to arrange a meeting in which renewable
energy plans will be discussed. He aims to reduce the LSE's carbon emissions by 1000 tonnes per annum. Current figures show the LSE gets 53 percent of its energy from renewable sources. This follows the LSE being described as the greenest university in London last year, scoring 2:1 overall in the People and Planet's Green University League.
LSE reluctant to spy on students despite Brown's warning
Patrick Cullen
The LSE is preparing a policy document dealing with the possibility of on-campus	extremism.
However, the School appears eager to tread lightly and protect freedom of expression at LSE, despite Prime Minister Gordon Brown's recent plea to universities to examine their anti-extremism policies.
Brown recently reiterated Tony Blair's warning to universities that they "must act against extremist influences", dravring on a Brunei University Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies report which claimed that universities had been widely infiltrated by extremist Islamic groups.
Professor Anthony Glees, the author of the report, based this claim on a historical analysis of student terrorism. Glees told Reuters that the current situation was worse than he had previously thought, declaring that "What we have seen since 2005 has been an increase in the number of students and former students involved in terrorist crimes."
In answer to the Government's insistence that universities keep watch on the activities of their Islamic Societies, a School spokesper-
son told The Beaver that "The School's Memorandum and Articles of Association states that 'Every Governor, Council Member, officer and employee of the Company, and eveiy student and other individual associated with the Company, shall be entitled to freedom of thought, conscience and religion, to hold opinions without interference, disability or disadvantage, and to freedom of expression within the law, including the right to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds'." The LSE is currently preparing a report on extremism on campus.
When asked, however, about other forms of extremism, such as the activities of the Animal Liberation Front, Combat 18, or the Communist Party of Great Britain' the School refused to comment. Neither the Director nor Security staff would answer The Beaver's questions regarding such groups. Further, no-one would comment about the Jewish Chronicle's assertation that anti-Semitism is on the rise, although the School has recently approached students about this issue.
A spokesperson from the LSE Students' Union (LSESU) Islamic Society told The Beaver they "unequivocally"
condemn "any group which tries to incite racial or religious hatred, particularly when those groups attempt to commit acts of terrorism in the name of Islam."
"However, the Government must be cautious in its' attempts to combat extremism on campus, they are in danger of promoting suspicion of all Muslim students ...this is a potentially dangerous and counterproductive approach ... we should be encouraging further engagement, dialogue and cooperation" the statement added.
Ziyaad Lunat, chair of the LSESU Palestinian Society, told The Beaver that "Dissemination of extremist views on campuses is unacceptable. There is agreement that a problem exists but there are differences on how it should be tackled. I believe that raising a climate of suspicion amongst students is counter productive and it may contribute to further entrenchment of bigoted views in our campuses."
He added, "The best way for the government to tackle the dissemination of extremist views is by dealing with the root of the matter... Strengthening democratic principles at home and abroad through the fair implementa-
r
Government can do many things - but it cannot by itself build a society where extremism cannot flourish, and terrorists cannot strike.
a I
tion of international law and human rights is the way forward." Lunat went on to say that the Government should stop "applying double standards" and refrain from "unilateral war mongering policies".
Fadhil Bakeer Markar,
LSESU General Secretary, said,"LSE students approved a motion this time last year against the government proposals to tackle extremism on campus. LSE has always been a place which shares different cultures, a place which celebrates diversity....We reject
proposals to spy on our students, and such statements from politicians do nothing productive to foster [the] spirit of community or inclusion that is needed to combat threats of terrorism."
06 leaver 1 ii December 2007
NEWS

LSE Choir impresses at two Christmas Concerts last week
LSE Academic wins top award in his field
?raph: David C. Lane
Dr. David C. Lane
The LSE Choir held two Christmas concerts last week at the St. Clement Danes Church on the Strand. On Monday 1 December 2007, the LSE Choir teamed up with the choir from University of St. Gallen's, Switzerland.
Performances included a selection of Christmas carols sung by the St. Gallen's choir followed by carols sung by the LSE choir. The night ended with Handel's "Dettingen Te Deum"sung by both choirs. For the concert on Wednesday 5
December, the LSE Choir was joined by the LSE Orchestra. The Choir performed carols, while the LSE Orchestra entertained the audience with the world premiere of Lloyd's "Prelude and Fugue", Tchaikovsky's "Variations
on a Roccoco Theme" and Schumann's "Symphony No. 4". The St. Clement Danes Church was decorated with Christmas decorations, and one audience member remarked that the evening was "breath-taking".
Ruchika Tulshyan News Editor
Dr. David C. Lane, an LSE academic in Managerial Economics and Strategy and Operational Research at the has been awarded the 2007 Jay Wright Forrester Award. The award is the top international award in his field.
The award was jointly presented to co-researcher, Elke Husemann by the System Dynamics Society for the 'Best Contribution to the Field of System Dynamics in the Preceding F^ve Years.'
Their work explores the underlying social theory of the system dynamics approach with the threefold aim of: developing a more rigorous statement of the field's social theoretic grounding; positioning system dynamics within the broader domain of systems approaches; and improving the contribution that system dynamics can make to research within the broad
range of social sciences.
The announcement of the award was made at the 2007 international conference of the System Dynamics Society, hosted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston.
Dr. Lane said: "I am extremely grateful for this honour. Increased awareness of system dynamics modelling is important because the approach has so much to offer policy makers - in the corporate sector and the public sector."
He teaches Masters degrees in Management and Strategy, Management and Economics, Operational Research and Decision Sciences and the Bachelors degree in Management Sciences at LSE.
Dr. Lane is a an academic governor of the School. In 2005 he received an LSE award for outstanding performance and innovation in teaching.
Robert Kagan dubs America "dangerous nation"
Chun Han Wong C&A Editor
America's track record as "persistent disturbers of the status quo" since its independence marked it as a "dangerous nation" in the eyes of contemporaries, said Dr Robert Kagan, an American scholar and political commentator.
The senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace also asserted that the American tendency towards "political, economic and strategic dominance" is not a historical aberration but a trait "imprinted in the nation's DNA."
Dr Kagan, author of the book "Dangerous Nation: America's Place in the World from its Earliest Days to the Dawn of the 20th Century", made these comments in his public lecture at the LSE last Wednesday.
Identifying the Declaration of Independence as the most important foreign policy statement in US history, Dr Kagan asserted that the liberal Enlightenment ideals which the Declaration embodied drove the US to political, territorial, economic and cultural expansion.
Contrary to the American self-image as a "status quo power" and reluctant nation
forced into wars by circumstance, Kagan asserted that the US has been a traditionally expansionist power. The US, he argued, is predisposed to exercise its power in pursuit of its national interests as dictated by its liberal ideals.
The militaristic US foreign policy in post-Cold War era, which amounted to nine significant military interventions in fourteen years, is illustrative of this interventionist trend, said Dr Kagan. The multilateralism that marked US foreign policy during the Cold War, he argued, masked an underlying tendency towards unilateralism that had been consistent in American history.
In response to questions from the audience, Dr Kagan highlighted the significance of the interventionist tradition on recent US foreign policy towards Iraq. The absence of the US defence budget from the 2008 presidential debates is also indicative of a general consensus that US foreign policy should remain interventionist in nature, he added.
Dr Kagan, co-founder of the conservative think-tank Project for the New American Century, was a signatory of the 1998 open letter addressed to then-US President Bill Clinton calling for the removal of Saddam Hussein from power.

Dr Kagan emphasising his political viewpoints on the United States
COMMENT&ANALYSIS
leaver! ii December 2007 |o7
c&a@thebeaveronline.co.uk
COMMENT^^ALYSIS
Speak no evil
Aled Fisher
The 'No Platform'policy is a vital safeguard for human rights and minority representation, and does not contravene the freedom of expression
Doug Oliver correctly noted last week that the rise o£ the fascist British National Party (BNP) is the most terrifying aspect of modern British politics. But not only does he fail to understand the causes of their revival, he also represents part of another alarming trend -that of people using misinformed 'free speech' arguments to allow bigots a platform for their views, undermining the 'No Platform' policy which bars fascists from speaking in Students' Unions.
Did six million people die in the Holocaust because their arguments were not good enough? This is the logic of 'free speech' propositions, which suggest that it is both worthy and possible to take on fascists in a 'civilised' debate, and actually change the views of people like Nick Griffin, the leader of the BNP, simply by telling them they are wrong.
The real reason that so many people died is that they were slaughtered by a uniquely calculating ideology, which thrived in crisis and motivated citizens to become the architects of genocide. This is the
shocking power of fascism, and why it must be utterly eradicated.
When Oliver asks whether other "extreme" ideologies like Communism and ultra-free market conservatism could be banned under 'No Platform', he overlooks the theoretical underpinning of fascism that makes it so dangerous. Political scientist Roger Griffin has defined fascism as "palingenetic": harking back to a mythic past and seeking to achieve a "rebirth" of that falsified memory. The conclusion of this is the creation of a false ideal type, leading fascism to violently discriminate against - and ultimately destroy - anything that does not fit that warped vision. In the case of white British fascism, that means all religions, people of other ethnicities, lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgen-der people, people with disabilities, and so on. Women are also accorded with a subordinate position in the white patriarchal society that fascism espouses. This is what makes fascism such a ferocious monster.
There is a qualitative dif-
ference between free speech and giving someone a platform. Nick Griffin, a convicted race-hate criminal, is free to express his views on the street, or find an ignorant printer to publish his campaign material

If your views impinge on the rights of others, it ceases to be a usefu debate and becomes an exercise in hatred and discrimination
- but we would not invite him into our homes to give him 'fair hearing', because it is our personal space. Where the BNP is active, racially-motivated attacks increase. Our Union must be a safe space where all students can come, free from
discrimination on any basis.
With freedom of speech comes responsibility. If your views impinge on the rights of others, it ceases to be a useful debate and becomes an exercise in hatred and discriniina-tion. The BNP do not care for free speech, and will abuse the good intentions of others to their own advantage.
For fascism, the debate chamber is one step on the road to the gas chamber.
Some will argue that No Platform pushes BNP activists into election campaigns, allowing them to gain representation. But this ignores the fundamental cause of their rise - the neglect of the mainstream parties, particularly Labour, who, in the rush for votes in marginal seats in Middle England, have ignored the concerns of white working-class voters who feel increasingly disillusioned and vulnerable. The BNP are cynically exploiting these emotions to whip up an irrational fear of immigrants and other minorities. The work of anti-fascist coalitions, like Unite against Fascism, in delivering information to voters to counter the BNP's racist lies, has had an effect: in Oldham, the scene of the BNP's highest 2001 general election vote, campaigners have succeeded in stopping the BNP from winning councillors. They have more than halved their number of election candidates from ten in 2003 to four in 2007.
Oliver's free speech argument may make feel him better
about the fact that one of his party's MPs, Evan Harris (Liberal Democrat), actively chose to join a platform with Nick Griffin and David Irving in Oxford, but it will not : v help us fight fascism. Real , action against the root causes of the rise of the
BNP, combined with principled stands like the 'No Platform' that protect our rights to real free speech, will expose these vicious racists ; J and hammer home the death of their ugly ideolo-'¦ gy once and for all.
ft


of-all fears ,
Talk is cheap
Sonya Pillay
Asean's inept and immoral response to the political oppression in Burma is indicative of its appallingly endemic hypocrisy and apathy
In a class on regional organisations last week, my tutor asked, "Who's in Asean?" and I happily put my hand up. In my sleepy morning daze, I had thought the question meant "who here belongs to a nation who belongs to Asean". For dividing us into regional demographics seemed to me, who had overslept and just rushed to school, like a plausible and interesting class activity). So I felt really sheepish when I realised he merely wanted a general introduction
to the member states, and there I was waving my hand in the air like a poster boy for the region.
The truth is, while I identify strongly with Asean as an organisation that I can politically and culturally "touch-base" with, I'm not so happy to tell people I belong to it these days. 2007 was supposed to be a banner year; Asean marked its 40th anniversary and created its first official charter. Instead, its consistent failure to address the crisis in
Myanmar and the unveiling of a confused charter have seriously dented its credibility. Even its sing-along anniversary theme song, questionably titled "Rise", seems to make a mockery of its ambition: "Though we're from ten different lands/ Bound by shores of common sand/ Singing out as one/ Let's stand."
What I'd like to know is who wrote these wince-worthy lyrics and, more importantly, why Asean does not in fact want to take a stand on so many things. The silence over Burma (Asean recognises the State Peace and Development Council as the legitimate government and hence refers to the country as the Union of Myanmar) was very telling, and indeed, very disturbing. While rallies in London lasted for weeks, there was only diplomatic cowering in Southeast Asia; in effect Asean sat haphazardly on the fence. It delivered muddled statements declaring its abhorrence for Burma's brutal treatment of opposition, yet respect for the authority of the ruling military junta - a respect predicated on the enduring princi-
ple of non-interference in the internal affairs of another country.
Yes, I understand this principle and largely agree with it; good fences make good neighbours. Asean comprises democracies, communist states and monarchies and was created as an umbrella structure to look beyond internal regime structures. To be fair, it's also
(l
How appalling that so many citizens of Asean nations ignored it, because our media took little notice and our Honourable Leaders downplayed it
quite an Asian response: you mind yoiu: own yard and I'll mind mine.
However, in the context of human rights, this position is morally bankrupt. It smacks of apathy. How disheartening it is that, in a region that is domi-nantly Buddhist, there was no massive outcry when Buddhist monks (surely the most peace-
ful of all sentient beings) were beaten, tortured and killed. How dismaying that democratic opposition is usually not taken seriously and constructively in the region, and this state of affairs, an extreme example at that, is nonetheless expected to return to normalcy. How appalling that so many citizens of Asean nations ignored it, because our media took little notice and our Honourable Leaders downplayed it.
Moreover, how pathetic it is that, barely a week ago, these Honourable Leaders convened to sign a new charter proclaiming a commitment towards a single free market, the building of democracy and guarantees of human rights. Worst of all. General Thein Sein, the Prime Minister of Myanmar, cheerfully signed it. This is not the "constructive engagement" that Asean had hoped to achieve when it admitted Myanmar a decade ago. This is apathy at the height of hubris; governments saying one thing, meaning another, and patently doing something else. This can only be a sham charter; it is counter-progressive to the region's ambition to emulate the transformationalist nature of the European Union community and fatally undermines Asean credibility.
All this doublespeak confounds me. The organisation seems to be taking weary steps backward, even as it attempts to make advances in terms of democratic and economic
'progress'. It seems to have lost sight of the region's most binding interest: the Asean citizen. A Malaysian friend of mine confessed to feeling an extra sense of affinity for the Burmese plight, because it belongs to Southeast Asia and he belongs to Southeast Asia -I confess I liked him more for saying that. Fortunately, Filipino President Gloria Arroyo too remembered her neighbours, calling for progress in Burma before her Senate would ratify the new charter. Yet Asean remains largely apathetic, and many shrug off Aung San Suu Kyi's house arrest as the status quo, not a transgression of human rights.
This 40-year-old faces yet another mid-life crisis, a decade after the Asian Financial Crisis. If it is the challenges that keep us kicking, then this is a good opportunity for change. Asean should re-examine its priorities, reconsider its promise-to-achievement ratio and minimise the gap between words and deeds. Asean's hands-off approach is a grave disappointment. Being inexperienced and overly cautious in actively dealing with regional human rights offences is one thing, but this unwillingness to take any real stand against unfair domestic aggression renders it a paper tiger. Its attitude towards Burma would be a good place to start. Asean would do well to remember the people it is supposed to be protecting.
08 leaver 1 ii December 2007
COMMENT&ANALYSIS
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COMMEN
ANALYSIS
c&a@thebeaveronline.co.uk

listen and be heard
Lucie Goulet
The poor attendances that mark the Students' Union awareness weeks and the UGM are a result of ineffective means of communication
This past term, the Students' Union has seen its fair share of mismanagement and mishandlings. Although I don't doubt the good faith that drove most projects, I believe that the way they are carried out left a lot to be desired.
Reports on SU's themed weeks has indicated poor attendances. Is this due to a lack of interest from students? I don't think so. I believe it has more to do with a lack of ability to communicate on the part of our SU. The same probably goes for the Union General Meeting (UGM), which has recorded all-time low attendances this term.
SU communications always follows the same predictable pattern. First, create a group on Eacebook. Invite your friends, create related events, and group-message everyone every now and then. Except no matter how popular our esteemed executive officers might be, they are very unlikely to be friends with every single person on campus, thus neglecting the majority of the student body. Not to mention those who aren't on Facebook.
Group-messaging probably aims to act as a tease, but often just end up being an annoyance and not read by the recipients. Online presence doesn't equal campaigning, even though it now is an indispensable feature of any campaign.
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The second step would commonly be carried out through the Houghton Street Review and the SU website, www.lsesu.com. The Houghton Street Review, formerly known as the Global Email, has been improved slightly since last
year, especially so in its layout. The website, however, is not up to date, many of its sections have no content and some links aren't even working. This shows a lack of forward planning. We are all fairly busy people, but nowhere on the website can you find details of events to come for the future SU themed weeks. It also lacks core documents such as the LSESU Constitution which, despite not being a page-tum-er, should be made easily available to any student.
Lastly, when the event organisers are really motivated, posters would appear on walls across campus. But not too many, and rarely on Houghton Street itself. The art of making posters has yet to be fully mastered. They are mostly informative, but usually fail to catch the eye. Which probably means that many students are not getting information; despite being publicly available, they are unfortunately badly promoted.
Lack of communication also means that we don't really know what the elected executive officers are up to. It means that come the Lent
Term elections, elections become a popularity contest and based upon electoral promises rather than an evaluation of previous deeds and achievements. This is ultimately bad for the Union. We're all guilty at one point or another of declaring that the Executive Committee is useless and doesn't do anything. This is probably not entirely true. When you talk to executive officers, it appears that they spend a lot of time in meetings. Indeed, meetings are an important part of any administration. But they can be time-consum-ing and the outcomes might not be immediately felt, if ever at all. It would probably be good for elected representatives to start communicating to students about those meetings.
But then you have the

problem of where to communicate. Sabbatical and non-sabbatical officers alike make reports at the UGM. However, given that the UGM is currently badly attended, few people get to hear them. An attempt to make them available on the SU website has been cut short. It's not about the information being badly displayed anymore, it is about it not even being available. Some contend that the Media Group could fill this gap, but they exist to report on the actions of our elected representatives, not to serve as a publicity platform. This communications void is best filled by the website, although it would have to be much more interactive to achieve this.
One of the Students' Union's new year resolutions for 2008 should be to leam how to better communicate with its constituents. It is only with effective communication that the SU campaigns, themed weeks and other events can have a real impact on student lives.


What the UGM used to look like
Time for thanksgiving
Kevin Perry
The Beaver has gone through much in the past term and due recognition ought to be accorded to the valued staff who make it happen
Looking back on a first term of producing The Beaver, I must admit that we have had a few scrapes. Nevertheless, I believe that we can be proud of the paper we have produced in the last eleven weeks.
It is often said that a small newspaper can measure it's success by the influence it has on the national news agenda, and in that respect I believe we have had some notable successes. The story we broke regarding the Twinning letter was picked up by the Evening Standard, Joseph Cotterill's
interview with Nick Clegg was referenced in The Times and Rajan Patel's story on LSE teaching standards became the basis for a story in the Times Higher	Education
Supplement.
There are a whole host of people deserving of mention, and I'll start with the former Managing Editor, Aditi Nangia. Having taken over as Managing Editor long before I was elected Executive Editor, Aditi provided continuity and stability for the paper. She is extremely talented, not just as a layout artist and graphic
designer, but also as a Virriter, photographer and editor.
Christine Whyte achieved nothing short of a revolution in her time as Features Editor. The articles she sourced and edited set a high standard of academic integrity, and her layout freshened up a format that can become heavy with a less delicate touch.
Rajan Patel was a superb news editor, and has continued to go beyond the call of duty as a news reporter and we thank him for that.
Meryem Torun played a central role in defining what
Part C is and can become. It has been an enormous undertaking to create new rules for the section, and cater to a market that has been ignored by previous generations of this newspaper.
Aba Osunsade was an excellemt Style Comptroller last year. This year, she also created some incredibly artistic designs for Part B as Editor.
Anna Mikeda has contributed massively to the look of the paper this year, not just through the photographs she has taken herself, but also through the assistance she has given to the paper by preparing photographs for publication.
Chun Han Wong has been an incredible servant to the paper, and will be sorely missed from the Comment and Analysis section. He has contributed a strong design aesthetic and intelligent editing.
A1 Mansour has brought a keen sense of intelligence and a spark of humour to his role as Features editor.
Of course, my thanks also goes to all those who are still working for the paper. Michael Deas and Ruchika Tulshyan for continuing to produce incredible news articles week in, week out. Joseph Cotterill for his keen eye for layout detail. Daniel B Yates for the perpetual pearl in our oyster which is PartB. He has been aided and abetted in the past few weeks by Thomas Warren and Ravi Mistry, who have
brought new ideas to PartB without losing it's distinct, unique voice. Chloe Pieters for her assistance across every section as an editorial assistant, and the speed with which she has taken up the reigns at Part C. Matthew Partridge and Josh Tendeter for a Sports section that has delicately balanced match reports with the banter we have come to expect from Beaver Sports.
i bon.:V-^ be p-'O i/3per
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The Beaver thrives on the fact that new people are always bringing ideas, and while a fantastic team has now emerged at the paper, there are always places available for people willing to contribute ideas, energy or even just the odd joke. For those of you looking for more engagement with the community you are currently spending your time in, perhaps The Beaver is just the thing.
EXECUTIVE EDITOR
Kevin Perry
MANAGING EDITOR
Tim Root
SECRETARY
Lily Yang
NEWS EDITORS
Michael Deas; Henry Lodge; Ruchika Tulshyan
C&A EDITOR
Chun Han Wong
FEATURES EDITORS
Joseph Cotterill Al Mansour
PART B EDITOR
Daniel B. Yates
PART C EDITOR
Chloe Pieters
SPORTS EDITORS
Matthew Partridge Josh Tendeter
PHOTOGRAPHY SUB-EDITOR
Anna Mikedo
THE COLLECTIVE:
Chair: Lucie Marie Goulet coltectivechair@>he-beaveronllne.co.uk Raldev Akol; Fadhll Bakeer-Markar; VIshal Banerjee; Wil Barber; Peter Barton; Ramsey Ben-Achour; Clem Broumley-Young; James Bull; Rochelle Burgess; Sam Burke; Jess Cartwrlght; Victor FIgueroa-Clark; Owen Coughlan; Patrick Cullen; Peter Currie; Holli Eastman; Aled Dllwyn Rsher; Lizzie Fison; Estee Fresco; Erica Gomall; Andrew Hallett; Aula Hariri; Josh Heller; Kevin Heutschi; Tahiya Islam; Felipe Jacome; Lois Jear/; William Joce; Naeem Kapadia; Pooja Kesavan; James Ketteringham; Sadia Kidwai; Arthur ICrebbers; Laura Kyrke-Smith; Bea Long; Ziyaad Lunat; Jomie Mason; Nitya Menon; bfan Merall; Ubby Meyer; Daisy Mitchel-Forster AH Moussavl; AdW Nangia; Rochael O'Rpurke; Davkl Osbom; Aba Osunsade; Dougkis Oliver; Erin Orozco; Phil PacanowskI; Laura Paifltt; Anup Patel; Rajan Patel; Will Perry; Danielle Priesttey; Joe Quaye; Dominic Rampat Anjali Raval; Garetti Rees; Ricky Ren; Sacha Robehmed; Louise Robinson; Charlie Samuda; Thienthai Sangkhaphanthanon; Amrita Saraogi; Saurabh Sharma; Daniel Sheldon; Rebecca Stephenson; Andre Tartan Alex Te^elboym; Kerry Thompson; Meryem Torun; Angus Tse; Molly Tucker; Vladimir Unkovski-Korica;	Subash
Viroomal; Thomas Woiren; Simon Wang; Greg White; Christine Whyte; Chris Wilklns; Amy Williams, David Woodbridge
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COMMENT&ANALYSIS
Seaverjn December 2007 Jo9
COMMENT
&
ANALYSIS
c&a@thebeaveronline.co.uk
leaver
Established 1949 - Issue 675
24-hour access is in demand...
...but students desire more than just that
As we're all probably aware by now, the library is no longer open 24-hours year-round. The Students' Union is taking a firm stance in favour of turning what was a pilot scheme last year into a permanent school policy, but as our survey this week suggests, there are imfortunately a number of other issues at least as worthy of the SU's attention, and hopefully they can be addressed by the School at the same time.
Perhaps the most worrying statistic in our survey is that some 88 percent of LSE students have trouble finding books they need. Anecdotal accounts are endless, and indeed it is in fact surprising that even such a small number (12 percent) indicated they never had such difficulty. If a university library can't be a reliable source of resources which students need to do their work, then there's a greater problem than simply inadequate opening times.
It's important for us not to get lost in the 24-hour debate if there's the potential for it to be brought to fore at the expense of greater issues perhaps more related to the practicalities of library usage. As students of a university that aims to be competitive with its American counterparts, we ought to expect our library to be open for 24-hours, as almost all are in the US, but what good is a 24-hour library if it doesn't hold sufficient stocks of the books we need anyway?
We can change the world..
...but only if we work together
The release of third-year Bradford University student Khaled al-Mudallal by Israeli authorities in the Gaza Strip last week is a refreshing reminder that student activism can make a difference. Seeing that in the same week, only a handful of LSE students turned up to march for climate change awareness, perhaps Khaled's successful release will stimulate a re-ignition of student belief that their idealism can provide the catalyst for action.
As the NUS "Let Khaled Study Campaign" largely framed the LSESU's election of Khaled as its Honorary Vice-President, his release also reminds us that the NUS really does have a role to play in international affairs. Student voice counts for something because, as we are often reminded, we are the future, and as students in Britain, the best way for us to have our voices heard is through our national union. We at the LSE can and should do our part, but we must equally recognize that we are more powerful, and can wield greater national and international influence when we act in concord with students at other British universities. Where mainstream apathy is perhaps the greatest barrier to successful student activism, this reminder that not everything we say falls on deaf ears is invigorating, and The Beaver hopes this promise bears more fruit in the future.
An Apology
The Beaver wishes to clarify a remark made in the lead editorial of issue 674, entitled "If you want teaching to change". The phrase "From the Director to the Brunch Bowl lady, just about
everyone at the LSE knows....." was never intended to imply a
hierarchy within the School, but merely to refer to a broad cross-section of the campus community.
The Beaver apologises unreservedly to all members of Catering Services for any offence caused by the poorly phrased line. In particular, The Beaver wishes to apologise if the line was read as having sexist connotations.
One of the most refreshing and enjoyable aspects of life on the LSE campus is its inclusive nature, and The Beaver is proud of the fact that every member of our community can expect to be treated as an equal. The fact that our editorial did not reflect this situation was down to poor communication on our part, and we deeply regret this.
Letters to the Editor
The Beaver offers all readers the right to reply to anything that appears in the paper. Letters should be sent to thebeaver.editoi@1se.ac.uk and should be no longer than 250 words. All letters must be received by 3pm on the Sunday prior to publication. The Beaver reserves the right to edit letters prior to publication.
"always wrong"
Dear Sir,
There has been some discussion in The Beaver over recent weeks about whether there can be a war with a just resolution and without a 'bloody aftermath'.
Allow me to provide a simple example of a war which meets the above criteria: the Falklands War, the 25 th anniversary of which was commemorated this year. At the end of this war, the Argentine invasion forces who had surrendered returned to Argentina, British sovereignty over the Falkland Islands was restored and the islanders' right to self-determination was upheld. The islands went from a state of decline before the conflict to a period of sustained economic growth and population	growth.
Meanwhile, in Argentina, the loss of the war led to the downfall of General Galtieri's military junta and the restoration of democracy. A good result all round - and none of this would have happened without the war being fought.
Therefore, the claim that wars are inherently always wrong, never have a truly just resolution and always leave a bloody aftermath is simply not true.
Peter John Cannon
_SIX pages_
Dear Sir,
We would like to reply to Maria Tolk's letter in last week's issue in which she pointed out a lack of student and School interest articles in the Features section. We agree that we have failed to run enough School interest stories this term. Nevertheless, Features is not the right place for student interest articles.
Maria argued that our writers and us treat Features like The Economist, presumably because of the top-quali-ty, objective and international articles we publish. Though we'll take that as a compliment, we do this because we think it is what students and staff want to read in our section. It is certainly what our writers want to contribute.
That's because they know PartB and news section are better forums for current student issues. PartB can cover them in an attractive, irreverent way which we think most LSE students prefer; while news can track vital subjects like tuition fees far more than we can. By contrast, the six pages of Features impose an opportunity cost on the articles our section can run. Still, we do cover the LSE rather than student interest stories, such as interviewing the chaplain and assessing the School's climate change record.
We check the many excellent features sections of other student newspapers like Bristol's Epigram and
Cambridge's Varsity. But the School is a very different body. It remains an elite social sciences institution without equal. It therefore deserves a different newspaper. Of course, this uniqueness is well worth several features sections to itself. So yes, nostra culpa. We'll run more LSE features articles.
Joseph Cotterill A1 Mansour Features Editors
_"now online"_
Dear Sir,
I would like to thank everyone who was in any way involved in Climate Change Action Week 2007. Despite essay deadlines, term-end tiredness and awful weather, I am pleased to say that the events were inspiring and engaging, and made so because of fantastic audiences and the hard work of volunteers. Particular thanks must go to the People and Planet Climate Change Campaign team and their Christmas tree, as well as all the people who helped individually!
We managed to get over 400 signatures in one week for the 100% renewable energy for the LSE petition. It is now online, so please sign it at www.petitiononline.com/Rene wLSE/petition.html! We will hand it to the school after next week's UGM (Thursday, 1pm, ¦ Old Theatre), where a motion supporting the campaign will be discussed.
And thanks to the 20-plus LSE students who came on the Campaign against Climate Change march on Saturday. In the worst weather in London for months, LSE students did themselves proud by joining the biggest-ever campaign for environmental justice.
There will be a meeting of the Environmental and Ethical Forum on Thursday 13th Dec at 2pm in U203 to discuss the week and next term's Environment and Ethics Week (Week 2 of Lent Term, January 14-18).
Aled Dilwyn Fisher LSESU Environment and Ethics Officer
"common cold"
Dear Sir,
I am flattered that The Beaver's C&A editor, Chun Han Wong, chose to devote a whole article to me, rather than just a heavy-handed graphic. I'm also happy to note my writing forms a source of entertainment for Wong. I only wish I could say the same. In his eloquently-titled op-ed of December 4, he makes some interesting points while missing mine completely.
Though I fail to see how directly answering Wong's challenge to me "neatly evades" his argument, I can understand his confusion over
OUR LAD
my definition of "equitable." I have not been using "equitable" in the Utopian "everything turns out all right in the end" sense, but rather in a more realistic "the fairest possible outcome given the alternatives." This is a distinction I had tried to make clear previously, and I apologize to Wong that it was not more so.
However, I am hard pressed to blame even this apparent miscommunication for Wong's incredibly arrogant attribution of inferred beliefs to me. Because I pointed out that war, regardless of its motivations, can sometimes effect positive change, suddenly I believe "the ends justify the means." Non sequiturs do not make an argument. Suggesting that motivations for war are bad, even if the results can sometimes be good, hardly equates to a Machiavellian philosophy where the motivations are good, but the means and results often less so. The point was that one should not be so quick to dismiss war as a vehicle for good, not that positive outcomes from war justify twisted reasons for prosecuting a war. Perhaps in the future Wong might spend less time inferring what I "meant" to say and more time reading what I actually said.
War is a tool for achieving "equity," but it is not the only tool, and I am well aware of this. Wong presents my argument as if I am not, as if I think war can solve problems like racism, superiority complexes and the common cold. There are other tools for dealing with these issues. But sometimes.
¦w
CHUM HAM
before they can be brought into play, naked force, with all its attendant ills and inherent injustices, must pave the way. Or does Wong think that the racism endemic in American culture could be dealt with absent the destruction of the institution of slavery (or, concurrently, that slavery could have been ended when it was by anything other than war)? Before one can solve the problems that lead to a dictator killing people, one must first stop the dictator.
This seems elementary to me, but that fact that Wong so pointedly misconstrues it shows that it is not. War, diplomacy, cultural re-program-ming, civil rights initiatives et al, are tools for achieving justice to be employed at different times, and under different circumstances. War can make the employment of the other more peaceful methods of resolving conflicts possible.
To blame the failure of one, as Wong does, on the employment of the other, is specious at best. At worst it displays a wilful ignorance towards the realities of the world we live in and towards the fact that evil people reside within it; evil people who cannot be halted in their depredations by anything other than force.
In the end, however, I think that Wong and I are essentially in agreement. We both think that there are times when war is the only choice for effecting "equitable" outcomes given the alternatives, and we both hope that those times are few and far between.
J.P. Medved
10 leaver I ii December 2007
COMMENT&ANALYSIS
COMMENT
¦© &
ANALYSIS
c&a@thebeaveronline.co.uk
israeii-Palestinian Conflict


Hand in hand for peace
Charlie Gluckman
If the Israel-Palestine conflict is to end in peaceful co-existence, it is constructive dialogue and not polarising rhetoric that will achieve this end
Considering the claim in Joseph Brown's op-ed of November 27, Take a stand', with regard to the 'Israel-Palestine debate', that '...those who...seek to compromise are actually sustaining the status quo of violence and terror just as much as those who are for the occupation', I think that the jury is still out on his flat-out denial of a polarising agenda. It is not indifference that 'sustains or even advances injustice, whether we want [it] to or not', it is articles like this.
In a university with a stronger support for Israel, Brown's article, along with Vladimir Unkovski-Korica's column, 'A Tale of Two Apartheids', of December 4, would invoke the following hostile chain of events. There would be a response explaining that Israelis live in existential fear because of their neighbours' denial of Israel's right to exist. Following this, there may be articles that say: Israelis are occupiers; those
Palestinians who were driven out of their homes are now forced to live in refugee camps; Israel is preventing the progress of the establishment of a Palestinian state. The response might then be: the Palestinian people have no sufficient leadership, Hamas is a terrorist organisation, and there are no viable partners for a peaceful two-state solution. And so on and so forth.
I have never been able to understand why it is that rigid supporters of Israel reject all rhetoric against Israel as the resurgence of anti-Semitism. Similarly, why is it that pro-Israel students tend to fall into being rigid and narrow supporters of Israel? Well, thanks Joseph, you helped me to figure it out. The uncompromising support for the Palestinians sustains the status quo by creating a rigid and narrow support for Israel, and vice versa. It then just becomes an unsolvable 'chicken or the egg' debate.
This polarisation ignores
the real people, in both Israel and in Palestine, who are affected by this violence on a daily basis. I always find
This polarisation ignores the real people, in both Israel and Palestine, who are affected by this violence on a dailv basis
myself saying to rigid supporters of Israel, with regard to Israel's right to defend its borders: go and actually witness the way in which Palestinian people are imprisoned, with
little or no freedom of movement, then come back and tell me if you still think that the actions of the Israel Defence Forces in the Occupied Territories are justified. Similarly, I want to ask Unkovski-Korica about his claim in his column regarding the 'Palestinians' right to resist'. Go and actually talk to bereaved parents who have lost their innocent son or daughter whilst on a bus to school, then come back and tell me that this 'right to resist' should continue. The 'Israel-Palestine debate' is not a debate; labelling it so condenses the complexity of the situation into simple notions that one side is right, the other wrong, reducing both sides into homogeneous blocs, each bitter about the other It is those that sustain this position who exacerbate the problem.
Why can't we stand in solidarity with both those Palestinians and those Israelis who are losing their family members because of the violence? We need to support organisations like the Bereaved Families Forum where Palestinians and Israelis who have lost mem-
bers of their family seek each other out as a means to put an end to the injustice. Why can't we oppose the violence and terror I coming from both j Palestinians and ]
Israel and stand in solidarity with those who are ,
seeking peaceful means to i end the con-j flict? Why can't we just/
remember the;
values that;
drove us to j care in the ^
first place {
and support i organisations
such as One Voice, a grassroots movement of Israelis and Palestinians who work to push an agenda of peace together?
Joseph, you were right. The School definitely needs to take a stand. Not caring is not an option. However, the stand must be distinctly against the violence, in all the forms that it comes We must be [ pro-dialogue and r not only support the current efforts that promote both dialogue and understanding, but actively seek new ways in which this can be done.





A false dawn
Javier Sethness
Despite the hype, Annapolis appears to promise little more than political gesturing and limited, if any, real changes to the unjust status quo
In a recent talk here at the LSE, distinguished Israeli historian Ilan Pappe described the Annapolis negotiations as a "charade of peace." Unfortunately, it seems that his conclusions are not unjustified.
The conference's joint declaration, signed by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian National Authority President Mahmoud Abbas on November 27, committed the Israeli government and the PNA to engage in "good-faith" bilateral negotiations toward the conclusion of a peace treaty that would resolve "all outstanding issues, including all core issues, without exception." Considering the role that power politics play in
these deliberations, though, it seems clear that whatever resolution of the "core issues" of borders, the status of Jerusalem, and the question of Palestinian refugees, they will be quite biased against Palestinian interests and fall far short of what justice would demand. Both the production and understanding of the very term "outstanding issues" similarly have been greatly influenced by considerations of power and thus exclude a number of rather serious realities germane to the viability of the favoured two-state solution and to considerations of justice more generally.
In conformity with the "Road Map for Peace" introduced by US President George
W. Bush in 2002, the
Annapolis declaration calls for a freeze on further expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank. It does not, however, take issue with 'facts on the ground': that of Israeli settlers, numbering 270,000 and 184,000 in the West Bank and East Jerusalem respectively. It hardly seems necessary to reiterate the illegality of these settlements, which amount to an Israeli land-grab. Incidentally, these settlements consume a rather disproportionate (and certainly inequitable) share of the West Bank's resources and also represent the dispossession and alienation of the Palestinians from these lands. Such settlements present a serious obstacle to the terms upon which a Palestinian state may emerge in the West Bank. Would the settlements be territorially included in such a state, and would their residents accept its legitimacy? The existence of these settlements may well result in the constriction of Palestinian state rule, if it comes about, to those areas of the West Bank not settled by Israelis.
Nor does the joint agreement stipulate anything about the place of the Israeli 'security fence' vis-a-vis the Palestinian society or the viability of a Palestinian state.
Constructed following the second Intifada, the wall's purpose is ostensibly to prevent the 'infiltration' of Palestinians, presumably for violent ends, into Israel proper. However, security does not seem to be the sole consideration for the wall. The wall often deviates east of the Green Line and hence separates, or according to Orientalist and Zionist discourse, protects Israeli settlements from Palestinians. This results in the physical strangling of Palestinian society, often cutting farmers off from their land or separating Palestinians both from each other and from their workplaces, schools, or hospitals.
Perhaps the most egregious issue excluded at Annapolis is the very question of Israel's military occupation of the West Bank and the substantial control it retains over Gaza, despite the 2005 withdrawal. As much as Israel's colonialist occupation of the West Bank contributes to the breakdown of Palestinian society, its legitimacy was not called into question, neither at Annapolis nor before. Nor was the fact that Israel has control over movement of people and goods (including medical supplies) into and out of Gaza looked into. The question of Israeli reparations for past crimes against Palestinians, such as the 1948 ethnic cleansing, years of military occupation, countless murders and house demolitions, had little place at Annapolis too. Instead, the Palestinians are encouraged to accept the decidedly unjust terms of negotiation as given: in essence, to submit.
On the table for discussion, surprisingly enough, is the question of those Palestinian refugees who fled or were expelled from historical Palestine following the creation of Israel in 1948. These refugees, including original refugees and their descendants, number anywhere from four to seven million individuals. The issue of Palestinian refugees is intimately connect-
k
It is rather sad that a conference deemed to be about peace could so systematically overlook profound questions of justice
ed to their right to return to historical Palestine, an 'inalienable right' that has long been supported by the UN General Assembly. It is in turn tied to the much-maligned bi-national, or one-state, solution. However, it seems unlikely that the US and Israel would suddenly realign their priorities and behaviour in accordance with the demands of international law and accept the right of return as legitimate. In fact, it is clear that Israel finds the bi-nation-al solution unacceptable, while
Bush has often expressed his commitment to maintaining Israel as a "Jewish state." The most that one could hope for from Annapolis in this regard seems is the US and Israel not insist that the PNA should explicitly renounce its support for the right of return in return for realising whatever half-measures that may come out of Annapolis, which they demanded that Yasser Arafat do at the 2000 Camp David talks.
It is rather sad that a conference deemed to be about peace could so systematically overlook profound questions of justice. This state of affairs is hardly surprising, given the existing power relations: nearly unconditional support from the world's most powerful country for a self-styled democracy that seems to have Uttle interest in reassessing or reversing the apartheid policies it imposes upon its colonial subjects. Such relations clearly influence the terms of negotiation as they systematically constrain the realm of the 'possible.' The most tragic aspect of such talks is the highly offensive assumption which they presume: that rights and justice are akin to commodities to be haggled over and largely determined by extant power structures. This situation is hardly unprecedented, but it is no less condemnable for that. Indeed, it seems entirely possible that the compromises to which Israel assented to will merely represent something of a blessing for the general reality that is left unquestioned at Annapolis: that is, the further unmaking of Palestine.
Red isn't Dead
How far can the Labour alienate the people?
Vladimir Unkovski-Koric^j
The Labour government of Gordon Brown is facing a serious crisis over party funding. A veritable scandal has broken out over attempts by businessman David Abrahams to conceal his £650,000 donations to the Labour Party. This is yet another sign that Labour, a party that grew out of the trade union movement, is representative of the decay of social democracy across Europe. On dropping Clause IV in 1995, Labour embraced an ideological commitment to free market economics, cuts in public services and an antitrade union agenda. With no other significant Left opposition in the country. New Labour could now move rightwards and not worry about its core supporters or trade union donors, since they had nowhere else to go. Above all, there was no longer any bar for Labour to start taking donations from the people who stand to benefit from the government's privatisation and market-driven policies.
And this Labour duly did. Under Brown's predecessor Tony Blair, an investigation had to be launched after claims arose that Labour had broken laws prohibiting the sale of honours by giving peerages to supporters in return for millions of pounds in loans that never needed to be repaid. Moreover, there were accusations that the Party had breached the Political Parties, Referendums and Elections Act 2000, according to which donations greater than £5,000 had to be declared. In the event, the Crown Prosecution Service refused to press charges because they could not prove that there had been an agreement in advance to provide cash for peerages. Proof of intent was required by law to press charges.
But on this occasion, it appears that Labour believed that legal loopholes existed which helped David Abrahams make his donations anonymously. Abrahams appears not to have been uninvolved financially in the campaigns for the Labour leadership and the deputy leader contest. Meanwhile, in Scotland, Labour's transport spokesperson has been forced to resign because he had solicited an illegal donation for Wendy Alexander's recent campaign for leader of the Scottish Labour Party.
Both Brown and Alexander won after standing unopposed. Why so much money for campaigns with a clear outcome? Why take the money? Why give it in the first place? It's not hard to guess. Behind Lord Sainsbury and Mahmoud Khayami, Abrahams has become the party's third largest fundraiser since Brown took over as premier. According to Stephen Pollard, research director of the Fabian Society in the early Nineties, the links between Abrahams and Labour politicians go back much further. He remembers several Fabian fundraising meetings where Abrahams "mixed freely with Labour back-bench MPs, frontbenchers, NEC members and Shadow Cabinet members...my memory of Mr Abrahams...casts a very different light on some Labour politicians' protestations that they have no idea who he is."
Incidentally, an investigation has been started into why Durham Green Developments, registered at Abraham's home address in Gosforth, Newcastle, was granted planning permission for a multimillion business park on green-belt land by Durham City Council - even after the application had been initially refused by the Department of Transport's Highways Agency. The ever-enterprising Tories noted during questions in Parliament that £160,000 had been donated to Labour by the only two listed directors of Durham Green Developments: Ray Ruddick and Janet Kidd
Brown's desperate attempt to leave behind this latest scandal appears to be leading him in the direction of further alienating the Labour Party from the labour movement. He is apparently contemplating caving in to Conservative pressure that contributions by individual unions to Labour be limited to a maximum of £50,000. For several generations, working people voted for a Labour government knowing that in some indirect sense they could pressure their leaders to be a government for the many, not the few. But this faulty mechanism appears crippled by Labour's intimate relationship with big business and rich lobbyists. It is time for the militant sections of the labour movement to start building a political alternative to New Labour with others on the radical left.
Blue is True
Locking up people without charge is simply not acceptable
Annette Pace
Home Secretaiiy Jacqui Smith, who gave a lecture at LSE last week, has just announced new government plans to increase the time a terrorist suspect can be held before being charged from 28 to 42 days. Civil liberties groups and the Conservative opposition are in uproar. 'This new attempt to increase detention without charge is going to be every bit as controversial as when Tony Blair famously failed to get 90 days without charge through Parliament in 2005.
The Home Secretary argues that we have to increase the time suspects can be ques-tioned by police in order to protect the public, and insists the measures will only bo used in "exceptional" circumstances. Under the new plans, the Home Secretary will have the power to set the 42 day limit, but it will have to be approved by parliament within 30 days. How the government came up with precisely 42 days is not clear, but the BBC's Nick Rob-inson has suggested it is likely to be the highest number the government think they can get through Parliament. It is depressingly clear that our treasured civil liberties are being erased on the basis of a cynical political calculation, not in response to a genuine need.
The civil liberties and human rights campaigning organisation Liberty is unsurprisingly horrified. They point to the fact that the United Kingdom already allows far longer for pre-charge questioning than many comparable countries. Ireland allows seven days, France six, and that much criticised violator of human rights, the US, only 48 hours. Next to those figures, it is astonishing that the government thinks it necessary to extend the time any of us could be held on no charge from the already excessive 28 days to 42 days. This is not to deny the seriousness of the terrorist threat to civilians in-the UK; however, we can deal with it more effectively without measures which not only fly in the face of British traditions of liberty and justice but could actually be counterproductive. For instance, Liberty wants to lift the current ban on the use of phone taps and other intercept evidence in court, which can prevent charges being laid. They also recommend allowing post-charge questioning in terror cases - although it is difficult to see why a suspect would answer any police ques-tions between being charged and going to court, as it would be likely to harm his or her defence. Most importantly though. Liberty points out that the government already has the power to temporarily increase pre-charge detention in exceptional circumstances under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004, by declaring a state of emergency. However, the gov-emment argues that declaring a state of emergency would be a victory for the terrorists.
David Davis, the shadow Home Secretary, was scathing in a BBC interview claiming that support among police chiefs was not as widespread as the government claims. Most damningly, he said of the six people who have been held for 28 days since the legislation was intro-duced in 2005, three had turned out to be innocent. Locking up innocent peo-ple for 42 days without charge is what you expect from military dictatorships. It's simply not acceptable in Britain. The shakiness of the government's support for this proposal is illus-trated by the hasty change of heart by Security Minister Lord West, who said in a radio in-terview that he had yet to be convinced of the need for more than 28 days - before swiftly changing his mind an hour later after a meeting with Gordon Brown .
Even the head of MI5, Jonathan Evans, is rumoured to be concerned that an increase in detention times could reduce the amount of intelligence gained from the Muslim commu-nity. No lessons seem to have been learned from mistakes made during the 'troubles' in Northern Ireland, where nearly 2000 suspected extremists were interred in the early 1970s. The practice was scrapped in 1975 in recognition of the fact that, contrary to ex-pectations at the time, it actually fuelled terrorism Extending the time police can detain a suspect without charge to 42 days would therefore be a mistake. It is not only unneces-sary: it would do the exact opposite of what it sets out to achieve.


A wise man once asked us to picture a scenario: "imagine you have the power to dream yourself any dream every night. So lucidly delicate and rich these dreams may be that you can live a lifetime within each dream. First you dream your self a life full of adventures, exhilaration and wonderful delights. You ;pend a few nights dreaming yourself into different variations of these fantasies. One night you will be a spy, ' I thrilled by excitement and pleasure, going to exquisite ' / feasts and having the most splendid affairs with beautiful creatures. You keep dreaming, all the different scenarios that you can ever conceive of. After a while perhaps, you are no longer capable of sustaining your pleasure without exhausting your imagination. You will then want to mix in an element of surprise, something that can restore the receding limits of the initial thrill. But what can this surprise be? Something you haven't planned for beforehand, something unpredictable, an element of danger. But worry not for you are still in control, nevertheless you are willing to slightly indulge in these surprises to taste the contentment of a true adventure. After a while the same pattern would emerge. You will quite simply bore your self from your habits. You will then keep dreaming with more surprises added in, things that you have not thought of, but more importantly, things that you could not have conceived of. Maybe not soon, but surely there would come a night where you will finally decide to have that ultimate dream. You refuse to plan your fantasy, leaving everything open to what may encounter you with its dangers and delights. When you are ready this is what you will do. So great the thrills of this fantasy may be that you will even wish to forget that you are dreaming. That is the dream that you are iimnsf now".
Have a wonderful dream this holiday kids
A1 Mansour




leaver ii December 200



Lack of adequate loaning op and va^e bureaucracy are leavi severe obstacles in meeting the f studies
By Martha Hampson
From the constant news stories, public debates and government announcements over student loans, top-up fees and grants it's easy, as a postgraduate, to get the impression that the national media just don't know you exist. Despite the importance of attracting and retaining postgraduates in maintaining academic and research standards in universities, higher degrees are often viewed as an unnecessary luxury. Even the National Union of Students funnels a disproportionate amount of time and energy into undergraduate issues. However, with postgraduate course fees at LSE
isational structui'e needed; the undergraduate student loan scheme. Despite public criticism about the removal of state grants, this scheme has been hugely successful. The number of undergraduates receiving a student loan rose to 880,700 in the 2005-6 academic year, according to the latest figures available from the Student Loans Company. With an average loan of £3,000 each, this equates to a huge £2.9 billion a year, a figure that will only rise as the push to get more students into higher education increases.
Against this, the 78,000 postgraduates studying for a one- or
theoretically, in the long run they don't cost the government anything at all. That's why undergraduate funding was moved to fees and loans in the first place. Postgraduates also find employment faster and at a higher level than undergraduates. This means that they are far more likely to be able to pay off their loans, and to do so much more quickly. If the sheer numbers of students involved really was an issue, then surely this leads to an argument for capping the number of undergraduates, too - something that nobody is suggesting on financial grounds. One of the many hypocrisies of the current
Student Support Expenditure
Fee and Maintenance for Student Support Scheme in England
			AC student suppon		sdt«fn» students	
		?ublK «xs»ndi!uf« (£ni cash)				
	Kumber 0^ AwMds (OOOs)	FtfOrjmts pasjisii?}	Mihtenanu [fllP)	[10)	Average LATSLC f«« gram «xpen{iiture per student ?£)r5}r75no^5ii	Avefsge LA'SLC fnainten^^ expenditure per sSuden: J£5flOlH1l
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now up to seventeen times those of undergraduate counterparts, the need for a re-evaluation of postgraduate funding is now critical.
The current funding options available to postgraduates are a tangled mix of bank loans, research funding and grants. With no centralised organisational body to help, it's up to individual students to research the options as best they can. This is despite a clear model of the sort of organ-
two-year master's degree and 12,950 PhD students are mere drops in the ocean (statistics from the Higher Education Statistics Agency). Given that the vast majority of these students are already in the student loan system, is there really any good argument for not extending it to cover them? I can think of only one - that it would cost too much. But this simply doesn't stand up, not least because we're dealing with loans, not grants -
system is that first-degree students on four- or five-year courses (often resulting in a master's equivalent) are eligible for a loan for their whole degree period - even when, as with many science degrees, this includes a year of paid industry work.
A major argument for the extension of the student loan scheme is the inadequacy of the current options available to postgraduates. Research fund-
ing bodies give out enormous amounts of money every year -the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), for example, gives out around £47 million to postgraduates annually. And yet competition is fierce - the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), the other main source of postgrad funding in the UK, awards funds to only one in four applicants. (If you're feeling lucky, the application deadline for the AHRC and ESRC is May 1st.) As well as the numbers of students one is up against when applying, the research councils also have strict criteria. Some of these are evident simply from the councils' names (the Medical Research Council, for example) but my course at the LSE fell through even the loopholes of the AHRC, which has the broadest remit. While the ESRC only funds PhDs or 1+3 programmes (where a research masters leads into a PhD), the AHRC has both a research and 'professional preparation' scheme. My course, being neither research-based nor representative of any clear career path, failed to qualify - my argument of "but I want to learn" just didn't cut it.
Even if one's run of the research council gauntlet has been successful, the amounts awarded aren't much to celebrate. The AHRC's 2007-08 rates are a fees award of up to £3,240, plus a possible maintenance grant of £10,200 (in London). JEven if awarded the full amounts, this would barely cover the LSE fees for most courses. So, it's likely
you would need to top this up with another option.
The only other viable option presented by the various government websites claiming to provide comprehensive funding information are Career Development Loans (CDLs). The LSE student finance office itself recommends looking into CDLs. I did so - and was sadly disappointed. Heralded by the Government as a new way into higher education, CDLs' premise is that students can take out a loan of up to £8,000 from one of three banks (Royal Bank of Scot-
land, Barclays, and tl and the Government v. pay the interest for the of the course. Sounds not. Firstly, it's verj which sorts of course The Directgov websi vaguely to 'vocational lated' courses, which w to rule out PhDs altogi the nice but fundamei helpful woman I talke the Co-op thought it that my fictitious MA i Literature would through the applicatio - although I wouldn't 1
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Daniel BYates is unfortunately unavaible for comment. He makes his statements through a salvaged enigma machine, a second world war decoding device, pre-progammed to emit miserablist statements at random intervals. It's fortunate that noone has the relevant decrypting tools to actually understand what he might be saying, the body language, transmitted over morse code and hastily scribbled dot-to-dot faxes, is less-than encouraging. We worry about him, but there's not a lot we can do, and he's a decent man at heart. This week's issue contains all of the things that an issue might reasonably contain. There are some elements best forgot, others than cannot help but be remembered. It was forged in the hellfires of iniquity, hammered pink-hot upon the anvil of congenital vulgarity. The team of convicted illiterates, who labour day-night-and-day to keep PartB within the confines of reason and moral decency, are life-long recidivists, perpetual lapsarians, who built straw huts in Eden yet decamp on weekends to their crash-pads in Sodom.
There is nothing to be said,
nothing that has not been already spoken. If you care read-on, if you don't, then don't.
'daniel b. yates'
tuesday the eleyenth of december, tuo thousand and seven
three .fl
pixar ate the babies
ericlundquist decries the homogenous nature of picture and prefers stories that never end
Walking along Oxford Street last week, I found myself confronted by a large placard advertising Jeny Seinfeld's upcoming animated film, Bee Movie. After shuddering with odious memories of Seinfeld, I simply made a mild grumble and was on my way. Later that afternoon perusing RottenTomatoes, as per my usual procrastination routine, I couldn't help but notice that Pixar's Ratatouille still topped the UK's box office charts weeks after its release. A sad epiphany wasn't far off: Disney/Pixar and its imitators have virtually monopolized children's films for a long, long time.
Honestly, try to remember a recent box office hit rated Universal/General Admission that wasn't a comput-er-animated comedy. Can
endearing talking animals or objects. Still having trouble? Since 1995, 9 out of the 10 top-grossing U/G-rated movies have been computer-animated comedies, the top six created through the Pixar mold described above. Most of these new-generation children's movies are innocuous, suited, and mildly enjoyable (exempting mental landfills like Over the
Hedge) when watched individually. However, taking a step back to look at the bigger picture, there's something seriously wrong. Pixar and its imitators have penetrated the Children's genre and are now pumping out CGI films at an ever-increasing rate—eerily paralleling the characteristics of a virus.
So why is Disney/Pixar's animated domination so bad? Films like Ice ;e and Toy Story are funny, visually appealing, and contain important lessons for the children who watch. The problem is that the films, the characters, and even the moral j messages are all virtually the same. I They are exclusively computer animated, almost always feature talking n o n
humans with celebrity voices, and deal _ _with the
same basic themes and issues. The i first two points are '
quite obvious, so let's take a look at some examples of the third. In Toy Story, Buzz and Woody start off as rivals. After getting lost outside and captured by the evil Sid, the two must put aside their differences and work together with the rest of the toys to escape. Bxizz and Woody learn not to judge appearances and discover an important les-
son about friendship. Ice Age tells the story of an anti-social mammoth that eventually reveals a heart of gold. He learns the value of friendship and helping others as he saves his diverse companions at the end of long journey. If;
that's not enough for you,
Pixar's Chief Creative Officer John Lasseter explained in a PBS interview that the creation of every story begins with personal growth for a protagonist, full of funny personality traits,
who learns to appreciate his friends and family.
Anyone need a cookie cutter?
Everything Pixar touches turns into solid gold—the films' enormous box-office revenues are further bloated by merchandising, video game adaptation, and advertisements.
While this may enable Lasseter and Steve Jobs to have sex atop heaping piles of cash, it leaves chil dren too young to know better addicted to mindless CGI comedies that spout the same moral platitudes year after year. Even worse, this monopoly makes it almost impossible for children's films of a different style or theme (if people still bother to make any) to gain
any kind of audience. Pixar's success has created a mold which virtually all major production companies now follow. The U/G-rating audience doesn't frequent small underground theatres to seek out independent films, so they watch what 'their parents choose, or what they see advertised on TV. By the time kids start to look beyond Pixar, they'll be too old to appreciate great children's movies as children. While teaching tennis to a group of 10-12 year olds last L summer, I brought ^up	The
^NeverEnding ^Story only to tsadly discover Ino one knew fwhat the hell I ' was talking "about. An epic t drama about the power of belief , and the limitless ^possibilities of Ithe imagina-Ition, The jNeverEnding FStory is an ^example of a brilliant kid's film appreciable even years later as an adult. Maybe I'm getting nostalgic, but it seems a damn shame that kids these days are stuck with the same stale popcorn movie after movie.
names not to give a teddy bear
mo mo-bear mo-hammerhead bear-prophet abortia-bear islam-eating monster bear beariy legal queer-bear (quear)
jail bear-bait pork Winnie Winnie the poo Gu^tanamo bear
r

This week I took up an invitation .from an ; esteemed director of filth to visit his set, I ' was, as you can imagine, thrilled at the p.rospect at seeing in the flesh the production of tnis my favourite medium. I was however much shocked, at what I encountered. The director, Bambo Fedoix:io, was a hero of xnine. His work is greiitly valued in the halls of Soho's finest sex shops and he is said to be the Fellini of European pornography. When. I met the m.an I was, ho\veve.r, somewhat i.mde.whe!med, Bambo is a short, corpulent man and as he met me he shook my hand his eyes gradually fell away from my eyes to my body, I could smell bourbon o,n' his breath and my gaze was drawn towards his stained "and soiled Hawaiian .sliirt that reeked of onions. As I entered the set the stench of vaseline was ovexpowering and the lighting glared u]3on the bare fle.sh of the performers. I watched one. girl v/.rithe about in front of the cameras fo.r. about half an hour and ivas soon desensitised to the erotic appeal of her act. Instead I was mesmerised by ner automatic moveiments and the blank expression o.n her face. She had by now exposed herself intimately so many times tlaat she no longer seemed to care."I reali.sed what ,years of viewing poi-xi had not re^'ealed to me! that the production of smut is a seedy process. After the shooting of the scene' f met "with the young starlet, a pleasant girl named Mandy "McMinx. Her real name is Margaret and she grew up in Bognor, After five minutes she excused herself and reappeared from the toilets sniffing and rubbing her nose like she had the .flu. I left the set be.raused and determined to reassess my relationship to pom. When I returned home however a brown package awaited me on my doorstep. It was Ti-anny Sluts 7.1 sighed, and self in the i
mm **
iftaE.VJO.lIFTi''®'
I
OK my kiddies top recipe time again. This ^ I is a great recipe that s going to help you ^
through the festive period. Once you've I put the tatties in the oven, steal a nip ^
of yo' mam's gin and hit the couch *
I then wait for all hell to break loose. *
g Last year my uncle Marmy got druiik •
fand put the cat in the microwave. Meg g mam went inental and smacked him ¦
•with a frying pan and we had to have ¦
#and ambulance round, and they I bought the popo who found me stash _
«of nuggy buds so I ended up sharing a I cell with Brutal Barry, a savage crook
fwho looks like Magnum P.I. and has a |
taste for forcible buggery. It was a -mighty bad Crimbo fmks, so this year |
I I'm getting meself where no man can
force himself upon me. So my advice |
% to you, my dear sweet cholos, is to \ keep the fuck away from Brutal Jl Barry.	^

LSE In
Emsn tnal]Etavar4isrtli@ISEU9Duih

C?e
met when you snuck down my chimney last Chrismas Eve. I hope you come again this year.
meet in the laundry room each Wednesday and I watch you iron. I also steal your panties and wear them -when we go out.
C?e
0
" 0
reimmersed myself i
killed that tramp together. Don't pin it on me. Let's get some guns and go down in style.
have no shame. You beat up my ex and threw his carcass into the Thames. I love you more than ever..
? filth that is my life.
can't wait to cook the turkey this year. I am going to stick the gibblets into my pants and dance a rumba in the kitchen.
sat in the library and watched you pick your nose for two whole hours. You smell of cabbage and nobody else sees you but I.
would read you Keats and declare my eternal love to you but I am still crouching in the bushes outside your house.
drink two bottles of gin a day and some 40 Mayfair Superkings. I am middle aged and divorced and you are my nubile lodger.

B. four	tuesday the eleventh of decenber, tuo thousand and seven
IN THE VAI.I.EV OF
m
CHILDREN
Bernard Keenan speaks to Academy Award winning director Paul Haggis about his new filnn In The Valley of Elah and the continuing tragedy of Iraq
"O;
ur President said, "We are under attack. I There is a monster over there and we need to go and fight it." And these boys said, "We'll do it, we'll step forward, we'll go." And they went..."
In the valley of Elah, David killed Goliath. In London, director Paul Haggis speaks passionately, as one would expect, about his film. It's a true story about what happened when one man's son came home from Iraq in late 2004. As Haggis talks, there is pleading in his voice, urgency. He is bewildered.
"Since we tell these boys such stories, they all grow up wanting to be that hero, wanting to be that David. And then what happens is a time of crisis. Some of the kids who were in this film joined up on September 12th, 2001. What kind of king sends a boy to fight a giant that his bravest warriors won't fight, that he won't fight himself? What happens to these boys when they go and find out that they are not David, they're Goliath?"
Haggis shot to fame two years ago when Crash won the Oscar for Best Picture. It was, in this writer's opinion, a heavy-handed and emotionally manipulative example of Califomian liberalism. Not bad, but not nearly as good as the quasi-spiritual reaction made out. It is a shame that this, his first film since Crash, has not met with the same acclaim, at least in the United States.
In the Valley of Elah follows Hank Deerfield (Tommy Lee Jones layering his usual tough-guy nonchalance with a surprising, nuanced fragility), a religious, all-American former Military Policeman who served in Saigon, as he goes in search of his son, just back from Iraq and missing from base. When the mutilated body is found across from a remote gunstore in the bush, all the ingredients for a good old-fashioned crime thriller fall into place. Deerfield and a single-mom detective, played by Charlize Theron, put the pieces together, despite obstruction from the Army, her superiors, and a mutual dislike for one another. But the truth is much more mundane, and all the more shocking for it.
Says Haggis, "I said to my agent go find me a story that no one wants to make. He brought me this magazine article by Mstrk Boal, which was published in Playboy. I'd been looking for something to do about Iraq; a lot of us were troubled by what was happening and what our involvement was. And we knew what we were getting from the press had not a modicum of truth attached to it. I found this story of this military police officer who went searching for his son, and fictionalized it. But these were all real events. The strip club, the chicken shack, everything about what happened is true. And shockingly so."
In real life, it was six months before the remains of Randy Davis's son were found. But then, as in the film, the mystery didn't extend very far. He was stabbed multiple times by his best friends, the men of his unit with whom he had witnessed, and committed, terribly cruel things - the killing of children, the torture of wounded Iraqis. Of course, no one at that time wanted to pay much attention. "Everyone was ignoring it. Public opinion turns against the war but we love to blame others for our mistakes. Now we're blaming Bush and saying, "You lied to us" - but we all knew it was lies, anyone with half a

brain could see that at the time. We got into it together. So I decided to make a political film that's non-partisan. I didn't want to try to judge anyone, just to say this is our responsibility, our shared tragedy, and if we can't truly empathise with the Iraqi people - and I don't think Americans can, even when we see the pictures of the dead...but maybe we can empathise with our own young men and women, see the tragedy through their eyes."
Throughout the film, Deerfield receives digitally salvaged video footage from his son's mobile phone - 'heat damaged' - footage and photographs that unveil the reality of the cruelty of the norm in Iraq and the moral inversion that war engenders. One image perplexes Deerfield throughout: a crumpled form, lying by the road. What is this image that his son emailed to him, the same day he called home in tears? And what was his reaction at the time - what did he say to the boy he sent to war? He knows, but won't bring himself to admit it. Not yet.
It is this experience, at the heart of middle-America, that Haggis really needed to reach out to. "I was out protesting against the war before we invaded, and after it happened, but I thought it would be wrong to say, "We were right, you guys were idiots," and rub that in their face. I wanted to do two things. I wanted to blame myself. Because this is going on in my name, these heinous crimes take place in our name. It's the American people who are keeping the troops there, and it's the Democrats who are still voting for more funding while taking the moral high ground. It's too easy to blame the politicians, much too easy. I wanted the film to play to Americans who are sending their sons and daughters, to make them think about changing their minds, to think maybe we shouldn't send our next son. I don't like preaching to the converted. And it's really played very well in the mid-
West and the South."
As the truth of what his son became (and what became of his son) emerges, Deerfield's world begins to crumble. But his is a stoiy repeated, in different ways, in thousands of homes across America as soldiers return. Says Haggis, "When soldiers get back we're just patting them on the back and saying, "Welcome back, you look great." And they ask us, "I look great? Can't you see what I've seen?"
"I thought we would never again see a war as cruel as Vietnam. But we're killing civilians at such a rate that we don't even bother mentioning it anymore. [Soldiers] talk about the various incidents that happened on any one day like, they went to house, threw a grenade into a room and killed a woman and two children, then threw a grenade into another room and killed an old man, and on to the next house, and on and on. At least in Vietnam, when something like My Lai happened, at least we were shocked. It still happened, and lots of other atrocities happened in Vietnam as you know, but there was still a modicum of decency I felt. And there were men [like Randy Davis] who came back from Vietnam and still truly believed, despite knowing about these things. And he also thought he knew that his son would not be the one to go and torture prisoners. That's what really shocked him."
Although at times it feels overly contrived, there are moments in the film that are genuinely shocking. Firstly because these are not the issues one expects to be addressed in a Hollywood film, but also because of the truth of the incidents: sticking a finger in a prisoner's wound for fun, driving a Humvee over a child, rather than stopping (the crumpled shape by the road, the spectre that haunts the film). This is not the story of the war as reported by Fox News. The need to fill the void is not lost on Haggis, "I started this in 2004, and I think a lot of film makers did the same so I think that's why we're seeing a lot of films coming out now, and I'm really proud to be one of them. We [as Americans] don't want responsibility; we don't want to look at the Iraqi dead, at how our soldiers are being forced to run over children in the street.
"I saw that photograph, of that child run over, and then I heard the man who had done it speak about it. This is a sweet man; this is a man who had a terrible decision to make. He was driving a vehicle and told never to stop. Why? Not because of you, sacrificing yourself. It's about not sacrificing the man beside you, the six in the back, and the men in the vehicle behind you and the one behind them. So that child runs out in front of you, you have a choice to make, you're 18 years old, and you've got three seconds. It's an impossible choice.
"These men and women are coming home shattered. We're seeing the highest rate of suicide and homelessness in our military's history. I spoke to these kids. They've seen horrible things. They'd burst into tears and say, 'All I want to do is apologise to the Iraqi people.'I wanted to speak to that experience."
In the Valley Of Elah is released on January 25th Painting by Aaron Hughes www.aarhughes.org
tuesday the eleventh of decenber, two thousand and seuen
fiye B,
Question: What is rectangular, black and white, looks like it was stolen from a Star-Trek set and is 'softer and thicker man ever'?
Answer: Kleenex for men.
Or so I am told by the powerful red letters which already have me put the box down- too much manliness for me to deal with at such a late hour.
The back authoritatively informs me that it is 'Strong. Soft. Sorted'.
Who? Me, in the protection of Lord Kleenex? The incredibly empowered male holder of the box? Or the slightly larger tissue the packet preciously holds?
Oh I get it. Manly tissues. For virile snot (and other masculine leaks one fears). As opposite to delicate ladysnot?
Sure men might need to wipe off various ends of their anatomy, but what was wrong with regular Kleenex in the first place? (or loo roll for that matter)
Men's tissues aren't new on the British market, but this space-ship edition is a novelty-and is the most scientific approach to nose-blowing I've ever witnessed.
These aren't sold in the United States- they aren't even mentioned on the US website.
Politically correct? Or perhaps because only British men can handle all this boxed testosterone?
It is interesting to note that Kleenex sponsored

for Men
rn ¦	------— -
Urap K^um Ury.
i a	JLf	yei
Changing men? Desperate marketers? A bit of both I'm afraid.
Let's recapitulate. The world hasn't quite recovered the metrosexual bomb which marketers lit over the western metropolis in the late 90s.
Desperate to arouse a dormant market, straight men became the direct target of advertisers. The idea was simple: they were sold products associated with stereotypical femininity and had sometimes been already adopted by the gay scene.
Thongs, face masks, mascara were given make-overs to be sold to your average Jo Schmo. All in all, it aimed to develop a higher level of appearance awareness amongst men as it would lead to, well, buying.
An interesting aspect of it was that, even though what was sold was blatantly lipstick in a squarer packaging, it was usually not referred as such- instead it was often given a technical name to make it look like a medical necessity rather than an act of vanity. Sure men wanted to look good (or at least were told so), but God(dess) forbid they might be called sissies. Lipstick became 'lip maximizing serum', foundation 'confidence corrector' etc etc.
Somewhere between Pitt's glossy pout and Backhand's plucked nipples, traditional, roaring, Tarzan masculinity was declared out of fashion, making room for a 'new man', one who waxes, wears pink and, yes ladies, fancies you (or
national survey on men's tears in 2005- revealing that men today
are 77% more willing to ciy in pub- (pot necessariiy Ifi thot ofder)
lie. strong and soft indeed, he weU might cry, but he remains a bona-fide bloke.
at least that lovely reflection of himself in your pupils).
alicepfelffer
Kleenex isn't solely creating a product for men, but is constructing a nationwide, all-male family of sneezers, all united for...erm, stronger tissues. This tissue becomes in itself a declaration of bom-again masculinity.
These tissues aren't alone in their quest. Recently, there has been a testosterone explosion on the market, showering with Rambo-ness every product imaginable.
Just about any brand has been adding its 'Just For Men' range- although the original product is seemingly unrelated to gender identity. Why? Such a line suggests to men that their virile needs had, up to then, been neglected. Do men, as a sub-culture, need to feel personally targeted? Does this mean that the rest of the line was in fact 'feminine' and all of a sudden inadequate?
The first in the trend was the Yorkie chocolate bar and its self-explanatory 'Not for Girls'. Behind a coy facade, it suggested that a man needed 'manly-sized bites', defining male needs through the dissatisfaction and rejection of the suddenly 'feminine' alternatives. From Head and Shoulder shampoo (for virile dandruff) to Japanese chocolate biscuits Pocky (Bigger sticks, darker chocolate. No queer innuendo there. Sigmund is that you?), to Coke Zero (marketed in the UK as 'the ultimate bloke coke'- no I'm not making this up) to many many more, this phenomenon is occurring round the world (and my local supermarket)

This 'For Men' trend indicates a change, a Second Wave metrosexuality. While First Wave (described above), displaced 'feminine' products onto a straight male market, here, a gendering of previously 'officially' gender-neutral products is occurring. Men become the central figure of the object, defined by opposition to the non-target, the non-man. The rest of the line becomes not inherently feminine, but simply not good enough for real men- therefore feminine by default, an insufficient, unmen-tioned Other.
The core of Second Wave is that men are being offered to purchase back some of that Tarzan masculinity which was forbidden from them during the First Wave. This born-again virility is constructed through the subtle, unspoken denigration of 'femininity'. What is Head and Shoulder, Pocky, Kleenex saying about men? They are strong, hungry, in a hurry, mature-only ever put in context by the creation of a weak, nibbling, slow, infantile Other. In order for these all-men products to be credible, they require the demeaning of women as subgroup.
Yes, masculinity and femininity as both masquerades, but unfortunately this squashing of a meek Other goes beyond supermarkets: this goes hand in hand with a return to mega-patriarchy, arch-macho values at a time women's rights are threatened world-wide, where feminism seems to be going down the drain. Yes Tarzan is back on the shelf and back on the street. Let's just hope he gets rxm over by Claude Frangois.



^ dreamt of a ^hite Christmas but this shit is darker ^than original sin



tf
1


^isn't a lump of coal in my stocking, i'm just pleased to see you. you can slide down my chim-mey 364 days a year.
/\\ you can move a little to \ fxhe left baby, beautifuf. Baby J ^ lis puking chocolate, this is some \ awesome texture, dude.

TUeSOAY, DECEMBER It
t
TO
MERGE WITH
PRINTED WITH INK THAT Ddiffir CARE ABOUT YOUR PROBLEMS
DAVIES IS NEW ENGLAND BOSS
Howard Davies has agreed to become the next England manager - but only on the condition that he will be allowed to take a three month sabbatical during the 2010 World Cup.
Davies didn't say at a hastily arranged Soho Square press conference, "I shall be writing a book. The precedent has been set for England managers to be granted a sabbatical leave of absence - just ask Steve McClaren."
Howard Davies was widely expected to take over as chairman but after Jose Mohrinho went to New Caledonia to find his dog, or just any old dog, FA Chief Executive Brian Barwick of--Z fered Davies the manager position.
: Barwick didn't exclusively tell The Beaver, "I don't actually have any knowledge of football or what it takes to be a good manager. But ; Howard really impressed me with his eloquent •• online diary and ability to make LSE students -k laugh and forget about the fact that they con-tinually get screwed over."
Davies is widely expected to purchase passports for the entire Manchester City squad on the black market and have them play for England.
..i When questioned about his coaching ability A- Davies didn't say, "Well, I intend to bring in a I bunch of FTAs (Football teaching assistants) ¦:%. with a poor command of English to help me. But I really believe that players should be expected to do a lot of private practice - even

though I have decided that training grounds are a poor use of resources after conducting a cost benefit analysis."
Peter Sutherland and Lord Grabiner QC of
Aldwych are the favourites to be named as Davies' assistant.
The LSE press office didn't say, "Howard who? Who is this Howard Davies bloke?"
beaverLiTE
vvww.beavei moviescorvi
NEWS
Sutherland crowned Miss LSE
Peter Sutherland has added to an already stellar career, which has included being Attorney General of Ireland and Director General of the World Trade Organisation, by being crowned Miss LSE 2007.
In the interests of diversity, the events' organisers added the rotund Irishman to the billing hoping he wouldn't make it through the 1st round. However, judges were impressed by his posture and the slippery, florid little number he sported on the night.
When asked what his favourite book was in the second 'question' round, Sutherland proceeded to recite his expansive CV until the judges were swooning.
When questioned about the shock decision. Judge Number Three, a Mr. Davies, simply replied, "I judged the Booker Prize."
Fellow contestants were outraged at the decision, and as number 7 put it, 'I came to the LSE expecting more.'
Back at Movida, sash disturbingly taut, the Suthster grooved into the early hours

at the overpriced London nightclub.
The next morning, BeaverLiTE caught up with the star-studded, somewhat stunted party-pooper. When asked how much he had spent on the
night, he replied,"I'm not sure - it cost the earth though." Later in the week, when criticised for excessive spending Sutherland apologised and explained that he thought he was being questioned about his decisions as BP exec.
beaverLITE -100%
Students open portal to find study space
A group of LSE students, fed up; with the library's lack of study spaces, have built an entrance to an alternate dimension accessible via the library staircase.
The LSESU Alternate Space and Time Society built the "conceptual wormhole" in consultation with renewed writer China Mieville.
"It was the only way we could conceive of getting enough study spaces," the ASAT Head Warlock explained. The portal offers access to a library in 17th century Poland. It is catered by DWEM slaves. The extra-dimensional space by 666%. "The only downside is the lack of ether-net cables," claimed the Head Warlock.
The group has attracted criticism from the School for installing the portal without permission. A School representative claimed that "eliminating the space/time framework is against buildings regulations. Repairing the laws of physics, so flagrantly broken by these students, will be exceptionally expensive. We have no choice but to raise fees by 300%."
The ASAT Head Warlock refutes this claim, saying the School should see the portal as a "golden business opportunity.
Pulse surpasses record listenership!
Hosh Jeller reports on the storming success of LSE's best radio station.

pulse
1*^ i-* l«Ni+
is a bit shit.
y§tfr}#r§

Nymbir @f Uftinitf
2007
Pulse DJs were celebrating wildly last night, as they're listenership numbers reached record levels. Figures from last night indicate 1 person listened to a show on Pulse FM. This vastly surpasses the previous record of 0 people set in 1991 when all students were promised £15,760 if they tuned in for 9 seconds, but no one did.
This new record puts the ratio of listeners to presenters at an unbelievable 1:50. Head of Pulse Dan Dolan didn't say, "this totally justifies all the money that we spend all the time on all our equipment. It proves that contrary to popular opinion. Pulse isn't just listened to by people in
the quad, there's someone online, which is great."	-
Howard Davies was not quoted, nor was Fadhil as saying, "This is a milestone for Pulse, now that we have a listener we plan to invest loads and loads of money into Pulse because it is totally worth all of that money and it isn't just a place for people who like to tell other people how great their taste in music is or make other people listen to their witty yet insightful banter."
fact free, guaranteed
FEATURES
beaverLITE
vi3<w\.v.beove;:novies.crni
longer discriminate against potential extra-dimen-sional-habiting students, who have been excluded due to fascist anti-portal School policy."
While the dispute is certain to continue, the portal will remain open to all students. It will be found on the ninth step of the library staircase. It is extremely visible, being guarded by dragons.
According to Wikipedia, Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf has revealed he is a huge fan of former Newcastle and England striker Alan Shearer.
Shearer, who recently missed out on the England manager's job to the LSE's Howard Davies, is idolised by Musharraf for his leadership,	his
courage, and his willingness to take out his opponents using his elbows.
However, the feeling is not believed to be mutual, as Shearer is a strong be-iever in democratic ideals, land is believed to be backing Imran Kahn.
GET
BETWEEN THE
SHEETS WTTH US
S/irii
s r
H-


Personal Massaae
Endorsed by The Beaver
Anatomically coirect
HAVE YOU SEEN THESE PEOPLE?
With your help, we can hope to end the emotional turmoil that are besetting the next-of-kin of these missing people
Name:
Jon Tyrannell, Editor of student journal The Script
Last Seen: May 2007, at Heathrow Airport awaiting a flight to Los Angeles, with totbags of Class-A narcotics
Distinguishing features: A haughty disposition laced with caustic sarcasm If found, please contact: Union Connmunication Connmissar Kit Borry
Name:
George Bernard Shaw, Co-founder of the LSE
Last Seen: Official date of death - 2 November 1950. Various paranormal sightings on the LSE campus
Distinguishing features: Wailing cries of despair lamenting death of Fabianism
If found, please contact: ]. J. Capsell, Deci-Seph Brown or any other socialist
Name:
Saint Lawrence, patron saint of libraries
Last Seen: 23 March 2005, at the BP Texas City Refinery, repairing an isomerisation unit before the explosion
Distinguishing features: Nocturnal reading habits and caffeine addiction
If found, please contact: If you are in possession of morals, contact the 24-
hour Library campaign team. Otherwise, proceed to terminate subject and claim reward from the LSE
Name:
Mr LSE, Vainpot and manliness extraordinaire
Last Seen: November 2007, protesting his controversial exclusion from the Miss LSE beauty pageant
Distinguishing features: Salacious lips, gorgeous eyes, inexhaustible libido
If found, please contact: The Feminist Society has a bounty on him, wanted
dead-or-alive. Females are advised not to approach him if alone. He will bed you at will.



sports
Boxing Beavers
• •• ti
• III
ill

This was set to be an exciting bout, hidden only by the hype of the Hatton Mayweather clash. At the weigh in these athletes seemed ill proportioned and many punters were set off by the stats. Yates smokes sixty Camels a day, but has a height and reach advantage over Warren. Warren has been accused of the use of illicit substances but has been on a rigourous programme of ten beers a day for the last six months. Neither give themselves easily to social concerns. Both avoided the AU Carol in favour of their preparation of the big night and neither has been seen at Crush for the last two years. The pre-fight weigh ins also gave fans a sight into one of the greatest rivalries in boxing history. As the two gladiators stared eye to eye over the scales Yates unleashed a vile stream of invective at the hapless Warren. He accused Warren of using his training period to insufflate cocaine and pay for the easy company of strippers much to the perturberance of the otherwise calm Warren. Waren in turn threatened Yates with taking his entourage
his town to molest his grandmother The two were pulled apart by the fight promoter, the notorious Kevin Perry, who has been acccused of embezzlement and adulteiy over his 34 year career as a promoter. Thus the scene was set: the acerbic remaks uttered, the vitriol unleashed. On the big night of the fight these two proud pugnators met in the ring after grandiose introductions and stood toe to toe, staring nowhere but into the eyes of the other. The referee, the indubitable Mickey Deas called the fighters together and the bell was sounded. Yates at once seized the advantage, lunging towards Warren and utilising his redoubtable size to his advantage. He feinted to the left and swung to the right delivering Warren a stinging blow with his powerful left, utilising his larger reach to connect with Warren's jaw. Warren staggered, clearly shocked by the power of Yates' jab. Warren's career has been marked by a notorious weakness to the jaw and his many fans
pected that he would fall at this, his first hurdle. However, he regained his feet and after a standing count rejoined the fray. Yet the first round was not to be his. Yates danced around him with the delicacy of Frasier and sank punch after punch into Warren's weak jaw. Warren was fortunately saved by the bell and retired to his corner. He was shouted down by his coach Samual DaviD Foot, a well known trainer from the slums of Hounslow and rejoined the fray. Yates came out of the second round the weaker party. Though Warren's nose had given way in the prior round, he did not let it affect him as he attacked Yates' weak underside. Warren moved inside Yates and delived a flourish of body blows upon his opponent that soon sent him reeling. However Yates, who has previously gone the distance with the redoubtable De La Hoya, offered a fine blow

to
Waren's nose that
sent him to the ground. Warren regained his feet in a standing count and once again assaulted the magnificent Yates, sending him to the canvas with a fine left to the jaw. As the bell sounded the judges were left to make their decision, and voted for a drawer between the two fighters. None of the punters expected such a result, and as both fighters stood in the ring awaiting the announcement many paper envelopes were passed to the judges by their friends at ringside. Overall, though the fight was exciting it marked another low point in professional boxing. The fighters were inadequate and uncouth and the tickets overpriced and unattainable, and the crowds soon left the arena in search of cocaine, booze and violence.
	¦¦	
		
		
		
		


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/i own half the amazon, i just \ dropped a log in my trousers, caii St a happy meal, get a free toy. and don1 forget children, burn a rainfor __est for Christmas.,____
/natural, it's natural., it's /\ Inatural. i gave you two min-lutes baby, I'm a fucking stag, lyou've got your presents, don-yner, blitzen and kebab, don't tell Vsantas's wife., our little sea-\sonal secret.
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IS!
B. eight
tuesday the eleventh of decenber, tuo thousand and seven

T
hree things I know about Remi Nicole:
1. She is smart. When I meet people and I'm attempting to determine if a) I'm going to like them, and b) I'm going to feel like talking to them for longer than five minutes without wanting to poke my eyes out, I ask them an extremely random question that has no relation to the topic at hand and see how they react. So, since Remi Nicole is pseudo famous, I felt she was deserving of my favourite random question.
"So, a bear and an alligator are fighting... in a sewer. Who wins?"
"The alligator"
"Why?"
"Because alligators are used to being in the water It's not always about size, I mean, a snake could kill a bear."
Nuff said. One point to Miss. Nicole.
2. She is one of those people that are just born to be famous - although not in the way that, let's say, Britney Speeirs was born to be famous (i.e. her mother's greatest ambition in life was to have a famous daughter). For the unfortunate hoards of struggling musicians out there, fame is the result of a catharsis; a process of checks and balances ,

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playing shit gigs in shit clubs, with shit audiences and even shittier sound guys - oh, and lest we forget, the shit day job that pays the bills. Yet, in spite of this, they forge bravely onward, and the lucky ones may eventually find some degree of fame. For Remi Nicole the story went a bit differently, and it took her the grand total of one year to move from chick in a coffee house, to a chick on stage opening for Amy Winehouse. If she was Britney Spears, you'd be worried ^ that by the end of 2009 she will be ^ married and divorced from her sleezy !: back up dancer, and in the process of re-growing her hair in between stints in rehab. But, she's not Britney. So we don't have to worry.
"Most of the people I know who got into music when they were a bit older kind of do it after having this 'fuck it' moment where they decide to throw away the real world, the day job, and pursue music for real, even if it means a hell of a struggle. Was there a moment like that for you at all?"
"No, not really, it kind of just happened. I started writing music, got recognized - there was not really any sort at pro-

rocheileburgess teaches us three things about londoh's newest star
found reasoning behind it, it just sort of happened organically and came together I'm really lucky I guess."
Humility from a famous person. Go figure. That's two points.
3.	She's a GIRL in
a rock band. Period. Everyone has got their 'thing'. Amy Winehouse has her coke addiction and beehive. Freddie Mercury had really tight white pants and eyeliner. But, with the release of her new single 'Rock and Roll' I think it is safe to assume that Remi's 'thing' is her status as a black girl playing rock music. Which I'm sure must be annoying as hell - so much so that she was driven to write a song about it.
"I know that you must get asked the question 'what's it like to be a black chick in a rock band' an awful lot and that it probably pisses you off."
"(laughs) Yeah. It gets old." "So, how about I ask you what it's like to be chick in a rock band? Since that's what you are first and
foremost."
"For sure, it's great... I love it... but it's tough at the same time"
"What's so tough about it?"
"It's harder.. I've gotta work for everything - for respect"
That's just bollocks if you ask me - how the hell could anyone not respect this girl, who after fifteen minutes on the phone starts to feel like a close friend? She confesses to missing just listening to music, even though she's getting paid to play it every day. By the way - if she did have time to rest, or relax, and listen to music, she has some good picks too: Sam Cooke, Beach Boys, Bob Dylan, The RoUing Stones (and that's three points in the bag!) Even though she is well on her way to being famous, she still picks her clothes for her gigs. Plus, after our phone call she was on her way to play another gig hung-over, which means she understands what it means to be a rock star in its truest form. These things alone should earn her respect. Whilst there are some who may claim that with time all of these great things (save for playing gigs hung-over) will disappear and that fame, m its intensity, will ruin the niceties that Remi Nicole shared with me, I have to disagree. Simply put, the kid's alright, and she plays a mean guitar.



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11
refereed by loisjeary
Dave McPherson used to be in a : %'S:V'00	band called INME, so called I
because they liked it when girls ; yelled it out to them. Ironically, ; Kings of Leon have probably j been in more women than Dave ; McPherson could ever dream of ; and hence are playing a massive ; arena, as opposed to a little bar ; in Holborn.
tobieule thinks the arrogance is justifiedi
Dave McPherson The Fly
Kin^ of Leon
Wembley Arena
Bloc Parly
Alexandra Palace
Kaiser Chiefs Earls Court
The Spice Girls
02
CSS
Coronet
Don't feel bad about leaving j after the support acts at either j of these shows, as We Are; Scientists and the Little Ones ; will prove that America pro- : duces infinitely more exciting i and accomplished guitar music i than Leeds, whilst the Cribs and i Foals are set to wear everyone ; out before Kele and co. can even ; take to the stage.
Expect Lovefoxxx to really i show how 'Girl Power' is done i 2007-stylee. Better to be dazzled : by handmade glittery jumpsuits; and real talent, than Roberto; Cavalli outfits intended to dis- i tract from a real lack of any tal- ; ent.
There are bands that evolve over time. There are bands that even constantly reinvent themselves. And there are bands that don't need any of this nonsense. So what happens when your New Favourite Band returns to town after almost two years? You go, you wait through two mediocre supporting acts, and then you rock yourself into ecstasy (or, if you're British, throw your pint into the crowd). When it's all over, you go home feeling relieved that some things in life remain the same, no matter what happens. The Hives are a very reliable band. Their style has changed minimally since the release of Veni Vidi Vicious in 2000 and even having their new The Black and White Album produced by PharreU Williams '¦
and Jacknife Lee did not even scratch the surface of their energetic .
Scandinavian garage rock. Why .
change if you already are the self-proclaimed greatest band in the '
world?
Self-confidence and a big '
scoop of black humour are crucial to experiencing Howlin' PeUe Almqvist and his boys live. The Hives, clad in their traditional *
black and white suits, play a tight set and expect nothing less than uncontrolled exaltation from the crowd - which works from their third song, which is the classic 'Die, All Right'. Straight afterwards, the audience are told by Howlin' Pelle that The Hives "are the five wise men which the Bible spoke of and we bring you
Gold, Frankincense and 'Hate To '___
Say I Told You So'". Their biggest ^Bi hit has everyone pouring their devotion onto the band and their beer on each other.
4


From then on, it's a breeze through old and new gems, hilarious J stage announcements and the chance to catch one of the roughly 24 drum sticks that Chris Dangerous throws into the crowd.
The songs from The Black and White Album fit well into the set list, but then they would, as they sound almost exactly 1 ke songs from Tyrannosaurus Hives or the break through Veni V di Vicious. After little more than an hour, we are told that there are only two songs left, and one song later Howlin' Pelle enlightens us that "if you had three and a half minutes left to live and were' asked what you wanted, 90% in this audience would say that , i they'd want to hear The Hives playing 'Tick '5 Tick Boom'", undoubtedly the best^ response to British understatement and of ^ course quite accurate" at this point. Afterwards,The Hives return for an ^ encore of 'Main Offender' and two 3 of the best new songs, 'Return the ^ Favour' and 'T.H.E.H.I.V.E.S.', anf^l incredibly funny climax of self-j;^ celebration .	TS
•.T
Experiencing The Hives works best when you expect nothing but a; i; tight set and an entertaining front; man. It's an evening of blissful stu--:3 pidity that takes no prisoners. As I \ walked out into the night, I was:^ amazed to see how many very young -jl faces there are among the sweaty ii'fj crowd surging out of the Apollo, v-* While The Hives may not have^ji changed much since their break-;*! through in 2000, they obviously;;,^ managed to attract many new fans as well as keeping their old fol-lj^ lowers. How? They just do it. They |i' * rule the world, stupid, snd don't ^ they know it!
Tuesday the eleventh of decenber, tuo thousand and seuen
nine
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iQiQtQ
anita dorotakaczmarczykre defies
logic by finding something to snnile about on the London underground

Standing on the right -aching feet behind the yellow line - back breaking bags - monosyllabic announcements - nosing a stranger's armpit or a smutty free newspaper These are the joys of the London Underground! That marvellous, sweaty portal of transportation that Londoners travel through every day exhales the intoxicating, vile fumes of the city, but it is also the arteries that give life to the diversity of London. An intricately woven underground network, it is part of the cultural tapestry that binds people together in this city. The Underground does all this? Yes, yes it does, and Gloucester Road Station has embraced this vibrant uniqueness through various art commissions called Platform Art.
Bored of the Canon and highbrow exhibitions that constantly recycle the same old (albeit spectacular) artworks, many art lovers are constantly on alert to experience something new. Gloucestor Road station manages to exhibit modern creations timelessly, yet they seem to go unnoticed by city slickers who are themselves prisoners of time. This station brings the gallery to the street, allowing transient visitors to forget the reality of the city within the few minutes they have to loiter on the platform, before boarding the
trains on the District and Circle Lines.
The most recent commission, Life is a Laugh, by Brian Griffiths, will be on view till May 2008. On inspection this contemporary piece gives the impression that this is, indeed, a 'joke'! However it is more than just a pile of a junk (which includes a discarded caravan, bicycle, mattreses and the constructed face of a giant panda bear) heaped together to create 'art'. These shabby, dull objects have been molded into an architectural space in which they do not fit or belong. Yet they become part of the Undergrounds landscape, perfectly representing London's fractured and frantic tempo.
The arrangement is reminiscent of an assault of
memories of BMX bikers ripping it large. The display represents London life - wild, fast and adrenaline-pumped -with the softer touches that are there to reassure the audience that if they trip while riding life itself, there's always a way to bounce back.
Initially on the platform, boredom and disappointment reign, but Life is a Laugh, and tomorrow is unpredictable - just like the unpredictability of this absurd piece of art. This unexpected creation engages the city and its people, asking them to take a step back, so they may see things from a different perspective. If you do, you will see how this seemingly simplistic manipulation of objects is representitive of our wildly diverse cultural and social environment. Avoiding the cliches of most public art commissions, Life is a Laugh offers the possibility for you to breathe a lungful of that fresh London air with a huge smile on your face.
Shake youseii from your sherry stupor, flick the crumbs of mince pie Trom your sticky jowls end get yo ro a gollei y this holiday.See these exhibi bef ore th«y fini.;!': showing early next year..
Millais at Tate Britiain
A retrospective of the Victorian master painter and founding member of the pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Until 13 January
Walter Sickert's Camden Town Nudes at the Courtald Gallery. Including his four provocative murder paintings. Until 20 January
Loise Bourgeois at Tate Modem. 95 years old and Bourgeois is still at the bleeding edge of modem art. A retrospective of 7 decades of work. A show not to be missed Until 20 January
Age of Enchantment at the Dulwich Pictvire Gallery.
Illustrations from the decadent and sometimes depraved minds of late nineteenth century artists Aubrey Beardsley and Edmund Dulac, among others. Charming, and not a little bit strange. Until 17 February
Touj ours Tingo
erinorozco learns some new vocabulary from Adam Jacot de Boinod
Pesamenteiro: a person who habitually joins mourners at the house of the recently deceased ostensibly to offer condolences, but really to partake of refreshments
Belochnik: a thief who specializes in stealing linen off of clothes lines
Poronkusema: the distance a reindeer can travel without taking a comfort break
Okuri-okami: a man who feigns thought-fulness by walking a girl home only to molest her at the door
Chaponner. to stick a finger up a chicken's bottom to see if it's laying an egg
Toujours lingo, Adam Jacot de Boinod's follow-up to lingo, is more than just an intemationally conceived dirty phrasebook. Recalling social and political aspects of communication, de Boinod raises many relevant issues regarding how humans relate to one another and the wider world around them. He also makes an entertaining case for the preservation of endangered languages. Initially, Toujours Tingo seems an incredible opportunity to bmsh up on bizarre and naughty catchphras-es from around the world. Indeed it proves helpful in this endeavor, providing readers with Tantenverfuhrer, which is German for 'a man with suspiciously good manners', or 'Aunt seducer'; and rhwe, which means 'to sleep on the floor without a mat, usually dmnk and naked' in Tsongan. These words and phrases are fun because they are bizarre and often times so foreign to Westem experiences as to seem a novelty. In this sense, the words de Boinod research are culturally peculiar and probably say quite a lot about the culture from which they are derived. For example, simply by taking the word sena into consideration, which means 'the time that elapses while snapping one's fingers ten times' in Sinhalese, one envisions a culture oriented towards music, harmony, and perhaps even ritualistic traditions. Alternatively, the Malay word pisan zapra, which refers to the time needed to eat a banana, recalls a tropical, island-like culture where such exotic fruits can flourish. Yet de Boinod insists that a majority of the words he discusses are intriguing precisely because they are universally relatable.
A great many of the words included in de Boinod's book demonstrate that similarities in the human condition can be shown even if the concepts entailed are conveyed through slightly more obscure cultural references. A phrase such as 'don't count your chickens before they hatch' in English is understood as 'one should not sell the fur before the bear has been shot' in Danish; or more uncannily, as 'don't hang the churning calabash before the cow has calved' in the Ndonga language of Namibia. The context may change, yet the lessons remain the same. Therefore, de Boinod is able to make a subtle and textured argument for universality and difference in the same book.
Finally, de Boinod reminds his readers of the vulnerability of these languages given the increasing use of English throughout the world. The conclusion forced upon readers by this book is that language is important, not as an abstract extension of culture, but as a real and tangible experience. To know these words and understand their meaning is to be able to participate in whole other lifestyles and societies. In other words, to extinguish these dialects is tantamount to extinguishing a part of human history with little to no hope of regaining it again.
Clearly Toujours Tingo is more than just an amusing book. It is essential reading for wannabe linguists, anthropologists and citizens of the world.
Mmbwe: a small round pebble from the stomach of a crocodile, swallowed by the Chief
Biritululo: to compare yams to settle a dispute
Gagung-. a man without a wife due to the gender ratio following the One Child Policy in China, literally translated to 'bare branches'
Oka/shete: urination difficulties caused by eating frogs before the rains have fallen
Pikikiwepogosi: having the taste of an animal that was tired out before it was killed
• B.ten
tuesday the eleyenth of decenber, tuo thousand and seven
Kids on Holiday vs Ufe CkaagiBf Experiran
l^r.
paulasvaton takes the gap year tourists to task
Claiming you like 'travelling' is somewhat vague. It's all too easy to say 'I love travelling'; who doesn't? It's much too broad a term to put under one category. The solution is to ask what do we mean by 'travelling?' Is the couple indulging in champagne and lobster in their immaculate first class carriage on the Orient Express experiencing the same as the grubby, unwashed, dread-locked youth sitting on the dirt-track munching on the last few rationed raisons waiting for some pick-up truck to take him to the next destination? A mattress for the night, a hose as a shower, flaking wallpaper and cockroaches or four poster beds, sumptuous suites and first class travel? Two opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes to travelling, both what I regard as ultimate travel experiences but of course in completely different ways. One for the person who wants to treat themselves to the utmost luxury. The other experience for the more adventurous among us, those with itchy feet and a desire to delve into a different way of life for a few months.
Im not talking here about the standard backpacker, the typical Thailand gap-year style travellers following the tourist trail and hanging out with a load of other 'travellers.' The people who get 'stuck' in one place for two weeks due to the presence of a ^ western bar. Their evenings are spent get-ting wasted with the same crowd they find at home, with a few other Westerners thrown in for that 'foreign' touch. These are novice backpackers who tread only where other tourists have laid foot, pay for rip-off tours in air-conditioned buses and who must consult their newfound Bible (aka Lonely Planet) every few hours just to play it safe.
The backpackers whom I believe reach the higher end of the spectrum in terms of the ultimate experience are the ones who will happily spend a whole afternoon finding the cheapest room. The ones who will do anything to see a place they want, even if that requires sleeping under some manky plastic sheeting on a beach, enduring the degrading looks of people aiming for refinement who have porters to lug around their YSL suitcases.The real travellers will adopt 'hunter-gatherer' level lifestyles where the word restaurant is unheard of. Here it's about making friends with fishermen for your twice-daily meal and if you want desert go to
the trees yourself. Why spend money on things that are already hanging there for free? It's about transforming your frame of mind and discarding anything to do with home, taking on a new lifestyle and hanging around with the locals.
If travelling is about getting to know a place then including the locals cannot be left out of the equation since it's p e o -p 1 e that
make up a
place. It's for this reason that backpacking in this way provides the ultimate experience because you're diving into the unknown; no guidebook or preplanning can prepare you for what the locals can give you. Of course one must practice caution so you're not meeting the wrong types, but explaining you're not a typical tourist will give you the green light. Then you can hitch-hike with them, trek for hours on end to the hidden beaches, dine on weird meat in the mountains, get invited around to their friends for the day or for a house party and meet the entire generation span and experience the joys of not being treated like a
tourist, but as a traveller, a friend of the locals. This allows you to see their day to day life and eventually it comes to the point where you begin to recognise and predict their habits. Only then can you say that you've had an experience that's reached a peak. This is because you've had to change yourself and adapt to their ways. It may not be permanent but it's a path to self-realisation. Observing them you automatically leam new ways to live and see the world.
Essentially its through roughing it that one experiences the nitty gritty of everyday life. At the more superficial 'tour bus level' one misses what is going on beneath the surface as one is whisked from one temple to the next. By avoiding the smooth path you're having to use your initiative and struggle forward and you're no longer in control of where you go, you just see where 'travelling fate' takes you. Often the highlight of any trip is not the destination but the journey itself and it's these insufficiently funded backpackers that are constantly on a journey. Travelling shouldn't be easy. Money guides you towards comforts and services designed entirely for the traveller and acting as a veil for the real country.
That leads me to the new breed of traveller emerging, the flashpacker. These cover the middle ground between the two extremes of travelling. They may be wild at heart but are just slightly too sophisticated to endure a cold night, money problems, menus in languages other than English, smelly hammocks, insects, dodgy border crossings, secondhand clothes, self-guided tours or haggling with the locals over trivial things not worth mentioning. They're beyond tour holidays but can't lower their standards too much. Like backpackers they're up for an adventure but alas with sufficiently healthier wallets when the going gets tough they've got an escape route. They're somewhat feeble since not wanting to face up to the realities they therefore they miss out on that crucial element and they are left dangling in the middle of the travel experience spectrum. They are neither draped in luxury nor are they as far-reaching as the traditional backpacker. Ok fair enough they get the best of both worlds but if it's the wow factor you want in travelling I'd say its either all out opulence (pillow-menu, Rolls Royce taxis and gold-dust baths) or penny-counting spontaneity for 2 months in a totally unfamiliar country with more rewards than any summer internship at JP Morgan.
THE MEECY SEAT
thomaswhittaker reviews the exoneroted
!
Despite a poorly chosen venue and some obvious first night snags the LSESU Drama Society's production of 'The Exonerated' was an excellent example of how it is still possible to address social issues from the stage without either pandering to sensationalism or giving in to callousness.
The script itself played a great part in this, revolving around the true stories of six Americans who were convicted and sentenced to death for crimes they did not commit and constructed from the words of the individuals themselves, allowing the audience a candid insight into a truly harrowing part of these people's lives.
What particularly struck me about this was something which I feel an absolutely fictitious script would have failed to address, namely the consequences of the victim's incarcerations, both for themselves and their relations. After leaving prison some relate how they found adjusting to the real world again a great problem. They found themselves needing the security of enclosure and locked doors- still reliving the emotions they had felt while locked up. Others who sought to reconstruct their lives found their reputations tainted by the false accusations of the courts.
Or, for example, take one character's remark that his brother "put himself right on Death Row with me" eventually taking to the bottle, losing his job and eventually being murdered in a bar brawl- something that would not have happened had he not been imprisoned. In this way we can become aware of the spreading problems that arise from such a situation which further condemn the courts mistaken accusations.
There are some nice human touches to the script as well. The story of "t how Sunny and her ~ man- convicted in 1976 of murdering two policemen exchanged sexual messages to each other	in
Japanese to avoid the eyes of the censors was particularly fun, as was the story that one inmate used his time in prison productively in learning embroidery.
The acting, on the whole, was above the normal standard expected of a student production, with Femi Oyeniran and Chris Merryman's controlled performances shining out as
particularly memorable. Chris Merriman's portrayal of Kerry Max Cook- a man falsely convicted at the age of only 21 in 1977 who remained on death row in Texas for 22
years-was excellent. There was a sensitivity to him, a quiet embarrassment at having to relate the horrific experiences he had endured (He was gang raped while in
prison several times) that gave him a true sense of pathos. But on top of this was some sense of tireless endurance and inner posi-tivity- at least he now knew it was over now and could look towards a future. Because of this he was one of the most likeable of the six characters. You felt a certain kinship and esteem towards him that must help in humanizing an institutional issue such as this.
Femi Oyeniran played Delbert Tibbs, a man accused of raping a woman and murdering a man in Florida in 1974 who was released from Death Row in 1977 but remained in custody until 1982, when charges were dropped. Oyeniran is perfect in the role, exuding a natural confidence and control on the stage which is so often absent in student productions, making him perfect for this key character in whom the other stories revolve. He was also, I think it is fair to note, one of the only characters whose voice managed to carry throughout the performance.
It is such a shame about the venue. Deciding to put on any play below a student pub with little, if any, sound proofing is always going to cause difficulties but this is particularly noticeable in a play such as this which relies so heavily upon the audiences' close relationship
with the characters upon the stage. Every time I began to become engaged I would hear a drunken roar from upstairs and my attention was immediately thrown. This disengagement is not helped by the way that the script jumps from one character to another so swiftly, allowing only very slim extracts of each story to be heard and considered.
The characters soon start to merge into one another until you are confused by which story you are hearing at any one time (something which I noticed that the lighting crew operating the much over used spotlight also found a problem, lighting the incorrect character at the incorrect time). Whether this is the result of the writer's assumption that a modern audiences' attention span must be particularly short or that they just did not have enough content to really develop each piece of dialogue further I do not know but it certainly diminished the impact of the character's stories for me.
On the whole though, this was an excellent production which managed to deliver an insightful argument against the death penalty. Here's hoping that future LSESU Drama Society Productions live up to this one but that they also consider looking elsewhere for appropriate venues.
tuesday the eleventh of decenber, tuo thousand and seven
eleven
K(G am mr
tech&gaming explores what to get and what to steer clear of for your consoles this holiday
Tech and Gaming <3 the Holiday season! Not for Santas, lights or big signs, we never leave our homes to actually go see them, no! It's the stupid discounts and presents we get from people we don't really care about because their names don't contain numbers! Regardless, if you're stuck on what to buy/ask/beg for this holiday, Tech&Gaming is here to help, providing you with what we consider to be the best options for you this Holiday.
Si
uper Mario oaiaxy
G(

I hate Super Mario Galaxy. Ever since I took the plunge and bought the damn game, it's taken over my life, and that doesn't look like it's going to change in the near future - simply because of one thing. Super Mario Galaxy is fun. Ultimately, the sto^ involves Mario being blasted of into space by the evil Bowser and traversing through various galaxies and planets. The variety of the levels is simply outstanding - not like the grey/brown shooty-shooty level design of many'of the games this winter. You could be floating in the middle of space with a tiny planet to hold onto one minute,
^ _ _1- -_______^______ ^	-A 1 ^ .A	A •.-k	^	A	^	^	rs	1	1 4- /-*¦**	^	ft	^	^	^^1 IVyf O V*1 V\1 O	) VI iT 1X71 ^ Vt
racing on a stingray in a"water planet shaped like a racetrack the next and then a few minutes later enjoying some old school Mario platforming with " els and some mind-screwing (although not particularly mind boggling) gravity puzzles. You'll find yourself finishing level after level just
to
moving levels
see what the designers have thought oi next.
Innovative controls, an extremely imaginative game world ^nd an endearing cast of characters makes this not only one of the best games released this winter but also one of the best games in a long, long time SilTIOnwang
alternatively... Metroid Prime 3
The finale to the Prime series signs off in spectacular fashion
avoid... anything on the Wii not by Nintendo: It s either going to be crap or fatal
Resistance: Fall Of Man (PS3)
The PS3's lonely online service, has very few - ORIGINAL - games keeping it alive, Resistance: EaU of Man is one of these and is also one of the original PS3 release games. Although, the single player campaign is enjoyable with an evolutionary, rather than revolutionary take on first person shooters (standard stuff like biSlet-time sniping and regenerating health), it doesn't match up to the 40 player multiplayer madness. The interesting use of an array of weapons with several secondary functions and the ability to play as two races gives Resistance a CTeat lifespan online. Nice touches like co-operation mode and unique differences in the single player mode are also welcoming. The graphics are, however, very last generation, but do give a reasonable presentation.
The sad conclusion is that this, one of the Ja^st game^ out for the PS3, is over a year old. Still, if you are picking a PS3 up this Christmas and need a decent games, go and buy Resistance TQIC
alternatively... a better console?
there s nothing on the console yet to justi fy Its current price tog
ovoid... getting one now " wait for It to mature and more games to come out before making a decision

Halo 3 (Xbox 360)
After all the hype and the years of playing and waiting, the Single Player campaign was a disappointment.Yes, it had some pretty cool epic moments with the new piano theme song playing in the background and a bunch of marines battling with you, but overall it felt just like more of the same. Every level was fairly linear, and the game just pushes you through one group of enemies after another with some vehicle encounters sprinkled in between. There sadly wasn't enough variety. The story could've also centered more on Earth, as I was disappointed in Bungie repeating their formula of transporting you to another Halo-world half way through the campaign. The new guns, equipment items and vehicles however are a refreshing and interesting change.
So what is it that really makes Halo 3 the console-seller that it is? The answer is simple: the multiplayer for Halo 3 is fantastic. With the inclusion of the Forge and Theatre modes, which allow anyone to make their own customizable maps, items, and gametypes and share their most awesome experiences in Halo on Xbox Live, Bungie has, in my eyes, perfected the console EPS multiplayer experience for this generation SeonniU
alternatively... Guitar Hero III
Air Guitar will never, ever, ever, ever get old
avoid... Xbox Live Gold - still packed full of angry 12 year olds shouting down their microphones
Call Of Duty 4 (Multi)
Call Of Duty 4 Modern Warfare is a masterpiece. Jaw dropping visuals, heart pounding set pieces, seismic-feeling weapons, thundering sounds, authentic squaddie banter or just that spine tingling feeling when the game's set pieces explode in your face, C0D4 is the ultimate in squad based high tech tactical military first person shooters. Though I could write reams on almost every aspect of this game, the one thing that truly stands out is the atmosphere. This game drips high end Hollywood production values, whether it be the news report/global surveillance centre interface or the numbing experience of piloting an AVAC from the infamous 'white hot/black hot' perspective. During its forgiveably short run CpD will put you into places and situations that are derived from actual interviews from Marines and SAS troopers on their experiences from all the major modem conflicts. This is crucial because it injects one of the most enduring features of the game - the sense of brotherhood - you look out for your virtual squad mates; they'll look after you. Battles and Skirmishes will take on all forms, whether it be fighting for control of the A1 Jazeera broadcasting station, escorting a tank across the suburbs of Iraq, Sniping ultranationaHsts in Chemobyll, or sky diving while under fire over a nuclear silo. This game shines in all three departments - graphics, plot and atmosphere onthonybavan
alternatively...
The Oranq a Half Llf( the best games e
e Dox
e 2 compilation, six of
avoid... all those terrible movle'game tie-ins
ver in one!
hasibbaber has a look at the best 1987 had to offer
retro corner
Christmas is approaching at an alarming rate and, once again, I don't think Santa is going to give me anything. He must fucking hate me; he hasn't given me anything for years. I'm a nice guy, so logically it follows that he's a complete cunt and it's fairly obvious he's a big, fat, hairy paedo. Next time I see him, I'm going to stab him in the throat.
I doubt I'll get a Nintendo Wii this Christmas; the opening paragraph hasn't done much to heal the great Baber-Santa divide and I can't really afford to buy one. I don't care though. I hate life now and everything to do with it. Literally everything was better twenty years ago, especially games and, in particular, games for 8-bit home computers. Fuck the Nintendo Wii and fuck Santa.
If you do happen to find yourself stuck exactly twenty years in the past, or with only a ZX Spectrum or C64 to staisfy your gaming needs, you'll probably find this round up of the best 8-bit home computer games of 1987 quite useful.
[Head over Heels (ZX Spectrum)	i	[The Last Ninja{Cb4)
A sequel of sorts to Jon Ritman's legendary isometric puzzler Batman, Head over Heels brought a whole new slant to the genre.
The game allowed players to switch between two characters,
a dog called Head and a cat named Heels. Head is lacking in legs, that is to say he doesn't have any. Obviously, this makes moving around a bit of a chore. Heels on the other hand has legs but no arms to speak of, rendering him unable to pick things up. If you ever managed
to get both Head and Heels in the same room you could combine them together and do some cool shit and solve previously unsolvable puzzles. Smooth, colourful graphics and fluid game-play make Head over Heels one of the most loved games on the ZX Spectrum
alternatively... Endure Racer - excellent conversion of Sega s classic
avoid... facing up to the fact its 2007
(1987 was perhaps the greatest year in the his- %
tory of the C64; Sid Meier's	Pirates!,
International Karate+, Defender of the Crown and Wizball provided the C64 with a barrage of quality titles. 1987 also saw the release of one of the platform's most iconic releases, System 3's aracde adventure The Last Ninja.
Featuring an amazing score by Ben Daglish ranking amongst
the best on the c64, fluid animation and an excellent combat system The Last Ninja was years ahead of it's time, a true cult classic.
alternatively... International Karate+ - amazing Ron Hubbard Soundtrack perhaps the best 8 bit beat em up
avoid... Santa ~ he's an evil cunt
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B* tuelye	tuesday the eleventh of december, tuo thousand and seven

-V • N
ecemeber 25th is rapidly
approaching, the season of good will to all men soon becomes lost in the wilderness that is Oxford Street on a weekend as shoppers from around the country flock to buy up their seasonal lovelies for their loved ones. This year however there has been a change, welcome to the rise of alternative Christmas gifts, and a philanthropistic approach to gift giving. All of the well known charities now boast to help you get that warm and fuzzy feeling this Yule tide season by giving presents which can genuinely make a difference to peoples lives.
Is it not supposed to be [the season of giving? Christmas day was not originally about eating enough turkey to induce the
meat
sweats and gorging yourself on enough mince pies until you reach a carbohydrate coma and fall asleep in front of the Queen's speech. Why not give your nearest and dearest something this year which will actually made a positive difference to those in need.
Oxfam are offering Goats, Positive living and spread the word packages, for just nine quid you can help stop the spread of AIDS buy donating giving money that will be put towards arranging work shops to highlight the importance of safe sex and also to help provide the drugs needed to keep HIV at bay. Bash in www.oxfam.org for more information.
Closer to home, the Salvation Army may be for many people be simply associated with Harold Bishop's mysterious disappearance. The Salvo's run shelters for people in need, giving them a place to kip and some food to eat, and go on hot meal runs for homeless people. For £76 you can sponsor a hot meal run for 20 people, or for just £18 you can supply two nights bed and breakfast in a hostel for someone in need.
To make a real difference this year. Shelter, an anti-homeless-ness charity, are seek-
ing
volunteers to work in their shelters on the big two five, check out www.englancl,
shelter, org.uk for more information.
There are also plenty of	;
ways to adopt a greener way a of celebrating this festive	F
season, after aU Santa Claus runs a carbon neutral operation (why else do you think he uses reindeer to pull his sleigh?) and it is the only time of year when you bring trees in from the cold and into your home.
Earthhuggers.com stock a wide variety of organic tree decorations, along with recycled wrapping paper and festive table decorations.
You can help in the fight against deforestation by buying a loved one their own special patch of rainforest. The World Land Trust sells pieces of rainforest for £25, saying that it may not cost the earth, but it may help to save it.
So,
when
Great Auntie Edna asks you if you would like the usual pair of princess embellished knickers for Crimbo this year, you maybe able to give her a more worthwhile suggestion.
e can all remember the P\irby with its annoying chirp and freaky eyes and the mass hysteria when the Teletubbies were cleared off of the shelves. Each year there is always one present which is on the top of every ones wish list. Identity takes a look at the ten most wanted presents this year.
TheNintendo Wii is the most sought after Christmas gift this year. They are defi-natley the most fun you can have with your clothes on, unless your playing naked bowling and then you have just reached a whole new level.
Limited Edition Reebok Trainers _(RbK DJ II International Tiesto Version) are next on the most wanted list selling a around £51. With obesity rising at the same speed as ones student loan is dimin-
ishing, it is pleasant to see that the humble sports shoe is still sought after, even if it is just for a Chav to match with his tracksuit bottoms rather than to run a marathon in.
A Nabaztag/Tag, The Communicating Rabbit, is this years rather questionable most wanted. It is sold as an incredible personal companion, a little robot that connects to the internet via Wi-Fi and does a bunch of stuff all of which borders pointlessness.
It's one of the first communicating objects which reacts to eveiything that happens on the internet. And he (or she) works even when your computer is turned off. He reads text out loud, he speaks, he sings, he moves his ears, you speak to him, he obeys, he gives information with his colours he can speak 13 languages and will generally annoy the hell out of you. Apparently soon you will be able to call him with your phone and talk to him with MSN, making this the perfect gift for those who are incapable of actual human interaction.
The other questionable but not so technologically advanced item is "Smiley", the ever smiling Mood Beam that's always in a good mood. Smiley's personal primary colour is orange and he loves to perform his amazing lightshows to cheer you up.
Joy. This is pretty much an oversized plastic mood ring, which glows different colours and flashes - think an early nineties school disco but without the


dodgy smoke
machine and make it pocket size.
Apparently we are all so depresses this time of year that there is ; gap in the market and we need a glowing piece of plastic to cheer us up... perhaps this is the inspired cure for seasonal affected disorder? Or maybe not.
A Digitial camera, essential for helping one remember all of the things that you wish you had forgotten at Walkabout through the joys of Facebook tagging.
IPhone - because apple products rule the world, and if you have not got the IPhone then a set of Portable Ipod speakers will have to do as second best.
High School Musical Two dvd, because we all wish sometimes that our lives were a musical, and Vanessa Hudgens and Zac Efron are of the legal age and thus can be perved upon with out judgement. Who said Disney was just for kids?
The 'Are you smarter than a ten year old' board game, inspired by the equally as intellectually stimulating television show, is guaranteed to cause ever lasting family
rifts as you prove to your Grandfather that he does in fact have the intellectual capacity of a five year old. As you had always suspected...and you thought Pictionary was violent...
The final demand for this year is a Dalek voice changer. So now everyone can enjoy running around pretending to kill David Tennant shouting exterminate. Whoop!
iBeaverii December 200
............
/ /
Iflfi / tii'M HI i t rl i lVi
r." /¦;. J-' £,'' r

lys, and the Co-op) ernment will kindly :est for the duration e. Sounds great? It's it's very unclear of courses qualify. |ov website refers /ocational work-re-s, which would seem 'hDs altogether, and fundamentally un-lan I talked to from ;hought it unlikely tious MA in English would make, it application process wouldn't be able to
find out for sure without making an application.
The major disadvantage of Career Development Loans, however, is simply that they don't make financial sense. Martin Lewis, from moneysavingex-pert.com, believes that the Annual Percentage Rates (APR) offered by the banks are misleading. The Co-op and Barclays offer 12.9% APR while RBS seem to give a more attractive 10%. But Lewis points out that the RBS figure includes the year when there's no interest at all, and he estimates the actual APR
you'll end up paying could be closer to 20% (based on repayments over five years). This means that if you borrowed £5000 for four years (with the first interest-free), you'd end up paying £5,990 with Barclay's and the Co-op, and somewhere in the region of £6,540 with RBS - a pretty substantial difference. Given that NatWest are currently offering a standard graduate loan of 8.4% over five years, so that £5,000 will be repaid for £6,096, it's difficult to see any real advantages to a CDL.
Individual universities them-
Student Suppot in the form of Loans
Eligibility and take-up of Maintenance Loans in England
Academic Year	Eligible Population COOCs)	Number of loans taken out (OOOsi	Take up of loans by elinible population	Total sum boirowed	Average value of loan m f21
2001j'02	768	629	32	2.0Q7	
2002/03	816	666	82	2.f6!	3,250
2S03yQ4	840	m2	81	2.2S8	3.310
2G04y05	874	6S3	79	2.MS	3,3®
20O5/OS 200@i07 Iprovlsional)	697	719 727	m	2,496 2:608 - ¦	3,4TO
2007^08 fprovisjonal) f3]		574		2.39S	3.5®
= not avasfabie
Source; Student Loaf>$ Ci^pany Limited iSLC)\ DIUS
= not avasfabie
Source; Student Loaf>$ Ci^pany Limited iSLC)\ DIUS
Grants in England
Srants in England
	Students				Expenditure i£m) fS|	
	Nurt^fs^OOOsJ		Pementa			
year	2006/07	2007/OS {43	2006/07	2£iti7m |4i	200^^7	2007/0814}
	9£	158	33	33	252	435
	58	1tO	23	23	S2	141
	127	217	43	45	-	-
	292	485	1D0	100	334	676
Sciiroe: Studeni Loans Ccysipany Limfted (SLCJ
Sciiroe: Studeni Loans Ccysipany Limfted (SLCJ
ation Grants in England
	Students				Expenditure (£mj |8]	
	Numbers (OOOsJ [5]		Percentage			
J yea r	200S/07	IQQim C4]	2006/07	2007/08 [4]	2006/07	2007/08 |4]
	t24	70	28	28	121	70
		IS	•ft	6	U	g
	328	les	68	m	-	-
	47%	255	1DD	loa	135	78
selves are stepping up to the plate to help students in need. For example, the LSE has just announced twenty new PhD scholarships for 2008, defraying £13,000 living expenses a year for three years. But most of these awards are department-specific, and only become available once you're already enrolled. They therefore fail to represent a viable funding option.
The major problem with all of the current schemes available is their unpredictability. Students are embarking on further study without knowing if they will be financially able to complete it. The PhD completion rate at LSE, for example, is 70% according to the latest Higher Education Funding Council for England figures, compared to around 96% for undergraduate
The question remains of how the government can claim to be
investing in higher education when it makes it so difficult for students to enter into further academic study or an academic career? Our universities are in danger of suffering not just from a lack of funding, but also from a lack of intelligent students wishing to continue contributing
to them - my friend Dan, for example, is considering a PhD in the United States for the sole reason that the funding options are more attractive. For the sake of our universities, a clear and comprehensive approach to postgraduate funding is urgently needed.
Student Maintenance Package 2007/8
Students entering Higher Education from 2006/07
Residual income	Amount of fee loan available |2]	^ount of mQlntenance grant avaiiabie
U0 to £17.910	£3.070	£2.765
Between £17,911 and £27.120	£3,070	£1,230 jo £2.764 [5]
Between £27.121 and £38.330	£3.070	£^ to £1.229 rei
Between £38.331 and £38.805	£3.070	Nil
Betv.'een £33.805 and £49,493	£3.070	Mil
Over £49,493	£3.07G	NU
The question remains of how the government can claim to be
141 sBeaver ii December 2007	_FEATURES
Tunlni Up Hi Heat m
Tit LI.


The role of Europe in the global response to climate change

By Preeya Sud
Last week, over 190 nations gathered at the UN Climate Change Conference in Bali to discuss the future policies to mitigate ' the effects from greenhouse gasses. The conference, which runs until the 14th of December, may be the first step to delivering binding emissions targets for participating nations after the Kyoto agreement expires in 2012. This at least, is what the EU and its 90 officials descending on the resort (creating a carbon footprint of god knows what) hope to achieve.
The EU currently sees itself as the leader in the battle against climate change. It is on target to achieve the Kyoto goals of reducing carbon emissions to 8% below the 1990 levels, has implemented a fully functional carbon trading scheme and has endorsed a plan to cap emissions to at least 20% below the 1990 levels by 2020 even in the absence of the pai1:icipa-tion of other developed nations -namely the United States - in a global emissions treaty. These targets are estimated to cost around 1.1 trillion over 14 years and are all in an attempt to limit a global rise in temperature to 2°C; something which can only be achieved if the US, China and India also limit greenhouse as emissions. Specifically, they are responding to a report published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which outlines the consequences of inaction.
In this apocalyptic type world, increased risks from drought, fires, flooding and associated diseases are likely to threaten thousands of lives and disproportionately impact the poorest in society. Sceptics will argue that the temperature rises are a result of natural fluctuations including variations in the earths orbit, volcanic eruptions and intensity of the sun. They also point to the fact that previous periods in the Earths history have been much hotter than today. Even so,
it is beyond reasonable doubt that humans have exacerbated global warming. So we should probably do something to limit it - potential epidemics of disease are entirely natural, have a history of wiping out populations, and yet we still take steps to mitigate them by quarantining and vaccinating.
The reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in the EU will be achieved using instruments such as the EU's 'pioneering' Emissions Trading Scheme, the largest such trading scheme for greenhouse gasses. The trading scheme works by setting a cap on the amount of emissions and issuing permits up to that amount to firms and other groups. These permits can then be traded between emitters. If the costs of reducing pollution are lower than the cost of a permit then the emitter will sell that permit to someone whose costs of reduction exceed the price of a permit. In this way, the total costs of curbing emissions are reduced compared to a standard regulation where everyone has to reduce emissions to the same level. Emissions trading schemes also spur innovation of cleaner technologies and are certain to reduce emissions to a required target since only a limited number of permits are created.
This all sounds very rosy. And in a perfect world emissions trading on a global scale could solve the climate problem. However, get even the tiniest aspect of running a trading scheme wrong, as the EU did in 2005, and the whole thing becomes an expensive debacle. In 2005, EU issued too many allowances causing a crash in the price of carbon permits and a failure to reduce emissions to its then target levels. Efficient permit markets require strict and enforceable regulations, things which are expensive to achieve and require a functioning legal infrastructure. So extending the European model to the rest of the
world may be tricky - in countries where it takes aeons for a case to even reach court and then another few years while the affected parties bribe each other into submission would such a trading scheme ever be possible?
Alongside instruments which could be used to reduce C02 emissions from industry such as a carbon trading scheme or carbon taxes, the EU proposes to limit C02 emissions from energy combustion by increasing efficiency, switching to renewable energies and using nuclear energy. Other potential areas of improvement include improving insulation to reduce energy consumption and forestry management.
Of course, this is only Europe, and a global problem requires global participation -in fact to limit temperature rises to 2°C, all industrial nations will have to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 30% below 1990 levels by 2020.
This is the reason the EU says it is pushing for a global treaty on climate change to come into effect from 2012. However,
there are those who believe in such an altruistic picture of the EU. They argue that by setting an emissions cap and other measures to combat climate change like elimination of trade tariffs on environmentally friendly products, countries may limit the development of others or in the latter case, effectively protect their markets from foreign competition.
So over all, the conference in Bali is likely to be one fraught with all the usual equity and policy debates that
surround solving any global environmental issue. That climate change is happening, regardless of who or what is causing it, is unquestionable. Will we reach a consensus on what is the bes policy to tackle it? Probably not.
IFFECTS OF €L1|H|ATE
But we should be heartened that Europe, however much its policies cannot be transferred to the rest of the world, is taking action.
mmnm
Wiwmtr liayi, Ugi coid di¥i/iiioNt8
Mor# Winn	sfNunid
	
	
Mort hmvY ni	n
	
Mor« AffNSit bit by drought
Uktly
Mer# lntiHii tfppteil

Uk«ly
Mors	ms,
li¥gis Cngt tiunamiil
Ulc^ly
Prsbibiiity
Virliially ctrtain: ovfF 99% Vtry likely:
Lilcf mm i6%
SOURCE: IPCC
FEATURES	iBeaver ii December 2007 hs


The primaries on the 5th of February can determine the final candidates of the American presidential election






By Gregory White
After an interminable campaign so far, the US Presidential primaries are about to commence. While the buildup has been long, the actual competition may be short lived. Events begin on January 3 2008 with the Iowa Caucuses where both Republican and Democratic presidential hopefuls will find their candidacies debated and voted over in schools, churches, and homes across the state.
In previous elections, it was easy to underestimate the importance of the Iowa primary. Now that the pre-campaign goes on so long, its distance from the majority of national primaries means it can no longer be counted as such. Candidates this time around are pouring time and money into the state realizing its strategic importance as either the kick-start or the final piece their campaign needs. New Hampshire will quickly follow on January 8, and South Carolina is poised thereafter. The focus will then shift to February 5, when more than twenty states will be holding their primaries - hence its being named Super Tuesday, the T^iesday of Destiny or (unbelievably tastelessly) Tsunami Tuesday. Be prepared for the two nominations to be practically decided by then, however, having condensed two years of grind into a short burst of three weeks' intense campaigning.
This is because the difference is profound in this election compared to 2004. There are no incumbents. No definitive front-runner for the Republicans has emerged so far, while the Democratic frontrunner, Senator Hillary Clinton, has recently faltered in the polls. The Republican who wins Iowa will move to New Hampshire five days later with a key logistical advantage, having already established precious legitimacy to his presidential bid. As for the Democrats, many view Iowa as the last chance for candidates other than Hillary Clinton to assert themselves.
The Republican Party is heavily divided as to which candidate best represents their chance for election simultaneously with their fervor for political morality. This will come out with a vengeance in the early caucuses. While former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani is the national frontrunner, he is not welcome in Iowa as many in the state view him as lacking the moral, Christian brand of rhetoric they desire in a candidate. Giuliani
has divorced twice and moves with a crowd of liberal New Yorkers whom many Midwesterners naturally despise. While Mormon candidate Mitt Romney had been dominating here, his lead is now slipping to Arkansas governor and pastor Mike Huckabee. If Huckabee, who was just weeks ago considered an outsider in this fiercely competitive and financially draining campaign cycle, wins in Iowa he will have made a national campaign out of what weeks ago seemed a chanceless bid. If Romney wins, this turns the race for the Republican nomination into a two-candidate campaign, as New Hampshire no longer cares for the former rebel politician Senator John McCain. It seems as if the role of religion will yet again decide another Republican candidate for President.
Most Democratic candidates have a much simpler agenda to their Iowa Caucus campaigns: stop Clinton. Senator Hillary Clinton, stepping out
and yet steeped in the shadow of her husband, has been in poll leadership from the start of this election cycle. She is ruthless, effective, and extremely organised. While she can at times appear cold and calculated, she is in the national lead by a wide margin and has seen little of that early success erode. Iowa, however, offers a point of weakness for her campaign. Senator Barack Obama and former Senator John Edwards, with their anti-establishment rhetoric and promise of hope for a new generation of Americans, are polling well in this state. Clinton has been forced to go on the attack against Obama, something his campaign is relishing as it gives this somewhat faded Democrat darling vital media space. Edwards is waiting patiently on the sidelines, hoping that somehow he will be able to pull off a similar surprise to his result in 2004, where he catapulted his campaign in Iowa with a third place finish.
Despite their importance for assessing the state of the field so far, polls will not really matter over the next few weeks. The faulty nature of such assessments was plain in the build-up to 2004's election, when Howard Dean dominated before faltering in Iowa. Instead, the candidates will have to walk a tightrope of gaffes and slip-ups. With so much media attention paid to the campaign cycle -especially as the hyper-attentive blo-gosphere is far more influential now than in 2004 - there is little room for error from candidates on either side of the political spectrum. Clinton is fantastic at this and, while occasionally confronting the rogue staffer or two, she runs a tight campaign rarely ever stating policy in a way that would elicit antagonism. This is important for her, as Clinton's national disapproval ratings are highest of the Democratic candidates: she is a highly polarising figure. Obama has a history of weak argument and failing
to capitalise on his opponents' mistakes. This may turn to his advantage in positive-campaign-loving Iowa, but hinder him thereafter. Edwards is rarely prone to a loose tongue, but has been overly aggressive against Hilary Clinton, considered by him as part of the Washington establishment. He has, however, adjusted to this failure by cutting back on the vitriol and running a positive campaign to appeal to Iowa's voters.
Just a week into the New Year, American voters will have a clear idea of who has a chance for victory, and who has been relegated to the position of possible vice- presidential candidate. If, however, Huckabee and Obama or Edwards triumphs, things could remain cloudy through to February 5. Tsunami Hiesday, then, could become the most dramatic American political event since the Florida recount.

r	".vrs-vr-
Edwards watches closely from the sidelines Clinton, the facade is beginning to crack The media darling Obama's appeal is fading
Romeny, Is this Mormon too hot for the US? Guiliani: Blah, Blah...Blah
Huckabee is gaining recognition quickly



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NOVRMBIR 2ZND, 2006
^ OUT

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K
LISTINGS
Beaver | ii December 2007
.wwwJsesucDm..
SU EXECUTIVE FICE HOURS
LvBakeei^M
2.30
/omen's Officer^,
'Siursi^#
'^liibby IVfeear " * sTfftirsda^^OPM, Quad
Co^munit^ions Officer,
¦1KaJt]^rry\ "Ehuisd^^^SOPKl,. Quad
j|ducati(^and Welfare,
„" Kyhana a1^ >• : „Thui^day§ %30PM. Quad
ii'
MULLED WINE
Where: Outside Library When; nth-12,th of December (Tue^ Wed.) Time: 4.00 pm Who: RAG and the Austrian.^SoClety,
AG and tlie Austrian Society have teamed up 7 to bring you th^,, best thing to happen tofchnsfmas smceJesw.
We 11 be ietiing n^led wine, or ^LOKWEIN as it's called, outside tli'e Jibrary on 'MOTday, Ti|esa^ and'Wednesdayffro! 4^,8PM 'lEor all you bu feeavers.
liast„year, thi|^gSi^t waS-.^otfed the best ciiartfeible event by |he LSESU, and this y^ it's j'to be even biggOTj%§'^;
llj^nvirpnpcnt an^ '^^ed bil\\|';i||;yier ¦ Thfe^dayS,lSPM
LGBT Officigif;
!. DomM<|||mpat ^ iv -Wfidnesaa^ y)AM, Qu^'
Societies piSccr, ; :
iCaiys^P^i^an .
Thursdays ~2PM, Qu%d
mrn^
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OdThe
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led Wine
Library, 4.00 PM
stitMtions?
£304, 5.00 PM
FRIDAY. 14 DECEMBiR
IMG DENACE
«iBTIop{b

^re: Three Tuns, Quad, Under^rourite|Bar .¦ ^hen; 14th of december	" ''
Time: All njght Who; Everybody
, leaked-:Jkust^n treats and of coufSe^SfSoKbi.
rith ail the top Chunes ^nd cheap drinks, there Is no better place to be out with your iimtes on Friday night! p^sp&ialiy on the last night of •feirm! ¦
^pfe. will be plenty of cheers and santa r those -^lly birds ; you and lt^py hours ) get your spjiats rising!
DAMAGE ,
Before .	£3
LSE/£4NUS;'£6 -other after 10pm)
V^'
All AU (Athletics. ^JjrnonJ"^ holders) from aH-iui^gStla-! £3 at all time
Plus if it's your i^fthday this week, email us early aaiijfflu'U get in for free. All your'^ts^l^ wiU- also get a dtfccouttt |ultjd
Qjtpap-	" '
THIS TERM '
RAG TOTAL stands at
£8,891.17
Rag has yet again raked in the money with the last RAG Raid raising a fantastic £806.95 for Interact Worldwidfe, making our parade of London's Streets in our
best Superhero costumes even more worthwhile!
Plus the delicious Kiispy Kj?enae sales have 1 "ndw^ "made a fantastic £273 for St. Mungos homeless shelter!
NEXT!'
MflGjERi;
A taste of the Term to' ^ condie;.!
We have more Pub Crawls (week 1 peoples!!), ROCK C^G with a fantastic line up,13\e HITCH HIKE Jo DXXBLOT/ . and of course the posf-Hitch St.Patri<fl£^ Day Party, tlie Best HAa EVER (Feb ll-15th),"plus parties, parties and hell yes more PABTUSS! s DO NOT MISS OUT!! - The Lent Term LINE UP be listed in fuUfon the HAfe ' | Website over the holicbBij® at www.lsesurag.com so eheck it out!	I
GET INVOLVED	j ,
email su.Bag@lse.ac.uk! ? |
W'Fil^sjyieeting outside the Old Buit^in^^ When; Friday, 14 th of decern ber .;¦ :\ Time: 4.30pm - 6pra	^
Who: Liyin^W^ge Campaign s > ^ ¦
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programme and in a crack in iher epresent the ^ap 'rich and the poor,
Uie Tate Mfcdern.. docs not lpay dtslYeami®st^|a living wage!
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^'BGYCOTT ISRAai AGKDEMIC INSTITUTIONSr

sii £250,000 floor to between {
sure
its £7.20,-
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^ action^ It the LSft^d'""'t)ld Building before hieat^ing ,^gdup w« feel th4t the Tate over to Bankside Halls to pipk
.i^er. the ¦ success of:^ Mving
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would like more info ort the Eiying Wa^" Campaign you can-v	>^ 54 visit
www4vingwage.org.uk
Where: Room E304 (East Building) .\^hen: Wednesday, December 12,2007 Tirhe; 5:00pm - 7;00p>m Vvho: Palestine:

I London!-
iM an idea'SSjjl«w "to continue iM^tampai^n, due its stotMs as 0 Wy London l3a(ffi^i«Smd jts proxiimt^^p , XSE's
Bankside HaHs.	¦
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orgi^&sing an action at thefO
Tate Mbderii on Fri:^^[_^' meeting if at all possible.
people up from there.
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|he UCU (UK's biggest Academic trade union) passed a. motiort lasi. ' to" "ehcburage membefs'ta Misfder" the moral -implica-
existing and	•>
Jj^l^gith Israeli academic m^|lmons". This ;«ay}ie a l^^^e media and beiKHS^;
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22
leaver | ii December 2007
SPORTS

AU Fxec.
HoWs Carol? She's All Fine Ta
AlcoHolness and Gin Lager
We all have our brave tales from Friday's carnage. I'm still trying to piece together my own as I rummage through the different flashbacks. The most vivid by far, however, were:
The Fines - First up on stage was a member of the 3rd team football. On the night of Miss LSE, Victor got so fucked that he ended up getting locked in the cleaning cupboard in the VIP section. After spending the night in the cupboard, Victor was found the next morning, covered in his own vomit. The staff left him to sleep it off.,..missing his title-deciding football match that day. Fine? It seemed only appropriate to fill up a mop bucket with beer, wine and whisky, make him drink from a wringed mop and then pour the rest on his head!
Next, amateur sex offender Tom paid the price for venturing home along a path so many rugby boys have travelled before. As he was too 'tied up' to shut the door, his lover's unsurprised neighbours were awoken by the sound of whips, chains and choking. Fine? We handcuffed him between two poles on the bar. Jacko then performed admirably in funnelling a bottle of wine.
Our SU Treasurer Libby
was next in line, for her peeing expedition. Netball seconds were on the way back from a tough match in Portsmouth so decided to have a few pints on the way home! Little did Libby know that while she was drinking like a fish, her bladder couldn't take the pace! Whilst the minibus was waiting in traffic, Libby decided to take the opportunity to have a wee! Jumping out on a busy main road she hurtled through what turned out to be a thorn bush with a 2m drop the other side! Her team noticed she was taking her time and could see her phone light swaying side to side. Little did they know she was stuck in the ditch!! Fine? Eating a Christmas poo, and drinking from a potty. It looked (see picture below) as gross as it sounds.
¦ Both Ally and Nina from women's rugby had got intimate with male counterpart Alex, so we thought they may as well share juices more directly. Fine? Down a pint and then pull. They did. Twice. Love it.
Next, kite-surfing captain had to take one for the team as he covered for the absent Brad who was fined for vomiting in AU Treasurer Jen's sink!. After being caught by the inhabitants of their shared caravan and told to clean it up. Brad assured them it was all under control and he was sorting it; only when the girls returned, they were hit by a tremendous stench of sick. Brad had cleaned his sick out of the
sink...but left it on the kitchen side in a plastic carrier bag! Fine? 5 shots of vodka, the reason for the stomach projectile.
Earlier in the year, Rob and Charlie went back together to some girl's house but ended up sleeping in a bed with each other. However, Rob didn't turn up, so, as Pooley decided that we needed a replacement, I picked our very own Events Officer! Fine? They enjoyed a dirty pint each downed with a handcuffed hand. Harder than it looks.
Netballer Lindsey followed and she swankered onto the stage, looking very confident. And so she should have been, she was given a challenge that was second nature to her. Every week that Lindsey turns up to Walkabout, you never get her away from any pole in sight. It only seemed right that as we had a pole dancing pole that Lindsey showed us how to do it...Fine? Downing 3 tequilas, then making her pole dance in front of a baying 400 person crowd. A 75% difficulty rating, completed easily by a pro.
In a fifth successive week Andy gets mentioned in The Beaver simply for being a virgin! Fine? Started off with 10 shots of whisky...but for every sex position Andy acted out on myself in 15 seconds (and we wanted movement!!), he lost a shot!! Rogers was left with 6. Poor show.
In what we thought would be our last mini fine before the monsters, fresher Alice was
punished. Since being at LSE she has been sick in a guys mouth, tripled her nocturnal activities and pulled two brothers. Fine? A bottle of wine with a friend of her choice, who happened to be our lovely Jen, which they polished off with authority.
The next section of the show was the infamous Mixed Grills. However, before this could start, a special request was made to fine Mr Rastogi from running. Normally, it would have been a 'no' but if you're told a story of how he kissed a 'girl' (and the inverted commas say it all) you have to make an exception. That'll be one dirty pint, please!
Three hockey freshers were then called up: Emma, Clare and Victoria. With chants of'As a wise man once said...WHO ARE YA!!' ringing about the Zoo bar, it was a very hostile atmosphere. Even more so when they were exposed for a complete lack of knowledge of the Barrel/Carol in trying to write an AU-dissing article for The Beaver. They had complained that they wanted to be fined like the rugby boys, so they were fined like the rugby boys! Phil was called up as well because he has a penchant for wearing pearl earrings and pulling his "sister" in Sports Bar! The mixed grills were blended for everyone to see and handed to these poor excuses of human beings. Sensing a vom-filled evening, one hockey girl made a break for it, the excuse being that she
doesn't eat meat. This infuriated the man-mountain AU Secretary Rhys, who launched into a tirade of abuse down the mic and to her face. Whilst the others munched on through, Rhys decided that if this young lass was not going to eat it ... she could wear it! 'As a wise man once said...Splodge!', as Rhys threw it at her as hard as he could.
Last but not least was the brilliant competition that is the Twelve Days of Christmas. The teams were as follows:
Rugby:
Ollie: for bottling every opportunity he has with girls.
Avi: for putting an arrow in his hair every time he plays rugby.
Dan: being too scared too go out with girls.
Ollie Townsend: for tour avoidance, then asking Daryl to come with him on a bum trip.
Alex Jones: for working his way through women's rugby.
Football:
Nay lor: for being his girlfriend's biatch.
Brooomie: for abusing 5 year-old ginger girls.
A1 : the only captain to not get a point by Christmas.
Pete : his army team made him
one step closer to world domination.
Tom : pulling his willy out in Walkabout and grinding up every girl in the place.
John of Gladiators fame gave the countdown and they were off... Dan was quickly into the partridge pint but was told to leave it 'til the end. Football's pint simply disappeared. Rugby were ahead coming to the closing spam and milk stages but, with the help of some fiddly-fingered footballer bystanders, football eked out a last-minute victory. Cue pandemonium as the FC belted out the chants one after another.
We the Exec hope you all enjoyed the evening and I personally can't wait to hear the stories on Monday. I went as a Jamaican bobsleigh member; I came back with a builder's hat, sunglasses and a mouth tasting of death. And very little dignity. The next day I had to get up for paintballing and felt shit. I then proceeded to take a paint-ball to my bell-end just to make me feel that little bit worse...
You know what would make me feel better? One more rendition: 'GET IT DOWN, YOU ZULU WARRIOR...'

Matthew
JCG Partridge
Just a quick article this week to finish off the year. In terms of football fixtures I'm backing Arsenal not to beat Chelsea (1.54). Fulham to beat Newcastle (2.42), Liverpool to
beat Manchester United (2.64) and both Bolton to beat Man City (5.5) and to draw (3.65). Given that the US primaries will have started before the next issue I'm also still going
to bet against 'Slick Willard' in both the Iowa and New Hampshire caucus/primaries (22.1-32.9 and 60.1-67.9 respectively) and 'Julie-Annie' winning the Republican nomi-
nation (39.4-40.7). On the Democratic side I'd advise you to bet heavily against the 'Audacity of Hype' (that is Barack Obama) in Iowa (52.5-54). If you really want to go
wild I'd suggest that you put some money on John Edwards to win the New Hampshire primary (1.1-5) and on James Webb (5.2-5.9). Have a merry Christmas!
IBeaver in December 2007 I 23
AU Exec...
Just Take A Look For Yourselves
TheAU Exec
''ell well well... the AU Carol, what about that then? No, that
isn't a rhetorical question: actually what was that all about? Can anyone fill in the gaps for me? I don't really seem to have many memories of Friday night... oh dear. Thankfully, everyone seems to be in the same boat. The beauty of the Carol, you see, is that everyone else was as drunk and messy as you probably were.
Therefore no one else will remember your antics! Which leaves many of you guilt free to repeat offend at the next suitable opportunity (which will be the last Wednesday of term: club dinners.) The Facebook evidence indicates that the Carol really exceeded my expectations, and although my memories from the Barrel in
my first year are still among the fondest of my time at LSE, there is a bright future ahead for the AU. We have ensured our reputation as unruly drunks remains firmly rooted in LSE culture. Although AU spirits seem to falter at times, last night showed that team spirit is what makes the AU the 'special' place that it is.
We could tell you about the fines, elaborate on why Jacko was handcuffed to the bar or why Victor had to drink from a mop bucket. We could give you a rundown on the twelve days of Christmas, and our heroes Who consumed fourteen boiled eggs and six tins of Spam. You could be told the history of the mixed grill, and why the hock-
ey girls were required to keep Phil company. Or maybe you just want to know the gossip and why so few people managed to make it to Crush. But as you all know, a picture paints a thousand words. So, for a special Tliesday morning treat, here are some of our favourites...

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The AU; Your family, your friends, your lovers and those with binge-drinking among their favourite activities. (N.B. we also play sport).
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Have yourself a merry little Carol!
Vicki Satterthwaite Claire Pickering
As promised, here is our report of The Carol. The first quote we should start with is from Vicki, just a minute ago.... 'MAAATTEE I can still taste that mixed grill'.
Okay, so we asked for it. And to be fair... we did appreciate it; at least someone reads our articles! When called up for our fine (due to our previous Beaver articles), Pickles tried to escape at first and left our heroic Moony to down a lovely concoction of chips, beans, egg, sausage and bacon. The bit she loved most was the added red wine and gin... she's partial to a bit of gin. Pickles did come back in the end and endured the punishment of having the best drink of her life poured over her face. We thought the other fines were more deserving...apart from the fact that most of them were to do with sexual incidents. Don't we have any dignity in the LSE AU?! We liked Libby Meyer's fine for 'weeing on the side of the motorway' - we're a bit partial to using natural habitats as a toilet ourselves...
Now let's go back to the beginning...The day began with our forest of Christmas Trees arriving at the Zoo Bar. A couple of minutes for everyone to check out each team's costumes, then the drinking began. Our favorite team outfit had to be the Oompa Loompas-good work. However we did enjoy the occasional sightings of the very tall leprechaun (thank you Campbell). Some outfits didn't quite last the night...the Zoo Bar may now have a cardboard Christmas tree permanently imprinted on their floor (Alison!). Moony also came
home sporting a Viking's horn (just one), Rudolf ears, some bee's wings and one of the Ninja's swords! Good work we think.
It was a good idea to begin the fines around 6pm, as everyone was nicely under the influence by then and willingly participated. The five free drinks were a brilliant idea, and apparently you were "hardcore" if you had used them all by 6pm. So we guess most of us are indeed "hardcore", although we did discover an "under the weather" escaped Fame character in the girl's toilets at 5.30pm. Pickles, instead of helping, stood watching and asked, "Hello, what team are YOU
from?" We especially enjoyed Parf's ecstatic response to receiving a full pint of beer from the bar with one free drink ticket, 'A whole pint??? YEAHHH-HH!"
A highlight of the night was the unfair 12 Days of Christmas race as Alison, managed to pocket one of the eggs from the rugby boys' table and further conceded to state that it was the "best egg she'd ever eaten". We cannot currently report who won the race because, well, we don't actually know. But well done to the team that succeeded! The Carol ended with some amazing songs such as Spice Girls and
Dirty Dancing, which finished off a brilliant stint at the Zoo Bar.
At 8.30pm, a mass group of sweaty teams wound their way through Covent Garden singing patriotic LSE songs. One Rastafarian even stole a busker's mic and attempted to grace us with a tune. However the busker managed to elbow him away swiftly. I guess he wasn't pro-LSE.
A couple of teams managed to make it to . Crush, although most of our Hockey team settled down for a nice Chinese in China Town. Pickles and Moony, however, didn't want to miss any VDT (Valuable Drinking Time) and paced it
to the Tuns bar. The night continued with the integration of teams, with some successful networking taking place. To the right we had a Spartan going at it with a Fame character, and to the left, a 118 "man" dancing with a tramp. The Ladies Football team had a productive competition of who could get the most phone numbers written on their bodies. From observing the level of ink poisoning going on, we can safely say that Alice Pelton won. Don't you worry guys, your numbers still remain on her (as we noticed at breakfast). We have one question, though, for Kimmy. We noticed you had a lot of
brown smudges around your mouth. Anything to do with a certain painted sportsman?
Overall, the 11 hours of drinking led to a brilliant night, so we'll definitely be fighting for the return of the Barrel next year, as more VDT would obviously improve the night. Well done to the AU, we're impressed and can't wait for more so please make AU events more regular!
Hope you all had as much fun as we did, and as usual Moony will be putting hundreds of pictures of the night up on facebook. See you all at the next AU event.
c
M K

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"we did discover an 'under the v^eather' escaped Fame character in the girls toilets at 5.30pm.'