1A1 SPORTS PAGE 8 LIFE&ARTS PAGE 14 Men’s baseball shakes off rough start MFA playwrights put their work onstage NEWS PAGE 6 Irish president pays UT a visit TOMORROW’S WEATHER High Low THE DAILY TEXAN 62 39 Friday, February 26, 2010 Serving the University of Texas at Austin community since 1900 www.dailytexanonline.com Cafe conflict City condemns attack on gays drives editor into SG race By Audrey White normal students,” Talbert said. Daily Texan Staff “SG does do good things, and Presidential candidate Austin there are good people in it, but it Talbert and his running mate, Joe needs to be more open.” Zimowski, have never had any As a result, the team has built a connection to Student Govern- campaign platform based almost ment, but they said this is exactly completely on open communica- what makes them the best option tion between students and SG so for students. that representatives can work with The recent Cactus Cafe contro- the University administration and versy inspired the pair to file for Legislature to accomplish things candidacy, Talbert said. He said students care about, he said. he considers the lack of student “I want to communicate with representation in that process the students and educate them and other recent decisions unfair on how SG can use their ideas to and frustrating. make this campus a better place,” “The longer you are in SG, the more disconnected you are from SG continues on page 5 Inspired to run Danielle Villasana | Daily Texan Staff in the upcom- Senior marketing major Emmanuel Winston, left, and Matt Morgan were victims of a hate crime early Saturday morning in the ing student parking garage of City Hall. government elections City leaders speak out their sexual orientation on aware if investigators had Attack shocks Austin because of Saturday morning outside any potential suspects. the Cactus for tolerance as APD of City Hall. Chuck Smith, interim ex- softball team; players Cafe’s closing, At a City Hall press con- ecutive directory of Equal- Austin Talbert begins investigation ference held Thursday, City ity Texas, said many hate involved in protest and his run- ning partner Council members Laura crimes continue to go unre- By Kate Guerra Joe Zimowski By Alex Geiser Morrison and Randi Shade ported or lack the evidence Daily Texan Staff believe they Daily Texan Staff — who is openly gay — needed for prosecution. Athletes from the Shady will make a An alleged attack, which spoke out against the vio- “It’s important for the city Ladies gay softball team were good President left two gay members of lence in an attempt to raise of Austin to take a stand confident that they were safe and Vice the Shady Ladies softball awareness of hate crimes in and say that we are not go- in a city as diverse as Aus- President team battered and bruised, the community. ing to tolerate bias crimes in tin — a confidence which because of prompted an outcry against “This is an opportunity for the city,” Smith said at the was badly shaken last Friday their close hate crimes in the city. heightened awareness and conference. when the team found out connection to It began as a night of pre- dialogue within the commu- Despite being victim to an about an attack on their fel- students. season revelry for a soft- nity,” Morrison said. attack that he believes was low teammates. ball team looking to start The attack is being inves- motivated by his sexuality, Two softball players from the season off on the right tigated as an assault and Winston, a marketing senior, one of the teams were at- foot, but UT senior Emman- could only be elevated to said he will not let this inci- tacked last Friday night out- uel Winston and Matt Mor- hate-crime status after sus- dent control the way he lives side of City Hall garage while gan, members of the open- pects are charged said Den- his life and instead will try wearing their team jerseys. ly GLBT-friendly team, were nis Farris, a spokesman for and use it as an opportunity Emmanuel Winston, a UT alledgedly beaten by four the Austin Police Depart- unknown men because of ment. He said he wasn’t GLBT continues on page 2 BALL continues on page 2 Danielle Villasana Daily Texan Staff Problem-solving Web site Law school symposium explores how border walls affect liberties opens to alumni, students By Shamoyita DasGupta The conference began in the complete reversal of that by walls Daily Texan Staff Eidman Courtroom of the law appearing everywhere. The more Service aims to collect and faculty and staff. While Spig- said Geoff Leavenworth, spe- Multidisciplinary professors school with the keynote speech we see globalization, the more it has implemented similar pro- cial assistant to the president and from across the U.S. and around by Wendy Brown, a professor of we see the dark side of globaliza- input from past, present grams at companies such as Cisco Web site administrator. “It forces the world joined University pro- political science at the University tion, in a sense.” and Southwest Airlines, UT will the institution to relook at the is- fessors at the UT School of Law of California, Berkeley. In her speech, Brown dis- scholars on the 40 Acres be its first university. sue and [if the idea is not imple- on Thursday in a symposium “There is a paradoxical phe- cussed globalization and how By Shabab Siddiqui Tso said the platform allows not mented] provides an opportunity about the building of walls and nomena that we see,” said Yishai the idea relates to the walls that Daily Texan Staff only ideas to be posted, but also to answer why it can’t be.” their effect on human rights. Blank, a senior lecturer at Tel have been erected, whether be- Students may get the oppor- the best ideas to come forward. The faculty and staff version The symposium, which contin- Aviv University’s Buchmann Fac- tween the U.S. and Mexico, Isra- tunity to have their ideas imple- “Each person has [his or her] of the software will be separat- ues today with a series of panel ulty of Law. “The more globaliza- el and Palestine or in other coun- mented at the University through own reputation score based on ed from the student-alumni ver- discussions with the professors, tion actually proceeds, the more tries around the world. a Web outlet designed by the Of- their quality of contributions and sion. Leavenworth said it is im- is the sixth annual conference we see construction of walls all “What we have come to call fice of the President. if [the contribution] gets a lot of portant to keep the interests of hosted by the Bernard and Au- over the world. [With] globaliza- globalization harbors fundamen- The University will launch a thumbs up on it,” Tso said. “Ulti- the two different groups separate. dre Rapoport Center for Human tion, everything is opening up tal tensions between opening and student and alumni version of mately, you get a 360-degree feed- The two entities also have differ- Rights and Justice and the Texas and the world is becoming one the Ideas of Texas Web site on back into the platform itself.” ent categories. International Law Journal. big village, and then you see the WALLS continues on page 5 Monday. The platform, which al- As of press time, more than lows people to share ideas that 260 ideas have been posted on will help advance the Univer- the faculty and staff site, and sity, mirrors a faculty and staff about 4,000 faculty and staff version that was implemented have viewed the suggestions. in October. Everybody’s looking Currently, the top ideas are pro- The Ideas of Texas site states at ways to increase viding free gym membership for the purpose of the site is to “stim- efciency.” faculty and staff and increasing ulate and recognize creative ‘‘ staff vacation time. problem-solving at UT Austin” — Paul Walker Some ideas posted by faculty through “discussion, review and and staff have already been ap- voting.” Categories range from UT presidential assistant proved. A suggestion to grow curriculum and teaching to stu- native plants in the flowerbeds dent life and University funding. by Garrison Hall and Hogg Au- After a student posts his or her ditorium by Jackie Dana, sociol- idea, other students and alumni Students on the Web site can ogy advisor and vice president will be able to rate and discuss it. check the top-ranked ideas any of the Staff Council, was ap- The number of votes and amount time they log in. At the end of proved last month. The Univer- of discussion help determine the the semester, the top ideas will be sity will start implementing the popularity of an idea, as well as sent to the president’s office and changes in the fall. the credibility of the poster. then distributed to the appropri- Paul Walker, special assistant The software was created by ate departments. The administra- to the president, said he believes California-based IT firm Spig- tion has two weeks to respond the Ideas of the Texas platform it. Director of marketing Richard to the poster of the idea with ei- could help the University during Tso said the company was ap- ther a promise to implement it or a harsh economic climate. proached by President William a reason as to why they will not “Everybody’s looking at ways Powers Jr. over the summer to de- be able to.