100 days to go: The presidential race’s red-letter days
USA Today – July 28, 2008
…When McCain and Obama sit down at the University of Mississippi for the first of three scheduled debates, it will be the first time since such forums began to be televised in 1960 that it won’t include a sitting president or vice president. That raises the stakes, says David Lanoue, a University of Alabama political scientist and co-author of a book about presidential debates. “Voters try to use debates to gain information about people they don’t know very well,” he says. “To some extent, that applies to John McCain — I think there’s still a lot people don’t know about him — but the obvious person is Barack Obama.” After a rapid rise from Illinois state legislator to presidential contender, he is “an unknown quantity” for many voters. Lanoue sees parallels to the 1980 campaign. Voters “wanted a change but they were worried whether Reagan was the right guy.” When the former California governor seemed reassuring during his only debate with President Carter, “the undecideds break and he wins in a landslide.” The debate at Ole Miss is to focus on domestic policy; the third debate, at Hofstra University on Long Island, is on foreign policy. In between, the debate at Belmont University in Nashville is a town-hall-style meeting, McCain’s preferred format. Past debates are most remembered for missteps: Richard Nixon visibly sweating in 1960, Al Gore audibly sighing in 2000, President Ford mistakenly declaring Poland free of Soviet control in 1976. “Debates are far more often lost than won,” Lanoue says…
UA to Offer Second Life Class
NBC 13 (Birmingham) – July 27
…Rick Houser is working on building a virtual University of Alabama campus in second life…the University of Alabama’s Vivian Wright is sure of this: “these students are growing up as digital natives. They want to use this, they want to be engaged in these types of technologies and it’s important for us to facilitate that learning”…
Royalties from Licensed Products Big Business for UA
Alabama Public Television — “For the Record” – July 25
Both Auburn and the University of Alabama were in the top 10 colleges last year that received the largest football associated revenues in the country…
College News
Tuscaloosa News – July 28
The University of Alabama – Brittany Finley, a senior at the University of Alabama, was crowned Miss Tuscaloosa 2009 on July 19 at the Bama Theatre…Finley is a native of Trussville. She plans to graduate with a bachelor’s degree in dance with a minor in communication studies…
UA Wheelchair Basketball Player Gives Back to Hometown
KPRC (Houston) — July 27
Now at the University of Alabama, Mary Allison came back to Houston as a guest instructor with one of the city’s wheelchair youth sports camps this summer…