In its second year of operations, the Campaign for Students has already raised $277 million to support student scholarships, research, and student-oriented services. The campaign aims to raise $500 million by MIT’s 150th anniversary in 2011.

Most of the funding acquired so far can be attributed to the first phase of the campaign — called the “silent phase” — where funds were raised by contacting individual donors without a full-blown marketing campaign. Since 2006, the silent phase has generated over half of the $500 million goal with help from major MIT benefactors.

Just last Friday, the campaign announced its second “public” phase and marketing strategy, known as “The Human Factor,” with a day-long campus event featuring MIT student accomplishments and research. Unlike the silent phase, in which the Campaign concentrated solely on large donors, the next phase will accept funds at the public level. Friday’s event was targeted towards a larger audience, and allowed anyone to attend the student presentations and dinner reception.

What makes this program different from other funding projects is that the money raised is strictly intended for MIT students rather than supporting faculty research. Chancellor Phillip L. Clay PhD ’75, leader of the Campaign For Students, explained that the money raised is allocated into four different student resources: undergraduate commons, financial aid, student life, and graduate support.

Of the $500 million goal, $200 million would be invested in scholarship support, $100 million in graduate fellowships, $100 million in educational improvement, and $100 million in student services.

With the money being raised, MIT will be able to continue to offer student services including financial aid, UROP funding, student facilities, travel abroad, and student group funding. Chancellor Clay noted that tuition alone cannot fund all of the services that MIT offers, and that donors are critical to many MIT activities. During the State of the Institute address, President Susan J. Hockfield said tuition does not cover even half the cost of providing a student with an MIT education.

Chancellor Clay explained that the campaign’s launch event allowed people to exchange fundraising ideas, discuss issues, and determine strategies that will help the campaign accomplish its goal of raising $500 million. While some benefactors donate a lump sum, Chancellor Clay acknowledged that many contributors will continue to donate money to the campaign at scheduled times.

In addition to the Friday event, the Campaign launched its website: thehumanfactor.mit.edu. The site spotlights nine MIT students whose talents, accomplishments, and hobbies represent the diverse environment at MIT. Finale P. Doshi G, for example, is a student pursuing her PhD in electrical engineering and computer science. Finale participates in over ten activities, including the MIT Kokikai Aikido Club. In her video, she discusses her work with robots as well as her passion for math.

The Campaign for Students started in 2007 under President Hockfield, Chancellor Clay, the Office of the Vice President for Resource Development, and several other MIT faculty members.

The Tech: In Washington, nothing gets done unless it is put on the agenda. How will Senator McCain make energy a priority for his administration?

James Woolsey: The first requirement if you want it on the agenda in Washington is to have the president want it there. Unlike the Bush Administration, which has been opposed to a mandatory cap and trade system, one of the most important things you can do to move towards renewable energy [and away] from carbon emissions is a cap and trade system. … I think that will [be] at or very close to the top of his agenda … the stagnation we have seen on [the energy] issue in the Bush administration will certainly not be the case in a McCain administration. …

With respect to moving away from oil as the underlying fuel for transportation while still getting through the period for some more oil to limit the amount of imports … [McCain] would push hard on electric vehicles — particularly plug-in hybrids. That tax credit has now been passed by the congress in recent legislation.

He also has the prize effort to move forward very much like the way the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, DARPA, uses prizes to help create teams [and] move forward with new technology … and that technology [can] reduce the cost of batteries for plug-in hybrids in electric vehicles by some 70 percent down to around $300 a kWh battery pack.

Press Detroit to move far more rapidly than they are now to deploy flexible fuel vehicles to help create a market for alcohol based fuels, ethanol, methanol, butanol, all of which have possibilities. But [McCain] is opposed to steering the system towards any one of those which is corn based ethanol, but definitely supports the movement towards alcohol-based fuels as well as toward electricity. Those two together should begin to have a substantial effect on our need for using [and] our dominance for oil [for] transportation.

But as an interim measure, while we move away from oil … [we should use oil that is] domestically produced [rather] than foreign produced because our borrowings of hundreds of billions of dollars a year to import oil have been part of our financial difficulties with our balance of trade [and] value of the dollar …

TT: Going back to cap and trade, Senator Obama has said he would auction off the permits. If this is different from Senator McCain’s position, how would he initially allocate permits and what criteria would he use?

JW: He hasn’t come up with a precise formula yet, but he does believe that at the beginning when one wants to try to move into having a cap and trade system set up rapidly … it would ease the transition if at least some of the permits initially were provided by the government. But our expectation is that it would be a fairly small percentage of the overall permits. We will steadily move towards having more be auctioned …

TT: There was a lot of talk at the debate … on new cleaner technologies. Setting aside where the energy comes from, the fact of the matter is that Americans consume about 25 percent of the energy produced in the world. Is energy consumption behavior a concern? If so, how will Senator McCain address this issue?

JW: Yes, it is a big concern and he is a strong supporter of moving out promptly with encouragement to be more efficient in use, especially of electricity. He talks about some of the companies — Wal-Mart, Texas Instruments and others — that have done a very good job of this and believes that a mandatory cap and trade system will put a particular pressure on any form of energy that emits CO2.

[This particularly includes] coal and to a lesser extent, but some extent, to natural gas. That pressure will help us move towards energy efficiency and towards shifting energy sources … from carbon emitting sources to non-carbon emitting.

TT: One of the specific projects mentioned by the McCain campaign is the goal of building 45 nuclear plants by 2030. Does Senator McCain have a plan on how this will be financed? Currently, what is the best option for waste storage?

JW: Ultimately, they are going to be financed by the consumers of the electricity. … He wants to get started on a program of that sort because he believes that … some old coal fired power plants need to be replaced and some of the old nuclear plants need to be replaced, so he wants in place a program that is capable of adding base load power that is clean.

If you are looking for base load that can operate 24/7 and not emit CO2, you are going to rather quickly think one is going to have to have some new nuclear power plants. There may be a question of how many: If everything works well with respect to energy efficiency … you might not need as many as you would otherwise would.

That might be also affected if we rather rapidly develop a method of sequestering — not just capturing but sequestering — CO2 from coal fired power plants. That might open up utilization of coal … These things can all interact. The solid reality [is] that we know how to produce nuclear power plants and we’ve done it before and done it successfully and it doesn’t emit CO2 and can operate 24/7. Those things together are what have pushed [McCain] to believe that we should move out promptly with a program on nuclear power plants.

TT: With your background in the CIA, you have been able to shape the energy debate into one of national security. Is this the only way to sell it to the American people? How will Senator McCain convince the American people in investing in plug-in hybrids and renewable energy technologies?

JW: There are all sorts of reasons to want to move towards renewable energy and away from oil dependence. There’s national security that applies to making the grid a lot more resilient as well as moving away from oil and a possibility of cutoffs in the Middle East.

There is also of course climate change, which [McCain] cares deeply about and along with Joe Lieberman was the first introducer of … a mandatory cap and trade system in the Congress … right around the beginning of this decade. Then there are people — there are large numbers of evangelical groups — that believe that one is not taking good care of the Earth if one pollutes it with huge amounts of CO2 and there are people who just want to drive more cheaply.

I drive in my plug-in hybrid at a cost for 20 miles, the first 20 miles a day are about two cents a mile where gasoline is 15 cents a mile. So you can be interested in moving away from oil simply because electricity is cheaper. Any of these reasons are fine; we have to have a coalition of people who are interested in these steps for all sorts of different reasons. …

I mean you got all kinds of folks that are interested in moving in this direction and each for their own reasons and the bigger you make the tent in terms of people with different objectives … they still … come together wanting to move away from fossil fuels and away from oil for transportation. That’s fine, that’s great, that’s how you get substantial amount of support is by being open to a wide range of people.

TT: How will Senator McCain engage developing countries such as India and China in reducing carbon emission, balancing development and environmental/energy concerns?

JW: … China is a very hard case because it does not have a rule of law, but it is a huge emitter of CO2 and it may be that initially, one would want to work with China on the basis of offsets and bring China into the system by having verifiable offsets.

For example, if a Chinese official says they are going to plant a million hectares of trees — that can be verified from afar from aircraft or even from satellites. But there are [some cases where a] Chinese official might say I was going to do x but now I’ll do y. If you just send money … you really don’t want that to be part of the system because people will understandably lose confidence in the system [if] it is based on a claim … from a country that doesn’t operate under the rule of law.

So I think one wants to move as quickly as possible to bring … the international cap and trade regime [to] countries that operate under the rule of law, particularly any [countries] like India that emit a lot of CO2 and then use offsets perhaps in other countries. …

[We should also move toward] developing technology that is more attractive than technology that emits carbon or … if we can get photovoltaic cells to have substantially higher efficiencies than they have now we may be able to make some of these renewables … a lot more attractive both in carbon emissions terms and terms of cost then they are today.

So the creativity of American society and the fact that bright graduates of MIT are now starting photovoltaic companies and battery companies — whereas few years ago that would not have been the case — is a very positive sign.

I think the best way to bring China and other emitting countries into the common effort is to invent and develop the technology that is more attractive for all reasons … or they are headed towards more coal fired plants.

On September 9, 1999, a nine-year-old Anjali Tripathi ’09 appeared on the children’s edition of Jeopardy! She had been featured in a promotion for the show saying, “I studied all my life for this.”

Then, in second place at the end of the second round of this famous quiz show, she lost the show after incorrectly answering the final Jeopardy! question. Tripathi won a consolation prize of a computer and a trip to Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida.

Flash forward nine years to September 17, 2008: Tripathi appeared on the show again in a reunion episode and stood, once again, in second place heading into the final round. She faced the prompt, “It’s 277 miles long, it’s up to 18 miles wide, it’s 6 million years old & at a given time temps. within it can vary by 25 degrees.” Her answer, “What is the Grand Canyon,” won her both first place and $25,000.

Tripathi had to prepare for the show almost completely in secret because of a standard non-disclosure agreement she entered into with the show’s producers.

She said this secrecy made it difficult to study for the show throughout the summer without attracting questions from her friends. She told only a few friends: one who had a television so she could prepare by watching the show, and another who advised her on a wagering strategy based on possible positions in the show going into the final Jeopardy! round.

Even after the show was filmed on August 12, she could not tell her friends about the outcome of the show.

She said that she felt a lot more nervous this time than she did in 1999 because this time she felt she was representing both herself and MIT.

She struggled with the first-round category “The Real MTV.” During the commercial break, she said show host Alex Trebek asked her if she had watched any of the MTV shows. She hadn’t, but that didn’t keep her from ending up on top.

Tripathi said she didn’t have a watching party on the night of her television appearance, but people gathered in her dorm’s TV lounge while it was on. A friend called her parents and told them, “My friend is on TV, my J[unior] lab partner is on TV!”

The Tech: In Washington, nothing gets done unless it is put on the agenda. How will Senator Obama make energy a priority for his administration?

Jason Grumet: He’s consistently said throughout the campaign that his two principle domestic policy priorities — of course in addition to the economy — are energy and health care and he was active in the negotiations that were seeking to advance a comprehensive energy policy bill in the Senate this fall and has made it clear that as president he will seek to bring the Congress together and see if we could in fact make real progress.

TT: You had mentioned a couple times in the debate about Senator Obama’s proposal of $150 billion over 10 years to promote alternative energy and create several million jobs. This includes investing $10 billion a year in creating what he called a “Clean Technologies Deployment Venture Capital Fund.” How much would be allocated to universities such as MIT? Where would the money come from?

JG: [The] small point … is that the plan was to have $5 billion a year to the Clean Venture Deployment Fund and $50 billion over ten years. The principal purpose of that fund is to accelerate the commercial scale deployment of the key low-carbon technologies. My sense is that a fine research institution like MIT is more likely to play a role in the R&D side of the energy innovation equation than on the commercialization.

TT: Will there be funds towards research?

JG: Senator Obama has indicated that [he would] at minimum double the funding of traditional energy R&D and that would, I think, present the opportunity for significantly increased public-private collaboration, both with universities through the national labs and with the private sector.

TT: Where would the money be coming from?

JG: The money will be coming from two places. Initially it will come from the removal of wasteful subsidies to highly profitable mature industries like the petroleum sector, but ultimately the funding will be sustained by directing revenues from the auctioning of carbon permits.

TT: There was a lot of talk at the debate as well as each campaign on new cleaner technologies. Setting aside where the energy source [is], the fact of the matter is that Americans consume about 25 percent of the energy produced in the world. Is energy consumption behavior a concern? If so, how will Senator Obama address this issue?

JG: It’s a tremendous concern. Senator Obama is aware that on average Americans use three times as much energy as we used in 1973 and that the failure to take advantage of efficiency opportunities is one of the factors impairing our economy and energy sector.

So he believes we need to do a couple of different things. One is that we need to develop policies that will consistently encourage efficiency gains. Key one is to change the way the power sector is compensated. This is the so called de-coupling of the electricity sector. Right now, while we ask them to promote efficiency, we pay them based on how much power they sell, which is fundamentally at odds with the goal of reducing wasteful consumption. That would be one type of policy that we need to put in place.

The second is that [Obama] will set stringent efficiency standards on both buildings and new building and appliances which the DOE is presently behind its obligation … to set. They are behind about 30 … over 30 different appliance efficiency standards. He will provide the resources to DOE and the clarity of mission so that they proceed quickly to catch up with their obligations.

And then finally I think he believes that while people don’t necessarily need to sacrifice, they do need to start to pay greater attention to our energy uses and recognize that our individual actions when taken collectively do have a significant impact on our national security and economy and the health of the planet.

[Obama] believes that in addition to proposing sound policies, the president has an opportunity and obligation to use the bully pulpit to engage the American people in a serious conversation about the need to reexamine our energy use.

TT: There was talk about governments picking favorites among technologies. How does your candidate advocate supporting a certain technology without disrupting the market forces, i.e. how does the government know who the winners are?

JG: Well, I believe he thinks that the government’s job, principally, is to set technology-neutral performance standards and obligate the marketplace to respond. So his support for a renewable portfolio standard, his support for low-carbon fuel standards, are perfect examples of technology-neutral performance obligations that he has championed [and] Senator McCain has opposed. Those are not technology-picking standards, they are government fulfilling its role to say that we desire lower carbon energy and allow the marketplace determine how to meet it.

When it comes to trying to provide incentives to help certain promising technologies overcome barriers to entry, [Obama] believes again these should be competitive processes, but there are some technologies … with the potential benefit so significant like zero-carbon coal technology, that he believes that it is in the public interest to provide direct investment to determine whether that technology in fact can be commercialized effectively.

And I think he believes government has to be thoughtful and prudent. We need to be better at knowing when to pull the plug and move on, but [Obama] believes that the scientific enterprise is one of success and failure, and if you are not willing to explore and invest resources in an idea that will ultimately fail, you will never have a portfolio that will in fact provide success.

If you look at analogy to any other industry, I think the idea of generic support which was being advocated by the McCain camp last night — we as a nation don’t say we are allocating a hundred billion dollars to generic national defense technologies — we identify that we have certain resources for air power, certain resources for naval power, we make choices.

Government is not a blind and neutral exercise. The challenge is to find that right balance and Senator Obama believes that if we lead with performance standards then provide targeted support for the most promising technologies that require competitive bidding processes and transparency and accountability, we have an opportunity to make real progress.

TT: How will Senator Obama engage developing countries such as India and China in reducing carbon emission, balancing development and environmental/energy concerns?

JG: [It’s] not a short question, but I’ll give you a quick overview. [Obama] believes that the only effective and equitable solution to climate change will require mandatory reduction commitments by all major emitting countries. He has committed to convene a global climate forum that will bring all the major emitting nations together.

While he believes that China and India must also make mandatory reduction commitments, [Obama] recognizes those commitments will not look like, in the first instance, those made by the U.S. and other highly developed countries … [this is] the notion of differentiated commitments.

[Obama] believes that there is a tremendous opportunity for the U.S. and other nations to try to [bring] advanced … clean technologies to China and other developing countries and that is an opportunity for both our manufacturing base but also a critical opportunity to help China modernize in ways that are more efficient and environmentally protective.

[Obama] believes the U.S. should be involved in partnerships [with developing] countries to provide funding and access to intellectual property that developing countries need and desire. He is supportive of international offsets but not to an unlimited degree.

[Obama] also believes that after the U.S. acts, countries like China will certainly be given a period of years to demonstrate they can make commensurate actions. In addition to support an incentives there will have to be some repercussions if other countries don’t take responsible actions down the road.

President Susan J. Hockfield announced the creation of the Environmental Research Council at the State of the Institute Forum on Monday, Sept. 29. The council will organize current and future Institute research related to the environment and will help establish a schoolwide “Environmental Initiative.”

The plan follows the May 2008 recommendations of a special committee chaired by Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences Professor and Department Chair Maria Zuber that such an initiative be established.

The council will have 13 faculty members and will be chaired by Dara Entekhabi, the Bacardi and Stockholm Water Foundations Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and director of the Earth Systems Initiative.

Research in the initiative will aim to understand and evaluate the Earth’s environmental systems and develop solutions to environmental problems, Entekhabi said.

Rapid global population growth has accelerated the impact of humanity on the environment, he said. Whatever this impact is, science should be able to predict and model this impact, he said.

Long-term problems are especially important to the council, Entekhabi said. The initiative will “enable research over the horizon and tackle high risk problems,” he said.

Students should involve themselves in the initiative, Entekhabi said. Students are the Institute’s “intellectual fuel,” he said.

The Energy Research Council will be politically neutral, Entekhabi said, and MIT should continue to be known for providing high-quality scientific advice unaffected by political burdens.

This research should have global consequences, said Chancellor Phillip L. Clay PhD ’75. “Air does not stop at political boundaries,” said Clay.

Duke, Stanford, Harvard, Princeton and Cornell also have initiatives that focus on the environment.

The ERC is expected to issue a research proposal for the initiative based on their work and input from other MIT faculty members by Feb. 15, 2009.

The United States and Britain appear to be converging on a common solution for the financial chaos sweeping the world, one day before a crucial meeting of financial leaders begins in Washington that the White House hopes will result in a more unified response.

The British and American plans, though far from identical, have two common elements: injection of government money into banks in return for ownership stakes and guarantees of repayment for various types of loans.

Both remedies will be center stage on Saturday, when President Bush meets with finance ministers from the world’s richest countries at an unusual White House meeting to swap ideas.

Bush’s invitation to finance ministers from Britain, Italy, Germany, France, Canada and Japan came on a day of phone calls and letters between European leaders and with Washington. Officials struggled to fashion a coordinated response to the ailing global banking system before going to Washington for annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

“As this thing has spread, the opportunities for cooperation have risen,” David H. McCormick, the under secretary of the Treasury for international affairs, said. “We need to promote and highlight these common areas.”

With credit markets still frozen and stock markets around the world in a deep swoon, there is a growing consensus that the crisis is now so fast-moving and harmful to the global economy that it demands an unprecedented degree of worldwide coordination.

The Treasury’s openness to direct infusions of cash is a remarkable change in tone from a few weeks ago, when the Treasury secretary, Henry M. Paulson Jr., and the Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, discouraged such actions in testimony before Congress.

“Putting capital in institutions is about failure,” Paulson declared on Sept. 23. “This is about success.”

Treasury officials, however, said the emphasis changed in the last week, largely because stock markets kept spiraling down.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Britain made the case, in a letter to President Nicolas Sarkozy of France, for another option gaining favor among economists — guaranteeing short- and medium-term loans between banks. By persuading banks to resume lending to each other, the plan aims to shake loose the paralyzed credit market. “This is an area where a concerted international approach could have a very powerful effect,” Brown said Thursday in the two-page letter.

Administration officials are discussing aspects of the British proposal but said different economies have different rules that complicate a single joint action.

One senior administration official argued that expecting an agreement on proposals like Brown’s would be “irrationally raising expectations.”

Still, recapitalizing the banks and jump-starting their lending are at the top of the list of remedies that many economists are now suggesting. By acting in concert, countries can maximize the punch of their actions, these experts said, while avoiding distortions that occur when countries go different ways.

Market by market, square by square, the walls are beginning to come down. The miles of hulking blast walls, ugly but effective, were installed as a central feature of the surge of U.S. troops to stop neighbors from killing one another.

“They protected against car bombs and drive-by attacks,” said Adnan, 39, a vegetable seller in the once violent neighborhood of Dora, who argues that the walls now block the markets and the commerce that Baghdad needs to thrive. “Now it is safe.”

The slow dismantling of the concrete walls is the most visible sign of a fundamental change here in the Iraqi capital. The U.S. surge strategy, which increased the number of U.S. troops and contributed to stability here, is drawing to a close. And a transition is under way to the almost inevitable U.S. drawdown in 2009.

There are now more than 148,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, down from the peak of around 170,000 a year ago, and President Bush has accepted the military’s recommendation to remove an additional 8,000 by February.

Iraqis are already taking on many of the tasks that Americans once performed, raising great hopes that the country will progress on its own but also deep fears of failure.

On Oct. 1, the Sunni-dominated Awakening movement, widely credited with helping restore order to neighborhoods that were among the most deadly, passed from the U.S. to the Iraqi government payroll in Baghdad. There is deep mutual mistrust between the new employer and many of its new employees, many of whom are former insurgents.

Another element of the transition, which has attracted far less notice than the Awakening transfer, is the Iraqi army’s beginning to turn over neighborhoods to the paramilitary National Police. In the future, its officers, too, will leave and be replaced by regular police officers.

All three moves mark a transition to an era in which the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government seeks more control over its own military and sway over America’s.

“The Iraqi security forces are now able to protect Iraq,” said Joaidi Nahim Mahmoud Arif, a National Police sergeant in Dora, in southern Baghdad. “They will depend on themselves above all.”

In dozens of interviews across Baghdad, it is evident that while open hostilities have calmed, beneath the surface many Sunnis and Shiites continue to harbor deep mistrust.

The 2007 state fair was days away when Alaska’s public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan, took another call about one of his troopers, Michael Wooten. This time, the director of Gov. Sarah Palin’s Anchorage office was on the line.

As Monegan recalls it, the aide said the governor had heard that Wooten was assigned to work the kickoff to the fair in late August. If so, Monegan should do something about it, because Palin was also planning to attend and did not want the trooper nearby.

Somewhat bewildered, Monegan soon determined that Wooten had indeed volunteered for duty at the fairgrounds — in full costume as “Safety Bear,” the troopers’ child-friendly mascot.

Two years earlier, the trooper and the governor’s sister had been embroiled in a nasty divorce and child-custody battle that had hardened the Palin family against him. To Monegan and several top aides, the state fair episode was yet another example of a fixation that the governor and her husband, Todd, had with Wooten and the most granular details of his life.

“I thought to myself, ‘Man, do they have a heavy-duty network and focus on this guy,’” Monegan said. “You’d call that an obsession.”

On July 11, Palin fired Monegan, setting off a politically charged scandal that has become vastly more charged since Palin became the Republican vice-presidential nominee.

The outlines of the matter have been widely reported. Monegan believes he was ousted because he would not bow to pressure to dismiss Wooten. The Alaska Legislature is investigating the firing and whether the governor abused the powers of her office to pursue a personal vendetta. Its report is due Friday.

Palin has denied that anyone told Monegan to dismiss Wooten, or that the commissioner’s ouster had anything to do with the trooper. But an examination of the case, based on interviews with Monegan and several top aides, indicates that, to a far greater degree than was previously known, the governor, her husband and her administration pressed the commissioner and his staff to get Wooten off the force, though without directly ordering it.

In all, the commissioner and his aides were contacted about Wooten three dozen times over 19 months by the governor, her husband and seven administration officials, interviews and documents show.

Last December, somebody using the name “Test Person,” from “Some Place, UT” made a series of contributions, the largest being $764, to Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign totaling $2,410.07.

Someone else identifying himself as “Jockim Alberton,” from 1581 Leroy Ave. in Wilmington, Del., began giving to Obama last November, contributing $10 and $25 at a time for a total of $445 through the end of February.

The only problem? There is no Leroy Avenue in Wilmington. And Jockim Alberton, who listed both his employer and occupation as “Fdsa Fdsa,” does not show up in a search of public records.

A New York Times analysis of campaign finance records this week found nearly 3,000 donations to Obama from more than a dozen people listing apparently fictitious donor information. The contributions represent a tiny fraction of the record $450 million Obama has raised. But the obviously questionable donations — some donors simply entered gibberish for their names — raise questions about whether the Obama campaign is adequately vetting its unprecedented flood of donors.

It is unclear why someone making a political donation would want to enter a fake name. Some perhaps did it for privacy reasons. Another more ominous possibility, of course, is fraud, perhaps in order to donate beyond the maximum limits.

There is no evidence that questionable contributions amount to anything more than a small portion of Obama’s fundraising haul. The Times’ analysis, conducted over just a few days and looking for obvious anomalies, like names with all consonants, identified about $40,000 in contributions from people that appeared not to exist. And these donations had not been refunded by the campaign as of its last filing with the Federal Election Commission in September.

It appears that campaign finance records for Sen. John McCain contain far fewer obviously fake names, although he has also taken in about $200 million in contributions, less than half Obama’s total.

Although campaigns have long wrestled to some degree with questionable donations, Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics, said the record-setting number of new donors Obama has drawn, many of them online, presents obvious new challenges to a compliance system that remains stuck in the past.

Until 3 p.m. on Thursday, it seemed as if the stock market might escape another dark day.

Then the selling hit — and hit and hit again, mimicking trading on Tuesday and Wednesday. What had been a moderately down day ended in a rout, with the Dow Jones industrial average closing down 679 points, or 7.3 percent, leaving it below 9,000 for the first time in five years.

In the busiest day in New York Stock Exchange history, panicky investors dumped stocks en masse. Almost no corner of the market was spared, with 1,754 stocks falling and just 87 rising on the Big Board.

Despite unprecedented steps by policymakers around the world to defuse the financial crisis, fear is spreading that a deep global recession is at hand. The credit markets, the heart of the financial system, remained in near-paralysis.

It is the question on the minds of New Yorkers, once they stop pondering the fate of their 401(k)s: If the city’s economy sinks to depths not seen in decades, will crime return with a vengeance?

Expert opinions differ, but the question is hardly illogical. The last time stocks on Wall Street fell hard, in 1987, crime was exploding, and the city saw historic highs in murders in the following years.

Before that, the fiscal crisis of the 1970s helped lead to the abandonment of neighborhoods, failing schools and startling crime rates: Robberies built through those years to a high in 1981, when there were 107,495 of them, for an average of 294 a day. (Last year’s total reported robberies, 21,787, was the lowest figure in modern history.)

“Every recession since the late ‘50s has been associated with an increase in crime and, in particular, property crime and robbery, which would be most responsive to changes in economic conditions,” said Richard Rosenfeld, a sociologist at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. Typically, he said, “there is a year lag between the economic change and crime rates.”

The Federal Reserve and Congress are pushing out close to $1 trillion to repair the nation’s financial system and to encourage lending. But that is not enough to revive the economy. Spending has to resume.

Consumers, however, have cut back sharply on their spending, in what will be the first quarterly decline in 17 years when the government tally is in for the third quarter. Business, in response, is shrinking its outlays for equipment, supplies and personnel. And now dozens of state and city governments, their tax revenue falling short of expectations, are engaged in yet another round of cost-cutting.

To offset this shrinkage, and head off a severe recession, the Democratic leadership in Congress is “seriously considering” a large fiscal stimulus proposal, which would send a significant amount of money to states and cities. “We have to prop up consumption,” Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, said in an interview in which he revealed some of the details the party leadership was discussing.

The new proposal would be far greater than the $60 billion stimulus package that the House passed in late September, Frank said.

With security and economic conditions in Afghanistan already in dire straits, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said Thursday that the situation there would probably only worsen next year.

“The trends across the board are not going in the right direction,” the chairman, Adm. Mike Mullen, told reporters. “I would anticipate next year would be a tougher year.”

Mullen said Afghanistan was likely to continue what a nearly completed intelligence assessment called “a downward spiral” unless there were rapid, major improvements. Those improvements include curbing Afghanistan’s booming heroin trade, bolstering district and tribal leaders to offset a weak central government in Kabul, breathing life into a flagging economy and stemming the flow of militants who are carrying out increasingly sophisticated attacks from havens in Pakistan.

Mullen struck a pessimistic note when asked whether it was likely such reversals would take place.

The French writer Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clezio, whose work reflects a seemingly insatiable restlessness and sense of wonder about other places and other cultures, won the 2008 Nobel Prize in Literature on Thursday. In its citation, the Swedish Academy praised Le Clezio, 68, as the “author of new departures, poetic adventure and sensual ecstasy, explorer of a humanity beyond and below the reigning civilization.”

Le Clezio’s work defies easy characterization, but in more than 40 essays, novels and children’s books, he has written of exile and self-discovery, of cultural dislocation and globalization, of the clash between modern civilization and traditional cultures. Having lived and taught in many parts of the world, he writes as fluently about North African immigrants in France, native Indians in Mexico and islanders in the Indian Ocean as he does about his own past.

Le Clezio is not well known in the United States, where few of his books are available in translation, but he is considered a major figure in European literature and has long been mentioned as a possible laureate. The awards ceremony is planned for Dec. 10 in Stockholm, and, as the winner, Le Clezio will receive 10 million Swedish kronor, or about $1.4 million.

At an impromptu news conference in Paris at the headquarters of his publisher, Editions Gallimard, Le Clezio seemed unperturbed by all the attention. He said he had received the telephone call telling him about the prize while he was reading “Dictatorship of Sorrow,” by the 1940s Swedish writer Stig Dagerman.

“I am very happy, and I am also very moved because I wasn’t expecting this at all,” he said. “Many other names were mentioned, names of people for whom I have a lot of esteem. I was in good company. Luck or destiny, or maybe other reasons, other motives, had it so that I got it. But it could have been someone else.”

In a news conference in Stockholm after the announcement, Horace Engdahl, the permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy, which awards the prize each year, described Le Clezio as a cosmopolitan author, “a traveler, a citizen of the world, a nomad.”

High pressure builds in from the west today, giving us a weekend of full of sunny weather. Temperatures will be slightly above normal with highs in the upper 60s°F and lows around 50°F. And while you are outside enjoying yourself this weekend (or maybe not if you have midterms and psets), meteorologists like me have very little to do.

Fortunately for those of us who love weather forecasting, a national forecasting contest called the Wx Challenge (“wx” is meteorologist lingo for weather) allows us to compete in this unusual sport. Every Monday through Thursday evening during the school year, over a thousand faculty, staff, grad students, and undergrads throughout the country enter a numerical forecast for the high temperature, low temperature, highest sustained wind speed, and precipitation for the following day for a given city, which changes every two weeks (for example, the last two weeks the city was Jacksonville, FL). The farther you are from the actual measurements, the more points you get, and whoever has the lowest amount of points wins. Trophies are awarded to the winning individuals as well as the winning teams.

I’m proud to say that MIT has come in first place six out of the past seven years, but not without a fight from our main competitors, Mississippi State University and San Jose State University.

On Monday night, Kresge Auditorium was filled with good-natured banter, verbal pats on the back, smiles, and even a hug. It was hardly the atmosphere I’d expected from two senior advisors to the presidential campaigns (R. James Woolsey on behalf of Senator McCain and Jason Grumet for Senator Obama) debating energy policy in front of a collegiate audience. Instead of outlining realistic policies and challenging the opposing viewpoint, both speakers steered the debate along a bland, albeit cheerful, tack.

Perhaps, to some, it’s reassuring that there’s little disagreement between the two camps on the “core values” of America’s future energy policy, a key issue as we face the effects of climate change and the end of cheap oil. It seems to me, though, that it’s perfectly possible for candidates to be in agreement — and both be wrong.

The fundamental reason for this is simple: no one wants to talk tough to the American people. While it’s increasingly obvious that American lifestyles (which consume five times more fossil fuel per capita than the global average) are unsustainable — even unethical — most of us would rather bemoan the fate of polar bears than turn off our computers every night. And the last person who wants to upset the real culprits — you and I — is the politician waiting nervously in front of the television screen on November 4.

Let’s pretend that politicians can, for once, speak truthfully and forthrightly without political pandering. Imagine a “voter holiday” analogous to the “gas tax holiday,” when, without fear of electoral repercussion, an honest, intelligent candidate could have his say. What real plan for energy independence and sustainability would he set before us?

He ought to start by promising to stop avoiding and start reducing. That means a firm “no” to more drilling, which is, at worst, at odds with our global warming objectives and, at best, only a temporary fix with a lag of five to ten years and billions of dollars in investment. (Bonus points for a candidate who hypothesizes what might be achieved if we focused those efforts on developing alternative energy instead.) Rather than fighting local fires by fidgeting with surpluses and gas taxes, we have to let the inferno blaze — let fossil fuel prices rise and simultaneously stop subsidizing an oil industry which has long outlived government hand-holding.

In fact, we need to stop subsidizing altogether. That means no freebies for alternative energy, either. Policy shouldn’t be microdirected, shoveling some funds to one industry and bankrolling another. Industry should succeed because the free market says its consumers are willing to foot the bill, not because politics has handed it a competitive edge.

Ending subsidies isn’t just about cutting monetary apron strings, though. Subsidies are as equally present in the “breaks” companies get from the government as they are in the checks sent to their bank accounts or the tax rebates that they receive. If Chemical Plant X releases toxic waste into the water supply, but taxpayers have to pay for the cleanup, then the plant got a subsidy equal to the cost of the remediation.

This is known as the “tragedy of the commons.” A point source — power plant, factory farm, etc. — releases waste into the air or water and isn’t held accountable. Ultimately, everyone pays a price, even those who weren’t involved in the first place. The tragedy of the commons explains why Australians developed increased rates of skin cancer after Europeans and Americans destroyed the ozone layer with CFCs. It explains why human breast milk is too toxic to cross state lines after chemical manufacturers released pollutants into the water supply. It explains why Bangladesh and Vanuatu eye their coastlines with increasing concern after first world countries pumped the atmosphere full of carbon dioxide.

To remove the implicit subsidy of the tragedy of the commons — as related to greenhouse gas emissions, at least — we must implement a carbon tax. This tax — a dollar amount levied for every ton of carbon emitted — would be broad in scope, affecting all industries equally rather than singling out the desired winners. The tax would ensure fairness by demanding that the polluters be held accountable. It would also level the playing field by allowing truly clean alternative energy to compete with fossil fuels: Renewable energy sources wouldn’t have to pass tax penalties on to their customers.

By allowing energy prices to rise and coupling price with carbon emissions, we can create a system where market forces select for fuel efficiency and, ultimately, a renewable energy economy.

The going will be tough. In today’s economic environment, it would be insensitive — and even cruel — to ignore the impact increased fuel costs will have on American families. Certainly, the plan I have sketched would be political suicide. Yet the American people are desperately in need of a leader, someone willing to admit that all is not well and that tough choices have to be made to achieve a lasting solution. We need a leader who will lead the world in adopting carbon tax standards, so that companies cannot flee with their jobs and plants to a land with fewer regulations.

I believe the American people are increasingly aware of this need and increasingly willing to listen to straight talk about our energy solution. I can only hope that we will convert this willingness into a demand for political accountability and honesty, because our politicians won’t be taking the first step.

Holly Moeller is a graduate student in the Joint Program in Biological Oceanography. She welcomes feedback at hollyvm@mit.edu.

Representatives from both presidential campaigns met on campus last Monday and were asked how their candidates would define success in the energy sector at the end of two terms as president. In spite of the night’s rhetoric about oil-free, renewable energy ambitions, their responses were surprisingly subdued.

Jim Woolsey said that McCain would consider a wide expansion of alternative fuels and vehicles like plug-in hybrids and flexible-fuel vehicles to be an accomplishment. Obama’s envoy, Jason Grumet, described a country that used just a little less energy than the year before.

After the events of the last month’s financial meltdown, let me offer a more dire vision of what will actually happen in the next four to eight years based on previous recessions and energy crises.

The economy, in the nation as well as the world, will take such a thrashing that any grand visions on energy, healthcare, or Social Security will be put on hold while the commander-in-chief fights multiple fiscal brush fires. Companies will be unable to obtain credit or investment for the billion-dollar projects that nuclear or coal plants command.

A shriveling world economy will shrink consumer demand, sinking the price of oil and natural gas like it did during the 1980s and 90s and obviate any substantial shift away from non-renewable sources. Energy’s best laid plans — whether from Obama, McCain, Pickens, or Google — will be all for naught.

The next president will serve only one term. The last time the economic klaxons blared in 1987, the shockwaves reverberated for so long that the next President, George Bush the elder, was booted out of office because he presided over a recession. Voters read his lips about new taxes but the circumstances of the early 1990s still dictated an about-face.

And while the savings and loan crisis was confined to banks, it still extended throughout the economy. Our current state of affairs will not be as lucky since the credit crisis will touch on all sectors and circles.

Jimmy Carter showed up on national TV in a cardigan and inspired a career-damaging round of mockery rather than inspiring people to turn down their thermostats. This was during 1977 — during a period of high energy prices and some of the worst economic conditions in modern America. The public was less concerned with the temperature of their houses than with the availability of a paycheck.

Awaiting the next chief executive are similar conditions in the form of a wide-ranging recession and high energy prices.

What policy levers will be left for the next president to pull? Both candidates back a nationwide cap-and-trade market for carbon dioxide. Such a law will be signed, but the resulting program will be riddled with so many handouts to the utilities and oil companies that it will be toothless.

Both candidates support a move toward higher mileage vehicles like plug-in hybrids. These cars will be on the road, like the Prius was at the beginning of the century, but they will make a similarly small dent in overall impact for a decade. Both candidates want to wean ourselves off foreign imports of oil. The country may produce more alternative fuels from sources like biomass but not in sufficient quantities.

In the electricity sector, both candidates support “clean coal” technology like carbon capture and sequestration, but research will simply saunter along and remain decades away from commercial deployment.

Both candidates support more electricity transmission capacity and “smart grid” technologies, and both candidates support renewable sources of energy like solar and wind. The build-out trends will merely continue for these technologies, but only if we’re lucky enough that they don’t fail due to persistently high costs.

In sum, the ambitious proposals of both candidates will remain unfulfilled.

They will both be wrong, that is, unless the next president of the United States puts together a public works project on the scale of the New Deal and manages to combine it with the international dedication of the Marshall Plan. Our bridges and highways are falling apart and transmission lines need to be built to deliver all that proposed renewable energy.

Climate change will only be solved by world consensus. If the next president can assemble a package that connects the economy with a transformative energy policy, such a proposal would truly be a plan with a realistic shot at changing the national landscape.

But good luck getting it through Congress.

Gary Shu is a graduate student in the Engineering Systems Division and the Department of Urban Studies and Planning.

This past Monday, I munched on a chocolate glazed donut and sipped on iced tea (lemon and sugar) from Dunkin’ Donuts. I had a $5 foot-long Spicy Italian sub from Subway after my 5.111 lecture. And after pistol practice, I grabbed a cheeseburger from the Cambridge Grill.

Before coming to MIT, only in my wildest dreams would I have had a donut for breakfast, Subway for lunch, and a cheeseburger for dinner. Today, I’m starting to feel sick of it. Two months ago, I never thought I’d be sick of Subway. For that, I have to thank MIT Dining.

I’m sure that it’s been said before, but there are 1,000 new undergraduates and 1,000 new voices here at MIT this year — so it needs to be said again. Effectively, MIT has no undergraduate dining plan. If you insist on saying MIT does have a dining plan, well then, it sucks. MIT’s food (not dining) policy fails students in a very important part of their lives: basic sustenance. I’ve got enough on my plate to worry about without needing to worry about what’s on my plate.

I don’t want to need to think about what I should buy to eat and where I should buy it. Since, for many MIT students, money doesn’t grow on trees, we really can’t afford to pay high prices at Café Four or LaVerde’s for the sake of convenience. In fact, we need low prices and convenience. This is not a lot to ask for in a place where, by virtue, time is scarce and there are more important things to think about than dinner. I want quick, cheap, and convenient.

Is cheap and convenient food an impossibility at MIT? My twin brother’s experience at Boston University makes me think not. He can hop out of bed, run to the dining hall, swipe his card, and pile as much food as he likes on his plate. Then he can go back for seconds. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner. It’s stunning.

Furthermore, from my own experience, the food across the river is not half bad! And here’s the icing on the cake (the same cake that BU students can pick up for dessert) — my parents aren’t paying any more for that service than they would be paying had they followed MIT’s “suggestion” of $2,200 a semester.

Talk about hidden costs (my parents were initially surprised to find MIT’s tuition and room and board cost was slightly less than my brother’s). So why can’t we have a similar plan here? Why are students enrolled in a “dining plan” effectively forced to purchase their meals at dining halls or risk losing money?

I would even settle for crappier food if it meant I could have as much of it as I wanted whenever I wanted without having to pay for individual items. And in my opinion, Shinkansen’s “Bullet Train Fast Food” isn’t setting the bar for food quality very high.

As a freshman, I don’t care if past dining surveys have found that many students did not take advantage of homegrown MIT dining facilities. If those plans were anything like the vestigial plan some of my friends from Next and Baker have to purchase today, I’m not surprised those students did not take advantage of dining halls.

The solution is not to get rid of dining halls. The solution is to change the dining halls. Make them more accessible and cheaper. Incorporate dining costs into room and board. Streamline the process. I think MIT would find dining halls to be incredibly popular if we modeled them similarly to our colleagues across the river.

Others have said it, I’m saying it, and more disappointed young freshman will say it in the future. However, it should be said again and again until something changes. Until everybody gets sick of tired of reading dining articles in The Tech. Until this issue has been discussed so mind-numbingly much that whoever’s in charge here would rather make these changes than listen to people complain. Whatever it takes to enact change during the transient influx of enthusiasm at the beginning of each school year before we all turn complacent and the issue is shelved until next Fall.

Ethan Solomon is a particularly hungry member of the Class of 2012.

MIT stands among very few institutions in the nation regarding how it prepares its students for their future. A solid, practical education ensures that we can adapt and take care of ourselves after we graduate from college. Personally, I assume that such preparation includes the skills necessary for daily sustenance.

As adults, we will have to make our own choices about what foods to purchase and how to cook them—even a little proficiency in the kitchen goes a long way in today’s world. On top of that, self-prepared food often turns out to be healthier and cheaper than purchased meals. It allows students the choice and flexibility to cater their diets to their unique bodies. Why, then, has the Institute decided to embark on its own vision to expand dining at the undergraduate level and overlooked the obvious benefits of cooking?

Just to be clear, I am someone who expected to be dining out all the time when I arrived at MIT. While I had prepared small items at home, I never cooked three meals a day for myself. I was scared of the stove. More and more, though, I find myself making my meals in my Burton-Conner suite kitchen. Nothing fancy — I might make an omelette one day or a peanut butter and jelly sandwich the next.

However, I count myself among the lucky few undergraduates at MIT that have a stove, fridge, and cupboards just outside my door. Without these, I suspect I would be purchasing the majority of my meals every day.

Buying ingredients, by any logic comes out as cheaper than purchasing meals. A large egg might cost you 75 cents and make a good breakfast, while a banana might run a quarter and serve as a nutritious snack. Even an entire dinner should not run anything more than a few dollars for one person. Preparing a meal should not have to be an arduous task; the time commitment depends upon what you want to make.

Personally, I feel that I pay enough in tuition such that I’ll take a clear opportunity to save money if I don’t have to sacrifice anything significant for it. The caveat, of course, is that our most convenient location for grocery shopping — LaVerde’s — is atrociously overpriced. Apples and oranges will run you a buck a piece or more. We really can’t count on MIT to make it easy for us to buy reasonably-priced groceries.

Moreover, preparing food should not just run you fewer dollars, but fewer calories. The selection at a typical grocery store is typically less fattening, than Lobdell or the dining halls, and often more nutritious. Undeniably, you can purchase healthy prepared meals on campus, but the control you have over how those meals are prepared is limited. Each individual has different dietary needs, and cafeteria dining will inevitably not meet those needs.

Whether you want to gain or lose weight, build muscle mass or lower your carbohydrate intake, the selection at a typical grocery store can far better help you meet your dietary needs than the cafeteria food at Baker, Next, McCormick, or Simmons.

The argument that managing your own food allows you to overeat or only consume junk defies the very purpose and spirit of college life; we have to be entrusted with the same kind of personal responsibility that we will have to face in the real world. In any case, I doubt anyone would classify cafeteria food as healthy. We students no longer live in a world in we should expect to be served and cooked every meal.

As far as I can tell, cooking does not affect you socially. Not only are there people around to eat with me if I cook for myself, but I can actually grow closer to people by cooking with them. In any case, I don’t see the difference if someone can just take food from the cafeteria and head back to a room to eat in solitude. Moreover, I eat out at least two or three times a week. Eating out feels better when you and your friends can make the choice to order a particular kind of food any day of the week from any restaurant you choose.

MIT needs to break away from its trend toward house dining. Forced dining plans — the ones that charge you $300 and require eating five days a week at the same cafeteria — are no way to encourage MIT students to prepare for the real world. These cafeterias are only practical for dinner and, despite efforts to increase their choice and serve vegetarian, don’t offer students the freedom to really make their own dietary decisions like they will when they leave college.

Cafeteria food cannot adequately serve the growing number of vegans, who need kitchens if they wish to maintain their dietary choices. Forcing students into what is typically an economic loss and restricting their options does not seem like the MIT way to me.

Neither, incidentally, does going against the wishes of the Phoenix group and tearing the kitchens out of Ashdown or arbitrarily overturning the choice of a majority of Simmons Hall residents against buffet style dining. Many halls, with the notable exceptions of East Campus and Burton-Conner, have inconvenient or inadequate cooking facilities. LaVerde’s overcharges students for necessities, and is too far from East Campus anyway.

MIT needs to remember its roots and offer its students the healthier, more practical option of cooking. Yes, we can choose not to cook our own food, but I simply would like to see students given more of an option than the current trend suggests they will have.

We are not an Ivy League school nor should we start acting like one — mens et manus implies we should at least offer students the chance to develop a practical, healthy, and cheap skill in cooking.

Karan Sagar is a member of the Class of 2012 that knows how to crack an egg or two.

It is the duty of every institution to take measures to ensure the health and wellbeing of its students. While MIT does make significant efforts to encourage healthy living, it has yet to find a substantial solution to the issue of campus dining.

The matter of campus dining has been under scrutiny for several years now. Programs such as weekly meal plans and all-you-can-eat buffets have been experimented with. However, after many changes, influenced to a great extent by the varied student responses to the different plans, as well as the inability of the programs to be financially self-sustaining, the current system of house dining membership has been adopted.

Under the present system, students can obtain a 50 percent discount on meals in the five dining halls, namely Baker, Simmons, McCormick and Next in West Campus and Ashdown House in the North West side of campus, on a charge of $300 a semester. As a result, a meal originally available for $9-$10 in the hall, can be obtained for half the price. This is almost always a losing deal for students. As per calculations, on the whole, students can only afford to miss about two or three meals in a dining hall per semester to avoid losing money on the membership.

In May 2007, the Baker House dining committee issued a report showing that the average Baker resident loses $125 per semester because of membership in the house dining program. Only about 13 percent of residents break even (The Tech, Volume 127, Issue 66). Though the risk of losing money does ensure some consistency of food habits for the students, the risk adds pressure to dine at one of the residential dining halls every evening, which is not favorable to most students.

The large part of the dining problem lies in the locations of the dining halls; having dining halls in five of the residences is not adequate. The dining facilities are used primarily by the residents of these halls, as these students have been forced to pay for dining membership. However, for many of the non-residents, dining in these halls is not an attractive proposition. Many students do not wish to dine in a place where they do not know people. In addition, the dining hours are usually inconvenient to members of athletic teams and student activities that often meet at the same time.

It is particularly telling that MIT, known for the predominance of our nocturnal culture, has only the Simmons late night café (which is isolated across Briggs field from the bulk of west campus dorms) and the convenience stores (MacGregor and LaVerde’s) open till a substantial hour into the night. As for the food, there is a paucity of variety available in the dining halls. The primary reason for this is perhaps that the contract for all the west-side dining halls rests with the same catering company.

Also, a noticeable fact is that the actual original price of the meals in the halls appears to be significantly inflated. A dish similar to one that is priced at $8 in the halls is available for about $6 in one of the other establishments on campus.

The residence dining halls have no provision for breakfast or lunch. As a freshman, I am yet to experience the Boston/Cambridge winter. However, I shudder to think what I will do if I there is a snow storm one weekend and I need to get breakfast in the morning. There will probably be no other option than to walk down to the Student Center in the biting cold.

In my opinion, while kitchens are important, every house should have a dining hall open for at least some key times, even if it is not operated on as large of a scale as the five major halls. In addition to an assured meal in one’s own residence for students, a dining hall fosters a feeling of community. This approach has already been adopted in the construction of the Ashdown House.

The halls could be open for some time in the morning, preferably for breakfast since students usually don’t come back to their dorms between classes. Another advantage of this plan would be that in the case that students don’t have their first class of the day until the afternoon, they won’t necessarily need to leave their dorms early in the morning to obtain a meal.

Most universities in the United States offer students with a large variety of dining programs. For instance, the University of Florida has two dining halls, where myriad dining preference options are offered to students. These choices include 7 meals a week programs, 21 meals a week plans or even unlimited dining.

True, the cost of these is way more than $300 a semester, but the availability of these options is a big plus for students. There is remarkable consistency in the food habits of their students, as opposed to the erratic food habits of the average MIT student.

Improvements to the system of campus dining should be an imperative — both to ensure better nutrition for students and to reflect the high standards our Institute has established in other elements of campus community and student life.

Radhika Malik is a member of the Class of 2012 who doesn’t want to leave her dorm to get a muffin.

The first round of the Major League Baseball (MLB) playoffs has concluded. Of the eight teams who entered the postseason last Wednesday, four are still standing. The Division Series did not offer nearly as much drama as the close of the regular season, with the matchups appearing lopsided and the winners advancing easily. The four teams who will move on to the next round are:

Los Angeles Dodgers: The Dodgers won their first postseason series in 20 years while extending the Cubs’ championship drought (100 years and counting), winning the first two games in Chicago en route to a three-game sweep. Chicago did not play at all like a team which had won 97 games in the regular season, scoring only six runs total in the series while committing six errors and batting .240 as a team.

Manny Ramirez continued to be a one-man demolition crew, going 5-for-10 in the series with two homers, while the Dodgers’ pitching stifled Chicago’s offense, limiting them to six runs total in the series. The Dodgers’ victory earns them a spot in the National League Championship Series (NLCS), where they will face the …

Philadelphia Phillies: Like the Dodgers, the Phillies easily defeated their opponents from the National League Central. For Milwaukee, C.C. Sabathia pitched like a mere mortal, failing to make it past the fourth inning in Game 2. In contrast, Philadelphia’s starting pitching was dominant, allowing only five runs in the series while compiling a 1.80 ERA.

Philadelphia’s offense, dormant for the most part in the first three games against the Brewers, broke out with four home runs in Game 4. They will need bigger contributions from the middle of their lineup — Ryan Howard, Chase Utley, and Pat Burrell — than what they got from them in the Division Series if they hope to advance.

Boston Red Sox: Boston always seems to raise their level of play a couple of notches in October. In the Division Series against the Angels, the Red Sox showed why they are the defending world champions, coming up with big hits and plays at key moments.

Meanwhile, the Angels’ series was filled with missed opportunities: they were unable to hit with runners in scoring position, stranded almost 11 men on base per game, and failed to execute a suicide squeeze bunt in the ninth inning of Game 4, costing them the game and series.

For Boston, Jason Bay, a sixth-year veteran making his first trip to the playoffs, homered in the first two games of the series and scored the winning run in the finale. Jon Lester, the starter in Games 1 and 4, did not allow an earned run in fourteen innings. In the American League Championship Series (ALCS), they will face their new rivals from the AL East, the …

Tampa Bay Rays: The (non-Devil) Rays’ magical season continues. Now playing in their first-ever Championship Series, the Rays played with determination and poise in their Division Series against the White Sox, and did not look at all like a young team playing in the postseason for the first time.

The Rays don’t have any clear-cut superstars on their team, but players have stepped up and contributed at key moments. Evan Longoria hit home runs in his first two postseason at-bats to lead Tampa Bay to victory in Game 1, while B.J. Upton homered twice in Game 4 to clinch the series.

Behind the scenes, Manager Joe Madden has been pushing all the right buttons, leading the team to a berth in the ALCS in their first playoff appearance.

The winners of each league’s best-of-seven Championship Series will face one another in the World Series.

Dodgers vs. Phillies: This is the fourth time that these two teams will meet in the NLCS. Philadelphia and Los Angeles are arguably the two hottest teams in baseball, each easily winning their first-round matchups.

They will have had plenty of time to rest for the Championship Series beginning Thursday night; both of the Division Series Game 1 starters — Cole Hamels for Philly and Derek Lowe for L.A. — will pitch on seven days’ rest in the first game.

If Philadelphia’s starting rotation can perform like they did against Milwaukee, they will be very difficult to beat. The Dodgers’ pitching staff, however, was just as dominant against the Cubs, and will stifle Philly’s offense unless Ryan Howard and Chase Utley start producing. Joe Torre will be looking to add to his record 79 postseason victories, using his experience to maintain the momentum of his young team.

A decisive factor in this series may be home-field advantage, since each team swept a 4-game series against the other at home during the regular season. Philadelphia has home-field, but the Dodgers, led by Manny Ramirez, will ride their late-season momentum into the World Series. Prediction: Dodgers in 6.

Red Sox vs. Rays: Boston is looking for its second consecutive championship and third in five years, but this year the road to the World Series runs through … Tropicana Field? Yes, the same stadium where the Rays had the majors’ best home record, and where the Red Sox couldn’t seem to win this season.

The two teams have a history of conflict, even though the Rays have not contended in the AL East until this season. There have been six fights between the clubs in the past few years, the latest being an all-out brawl at Fenway Park on June 5 for which eight players were suspended.

This series should be an exciting one, featuring two teams with opposite postseason histories. Boston is in the ALCS for the fourth time since 2003, while Tampa bay, a team in the playoffs for the first time, only has six players on its roster with postseason experience.

The teams are also evenly matched: both lineups feature power and speed, along with talented starting rotations. Boston will have a distinct advantage, however, in the ninth inning (where they outscored the Angels 5-1). Jonathan Papelbon has established himself as an elite closer, while the Rays’ Troy Percival has been out since mid-September and is still uncertain for this series.

The Red Sox, with all of their injuries, will have to find ways to keep up with the energetic play of the Rays in a long series, but their playoff experience will be a huge factor. As much as I’d love to see Tampa Bay’s Cinderella season continue, Boston has proven they play their best baseball in October. Prediction: Red Sox in 7.

Wellesley College defeated the MIT women’s tennis team 6-3 in their match last Tuesday. The match started with doubles play as usual. The team of Leslie A. Hansen ’10 and Anastasia Vishnevetsky ’12 finished first, destroying their opponents 8-1. Next off was the team of Anisa K. McCree ’10 and Melissa A. Diskin ’11, who lost their tough match 8-1.

The exhibition match of Alexandria C. Hall ’12 and Jennifer A. Rees ’11 came off next, losing a close match 6-8, leaving the number three team front and center. Karina N. Pikhart ’09 and Yi Wang ’09 played a tough match, fighting all the way. The points were quick and precise, and the lead changed sides repeatedly until the very end. In the end, Pikhart and Wang lost the match 6-8, leaving MIT behind 1-2 going into the singles matches.

Coach Carol Matsuzaki told the team that the mantra of the day was fight: “You want to be the person that when the teammate next to you looks over, they get inspired to fight harder.” The rest of the match went by in a blur. McCree lost her match 6-2, 6-0, and was closely followed by Wang who won her match 6-2, 6-0. Hall lost a hard fought match 6-1, 6-1. Next off was Diskin who lost her match 6-4, 6-0. Vishnevetsky defeated her opponent in a close match, winning 6-4, 6-3. Next off was Rees, who lost her exhibition match 6-1, 7-5.

This left only two matches still contested, each going into the third set. Pikhart went down fighting, losing her match 6-3, 1-6, 6-3, leaving Hansen in the spot light. Hansen fought hard and the points went back and forth between the opponents; in the end Hansen lost 6-3, 1-6, 6-4.

The MIT Men’s Soccer team has been having a fantastic season, playing their way to an 11-0-1 record, 2-0 in New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) conference play. On Wednesday, the Engineers defeated Brandeis University 5-0, their largest margin of victory in a shutout in 37 years.

Christian W. Therkelson ’11 scored twice in Wednesday’s non-conference game and played a crucial role in each of the Engineer’s first four goals. Therkelsen opened scoring on a throughball from Neil S. Zimmerman ’09 five minutes into the first half. Therkelsen assisted with subsequent goals by Zachary E. Kabelac ’12 and Peter Bojo ’11 to bring MIT’s lead to 3-0 at the end of the first half.

Therkelsen scored again in the second half upon receiving a ball deflected by Brandeis goalie Sean O’Hare after a free kick by Jason Zhu ’11

—Aaron Sampson, Sports Editor

MIT and Babson played to their third tie in five seasons on Tuesday as neither team could break a scoreless deadlock in a New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) women’s soccer match.

Babson stayed on the attack for most of the first half, and closed the contest with a 10-3 advantage in shots. The action rarely left the midfield during the second half while neither team was able to generate a serious scoring threat in the extra sessions.

Babson nearly cashed in during the 55th minute as Jackie Graham’s header off a corner kick landed just to the right of the MIT goal. The Engineers responded with their best opportunity of the day in the 70th minute as a potential game-winning goal off the foot of rookie Alisha D. Lussiez ’12 was called back after MIT was whistled for offsides.

MIT junior Kathryn A. Pesce ’10 had a near-break-away attempt just three minutes later, but Babson goalkeeper Sarah Macary rushed in and made a diving stop to prevent a clean shot. With five minutes left in regulation, rookie Lauren Clement had a cross land at her feet in front of the MIT goal, but she couldn’t make the turn before the threat was cleared.

Stephanie V. Brenman ’09 made six saves for the Engineers, including four stops in the first half. Macary finished with two saves for Babson.

—James Kramer, DAPER Staff

The MIT women’s volleyball team held off a formidable Wheaton College squad, 25-22, 21-25, 26-24, 22-25, 15-8, in a New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) match on Tuesday night.

During the opening set, the teams traded early points, but the Engineers eventually managed to forge ahead, 23-15, on Jennifer Li’s ’11 ace. Wheaton crept back thanks to a 7-1 run that made it 24-22 before an error sealed the win for MIT.

Set two was also a close affair, as Wheaton maintained a minimum three-point cushion for the remainder of the set. Alexandra T. May ’10 landed a kill to close the gap to 24-21, but Lauren Kraus blocked an attack at set point to tie the match.

The Engineers took a 6-1 advantage in the third set behind a pair of aces from Lindsay E. Hunting ’09 and consecutive kills by May, but Wheaton tallied a 6-0 run to capture the lead. The teams played through five more ties before the Engineers rallied with a 6-1 run to go up 24-23. The Lyons forced a short-lived tie at 24 before another May kill clinched the set.

When MIT edged ahead, 11-8 in the fourth set, it was the first time either team had led by more than two points, but Wheaton scored four straight thanks to consecutive Kraus blocks to put the hosts on top, 12-11. Four ties ensued, as neither squad led by more than three points. Consecutive May kills eventually made it 24-22, but a kill from Wheaton’s Miranda Howitt forced a fifth set.

Kraus and Kaitlyn Stokes blocked an MIT attack to give Wheaton the first point in the final set, and a Becca Rose ace had the home team on top, 5-3, before the Engineers rallied for 12 of the final 15 points in the match. After MIT had surged ahead, Stokes’ kills brought the Lyons to within 9-7 and 11-8 before a Hunting ace ended the match.

—Mindy Brauer, DAPER Staff

New conductors can be traumatizing, regardless of the quality of the ensemble — the tension surrounding these changes originates from the very heart of the complex relationship between an orchestra and its conductor.

The entire system seems turned on its head: here are the musicians, negotiating physically and intellectually difficult passages of music at the tyrant command of a single conductor, yet it’s the conductor, the individual who goes to the stand and simply waves the baton in moments of inexplicable conjure, who receives all the glory. Why should the ones who appear to be doing the most amount of work be receiving the least amount of credit for it? Marx would have a lot to say about this.

But appearances can be deceiving. Regardless of what’s going on during a performances, a good conductor shapes the music into its final form. A good conductor not only considers the piece as a whole — what, precisely, the music is trying to say, how it tries to say it — but, perhaps most importantly, how to communicate this using the ensemble at hand.

So there’s a relationship that forms: members of the ensemble get used to the tricks and thinking that every conductor uses to explain the music, conductors gain an intimate understanding of the abilities and tenor of the ensemble, what’s appropriate, and how to articulate music the most effectively, given the group at hand.

As both audience member and performer, it’s difficult to know what to make of a new conductor, especially during early performances. Things change, sounds are different, and it takes a good while for a group to become familiar with its new leader, the conductor to come to an understanding of the ensemble.

This is why the Handel and Haydn Society’s performance on Friday, October 3rd was such a difficult one to interpret. The Handel and Haydn Society, the nation’s oldest continuously performing ensemble, has undergone some recent renovations, landing British conductor Mr. Harry Christophers at the stand.

Adding to the confusion, of course, was the program of Händel’s coronation anthems and opera excerpts. George Fredric Händel wears many faces: there’s the religious zealot of the Messiah (HWV 56), or the playful innovator of the Fireworks (HWV 351) and Watermusic (HWV 348). The coronation anthems and the opera excerpts provide two very different versions of Händel.

Written for the coronations of King George II and Queen Caroline of England (a gentle reminder of historical context that this was the music that was playing in the halls of the British monarchy during the American Revolution), the anthems themselves are stiff, thickset pieces of music, dutifully following text and purpose, and the performance followed suit. The anthems were not without their moments: “The King shall rejoice” (HWV 260), for instance, raised eyebrows even in the modern audience with its unique setting of “Allelujah” and “Zadok the Priest” (HWV 258) was a surprising climax at the end of the evening.

Händel seemed much more of himself in the operatic excerpts. Soprano Gillian Keith provided a consistently thrilling performance. Händel’s facility with vocal arrangements became clear as the soloist and chorus glibly alternated in “Welcome as the cheerful light” from Jephtha (HWV 70) and “Endless pleasure” from Semele (HWV 58). Keith was featured soloist for much of the remaining program and was able to highlight Händel’s great talent as a dramatist.

“Myself I shall adore,” from Semele, sparkled as Keith facilely negotiated melismatic acrobatics while maintaining the dramatic flair of the opera stage. In contrast, Keith was sensitive to the tragedy of “My racking thoughts,” also from Semele, in which we explore the anxious inner psyche of the heroine.

The purely orchestral portions of the evening seemed less settled; the opening “Arrival of the Queen of Sheba” from Solomon was marred by messy solo work. The overtures to Jephtha and Semele did not have the same stunning effect as the choral anthems and opera selections.

Certainly, this may have been a function of using period instruments in the context of Symphony Hall. A space constructed for the lush sounds of the Romantic symphony, Symphony Hall did not support the more spare sounds of the harpsichord, theorbo and baroque instruments as well as a church or a salon — the intended spaces for this form of music — may have. Certainly, in combination with a new conductor and the varied moods of Händel, this led to a unique listening of the music.

That said, however, this is an exciting time to be listening to the Handel and Haydn Society: it is far too early to judge whether Christophers’s pairing with the ensemble is a successful one yet, as both ensemble and conductor grow to an understanding of each other. But, given Mr. Christopher’s considerable credentials and the Handel and Haydn Society’s distinguished history, this is a combination to keep watching.

Last Friday’s Russell Peters show was an uproar. I hadn’t heard of Russell Peters prior to the show, so as I made my way to the website five days after tickets went on sale, I was surprised to be greeted with the message ‘SOLD OUT’ in glaring red font. Many Bakerites were also unpleasantly surprised at how quickly the tickets sold out. During the course of the week leading up to the show, I think there was a frantic e-mail sent out every day about some poor soul willing to buy tickets for double the price.

The show began at 8:00, but a line started to form as early as 6:30. When I arrived at 7:15, there was no way to tell where the line began and where it ended. It’d snaked around half of Kresge and then looped backwards in the opposite direction. Even after entering the actual theater, there was a fear that someone would steal your seat (we were sitting four rows from the stage); bathroom trips were sacrificed. All for Russell Peters — for whom the audience would have to sit through the guest comedian, Michael Fabelin’s ten-minute show.

A native Bostonian, Fabelin was energetic and armed with a rambunctious foul mouth. A few of his less P.C. jokes were cute, but many of his vulgarities were so in-your-face (complete with bodily motions) that the atmosphere fell stale after the first three minutes.

I began to worry that perhaps there would be the awkward obligatory applause for Russell Peters too. I had only YouTubed the man’s past shows earlier that week and was floored by his breadth of content. This guy really did his research — he depicted the cultural stereotypes to a T, not so much the stereotypes produced by Americans, but ones steeped in the culture itself. These ranged from how Bombay’s distinctive scent often floored ex-pats to the angry Singaporean man behind him in the DDR line.

When Peters stepped on stage, one knew that this was a man who simply bathed in the showlight. He had a dynamic stage presence, aided by his shiny silver sneakers, and interacted comfortably with the audience. Despite his own claim to be ADD, Peters had an awfully good memory of certain characters in the audience — like the Northeastern student from “QATAR!-where-everyone-drinks-oil” to the freshman in the first row, decked out in a lemon-yellow sweater. One could tell that he drew inspiration from real life experiences.

What was lasting about Peters’ show was his emphasis on jokes that played with stereotypes, rather than being based in stereotypes. There’s a sharp difference between accepting and utilizing social stigmas to mock a particular culture, and mocking the stigmas themselves. While many of the stereotypes Peters put forth concerning Asian countries were surprisingly on the mark, they were so relished because one knew that Peters himself held little stock in them.

In his act, Peters brought up a surprisingly profound theme: “you are where you are raised” — an observation that transcends both race and culture. He repeatedly made the claim, you may have been born in Country X but if you didn’t grow up in Country X, you can’t say that you’re actually from Country X. What constitutes being from a particular place are the influences of the place’s culture. Peter’s brilliance as a comedian lays in his ability to express such a complex message through effortless humor.