Mirror - Vol. 04, No. 18 -February 12, 1981

              Irish Society Dance Awaits U. Council Decision
by Ken Vaughn
The University Council was ex-pected
to meet this week to dis-cuss
moving this year's Irish
Society dance to the main cafe-teria,
according to council
member Mike Bentivegna. The
open meeting became necessary
when Campus Center Director
James Fitzpatrick failed to give
consent to move the social event
from the Oak Room, where it is
currently booked.
The annual "Luck of the Room-mate
Dance" has been scheduled
for March 13. Irish Society Presi-dent
Bob McVeigh said the event
was a huge success last year
when it was held in the Oak Room.
He added that because of the size
of the Oak Room, many who
wanted to go last year could not
gain admission. To remedy that
problem this year, he and society
officer Brian Gilbert sought to
move the event to the cafeteria.
McVeigh said he went to ask
Fitzpatrick if the event could be
moved, and his request was
denied. He then asked Vice-
President of Student Services
William Schimpf's help in per-suading
Fitzpatrick to allow the
dance in the cafeteria. However,
Fitzpatrick did not yield, and the
Irish Society decided to pursue
other channels of influence.
Last week, the society received
the backing of the Student
Legislature as they unanimously
recommended to ask that the
dance be moved. FUSA President
Andrew McGowan also endorsed
the move. Now the council's help
is being solicited.
"The cafeteria was not built as a
multi-purpose room," said Fitz-patrick,
who added that the cafe-teria
is used for just four major
dance events each school year.
The dining hall has permanent fur-niture,
said Fitzpatrick, making it
very difficult to move the tables
and chairs and then re-set them
for the next day meals. "We have
not told them that they could not
have the event," he said, pointing
out that the Irish Society booked
the Oak Room November 20 for
their spring dance.
The dance will be semi-formal
and feature the Gashouse Band, a
50's type group. Tickets are ex-pected
to cost between $8 and $10
a couple, said McVeigh.
If the Irish Society should lose
the battle to move their dance,
McVeigh said that admittance may
have to be restricted to club mem-bers
only. Hopefully that conse-quence
won't occur, he conclud-ed.
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Bentivegna Wins in Landslide
by Bryan LeClerc
Mike Bentivegna was elected
FUSA President in a landslide vic-tory
Tuesday, receiving a total of
876 votes, a 489 vote plurality over
runner-up Janet Canapa.
Out of the 1389 votes cast, Ben-tivegna
held 63%, Canepa 28%
(387), and Bob Dube 8.5% (119).
Seven votes were cast for various
other persons. Bentivegna carried
every dorm with the exception of
Southeast and Julie Hall.
The breakdown of votes is as
follows: Campion- Mike 92, Janet
54, Bob 10; Gonzaga- Mike 78,
Janet 45, Bob 14; Loyola- Mike 105,
Janet 18, Bob 13, Other 2; Regis-
Mike 139, Janet 40, Bob 14, Other
1; Julie Hall- Mike 15, Janet 20,
Bob 3; Northwest- Mike 123, Janet
44, Bob 13; Fareast- Mike 69, Janet
38, Bob 21, Other 1; Southeast-
Mike 57, Janet 68, Bob 2, Other 3;
Off-Campus Boarders- Mike 173,
Janet 45, Bob 24; Commuters-
Mike 25, Janet 15, Bob 5.
Following the confirmation of
his winning Bentivegna stated,
"Thanks to all who helped. I ap-preciate
it a lot." He said that he is
"serious on the platform ideas. I
would't have put them in if they
were not feasable." One of Ben-tivegna's
hopes is to research into
the current system of course
registration. He also plans to look
into the high cost of main-tenances
charges that plague
most dorm residents.
Bentivegna has in his plans a
survey to be taken which will
determine the University's party
regulations to be reasonable or
not. Once completed, any changes
that are deemed necessary can be
handled by the new administra-tion.
For OCBs and Commuters the
new President has outlined
daytime programming to increase
interest in various SEC and FUSA
events. Also for these two groups
is the possibility of a one-meal
plan consisting of daily lunches.
One last part of the new ad-ministration's
platform deals with
the idea of expanding the week-end
hours of the Stag-Her Inn and
the opening of a ticket booth in
the Campus Center to sell tickets
for assorted events.
Bentivegna said, "I plan to get
active on these ideas when my ad-ministration
takes over. I look for-ward
to an easy and smooth tran-sition
with Andy McGowan." To
sum up his victory Bentivegna ex-claimed,
"I'm psyched to do the
job."
Ski Team Rescues Motorist
Michael Bentivegna dominated the polls Tuesday to become the Presi-dent
Elect of FUSA.
Bangkok Flu
Invades Campus
by Rich Swietek
For many Fairfield students the
return to classes following winter
break was interrupted due to an
outbreak of flu here at the univer-sity.
According to Dr. Sal Santella,
Director of Medical Services, most
cases seemed to resemble the
Bangkok Flu which has been in
the Fairfield area, but as of this
moment there has been no confir-mation
from cultures and tests run
on students from the university.
He also stated that those persons
with the virus usually suffer from a
combination of aches, headaches,
chills, fever, an occasional sore
throat, and a cough which is felt
(continued on page 2)
by Marguerite Downing
The Fairfield University Ski
Team may not have placed first in
their competition this weekend,
but their successful efforts to
save the life of a burning accident
victim placed them well above any
others who may have been driving
through Norwalk Saturday night.
At approximately 12:45 a.m.
Sunday morning, returning from a
race in Hidden Valley in New
Jersey, the Fairfield University Ski
Team observed a disabled car and
a man burning on the side of the
New York State Thruway. Senior
David ("Vid") Margarone reported
that the man was "lit up." Accor-ding
to Patricia Sullivan, another
ski team member, the victim's
coat, stomach, and leg were on
fire. Patricia noted that it was dark
out and difficult for her and the
others to make out at first that
there was any wire near or on the
man. She stated, "Our first reac-tion
was to grab him, it didn't oc-cur
to us that he had a current go-ing
through him."
Margarone made the first at-tempt
to save the man. He re-ported
that he "grabbed him" and
the voltage that was flowing
through the victim almost sent
David to the ground. Shortly after,
the members of the ski team were
able to remove the high voltage
line causing the fire from the
man's body using rocks as their
tools. The students immediately
summoned an ambulance to the
scene.
According to another passenger
in the victim's car, the two had
struck a light pole. En route to get
help, the victim had become en-tangled
with the live electrical
wire, and was rendered un-conscious.
Sullivan, a sophomore, was
distressed that the ski team was
the only car that stopped to aid in
the situation. She said, "We were
amazed that no one else stopped.
People had driven by before we ar-rived,
but no one stopped. It seem-ed
like forever before help arrived.
It was awful."
Margarone observed tha the vic-tim
had sustained a one-inch la-ceration
in his leg. According to
the Nursing Supervisor of Norwalk
Hospital the victim, identified as
21-year-old Brendan Kelly, is con-scious
and in satisfactory condi-tion.
Harrington: America Headed For Serious Trouble
by Jean Leber
Michael Harrington, left wing
Democrat and President of the Na-tional
Democratic Socialist Organ-izing
party was the distinguished
speaker in the Oak Room on Tues-day,
February 3 at;8 p.m.
Stressing his anti-capitalist
views, Mr. Harrington promoted
his belief that the United States is
at a point of great structural
change and is heading for serious
trouble under the Reagan ad-ministration.
The lecture covered
such topics as our economic
state, our domestic social crisis,
and our international relations.
With regard to economics, Mr.
Harrington believes that in our
capitalistic society, corporations
have too much power in money
and resource allocation. Their pro-fit
consciousness has cheapened
the quality of our lives through in-ferior
quality products. According
to Harrington, "the allocation of
money in our society is decided in
the corporate boardrooms. The go-vernment
doesn't allocate re-sources
but rather makes econo-mic
and fiscal policies for corpora-tions."
Capitalism, according to Mr.
Harrington, has also created other
problems such as lack of a na-tional
health system and the
energy crisis. His party supports
the view that the U.S. has such an
extreme crisis due to the deterior-ation
of railroads and mass tran-sit,
both destroyed by an over-abundance
of corporate power.
Regarding the Reagan adminis-tration,
Harrington believes that
Reagan's cut in government
spending will cause the elderly on
social security to suffer, while the
cut in corporate taxes will result in
the corporations increasing their
poor distribution of wealth. In-stead
of giving the corporations
money to plan socially beneficial
things he would rather see the fe-deral
government do the
spending.
On the international scene, Har-rington
feels that the U.S. is not as
far advanced as it once was. Pre-sently
European and Japanese
steel industries outstrip the U.S.
He also stated that one way of
bringing more revenue into the
U.S. would be by helping the third
world countries develop technolo-gically,
since they would have to
look to the U.S. for certain
materials.
Harrington's lecture ended with
the plea for an alternative to
Reagan through the collective ef-forts
of people. He believes that
political movements can create a
social atmosphere to solve the
moral problem facing America.
"The 1980s will be a decade of tur-moil
and change," he concluded.
Renowed socialist philosopher Michael Harrington addresses Oak
Room audience Tuesday, February 3. [Photo by Patty Lanza]