A Sampling of Clips for 
February 23, 2006

* UCSD faculty and staff may obtain a copy of an article by e-mailing the University Communications Office

Homeland Security: U.S.-Mexico Border Woes
The New York Times, Feb. 22 -- The U.S. economy depends on unskilled labor in dozens of industries, including agriculture, construction, the hospitality industry, and child care. For these jobs, the United States relies heavily on the ten to eleven million illegal immigrants currently in the country. A majority of this population is from Mexico, and more migrants make the dangerous border crossing each year. As attention focuses on border control, the Senate is considering a bill that would make it a crime to employ or aid an illegal immigrant. (Cites a study by Wayne Cornelius, a political science professor and director of the Center for Comparative Immigration Studies at UCSD.) More 

Cigarette Promotions Successfully
Target Certain Groups, Study Finds
Health Behavior News Service, Feb. 23 -- Promotional offers from cigarette makers are used by more than one-third of smokers, a new study finds, and are most likely to be used by young adults and African-Americans. “Our results provide strong evidence that tobacco industry promotional offers are particularly appealing to certain market segments,” say researchers led by Elizabeth A. Gilpin, M.S., of the cancer center at UCSD. More 

Bay Area Lawmaking
The Weird and the Wonderful
KTLA News, Feb. 23 -- City Councilwoman Jane Brunner never imagined that her idea of a fast-food trash tax might tumble cross-country like a castoff Big Mac wrapper. Her proposal to charge restaurant chains and corner markets to pay crews to pick up the litter from their products, she says, was simply a common-sense solution to a mounting local trash problem — not a template for dealing with urban litter coast to coast. But the Bay Area has earned a national reputation for concocting cutting-edge laws that raise public awareness and the occasional skeptical eyebrow. Before it was passed Tuesday by the Oakland City Council, Brunner's trash tax had prompted copy-cat calls from curious city officials in half a dozen states. (Quotes UCSD political scientist Thad Kousser.) More 

Bush Renewable Energy Plan Rapped
San Diego Union-Tribune, Feb. 23 -- The county's environmental leaders greeted President Bush's vision for renewable energy with skepticism yesterday when U.S. Interior Secretary Gale Norton pitched the plan in La Jolla. The Advanced Energy Initiative doesn't promote nonpetroleum energy sources enough, they said, and won't wean the country from its dependence on oil and coal quickly enough. Environmentalists nationwide have expressed similar criticism. (Event was hosted by UCSD's Scripps Institution of Oceanography.) More 

Playing It Unsafe
San Diego City Beat, Feb. 23 -- New HIV cases dropped in the ’90s, but ‘prevention fatigue’ – a phrase coined by Diane Pendragon, a clinical psychologist at the Anti-Viral Research Center at UCSD -- has the disease back on the rise. More 

Senators Displeased with UC’s Leadership
San Diego Union-Tribune, Feb. 23 -- University of California leaders faced sharp rebukes once again by state senators yesterday, with some criticizing UC President Robert Dynes' leadership and others questioning whether UC's governing board is serving its purpose. In the second and final hearing scheduled by the Senate Education Committee on UC compensation matters, several senators said they were dissatisfied with how Dynes has worked to correct extravagant paid-leave arrangements and outside compensation for chancellors – none of which were reported to regents or the public. (Mentions UCSD Chancellor Marye Anne Fox.) More