Author: jplucas

Quoted: Jeff Kirsch, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor of Spanish and Portuguese.

Quoted: Larry Hunter, a management professor at the University of Wisconsin.

Quoted: Peter Carstensen, a University of Wisconsin law professor.

Most people who serve on juries have never seen a real trial, and their expectations about trials are shaped by the stereotypes they see on these types of TV shows, said UW- Madison journalism professor Douglas McLeod.

Darrell Bazzell, who led a special city committee that studied the proposal, said the move is a good opportunity to deliver more services and shake up a status quo that has left minorities dissatisfied with their quality of life.

A UW-Madison professor of bioethics, Pilar Ossario, said face transplants present a different set of ethical questions than those associated with other types of transplants.

Ossario commented on a national report that two medical centers are close to moving forward on a controversial face transplant procedure.

Laura Jull, UW-Madison horticulture assistant professor and extension specialist, estimates Dane County residents spent $118 million on the green industry in 2002.

Barry Gerhart, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor and author of two books on CEO pay, said part of the CEO’s mission in a post-Enron environment is “staying out of trouble” from an ethical or corporate governance standpoint.

Gerhart also said a lot of corporate leaders have technical and financial skills, but the best know how to get employees on board with the company’s vision and then carry it out.

If the federal government ends up with a hollow victory in its case against the tobacco industry, or if it loses the case altogether, an important part of the blame should go to what the Justice Department did or, rather, failed to do in its closing argument last week.
When department lawyers summed up their racketeering case against tobacco companies, they appeared set to demand $130 billion from the industry over 25 years to fund a national campaign to help people quit smoking. The $130 billion was the recommendation from their own key witness UW- Madison Professor Michael Fiore.

The mayor’s plan is supported by prominent minority leaders like LaMarr Billups, a special assistant to the chancellor at UW-Madison, and Steve Braunginn, former director of the Madison Urban League.

It’s a question Dane County has studied for 13 years: How can its courts ensure that trials are not heard by all-white juries?
While no clear answer has been found, one factor has persisted: About half of the jury summonses sent to potential minority jurors do not reach them because of outdated addresses on the state Department of Transportation lists provided to courts.

“Everybody knows what the problem is,” said Jim Cooley, a UW-Madison Law School professor with the school’s legal defense program. “For minorities, they have to move far more often than stable, white, middle-class folks.”

Why are there so few G rated movies? And does the rating mean what it used to? The Dove Foundation, a conservative advocacy group in Michigan, recently released a study stating that G-rated movies are nearly 11 times more profitable than R-rated films.

Joanne Cantor is Professor Emerita at the UW-Madison, and an expert on on children and the mass media. “One reason may be, the ones that do come out are making so much money (because) there are so few of them, that’s there’s not a lot of competition.” Cantor said parents who want to take their young kids to a movie this summer should also be aware of what’s being called “ratings creep.”