A couple weeks ago my friend Aaron and I were conversing in a bar just outside the gates of campus. A middle-aged man approached us and asked us if we were Vassar students. We told him we were and he proceeded to make small talk, moving closer to us with each question. My friend and I exchanged looks of annoyance and hoped the man would soon be on his way. Little did we know what would come next.

On Sept. 2 a two-year-old search for a man suspected of kidnapping and murdering eight Poughkeepsie, N.Y. women came to a close when police raided his home near Vassar and discovered their bodies. The past couple months have been filled with the inevitable shock and uproar from the community. (For more on the story, see http://www.pojonews.com/missing.)

The man in the bar proceeded to query us about the murders and asked if we knew how close the house was to us. He explained that a friend of his was planning on renting the house (from whom and how had apparently never crossed his mind), building mannequins in likeness of the eight women, positioning them where their bodies were found inside the house, and opening it up as a tourist attraction on Halloween night.

Disgusted, we told him we weren't even remotely interested. He then had the nerve to tell us that if we wanted, he could get us $5 off the admission price his friend wanted to charge.

I never cease to be amazed by the sick minds of this world.

Thanks for reading, and have a great week! (And may all your business ventures not involve corpses.)

-Gabe

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- In an election year, just about everybody -- voters, pollsters, political consultants and candidates -- says they don't like negative advertising. So how come each election has its share of TV "hit" ads?

The answer is simple: Because they work.

Take the U.S. Senate race between incumbent Democrat Barbara Boxer and Republican challenger Matt Fong.

For months, polls have showed the two locked in a dead-heat race, although Fong appeared to have momentum on his side.

But in the last two weeks, their roles have been reversed: Statistically, the two are nearly tied, but now it is Boxer who appears to be on the march.

In part, that's because the impact on California's Senate race of the scandal involving President Clinton and former White House intern Monica Lewinsky has diminished. It was once an issue that smothered all other issues, but now a majority of likely voters surveyed by a number of pollsters say it will not affect their decision on Election Day.

But the bigger reason is the kind of advertising Boxer and state Democrats have been running: It has been aggressive, negative and pervasive, hitting Fong on assault weapons, HMO reform and toxic wastes. Those warm, fuzzy introductory ads that Boxer ran early in the campaign have been replaced by direct hits on Fong, who has been unable to respond effectively.

One ad that targeted Fong's position on HMOs even prompted complaints of racism from the Chinese American candidate, who contended that it used racial images and suggested that he was "foreign."

Fong has launched his own negative advertising blitz, accusing Boxer of favoring soft-on-crime judges, for example, but it appears to have been overwhelmed by the Boxer barrage.

In effect, Boxer has been able to do exactly what political consultants said she had to do to mount an effective campaign. She has shifted the focus of the Senate race from her own negatives, of which there were many, to Fong, whom she contends is too conservative for the California electorate.

The final week of the campaign is all but certain to see more of the same, and the key now is money.

Barring a surprise infusion of funds from the Senate's Republican campaign committee or the Republican National Party, Fong is likely to have about $1 million to spend through next Tuesday on TV ads. But Boxer will have about double that, perhaps even more, because of the fund-raising swing that President Clinton made through California over the weekend.

The final week before Election Day is when voters really begin focusing on the campaigns, and what they're going to see in the Senate race is a carpet-bombing of advertising, most of it negative, aimed at Fong.

The 30-second TV ads, of course, do little to educate voters about who is the better candidate, and voters who rely on them for factual information are doomed to disappointment.

But at this point in the election the candidates are not out to educate anybody. They are out to persuade people to vote for them and, once again, negative ads seem to be giving them the best ammunition.

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