The Muhlenberg Weekly

Issue date: 1/31/08 Section: News

Mon., Jan 28 was President Bush's last State of the Union address, ever. In recognition of this event, Colleges Against Cancer (CAC) and the College Democrats (Dems) teamed up to host a group viewing of the address in the Red Door. When asked about the origination and unusual partnership of groups for this event, Bari Lasky '10, Advocacy Chair for CAC said, "The American Cancer Society (ACS), CAC's parent organization, likes CAC to hold one event per month for each of the pillars of the club (advocacy, survivorship, mission delivery). One of ACS's suggestions for this month was to have a State of the Union watch party. I loved the idea and decided to put it together. When thinking of publicity, I thought that it would be nice to have some of the more politically active people on campus join us and spoke to Adrian Shanker, Vice President of the College Democrats."

What is most unlikely about these two groups coming together for a mutual event is that CAC is a non-partisan group; however, regardless of political agendas, members of both organizations shared an interest in what the President had to say on Mon. night. Hosting the State of the Union address is not an annual tradition for the College Dems, but they were proud to co-host along with CAC. "This State of the Union is particularly important as it is Bush's last one, and for that we are celebrating," said Shanker.

On the night of the address the College Dems were raring to go with State of the Union bingo cards for anyone wishing to play along with Bush's speech, and a laptop was hooked up to a live blog so that they could share their thoughts and receive feedback with other Democratic supporters. Following the President's speech, CAC called into a conference call that ACS was holding to discuss the implications that Bush's projections hold for healthcare. Due to ACS's charter status it cannot lobby or hold politicians accountable for their voting records.

Fortunately, for ACS, the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACSCAN), the non-partisan, non-profit sister organization of ACS, is able to train members to speak for ACS and then go to legislatures to advocate laws and policies that will help people fight cancer.

In addition to this month's Advocacy event, CAC also held its Purple 101 event on Tues. Jan. 29. Last year was CAC's first in "painting the campus purple" and it was so successful that the group received national recognition for their efforts being named the best Purple 101 in the state of Pennsylvania.

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