With the presidential campaign entering its final weeks, the following experts at the University of California, Santa Cruz, are available for media interviews on the following topics:
Bush vs. Kerry
Michael Brown, professor of politics, can compare and analyze the candidates' positions on domestic policies, including taxes, the federal budget and the deficit, and Social Security privatization. He is an expert on voter behavior, party coalitions, patterns of party identification over the past 30 years, and shifts in voter identification, such as the growing number of high-income Democrats.
Office: (831) 459-2052
E-mail: popcorn@ucsc.edu
Daniel Wirls, professor of politics, is an expert on the presidency and Congress. He is also knowledgeable about the role of gender in elections, and public opinion and the political process.
Office: (831) 459-2134
E-mail: wirls@ucsc.edu
John M. Doris, associate professor of philosophy, believes people overestimate the impact of character and underestimate the impact of situations. In his book, Lack of Character: Personality and Moral Behavior, Doris writes that circumstance has a large impact on how people behave, regardless of their character.
Office: (831) 459-5676
E-mail: jmdoris@ucsc.edu
Pedro Castillo, associate professor of history, specializes in Latino politics and can discuss the impact of voter registration and get-out-the-vote strategies in battleground states. He also has expertise on the power of Spanish-language media in politics. He is a member of the National Democratic Committee.
E-mail: pcastle@ucsc.edu
Office phone: (831) 459-2738; (831) 459-2769
Voting Problems
Paul Ortiz, a voting rights specialist and an assistant professor of community studies, is an expert on the disenfranchisement of African American voters. Ortiz's forthcoming book, "Emancipation Betrayed: The Hidden History of Black Organizing and White Violence in Florida from Reconstruction to the Bloody Election of 1920," describes the 1920 election in Florida when white supremacists and the Ku Klux Klan violently--and with state sanction--prevented African Americans from voting. "There is a pattern of disenfranchising blacks, although the methods change," says Ortiz.
Office: (831) 459-5583
E-mail: portiz@ucsc.edu
Arthur Keller is one of many computer scientists who say the widespread adoption of touch-screen voting machines since the 2000 election raises serious security, reliability, and accountability issues. Keller, a visiting associate professor of computer science, is vice president for finance and administration of the Open Voting Consortium, a leader in the development of open-source voting software. He is leading the development of an open-source PC-based voting system based on an accessible voter-verified paper ballot, a prototype of which was called a "touch-screen holy grail" by the San Jose Mercury News.
E-mail: ark@soe.ucsc.edu
Home office: (650) 424-0202
Foreign Policy and Iraq
Ronnie Lipschutz, a professor of politics, is an expert on international affairs, peacemaking, and conflict resolution.
Office: (831) 459-3275
E-mail: rlipsch@ucsc.edu
Paul Lubeck, a professor of sociology, specializes in Islamic social movements and religious and social diversity within the Islamic world.
Office: (831) 459-2906
E-mail: lubeck@ucsc.edu
Jobs and the U.S. Economy
Lori Kletzer, professor of economics, is a labor economist who specializes in outsourcing. Named by the National Journal as a top expert whose ideas will shape the debate over the U.S. workforce, Kletzer codeveloped a wage-insurance plan designed to help workers who are displaced by outsourcing.
Office: (831) 459-3596
E-mail: lkletzer@ucsc.edu
Manuel Pastor, professor of Latin American and Latino studies, can discuss what's at stake for Americans in the election, from jobs to the deficit, immigration policy, civil liberties, and race relations. Pastor, an economist, is director of the UCSC Center for Justice, Tolerance, and Community.
Office: (831) 459-5919
E-mail: mpastor@ucsc.edu
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Contact: Jennifer McNulty (831) 459-2495; jmcnulty@ucsc.edu
