The LA Times has an article on the College Republican's march down Telegraph, as does the Patriot. The Republicans were here for a long-planned College Convention, enthusiastically playing up the 'Republicans? In Berkeley?' theme. (The Conference was named 'Behind Enemy Lines.) The march went down Telegraph, yelled at hippies for a bit, then went back. Some idiot was waving a 'Peace sign = Swastika' sign, which the Republicans should be embarassed about.

Both the Times and the Patriot use the opportunity to survey the changing face of campus. The Times makes the obvious points: it's more Asian now, faculty are more to the left then the students, Sproul has more Christian groups then political ones, plus this nice quote:

The noontime information tables in Sproul Plaza, Brady noted, are much more likely to be set up by fundamentalist Christian groups and Asian ethnic societies than by the leftist political splinter groups of years past. "There's no longer any appreciable interest in socialist movements or groups, such as the SDS" -- Students for Democratic Society -- Brady said, "although those groups are still there."

This one is good too:

"I get the sense the community is much more into protest than the campus," Leonard said. "There is a culture of protest in the Bay Area that is steadily getting grayer and older."

Heck, the community is antagonistic to the campus.

The open question is still: where do the Republicans go from here? At a certain point being an oppositional group becomes hard to swallow: The Republicans have some 500 members, consistently hold ASUC spots, and are sufficently confident about their popularity that they'll run for Executive office. More to the point, the Republicans depend on members who come to Berkeley already Republican and with a chip on their shoulder, without a high conversion rate. Continued growth in membership will have to come from conversions and 'borderline' Republicans, like the Asian Christians. Still a pretty white group on Sproul yesterday. Email This Post!