StrangeSox

QUOTE (HickoryHuskers @ Sep 3, 2014 -> 02:24 PM) Well, I would guess you might have a difficult time finding many, if any, people in academic positions at Berkeley that has ever publicly expressed a conservative viewpoint. I'm not sure what Berkeley has to do with this, but John "torture memos" Yoo has been a law professor there since the 90's.

QUOTE (HickoryHuskers @ Sep 3, 2014 -> 02:04 PM) Well, I've never heard of this kind of thing happening at ND with regards to an academic position, but there are hundreds of people in administrative positions at ND because of connections to wealthy donors. Oh absolutely. That's how the boards at most of these schools get staffed. But when it comes to free speech and academic positions, there's actually a lot of case law that says public schools cannot base hiring/firing decisions on viewpoints. Far from happening all the time, like jenks said, it's actually explicitly illegal to do so.

Johnathan Adler just commented on this case over at the Volokh Conspiracy, and his post contains numerous links to other sources/discussions. Adler's a conservative legal scholar who's work is at the heart of the Halbig challenge to Obamacare's subsidies, so it's not just a bunch of liberal or leftist professors who have strong concerns about UIUC's actions. Adler quotes from FIRE, an organization concerned with free speech on campuses that more often than not takes up conservative causes:

all this talk of the terrible Cowboy's D has me wondering, Luck (against Denver) or Kapernick this week?

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 3, 2014 -> 12:25 PM) By your logic, you vote for different politicians to influence school policy. Yes, and? I'm in favor of democratic accountability, especially for public institutions. edit: I should clarify a bit there that I don't think academic decisions should be subject to political pressure or changes. I think where we got off though was the correct idea that public institutions can be unduely influenced by politicians/public officials. While that's true, we also have a direct recourse for that (elections), whereas there's not really anything we can do about private donor influence.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 3, 2014 -> 12:22 PM) Frankly, there's so little money contributed to most public colleges these days by the state governments that it almost seems like we should. At some point it's going to happen that a major state school is going to kick its state government out of its management on those grounds if they can fill in the small money difference. UIUC it's down to here. I want to say that ptact mentioned something about GSU considering doing this.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Sep 3, 2014 -> 12:15 PM) Let's pretend this guy said something borderline racist/homophobic/sexist, yet the school still wanted to hire him because he's an "important scholar." I'm sure you'd be 100% behind him, right? Because donors/alumni shouldn't pressure the admin to get rid of someone they like, right? Come on, you know that's BS. This guy said some controversial things to a group of people. They complained. The admin reacted. Change the statements to whatever you want and this stuff happens all the time. There are plenty of examples of professors out there who continue to hold tenured positions despite saying awful things. Either way, I don't think donors should be able to use their wealth to create pressure over the school, period. This guy said some things on twitter, not to a group of people directly. The admin then reacted, sure, but they flailed around a lot and have offered several different flimsy excuses for their actions. As far as I'm aware, this doesn't very often at all in academia, and when it does, there's usually a lot of backlash.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 3, 2014 -> 12:11 PM) Except you have the choice to go to or support another university. You don't have the choice for another politician. The one in office is the one you are stuck with. That's not true for public institutions. U of I is getting my tax dollars regardless of my current opinion of my alma matter. I'm only stuck with the current politicians in office until the next election, when I will again get a voice in the matter. I will never have a voice in wealthy alumni using their donations to influence how our public universities are run, though.

One lesson everyone can take away from this, though: don't ever try to make a nuanced argument on twitter.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Sep 3, 2014 -> 12:07 PM) What I meant by that is that I don't think there's a realistic fear that major donors are getting people hired/fired for random reasons. Here there's a person making controversial and borderline anti-semetic remarks and people who contribute a good sum of their hard earned money don't want their school hiring someone like that. It's no different than donors being pissed with athletic programs are bringing in bad kids or other teachers/students make racist/sexist remarks. You can't expect to be shielded by some professor bubble just because you work at a school. If a client of your employer learned that you were making public comments they didn't agree with and they threated to move their business elsewhere, i'd have no problem with your employer getting rid of you. That's the way the world works. Obviously a school is not a business, but you're talking about alumni who are very involved in funding the school and allowing it to operate. I'm not saying the school should follow the donor's wishes all the time, but should it be a consideration? Absolutely. You need to keep your donors and alumni base happy. And if enough of them complain, you should act. But the academic world really is different, and academic freedom/tenure protections are hugely important. If you aren't guaranteed some sort of protection from being fired for saying unpopular things, there will be a chilling effect on controversial and innovative research. Ok, well I disagree. I don't think the admin should follow every command of the donor, but they should at least listen to them and consider them. I think that the reality is that they absolutely do have to listen to them. What I'm saying is that it would be better if our public education system wasn't so reliant on private donations so that they wouldn't have to do what donors want.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 3, 2014 -> 12:03 PM) This was done in IL by many politicians. Should we remove governmental oversight of the public schools? No. But public officials are at least ostensibly accountable to the citizens; we all have some say in who gets elected. Private wealthy donors are not.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Sep 3, 2014 -> 11:39 AM) edit: You can't tell from the article what the donations were for, but I guess we can surmise that most were general donations. I still don't really have a problem with it, especially if you've got a bunch of high level donors making the same complaint. If the hire is saying controversial things, he's going to have to deal with people not liking them. That's the nature of speech. What if the guy went on a moronic misogynist rant about rape or naked pictures being leaked or something and a bunch of female donors, alumni and students voiced their concerns? Should those concerns not be considered either? It's not that he has to "deal" with people not liking him, it's that UIUC is now losing someone who they viewed as an important scholar in his field because some wealthy donors don't like the things he said on twitter. Even more damaging, it sheds a very negative light on the school in academia and can impact their ability to attract top scholars in the future. I'll let the letter from the American Historical Association, the professional body for historians, explain:

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Sep 3, 2014 -> 11:39 AM) I mean in conspiracy theory land I could see a problem with it, but not really in the real world. What do you mean conspiracy theory land? There is an ongoing case in the real world where an academic hiring is being reversed due to pressure from wealthy alums. There was also the eventually failed attempt to remove UVA's president in 2012 that was at least partially influenced by two wealthy donors. I don't think running public institutions on that sort of patronage system is a good model. It leads to corruption and undue influence. I see no reason why a donation to UIUC should buy you a say in who they hire. You do know that most (if not all?) public schools have had their funding cut repeatedly over the years and that rising tuition rates reflect that, right? There are other causes as well (bloated admin salaries and head counts), but loss of public funding is a major part.

Do you think it's good for wealthy alumni to be able to control academic hiring decisions? Might it be better for these institutions to not have to rely so heavily on donations?

QUOTE (witesoxfan @ Sep 3, 2014 -> 10:50 AM) First Breaking Madden of the year yessssssssss http://www.sbnation.com/2014/9/3/6074263/b...adeveon-clowney

Speaking of UIUC, they've opened up a s***storm of academic/professional backlash against the administration there over their decision to "dehire" a new professor who had accepted a tenured position over some harsh tweets about Israel/Palestine. There was a big document dump of emails thanks to some FOIA requests, and what's pretty clear is that some wealthy donor alums have enough power and influence over educational institutions that they can control academic hiring decisions. http://www.news-gazette.com/news/local/201...onors-fury.html

how does leaguesafe actually make money?

The Red Line Project has a guide to the local and state races, my friend's one of the authors http://redlineproject.org/election2014guide.php

The occasional sloppy game is fun because it's a novelty. If it became routine,it would suck.

isn't his beer terrible?

Stephen Colbert is hilarious.

not thrilled with my first draft, picking right in the middle of the order sucks. 12 teams, non-ppr QB-Cam Newton WR-Vincent Jackson WR-Torrey Smith RB-Marshawn Lynch RB-Alfred Morris TE-Martellus Bennett WR/RB/TE-CJ Spiller K-Nick Folk DEF-Kansas Bench: Golden Tate Anquan Boldin christine michael Khiry Robinson Bernard Pierce

I didn't know Buzzfeed did long-form journalism, but I thought this look inside The Villages, a retirement community in central Florida that's the largest in the country, was really interesting. Not necessarily partisan political, but didn't know where else to dump it. http://www.buzzfeed.com/likethebreadorthed...retirem#2gg4dcz

People are busy doing stuff over Labor Day weekend, though. I don't know how many people have big plans for September 8th that would drive down NFL ratings.

Pennsylvania’s GOP governor will expand Medicaid to 300,000 poor people