Shots In The Dark
Please, Make Him Stop
Fabricator Jayson Blair has written a column for
bp, a magazine for people with bipolar disorder. (Blair, you will remember, was the
New York Times reporter who plagiarized other people's work and claimed to be reporting from places he'd never even visited.)
In the past, Blair has blamed racism for his downfall at the
Times. Now he says it's because he suffers from bipolar disorder. This strikes me as an insult to people who really are the victims of racism or bipolar disorder.
I don't believe that journalists who make mistakes should be driven from the business forever, doomed to life as a publicist or monk. I'm glad that former
New Republic plagiarist Ruth Shalit has been given a second chance, and I was willing to be open-minded about former New Republic (and George) fabricator Stephen Glass when he returned with a novel,
The Fabulist. But still...would it be so hard to say, "I was young and incredibly ambitious, and I responded by lying and making things up"?
Apparently, yes. Better to blame the disease.
Harvard Rules...in the Wall Street Journal
Michael Steinberger, a senior correspondent for the American Prospect, has a piece in today's Wall Street Journal on why Harvard gets so much ink. He mentions
Harvard Rules and Ross Douthat's
Privilege, of course, as examples of the media paying attention to Harvard. But before launching into his explanation, he first argues that Harvard doesn't deserve all the attention it gets.
According to Steinberger, Harvard:
--doesn't produce presidents the way it used to
--doesn't produce business leaders very often, and when it does, they underperform businesspeople from other schools
--doesn't lead in technological innovation
--it isn't as intellectually influential as it used to be
In short, "Harvard is diminishing in importance as a factory for ideas and a breeding ground for future leaders."
But what do you really think, Mr. Steinberger?
Well, apparently he thinks that the prevalence of Harvard grads in the media (he's not one) helps explain the media's attention to Harvard.
Sometimes, certainly. Another reason, I think, is the name brand quality of the university. A third reason is that the university is still excellent in so many ways.
But say for the sake of argument that Steinberger's right about Harvard's diminishing centrality. The question then becomes, is Larry Summers' presidency addressing these issues?
And I don't ask that question rhetorically... It is, really, Harvard's most important question, and I don't think there's a simple yes or no answer.
The Harvard AIDS Scandal--400 Dead?
The Crimson estimates today that up to 400 people may have died while waiting for AIDS drugs from Harvard—drugs that never reached them, because Larry Summers delayed the purchase of those drugs for five months after Harvard received grant money from the federal government.
As reporter May Habib puts it, "Mass Hall delayed the funding until it imposed a structure that placed more administrative control over the grant in the hands of University officials."
For "University officials," you can substitute the words "Larry Summers."
(Come to think of it, you can substitute "Larry Summers" for the words "Mass Hall," too, so that the sentence should really read: "Larry Summers delayed the funding until he imposed a structure that placed more administrative control over the grant in the hands of Larry Summers.")
But Summers has done a remarkable job of distancing himself from this story. He's never been quoted (that I've seen) on any aspect of it. Instead, he's gotten provost Stephen Hyman and even Corporation member Jamie Houghton to speak to the press. He even has his new spokesman, someone named John Longbrake, speaking on the record. Everyone but the ultimate authority.
As I've noted before, Hyman has given a multiplicity of excuses to explain the five-month delay, one of which directly contradicts a quote from Jamie Houghton, the Corporation's senior fellow.
This Crimson article adds yet another: "Hyman has said that the University was concerned that anti-retroviral drugs purchased through the grant...would end up on the black market and that patients who began treatment would have to stop because of shortages or supply chain problems."
So...the logical option is just to let them die?
The most heartbreaking thing about this article is the plaintive quality of the quotes from those who had hands-on contact with the African patients. "They basically held us hostage," Nigerian program director Robert Murphy said of Mass Hall. "They didn't draw down on the funds, they delayed until the very end...."
Meanwhile, many of the health care workers in Nigeria were working without pay for months because Harvard wouldn't initiate the program...but they knew that without their help, people would die.
This One's for the Birds
How can you not love this story? An ivory-billed woodpecker, thought to be extinct for 60 years, is spotted deep in an Arkansas swamp. Naturalists keep the sighting secret for a year while they work to confirm the sighting. And—good heavens—Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton, who's generally more interested in pillaging the environment than protecting it, announces that the government is going to contribute ten million bucks to preserving land for the bird.
We will always need wonder and mystery in life, and a story like this helps make us feel that, as much as we've trashed the planet, perhaps there's still hope left. Here's my favorite quote:
<<"Frank Gill, former president of the National Audubon Society, said of the news, "You get so depressed by the state of things, to suddenly have this happen in your backyard" is wonderful, "just the thought that there are places in the world still—deep wilderness—harboring a secret like this.">>
Well said, Mr. Gill.
The Harvard AIDS Scandal, Cont'd.
In John Donnelly's April 24 Boston Globe piece on the AIDS scandal at Harvard, provost Stephen Hyman gave this explanation for why the university waited five months after receiving a federal grant before beginning to purchase AIDS drugs for dying Africans:
<<"One major concern for Summers and members of the Joint Committee of Inspections, a Harvard audit board, was whether the US government or patients could sue Harvard for any perceived future problems, Hyman said. In 2000, the US government had sued Harvard for alleged misuse of federal funds in a development grant in Russia. 'That lawsuit sensitized [Larry Summers] enormously for the need for Harvard to do this right,' Hyman said.">>
But just three days before that, on April 21, Corporation senior fellow Jamie Houghton told the Crimson something very different.
<<...James R. Houghton '58 said the University's actions on the Kanki grant were not related to the HIID investigation [of Harvard in Russia]. "It was a large grant that we just felt in that part of that world needed controls," Houghton said. "I don't think that that's an abridgement of academic freedom at all.">>
Well, gentlemen—which is it? A "major concern" or a non-issue? If you're going to craft a message to explain this tragic inaction, everyone involved has to stick to it. Otherwise, it looks like you're not telling the truth.
Regardless of whatever impact the HIID fiasco had, one can't help but wonder: If those people dying of AIDS happened to live in, say, Boston, instead of Africa, would Harvard have waited for five months before purchasing medicine that could have saved their lives?
One suspects that legal concerns, if any actually existed, would probably have mattered less if it it were white Americans who were dying, rather than black Africans.
Allston and Science, Part 2
Perhaps I was too glib before. Because the more I look at the Task Force on Science and Technology Report, the more I think it requires careful annotation. Turns out there's another between-the-lines implication that I missed at first glance: the further centralization of power in the hands of Larry Summers.
It works like this: the task force issued a "call for ideas" to the Harvard community, with a particular emphasis on proposals that cut across several schools and departments. (And here's a wonderful line:) "Meritorious proposals with a scope no greater than a single existing department were referred back to the relevant school."
What a lovely way of saying "rejected out of hand."
So only cross-departmental or -school proposals were considered. Aside from whatever intellectual merits this may have, it also promotes the dismantling of Harvard's every-tub-on-its-own-bottom structure and centralizes decision-making.
By making future projects cut across departments and schools, the individual department chairs and school deans become less powerful, and Larry Summers accrues more...especially since he'll be the one doling out the real estate. Those proposals, chairs, and deans which please him will get space. Those which don't...won't.
Tricky, eh? Larry Summers must have learned this tactic while back at Treasury, sneaking things through Congress by burying them in pages of legislation too numerous or boring for most people to read...
Schadenfreude, Part 2
Time's Matt Cooper, still going through legal hell trying to protect his sources, has dumped lawyer Floyd Abrams. Not that Matt cares, but I couldn't be more delighted. Abrams is—you heard it here first—a pompous, overrated hired gun, more interested in getting his name in the papers than being a careful and good lawyer. (Go ahead, Floyd, sue me.)
I have some firsthand experience here; Abrams once delivered an unhelpful opinion on a legal matter I was involved with, despite a blatant (and unacknowledged by him) conflict of interest.
Since then, though, I've paid some attention to what Abrams really does—primarily, coast on his reputation from his long-ago glory days as a guy who truly believed in freedom of the press. I wouldn't be at all surprised if Matt Cooper had discovered the same thing.
A Little Spinach with Your Pop Culture
Meanwhile, back at Harvard, the university "Task Force on Science and Technology" has released a report on the development of the Allston campus. It's too dry for me to sum up, so I'll just quote the Crimson's article today:
" A Harvard task force will recommend today that future Allston development be anchored around two science complexes of 500,000 square feet each, in which faculty from different fields will work collaboratively on several broad areas of interdisciplinary research."
The twelve-page document has a lot of filler, with lines like, "The Task Force found extraordinary variety in the subject, scale, and organization of research being conducted at the University." (Shocked, shocked.)
But between the lines, the implications of this report for Harvard are fascinating and profound. First, the projects it advocates will require staggering sums of money—in the billions of dollars, surely. Brace yourselves, Harvard alums—you know what's coming. But it will be interesting to see if the university develops new fundraising methods, and particularly closer partnerships with the private sector, to pay for all this.
Second, and perhaps most important, if anything like these proposals get built, the identity of Harvard will change fundamentally; it really will look a lot like MIT. From all I can tell, the Allston development includes no new growth for the humanities. So consider all the science that would be conducted on both sides of the Charles, and you can see that the identity of Harvard would become primarily that of a science and technology-oriented research university.
With particular emphasis, I should add, on the word university. This massive science complex would primarily engage graduate students, post-docs, and scientists. The importance of Harvard College—the sense that it is the university's crown jewel—would surely diminish.
The plot thickens, doesn't it?
The World's Most Annoying Trend
Pop-up ads that make noise, like the buzzing of a fly or the clicking of a camera shutter. Yes, ad geniuses, they get your attention—and make you instantly click away from the page that contains them.
(No link here, but don't worry: they'll find you.)
Sometimes I Get Out of My Apartment
Last night I was invited to the opening of a new downtown boutique called...Butik. I wish I could say that I was invited because of my great friendship with its owner, Danish model Helena Christensen, whom you may remember from the Chris Isaak video "Wicked Game," but no—a friend was organizing the event.
The long and narrow store is at 605 Hudson Street, but I could tell when I was getting close because of the crowd of smokers standing around outside. (Fashionistas are one of smoking's last holdouts in New York, perhaps the last upmarket profession where people still consider it chic to puff away.) Inside was a bar serving apple martinis and bottled water. The place was so crowded, I picked a spot and tried not to be moved.
I am a terrible guest at such things, because mostly I just stand around and gawk. But truth be told, there was a lot to gawk at, especially for someone who works from home most of the day. At 36—decrepit by model standards—Ms. Christensen is still stunning, and for a while she was standing with Iman greeting guests. (A gay man next to me was obsessed with Iman's voice, so I encouraged him to introduce himself. "I loved her in 'Out of Africa,'" he raved.) Every other guest seemed to be a model, which has the effect of making one realize just how much one does not. Even the men were models...or guys who looked like they make so much money, they don't need to be handsome to date models, which is another well-defined New York genre.
As for the merchandise...I couldn't see very much of it—some wrought iron chairs, a couple of old skirts—but from what I could see, it looked like a lot of stuff that I've thrown away over the years. (Well, not the skirts.) Nonetheless, I am told these
objets d'art are very glam right now. If you're in the market for it, and price is no object—or if you just hope to catch a peak of Helena Christensen—you could do worse than dropping by Butik.
After about half an hour, Iman left, and the spell was broken. I pushed my way through the crowd, past a harried waiter holding a tray of salmon tartare above his head while a horde of men clambered hungrily through the door. (Question: What kind of hors d'oeuvre do you serve a room full of models. Answer: No thank you, I'm not hungry right now.)
"I admire you for that," I told him. He winced and said, "It's not a very admirable position."
On finally getting outside, I passed a group of four men who looked like investment bankers just as one was saying, "Show me the money—I couldn't agree more. Show me the money.
Show me the money."
New York! It's a great city.
More Proof That Karma Does Exist
Katie Couric's troubles continue. She's less popular than Diane Sawyer! Everyone seems to think that she's gotten too big for her britches. Morning TV watcher Bill Kauzlarich of Farmington, Ill. tells USA Today, "I'm a big fan of Katie (love those legs and heels), but she sure seems full of herself." While Shirley White of Birmingham, Mich., adds, "Katie's style has evolved into a know-it-all interviewer who constantly speaks over her guests and at times comes off abrasive."
Those of you who've known me for some time will understand if I pause to enjoy a moment of schadenfreude....
Bye-Bye Bolton
There are times when a White House nomination gets blocked or otherwise derailed for all the wrong reasons—silly controversy, meaningless personal foibles, partisan bickering. What's happening to the Bolton nomination isn't one of those times. As the Senate expands its investigation of him, Bolton is twisting in the wind for all the right reasons. By temperament, he's not the right man for a diplomatic job; and as a longtime foe of the United Nations—not just critic, but foe—his nomination is an insult to that body. Moreover, he's driven by ideology rather than by judgment, and don't we have enough of that in this country as it is?
Bolton's nomination is toast. And if you're sensing that I'm happy about that, you're absolutely right.
It all makes me think that humility—as opposed to the arrogance of the people trying to thrust this noxious character down our throats—is really an underrated public virtue.
In Defense of Vomit
That's the headline on this Crimson column in defense of the protester at the CIA/Department of Homeland Security recruitment talk who made himself throw up into a bag, thereby bringing much opprobrium on the protesters and just generally grossing everyone out.
Key graf: "Like most people, I am uncomfortable with vomit. But what made the CIA/DHS protest so brilliantly inappropriate is exactly that it was so inappropriate. The vomit jolted students into paying attention. ...Vomit may not be pretty, but vomit works."
I, too, am uncomfortable with vomit, although as a former college student, I'm mildly familiar with it. So rather than go out on a limb and take an opinion on this important issue, I leave it up to you to decide....
Cornel of the South
Here's one review of a recent Cornel West speech at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro.
Key quote: "Anyone who came out to hear West would have found a patriotic and deeply religious man talking about democracy as a spiritual imperative in a way that is refreshingly - at times even jarringly - inclusive."
West had an audience of about 1,000....or about 300 more than Maureen Dowd when she visited UNCG.
Appeal to a popular audience is hardly the only measure of an academic's worth—although it does seem to be one that Larry Summers generally values—and it's certainly not the most important measure, but still, I wonder: Is there any current Harvard professor who could travel to the University of North Carolina, Greensboro, and draw a crowd of 1,000 people?
Which is not to slight Harvard professors, but merely to suggest that the banishment of Cornel West is a deep and ongoing loss for Harvard.
Come Back! Come Back!
This report by the Computing Research Association warns of a drop in the number of undergraduates interested in majoring in computer science. The drop applies to both genders, but it's particularly dramatic among women. Between 2000 and 2004, the number of men planning to major in comp sci declined 60 percent; between 1988 and 2004 (don't ask me why the dates are different), the number of women declined 80 percent.
Key quote: "The furor over recent remarks by Harvard University president Lawrence Summers about women's alleged inability to understand science is whispered to be making things worse."
There's no evidence presented for that claim, and I'm sure it would be nearly impossible to prove, but I'd like to see some substantiation.
Bottom line: "The number of total incoming freshmen last fall who felt they would probably major in computer science was just less than 1.5 percent of all enrolled freshmen."
I don't know if that number applies to Harvard. I do know that Larry Summers has pushed for the elimination of humanities departments with such low levels of interest....
Following the Money
Here's one Harvard alum, John J. Christman, class of 1955, who's so upset about the goings-on at Harvard that he's cutting off his checks to his alma mater and skipping his 50th reunion.
(Hmmmm...a member of the Harvard class of 1955 panned my book in the LA Times. Must be a cantankerous bunch.)
The unusual thing about this man is that he's not stopping giving because he's mad at Summers; he's stopping because he's ticked at the faculty.
Key graf: "The recent disrespectful antics of the Harvard faculty toward president Lawrence Summers have just turned me off completely. I know of only one way to get this situation turned around. That is for the alumni to shut off the money spigot."
Christman goes on to say, "This conclusion has not come to me recently. I have been disaffected since the nonsense of the 1960s was allowed to get totally out of control. The recent actions are only a manifestation of the fact that the inmates have taken over the asylum. The present faculty and fellow travelers are just the students of the 1960s who forced the university to do away with ROTC and establish such nonsensical courses as women's studies, black studies, etc."
Really, you can't make this stuff up.
Of course, Mr. Christman's decision to stop contributing to Harvard will probably hurt the president he wants to support....
Pushing a Snowball Down a Hill
The UK publication Medical News Today picks up the story of the Harvard AIDS scandal. But where are two logical outlets, the New York Times and the Washington Post? The Times should cover the story because of its inherent importance, and the Post has a local angle—how a university mismanaged a government grant, delaying its implentation in contravention of the terms of the grant—and how, according to AIDS doctors in Africa, people died as a result.
Come on, guys. Get in the game. This story is objectively more important than the women-in-science controversy, and just think of all the newsprint you devoted to that....
Another Shameless Plug
Saw another powerful, well-made documentary at the Tribeca Film Festival today: "The Brooklyn Connection," directed by Klaartje Quirijns. The film tells the story of Florin Krasniqui, a Kosovar Albanian living in Brooklyn. Almost singlehandedly, Krasniqui equipped and armed the Kosovo Liberation Army in its war against Serbia—and he did it all legally, buying thousands of guns in the United States and putting them on planes to Albania, where the arms were smuggled over the border into Kosovo.
I once spent some time in Kosovo and wrote a piece about life there after the NATO bombing of Serb troops. It's a dangerous, creepy place where violence simmers just beneath the surface of ordinary life. But the film is also about how absurdly easy it is to export violence across borders. In one disturbing scene, Krasniqui buys some kind of massive gun (I'm a blue stater, I have no idea what kind) from a Pennsylvania gun shop. The proprietor asks him what he plans to use it for; Krasniqui says he's going elephant-hunting. No one believes this lie, but no one cares. It's cover enough.
We hear a lot about other countries, Muslim countries, exporting violence to the United States. But in this case, Krasniqui, a private citizen, exported violence from the United States to a predominantly Muslim country, and he did it all perfectly legally. That's scary. That the United States happened to support the efforts of the KLA doesn't change the fact that next time, all those guns could be going to someone we don't support. And as the film shows, if NATO-occupied Kosovo devolves into violence again, NATO soldiers will be fighting rebels equipped with American firepower. All legally bought and sold.
Full disclosure now: The film was based on a book by my friend Stacy Sullivan, a brave journalist and fantastic writer. It's called Be Not Afraid, For You Have Sons in America, and it's a gripping read. Congrats to Stacy and everyone else involved in the making of The Brooklyn Connection.
More Sex and Scandal
That got your attention, didn't it?
But this time, the scandal is at a high school—my old high school, as a matter of fact, the Groton School, in Groton, Massachusetts. A few years ago, an embittered male student raised allegations of sexual abuse at Groton, although sexual harassment might be a better term for it. (Oddly, the alleged perpetrators were also boys, which raised all sorts of stereotypes about prep schools. None of which were true when I went there, and no, I'm not just saying that.)
Anyway, the father of the student was furious with the way the school had handled the matter, and all of a sudden, the New York Post began running salacious Page Six items about buggery (well, not really, but that was the implication) at a hoity-toity prep school (and I guess Groton is pretty hoity-toity, although somehow everyone there, including myself, manages to feel like loners and outsiders).
Terrible publicity for the school, of course, which was such an easy target for the Post that it could do little to fight back. Then the matter got in the hands of an ambitious district attorney who sensed an easy mark, and now Groton has "pled guilty," as USA Today puts it, to not reporting allegations of sexual abuse.
Groton paid a $1250 fine, which tells you something about how serious its alleged offense was. Still, a big story in USA Today—"Elite Prep School Pleads Guilty in Sex Abuse Case"—isn't good for any school.
All I can say is that Groton's getting a raw deal on this one... As it happens, I doubt I'll ever be able to afford to send my kids there. But if I could, I would. Without hesitation.
For My Texas Readers
Cornel West will be speaking at the University of Houston on Thursday. The grammatical and factual mistakes in this University of Houston press release, by the way, do not bode well for UH students....
2 Out of 3? Could Be Worse
Could be 3 out of 3.
Readers of Gawker.com guess the identity of that unnamed "journalist-turned-Ivy-League-lecturer" who's been a little too friendly with his female students. Two out of the three guesses involve Harvard profs. (One of those guesses, to be fair, is clearly a joke.)
Dating grad students is one thing...but did that visiting lecturer really date
undergrads? Yucch.
A Shameless Plug
On Monday night at the Tribeca Film Festival I saw a wonderful movie that deserves wider recognition—and a theatrical release. Called Special Thanks to Roy London, it's the story of acting coach Roy London, who died of AIDS in 1993. I hadn't heard of London, who never allowed his acting classes to be recorded and gave only two interviews. But as this documentary shows, he had a fascinating life and a huge influence on an enormous number of actors, including Jeff Goldblum, Garry Shandling, Sharon Stone, Geena Davis, and Hank Azaria. It's quite remarkable to watch a film in which Hollywood stars talk modestly about their own gifts and expansively about how much someone else made them better. Roy London sounds like a very special person.
Now, full disclosure: The film is directed by Christopher Monger and co-produced by Karen Montgomery, who happens to be his wife. I know them both a little bit; Christopher wrote the screenplay for the never-made film of American Son. (If you're interested, e-mail me, we'll have lunch.) This film was a labor of love for him and Karen, and it shows. They did an amazing job.
Review This
At a speaking engagement a few weeks ago, I suggested that the ultimate test of Larry Summers' leadership style was results, and that so far, the results were lacking. Summers' style seems to have impeded his agenda as much as promoted it, I said.
After the talk, an angry alumnus asked me for specifics. I pointed to the curricular review, which I said was in a state of freefall, a fiasco. He responded that that wasn't so. "You should read Dean Kirby's 8,000-word letter to the faculty," he said. I answered that I had, that this was perhaps not the most objective source, and that he could easily find other viewpoints by reading, say, the Crimson. He walked away in something of a huff.
Now there's more evidence that I was not, in fact, smoking crack. The Undergraduate Council has released a report "strongly criticizing the progress of the Committee on General Education," which is the review's most important component. According to the Crimson, the Council "encouraged the Committee on General Education to state a cohesive philosophy on what a Harvard education should be before making any recommendations for change."
Here we are, two years into Larry Summers' highly-touted curricular review, and undergraduates are rightly pointing out that the review lacks any guiding philosophy other than the mantra to get something done as soon as possible so that it can be flacked to alumni and the press.
A curricular review needs the wholehearted participation of the faculty, which it has never had, since Summers has made a point of discouraging that. One faculty member involved in the review told me how Summers "dominated the proceedings and dismissed the input of committees that had put hundreds of hours of work into it." Meanwhile, the Committee on General Education, for example, is stocked with his inner circle—Steve Pinker, Luke Menand, Robert Kirshner, Michael Sandel, etc.
After the no-confidence vote, serious faculty participation in the review is even less likely.
I hear whispers that the entire effort is essentially crumbling...and that what might happen is the passage of a few small steps—promotion of study abroad, for example—and the abandonment of any attempt at a larger, cohesive overhaul.
Voice of the Left
The Village Voice has this smart piece on Harvard, along with some kind words about Harvard Rules. It's nice to see the book discussed, finally, in a progressive publication.
You have to give the conservative media credit; they realize the reality of the university as a political battleground in a way that the liberal press, such as it is, does not. Ross Douthat's Privilege has been picked up and carried around on the shoulders of conservatives as if it were the quarterback who scored the winning touchdown. By contrast, Salon.com, the Nation, Mother Jones, the New York Review of Books, the American Prospect—none of these places have reviewed either Harvard Rules or Privilege.
I wonder if the left, shaped so much by the '60s and '70s, doesn't simply take its dominance in academia for granted. If true, Baby Boomer liberals are going to be in for a big surprise. As Tom Wolfe and, more realistically, David Brooks, have pointed out, college students today are hardly surefire liberals. If the left cedes this turf to conservatives, it's in even greater trouble than it is now.
Waffle, Waffle
The Crimson also runs an unfortunately tepid editorial on the AIDS grant situation.
Key grafs: "Bureaucratic oversight is often a necessary evil at a university. The administration's unprecedented takeover of a federal grant given to a researcher that teh School of Public Health (SPH) is a perfect example of this. In February of 2004, Professor of Immunology and Infectious Diseases Phyllis Kanki received a $107 million grant to address AIDS in Africa as part of President Bush's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. ...But last summer, University officials imposed a centralized management structure on Kanki as well as a provision tantamount to a gag order that prevents her from talking to the government, even though she was the recipient of the grant.
"It is unfortunate that the University is forcing Kanki to manage her grant through an executive director who reports directly to Mass. Hall. However, given the tremendous size of the grant—almost two times larger than any other received by Harvard—and the liability Harvard assumed by accepting the grant, the administration's actions are understandable though inexplicably heavy-handed."
Curious, that phrase—"understandable though inexplicably heavy-handed."
I know the Crimson tends to err on the side of caution when criticizing the Harvard administration, but this time, the Crimson has just erred. If Harvard has long-established principles of grant management—which of course it does—then the particular size of this grant is not the issue. Moreover, oversight by this Mass. Hall is hardly a guarantee that things will run better. Finally I'm not convinced that liability was an issue here either; the comparison between this grant and Andre Shleiffer's work in Russia is tenuous. (Somehow I don't see Dr. Kanski investing in African stocks.)
The Crimson is buying into the spin put out by Mass Hall. It should raise the question of whether Summers' overarching desire to control every major project at Harvard led him to delay implementation of the grant program for five months, possibly costing thousands of lives. I suspect that the real reason the Crimson won't just come out and say so is because the possibility is simply so upsetting, so appalling, that no one wants to believe it could be true.
Meanwhile, I wonder how Summers' apologists—those people who talk about him being a free speech martyr—will reconcile that portrayal with the fact that he (through his dean, Barry Bloom) imposed a "gag order" on a Harvard professor. To keep her from talking to the government....
Hmmmm
Folks up at Harvard might want to read the blind items on today's Page Six with particular interest, given the precarious state of gender relations in Cambridge.
Pinker Vs. Spelke
The Crimson covers the Science Center debate between Steve Pinker (i.e., Summers surrogate) and Elizabeth Spelke (speaking on behalf of Nancy Hopkins and women everywhere). According to the Crimson, Spelke seems to have gotten the better of the debate, at least as far as the audience was concerned. Still, it sounds to me like she conceded a few points that she needn't have. For example...
1) "Pinker later noted that women are not underrepresented everywhere, but only in the hard sciences."
Granted, I'm going on the Crimson's version of what was said here, but this is just nutty. As Nancy Hopkins pointed out in her essay in the MIT faculty newsletter (see below), science and math are far from the only fields where women are underrepresented. For example: business, law, medicine, op-ed pages—even the humanities. (At Harvard, men outnumber women in the humanities by about two to one, despite the fact that women are earning more Ph.D.s in the field than men are.)
2) “Spelke brought up some key points,” said Parvinder S. Thiara ’07, who sported a Che-Summers shirt for the event. “But she did admit, and I think it’s important, that at the highest level, there was no discrimination.”
It's unclear from this quote what highest level Thiara is referring to—whether it's the sciences, or the professions in general. But if it's the latter, all you have to do to refute it is to look at Harvard. Where are the women in the highest levels of the Summers administration? Why is there only one woman on the Harvard Corporation?
Maybe Spelke wanted to keep the issue as narrowly focused as possible...but the argument that there's discrimination against women in all fields certainly helps explain the lack of women in science, as opposed to the innate differences line of thinking.
3) "Pinker also noted that men and women tend to have different priorities in life; men seek status and money, while women look more for interpersonal relationships.
“'What this means is that there are slightly more men than women who don’t care whether or not they have a life,' Pinker said."
According to the Crimson, Pinker was positing a biology-is-destiny explanation for this phenomenon. That's curious. There are so many plausible sociological factors to explain the differing choices that men and women make, I'd love to hear Pinker make this case.
I'm no scientist or deep thinker like Steve Pinker is. But the more I hear of his thinking, the less convinced—and more unimpressed—I become.
State of the Literary World, Part 1
Today's Times has an inadvertent commentary on just how screwed up the state of serious writing—and reading—is today.
On the one hand, Janet Maslin gushes over a new book,
History of Love, by Nicole Krauss. Sample gush: "Beyond the vigorous whiplash that keeps Ms. Krauss's "History of Love" moving (and keeps its reader offbalance until a stunning finale), this novel is tightly packed with ingenious asides."
On the other hand, literary darling Steve Stern is struggling just to stay in print, despite regularly receiving the kinds of reviews that, well, Janet Maslin gives to Nicole Krauss.
The literary world has never been fair, of course, but there are some particular concerns in this comparison. Why is Nicole Krauss headed for massive success and Steve Stern forced to teach writing at Skidmore College to make a living?
It doesn't sound as if it's because Krauss is much the better writer. Perhaps it's a question of image. Krauss, young and pretty, is pictured lying down in blue jeans and a low-cut blouse. The middle-aged Stern is pictured from the waist up, wearing a sweater that appears as bedraggled as does the rest of him.
Krauss also happens to be married to literary celebrity Jonathan Safran Foer, author of the wildly overrated
Everything is Illuminated. The two make for good copy: the Times recently ran a real estate article about their purchase of a $6 million townhouse in Brooklyn.
Writers write today in a culture in which fewer and fewer people are reading. That's partly why publishers like to have a pretty face and a sexy backstory to market. But I can't help thinking that this is not, ultimately, how the written word will retain its relevance. Writers are never going to be able to compete with movie stars on the looks front; you can't win competing on someone else's territory. (And you sure don't see Hollywood studios marketing their stars as really, really smart.)
Publishers have to have faith in what they sell...even if Steve Stern doesn't much resemble Brad Pitt. They may just have to think of more creative ways to sell it. Maybe promoting Stern's new book, Angel of Forgetfulness, on the web is one way....
Case Closed?
Scientific American weighs in on the differences between the male and female brain. The piece is, of course, pegged to Larry Summers and his thoughts on the innate differences between men and women. The conclusion seems to be that while male and female brains turn out to have numerous differences, it's absolutely impossible to say what, if any, real world effect those differences produce, and to suggest that they affect career choice is an extrapolation unsupported by evidence.
Key quote (from this sidebar specifically about Summers): "What does the research say? Evidence linking inequities in anatomy to intellectual ability is hard to come by. For starters, sex differences in performance on standardized tests of general intelligence are negligible, with insignificant differences sometimes favoring women, sometimes favoring men. And although neuroscientists are discovering a multitude of sex-related differences in brain structure and function, no one can at present say whether these differences have any influence on career success in science--or, if they do, how their effect might compare with that of cultural factors."
Summers' remarks at the NBER conference seem increasingly out of the mainstream....
Where's Larry?
There's one source conspicuously absent from Donnelly's article: Lawrence Summers. The Harvard president either wouldn't be interviewed, or wouldn't be interviewed on the record. Meanwhile, Stephen Hyman, Summers' #2, is forced to make excuses for his boss—excuses that will stain Hyman's reputation permanently.
Why wouldn't Summers speak? After all, whenever there's good news—about, for example, Harvard's financial aid program (as opposed to its AIDS program)—Summers is more than happy to be quoted on the record. In fact, he insists upon being quoted in those articles.
This story, however, is bad news, and Summers wants to disassociate himself from it. Given the precarious condition of his presidency, he can't afford bad news. So he shovels responsibility onto an underling.
It would be impressive if Summers stood up and said, "I'm the president. This is my responsibility. The buck stops here."
Instead, he leaves the impression that he is more concerned with saving his own ass than doing the right thing....
Consider the Excuses
In John Donnelly's well-reported article, provost Stephen Hyman proffers a number of excuses for Harvard's five-month (minimum) delay in buying AIDS drugs for dying people in Africa.
These excuses include:
1) "[Summers] worried that the program was hastily crafted and could be a legal risk to the school."
2) "...during the five-month period, Summers and [Hyman] were reviewing Harvard's role in the project and trying to ensure that it was properly managed."
3) "One major concern for Summers...was whether the U.S. government or patients could sue Harvard for any perceived future problems, Hyman said. In 2000, the U.S. government had sued Harard for alleged misuse of federal funds in a development grant in Russia. "That lawsuit sensitized him enormously for the need for Harvard to do this right,' Hyman said."
4) Hyman and Summers were so concerned about AIDS patients, they wanted to take the time to set the program up correctly. "'Precisely because this is about life and death, it is absolutely critical that we get this right,' Hyman said."
5) Was this task appropriate for Harvard? "Hyman said Summers also raised questions about whether running an AIDS program in Africa was consistent with the university's strengths of teaching students and conducting research."
Let us consider these excuses, noting first that their multiplicity suggests a bureaucrat throwing explanations at the wall in the wan hope that one of them will stick.
1) "[Summers] worried that the program was hastily crafted and could be a legal risk to the school."Well, yes, the program was hastily crafted; it was called the "President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief." In other words, the White House's express intention was that this money be spent
quickly. So Summers overruled the White House.
2) "...during the five-month period, Summers and [Hyman] were reviewing Harvard's role in the project and trying to ensure that it was properly managed."
Let me repeat: the President's
Emergency Plan..
.
In any event, given the upheaval at Harvard recently, one has to ask whether a program under Larry Summers' control would, in fact, be better-managed than one independent of his authority. The evidence would suggest that management is not Summers' strong suit.
3) "One major concern for Summers...was whether the U.S. government or patients could sue Harvard for any perceived future problems," Hyman said. In 2000, the U.S. government had sued Harard for alleged misuse of federal funds in a development grant in Russia. "That lawsuit sensitized him enormously for the need for Harvard to do this right," Hyman said.To those familiar with the events in question, the cynicism of this explanation is staggering. At the center of the government's lawsuit is Harvard economist Andre Shleiffer, who is accused of profiting off Russian stock investments even as he was taking US money to give advice on the Russian economy. For years, Harvard has been arguing that it did nothing wrong in the Shleiffer fiasco, and has backed the economist to the hilt. Why? Well, as Boston Globe columnist David Warsh has persuasively suggested, perhaps because Shleiffer is one of Larry Summers' best friends....
But setting aside that conflict of interest, let us consider the argument on its own terms. In one instance, Harvard is being sued over accusations that one of its economists insider-traded and that Harvard should have known about it.
In another scenario which is supposed to be analogous, an African AIDS patient might sue Harvard over mismanagement of a federal program. Think about that. Assume that such a patient lived long enough to file a lawsuit (because that's what dying African AIDS patients do, file suit against a far-away university). What's the realistic likelihood of such an event occurring?
Yup--better to just let the patient die.
4) Hyman and Summers were so concerned about AIDS patients, they wanted to take the time to set the program up correctly. "Precisely because this is about life and death, it is absolutely critical that we get this right," Hyman said.In other words, because this is a matter of life and death, let's move with exruciating slowness that will, in fact, cost lives—possibly thousands of them.
5) Was this task appropriate for Harvard? "Hyman said Summers also raised questions about whether running an AIDS program in Africa was consistent with the university's strengths of teaching students and conducting research."Whatever the answer to the question may be, the real point is that it contradicts things Summers has said a hundred, a thousand, times. He has consistently advocated a greater role for the university in the real world and urged that Harvard help solve the world's health problems in a hands-on way. In this speech from just a few months ago, Summers contradicts the above explanation in half a dozen different ways. Here he talks about Harvard's attempts to participate in tsunami relief. And here Summers talks about his view of the global role for Harvard's School of Public Health.
Key quote: "But I say to you, if any institution in the world is well situated to maximize the contributions to solving that problem [of disease and economic inequity], it is the School of Public Health, with unmatched connections throughout the developing world, with an extraordinary scientific capacity, located here in the center of the best bio-medical research community that there has ever been in the history of the world, in the middle of a university whose major mission is to become more open to the rest of the world. It is a very exciting time to be associated with the Harvard School of Public Health because I am convinced that the School is going to accomplish great things in the next 10 years. And I am determined to do everything that I can to help [dean] Barry [Bloom] and his colleagues do those things and make progress against what I believe are the largest solvable problems that this planet faces."
Sounds like a prescription to fight AIDS in Africa, doesn't it?
The point is, none of the various excuses that Stephen Hyman offers are convincing. The truth may just be that Summers wanted to take control of a $100-million federal grant...no matter how long it took. Or how many people died in the meantime.
The Real Story?
One reason why I'm appalled by Summers' handling of this AIDS grant is because I don't believe the proffered excuse that he was worried about legal risks. The other three institutions which had received money from the federal government weren't worried, and they started spending the grant money almost immediately after receiving it. After all, people were dying.
So what was really going on? Well, there's substantial, if circumstantial, evidence that Summers just didn't like the fact he didn't control a massive federal grant given to one of Harvard's schools—and he refused to let the program be implemented until he did control it.
Start with my own reporting, on page 305 of Harvard Rules: "In the spring of 2004, Barry Bloom, dean of the School of Public Health, infuriated Summers by announcing that the school had received a $100-million grant from the federal government without first informing Summers or including the president's name in the relevant press release. According to several sources familiar with the incident, Summers was so enraged that, at a subsequent dinner attended by both Bloom and him, the president insisted on being somewhere he could not see the dean. (Asked for comment, Bloom said, 'I have the greatest respect for President Summers.')"
The Boston Globe and Harvard Crimson have both detailed Summers' attempts to wrest control of the grant away from Dr. Phyllis J. Kanki, apparently because Summers didn't think Kanki was competent to handle such a large grant. (She is, after all, a woman in science.)
Never mind that the federal program which distributed the grant money was called the "President's
Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief."
(That would be President Bush; italics added.)
Or that grant applicants were given a month to write proposals, due to the urgency of the situation. People were dying.
Larry Summers held up the purchase of AIDS drugs for dying people for—depending on how you calculate the delay—five to seven months. And one very possible reason is because he was furious that he was not given credit for bringing the money to Harvard, and he did not control the distribution of it.
In other words, because his ego was bruised.
This story is a tragedy.
Inexcusable
The Globe's John Donnelly investigates Larry Summers' handling of the $100-million AIDS grant to the Harvard School of Public Health. This disturbing piece of reporting raises probably the most serious questions about Larry Summers' judgment and leadership style yet raised.
Nut graf: "Harvard University president Lawrence H. Summers delayed the spending of millions of dollars to treat dying AIDS patients in Africa for five months last year, because he worried that the program was hastily crafted and could be a legal risk to the school," a senior Harvard official said. "...Harvard's delay meant that some patients died."
Some background. In February 2004, the federal government awarded large grants to fight AIDS in Africa to Harvard, Columbia, Catholic Relief Services, and the Elizagbeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation. As Donnelly reports, the latter three institutions began spending that money in March. Immediate action was urgent.
But Harvard waited until September to start spending its funds, many of which were earmarked for the purchase of AIDS drugs. The drugs didn't start arriving in Africa until November and December, nine and ten months after Harvard received the money. How many AIDS patients died during that time? "We lost many," said Dr. Isaac Adewole, who oversees one of Harvard's treatment sites. "Even now, we still don't understand what Harvard was doing." And, Donnelly notes, "doctors running the program said that without the delay they would have had more than 10,000 on treatment in the first year," instead of the 7,300 it had at the end of March. That's a difference of at least 2700 people receiving treatment. 2700 people.
What was the reason for the delay?
"Harvard Provost Stephen E. Hyman said that during that five-month period, Summers and he were reviewing Harvard's role in the project and trying to ensure that it was properly managed."
Of particular concern, Hyman claims, was "whether the U.S. government or patients could sue Harvard for any perceived future problems." Hyman referred to a federal lawsuit against Harvard for alleged misuse of federal funds in a development grant in Russia. "That lawsuit sensitized [Summers] enormously for the need for Harvard to do this right," he said.
But as Donnelly reports, Summers spoke with Columbia president Lee Bollinger to discuss these concerns, and Bollinger spoke with Dr. Allan Rosenfeld, the dean of Columbia's school of public health. "I told [Bollinger] that I didn't think there was a large [legal] risk," Rosenfeld told Donnelly. "I don't think the university is at any greater risk than any other funder."
So we are left with an unconvincing explanation, a nagging question—what was really going on here?—and a sense of horror over the fact that thousands of people may have died due to Harvard's inaction.
Meanwhile, Larry Summers quite obviously declined to speak for this story. (If he did, it certainly wasn't on the record.)
Instead, he has shoved Stephen Hyman out in public, leaving the poor provost to twist in the wind..... Hyman may not yet realize it, but this scandal will forever taint his career. How many people will have to fall on their sword for Summers before they decide it's just not worth it any more?
More Men Behaving Badly
More stories about how Bush U.N.-nominee John Bolton terrorized people who disagreed with his opinions or refused to give him the intelligence estimates he wanted to push his ideological agenda.
The Bolton nomination is dead. The only question is whether President Bush decides that it's in his political best interest to force a vote—which he'd lose—or whether he withdraws the nomination early next week. My guess: The Republicans don't really want to have to vote for this guy, who gives every indication of being a complete crackpot. They'll pressure the President to avoid a vote, so that they don't have to go on the record with their support or opposition. Bush will withdraw the nomination.
I think there's a larger point here besides the fact that Bolton is, apparently, a jerk. Despite the fact that the war on Iraq may yet turn out to be a success, Americans don't want unilateralism. We still think diplomacy is important, and yes, even the United Nations. In fact, we may think that even more now than we did before the Iraq war, and the realization that those much-touted weapons of mass destruction don't exist.....
Another point: Since Bolton was obviously Dick Cheney's guy, one has to wonder where else Cheney is driving Administration policy...
Sticking up for Summers
Writing in the Jewish World Review, First Amendment advocate Nat Hentoff makes the case for Summers as a victim of political correctness. Hentoff tells the story of a high schooler in Yakima, Washington, who defended Summers.
Key quote: "President Summers offered no conclusions [at the NBER conference]. He wanted these intellectuals to do what they're supposed to do — think. But his challenge resulted — as high-schooler Toop wrote — in "the political correctness squad (rushing) upon him like a pack of bloodthirsty dingos that just smelled baby."
I've written before that I don't think this controversy had anything to do with free speech—or political correctness, for that matter—but in the interests of balance, I post the article for your consideration.
And also because I love that simile—"a pack of bloodthirsty dingos that just smelled baby." Fantastic. Rush Limbaugh, your successor has just entered the building.
Yet Another Reason to Buy a Mac
Microsoft caves in to bigotry. So disappointing.
Show Me the Money
I've long thought that the key to Summers' fate lies in the hands of Harvard donors. If a significant percentage of them stop giving, his goose is cooked. But if they continue to give—or actually increase their contributions—his position is stable, and he can work to shore up his internal support.
Now I hear that the Corporation has privately acknowledged that Summers needs to be "built up" before he can embark on a major, public capital campaign, a process that, the Corporation thinks, could take two years.
Moreover, a recent Summers visit with several Silicon Alley billionaires left the billionaires "visibly unimpressed"...
The Image Problem, Redux
Crimson columnist Stephen W. Stromberg has a smart take on the latest Summers controversy, his remarks on Native Americans and genocide. Like me, Stromberg finds the latest remarks less objectionable on paper than would merit the angry reactions they have prompted. I think it has something to do Summers' high-handed manner of speech; Stromberg argues that people are just so irritated with Summers now, they're quick to be offended.
(A possible flaw in this argument: the Native American conference took place last September, and participants were ticked off at the time.)
Stromberg suggests that one solution is for Summers and Mass. Hall to be more forthcoming with information generally.
Key quote: "Releasing everything—meeting notes, administrative documents, memos, you name it—isn't just in the best interests of the Harvard community, but of the president's office, too. And this doesn't just apply to potential scandals. Students and Faculty often feel out of the loop in Allston decision-making, the curricular review, shakeups in administration. ...They complain that communication between Mass Hall and the rest of the University community often comes in the form of press releases...."
It's a smart piece and well-worth reading.
And if I may add my two cents: Summers should make it a policy not to speak to journalists off the record or on background. It would befit his office, and diminish the air of secrecy and manipulation that surrounds his presidency.
Kinda like Ali-Foreman
I have no idea if this is a public event, but if it isn't...well, I couldn't sneak in, because I'm a reporter, and that's frowned upon for us. But if I were you, I would. It should be fascinating....a conversation about the brain that's really a conversation about Larry Summers.
<
A Conversation with Steven Pinker and Elizabeth Spelke
Friday, April 22
4:00 pm
Science Center B
The speakers will discuss research on mind, brain, and behavior that
may be relevant to gender disparities in the sciences, including the
studies of bias, discrimination, and innate and acquired differences
between the sexes.
Sponsored by Harvard University - Mind/Brain/Behavior>>
Wish I could be there...but I'm helping some friends move, and postings may be affected today.
The Image Problem
This story in
The Record of New Jersey compares Larry Summers to Princeton president Shirley Tighman. Less than favorably.
Key quote: "If the president of Harvard thinks women are innately inferior, how far have we come? The reassuring answer from the president of Princeton: We've not only come a long way, but the young women coming after us will go a whole lot farther."
But here's the real problem. The piece is headlined: "Princeton to Harvard: Girls Rule."
I'd guess at least one newspaper in every state in the country has done a similar piece. The common theme: Despite what Larry Summers might say, girls in our state are good at science, and don't care if the president of Harvard thinks otherwise
This is obviously a caricature of what Summers said, but that's the way the media works. The problem for Summers—and for Harvard—is that the caricature is taking root.
Limning Larry
An interesting side note from the Globe article: Summers' spokesman mentions that Summers was basing his statements about Native Americans on a number of sources he'd read, including Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs and Steel" and an article in Commentary magazine.
(Incidentally, we don't know who Summers' spokesman is, because as with erstwhile presidential flack Lucie McNeil, Summers apparently doesn't want the person quoted by name. Thus we have the curious phenomenon of a university president who won't speak to the press on the record and will only allow his spokesman to be identified as his "spokesman." Transparency, anyone?)
But on to the main point.... This isn't the first time Summers has gotten in trouble for delivering remarks to an academic audience based on his reading of a popular book. His women-in-science comments were drawn from Steven Pinker's book, "The Blank Slate."
Why is this important? Well, for one thing, because Summers delivers these remarks with a posture of omniscience, but he's generally speaking to people who've written more specialized materials than these popular works. That's a recipe for trouble.
Summers clearly has an affinity for popular tomes. Why? Perhaps he's playing catch-up after a decade away from academia in Washington. Or, as some Harvardians suspect, perhaps he disdains humanities-related scholarship that isn't popular. If it's not read by a wider audience, Summers isn't interested.
That could be one reason why Summers has such an affinity for celebrity academics like Pinker, Luke Menand, Michael Ignatieff, Samantha Power, Malcolm Gladwell, et al. He doesn't see the point of intellectuals who don't reach a broader, "real world" audience. Not a humanist himself, and uncomfortable with the humanities, he depends on data to evaluate works in the humanities. In this case, the data appear to be sales figures.
Deja Vu All Over Again
Marcella Bombardieri in the Globe picks up on the latest Larry Summers controversy, his remarks at a conference on Native American studies.
Key quote: "The new controversy is another distraction for Summers at a time when many professors say the debate over his leadership, which culminated in a vote of no confidence last month, has paralyzed the administration. However, several critics and supporters of Summers alike said yesterday that they did not think the speech about Native Americans would significantly alter the campus discussion about the president, since most people's opinions about Summers are already hardened."
That last line about hardened opinions is particularly important, since it goes to the question of whether Summers can resuscitate his presidency. The worst of the women-in-science controversy may be past. But the lines of division are so deeply plowed, it's hard to see how Summers can smooth them over. Unless, perhaps, you are willing to take a long-term view--say, five to seven years. But how long is the Harvard Corporation going to allow the University's agenda to lie fallow (sorry, I'll stop now) so that Larry Summers can attempt to refurbish his reputation?
And that scenario assumes that no new controversy erupts, which would be an assumption based more on wishful thinking than past precedent.
How Power Works
I've been meaning to write about Skip Gates' decision to step down as chairman of the African and African-American Studies department. I don't think there's any deep inner meaning; Gates has been chair for a long time, and he really doesn't need the job to maintain his exalted position in the world of academia. Plus, being a chair can be a huge drain on time and energy.
More telling is how widely Gates' decision was covered—from the New York Times to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Under normal circumstances, a decision to resign a department chair hardly merits newspaper coverage. Two factors are involved here. One, Gates' own celebrity status. And two, newspapers looking for any hint of instability at Harvard. Everything related to Summers is hot, hot, hot....
Here's a more important story: Gates is now becoming the chair of the Pulitzer Prize committee. The position conveys enormous cultural power. Just one example: Even more than usual, one must now read every mention of Gates in the New York Times with deep skepticism.
There's no way the paper can ever be objective about the chair of the Pulitzer board....
And Speaking of Curious Choices
So the new pope is a 78-year-old former member of the Hitler Youth who believes that Catholicism is the "true" religion and all other faiths are deficient. According to the Times, the newly-named Benedict XVI "has repeatedly condemned religious pluralism" and has argued that concern about child molestation by priests "is intentional, manipulated, that there is a desire to discredit the church."
Ratzinger has also reinforced the ban on women priests and attacked feminism as ignoring biological differences. He's anti-gay, anti-birth control, anti-stem cell research....
Well...this should be interesting. Without knowing, of course, how Ratzinger's papacy will turn out, let me just suggest that secretive selection processes have not served the world's iconic instititutions well in recent years.
Which reminds me of John Bolton....but that's a blog entry for another time....
Rack 'em Up, Let's Break
Here's InsideHigherEd.com's take on the Summers talk regarding Native Americans.
Just so everyone can keep track, let's sum up whom exactly Larry Summers has offended during his four years as president of Harvard.
1)
African-Americans. (The Cornel West incident, stated doubts about affirmative action.)
2)
Latinos. (Rejecting calls for a Latino studies department, Summers explained that the reason there was an African-American studies department—but shouldn't be a Latino studies department—was because of the importance of the Civil War.)
3)
Muslims. (Summers argued that people who felt Harvard should divest from Israel over human rights issues were anti-Semitic; he treated Muslim commencement speaker Zayed Yasin with contempt.)
4)
Native Americans. (See above.)
5)
Asians. (Summers repeatedly recounted an inaccurate story about the number of teenage prostitutes in Seoul, South Korea, which suggested that there were more teenage prostitutes in Seoul than there were teenager girls.)
6)
Women. (The women in science remarks, among other things.)
7)
Gays. (Summers repeatedly called for the return of ROTC to campus, despite the military's anti-gay discrimination; he refused to fight enforcement of the Solomon Amendment, which mandated military recruiting on campuses receiving federal monies, on the grounds that the issue of anti-gay discrimination was not important enough to merit jeopardizing federal dollars.)
The only major ethnic group or other constituency at Harvard that Summers has not insulted or offended in some way, as far as I can tell, is his own—white Jewish men. Which helps to explain some of his troubles. Politicians—and the president of Harvard has to be a politician—are supposed to broaden their base of support by reaching out to different constituencies, rather than pissing them off.
It continues to fascinate me that the members of the Harvard Corporation saw Summers as the man who could unite and lead this university....
Whoops! He Did It Again! (Again)
Larry Summers has released a transcript of remarks he made at a September 2004 conference on Native American studies at Harvard. Those remarks became an issue when the Washington Post profile of Summers (mentioned below) quoted scholars who'd been present saying they were offended by the president's remarks at the event. At the time, the Crimson had heard rumors that Summers had angered attendees, but—shock!—his ever-helpful press secretary, Lucie McNeil, had refused to release a transcript. Perhaps the remarks were off the record.
Here's a key quote from the Crimson write-up:
"Even seven months after the conference, several scholars who attended the event are still incensed by the president’s remarks.
Michael Yellow Bird, director of the Center for Indigenous Nations Studies at the University of Kansas, said that Summers’ remarks were “really, really insulting.”
Tara Browner, associate professor of ethnomusicology and American Indian studies at UCLA, wrote in an e-mail to The Crimson Sunday that she and several other attendees were “appalled” by Summers’ statements."
But the Crimson's reportage of the transcript actually makes things out to be more complicated. It doesn't seem that Summers said anything factually incorrect. He said that more Native Americans died from diseases carried by Europeans than in combat, and there was no conscious plan to commit genocide. Some of the scholars present thought Summers was presenting a whitewashed view of history, apologizing for colonialism.
What's really going on here? It's the difference, I think, between the way Summers' words read on paper, and how they sound when he delivers them. It's a question of style. When Summers speaks in public, he often comes across as arrogant, patronizing, impatient, dismissive. Even if what he's saying is, on paper, factually correct and largely unobjectionable.
I've seen Summers stride into a conference, surrounded by worshipful aides. running late as usual, and instantly start telling all the scholars in the field what the real truth is, and what they should be working on. (I wasn't at the NBER conference in January, but that's exactly what happened then too.)
Summers' body language, his tone of voice, the way he breezes in and out—everything reads wrong. Even when what he says is essentially smart or even sympathetic. He's an arrogant man. And that's not going to change. The question is whether it helps his presidency more than it hurts it.
Tell-It-All on the Mountain
Stephanie Green, a former researcher for Star magazine, has won a lawsuit filed against her by American Media Inc., which was attempting to stop Green from publishing a novel inspired by her days working for the tabloid. (Star is owned by AMI.) The suits at AMI alleged that they needed to screen a copy of the manuscript in order to determine whether Green had violated confidentiality and "non-disparagement" clauses in her employment contract. The judge ruled that AMI didn't have cause to sue; AMI says it plans an appeal.
Here's what the case is really about: Green is hinting (pretty explicitly) that her book is based on infamous Star editor Bonnie Fuller, a legendary editorial tyrant who has dragged down the quality—and pumped up the sales—of every magazine she's ever worked for (and probably some she hasn't). AMI wants to protect its celebrity editor.
Let us consider some of the ironies in this situation.
First, you have a media company suing to prevent the publication of a
novel.
Second, the media company in question happens to be the obtainer and purveyor of celebrity dirt which, one hopes, is far juicier than anything one could write about a mere editor.
And third, if a celebrity lawyer insisted upon pre-publication review of an article about his/her client, American Media would presumably tell that lawyer where to go.
But never mind all this. More important than irony, this is another example of the invidious proliferation of confidentiality agreements in the world of business and media. It's well-known that I've had my own troubles with such agreements, and
I've argued in print that they're tools employed by the rich and powerful to intimidate and silence the less rich and less powerful. Many of these agreements are simply intended to scare people out of exercising their First Amendment rights. Imagine if Microsoft created computer viruses aimed at annihilating shareware.
Remember—American Media sued to stop this woman from writing a work of
fiction. Apparently they thought it would contain much truth. (Which is another irony, because most people would say that American Media publishes non-fiction, little of which is true. )
That the book in question isn't substantively important doesn't matter. The fact that a media company sued a writer to stop her from writing a novel should alarm every one who values a free press. AMI should drop its appeal, and Green should go ahead and sell her book.
Atom Tom
House majority leader Tom DeLay continues and intensifies his attack upon the federal judiciary—and this time he's ratched it up a notch. Appearing on Fox News on Tuesday night, DeLay specifically criticized Supreme Court justice Anthony Kennedy, saying that it was "outrageous" that Kennedy sometimes considered international law during deliberations and conducted research on the Internet.
Make no mistake: What we are watching here is the death spiral of a politician whose self-destruction has, in some sense, always seemed inevitable. The question is only how much damage he will do on his way out the door.....
It is time for some senior Republicans in the House and Senate to come knocking on DeLay's door and say, "Tom...Tom....it's time to go home now. Time to go home."
And it is time for some Democrats to say in public that President Bush needs to disavow--also in public—these attacks upon the separation of the branches of government. If only to preserve his party's chances for retaining the House in 2006, Bush has to jettison DeLay.
On a side note, what's so awful about doing research on the Internet? I hear there's some good stuff on there......
Whew! That Was Close
Helis the beluga whale has escaped the Delaware River and returned to the Atlantic. This is, of course, a great relief to whale lovers everywhere. One can only hope that Helis has not suffered too greatly from his exposure to any water anywhere near New Jersey.....
Steal This Text; Punishment May Vary
The Crimson editorializes about the case of Laurence Tribe, just reprimanded but not punished by Harvard for committing plagiarism. Pertinent quote: "In a joint statement issued Thursday by President Summers and Harvard Law School Dean Elena Kagan, the University declined to formally punish Tribe in any substantial way. While Tribe has been mildly chastised for the academic dishonestly, the statement, coming months after the plagiarism was publicly acknowledged, amounts to little more than a slap on the wrist."
That, says the Crimson, constitutes a double standard in the treatment of professors versus that of students, who would surely receive a much harsher punishment had they committed the same act of plagiarism.
Well, yes. Absolutely true. But there's another double standard: the difference between the way Larry Summers treats professors he likes, and the way he treats those he doesn't. Laurence Tribe commits the gravest academic sin possible, and is "mildly chastised." But Cornel West, who was guilty only of being too popular with the wrong people, received a much harsher sentence—a nasty dressing-down, and the clear signal that he was unwelcome at Harvard.
That's not the only instance of the double standard. Summers has aligned Harvard firmly in support of scandal-tarred economist Andre Schleiffer, accused of investing in Russian stocks while he was under contract from the US government to help rebuild the Russian economy. (Boston Globe columnist David Warsh has written smartly and with some exasperation about Harvard's bizarre defense of Schleiffer.) Is it any coincidence that Schleiffer is a longtime friend and intellectual partner of Summers?
Tribe, meanwhile, co-wrote a New York Times op-ed on affirmative action with Summers that brought the president reams of good publicity. Months later, Summers named him to the position of University Professor, the most exalted position a professor can attain at Harvard. Apparently, once you've reached that status, you can get away with anything...as long as you've scratched the president's back first.
It's this kind of behavior that has turned so much of the Harvard community against Summers—the sense that he plays favorites and devalues academic integrity in order to stack the university's highest positions with cronies....
Queen Ann
I can't say too much about Ann Coulter, and no, I don't mean it that way. I mean, I literally can't say too much about Ann Coulter, because I have so many conflict of interests with her that you can't trust a thing I would say, if I did say anything. Let's see: I edited a column she wrote for George. We share the same literary agent. Plus, I like her. In person, she's really quite lovely. Back at George, you couldn't have asked for a more pleasant person to work with, or a more enthusiastic supporter of the magazine. And because of those things, I only share my political differences with her...with her.
I will publicly marvel, though, at Ann's genius for publicity. Here she is, on the cover of this week's Time magazine. The timing is a little weird, since Ann doesn't have a new book out; the piece is an "evergreen," meaning it's always timely (enough), and can be held for a slow news week. Nonetheless, she's on the cover of Time! I can't imagine how much that's worth to Ann in terms of book sales, speaking engagements, the next book contract, etc. Half a million dollars? A million?
But instead of reacting with humility and/or self-consciousness, as most writers would, Ann is complaining that the cover photo is unflattering, and that this is evidence of liberal bias in the media. It's a brilliant way of assuring her conservative base that she hasn't sold out, hasn't gone mainstream...that she can work with the MSM, and then turn around and dis it. That is truly having your cake and eating it too.
Of course, some liberal critics think she ought to be pleased with the cover, given its alleged original appearance....
More Curious Behavior
Meanwhile, graduate students at Yale and Columbia are on strike to pressure those universities to grant them union status. As a former grad student, I have some sympathy: being a graduate student is a miserable existence, filled with loneliness, isolation and poverty just as your peers from college are starting to pull down the big bucks. Universities need to improve this situation as best they can, because people do have other choices, and there are lots of careers that are just as fulfilling as becoming a professor, with better quality of life.
At the same time, I'm not convinced that unionizing is the way to go. Unions, of course, have their own issues that grad students—many of whom, shall we say, haven't had a lot of experience with union work—may not wish to acknowledge, or even know about. But more than that, it suggests a way of thinking about graduate school as a semi-permanent state of existence. (I knew plenty of grad students who seemed quite content to whittle away a decade or so working on their doctorates.) That's a mistake. Graduate school is something to finish as quickly as possible. It's like a dentist appointment. No matter how comfortable the surroundings, or how potent the anaesthesia, it's still best done with as soon as possible. Wouldn't forming a union only create an incentive to stay in that life limbo for longer than one ought?
Idiots, Indeed
The Red Sox have done the right thing and banned season ticket-holder Chris House from Fenway Park. House, you may remember, was the fan who tried to hit Yankee outfielder Gary Sheffield in the face while Sheffield was making a play near the right-field wall. Another charming Red Sox fan then dumped a beer on Sheffield.
Many Red Sox fans are perfectly adequate people. But others are barely human. I love Fenway Park, but too often the fans there are out of control. First there's the charming t-shirts vendors sell to children outside the stadium: "Yankees Suck/Jeter Swallows." Nice. I remember the year when fans in the bleachers started bouncing around blow-up dolls of women...which went on for months, until some female fans complained and the team management finally realized this wasn't funny. Or the early spring game I attended when the temperature was so cold that fans in my section started picking fights just to stay warm. By game's end, at least half a dozen fights had broken out. And this was behind home plate....
The House incident wasn't the first time a Sox fan has attacked a Yankee player. A couple years ago, a Sox groundskeeper picked a fight with pitchers in the Yankee bullpen. The fans thought this was heroic, and the guy became a local hero.
If the Sox didn't take action, sooner or later someone was going to get hurt—either a player would be brutally assaulted, or a fan would get hurt by a player defending himself. It's about time the Sox took action to make sure that Red Sox Nation doesn't become Savage, Primitive, Drunken Idiot Nation. Chris House, wherever he is, should go root for the Boston Bruins....
Bad Company
Writing in The Standard, which bills itself as "China's Business Newspaper," Barbara Kellerman compares the management styles of Howell Raines, Larry Summers, and Ricardo Muti, former musical directorof Las Scala. Well, she doesn't compare them so much as say that they are similar, and that the people below these heavy-handed leaders are more likely to voice their protest than they used to be.
Key quote: "In the past, first-rate editors at The New York Times were not canned for being callous, nor were Harvard presidents humiliated for being abrasive or La Scala conductors brought to their knees for being autocrats. These three leaders were called to account for management styles that until recently were widely considered acceptable or, at least, not the sort of behavior that would cause a mutiny. Their fates are a reflection of the new intolerance for bad leadership that is also affecting corporate boards and international courts."
What's somewhat remarkable about this is that Kellerman gets paid by Harvard; she is the research director of Harvard's Center for Public Leadership and author of Bad Leadership: What It Is, How It Happens, Why It Matters.
The salient fact, of course, is that while at the Times and La Scala bottom-up protest can topple an imperious leader, at Harvard, the only folks who could push Summers out the door are the members of the Corporation...three of whom (out of a possible six, a total of seven, including Summers) he has appointed....
The Vomiter Speaks
The vomiter—or should I say, "vomiteer"—a student named Matthe Skomarovsky, defends his action in this letter to the Crimson. He points out that he vomited into a "double plastic bag," so no one had to pick up after him. And he argues that recruitment is not an act of free speech, and is therefore disruptable.
Neither of these arguments strikes me as suasive. On the aesthetics of vomiting, Skomarovsky should stick to his guns. If he feels so strongly about the ethics of CIA recruiting, he should insist that his actions were determined to shock and awe—not unlike a monk who sets himself on fire—and that the very point is to provoke people into having a visceral reaction.
On the second point...though I'm not a First Amendment lawyer, somehow I doubt that commercial speech—i.e., recruiting—is not protected by the Constitution.
Whoops! He Did It Again
Well! Apparently there were two protests occurring during the recruiting visit of the CIA and Department of Homeland Security last week at Harvard. One was staged civilly enough outside the Science Center, where the recruitment meeting was held. Another, less civil action took place inside. According to this letter-writer in the Crimson, protesters repeatedly coughed during the recruiters' talks, staged a mock arrest of an ethnic minority, and wore black shrouds to invoke Abu Ghraib. One protester even made himself vomit—which, the correspondent says, couldn't have been very nice for the Harvard maintenance staff.
Since I'm of the mind that the nation's tolerance for torture and unjustified detentions by our military and intelligence apparati has been depressingly high, I think the black shrouds are kind of a nice touch. (When I graduated from Yale, protesters carried small coffins to the front of the Commencement stage, to symbolize the children who died under apartheid. Grim, and somewhat disconnected to the proceedings at hand, but great theater.)
Still...vomiting is a bit much. Shouldn't that be saved for the final clubs?
On a more serious note, there's never any excuse for abridging anyone's right to make themselves heard.
That Sound You Hear
It's women bumping up against the glass ceiling. Sara Rimer writes about the question of women in math and sciences in this Times article.
Key quote: " Even as the number of women earning Ph.D.'s in science has substantially increased - women now account for 45 percent to 50 percent of the biology doctorates, and 33 percent of those in chemistry - the science and engineering faculties of elite research universities remain overwhelmingly male. And the majority of the women are clustered at the junior faculty rank."
Rimer explains some of the reasons why; she does not mention "intrinsic differences" in aptitude.
Oh, and by the Way
That conference at Stanford? Free and open to the public.
Which is to say,
not off the record.
Women Heading West
Stanford, which may now be Harvard's biggest competitor, is hosting a conference on women in the sciences. Talk about kicking a man when he's down. This kind of thing that makes Stanford look smart and progressive, while Harvard...doesn't. How ironic that one of the reasons Larry Summers was chosen as president of Harvard was to help the university better compete with—yes—Stanford....
Fool or Hero?
Phil Kennicott has this profile of Larry Summers in the Washington Post. ("Fool or Hero," it's blurbed on the Post website, which is a classic example of how newspaper websites can have lower standards than the physical papers; the actual article is titled, "The Man in the Ivory Tower.")
First things first: Summers "declined to speak on the record for this story," almost certainly meaning that he spoke to the reporter but wouldn't allow himself to be quoted or have any information attributed to him. (By most standard journalism rules, anyway.) But unless I'm reading this wrong, Summers did talk to the reporter; he just didn't want it publicly known that he spoke to the guy. Make of that what you will. I remain of the opinion that this is appropriate behavior for a politician, but not a university president.
Kennicott's article is pretty subjective; it's in the "Style" section of the paper. Here's his thesis: "Two...subtle schools of thought prevail to explain the events of Summers's tenure. One is the personality theory: Summers is brilliant, brash and simply likes to stir things up. The other might be called the "dark thread" hypothesis: All of these episodes are connected and that Summers is out to remake Harvard, and perhaps the world, in ways that should be deeply troubling to traditional academics, and perhaps the larger, liberal-left establishment as well. "
Worth pondering. But I'm not sure that the two theses are incompatible. Larry Summers is a complex man. And then, of course, there's always the possibility that he himself doesn't know exactly what he's up to—that there is, in fact, no grand master plan.
Can We Talk?
A website named "Spiked Liberties" has this report on Larry Summers' address to the Harvard Club of New York last week. Well, actually, it's not much of a report because Summers' remarks were off-the-record. As blogger George Blecher writes, "the President of the Club announced: 'This is a private gathering. All working press - Harvard grads or otherwise - should be advised that President Summers' remarks are completely off the record.'"
Blecher happens to be a supporter of Summers, arguing that he's a victim of a public fear of controversial ideas. But I wonder if even he isn't a little disturbed by the idea of the president of Harvard speaking at a large gathering on an off-the-record basis. Has there ever been a Harvard president before Larry Summers who routinely declared his remarks off-the-record? Isn't there a contradiction between saying that you want to spur public debate and refusing to be quoted? Doesn't that suggest that you want to make "provocative" remarks, but don't want to take responsibility for them?
Back in January, Summers' defenders repeatedly used the argument that his remarks at the NBER conference were supposed to be off-the-record and, therefore, it was unfair to hold him accountable for them. I'm not sure I understand the logic, but I'm more worried about the implications. Under what conditions should the president of the world's most important university insist upon speaking off the record?
Of course, I'm not the president of Harvard, and don't have the bully pulpit that Larry Summers does—fewer people care what I say. But as a point of principle, I don't speak off the record except in very rare circumstances. When you know that you can be quoted, you hold yourself to a higher standard, and avoid the low road.
Politicians speak off the record. Press secretaries, publicists, and spies speak off the record. Professors, journalists, writers, and university presidents...shouldn't.
Nancy Hopkins Tells Her Side of the Story
In the March/April issue of the MIT Faculty Newsletter, biologist Nancy Hopkins writes a lengthy (eight-page) explanation of her decision to walk out of Larry Summers' NBER speech. For all those who've written or thought that Hopkins is hysterical, over-emotional, et al, this essay is a must-read. Unfortunately, I can't link to it, because it's on a password-protected site. (A little bird—not Hopkins—sent it to me.)
Hopkins begins with some background on the issue of gender in science, detailing her own experience with a committee that investigated the problem at MIT. "The resulting 150-page report presented vivid evidence of how women professors enter science believing that gender discrimination is a thing of the past, but, as they approach the age of the men in power, suffer marginalization and day-in and day-out biases. These small inequities, as they accumulate, make doing science and attaining top positions much more difficult for women."
She then moves on to the NBER conference, and writes this (italics added):
"Summers told the NBER audience that he would offer three hypotheses to explain the under-representation of women in tenured positions on the faculties of leading universities, particularly in the fields of science, math, and engineering. As set forth in the transcript of his remarks, the three, in order of importance, were: 1. Women's family responsibilities and unwillingness to work the 80 hour week it takes to get to the top; 2. Differences in "intrinsic aptitude" between men and women; and 3. Socialization and discrimination in hiring. Summers dismissed the third hypothesis as unimportant, saying that we overestimate the impact of socialization, and that market forces would work to remove gender bias in hiring within academia. As Summers continued, I became convinced that these hypotheses were in fact his personal beliefs.
To those who work in this field, and to many women who worked their way to the top of elite science or engineering, Summers' comments were astonishing because: a) they ignore decades of research that have already disproven much of what he said; and b) they embody the very attitudes that constitute gender bias and that have been shown to hold women back. "
Hopkins then tackles the idea, put forward by Summers' defenders, that dismay over his remarks is misguided, a sad example of political correctness, and a threat to academic freedom (italics hers):
"Were Summers merely a professor in the field who wanted to advance the genetic inferiority of women to do math and science at elite universities, the processes that accompany academic freedom and enable the academy ultimately to discover the truth would kick in. The speaker would be required to present data...ideas would be tested and those found wanting would ultimately be weeded out. But the President is not a researcher in the field, and the processes associated with academic freedom of faculty to do research do not pertain when he speaks. Summers is the boss. His words are the pronouncements and opinions of Harvard University."
Finally, Hopkins writes about the press reaction to her walk-out and subsequent criticisms of Summers' remarks.
"[Hard] to understand, at first, are certain Harvard faculty critics, particularly our former colleague Steven Pinker, who has portrayed me in the press as being opposed to academic debate and inquiry (The New Republic , February 14, pg 15, 2005).... Why would Steve imply such an obvious untruth? Some Harvard faculty told me that Pinker and his popular-press book The Blank Slate were the source for Summers' NBER comments. Having now read the poorly reasoned and unsupported section on gender in Pinker's book, this seems likely. If so, Pinker's defense of Summers makes sense. In fact I think he owes Summers an apology. But he owes me one as well. Ironically, Harvard psychologist Professor Elizabeth Spelke and I were scheduled to debate with Pinker on the Charlie Rose show about research in biology, genetics, and psychology that debunks Pinker's views, but Pinker backed out. The show was cancelled because, they told me, they could not find a psychologist to take Pinker's viewpoint who was willing to appear. "
I'd be curious to hear Pinker's side of this, but if he really did back out of appearing on the Charlie Rose Show, that's not confidence-inspiring.
Finally, Hopkins asks why this incident seems to have taken such a hold on the public imagination. She concludes: "I think the fascination with this story is that we may be witnessing a skirmish in the final battle - a battle to get to the top, the last step in a process that has gone on for millennia. ...Men hold at least 95% of the institutional power in America, and it's not easy to give that up. What many of us are waiting to see in this symbolic struggle is whether women are finally going to achieve equality or not. And I think it's not only men who fear such an outcome. I think many women do, too."
Agree or disagree with Hopkins, she's clearly a serious figure who has been done a disservice by media caricaturing and conservative punditry. Her article deserves widespread distribution; I hope she and MIT post it somewhere public....
One University, Lots of Gods
Battell Chapel is one of the loveliest spaces at Yale University, but I remember that, as an undergraduate, I barely spent any time there. What went on inside the chapel seemed disconnected from the rest of Yale life. One reason was that the Sunday services there were organized by the United Church of Christ, formerly the Congregational Church, and were intended as much for the New Haven community as for Yale students, if not more. There was a logic to that, since Congregationalists founded Yale, but it certainly meant that the church's impact on the university community was diluted.
Now Yale is ending its official affiliation with the United Church of Christ in order to make the church better reflect the religious diversity of Yale students. This is one of those moves that, while painful, makes a certain amount of sense. Yale is a place of diverse religiosity, and its chapel should reflect that.
It's also something that Larry Summers would very much like to do with Harvard's Memorial Chapel, according to people I've spoken with on both sides of the issue. But I suspect it won't be happening any time soon. This is a fight that Summers can't afford to pick right now....
Fox in the Henhouse
A fascinating story about Evelyn Fox Keller, an MIT scientist and professor of the history of science who has written extensively about the role of gender in the sciences. (For some reason, it's a hot topic now....)
Key quote:
"Let me make clear from the outset," she wrote in "Reflections," "that the issue that requires discussion is not, or at least not simply, the relative absence of women in science." Women are relatively absent in almost all important intellectual and creative endeavors, she said. But few of these endeavors, she went on, "bear so unmistakably the connotation of masculine in the very nature of the activity."
"To both scientists and their public, scientific thought is male thought," she continued. "Hard" objectivity itself is identified with masculinity, she wrote, and "soft" subjectivity is identified with femininity. "What would it mean for science if it were otherwise?"
I think that's worth pondering without any commentary from me.....
It's Only Fair
Pat Burson of the Chicago Tribune devotes an entire column to Larry Summers' remarks at the NBER conference in January. The point is to demonstrate how to recover from a gaffe.
"No one is immune from saying something so clumsy, inaccurate, outlandish or uncouth that he or she regrets it," Burson writes. "Fortunately, foot-in-mouth disease need not be fatal, say psychologists, workplace coaches and communications experts, but certain steps are necessary to recover from such a misstep."
Unfortunately for Summers, Burson doesn't mention—and perhaps isn't aware of—Summers' April 7th speech entirely recanting his January remarks. (See "Talking the Talk," below.) And Burson isn't alone in this failing: outside of the Boston media, that speech hasn't been covered at all. Not even the New York Times, which paid enormous attention to Summers' original gaffe, has remarked upon his mea culpa.
This is entirely predictable media behavior—cover the controversy, but not the aftermath—and entirely wrong. If you think the original sin is worth covering, then you have to cover the attempt at redemption as well. It's only fair, and the lack thereof is the kind of thing that makes the general public so cynical about the media. If I were Summers, I'd be fuming....
Protest Accomplished
Harvard associate dean Judith Kidd changed her mind and decided to allow the Harvard Social Forum to protest on-campus recruiting by the CIA and Department of Homeland Security.
That's the right decision, and not just because she was using a technicality as a pretext for prohibiting the protest. Harvard needs every demonstration of passion and idealism it can get, even if, to some, it may seem misguided. Most Harvard students are obsessively pre-professional and politically apathetic, which is an unfortunate state of affairs at our most important university. Signs of independent thought and conviction, and political engagement with the outside world—whether liberal or conservative—are few and far between. The College should encourage, rather than suppress, them.
I know, that's a pipe dream. So I'll settle for "tolerate."
Back from Beantown
It was quite a 24-hour swing! Thanks to the Harvard Club for hosting such a nice dinner, to the good people at the Harvard Coop for organizing the reading, and to Curt Schilling for serving up a home run pitch to Jason Giambi.
Most of all, thanks to all of those who came to talk about
Harvard Rules. It was a pleasure to meet and chat with you. I know how many demands there are on people's time, and I'm always grateful when someone takes the time out of their busy day or evening to come hear an author talk. At the end, I always get the feeling that I've gotten more from the exchange than you have, but I hope that you don't walk away completely unsatisfied.
Harvard's Hit Man?
TIME includes Larry Summers in its list of the 100 most influential people in the world...but it's a little hard to tell why. Here's TIME's write-up, which is available online only to subscribers:
"Harvard's Hit Man
IN 1654, Harvard's first president was run out of office. Henry Dunster declined to baptize his son, believing that only adults should be baptized. And that was the end of him.
Great influence sill brings inordinate scrutiny. Larry Summers, Harvard's current president, was hired in 2001 to centralize authority and shake things up. But Summers, who fancies himself a provocateur, proved uncommonly impolitic. After he told celebrity Afro-American studies profess Cornel West that he lacked gravitas, West defected to Princeton. In January Summers, 50, speculated that "intrinsic aptitude" differences might explain why so few women hold tenured science posts. He has apologized, to no avail.
The only thing more surprising than Summers' recklessness is how much people care. In March a faculty no-confidence vote (which had no practical import) made headlines as far away as Australia. No one is more stunned than Summers. Showing off newly acquired restraint, he tries to explain: "Harvard is one of the two or three most recognized names in the world." On the upside, he gets better access to foreign leaders than when he was President Bill Clinton's Treasury Secretary. "I got much more of [China's former president] Jiang Zemin's time." --by Amanda Ripley"
This piece certainly make an argument for visibility. But influence? I'm not sure that's happened yet. At least, not in a constructive way.
You Could Always Just Arrest Them
Harvard College deans say they won't allow a protest against CIA and Department of Homeland Security recruiting on campus because the protesters failed to fill out an online form....
Given Larry Summers' well-known antipathy to student activism of any sort, and the flimsiness of the pretext for the ban, one has to wonder if this prohibition isn't coming from the top....
Up, Up and Away
I'm off to the Delta Shuttle. Hope to see you at the Harvard Coop, 12 PM tomorrow, for some good conversation about books, Harvard, Yankees-Red Sox, and anything else that may be on your mind....
Protest This
Last summer during the GOP convention, New York City police arrested almost 2,000 demonstrators, most of whom seemed to be doing little more than walking down the street. Not all of the arrested were even demonstrating. Some of them were people who just happened to be, well, walking down the street. Mayor Bloomberg had pledged to the Republicans that the city would be orderly for their convention—this would be no Chicago, 1968—and the police made it so.
Now the New York Times reports what seemed obvious at the time: that police were arresting people without cause—and lying about it. At one of the first trials of an arrested demonstrator, one cop testified that it took four officers to hold the guy down. But according to the Times, "A videotape shot by a documentary filmmaker showed Mr. Kyne agitated but plainly walking under his own power down the library steps, contradicting the vivid account of Officer Wohl, who was nowhere to be seen in the pictures. Nor was the officer seen taking part in the arrests of four other people at the library against whom he signed complaints."
Another man, Alexander Dunlop, claimed that he was arrested while going to pick up sushi. Police presented one piece of video at his trial; volunteer videographers showed that it had been selectively edited; prosecutors immediately dropped the charges.
What's become blindingly obvious is that the NYPD was determined to arrest people
simply for exercising their constitutional right to free speech and assembly.
I hope some of these folks file lawsuits. But the real responsibility for this lies with Mayor Michael Bloomberg. A billionaire who owns a media company, he should know better. Or maybe he's just used to controlling what gets shown in the press....
That the rebutting evidence has come from amateur videographers shows just how important the democratization of technology is for subverting authoritarian behavior. From video cameras to blogs, ordinary people have the tools to speak truth to power, and make sure that power feels the consequences. When will the Michael Bloombergs of the world realize this? Probably only around election time.
How ironic that the only videographers who didn't get this story are the TV networks "covering" the convention....
What Lee Atwater Always Suspected, Part 2
Larry Summers on a t-shirt! Inspired by Che Guevara! On sale from—no kidding—the Harvard Republican Club. One way or another, you know this is going to be a collector's item....
What Lee Atwater Always Suspected
In protest of Larry Summers' remarks on women in science, the Harvard Undergraduate Council has voted to change Harvard's color from red to pink. That, at least, is what the Daily Pennsylvanian says, and I always believe what I read in the Daily Pennsylvanian.
And Quite A Story It Is
I've always liked Bob Dole. As Kansas senator, he seemed a little too honest for politics—which is to say that he knew what he was supposed to do, the rituals in which he was supposed to partake, but somehow he just couldn't bring himself to fake it. He cared about the process of legislation, about making the Senate function well, about minimizing the amount of puffery and claptrap in public life. That's one reason, I suppose, why he made such a lousy presidential candidate. When he thought something was bogus, he couldn't hide his feelings.
Now Dole has written a new book, "One Soldier's Story," that tells of his Kansan childhood and his experience in wartime. From the Times review of it, the story of what happened to him in World War II is horrifying and inspiring at the same time. Trying to rescue a wounded man while taking fire from German soldiers hidden inside a French farmhouse.... Dole still sounds terse and stoic about his heroism and his injuries. In a culture where Donald Trump is a modern-day hero, there's something admirable about that. I hope "A Soldier's Story" is a big hit.
Affirmative Action for Conservatives, Cont'd.
Cathy Young waves the flag for "intellectual diversity" on campuses in the
Globe today. She decries the "leftward tilt of the American professoriat"—wait till she checks out the French professoriat!—and faults its intellectual arrogance. Just look at the reaction to Larry Summers' remarks on women in science, Young writes.
What's striking is how, in proposing ways to address the "problem," Young adopts the language of affirmative action. She speaks of a "perhaps unconscious" bias and suggests that "on a subtler level, there is on many campuses a climate in which a ''normal" person is presumed to be liberal."
Young writes: "Some conservatives want a political solution: legislation that would not only protect the rights of dissenting students but penalize professors who use the classroom to push a political agenda. Many professors are appalled, understandably, by the idea of legislative intervention in the classroom. The best way to avoid such intervention is for the academy to make a good-faith effort to recognize and correct its intellectual diversity problem."
This is such an ideological mish-mash that it's hard to deconstruct. But essentially Young's saying that the federal government should let colleges fix the alleged problem their own way, which is pretty much what Lee Bollinger, Larry Summers and others said in the context of affirmative action.
I think this particular cause is a bit nuts. But whether conservatives are advocating federal intervention or affirmative action on the issue, they're abandoning their own principles of up-by-your-bootstraps federalism. Is it possible that they're conceding that sometimes, when you don't have the power, laissez-faire capitalism isn't enough?
Maybe lamenting the lack of ideological diversity will make them more sympathetic to the question of ethnic and economic diversity on campus. But somehow I doubt it.
Silly New York Times, Part Two
Sometimes the un-hipness of the
Times really is startling. Take, for instance, today's story on how upcoming magazine
Radar is launching a website before it publishes its first physical issue. The Times treats this like a revelation. "The strategy is highly unusual," says Katharine Q. Seelye.
I suppose...but isn't there a "so what" factor here? Most magazines have websites to go along with the paper product. And most readers ignore them, except when they're looking up an old article, which generally can't be found anyway.
Ah, but Radar's website will be different, Seelye explains. "The Web site will not reproduce the magazine's contents but instead offer fresh takes daily on the news and gossip and will showcase a series of features.
"These will include a stock ticker with the relative popularity of various celebrities ("Trump up by three over Tina Brown!" Mr. Roshan intoned). There will be "after-death" interviews when the departed are back in the news (say, with Howard Hughes when "The Aviator" came out).
"And fans of the interactive will have a chance to post pictures of themselves on the Web site for 15 minutes along with a sentence or two about why they should be famous. All the while, a clock will tick down their 15 minutes."
Let us translate this: Radar's website will not feature any actual content that Radar has to spend money on.
As for the aforementioned website features...well, since I am a fan of new magazines and people who start them, perhaps it is best to say nothing at all.
Oh, all right, one thing: Donald Trump over Tina Brown by 3? Is there anyone who could possibly give a damn?
Rooms, and a View
Because I wrote a book about John Kennedy, a number of people have mentioned this New York Times story to me. It relates how John and his sister Caroline bought an apartment for Marta Sgubin, described as the "longtime cook and companion" to Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. The
Times presents the purchase as an act of pure benevolence. John and Caroline "made the purchase after they decided to sell their mother's apartment at 1040 Fifth Avenue, at 85th Street, and worried about what would happen to Ms. Sgubin, who lived there and whom they had come to consider tantamount to a member of the family."
...
"'It was clear to me that Marta Sgubin's happiness was of paramount importance to John Kennedy and to his sister, Caroline,' [real estate broker Kathy] Sloane said."
I don't know the details, but I have a feeling that the situation is more complicated than portrayed. After all, if John and Caroline simply wanted to buy the woman a place to live, why did Caroline only transfer the title now, a decade after they bought the apartment?
The Kennedys reward loyalty, it's true. But they also know that a longtime companion to Jackie O. would possess a horde of personal information that would prove lucrative in the tell-all market.
Isn't it possible that John and Caroline bought the apartment for Sgubin
both because they wanted to thank her and as a kind of insurance policy, to buy her silence? Thanks for the years of service. But talk about them, and you're out....
I write this not to be petty, because, after all, you can't blame the Kennedys for being concerned about this issue. People who come into contact with the Kennedys do write books about the family. (Some, I hope, more well-intentioned than others.)
But the story is more interesting when you understand what's really involved. (The
Times write-up is essentially a wet kiss to Caroline Kennedy.)
As a writer interested in the anthropology of power, I think this is a fascinating example of the problems faced by the rich and powerful in a tabloid society—and of how they can address those problems in a way that the rest of us can not. And then get a puff piece in the
New York Times out of the whole thing.
And on the subject of class... it's interesting that, while the
Times quotes Ed Schlossberg [Caroline's husband] and real estate broker Sloane, they don't actually talk to Sgubin herself. It's worth pondering why that might be the case. Perhaps Sgubin knows that the paper really isn't interested in her....
Reminds me of the
Times story on Harvard's Dormaid in which the paper never bothered to talk to the people who actually clean students' rooms....
And Speaking of Slinging It....
I'll be appearing at the Harvard Coop on Wednesday, April 12th, at noon.
This should be interesting—the last time I was up in Cambridge, about a month ago, I stopped in the Coop to sign a stack of books. As I was putting my John Hancock on paper, a woman sidled up to me and whispered, "You have done us all a great service." Turned out her husband was a faculty member at Harvard and she was tired of him coming home filled with Larry Summers-related frustration.
Meanwhile, one of the clerks told me that
Harvard Rules was selling very well—but that customers tended to ask for bags in which to hide it as soon as they bought it.
Don't be shy, Harvard! If the entire country is talking about your problems in public, so can you....
Seriously—I know that the atmosphere at Harvard has become so polarized,
Harvard Rules might be seen by some as partisan. In fact, it's more of an attempt to show the exercise of power in a university presidency. Whether that exercise is for better or worse, it's more Harvard's job to judge than mine.
I also want to thank the Coop in advance for having the guts to schedule this discussion. Let's just say that not every local bookstore would do the same.
Insert Pun Here
The story of manure-thief (and Harvard economist) Martin Weitzman continues to provoke confused laughter around the country, as in this essay in the
Wisconsin State Journal. It doesn't help that Weitzman is, apparently, a specialist in the microeconomic theory of environmental economics. (Whatever that means.) Perhaps he was researching economies of scale in excrement-theft.
The weird thing is that Weitzman has apparently been stealing shit for years. There's clearly some deeper psychology involved here. I mean, pilfering diamonds or Van Goghs is one thing. But stealing manure? That does suggest a problem with self-esteem....
Anyway, here's this conclusion from columnist Bill Wineke: "Had Weitzman taught microeconomics at the University of Utah, his horse-manure thievery would never have made national news. The moral is, if you're going to be a Harvard economist, be prepared to pay for your horse apples."
Harvard Rules in Brazil
How's your Portuguese? The Brazilian magazine
Epoca has this write-up of
Harvard Rules and the Lawrence Summers controversy. Brazil is a country that's close to my heart, so it's a delight to have the book written about there.... Obrigado,
Epoca.
And Then There's This to Cheer You Up
The
Columbia Journalism Review slags its own university for its attempt to manipulate the media.
Key quote: "PR is PR, we concede, but Columbia is the home of the Pulitzers, a top journalism school, and CJR itself. It should know better. Even its flacks should know better."
Writing like that takes some guts. Good for CJR. I wonder if such in-house honesty would be tolerated at Harvard, where media manipulation is standard operating procedure.
Journalists Behaving Badly
Two bizarre stories of prominent journalists screwing up.
In the first,
Detroit Free Press columnist Mitch Albom—yes, he of
Tuesdays with Morrie fame—wrote a column on Friday for publication Sunday in which he described events that were supposed to have happened Saturday. (Got that?) The only problem is the events didn't happen, and the Free Press is now looking into the matter.
This is an old newspaper trick. I remember, almost 20 years ago, as an intern at the
New Republic, reading a wire service copy of a column by a famous columnist (who shall remain nameless, just in case memory betrays) about what she did on New Year's Eve. The only problem was that I was reading the column on December 30th.
As Bill Maher would say, new rule: Journalists can't write columns about things that supposedly happened until
after they've happened.
But this would explain why
Tuesdays with Morrie always felt a little too perfectly sentimental....
Second bizarre story:
The New York Times has fired Susan Sachs, its Iraq bureau chief, after she allegeldy sent incriminating letters and e-mails to the wives of correspondents John Burns and Dexter Filkins, detailing alleged infidelity on the part of those two men.
You have to read this story to believe it.
And as for the idea of war correspondents with bad marriages? I'm shocked. Shocked.
Talking the Talk
Well, what do you know? Larry Summers gave a talk last night at a Harvard symposium on women in science and reversed course 180 degrees from his January remarks at the NBER conference. This time, Summers spoke about the "implicit bias" that many women face, referring to studies that show journal articles are more accepted when they come with a man's byline rather than a woman's. He also spoke of how female musicians have done better in auditions when performing behind a screen, so that the judges did not know their gender. (That example appears to suggest that Summers has read Malcolm Gladwell's Blink, which would make sense—he loves pop-science like Steve Pinker and Michael Lewis'
Money Ball.)
The speech has been picked up by the
Boston Globe (see link above), Reuters, and InsideHigherEd.com.
Is Summers' conversion genuine? It may not matter. Summers changed his public attitude towards affirmative action a couple years ago, and even though his private opinion didn't change, the public stance he took made a difference. Regarding the status of women at Harvard, the proof of Summers' sincerity will be, as they say, in the pudding.
Meantime, I hope that Summers' words get widespread distribution. It's only fair. Since his January comments were reported all over the world, this new perspective should get equal time.
The World Outside Harvard
Harvard isn't the only university with a no-tuition plan for students from low-income families. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill actually kicked off its similar plan before Harvard did, and InsideHigherEd.com reports that the UNC program is a smash.
Key quote: "The results so far suggest that the lowest-income students are well-prepared academically, and can succeed at top universities. And the economic analysis of these students shows just how stratified top public universities have become by income, and how out of reach those universities can become without ambitious outreach efforts by universities."
Two points on that.
First, that the low-income students are succeeding academically is a huge point. The question about low-income students has never been whether universities should help pay for them, but whether they've had the preparation to succeed at places like Harvard and UNC. Perhaps the strength of their motivation makes up for any gaps in their prior schooling?
And second, it is sad but important to note that even public universities have become stratified by income. One possible reason: As the federal government has cut its support for education, state universities have been forced to raise their tuitions....
With Friends Like These....
Novelist Jack Engelhard defends Larry Summers in this opinion piece in "Chronwatch," a conservative website devoted largely to monitoring the
San Francisco Chronicle.
(I know—weird.)
Key quote: "Lawrence Summers, Harvard’s president, is on the ropes for remarks taken to be anti-feminist. Foaming-at-the-mouth feminists want his scalp and members of his faculty want his blood (libel). His real trouble began when, some time ago, he mentioned anti-Semitism, that it is real, and that it is all over the place. He’s been a marked man ever since..."
He's been a marked man ever since? Surely this is a bit much.
One of the interesting challenges Summers faces is that many of his defenders outside the walls of Harvard Yard are people he ordinarily would have no patience for—and who are even more divisive than Summers himself....
Playing the Press
A curious story: The
New York Sun reports that Columbia University brokered an arrangement with the
New York Times by which the
Times would receive an advance copy of its report regarding allegations of professorial anti-Semitism. The
Times received the report a day before it was made otherwise public on the condition that it not seek comment from any interested parties.
That, of course, would have made it very difficult for the
Times to write about the report early. So the paper asked the university's permission to call one professor named, unfavorably, in the report, for comment; Columbia granted the exception, the
Times made the call, and published its early story, which was given major play in the paper and was generally considered good for Columbia.
Is there anything wrong here? Well, yes and no. These sorts of deals happen all the time, of course. The advantage for the
Times is obvious. The advantage for Columbia: Well, the exclusive quid pro quo will generally guarantee the story greater prominence and, possibly, a favorable spin for Columbia. And then other papers will follow the
Times' lead....
What jars is the idea of a university engaging in such media manipulation. We don't like to think of such
realpolitik existing in a place of such idealism. But of course it does, and perhaps it's time to readjust our sense of how universities function. Harvard, Columbia, Yale, whichever—these are powerful institutions with huge amounts of money and prestige at stake.
But on the other hand, haven't we lost something when we concede that our finest universities labor to manipulate the press just as Microsoft or the United States government would?
Independent Thinking
England's
The Independent delivers its take on the Summers matter. The author's conclusion? That Summers' fate is in the hands of alumni—more specifically, in their check-writing fingers. If donations tail off, he's in trouble. "I'm not alone in being disappointed with the ridicule Summers has brought against this university," said Benjamin Levy, class of '69.
The question is, how many more like Levy are there?
A Critical Mass
Political scientist Michael Dawson's departure from Harvard is being widely covered. I've seen stories on CNN.com and in the Boston Globe, the Boston Herald, the Chicago Sun-Times, Reuters, and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
Typical headline: "Troubled Harvard Loses Another Faculty Member."
Typical quote from Dawson: "The research environment has changed since I first accepted the offer to Harvard,'' said Dawson, who added personal reasons also influenced his decision. ``I thought I would be able to work with, among others, [departed black scholars] Cornel West, Anthony Appiah, Lawrence Bobo and Marcyliena Morgan.''
The departure of a professor from Harvard—especially one who's relatively unknown—would not ordinarily be a subject for mainstream journalism. But the problems at Harvard have achieved a kind of critical mass in the public arena, so that every new development is covered as part of a larger and ongoing drama. This can not be good for the university.
And if the Pope Wasn't Enough to Make You Believe in God...
Yankees 4, Red Sox 3.
I was at the Stadium yesterday—it's telling about the differences between the two cities that Boston has a "park" and New York has a stadium—and the day showed just how glorious baseball can be. The first real day of spring in New York brought a pitchers' duel to the Bronx, Carl Pavano versus Matt Clement, and each pitched terrifically well—Pavano just pitched a little better. The Red Sox, who are always dangerous, tied the score in the top of the 9th against reliever Mariano Rivera, who looks less and less superhuman with every passing season. Then Derek Jeter homered on a 3-2 fastball from Kurt Foulke, and the game was over, silencing the obnoxious Red Sox fan a few rows in front of me who insisted on standing up and shouting, "This is
my house! This is
my house!" (Where were the Bleacher Creatures when you needed them?)
Nine innings of excellent pitching, solid hitting, and pretty good defense (at least from the Yankees). A full house in the Stadium, a blue sky, a Yankees victory—who could ask for more?
Well, I could.
The experience of going to a Yankee game could be improved immensely by taking the following steps immediately:
1) End the playing of "God Bless America" between the top and bottom of the 7th. The act has become more a forced exercise than a demonstration of passion and solidarity. It's like forcing people to stand up and say the Pledge of Allegiance. Plus, that Irish tenor is dreadful, and reminds one of Rudy Giuliani, which causes stomach pain. Forcing people to listen to "God Bless America" is, well, un-American.
2) Do something about the terrible quality of the food vending. If fans have to pay outrageous sums for food—$26 for two hot dogs and two beers—at least get better beer, healthier food, and more outlets. There's no reason any fan should have to miss an entire inning just to get something to eat.
3) The Yankees have now put crowd control barriers along both sides of River Street. This must end. It is the Yankee fan's God-given right to cross the street at any point he wishes. Getting from the exit of the "D" train to The Bat now takes about 15 minutes to walk two blocks.
4) Immediately eject all fans walking around typing on their Blackberries.
5) Enough with the Red Sox fans. I see a suspicious amount of brand-new Sox caps on the heads of New Yorkers these days. It's irritating. This is
not your house, you Johnny [Damon]-come-latelies.
Ah, well. Maybe the Queer Eye episode featuring the Red Sox, or the nauseating Drew Barrymore-Jimmy Fallon movie, will finally show that after just one victorious season, this Sox team has jumped the shark....
But Hasn't the Definitive Book Already Been Written?
Author Seth Michael Green is traveling around the Ivy League, hanging out with students, for a new book tentatively titled, "What I Learned in College: My Year with the Ivy League."
“I have a definite bias against really shoddy, fly-by-night operations calling themselves colleges,” Green tells the
Harvard Crimson. “I am really all about the Ivy League schools.”
Those already curious about the seedier side of Ivy League student life might want to take a look at Ross Douthat's Privilege.
Economists Doing Good...
John Cassidy reviews Jeffrey Sachs' new book,
The End of Poverty, in this week's
New Yorker. Sachs is a fascinating character with good intentions, an enormous ego, a flair for publicity, and a decidedly mixed track record in international economics. That said, he's also trying to focus attention to the problem of poverty around the world, and agree or disagree with his proposals, how can you argue with that?
Sachs, by the way, was in the Harvard economics department until Larry Summers' return to the university. The two men have long been rivals, and the general consensus was that Harvard wasn't big enough for the two of them. So Sachs is now at Columbia....
This Is Almost Too Easy
Harvard economics professor Martin Weitzman has been arrested for trying to steal a truckload of manure.
That would explain why his students leave class with—oh, never mind. You know where I'm going....
Oh, All Right
Since I rarely scoop the
Crimson, I'm going to go ahead and post its story on the departure of political scientist Michael Dawson...which you read about here, um, last Thursday.
Granted, the
Crimson was on spring break...
Despite what Skip Gates suggests, the Af-Am department at Harvard does appear to be in precipitous decline.
Playing Hooky
Technical difficulties kept me from posting this morning, and now I'm headed off to Yankee Stadium to see an early season Yankees-Red Sox match-up. Lots of stuff to come as soon as I'm back....
The Natural Order of the Universe Reasserts Itself
Yankees 9, Red Sox 2. Read all about it here.
The Bad News Is...
...that after reading the Harvard Crimson, those accepted students might not want to come to Harvard.
This story reports that the curricular review's committee on general education has abandoned its plans to release a report this year, because the response to the report it had planned to release ranged from disbelief to disdain.
(How curious that two of the committee members, Steve Pinker and Luke Menand, are proteges of Larry Summers, recruited specifically by him to come to Harvard. They have, collectively, about three years of Harvard institutional knowledge.)
Meanwhile, this story reports further on Harvard's 27th-place ranking out of 31 peer institutions. Key quote: <<
Despite Harvard’s reputation as the gold standard of education, the University in many ways fails to meet the needs of its [undergraduates].>>
The question is will these pieces of substantively bad news affect whether all those newly admitted students decide to come to Harvard? My guess: probably not. The brand is still too strong.
But it's also possible that I'm wrong, and that this bad news, coupled with Larry Summers' controversy, creates an aura of decline for the university....
The Good News Is...
Harvard has just released its admissions statistics for the upcoming year, and they are impressive as always—and maybe a little more so.
The number of applicants rose to 22, 796, a new record, and after losing out to Yale last year, Harvard recaptured its status as the most selective college in the country, accepting only 9.1 percent of applicants.
And Harvard says that those applicants will benefit from the financial aid initiative Larry Summers has promoted, reducing tution for families with incomes from $40,000 to $60,000 and eliminating it for families with incomes under $40,000.
The number of students likely to be eligible for what's known as the Harvard Financial Aid Initiative is around 360, a 22% increase from last year.
If the Harvard admissions office really found some 60 new students from low-income families who qualified for admission, good for it....
Good Journalism for You
A week or so ago I was interviewed by a writer from
USA Today for a piece on
Harvard Rules and Ross Douthat's book. Today I just received a letter from the paper—the "USA Today Accuracy Survey." The letter asked if the piece had made any specific mistakes, and if I thought it was fair or unfair, and in what capacity I'd been interviewed.
Such a simple tool to improve journalism, but I've never seen any other newspaper do this. (And good luck getting a correction in the
New York Times, if they do you wrong.)
Good for
USA Today.
Go Shark! Go!
Some months back, the Monterey Aquarium in California was given a young great white shark that had been captured by a fisherman. Great white sharks have never survived in captivity, but this one did, and attendance at the aquarium soared as people came to see this remarkable animal.
Now the shark has grown too big and has started to eat the other fish—hate it when that happens—and so the aquarium had to release the animal into the wild.
We can only wish it well. According to Peter Benchley in this month's issue of Men's Journal, sharks kill about 12 humans a year. And every year, we kill about 90 million sharks. No, that's not a typo. Ninety million.
It's Not Just the Gender, Mr. President
A scholar examines an aspect of Larry Summers' infamous NBER remarks other than the biology question: his suggestion that women were unwilling to work the 80-hour weeks required for success in math and science.
Her conclusion: "We need to get past the mythology of what makes creative people productive, past the American ethos that all can be ours if we just put enough hours into it, and do solid research on the topic. We don’t need occupational stereotypes to scare talented youth of either sex away from science, and I hope at some point prominent academicians such as the President of Harvard become good enough scholars to move past inaccurate clichés."
Wanted: Glutton for Punishment
Must enjoy controversy. Some cleaning-up after your boss required. Experience in fending off hostile faculty members also a plus.
So if you're interested in becoming Larry Summers' new chief of staff, apply here.
Is It Something in the Coors?
The craziness in Colorado continues. Ward Churchill says he won't cooperate with any investigation into whether or not he really is of Native American descent. The investigation, he says, is appropriate for a "lunatic asylum."
Meanwhile, a state legislator is criticizing the university panel that suggested that Churchill should not be fired for his boneheaded essay about 9/11. "The patients are in charge of the asylum," said this state representative.
Here's a crazy thought: Let's strap Churchill and the politician in straightjackets, lock them in a padded cell, and see if they can headbutt each other into unconsciousness....
Hard Feelings at Columbia
Both sides at Columbia sound unsatisfied with the faculty report on whether pro-Palestinian professors intimidated Zionist students, according to this story in the
Times. The Zionist students feel that their complaints haven't been adequately redressed. Supporters of the pro-Palestinian professors feel that there really wasn't any intimidating behavior to complain about, except perhaps by the Zionist students. But there may not be enough outrage to fuel more controversy, and for Lee Bollinger, the worst of this controversy may be over.
The
New York Sun, however, doesn't think much of the report and wonders, "Where are the trustees?"...
The Satire Problem, Cont'd.
The
Detroit Free Press includes Larry Summers on a list of "real-life April Fools." Other nominations include Michael Jackson, Bernie Ebbers, and Paris Hilton.
Death with Glamor?
Are the media glamorizing the suicide of Hunter S. Thompson? This Denver writer thinks so. I agree: there's a fine line between believing that people of sound mind should have the right to choose how they die, and describing it in a way that might encourage others to pursue the same path.... Hunter Thompson's death is being romanticized just as his life was. I suspect part of him would loathe that; part of him would like it very much.
No, It's Not an April Fools' Joke
News flash #2: the Pope's urinary tract infection is responding to antibiotics.
