“The Psycho Ex-Girlfriend of the Democratic Party” (And John even gets a mention!)
Archives for 2008
The Local Scandal
For those of you around WV, this is the big local scandal that has captured the campus and the state for months:
When he became president of West Virginia University last year, Michael Garrison seemed poised to use his political experience to help build the institution’s national reputation.
Less than a year after taking office, Garrison is struggling to hold on to his job and contain a scandal, after the university granted an unearned degree to a longtime friend, the daughter of the West Virginia governor. On Monday, the Faculty Senate voted 77 to 19 in favor of a resolution of no-confidence in Garrison and demanded his resignation.
“A lot of the sentiment had more to do with the absolute importance of academic integrity and the fact that the president is responsible for whatever goes on in his administration, rather than anything that he did specifically or did not do,” said Steve Kite, a geology and geography professor and chairman of the Faculty Senate.
A huge black eye, and I am glad I don’t have to deal with it. As a practical matter, I don’t know how Garrison will stay as President, particularly after I saw a news story today in which he admitted error (I read it on the bus in the local paper, and I can’t find a link). The Faculty Senate is pissed, and admitting that you were at fault, even obliquely, is not going to calm them down.
Again, glad I do not have to deal with it (I really don’t even know any of the players), but sad and angry the whole thing has happened. It is embarrassing, and it hurts the school’s reputation. It really does have the whole power structure involved- Mylan, our biggest donor, the Governor and the state political machine, and the bigwigs at WVU. Such a mess, and I honestly could not begin to predict how this will turn out.
As a side note, the correction at the top of this WaPo piece is awesome:
Correction to This Article
Due to an editing error, an article in Thursday’s newspaper on West Virginia University misidentified the faculty organization that had approved a resolution of no-confidence in WVU President Michael Garrison.It is the Faculty Senate, not the Faulty Senate.
Cheaters
After brokering a deal to protect himself, former New England Patriots employee Matt Walsh has finally turned over his evidence in the videotaping controversy.
The New York Times reported and the NFL confirmed on Wednesday that Walsh sent eight tapes to the league that show the Patriots recording the play-calling signals of five opponents in six games between 2000 and 2002.
Taping the signals of opposing teams is prohibited by league rules, and the Patriots were already fined $750,000 and docked a first-round draft choice in September for taping the New York Jets. NFL commissioner Roger Goodell left open the possibility that more penalties could be levied.
A Patriots employee from 1997-2003, Walsh reached an agreement to turn over the tapes in exchange for being indemnified from all future legal fees.
The list of the Walsh tapes indicates that the Patriots taped offensive and defensive coaches in regular-season games against the Miami Dolphins, Buffalo Bills, Cleveland Browns and San Diego Chargers. The team also made video of the Pittsburgh Steelers in the 2002 AFC Championship Game.
It is personal now. We lost that game 24-17, and it is not too out of bounds to suggest that the margin of victory, one touchdown, was through cheating.
Bill Belichick- Cheater.
New England Patriots- Cheaters.
They should have their Superbowl stripped from them, as well as the AFC championship, and Belichick should get a lifetime ban.
Open Thread: Sinking Ship Edition
Possible McCain Slogans
This is the funniest thing I have seen in a while. My personal favs are:
#1- Old is the new hope
#9- Obliterating the Middle East is on his bucket list.
John Bolton Says We Should Bomb Iranian Training Camps
Splendid. If training camps are anything like the ‘training’ or ‘camps’ that I’ve seen those places are mostly dirt with targets set a long distance away from the muddy spots where people kneel to shoot at them. Obstacles are made out of unpainted plywood and the barracks make your freshman dorm look like the Hilton. Building one of those would cost, what, $50k? It would take about five days to build another one using minimally skilled labor. A cruise missile costs a a million. A big GPS-guided bomb dropped by a stealth plane at night can’t cost that much less, and I doubt that the time and resources spent to ensure that the rest of our planes could overfly Iran without playing dodge-the-missile would come cheap either.
All of this takes for granted that the loyal Bushies in charge of choosing targets inside Iran can tell a training camp from a high school soccer field, which by now ought to be pretty hard to believe. I wouldn’t hire these guys to clean a Wendy’s for fear that they’d empty a mop into the deep fryer.
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