Jim Prall
Toronto, Canada

DMI Blog

The ebb and flow of environmental progress has arisen once again. Taking a brief hiatus from the familiar stomping grounds of D.C., the going green vs. getting green (”money”) showdown appears to have settled out west. Specifically, over th…

justice dept, eductation you name it

Yeah, it’s a state with some serious wingnut problems. However, it’s also a state that has elected a Dem majority in the legislature and a Dem governor. We have Colorado Springs, but we also have Boulder and Denver. So it’s a complex region.

In any case, I ain’t leaving, and I ain’t shutting up.

Thanks for the sentiment. Yes, I’ve landed on my feet. Thank you. As for Mesa, its decline (in reputation and quality–and I’m not alone in this assessment) is directly linked to its president and his decisions. The remaining tenured professors are terrific–at least the ones in my former department are considered to be so. However, they’ve been impacted and so have the students. Mesa, at one time, had a good reputation and had been building it even further. No more.

(btw, the paltry salary I confessed to was a result of accepting the first job offer when I got out of grad school. I know better now.)

I at least hope you’ve found a place that appreciates you a little more….

When it comes to electing regents the right wingers go all out. They’ve been whining about liberal boulder for decades and with the talk radio monopoly one blowhard and a big microphone carries the weight of tens of thousands of concerned citizens donating a few hours of concern or dollars here and there. Their constant talk radio attacks on ‘liberal’ CU has been paying off and progressives need to wake up as to their most effective propaganda tool- the same one instrumental in sellling us this bush disaster.

If Co citizens want to get some sanity bat into their state they need to take their free speech demonstrations and boycotts to the root of the problem- their local right wing talk radio station.

The first thing Foster did was ask for the resignations of all the deans–that’s right, the Dean of Liberal Arts and Sciences, the Dean of Education, the Dean of Wellness and Recreation, all of them, so that he could save some money. Then he hired two of his cronies from the state’s office and created positions for them (at six-figure salaries). He heaped the duties of all the Deans onto the individual Chairs of departments (I do think, maybe, there was a small bump in salary for them–but not much). Then he sought the resignation of many of the tenured professors, ones who were close to retirement, so that he could hire “Instructors” (ones with Bachelor’s degrees). Then he lowered the entrance requirements so that students who scored a 13 on the ACTs could enroll. Enrollment went up and so did revenue, but the quality of students went down and the classroom size went up. But the numbers looked good–meaning the college was inching toward getting out of the red and into the black. This. This. This is the real “accomplishment” or bottom line of Republican “educators” and “administrators.”

And the above is no shit.

The perfect post-Reagan college president. By golly, he’ll run it like a business. Enron, anyone?

When it comes right down to it, I believe Benson shouldn’t be hired, though I have strong feelings that some of the arguments against him are red herrings. Not that it matters to me, personally. All the highly academically skilled kids I know avoid CU like the plague, and I would have to think long and hard before forking over tuition money there for my own kids.

I probably wouldn’t do it.

Bruce Benson is allied with the likes of Pete Coors and David Horowitz. He’s an oil exec who doesn’t believe in global warming. He has a track record of poleaxing tenured professors. And now he’s among the 1% least educated college presidents in Ame…

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