Harvard is spending $50 million bucks to make its faculty more diverse.
Sigh.
Why is it that my alma mater just doesn't fire everyone who isn't on a diversity list to really stand head and shoulders above other universities in the diversity rankings? I know that I am being absurd, but the fact that the Big H feels compelled to spend $50 million dollars to hire people based on their secondary characteristics of being bothers me.
The reports paint a picture of a campus where women in science feel a lack of respect, if not outright hostility. "In some departments, women graduate students and postdoctoral fellows report hearing disrespectful criticisms of their abilities from male colleagues and a lack of a supportive environment," one report said.
At Harvard? C'mon. As a paractical matter, a more PC school is hard to imagine
Among the initiatives cited with approval by professors were recommendations for helping female and minority faculty members with their professional and personal lives, including giving financial aid for research and day care and helping the spouses of professors being recruited by Harvard to find jobs.
Wouldn't current professors be ticked off that they are left out of this feel-good festival of cash for the university's guilt? To be fair, though, the concrete details sound less ominous than the univeristy's conceptual commitment to discriminate against you if you are male.
Remember that Harvard is not saying that they will choose the female or minority candidate, all things being otherwise equal. No, the university is maintaining upfront that the intial screen will be for your estrogen or melatonin count.
Fair Harvard? I think not.
Tuesday, May 17, 2005
Monday, May 16, 2005
Study Results
A new Pew Study makes a surprisingly accurate analysis of the political coalitions of the Right and Left. Both groups come across are far more heteronomous than they are often portrayed (a conclusion that fits with my experience). Here are some highlights.
"The Pew study found that, in terms of personal income, the Republican Enterprisers and the Democratic Liberals look almost identical. About four in 10 in each group said they have household incomes of $75,000 or more. The same held for one of the groups in the middle, the Upbeats. Enterprisers are the most likely to own or trade stocks (53 percent), followed by the Upbeats (42 percent), Liberals (38 percent) and Social Conservatives (35 percent).
Looked at from the other end of the income scale, nearly half of Pro-Government Conservatives have incomes of $30,000 or below, about the same as the Disadvantaged Democrats.
A similar pattern occurs when the groups are measured by years of educational achievement. Enterprisers and Liberals look very much alike: 49 percent of Liberals and 46 percent of Enterprisers are college graduates.
At the other end, 13 percent of Disadvantaged Democrats graduated from college, while in the Republican coalition, 15 percent of Pro-Government Conservatives graduated from college. In the cluster of groups that form the middle of the electorate, 11 percent of Disaffecteds finished college, while 37 percent of Upbeats are college graduates."
"The Pew study found that, in terms of personal income, the Republican Enterprisers and the Democratic Liberals look almost identical. About four in 10 in each group said they have household incomes of $75,000 or more. The same held for one of the groups in the middle, the Upbeats. Enterprisers are the most likely to own or trade stocks (53 percent), followed by the Upbeats (42 percent), Liberals (38 percent) and Social Conservatives (35 percent).
Looked at from the other end of the income scale, nearly half of Pro-Government Conservatives have incomes of $30,000 or below, about the same as the Disadvantaged Democrats.
A similar pattern occurs when the groups are measured by years of educational achievement. Enterprisers and Liberals look very much alike: 49 percent of Liberals and 46 percent of Enterprisers are college graduates.
At the other end, 13 percent of Disadvantaged Democrats graduated from college, while in the Republican coalition, 15 percent of Pro-Government Conservatives graduated from college. In the cluster of groups that form the middle of the electorate, 11 percent of Disaffecteds finished college, while 37 percent of Upbeats are college graduates."
Friday, May 13, 2005
Crap
Today's Washington Post has an article that made me laugh. Such archetypical leftist cant is rarely found anymore in its pure form. To wit:
Speaking at the Washington Convention Center, [Donald, ed.] Kagan's subject was right in line with the usual topics taken up in previous Jefferson lectures (a $10,000 honor sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities). He gave a stout talk, "In Defense of History," with lots of sideswipes at the old boogeymen of conservative academics. He got laughs for little digs at the relativists (who believe that other societies may have equally legitimate values and truths) and the multiculturalists (who think the traditional canon is not so weak as to bear with a little expansion). He saved especial scorn for poor deluded literary theorists and misguided historians who stray from the usual, worthy subjects: "high politics, constitutions, diplomacy, war, great books and ideas." Perhaps he was having a little argument with the Harvard poetry scholar, Helen Vendler, who argued in last year's Jefferson Lecture that poetry should be placed first among the various disciplines in the humanities. Nonsense, says Kagan.
[more from the article, ed.]...Kagan's book, and his life's work, have contributed to an environment in which fear of vague potential threats often overwhelms sane evaluation of real threats (Kagan went on and on about potential WMDs in Iraq in his book, though they were never found).
The author, Phillip Kennicott, makes absolutely no attempt to hide his views and by my lights calls Kagan a curmudgeonly old fool who hasn't learned anything about the world, is a typical neo-con/racist with no respect for other cultures or values, and is getting kicked in the arse by fate, as religion, and not history, becomes again the dominant mode of moral certainty in this country (in opposition to Kagan's stance).
Jeez, man. I'm going to write an op-ed to the Post. This smug little article really sucks.
Speaking at the Washington Convention Center, [Donald, ed.] Kagan's subject was right in line with the usual topics taken up in previous Jefferson lectures (a $10,000 honor sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities). He gave a stout talk, "In Defense of History," with lots of sideswipes at the old boogeymen of conservative academics. He got laughs for little digs at the relativists (who believe that other societies may have equally legitimate values and truths) and the multiculturalists (who think the traditional canon is not so weak as to bear with a little expansion). He saved especial scorn for poor deluded literary theorists and misguided historians who stray from the usual, worthy subjects: "high politics, constitutions, diplomacy, war, great books and ideas." Perhaps he was having a little argument with the Harvard poetry scholar, Helen Vendler, who argued in last year's Jefferson Lecture that poetry should be placed first among the various disciplines in the humanities. Nonsense, says Kagan.
[more from the article, ed.]...Kagan's book, and his life's work, have contributed to an environment in which fear of vague potential threats often overwhelms sane evaluation of real threats (Kagan went on and on about potential WMDs in Iraq in his book, though they were never found).
The author, Phillip Kennicott, makes absolutely no attempt to hide his views and by my lights calls Kagan a curmudgeonly old fool who hasn't learned anything about the world, is a typical neo-con/racist with no respect for other cultures or values, and is getting kicked in the arse by fate, as religion, and not history, becomes again the dominant mode of moral certainty in this country (in opposition to Kagan's stance).
Jeez, man. I'm going to write an op-ed to the Post. This smug little article really sucks.
Wednesday, May 11, 2005
Posada
Mention that someone was a CIA agent and polar opposite feelings erupt in most people, typically depending on the person's feelings for the agency.
The question here for the great and good people of conscience everywhere (exempting myself as a person with little conscience) is can the US fight a war against terrorism while possibly having someone responsible for loss of life in the cause of defeating communism (paid for by the agency) loose in the country?
From this morning's BBC Online
"The US would have to reconcile its traditional sympathy for the politically influential Cuban exiles in Miami and its firm stand against suspected terrorists in the wake of the 11 September 2001 attacks, our correspondent says.
"
...and my answer: realpolitik -- I don't feel in the least threatened by this guy's existence on our country's soil, nor is his presence on US soil a moral quandry for our terror war. The US is fighting people who want to kill us. The war on terror is not a war for all things good in all times and places (despite Bush's rhetoric). Posada (the guy in question) does not want to kill us; in fact, he wants to kill our enemy.
I hope the agency put him up somewhere nice, gave him a funny name and a few dollars to spend on his retirement...
The question here for the great and good people of conscience everywhere (exempting myself as a person with little conscience) is can the US fight a war against terrorism while possibly having someone responsible for loss of life in the cause of defeating communism (paid for by the agency) loose in the country?
From this morning's BBC Online
"The US would have to reconcile its traditional sympathy for the politically influential Cuban exiles in Miami and its firm stand against suspected terrorists in the wake of the 11 September 2001 attacks, our correspondent says.
"
...and my answer: realpolitik -- I don't feel in the least threatened by this guy's existence on our country's soil, nor is his presence on US soil a moral quandry for our terror war. The US is fighting people who want to kill us. The war on terror is not a war for all things good in all times and places (despite Bush's rhetoric). Posada (the guy in question) does not want to kill us; in fact, he wants to kill our enemy.
I hope the agency put him up somewhere nice, gave him a funny name and a few dollars to spend on his retirement...
Wednesday, May 04, 2005
Zarqawi. Again
We almost had him. Again.
"The Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is reported to have been seen on Wednesday at the hospital in Ramadi, which was later searched by US forces. The director of the hospital, Munam Aftan, told the Iraq-based newspaper Al-Zaman that US troops surrounded and raided the entire hospital, searching for al-Zarqawi, who is believed to be al-Qaeda's leader in Iraq."
Soon.
"The Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is reported to have been seen on Wednesday at the hospital in Ramadi, which was later searched by US forces. The director of the hospital, Munam Aftan, told the Iraq-based newspaper Al-Zaman that US troops surrounded and raided the entire hospital, searching for al-Zarqawi, who is believed to be al-Qaeda's leader in Iraq."
Soon.
Unemployment Relief for the Gulfies
Jobs, Jobs, Jobs!
"The counterterrorism source, a former top CIA official, said that the laptop also revealed that Zarqawi is actively recruiting most of his suicide bombers from Yemen and Saudi Arabia.
'He was doing that in Europe, within the Muslim communities, but the European countries are now watching closely,' he said. 'There are hundreds and hundreds of Saudis who are trying to be recruited for suicide missions. The Saudis are trying to stop them, but they can't get them all. And Zarqawi's got his people now in Yemen recruiting.'"
Wanted: Men desiring great pay, few hours, and a place in heaven surrounded by virgins.
"The counterterrorism source, a former top CIA official, said that the laptop also revealed that Zarqawi is actively recruiting most of his suicide bombers from Yemen and Saudi Arabia.
'He was doing that in Europe, within the Muslim communities, but the European countries are now watching closely,' he said. 'There are hundreds and hundreds of Saudis who are trying to be recruited for suicide missions. The Saudis are trying to stop them, but they can't get them all. And Zarqawi's got his people now in Yemen recruiting.'"
Wanted: Men desiring great pay, few hours, and a place in heaven surrounded by virgins.
Insugency diminishing
Maybe Zarqawi's 15 minutes of fame are about up.
The letter, dated April 27, was signed by Abu Asim al-Qusaymi al-Yemeni, who Whitman said was an Al Qaeda member and veteran of fighting last year in the former insurgent stronghold of Fallujah. The letter was seized during an April 28 raid in Baghdad, the military said.
The writer condemns some middle-rank Al Qaeda leaders in Iraq -- the ''emirs," Arabic for ''princes" -- and asks the sheik to ''test those who are below you. Some of them are . . . oppressors."
''Morale is weakening, and there is [exhaustion or confusion] among the ranks on the mujahideen," the writer says, according to an Associated Press translation of the copy provided by the military. ''We have found emirs who are not fit for leadership."
The letter, dated April 27, was signed by Abu Asim al-Qusaymi al-Yemeni, who Whitman said was an Al Qaeda member and veteran of fighting last year in the former insurgent stronghold of Fallujah. The letter was seized during an April 28 raid in Baghdad, the military said.
The writer condemns some middle-rank Al Qaeda leaders in Iraq -- the ''emirs," Arabic for ''princes" -- and asks the sheik to ''test those who are below you. Some of them are . . . oppressors."
''Morale is weakening, and there is [exhaustion or confusion] among the ranks on the mujahideen," the writer says, according to an Associated Press translation of the copy provided by the military. ''We have found emirs who are not fit for leadership."
From Drudge
THE TEXAN reports: Shouts became so pervasive during the question-and-answer session that Coulter informed the organizers she would no longer take questions if the hecklers were not silenced. For a time, the shouts were considerably lessened, until the issue of gay marriage was broached.
Coulter said she supported the definition of marriage as between a man and a woman on the basis that a good woman civilizes and inspires a man to strive for something better, leading to a question that was met with a stunned silence.
"You say that you believe in the sanctity of marriage," said Ajai Raj, an English sophomore. "How do you feel about marriages where the man does nothing but f*@k his wife up the ass?"
UT Police officers approached Raj to arrest him, resulting in a mass exodus of protesters chanting, "Let him go."
DRUDGE REPORT FLASH 2005®
These are civilized university students who believe in tolerance and respect for people with diverse views? Ha! If I hadn't had experiences like this myself, I probably would write this off as an isolated incident. But it isn't. And it's shameful. Long live diversity...
Coulter said she supported the definition of marriage as between a man and a woman on the basis that a good woman civilizes and inspires a man to strive for something better, leading to a question that was met with a stunned silence.
"You say that you believe in the sanctity of marriage," said Ajai Raj, an English sophomore. "How do you feel about marriages where the man does nothing but f*@k his wife up the ass?"
UT Police officers approached Raj to arrest him, resulting in a mass exodus of protesters chanting, "Let him go."
DRUDGE REPORT FLASH 2005®
These are civilized university students who believe in tolerance and respect for people with diverse views? Ha! If I hadn't had experiences like this myself, I probably would write this off as an isolated incident. But it isn't. And it's shameful. Long live diversity...
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