'It is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.'
— Carl Sagan

CNews 2July09

Sloppy writing and blatant hero worship mark two of DU Sturm College of Law's Race to the Bottom's "reportage" of the Ward Churchill reinstatement hearing yesterday.

First, their color commentary
Excerpt:

While the witnesses—especially Professor [Richard] Jessor—spoke passionately about the importance of research integrity to maintain academic standards, this is a pretty esoteric concept.

In the end, CU had only speculation that the sort-of-proved allegations of research misconduct would so damage the University’s reputation as to affect hiring and enrollment.

Integrity is an esoteric concept. Got it. In any case, that CU only "sort-of-proved allegations" of research misconduct during Teh Trial is precisely why Churchill won and CU lost; fairly obvious instances of Churchill's research misconduct, plagiarism, and fraud litter his career, and it takes a special brand of stupid to miss them. Lucky for CU, defense attorney Patrick 'Rourke was up to the task.

Anyway, in a second post, The Battle of the Message
Excerpt:

Professor Churchill’s testimony was—as ever—eloquent. He emphasized that he filed a lawsuit as “a matter of principle to preserve the concept of academic freedom, which is to say that political powers cannot silence professors because they disagree with their beliefs.” (all quotes approximate) “And to obtain justice, restitution, restoration to the position that jury found I was illegally removed from.”

Yup. Eloquence that even paraphrase cannot adulterate. Perhaps the testimony yesterday was lopsided in terms of eloquence, righteous indignation, and hubris, but who could tell from these reports? Charlene Hunter, the third year law student to whom integrity is an esoteric concept, authored both; her past reports on this case have all shown a growing bias toward The Perfesser, and these two posts mark her change to E major.

Incisive, dispassionate legal analysis of the final act of a complex legal ballet? Or schoolgirl-crush mash notes written by scented candle light, reclining in a warm, sudsy bath, Ravel's Boléro playing in the background? You decide. (ht Leah)

Teachers for a Democratic Society, repository of the "Unfire Ward Churchill" petition (and nothing else), having apparently achieved its purpose, ceased to exist a while back, but we're just now able to speak of its passing without tears.

CNews 1July09

Today's the day. We'll post news, most recent first, of Professor Doctor Indian Ward Churchill's reinstatement hearing as we learn of it.

DrunkaRadioyente wraps up the Crapless & Silverfish hearing coverage quite nicely


Testimony ends, ruling on reinstatement expected early next week (Daily Camera)
Excerpt:

Before court ended, Churchill attorney David Lane cross-examined CU Chancellor Phil DiStefano on the stand.

He asked the chancellor what the appropriate remedy is -- given a jury's finding earlier this year that CU violated Churchill's constitutional rights -- short of giving his client his job back.

"If he didn't commit research misconduct, I would support him coming back to the university," DiStefano said.

Churchill's return would 'taint' campus, CU dean says (Denver Post)
Excerpt:

"If Ward Churchill were reinstated, in terms of reputation, do you think it (the university) would suffer?" CU attorney Patrick O'Rourke asked Todd Gleeson, the dean of the college of arts and sciences.

"I believe it would suffer nationally," Gleeson said. "It taints the department with a reputation of having standards that don't match our national or campus expectations of scholarly work."

The Perfesser on the stand: 'It was never about the money' (John Aguilar is blogcasting the hearing for the Daily Camera)
Excerpt:

CU attorney Patrick O'Rourke immediately pounced on Churchill's assertion that he is not after money in the case.

He presented a number of statements Churchill had made in the past about suing for damages and seeking seven figures.

O'Rourke also asked why Lane had made such an issue about awarding money to Churchill during his closing arguments to the jury at the civil trial earlier this year.

Churchill said the more important factor was that the jury found CU violated his constitutional rights.

"It was never about money," Churchill said. "There were three other components to that verdict and they did exactly what I wanted them to do."

CU Angry Studies chair Emma Perez says Churchill would be welcome at CU (Denver Post)
Excerpt:

"They are lining up to take classes with Ward," Emma Perez said. "In the academy throughout the nation people see Ward as a hero."

CNews 30June09

From our Pot, Kettle. Kettle, Pot. department: Michael Roberts over at Westword gives The Perfesser a reach-around while criticizing director Liz Garbus' slob-job of same.

CNews 28June09

DrunkaSartre has a report on the turnout at the Elmwood, Illinois rally to honor Ward Churchill.

Don't forget: The Perfesser gets yet another of his seemingly endless days in court July 1.

CNews 25June09

From our We Just Threw Up In Our Mouth A Little department: Westwart reports "Ward Churchill to get hero treatment in HBO documentary" and has a link to the HBO trailer (ht anonymous)

CNews 24June09

The Danegeld Solution: Teachers Paid To Do Nothing
Excerpt:

Hundreds of New York City public school teachers accused of offenses ranging from insubordination to sexual misconduct are being paid their full salaries to sit around all day playing Scrabble, surfing the Internet or just staring at the wall, if that's what they want to do.

[...]

Because their union contract makes it extremely difficult to fire them, the teachers have been banished by the school system to its "rubber rooms" — off-campus office space where they wait months, even years, for their disciplinary hearings.

[...]

"You just basically sit there for eight hours," said Orlando Ramos, who spent seven months in a rubber room, officially known as a temporary reassignment center, in 2004-05. "I saw several near-fights. `This is my seat.' `I've been sitting here for six months.' That sort of thing."

[...]

Because the teachers collect their full salaries of $70,000 or more, the city Department of Education estimates the practice costs the taxpayers $65 million a year. The department blames union rules.

[...]

Once their hearings are over, they are either sent back to the classroom or fired. But because their cases are heard by 23 arbitrators who work only five days a month, stints of two or three years in a rubber room are common, and some teachers have been there for five or six.

CNews 23June09

From our Little-Known Penumbra Of The US Constitution #17 department (ht Terry Hastings)
Excerpt:

Rather than simply deciding that the change in the handbook altered what was a "vested right" [to tenure] of the professors, Denver District Judge Norman D. Haglund ruled that "the public interest is advanced more by tenure systems that favor academic freedom over tenure systems that favor flexibility in hiring or firing." He also noted that "by its very nature, tenure promotes a system in which academic freedom is protected."

The "academic freedom" Judge Haglund talks about means little more than "perpetual employment." Um, Judge? Unless they've moved it, we believe Clue Rental is on aisle three. You're welcome.

CNews 22June09

From our You Know You've Made It When Cracked Considers You A Celebrity department (ht Waldo Pepper)
Excerpt:

When questioned about his heritage, Churchill mentions he was a member of a tribe called the United Keetoowah Band. It turns out this [is] a tribe who [sic] gives out cards to many non-native celebs, including Bill Clinton.

The University of Colorado, where Churchill taught, found itself in a bind. The hiring of Ward based on Indian heritage was hush-hush, so firing him for not being [an] American Indian posed many problems. In fact, they bypassed the usual six-year probationary period and Ph.D. requirement in order to "snap up" Churchill, making them look like fast-acting idiots.

Then, things began looking extra grim for the university when Churchill published a paper comparing 2001 WTC employees to the orchestrators of the Holocaust.

CNews 16June09

The Perfesser's web of historical deception and fraud continues to metastasize, and "America's Holocaust Denial" is a near-prototypical instance of it. Rev. Chuck Freeman cites Doctor Professor Indian Ward Churchill's claims of Native American genocide, then goes on to support that with a quote from an essay by Lenore A. Stiffarm and Phil Lane, Jr.—failing to note, of course, that Churchill has admitted to ghost-writing the Stiffarm and Lane piece (according to page 89 of CU's investigative report),

"[Churchill] claimed that he actually wrote ('from the ground up,' as he puts it) five of the essays attributed to others in The State of Native America, including not only the essay credited to Robbins, but also those credited to M. Annette Jaimes (the volume’s editor) as sole author, to Jaimes and Theresa Halsey as co-authors, to Lenore A. Stiffarm and Phil Lane, Jr. as co-authors, and to Jorge Noriega.").

Another "historian" Rev. Freeman quotes is David E. Stannard, who was an expert witness for The Perfesser during CU's misconduct investigation, is a signatory to any number of "Unfire Ward Churchill" petitions, and who also just happens to have written the introduction to Churchill's A Little Matter of Genocide:

"Ward Churchill is a man looking for trouble. Of course, anyone familiar with his voluminous writings during the past two decades—on subjects such as racism in American film and literature, New Age spiritual hucksterism and counterfeit Indians, U.S. government death squads, the damage done to indigenous peoples by the forces of capitalism and Marxism, and a great deal more – know [sic] that Churchill quite audaciously has been courting (and finding) trouble for some time now. [...] It is only because of trouble-makers like him that the deadened conscience of this nation might some day begin to stir. May his kind multiply.”

Obviously, Rev. Freeman is no historian. But then, neither is anyone else he cites. (ht anonymous)

Update: Rev. Freeman responds:

Even if Churchill et al. are quacks and frauds it is tough to look at the evidence in any objective manner and not refer to what happened to the American Indians as a holocaust.

Soulfully,

Chuck

Go find Dan Rather, Chuck. Ask him how that "fake but accurate" defense is working out.

Update II: Rev. Freeman emailed us this morning asking our view on the subject of genocide and holocaust, and we responded:

Chuck:

I suspect a combination of white guilt (as "JD" noted over at The Seminal), an innocent willingness to trust academics, and a resonance to your own historical beliefs led you to accept Churchill's polemics uncritically. As a real historian, Russell Thornton, has pointed out (commenting about Churchill's willful miss-citation of a Thornton essay): "The history is bad enough. It doesn't need to be embellished."

The field of Native American history is full to overflowing with frauds like Churchill and second-handers who echo his fabrications as gospel. Historical laymen such as you and me can be forgiven, I suppose, for accepting what academics write as true—at least provisionally, and until someone shows that writing to be fraudulent.

In any case, my own view is that the clash of two cultures (one hopelessly outmatched in terms of firepower) over possession of land is a complex history featuring tragic misadventure, wrongheaded charity, and yes, some willful evil—just like all history. But the terms genocide and holocaust assign every Indian death to just one of those factors: willful evil. Was the director of a Christian mission school on a reservation willfully evil? Was the smallpox-infected passenger of a steamboat that moored near an outpost that traded with the Indians willfully evil?

I'd suggest a reading of some of the essays on PB, which in turn will link to other writers, many of whom are historians, all of whom have something to offer the conversation. Read each one with the same skepticism you should have applied to Churchill's outlandish claims; you'll come away with a more clear knowledge of the tragedy of Native American history—and the disservice Churchill and his ilk have done it.

JW

...to which we might add our hearty agreement with a portion of another citation in Rev. Freeman's blog post—that of John the Baptist: "Brood of vipers! [...] Every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire." To belabor the point with a return to our initial analogy at the top of this post, no treatment, however heroic, can save the cancer-ridden corpus of Native American history. Time to bury it, salt the earth around its grave, and start over.

CNews 14June09

If you haven't experienced the full soporific effect of The Perfesser, BlogTalkRadio offers you a golden opportunity to remedy that lack (caution: do not operate heavy machinery or attempt rationality while under the influence of this powerful dopiate). From an on-air interview recorded June 11, 2009 (you can also download the interview here) (ht Leah)