Andrew Golis

has hit it’s all time low. Now, while I don’t believe that politicians should move based on polls, and that momentary public opinion doesn’t necessarily mean much, it is notable that the President we will re-inaugurate tomorrow lead us into a war as a result of circumstances that only 39% of the country believes were “worth going to war over.” Something to think about anyway…

Big Man on Campus (University President Larry Summers) got himself into trouble again this week. If you need to get up to date on the matter, you can read the Crimson, or the Globe or the Times.

To be honest, I didn’t really want to write about this. I simply don’t know very much about it and, in a community where everyone is sure of themselves all the time (ahem, Harvard), where saying anything essentially makes you a target of one of the self-important few on either side, I’m slowly learning that it’s important to admit it when you don’t know bupkis (except in section, in those cases, I’ve learned to piggyback off of other people’s comments).

So, to begin, I’ll make my stance on the whole thing as clear as I can: I don’t know very much about it. I know that “biological” difference have been used by those in power throughout history to justify oppression, but I also know that mainstream scientists have, more and more, believed that they can identify genetic differences and generalize them to race, sex, generation etc. I know that hormones do change people – I read an excellent article about the changes Andrew Sullivan felt when he took testosterone shots to counteract the low T-cell counts that resulted from his HIV. I have also read that many sociologists, including those cited by Summers, believe that most, if not all, of this can be attributed to socialization. Beyond that, I simply don’t know enough, haven’t studied the issue enough to have a specific opinion.

Because of that, and because of the fact that we’re still trying to piece together what exactly Larry said, I didn’t want to write about it and I didn’t know what to think. I’m still learning, trying to figure it out on my own from the conversations that are out there. If you have any good research on either side that you think will teach me something about this whole thing, let me know, drop me a comment or an email.

What I do know, however, is this: there are enough smart people on both sides of the issue that it deserves a thoughtful and extensive discussion. That, and only that, is how we as a society learn and progress. The majority of the world is like me, we may have predetermined leanings (mine is that Larry is wrong), but we don’t know and will be swayed by whomever makes the best case for their side.

With that belief, I sent an email to the HPAG list. It’s a list of progressive activists on campus that range from mainstream liberal to far-left radical. Someone had sent the first article on Summers and another person had responded sarcastically “it’s a good thing he has a penis so he doesn’t have to worry about these things.” I responded: “While I disagree with President Summers, I really think we should discuss what he’s saying rather than just dismissing it.”

The responses I got to this email, which at the time seemed to innocuous to me, where enlightening. Take this one for example:

Andrew,

I’m a little disappointed that on MLK you are saying we should “discuss” why women are inherently inferior to men in math and science. Do you also want to discuss why African Americans are inherently less intelligent than white people? It is totally unacceptable for the president of the best university in the country to imply that half of the students at his school are naturally disadvantaged in their mental capacities, simply because they are women. I will not have an “open dialogue” about that. [...]

I received other similar emails on why we shouldn’t discuss his comments, all from those who believed that even doing that was contributing to “sexist and absurd” comments, etc. Rather than recreating the thought, I’ll simply attach what I responded with:

To be clear on why I think we should discuss things we have problems with, rather than off-handedly dismissing them: it’s important that we as a community have arguments, thoughts and beliefs that are based in dialogue and comprehension. When an issue such as this comes up, we should analyze what’s wrong with it so that we as a community learn and can articulate to others what is necessary to fight back against it. Too often in this community we make assumptions about what other people think, know, feel. We say “this is bad, this is good” without explaining to each other why we think this. Sometimes this leads us to false conclusions, socially-pressured group-think or simply shoddy logic. In this case, I thought we should discuss it because I think it’s important that we discuss WHY what he said was wrong. [...]

We cannot, WE MUST NOT, simply be happy that we all agree that 2+2=4. As activists, advocates etc. it is our goal, our responsibility, to articulate to others WHY 2+2 DOES NOT equal 5. If we cannot do that because we are so sure of ourselves that we do not grow and learn as a community, it will make us ineffective and misunderstood. [...]

Now, I didn’t attach all of this simply to tell you about some random event in my life. As I wrote in my response email, I think this is a perfect example of what is wrong with this particular community at Harvard. The fundamental problem is not substance. The fundamental problem is tone and strategy. A strategic person would have taken this opportunity to lay out all the reasons Larry was wrong, make the case and call on others for action. A strategic person would have realized that such strident responses only alienate those who are unsure, who are open to be taught, who are open to thoughtful dialogue. A strategic person would have led.

I’ve been wondering whether or not this tendency in Harvard’s progressive/radical community can be generalized to a problem with liberalism, or if it only happens when the self-righteousness of being a Harvard student is thrown into the mix. I’m still not sure, but the thought worries me.

Martin Frost, who seems to be becoming Dean’s primary opponent for the chairmanship, ran some ads during his previous campaign that essentially consisted of him associating himself with the Republican Party. I understand that he was running in a rejiggered district in Texas against an incumbent (he was also an incumbent, they were put in the same district because of the redistricting), but seriously, do we really want a chair who runs away from the party? We need a chair who’s the biggest cheerleader for the party possible, not someone who wouldn’t even put “Democrat” on his campaign signs….

Anyway, watch a news clip from a local news station in Dallas from during the campaign about this.

Is it a silly idea? yes.

Would it work? absolutely not.

Would he do it? never.

And yes, I’m drawn to, nay, inspired by the idea. Jon Stewart should be the next anchor of CBS News. I know what you’re thinking, “why am I reading this stupid blog?”, but seriously, this is not a joke. It’s so much not a joke that the head of CBS, Les Moonves, wouldn’t rule it out:

Nearly 30 million people watch the evening news on one of the three networks on most nights, but many of them are older. Young people tend to get their news in bits and pieces, from the Internet and cable, he said.

“We have to try and reinvent that,” he said. “One of the ways we’re looking at is making it younger and more relevant, something that younger people can relate to as opposed to that guy preaching from the mountaintop about what we should and should not watch.”

Asked twice, Moonves wouldn’t rule out a role on the evening news for Comedy Central’s Jon Stewart, whose “The Daily Show” skewers politicians and the news media each night.

Because both Comedy Central and CBS are owned by Viacom, I bet they could work out the contract issues (Stewart is signed on to the Daily Show through 2008). I knew big corporations that own everything were good for something!

Harvard gets no respect. Even the oft-nerdy bloggers make fun of us! From wonkette:

We hear there is a conference at Harvard this weekend on blogging and ethics. They’re going to work on some ideas about standards and accountability. So glad Harvard is looking into this because we’re not sure anyone could figure out whether or not to trust blogs unless Harvard tells them what the deal is. We look forward to future chin scratching to come on even weightier topics: Crossing the Street: Should You Look?; Mixed Nuts: Why Does the Brazilian Nut Always Wind Up on Top? and Spending Endowment Money: Let’s Just Roll Around Naked In It, Shall We?. The upside is that this conference takes place on a weekend, so there’s a good chance that everyone will be bombed by noon. Oh wait, it’s Harvard. Well, maybe they’ll drink a lot of green tea and get gassy.

Maybe we will! HA! That’ll show her.

the crazy doctor marches bravely on. Here’s the latest from the dnc chair race, as told entertainingly by today’s note:

Monday’s decision by Scott Maddox and the Florida Democratic delegation to the DNC to endorse Howard Dean will precipitate the quickening of opposition to Dean’s candidacy (as well as give Dean the potential to break this thing wide open).

If the governors or Southern party chairs from other states want to stop him, they’ll probably need to stop him by the end of next week.

It is hard to see how a Bob Kerrey or even a John Edwards entry in the race could reduce the number of votes that Dean ultimately gets. Look at his Hotline survey number, add in the Florida delegation (minus a few who are double counted) and he is fast approaching 100 votes, a number that some of his opponents think he has already surpassed.

He is now emphatically the frontrunner, though he has not yet accumulated more votes than the combination of his opposition, and 50 percent is the threshold.

“‘The only knock against Howard Dean is that he’s seen as too liberal,’” Mr. Maddox said. ‘I’m a gun-owning pickup-truck driver and I have a bulldog named Lockjaw. I am a Southern chairman of a Southern state, and I am perfectly comfortable with Howard Dean as D.N.C. chair.’ LINK

The three questions are:

1. Does Dean have a ceiling below 50 percent?

2. Is there someone in the race now who can coalesce the anti-Dean forces?

3. Is anyone else big getting in?

If the answers to those questions are “no,” we all need to start thinking about the meaning of the phrase “Democratic National Chairman Howard Dean,” but we aren’t sure there are three “no’s” there.

…

Now dessert: The Washington Post‘s Mark Leibovich offers a succinct, wise, and wildly observant look at Dean, “the former rock star in a field of ‘American Idol’ contestants” in the race for DNC chair, who insists that politics is politics and he’s running on the same message of reform that he always was. LINK

There’s more in there that I cut out in case you’re into that whole brevity thing. My favorite part, by the way, was lockjaw. Someone I know will be getting that nickname soon, the question is simply who…

For an explanation of what this series is all about, read here. For part 1 of the series, read here. For part 2 of the series, read here.

In keeping with ignoring previous requests and instead writing about things that spark my more immediate interest, I’m going indulge jernigan and write about our campaign staff and a little about our structure. Seeing as how he was one of the tie-wearers, I’m curious to what he thinks about all of this. Apologies to my brother for not writing in iambic pentameter

———–

Alright, so the question at hand is how the campaign itself (me, the structure, the staff, the decisions etc.) worked.

First, a few points on the staff and structure. When we designed the structure of the campaign, the goal was to take the traditional model used by past successful UC campaigns (Mahan, Rohit, Sujean) and give it a shot of steroids. The model that had essentially been handed down (usually because the candidate worked on the previous President’s campaign) for years essentially consisted of a campaign manager (the candidate himself in Rohit’s case) and an inner cabinet with loosely assigned personal responsibilities but that generally dealt with issues on an ad hoc basis. We started from the personal responsibilities and solidified them, while at the same time adding an expansive field team. The rest of the details of how all that worked are a trade secret to be passed on to the next generation in due time

Two fundamental goals drove the way I organized the campaign. First, my goal was that Matt and Clay would never have to think about a logistical aspect of the campaign. I knew that Matt’’s perfectionist tendencies meant that if he had to worry about anything other than being the candidate, he wouldn’t sleep at all for those two weeks. I’’m proud of the fact that neither of them ever designed a poster (they got drafts and approved or not), got copies, read a budget or scheduled a meeting. The staff knew to always email or call me rather than one of them with campaign questions unless it was really important. I was their filter. Their job was to be the candidates, to speak to voters and groups. My and the staff’s job was to make that as easy for them as we could.

Secondly, I wanted to staff to include as many people as possible. I knew that the more people that were actively engaged in the campaign the more excited surrogates we had around campus, telling their friends, roommates and classmates about what they were doing. That kind of energy and enthusiasm would act as a testament to the importance of the campaign. This was the primary motivation for creating what ended up being an amazing field team (with Schmidty leading it). Harvard students don’t follow the UC intensely, and tend to vote for whoever they trust tells them to. I met a lot of people during the campaign who said things to me like “oh man, EE is spending so much time on this, I’ll definitely vote for you guys because it must be important” or “if Schmidty’s with you than so am I.” Relationships matter, and we wanted as many as possible.

One of the advantages we had on this front was that, because a lot of our staff was recruited through the UC and not simply our immediate circle of close friends (who were also there and amazing), our social network was huge. Other campaign staffs relied on close friends or specific pre-existing groups. Because of this, it was harder for them to expand beyond that immediate circle. Another advantage that our campaign had was that we had a lot of amazing people who were willing to work their asses off, even when it wasn’t the sexiest job in the world. The night before the campaign started, staffers of ours saw both Ty and Teo and Samita in Kinkos making copies of their own posters. Our staff was not simply recruited to do the sexy parts of the campaign in public, they were willing to do the hard work in private. That’s a big deal.

So, that said about the structure, a few quick thoughts on my job. My job was to set all of this up and lead it. Getting everything in place, whether it was the website or the platform or the staff themselves, was my primary concern for the time before the campaign started. This allowed Matt and Clay to spend a lot of time working out their platform, meeting with people on the UC and recruiting the people that ended up being our staff. During the campaign, my job was to facilitate the madness. Whether that meant being on the phone with Matt telling him what his next meeting was or figuring out who could run over to kinkos for copies at 1 am, or figuring out the next day’s schedule, it was just pretty much my job to make sure the whole thing stayed on track.

Strategy was mostly limited to posters, deciding how to spend the candidate’s time, what to say in our Crimson editorial, things like that. Most of those decisions were made by Matt, Clay and myself, often with input from others (especially Greg and a few other indispensable advisors). The big decisions always included Matt and Clay, but random little decisions I would just take care of.

Ok, because it’s late I’m gonna stop here. I apologize for the randomness of this entry. Please comment and ask more questions, I’ll do my best to answer them.

Alright, it looks like everyone and their mom has checked into the DNC race over the weekend and has written about it. For normal news articles about the weekend events in the race, read here (yahoo news), here (stl post dispatch) or here (charlotte observer). To get a new completely unscientific poll, go here (has Dean “leading”). Finally, if you want to read a really crappy piece of journalism from the NYT, read here. The crappiest paragraphs:

And the decision by Dr. Dean to join the race has certainly made it more ideological than usual. Should he win, his outspokenness suggests he will break with the more traditional role of party leaders.

To some extent, that accounts for the uneasiness among many Democrats about Dr. Dean, who is so closely identified with the party’s antiwar left. He has sought to play down his ideological edges.

You’d think that the NYT would be above stupid media caricatures. Dean is more conservative than a lot of the party. He’s fiscally conservative and socially progressive. That he’s “identified with the party’s antiwar left” is purely because people like Adam Nagourny keep saying so. He was against the war, but if you can understand things in multiple dimensions, you’ll realize that he shouldn’t be identified with that wing of the party at all…

ALSO: Some gossip from the oh-so-reliable New York Post on some people trying to convince former Senator Bob Kerrey to try for the job…

I will be writing glazer/capp part 3 later tonight. At this point, I have two requests (here and here). Any others? Anything in particular?

who’s up for a little blog nepotism? I am!

A newspaper writer from northern California who looks like an older version of me wrote an important column last week about exactly what I was trying to articulate in my post about MLK.

READ IT!

warning: the column refers to a few issues local to where I’m from, but you should be able to understand it without any trouble.