Andrew Golis

or, as UC member Jason Lurie put it in an email to the UC list: “Faculty tells Summers to suck it.” The vote was 218-185 with 18 abstentions. The article is here. I’ll get Matt to give me a first hand account of what it was like later tonight when he gets back.

I’m not sure this means much more than a black eye. It would unfortunately set a dangerous precedent if the faculty was able to exert direct control over who is President. Many progressive-types want the faculty to have that control, but I can think of a lot of scenarios in which you want the President to be able to ignore them and go ahead with pushing something unpopular.

What do you think? Should Larry step down on his own accord? Should the Coorperation (a scary shadowy group of rich white dudes who run the world and this University (i’m not even kidding)) fire him?

A good column from Paul Krugman today on Social Security. Question: when will the media decide that it is its job after all to stop politicians from lying? I don’t get how they’ve decided the lying angle won’t sell papers/get viewers. Seems like a good one to me.

The Crimson Ed Board, which is usually a fairly center-left group of folk, enthusiastically welcomed Greg Mankiw to the post of teaching Ec 10. I already briefly mentioned and had some comments on this last week. In fact, Jernigan’s comment is similar enough to the Ed Board’s position that I wonder if he’s been moonlighting.

In any event, I could not disagree more. First, it’s important to understand the relevance of the course. It is the biggest class at Harvard. It is taken by almost everyone who enters the fields of Government, Social Studies and, of course, economics. This is not a normal class in which a small bias can be ignored as a part of a greater whole.

Second, the class used to be co-taught. Back when there were liberals in the Ec Department who didn’t openly accept the idiotic theory that individuals act on an inherently “rational” (read: selfish) basis and that society as a whole was improved when society as a whole progressed. It is accepting the presuppositions of the neoclassical conservative to say that this is science and liberal understandings of greater good are not. Do not believe it.

For more on this I would recommend reading two book and two articles. First, since most of you have probably read Smith’s Wealth of Nations in Ec 10, go read Theory of Moral Sentiments, his other book. You’re going to realize that our fetishized version of the neoclassical Smith is WAY off. Second, read two articles from the late 19th century, the first by Sumner called “Sociology” in which he argues for a conservative “science of sociology” in which individuals act selfishly. Then, read the response by Ward called “Mind as a Psychic Factor” in which he argues that the human mind and the ability to have morality and progress that goes beyond acting selfishly, and instead learning to act collectively, is the most recent and important step in human evolution.

Thoughts?

While I won’t post any of it here because it’s a little mean-spirited and, shall we say, inappropriate, I highly recommend the newest edition (www.crimsonrumormill.com if the link isn’t working) of the Crimson Rumor Mill for anyone who is interested in learning about UC. Only some of it is true, and a lot of it is well beyond the pail, but it is hilarious.

Because apparently he’s reading Tocqueville and making references to him. From the NYT:

In off-the-cuff and slightly confusing remarks, Mr. Bush said that “de Tocqueville, the Frenchman who came to America in the early 1800′s, really figured out America in a unique way” because he saw that “Americans form association in order to channel the individualistic inputs of our society to enable people to serve a cause greater than themselves.”

On March 7, in unprepared remarks introducing his wife at an event to help troubled children in Pittsburgh, Mr. Bush again mentioned Tocqueville, this time saying that the Frenchman had written about Americans who were able “to associate in a voluntary way to kind of transcend individualism.”

It’s the typical “pick the part that suits me best” that both sides do, but still, I’m fascinating by the idea of Bush as intellectual. I haven’t been in the “Bush is an idiot” camp for a while (after all, if he’s an idiot, what does his continued ability to kick our (liberals) ass say about us?) but I never took him for, well, a reader.

This study tells us what we already know: Fox News is ideological and much less biased than other news stations and 24-hour cable news networks in general are less substantive than nightly news broadcasts or newspapers. Not surprising, but nice to have numbers instead of general impressions.

While I think it is dangerous and fulfilling a completely different social goal to have ideologically-based news, I don’t think they shouldn’t be allowed to do it, or anything like that. It’s a free country. But they at least shouldn’t be allowed by the public to get away with claiming to be non-biased. It’s like FUP, it’s fine if you have an ideology, but be clear about it so people can take that into account.

In terms of cable news in general, check out my blockmate’s experience with talking head syndrome.

the government is spending your money on propaganda (NYT Sunday). To be clear, I do not say this lightly or in the flippant manner of many reactionary lefties. This is actual propaganda: hundreds of videos, produced by government agencies to appear as TV news spots, with hugely positive spin on the President’s policies, being sent to and put on air by local television news shows. The Governator has started doing it also.

This should scare you in a serious and fundamental way. It also highlights what I see as both a strategically and morally important cause for the democrats, fight for democracy itself.

the Crimson published a “day in the life” profile of my roommate, Mr. Matthew J. Glazer, today. It was pretty good, I thought, and not just because it relied heavily on quotes from me. Definetely read it. In case your too lazy, here’s the metaphor the piece leads with:

In the past few weeks, the UC has made it a priority to clean out the office which, Glazer says, has not been sorted through since before he joined the UC, two-and-a-half years ago.

The excavation of the office, in which three fax machines, several phones, and a Plinko board, among other things, were unearthed, is a little like what Glazer hopes to do during his two semesters at the helm of the UC, with a structural reform committee already at work on making proposals for changes to the makeup of the organization.

“This year I really want to get rid of these traditional issues, for example [24-hour] libraries. If you look at campaigns for the past ten years everybody’s said it,” Glazer says, tucking his trademark long locks behind his ears.

Read the whole thing. Liz Goodwin worked hard on the piece and I think it was worth it (also, it’s nice to my best friend!).

The President at one of his fake town hall meetings had this question and answer session with someone who was supposed to be helping him advocate for his Social Security Plan. I’m not sure whether to laugh or cry:

THE PRESIDENT: Let me ask you something about the Thrift Savings Plan. This is a Thrift Savings Plan that has a mix of stocks and bonds?

MS. WEBSTER: Yes, sir.

THE PRESIDENT: Now, how hard was that to learn how to do that?

MS. WEBSTER: And I chose the safe plan, government bonds. (Laughter.)

THE PRESIDENT: That’s all right. Well, not so safe, unless we fix the deficit.

Is that supposed to be funny? I mean, it kind of is, but not for the reason I think he thinks it is…

After I wrote this week’s column about how Harvard student’s don’t take enough time to spend with each other, having conversations, challenging each other and generally being interesting people, former Dean of of Harvard College Harry Lewis sent me an email, noting that he had advocated the same thing.

He linked to a letter he wrote and sent to my freshman class that caused quite the stir. In preperation for the weekend, I thought I’d share it with you:

It may seem hypocritical for us at the same time, perhaps, to offer you Advanced Standing and to advise you not to accept it; or to explain how to qualify for a joint concentration and to discourage you from pursuing one; or to offer other opportunities and to suggest that you should not take them. But the most important thing you need to master is the capacity to make choices that are appropriate to you, recognizing that flexibility in your schedule, unstructured time in your day, and evenings spent with your friends rather than your books are all, in a larger sense, essential for your education. In advising you to think about slowing down and limiting your structured activities, I do not mean to discourage you from high achievement, indeed from the pursuit of extraordinary excellence, in your chosen path. But you are more likely to sustain the intense effort needed to accomplish first-rate work in one area if you allow yourself some leisure time, some recreation, some time for solitude, rather than packing your schedule with so many activities that you have no time to think about why you are doing what you are doing.

And remember, to some extent as Harvard and other major universities go, so goes the country. When it comes to competitive culture, we lead. So let’s lead the country to be happy and healthy, not insanely busy, money and resume-driven overachievers.

Spend some time with a friend this weekend, see you on Monday!