Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Matory to Duke

Here’s how Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz reacted to the news that J. Lorand Matory is leaving Cambridge: “I think it’s the best thing that’s happened to Harvard in a long time. Privately, there’s a real sense of exhilaration and relief that this man is no longer a blot on our community.”

As a Harvard graduate (B.A. and Ph.D.), I echo Dershowitz’s sentiments: Matory’s damage to Harvard was incalculable.

The African-American Studies professor’s campuswide claim to fame came in his sponsorship of the resolution to censure former president Larry Summers. Summers’ sins, according to the resolution that Matory originally penned? (1) The president correctly termed the divest-from-Israel movement “anti-Semitic in effect if not intent”; (2) The president demanded that then-University professor Cornel West produce scholarship, rather than rap records; (3) The president stated, in widely condemned remarks, that—if only to disprove the point and silence conservative critics—scholars should consider whether cognitive differences between the genders, and not discrimination, might explain the disparity between men and women among the ranks of tenured science faculty.

After the faculty revolt succeeded in forcing Summers’ resignation (with critical assistance from Harvard Corporation member Nan Koehane), Matory fumed to the Boston Globe that Summers’ support for Israel represented “one among a variety of issues on which Mr. Summers seemed to advocate the rights of the privileged.” Did Summers’ success in pushing through guaranteed free tuition for lower middle-class students constitute one of the other issues on which he stood up for the “rights of the privileged”?

Matory continued: “Because of his extremely vocal support of Israel, he essentially shut down the national divestment movement.” So, in other words, Summers was worthy of censure not only because of what he said, but because he was effective in saying it. Prof. Matory offers an intriguing model for a university president.

(A point worth recalling: Summers--who served as Treasury Secretary to Bill Clinton and is now a key economic advisor to Barack Obama--was far too conservative for Matory and his faculty allies.)

Matory’s ramblings about Israel were embarrassing and contradicted the spirit of evidence-based inquiry upon which higher education should be based.

What institution has taken Matory off Harvard’s hands? Duke, where he will become the new chairman of the African-American Studies Department, as of July 2009. In Durham as in Cambridge, Matory will doubtless use his considerable talents to uphold the position of advocates for the status quo on campus. In Durham, he should find the Brodhead administration far less likely to challenge him in any way than was Larry Summers.

One of the administrative low points of the lacrosse case came when the Duke trustees unanimously elevated African-American Studies to departmental status (citing its “admirable commitment to advanced research, teaching and outreach activities”), despite the weak level of scholarship from many of its faculty, its scant number of undergraduate majors, and the fact that its most recent “outreach activity” had been sponsorship of the Group of 88’s statement.

Matory will become the fourth chairman of AAAS since 2006. His immediate past predecessors?

Charles Payne, the chairman who violated Duke rules in using department funds to pay for the ad, and who further violated procedure by placing the ad on the AAAS website for 183 days.

Charlie Piot, whose definition of what constitutes “scholarship” is almost laughable.

Thavolia Glymph, one of three figures on an April 2006 panel lamenting about how “since the [negative] DNA results were returned Monday, we [have been] moving backwards.”

Quite a distinguished record. Matory should fit right in.

---------

Matory certainly will find an ally in Group of 88’er Karla Holloway. In this week’s Chronicle of Higher Education, Holloway proposes a “diversity” crusade targeting units of the university whose “diversity” performance the 88’er deems insufficient.

Says Holloway about Duke’s record in “diversity” hiring, “There has been growth in arts and social sciences [the departments which produced 85 of the 88 members of the Group], and medicine, but in some ways that growth has arguably allowed other schools or divisions not to work as aggressively with this effort.”

The target, according to the article? The Law School(!)—the one “school or division” whose performance in the lacrosse case did not embarrass Duke. Only in the world according to Karla Holloway would the law school—and not the groupthink-dominated departments in the humanities and (some) social sciences—require new personnel policies.

54 comments:

Anonymous said...

When will Duke alumni and the greater Duke community step in to try to save the reputation of this excellent university?

Anonymous said...

Wow, things are going from bad to worse at Duke. Does Duke truly suffer from "Ivy-envy" to the point that it will willingly hire Harvard's "refuse"? Harvard wins (again) through "addition-by-subtraction." No wonder people laugh at Duke.

Anonymous said...

Oh, this will be real popular around the time of the Annual Fund drive....

Anonymous said...

I wonder if the Law School will be allowed to defend itself, or if Broadhead will muzzle its response to this stupidity.

Anonymous said...

The "reputation" of this excellent(?) university would take care of itself, IF the "excellent" was restored to the university. One really has to wonder what they are thinking (or not!)

Anonymous said...

You just couldn't make this stuff up. To paraphrase K.C. ------- Astonishing!

Anonymous said...

Thanks, Harvard. As if we don't already have enough toxic waste around here.

Duke Prof

Anonymous said...

What a fraud . . . everyone knows how these "educated" people define "diversity." The academic groups in this country are so inbred and bigoted as to make it nearly impossible for these sorry bastards to interface with any reality beyond their own lies.

Anonymous said...

Duke University's leadership continues to wallow in its own guilt about having been officially segregated since 1961. (Earth to Bob Steel: that was 47 years ago. Many new generations have been born since then.)

Here is the thing to keep in mind: Harvard had the chance to keep him and did not do it. This is huge, as they essentially told him to get lost.

I predict that he will do even more damage to Duke University than have their other "stars" such as Houston Baker, Karla Holloway, and Wahneema Lubiano. The real effect of his hiring -- and, no doubt, the astronomical salary Duke will pay him -- is to tell the truly productive members of the Duke faculty that they really don't matter.

Duke thinks it is buying racial peace and harmony with this hiring; instead, it will buy even more grief and, unlike Harvard, they won't be able to get rid of him because no one else will take him, especially at the salary he will command.

Anonymous said...

KC, where in the article does Holloway propose the "diversity crusade" you note above. I can't believe this is a dishonest reading of the Chronicle. So will you explain your casting her comment in this way? Your credibility is, once again, at stake here.

kcjohnson9 said...

To the 2.59:

I'm not sure I follow your question, since I provided the quote from Holloway to which my statement referred.

I'm also not sure that I follow your comment, "Your credibility is, once again, at stake here." Since you have chosen to comment anonymously, I assume that you are saying that you previously had claimed my "credibility is . . . at stake here," but you provide no reference to such a claim.

The CHE reporter summarized Holloway's attitude in the previous sentence: "Karla FC Holloway, an English professor who served as dean of humanities and social sciences from 1999 to 2005, says each unit of the university should be held accountable for its record on diversity." [emphasis added]

The next two paragraphs in the article dealt with the law school. Perhaps, are you implying, she was targeting the Divinity School? I suppose it's possible, though it seems unlikely.

One Spook said...

For amusement, read the Duke Chronicle's coverage of Matory's arrival. Julia Love's vanilla report is good news for clothing stores in Durham because she fails to mention any toxic baggage Matory brings from Cambridge.

The comments on the article are good reading also, particularly one from "pearl" who is spot on.

As it is often lamented here: "You cannot make this stuff up!"

One Spook

Anonymous said...

KC. But tell your readers where the "crusade" is. You seem to have neglected your use of that word.

kcjohnson9 said...

To the 4.49:

It's not clear to me if you are the 2.59 anonymous commenter. If so, it's not clear to me if you are reiterating your uncited 2.59 comment that you have previously contended that my credibility was at stake.

As to the point: I'm not sure I follow your comment. Are you suggesting that Prof. Holloway wasn't serious in proposing to the CHE that individual units at Duke be held responsible for not meeting her desired "diversity" levels?

I take Prof. Holloway at her word: the idea of holding units "accountable"--an approach that would have to include the reallocation of faculty lines--is an extreme one (as the CHE article notes, since it has formed the basis of the since-repudiated Virginia Tech "diversity" scheme). Perhaps, however, I was in error in suggesting that we should take Prof. Holloway at her word, and in believing that she offered a recommendation to the CHE that she desired to see implemented.

I don't believe so: but if you do, I would urge you to address your concerns to Prof. Holloway rather than to me.

Anonymous said...

Is the reharmonizer man parsing words again in order to try to cover for his 88 friends?

"Crusade"? Something you don't understand about that word?

Anonymous said...

The era of racial discrimination in academe is long past. The idea that qualified African-Americans are denied positions because of their race is laughable, especially at the "elite" universities.

Racial minorities are recruited and given special things unavailable to other faculty members. For example, a new black faculty member where I teach is given a three-year $20K "Welcome Grant" in which the person can spend the money for travel to conferences, computer equipment, journal subscriptions, or other things related to his or her professional development.

Now, I have no problem with these grants, as they do not make me any worse off, and the university has been very supportive of my own professional development efforts. However, even with these grants, it is very, very difficult for us to bring in qualified black faculty members. The real problem is that there are very few doctorates granted to blacks outside of the Identity Studies or English.

Furthermore, the blacks who are qualified are recruited into higher-paying faculty positions. We have seen at Duke that even though some of them have thin CVs, nonetheless they are tenured and promoted. No university wants to be accused of racial discrimination, and Duke is especially sensitive to such charges because of its segregationist past. People like Wahneema Lubiano and Karla Holloway know this and push that button as much as possible.

Now, Duke can hire whomever it wants, and if they want this divisive character there, and want to pay him a huge salary, then let them. But let us not kid ourselves as to the "quality" of this hire.

Anonymous said...

Sheesh-
From Matory's Harvard web page.
The third of the three bio paragraphs (presuambly autobiographical):

Professor Matory grew up in Washington, D.C. He earned his A.B. in anthropology, magna cum laude, from Harvard in 1982 and his Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Chicago in 1991. He speaks French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Yoruba fluently. He has won numerous fellowships and awards and has served on the editorial boards of American Ethnologist, GLQ: a Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, and Brazil's flagship journal of black studies, Afro-Àsia.

And I had thought his command of Portuguese was only fair. Either he's been working on it or I was mistaken.

KC- Thanks for keeping us up to date on the happenings in wonderland.

Anonymous said...

At what point will the people being desribed in this article be satisfied with the world or themselves? What are they working for? What drives them? Apparently, it is not diversity or any kind of equality before the law. They are racist hiding behind whatever is useful to them. No reasoned, fair-minded person would behave the way these horrible people behave. What is almost as appalling is the behavior of those at Duke and elsewhere who allow this to go on the way it does. Yes, many if not most are afraid to challenge these people . . . fear is a very important tool being used by these individuals described here. It was very much used to bring all of Durham and Duke under their control. What else would allow these horrible racist to go on.

Anonymous said...

What exactly did the Duke Law School do to garner any praise? I do not recall hearing a peep from them or any reports on the whole mess. This is too bad as some critique of say the role of judges in facilitating false prosecutions would have been interesting. It seemed to me as if they treated the case and their fellow students as radioactive. If the law school did not embarrass Duke it was because they did not do anything. Maybe the Law School feels embarrassed itself for that not doing what ought to have been done. Do you have any contacts at the Law School who have an opinion?

Anonymous said...

Is Payne a Communist?

W. R. Chambers said...

Academic freedom is a blessing.

unbekannte said...

Will Duke recruit Madonna Constantine Next?

Debrah said...

I suppose one should be surprised by Duke's hiring Matory; however, he seems to be a superb addition to the Gang of 88.

This is further evidence that Duke does not intend to even think about modifying the way it does business.

From the Boston Globe which illustrates the agenda so well:

Who is ''the die-hard left," I asked? ''They are anti-American and anti-Israeli," he replied. When Matory and others started lobbying for a no-confidence vote against Summers last year, Dershowitz said, ''we did find an association between those who signed the petition against Israel and those who opposed Summers. There was a high degree of correlation."

Matory is made for a prominent place among the Gang of 88.

And of course Karla Holloway would want to take over the law school as well.

That way she can continue to "teach" there for as long as she wants without actually having a degree in law---or anything else that represents real scholarship.

This latest hire is, indeed, a depressing omen.

Anonymous said...

Obviously, Matory is an intelligent person and is very capable. No one denies that. Unfortunately, he has chosen to take his very good skills and put them to use by being very, very divisive and intellectually dishonest.

As I have said before, sooner or later he will do real damage to the Duke faculty, which has suffered enough hits already.

Debrah said...

Durham's legal bills

Anonymous said...

Clear evidence the Duke Admin and Trustees have not used the lacrosse frame-up as a "teaching moment" from which they could learn something. . .

Ex-prosecutor said...

It is unfortunate that my alma mater, Vanderbilt, apparently did not know of Professor Matory's availability. Doubtless, they would have entered into a bidding war with Duke to have him join Houston Baker, whom Vanderbilt touts as one of its leading intellectuals.

Debrah said...

One of the courses listed that Matory teaches is syncretism.

This is such a farce.

Nothing in Matory's work or his own words suggests that this idea is ever put into practice by him.

His courses, like most of Duke's Gang of 88, consist of "African-American" or "African" this or that.... hyphenated into whatever agenda he has going at the time.

He's no dummy, but he's certainly no scholar.

People such as Matory possess an entirely insular mindset.

Unknown said...

DUKE- is just going 100 MPH right into a wall. The damage won't be realized until donors stop donating and top students stop apply. What brilliant student would want an undergrad degree from DUKE? I am done supporting DUKE.

Debrah said...

Some of us are still engaging the N&O editors' on their blog over a recent embarrassing---to them---memo sent out to their staff by one of their senior editors.

They are now going through the same gyrations as they did when this same senior editor published an outrageous post right after the UNC-CH student body president Eve Carson was brutally murdered.

She was tallying up and comparing news coverage before Carson had even been buried.

This is the same woman who was on duty in the editors' office when the Lacrosse Hoax first broke.

There's an unmistakable and very damaging pattern here.

And I will be waiting for the N&O's coverage of Matory's arrival at Duke.

They will make a huge display and will not include one line about his very anti-Semitic and unapologetic racist past at Harvard.

Also, on Tuesday, the N&O published an op-ed sent in by William Chafe---with his current location listed as Georgetown, Maine....so far away and busy, (LOL!!!)---in which he was dispensing advice on the economy and the presidential campaign.

I recall until recently he was a Hillary supporter and has never come out strongly for Obama. Yet in this offering he was repeating attacks on McCain which by anyone's standards and ideology were erroneous.

Every time I see Chafe's name I still think back to his pathetic Timothy Tyson-like columns where he compared the Lacrosse Hoax with the case of Emmitt Till.

And as an "esteemed" historian, even got the year of the Till case wrong!

Can there be any doubt that the editorial pages of the N&O will keep a very generous space reserved for Matory's bile?

Gary Packwood said...

Anonymous 09/24/08::9:33 PM said...

...At what point will the people being described in this article be satisfied with the world or themselves? What are they working for? What drives them? Apparently, it is not diversity or any kind of equality before the law. They are racist hiding behind whatever is useful to them. No reasoned, fair-minded person would behave the way these horrible people behave.
::
People get used to their deformity.
::
GP

Anonymous said...

One wonders how the Duke endowment has held up under the current economic cycle?

One the one hand,Duke may be exposed by holding paper that has no market value.

On the other hand, they may have greatly increased their assets by shorting banks stocks like Wachovia.

Where's the transparency that Mr. Steel was advocating on MSNBC the other night?

Anonymous said...

1:46

Can't stop laughing-
Maybe it's not too late- give them a heads up.

Anonymous said...

As the Wall Street Journal once opined, "What's the difference between the leadership at Enron and the leadership at Fannie Mae?


...Those at Enron were convicted."

It turns out Duke's legal counsel, Jamie Gorelick, as Vice Chairman of FNMA, also, like Christopher Dodd, received loans from Countrywide. Christopher Dodd is right in the middle of the bail-out plan - that is not so comforting.

You will find that FNMA's also made significant contributions($100 million +)to Dodd, Clinton, Kerry, and Obama - their top five beneficiaries.

You will find that several attempts to reform FNMA were blocked by Congress.

As widely reported, Franklin Rains, Jamie Gorelick and other management used non-GAAP accounting to cook FNMA books and extract huge bonus compensation that totaled well over $100 million. Gorelick alone took north of $25 million.

Who would hire someone like this?

Bob Steel

This is unreal. How did Bob Steel get hired at Wachovia.

Amazing.

Anonymous said...

Wasn't Bob Steel was up for his Asst. Sec. of the Treasury appointment while he was throwing the Duke boys under the bus?

This is the same guy who, as Asst. Secretary of the Treasury, was later involved in the decision to open the discount window to non-bank institutions like Lehman, Bear Stearns, Morgan-Stanley etc.

Moral hazard = Bob Steel

Anonymous said...

It is so sad. Duke, poor Duke. In aviation, a spin can be fatal. And Duke is in a downward sprial that surely will end the same way. The only question is the duration of the descent into academic oblivion. How would you like to have a Duke degree now, and attempt to defend what your old school has become? Imagine the arguments you would have to marshal in order to explain the existence of Lubiano, Matory, Curtis, Holloway, Brodhead, Chafe, the Gang of 88 and all the others. Just imagine....it's painful to even contemplate.

Debrah said...

Word is that Samiha Khanna, whose work barely justifies mention except for the damage she does, has logged in with this one today.

Truly someone who needs to find a new line of work.

Debrah said...

On this page you will be able to hear a talk by Matory.

This took place in the Perkins Library at Duke on September 28, 2006--almost two years to the day and while the Lacrosse Hoax was in full swing.

Anonymous said...

As a Harvard alum from the days when meritocratic principles were central in choosing faculty (preference for alumni sons and preppies as undergrads was another matter), I was delighted to see Matory relieve the university of the embarrassment of his presence, especially in that he made clear that his prima donna act was in response to Haravard's refusal to come across with a big raise for him and a spousal appointment for his wife. As for Duke's loony judgment--well, that's what we've pretty much come to expect from that place. After all, how better to replace the worthless posturing of Houston Baker than to invite Matory to engage in more of the same.

Unfortunately, this doesn't mean that Harvard has really purged itself of the underqualified among its faculty. There is, for instance, the bizarre case of the new Dean of Harvard College, E. Hammonds, who was apparently awarded that role despite the nullity of her "scholarship" merely because she was pigmentally correct.

But it's more than a matter of mere racial favoritism that has degraded faculty quality at Harvard. The place has been susceptible to trends and fads of all sorts over the past decade or two, with the result that many of its most prestigious academic slots have been awarded to pretentious posturers who have been clever about going with the flow politically, ideologically, and in terms of meretricious fashion. One of the reasons Summers was in the crosshairs was that he tried to do something to repair the damage. Sadly, it now appears that it will be years before all the toxins are flushed from the system.

Gary Packwood said...

In November, 2007 Paula McClain wrote that the president was 'taking things on directly' with respect to the Duke lacrosse crisis.
::
“And finally I agreed (to become Chair of Academic Council) because we're facing a number of issues because of the difficulties from the lacrosse crisis last year. The president is taking an approach of taking things on directly. We could have just tried to wait things out and see if these issues went away, and we're not. I'm proud of that, and I wanted to be a positive factor in those efforts.”

http://news.duke.edu/2007/11/mcclain.html
::
Is the arrival of J. Lorand Matory on the Duke campus one of 'those efforts' from Brodhead's office that McClain wanted to be part of?
::
GP

hawkeyedjb said...

It would be foolish to think Duke will suffer as it continues to embrace anti-Americanism and reject scholarship. Its endowment will be just fine, and it will reap ever more praise from the people who matter to it: those who embrace the same values. Those who make hiring decisions at Duke will rejoice in the criticism of Matory, and will see it as a sign that they need to recruit more just like him.

It's unlikely that anyone in a position of power at Duke gives a hoot about the opinions of anyone who might visit a blog like this one.

Anonymous said...

No Justice brings up the issue of Jamie Gorelick. There is little doubt in my mind that she was retained by Duke for her brand name. In the interim, that brand has lost all of its supposed value and the work product is still sub-par. When a closer loses his fastball, that guy is usually put on waivers. We'll see.

*************

K.C.'s posting about Ms. Holloway's latest scholarship seems consistent with the "spreading cancer" metaphor. Prognosis still gloomy.

*************

SITUATION: You've just had a big problem with witch trials. It has caused you a great deal of distress, pain and financial burden.

RESPONSE: You hire one of the most celebrated witch-hunters in the land.

CONCLUSION: Even the scared ignorants in Salem knew better than that.

*************

I hope that someday K.C. does another book about what Duke has done since the fiasco. MOO! Gregory

Debrah said...

A column by Matory in SPME.

"Scholars for Peace in the Middle East"

He's such a drama queen.

Debrah said...

A past Post article on the faculty and Summers.

Anonymous said...

Perfect...

Inre:
"SITUATION: You've just had a big problem with witch trials. It has caused you a great deal of distress, pain and financial burden.

RESPONSE: You hire one of the most celebrated witch-hunters in the land."

I'm reminded of Monty Python and the Holy Grail(1975). As the Klan of 88 and their abettors continue to "burn" the players through action and inaction we can use this movie as a road map of things to come. It appears we are somewhere between, "Crowd: Yeah! Burn her! Burn her!" and "Sir Bedevere: Did you dress her up like this?"

"Sir Bedevere: What makes you think she's a witch?

Peasant 3: Well, she turned me into a newt!

Sir Bedevere: A newt?

Peasant 3: [meekly after a long pause] ... I got better.

Crowd: [shouts] Burn her anyway!"

AND

"The Witch (Lacross players and coach): I'm not a witch I'm not a witch!

Sir Bedevere (Justice): But you are dressed as one

The Witch: *They* (Duke faculty, administration, MSM, et al) dressed me up like this!

Crowd (Klan of 88, Broadhead, abettors): We didn't! We didn't...

The Witch: And this isn't my nose (Listening Statement). It's a false one.

Sir Bedevere: [lifts up her false nose] Well?

Peasant 1: Well, we did do the nose.

Sir Bedevere: The nose?

Peasant 1: And the hat (something happened articles,comments, emails, etc.), but she is a witch!

Crowd: Yeah! Burn her! Burn her!

Sir Bedevere: Did you dress her up like this?

Peasant 1: No!

Peasant 3, Peasant 2: No!

Peasant 3: No!

Peasant 1: No!

Peasant 3, Peasant 2: No!

Peasant 1: Yes!

Peasant 2: Yes!

Peasant 1: Yeah a bit.

Peasant 3: A bit!

Peasant 1, Peasant 2: A bit!

Peasant 2: a bit

Peasant 1: But she has got a wart (College students who drink)!

Random Person in the crowd: *cough* *cough*"

Anonymous said...

Duke has now officially moved out of Wonderland. The campus and it's magnificent administration (which includes both board and boardhead) are now residents of Dunderland with all the rights and privileges therein. Truly amazing, isn't it?????

Gary Packwood said...

hawkeyedjb 9/26/08::9:20 PM said...

...It's unlikely that anyone in a position of power at Duke gives a hoot about the opinions of anyone who might visit a blog like this one.
::
It is unlikely that Duke alumni in positions of economic power understand that those in positions of administrative power AT Duke gives a hoot about them as anything but a means to an end.

Essentially, while the wealthy alums are swizzling Chardonnay in the Rose Garden with the poets, the hired hands are making off with the silver.

The Trojan Horse has made it through the gates of the Gothic wonderland and we need only sit back and wait for someone to write the history demonstrating "wie es eigentlich gewesen [ist]" (how it actually was) for the young members of the Duke men's lacrosse team.
::
GP

Debrah said...

I ran across this more in-depth view of Matory from a decade ago.

You can glean an undiluted view of someone when you check them out from earlier stages.

This simple interview puts a very fine point on the utter uselessness of Matory's scholarship and that of most of the 88.

Check out how he describes his work.

This is nothing more than a self-massaging and narcissistic journey, similar to anyone spending time researching their family tree.

Someone explain to this dear superfluous man that all humans marvel at, and psychologically and emotionally record, the differences among various people in our families as well as other people we encounter daily.

Really, this account does everything to illuminate the worthlessness such subject matter presents to the academy.

University campuses have been hijacked by these navel-gazing repetitive clowns.

Every culture and every race are comprised of their own unique patinas and idiosyncracies.

To turn such subject matter into a distinct formulation of course study is such a joke.

Matory is a huge phony.

Debrah said...

"It's unlikely that anyone in a position of power at Duke gives a hoot about the opinions of anyone who might visit a blog like this one."


As resigned and bold---all at the same time---as that sounds, I believe there are multiple examples of responses and behavior from these people that would prove that to be false.

Debrah said...

H-S:


Duke stonewalls

Thank you for The Herald-Sun's update on the cost of lawyers defending city government and police in the lacrosse hoax lawsuits. The public is entitled to such information, crucial to the concepts of transparency and accountability.

I have been trying to get Duke University to provide similar information, only to collide with "policy" that denies access. I have been stonewalled when asking for any reason that justifies this policy, which seems born of a clandestine mind-set that conveniently masks the dismal role of Trustee Chair Robert Steel and President Richard Brodhead in the debacle.

Federal law does make one arcane report public, and it's quite interesting. In the 2004-2005 school year, Duke spent $4,316,301 on legal fees for all activities. In the following year, which included three and a half months of the hoax, it was $5,879,729. In 2006-2007, the latest with data available, this total leaped to $10,207,165.

Heavy litigation did not set in until after this. Duke added lawyers like Jamie Gorelik of Washington, whose firm typically bills $800 an hour for partners' time.

There is no certainty that the hoax led to these increased legal costs, because Duke will not help interpret the numbers. But I can identify no other reason.

Across the full spectrum of the university, the denial of information is a hallmark of the Brodhead years, and it is disintegrating the ability of students, alumni and faculty to effectively monitor and participate in university governance.

ED RICKARDS
New York
September 29, 2008

2008 GOALS said...

Guess we'll be finding out what kind of golden parachute Steel negotiated for himself as soon as Citi (or some other entity) gobbles up Wachovia. Couldn't happen to a nicer guy! NOT!

Anonymous said...

This year, my nephew was offered a "full ride" scholarship to Duke Law School. Eventually, he chose Harvard with its $70,000 cost, even though his parents are a school teacher and an electrician.

I sent him some comments from some of the commentariat here when he was making his selection. I think he's even more glad today of his choice.

RRH

Anonymous said...

No justice, no peace said...

One wonders how the Duke endowment has held up under the current economic cycle?


I hope they were holding a lot of Wachovia stock.

Anonymous said...

Has any of you considered that Matory could be right. It would have been easier and safer for Matory to bury his head in the sand, and not face the Harvard establishment! He's not being forced out or fired, and he is still widely read and respected. Principled and moral enough to speak his mind. Hope he continues to speak up at Durham