Hilarious screwup. And it's all the more hilarious because the subject of the editorial is doubt about Governor Scott Walker's use of the expression "drafting error" to explain a proposed change in the statutory law about the mission of the University of Wisconsin System.
NYTimes Edit Board ruthlessly attacks some guy named "Mr. Scott" who they claim is the governor of Wisconsin pic.twitter.com/y8iNv5ROO8
— Logan Dobson (@LoganDobson) February 6, 2015
So was that really, truly a drafting error by The New York Times, or was this behind-the-scene mockery that accidentally got published, "Mush from the Wimp"-style?
Here in Wisconsin, Walker-haters have often called the man "Scottie." Here's an example in some video Meade shot during the protests of 2011: "Koch Brothers" (in top hats) manipulating their puppet Walker and saying "Come along, Scottie!"
The New York Times has "brazenly deleted" its use of the moniker "Mr. Scott," and if confronted, I supposed it would say it was a "drafting error." If so, we could get all derisive and contemptuous and call the "excuse" "ridiculous" and the original draft "pernicious" in precise emulation of the NYT editorial.
Here's my post from a couple days ago on the underlying substance of this controversy: "Why did Scott Walker attack the University of Wisconsin's century-old 'Wisconsin Idea' slogan/mission?" I don't know whether Scott Walker and his people intended to delete some statutory verbiage because they recognized it to be "The Wisconsin Idea" and they oppose that idea or because it just looked like meaningless blabber. Here's a photograph showing the editing that seems to mean so much to Walker's antagonists.
(Click to enlarge.)
To my eye, it looks like the changes were, first, to augment the mission to include meeting the state's "workforce needs" and then to eliminate what the editor thought was excess verbiage. Note that The Wisconsin Idea is still there in the first sentence in the words "to... discover and disseminate knowlege... beyond the boundaries of its campuses."
The Times editorial ends with some perseveration about "red meat for conservative zealots," but come on. If that editing counts as red meat for conservative zealots, this outrage over word editing is a big bloody slab of red meat for liberal zealots.
AND: I'm frontpaging something I said in the comments:
As with the Wisconsin protests, we're seeing an effort to make people think they must be enraged at this monster Walker.MORE: The editorial reads as though some local Wisconsin hothead spewed it out for them. Maybe the original referred to Walker by his first name and the minimal editing inserted the "Mr.," because that's a longstanding NYT convention and some mindless functionary was tending to the superficial task. That is, no fact-checking was going on and Scott looks like a last name. There actually is a Governor Scott in the U.S. right now (in Florida).
I backfired in 2011 and in 2012 and in 2014. Maybe it seems new to some people outside of Wisconsin, but it's so stupid and boring to me.
And this is especially stupid, because look at the words that people are throwing a fit about. Do they really think the American people are going to understand this tempest in a teapot? First, you have to internalize the devotion to something called The Wisconsin Idea (which I suspect will read as banal and obvious to people in other states: Why is that something special about Wisconsin as opposed to what all universities try to do?). Second, you have to believe that the change in the language was anything other than weeding out some verbose obviousness. Third, you have to think that the University's mission statement needs to appear in the statute... and not just appear, but appear repetitiously.
Who would go there? It makes absolutely no sense.
Posts
128 comments:
"To my eye, it looks like the changes were, first, to augment the mission to include meeting the state's 'workforce needs' and then to eliminate what the editor thought was excess verbiage."
When I google University of Wisconsin and work force, I get to COWS and Havens Center.
this outrage over word editing is a big bloody slab of red meat for liberal zealots.
Hear, hear!
Ideagate is going to go on the Walker?GOP scoreboard as another painful loss.
Walker Governor 1: You lose
John Doe 1: You lose
Senatorial Recalls: You lose
Prosser/Kloppenhoof: You lose
Walker Recall: You lose
John Doe II: You lose
Walker Guv 2: You lose
Ideagate: You lose
I think this, by definition, makes you Losers.
Gee, what a surprise. It turns out there was no attempt to change the "Wisconsin Idea" at all, just some boilerplate statutory language defining the mission of the UW. The two Van Hise quotes that get all the honor on the UW campus are one that says something along the lines of the boundaries of the Unversity being the boundaries of the state and another about "sifting and winnowing' to find the truth, neither of which were in the statute. A tempest in a teapot concocted simply to discredit the governor. Too bad the truth of the editing involved likely won't reach beuond the readers of this blog (half of whom will refuse to admit what really happened due to blind hatred of Walker).
I am kinda curious to learn how the error came about. 'Mr. Scott' is only nominally easier to type than 'Mr. Walker' (that is what it says now.)
Hilarious screw-up. I wonder if anyone is getting a note in their file.
If you're in the publishing biz, always type in what you think will end up online. I can't stand it when I find errors in my blog posts after they've been published.
Just part of the NYT stylebook.
Mr. Scott.
Mr. Barack.
Mr. Bobby.
Mr. Chris.
Mr. Joe.
Mr. Rand.
Mr. Ted.
Mrs. Hillary.
Mr. George.
They always refer to politicians by the their first names and omit the Pres, Gov. Senator, etc.
Nothing to see here.
As someone who has no strong feelings about Scott Walker one way or another I've can assure everyone that this "scandal" over revamping a century old mission statement is a huge snooze fest that only rabid partisans could possibly care about.
If this is all that Walker detractors can come up with then he's the GOP's nominee.
It's somewhat interesting to watch reruns of Star Trek TOS to take note of how the writers change the characters from episode to episode. Mr. Scott improves as did Frazier and Rebecca on Cheers. He becomes endearing.
From William Shatner's autobiography, I got the impression that stuff like that is the result of behind-the-scenes politics. He stated expressly that he was pissed off royally when Leonard Nemoy started getting more and more camera time.
I don't recall Shatner saying much about James Doohan, though. Not a threat to the leading man, I suppose, as clearly subservient.
Some people might dislike Gov. Walker less if he were more the type to be content to crawl into a Jeffries Tube with a crescent wrench at his own peril, rather than insisting his rightful place is sitting in the captain's chair.
@Ralph
The already desperate search for "something" on Walker.
I hope he never owned a dog.
I thought Mr. Scott was pretty ridiculous in The Lights of Zetar. Maybe that was meant as plot development for him, but it rang super false to me.
On the other hand, his defense of the Enterprise in The Trouble with Tribbles was completely expected.
There's a special kind of Lefty who takes the Monopoly Man/Fat Cat/Plutocrat image, makes a costume out of it, and shows up at a Capitol protest.
Union or not, maybe it's part of a mating dance for the rotunda babes.
Maybe Uncle Money Bags just lends an air of legitimacy, fun and creative license to the event; possibly a fatherly glow for the young initiates just getting their protest legs.
I liken it to humming 'This Land Is Your Land' absent-mindedly during an NPR facilities tour, then catching yourself with a sheepish smile.
It just makes everyone feel good.
Looks to me like the changes that were made were something any editor would make to that kind of overwrought and repetitive prose.
Bart: Just give me twenty-four hours to come up with a brilliant idea to save our town. Just twenty-four hours, that's all I ask.
Townspeople: [in unison] No!
Bart: You'd do it for Randolph Scott.
Townspeople: [reverently] Randolph Scott...
Townspeople: [singing in the fashion of a church choir] RANDOLPH SCOTT!
Howard Johnson: All right, Sheriff. Twenty-four hours.
I am Laslo.
I'm sure the NYT editorial board has a deep, long-term interest in the business of the University of Wisconsin.
This is what layers and layers of fact checkers and editors gets for you.
The Ministry of Truth is doubleplus pleased.
I dare anyone who was a part of writing that Mission Statement to be able to recite it word for word.
I'll even give them a week to practice.
And, if they can do it, I'd then fire them on the spot.
I am Laslo.
I call BS. That can't have come from the NYT. Even they have higher standards than that.
"badly miscalculated"
"furiously courting"
"ridiculous excuse"
"pernicious editing"
Let me write that again "pernicious editing"
That can't have reached the pages of the Grey Lady.
Well, it was there...
Who knew madisonfella wrote for the NYT?
I can't help but think they lard up the statement to obfuscate against any specifically identifiable results that could be expected upon graduation.
Calgon: you're soaking in it.
I am Laslo.
Clearly the editor/writer was trying to minimize the importance of the university to the community and thereby minimize the importance of the cuts.
Stupid fuck achieved the opposite result.
They got him confused with the governor of florida...lol
"If that editing counts as red meat for conservative zealots, this outrage over word editing is a big bloody slab of red meat for liberal zealots."
This "red meat for conservative zealots" is just a tiny morsel in their daily diet of leftist media gruel.
Any deviation from Progressive orthodoxy serves as a "big bloody slab" for lefties. Those slabs contain lots of empty calories, of course, so they have to keep gorging.
Has any national newspaper ever commented on any editing of any university mission statement? If not, why now? (He asked rhetorically.)
Stupid fuck achieved the opposite result.
Right, because effective writing involves redundancy and a prose style heavily larded with adjectives. Every "reasonable man" knows these rules of writing.
Sometimes ARM, you should try to remember the persona you are trying to create and just let stuff go that gets your blood boiling, like swipes at overwrought prose in defense of progressivism.
I would love to hear any input from the mouth breathing progressives here (see, aren't adjectives great?) as to any actual changes in meaning that the editing created.
Like there is no change in meaning between "All the news that's fit to print" and "All the news we see fit to print."
As with the Wisconsin protests, we're seeing an effort to make people think they must be enraged at this monster Walker.
I backfired in 2011 and in 2012 and in 2014. Maybe it seems new to some people outside of Wisconsin, but it's so stupid and boring to me.
And this is especially stupid, because look at the words that people are throwing a fit about. Do they really think the American people are going to understand this tempest in a teapot? First, you have to internalize the devotion to something called The Wisconsin Idea (which I suspect will read as banal and obvious to people in other states: Why is that something special about Wisconsin as opposed to what all universities try to do?). Second, you have to believe that the change in the language was anything other than weeding out some verbose obviousness. Third, you have to think that the University's mission statement needs to appear in the statute... and not just appear, but appear repetitiously.
Who would go there? It makes absolutely no sense.
Do they really think the American people are going to understand this tempest in a teapot.
On reading it, it *had* to have been written by somebody from Wisconsin... strike that, Dane County.
It makes me think slightly less of Gov. Walker that he bothers to edit mission statements, a bit of gilding on the underlying wooden motives of the bureaucrats who actually run a university.
It is worthwhile asking what makes a great nation great. Germany and Japan are clearly great nations. Neither country currently has much of a military presence yet there is little argument that they are world leaders. What makes these nations 'great'?
Is it their lawyers? Italy has more devious lawyers.
Is it their doctors? Australia has better doctors.
Is it their poets? Iran has greater poets.
Is it their bread makers? France has much better bakers.
What makes Germany and Japan great is their technology and their intellectual capital. These are countries that have the intellectual fire power to dominate.
Where does this intellectual capital come from? Not law schools, or liberal arts colleges, or run of the mill medical schools or trade schools. Intellectual capital is created in the great research universities and research institutes and the best export orientated manufacturing firms.
Apparently Scott Walker feels this is an unimportant consideration.
Yes, viewed dispassionately, this kerfuffle is boring and stupid. Viewed politically, it isn't.
"Do they really think the American people are going to understand this tempest in a teapot? . . . It makes absolutely no sense."
It's not about instructing the "American people." Apart from helping lefties gorge on outrage, it makes a lot of sense from the point of view of mobilizing the base. Worked in 2012.
At a previous manufacturing company I worked for they decided to update the Mission Statement with input from the employees.
Referencing the "Star Trek" Scotty: "All these adjectives -- I'm not sure how much she can hold!"
I am probably just still nursing the grudge that mine wasn't selected.
"Fast First, Quality a Close Second."
I am Laslo.
Yes, Althouse. I agree with every word of your 9:13.
It amuses me the NYT even pretends to care!
Scotty's handlers will have to buy him a better excuse-making machine.
His old, refurbished FingerPointer2000 will never hold up through a two-year national campaign.
"Do they really think the American people are going to understand this tempest in a teapot? "
To someone from another state, but who is reasonably well educated (as opposed to credentialed), the "Wisconsin Idea" will bring up the fact that Progressivism was at one time the Wisconsin idea. I'm not sure they have thought this through.
Surely you can say nothing in fewer words, ARM. Don't go all Ritmo on us!
The most illuminating thing about this is that the NYT surreptitiously fixed its embarrassing error without acknowledging the change in any way. That says a lot about the Editorial Board's honesty and class -- or lack thereof.
According to the NYT none of this has anything to do with Governor Walker. It was all done by some faceless bureaucrat named Mr. Scott or, some say, Mr. Walker. I think it was Brian Williams.
Why is the senator from South Carolina rewriting Wisconsin mission statements? Federal overreach! Also clearly the NYT is racist. A black man can't erase the racist patriarchal statements of dead white men and speak his own truth.
"There's man out there from....I dunno, some mid-western state, who's starting to get some national press."
"Oh? What's his name?"
"Starts with an S, I think. Who cares. There's an R behind."
"Ridiculous!"
"Pernicious is what it is."
"Oh shit! Hillary! Could he hurt her?"
"Not if we do our jobs."
"I'm on it."
Paco Wové said...
Surely you can say nothing in fewer words, ARM.
'Stupid fuck achieved the opposite result' - seems admirably concise to me.
I think it is very hard to understand -- if you're not a Wisconsinite -- the devotion some will have to the University and its ideals. Other landmines for politicians in Wisconsin would be to tinker with the Packers, Dairy Farms, the Brewers (less so, IMO), the Bucks (even less so). It would be like the Governor of NH or VT taking on Maple Syrup, or the Governor of Idaho attacking potatoes or the Governor of PA attacking Scrapple or Philly Cheese Steaks.
Unless you live in the State, you might not understand it.
The rest of the Country, though, isn't going to care. The beauty of Federalism. Maybe that should be "beauty", eh? It's even stranger that the NYTimes wants to comment on it, but if you view it through the prism of a coming Presidential Run, Walker's Budget and the Times' comments follow a narrative & perfect sense.
I backfired in 2011 and in 2012 and in 2014.
You backfired or it backfired?
Looks like you made a drafting error while scolding others for their drafting errors in an editorial about Walker making drafting errors. (or did he change his story again? Hard to keep up with what Slippery Scott's story is sometimes)
Meanwhile, the Walker supporters still insist this is all about his proposed changes to the Wisconsin Idea when actually it is about Walker lying and trying to cover it up.
Then it sounds like he's perfectly suited for the presidency, Mad, so what's the problem?
Bob made me laugh.
Bob is good.
Since there's such devotion to the University and it's ideals, the there should have been or should be more conservatives and libertarians teaching.
Neither country currently has much of a military presence yet there is little argument that they are world leaders.
1) The reason they have little military presence is because they are free-riding on the American taxpayer, and have been for decades. To be fair, Japan is constrained by their constitution, and there does appear to be a move towards restoring their military.
2) Neither nation is a world leader except in the abscence of leadership from the United States.
Seeing Red said...
Since there's such devotion to the University and it's ideals, the there should have been or should be more conservatives and libertarians teaching.
Like some kind of affirmative action program?
when actually it is about Walker lying and trying to cover it up.
Wait..when did you guys start to give a shit about lying and covering it up?
Let it be known, far and wide, Mr. Scott shot the first salvo in the War Against Twaddle.
twad·dle (twädl) noun 1. trivial or foolish speech or writing; nonsense.
ARM admires The Axis. Why aren't Germany and Japan currently without much of a military presence? We know they were great at killing people.
Who would go there? It makes absolutely no sense.
Neither did the "Republican War on women" attack......but it worked.
No Lefty has ever lost from underestimating their voters....
Sorry, why are....
I'm glad I'm not the only one who confuses right-wing nutjob Rick Scott of Florida with right-wing nutjob Scott Walker of Wisconsin.
Rick Scott, Tim Scott, Scott Brown, Scott Walker. The four Scotsman of the Conservative Apocalypse. Don't be a celtophobe.
AND: I'm frontpaging something I said in the comments:
As with the Wisconsin protests, we're seeing an effort to make people think they must be enraged at this monster Walker.
Worked on ARM who apparently thinks "Mr. Scott" wants to close down Wisconsin U.
Unclear why this ... nothing ... sent ARM off the rails.
It is worthwhile asking what makes a great nation great. Germany and Japan are clearly great nations.
Yes, after we 'splained a few things to them in very clear terms... get it "terms"?
it is about Walker lying and trying to cover it up.
To cover ***WHAT*** up? That somebody with an ounce of sense about how English ought to be written took a blue pen to some clearly excess prose, without changing the meaning in any way that anybody here can point out?
Sorry, but sane people, and even insane people who are keeping up on the medications, can clearly see that this is crazy.
Blogger Tank said...
Worked on ARM who apparently thinks "Mr. Scott" wants to close down Wisconsin U.
Not at all. If "Mr Scott" had come out and said that he wanted to make a carefully targeted cut of some superfluous activity at Univ. Wisconsin, say close down the law school, then I would not have a problem. But these vague across the board cuts are what kills universities. The best people simply get up and go somewhere where there will be more support.
I am sure there is not a dime of waste at Wisconsin to be cut.
And I am also sure, after reading ARM's convincing argument, that the USA lost its best chance to be a truly great nation when we didn't unconditionally surrender to the Soviets, the way Japan and Germany unconditionally surrendered to achieve their greatness.
Moron #1:
"MadisonMan said...
I think it is very hard to understand -- if you're not a Wisconsinite -- the devotion some will have to the University and its ideals"
Give me a fucking break. I bet less than 5% of residents would even know there something called the WI idea at the UW. The only widespread devotion to the UW is for their sport teams.
Moron #2:
AReasonableMan said...
Blogger Tank said...
Worked on ARM who apparently thinks "Mr. Scott" wants to close down Wisconsin U.
Not at all. If "Mr Scott" had come out and said that he wanted to make a carefully targeted cut of some superfluous activity at Univ. Wisconsin, say close down the law school, then I would not have a problem. But these vague across the board cuts are what kills universities. The best people simply get up and go somewhere where there will be more support.
Really, name another public University where this has happened. One.
tim in vermont said...
Like there is no change in meaning between "All the news that's fit to print" and "All the news we see fit to print."
Actually, a tell-all book by a NYT former insider said it best with the title, "All the News That Fits". It was written all the way back in 1969, and the leftwing bias at that dying fishwrap has since become exponentially worse.
You can still buy it at Amazon.
some mindless functionary was tending to the superficial task. That is, no fact-checking was going on
Isn't that one of the reasons our governor gave for the "drafting error"? There's been so many different excuses given it is hard to keep up sometimes.
Curious George said...
Really, name another public University where this has happened. One.
Are you so clueless that you don't recognize that the top research universities are in constant competition with each other and that they rise and decline over time? Especially the ones with a less certain reputation and problematic geography like UW.
" Intellectual capital is created in the great research universities and research institutes and the best export orientated manufacturing firms."
Germany still requires engineering students to work in industry and do an apprenticeship at a trade, last I heard. That has been the basis of their mechanical engineering progress since the 19th century. They also have a wonderful apprenticeship system for those who do not attained college.
Germany pioneered organic chemistry in the 19th century. Their research universities were all over Germany.
Japan benefited from MITI for a while but has lagged the past 25 years. A few great entrepreneurs started Honda and Toyota and the Japanese fixation on small detail, as can be seen in a number of their art forms, carried over to quality work in industry. It is a cultural thing rather than great research universities. They were taught much of the basis of their current industrial success by Deming who taught them statistical methods he learned from Shewhart who is the father of all quality control in industry world wide. Neither came from a research university.
Many American universities these days are over run with political correctness and idiotic theories like the current LGBTQ craze that may destroy their usefulness. The only thing saving Cal is the fact that the STEM students don't attend Women's Studies classes.
That is ending at Dartmouth which enters the new age of rape culture
all students will have to take part in a sexual violence prevention program all four years that they're enrolled at the Ivy League school.
Maybe the "Vagina Monologues" will become mandatory if the LGBT students allow it.
Details don't matter. It's just more hammering away at the meme of "the people of Wisconsin HATE HATE HATE Walker and he's awful" to get it out as received wisdom come election time.
yeah...don't you remember when that one public university went out of business and all those people lost their jobs?
Good Points MichaelK
I wonder if Germany and Japan have first rate Women's Studies programs? If they don't, can they really be regarded as "Great Nations"?
madisonfella.
All I can say is HA HA HA HA HA! if it weren't so sad... :(
None of this means anything unless tax dollar allocations change based on the wording changes.
But hey, style over substance, at least at the NY Times.
"AReasonableMan said...
Curious George said...
Really, name another public University where this has happened. One.
Are you so clueless that you don't recognize that the top research universities are in constant competition with each other and that they rise and decline over time? Especially the ones with a less certain reputation and problematic geography like UW."
Blah blah blah. I want one example where vague budget cuts killed a university because top people left. That's what you said.
Your statement really requires you to be able to name many expamples, but I just want one.
But lets face it, you can't. Because it's bullshit. As usual.
60 percent of the US universities lost ground this year, and the nation suffered an average fall of 5.34 rankings places.
As with previous years, publicly funded US universities suffered the worst losses.
tim in vermont said...
Good Points MichaelK
if we were discussing the state of the world 70 years ago.
if we were discussing the state of the world 70 years ago
You are dodging the question. Do Germany and Japan have first rate Women's Studies programs, and if they don't, can they be considered "truly great"?
I suspect that the NYT let some bunch of pissed-off Wisconsin lefty activists act as squatters on its editorial page, the only page in the newspaper that lets the author(s) hide behind a veil of anonymity.
The Times has let itself get publicly humiliated by allowing incompetent press release/advocacy journalism on its own editorial page. To say the Times should know better is trivial; that it clearly seems not to is devastating.
"if we were discussing the state of the world 70 years ago."
So, "History is bunk ?"
Explain the current state of Japanese higher education, please.
Isn't Rick Walker the governor of Florida?
I bet less than 5% of residents
My reason for using the word some.
Words have meaning.
They always refer to politicians by the their first names and omit the Pres, Gov. Senator, etc.
Nothing to see here.
2/7/15, 8:03 AM
Just the first name, like British lords.
Cynicus is on fire. D.GOOCH
"MadisonMan said...
I bet less than 5% of residents
My reason for using the word some.
Words have meaning."
Nice try, but sadly you fail. You compared them to the Packers. Are you saying that only %5 of Packer fans have devotion?
My suggestion, want to get out of a hole, stop digging. Or don't jump in.
Y"It is worthwhile asking what makes a great nation great. Germany and Japan are clearly great nations.
Yes, after we 'splained a few things to them in very clear terms... get it "terms"?"
Bombsplaining. There's a heap of Muzzies that could use some.
"AReasonableMan said...
60 percent of the US universities lost ground this year, and the nation suffered an average fall of 5.34 rankings places.
As with previous years, publicly funded US universities suffered the worst losses."
There is nothing there that supports your position. Zero.
So again, name me ONE university that was "KILLED" because top people left because of vague budget cuts.
I thought the Wisconsin idea was cheese.
The New Yorkers are comfortable with being part time Floridians with second homes Miami and environs over the winter who return to their jobs in New York in the spring. So they may think the Governor named Scott is only part time Floridian too who resumes his job in the frigid North/Wisconsin every spring.
I say cut them some slack. Fly over country to LA and SF is done at 38,000 feet, and who can see the farms from there.
Curious George said...
There is nothing there that supports your position. Zero.
I believe that you genuinely believe this, because you are a genuine idiot.
@Althouse, you might be the last person in America who thinks that the NYT is an actual newspaper. After all, they hire Columbia J-school grads, not journalists.
I thought the Wisconsin idea was cheese.
It's cheesy, but it's not real cheese.
I believe that you genuinely believe this, because you are a genuine idiot.
Unless, of course, you're the drooling idiot and everyone else is sane.
Mr. Scott or Scotty, as known by his close associations, was a fictitious character in the series Star Trek.
Like a stopped clock, ARM is right about something - vague untargeted cuts are bad for universities (and other institutions). If you tell a bunch of bureaucrats they need to cut 10%, without telling them how or where, they're going to cut all the productive functions and leave the bureaucratic functions alone.
Here in California, UC has three times as many administrator per student as it did in 1984, but only about the same amount of faculty. If UW is similar (and why wouldn't it be), there's a lot of room for targeted cuts, which would pay better politically.
Here in California, we have governors Brown and Napolitano working on UC's budget problems. Unfortunately, they're probably not going to send the suede-denim secret police after the excess administrators.
I don't think the "idiot" exchanges are helpful. I do think that almost all universities these days are filled with non-teaching drones whose responsibility is to see that Progressive values are protected.
I don't usually quote the source but they are on to something.
One thing that has changed, dramatically, is the administrator-per-student ratio. In 1975, colleges employed one administrator for every eighty-four students and one professional staffer—admissions officers, information technology specialists, and the like—for every fifty students. By 2005, the administrator-to-student ratio had dropped to one administrator for every sixty-eight students while the ratio of professional staffers had dropped to one for every twenty-one students.
Apparently, as colleges and universities have had more money to spend, they have not chosen to spend it on expanding their instructional resources—that is, on paying faculty. They have chosen, instead, to enhance their administrative and staff resources.
ARM, you should like that source. There's a place to cut.
"But these vague across the board cuts are what kills universities. The best people simply get up and go somewhere where there will be more support." OR these "sequester-style" cuts give the U the ability to discover what parts of their business aren't efficient, productive and critical to the mission.
Those administrative ratios come from new regulations that overwhelmingly come from politicians that "ReasonableMen" favor.
If I make a new law a university has to follow, they have to create an administrative job to make sure the new law or regulation is followed, like night follows day.
This kind of thing was never real to me until I began work in a heavily regulated industry, coming from a less regulated one.
Now all good liberals want to regulate the Internet. Only good will come of it, they assure us.
"AReasonableMan said...
Curious George said...
There is nothing there that supports your position. Zero.
I believe that you genuinely believe this, because you are a genuine idiot."
No, it's true. Which is why you don't cite anything from your source. You just a bullshitter. You know it. I know it. You know that I know it.
Am in the middle of a ninety day free trial at nytimes.com and suspect I've just missed its humorous high point.
I love having it available for reference and do usually at least skim the front page articles etc, and access to Ross D. on Sundays is nice, but I doubt I'll begin coughing up twenty bucks a month come the end of March. But contemplating the possibility makes the monthly OED subscription seem much more realistic. :-)
"Anthony said...
Like a stopped clock, ARM is right about something - vague untargeted cuts are bad for universities (and other institutions). If you tell a bunch of bureaucrats they need to cut 10%, without telling them how or where, they're going to cut all the productive functions and leave the bureaucratic functions alone."
No, this is bullshit too. The UW budgets every year. The make value judgments all the time. They always want to spend more than they have. Every organization does.
drywilly said...
OR these "sequester-style" cuts give the U the ability to discover what parts of their business aren't efficient, productive and critical to the mission.
The sequester, by cutting only discretionary spending and not the much larger entitlement spending is a good example of what Anthony alluded to. Lacking the courage to deal with the actual problem, runaway entitlement spending, the politicians are undermining the core functions of government such as research funding.
Curious George said...
No, this is bullshit too.
You are a complete dummy. You have no argument and ignore every fact. You are just empty rhetoric. Some of us work in the real world where the ability to spout empty rhetoric is considered the most useless skill of all.
The best solution to University funding problems is further regulation then ARM?
That's how you vote, isn't it?
tim in vermont said...
Those administrative ratios come from new regulations that overwhelmingly come from politicians that "ReasonableMen" favor.
Straw man. Make a real argument based on something I actually said.
tim in vermont said...
The best solution to University funding problems is further regulation then ARM?
Another straw man. Learn how to debate or shut up.
I think I found the author of the piece. The denunciation generator at BoingBoing.
Imperial Traitor Scott Walker Condemned!
ARM, Masterdebator.
If only the author had managed to work "scrofulous" into the "editorial."
Walker is a traitor to the nation for all ages, who perpetrated anti-party, counter-revolutionary factional acts in a bid to overthrow the leadership of our party and state and the Wisconsin Idea.
OK, I added the Wisconsin Idea.
"AReasonableMan said...
Curious George said...
No, this is bullshit too.
You are a complete dummy. You have no argument and ignore every fact. You are just empty rhetoric. Some of us work in the real world where the ability to spout empty rhetoric is considered the most useless skill of all."
LOL. I guess I could be like you and spout bullshit as fact and then dodge all questions asking for any proof of my assertion. But I won't.
And all these replies, blah blah blah. You can't name a single example of your assertion.
"AReasonableMan said...
Make a real argument based on something I actually said."
LOL. Sure.
Wait until Walker pitches changes to the "Welcome to Wisconsin" highway signs!!
Oh, the humanity.
Curious George said...
You can't name a single example of your assertion.
I gave you a long list of actual data, which you ignored, pathetically.
It is blindingly obvious. Given the opportunity to work at Kodak or Google where do the smartest engineers go to work? One company has good financial prospects, the other, not so much.
"AReasonableMan said...
Curious George said...
You can't name a single example of your assertion.
I gave you a long list of actual data, which you ignored, pathetically.
It is blindingly obvious. Given the opportunity to work at Kodak or Google where do the smartest engineers go to work? One company has good financial prospects, the other, not so much."
Again, your links had zero information to support your claim Corky. But if you want to prove me wrong, pull out the name of one school, and highlight the text that tells how any university was killed by vague budget reductions.
You. Can't. Do. It.
AReasonableMan said...
"Not at all. If "Mr Scott" had come out and said that he wanted to make a carefully targeted cut of some superfluous activity at Univ. Wisconsin, say close down the law school, then I would not have a problem."
"Superfluous activity"? Why would you cut the Law School, a part of the university that brings in more money than it spends?
Meade said...
"Superfluous activity"? Why would you cut the Law School, a part of the university that brings in more money than it spends?
Let's see some data to back up that assertion.
Unlike Curious Stupid, I am willing to look at the data.
"Let's see some data to back up that assertion."
Your assertion that the UW Law School is "superfluous activity"? Back it up, Reasonable Man.
Meade, you made a verifiable potentially factual statement - the UW Law School makes money. I'm not dismissing it out of hand I am just asking to see some data.
The superfluousness of the law school is a value judgement, my values, my judgement.
my values, my judgement
Written by someone who has neither.
Death will be a release.
"AReasonableMan said...
Meade said...
"Superfluous activity"? Why would you cut the Law School, a part of the university that brings in more money than it spends?
Let's see some data to back up that assertion."
Post a couple not relevant links Meade, and when ARM confronts you, just say it's in the link, just post how it's in the link. Over and over and over.
PMJ, of course, cannot drink if he hopes to see another sunrise. Cirrhosis is a bitch.
Drink. Drink and be done with it. Death will be a release.
Curiously Stupid - still struggling with quantitative data.
OMG ! ARM is on a rampage !
" Lacking the courage to deal with the actual problem, runaway entitlement spending, the politicians are undermining the core functions of government such as research funding."
Do you happen to recognize which political party is the villain in this particular scenario ?
Do you happen to recall the Ryan plan for Medicare reform which was demonized by hysterical lefties ?
I thought it was a pretty good plan. Certainly a staring point for negotiation.
Have you ever looked at the plan that McCain presented for healthcare reform in 2008 ? It was a pretty good plan. He couldn't explain it but that had nothing to do with its merits.
I've been studying health reform for 30 years and more. You could look here if you were interested. Amusingly, that was what got me banned from Washington Monthly. The commenters were outraged that I did not think single payer was a good idea.
Michael K said...
Do you happen to recognize which political party is the villain in this particular scenario ?
I do. Both of them. As a moderate I don't have to carry water for anybody.
Drink. Drink. Drink. The world will be a better place and hell can't any worse than your life now.
Scotty, we need more money!
I'm givin' it all we've got. But money doesn't grow on trees. It's created in government-sanctioned presses and circuits.
Moderately moderate, pedant.
Death will be a release.
I want to reassure you, because the end is so close.
Death will be a release.
Death will be a release.
For you, and for the rest of us.
This last post was within the normal range of human communication. Well done! Did the nurse help you with this?
Whoops! She stepped out again. You clearly need constant care at this late stage.
Death will be a release.
This was a better. I like this new '30s' personality. More upbeat and coherent. Fantasy and role play can be so therapeutic at the end.
---Clearly the editor/writer was trying to minimize the importance of the university to the community and thereby minimize the importance of the cuts. --
Since we are all looking at the same text, as a pre-eminent wordsmith, could you please cite specifically which line outs are aimed at accomplishing the goals you state? Thanks.
Thanks for deleting my hilariously witty posts, Meade.
It makes UnReasonableTwat look even more like a deranged lunatic.
I owe ya a new lawnmower blade or something.
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