The Little Green Blog

Nate Fick '99 for Trustee

2011-12-05T03:31:00.005-05:00

The Little Green Blog would like to applaud the Dartmouth Alumni Council's decision to nominated Nathaniel Fick '99 as a candidate for Trustee. As a best-selling author, the leader of a DC policy institute, and a former military officer with combat experience, Mr. Fick's perspectives and experiences make him an excellent candidate. But more importantly, this nomination is a refreshing departure from the usual slate of candidates drawn from the financial world and chosen more to be work horses of fund-raising than inspiring leaders of note.

Mr. Fick rose to prominence as the commander of a Marine Corps platoon profiled in a series of prize-winning articles by journalist Evan Wright for Rolling Stone. The articles became the basis of Wright's 2004 book, Generation Kill and the 2008 TV Series on HBO of the same name. In 2005, Mr. Fick published One Bullet Away, a war memoir that was included on Marine Corps reading lists and became the basis for much of his military fame. His book (which I previously reviewed ) reads like a pencil-written journal splattered with blood from the earliest days of war in Afghanistan and Iraq. It lives in the moment, offers a tremendous first-person perspective on war, and opens the eyes of the reader to the everyday life of the modern Marine.

Today his business card reads "CEO of the Center for a New American Security", a position he has held for the last two years. Founded in 2007, CNAS is a leading DC-based liberal-hawk national security think tank of 30 employees. After the 2008 election, most of its leadership was subsumed into the Obama administration, leaving Fick at the helm. Rather than turning out the lights, he has overseen CNAS's growth into a prodigious machine, turning out white papers, conferences, and podcasts at a blistering pace. If he is half as connected with the Dartmouth Student body as his company tries to be with Washington insiders, he will be an effective trustee indeed.

In short, Nathaniel Fick's accomplishments are great and varied for so short a life (if elected he would be the youngest trustee by a decade). He brings to the board valuable experience as a veteran, public policy leader, and author, and his fame in all three fields can only help to raise Dartmouth's profile. In supporting Mr. Fick's candidacy, we would encourage the Alumni Council to continue finding inspiring leaders in all fields-- from artists to authors, inventors to industrialists, scientists to soldiers-- and advance them as trustee candidates. There is more to Dartmouth than finance and more to leadership than money. It's time we had more Trustees that reflected that.

Liberals and Conservatives Overlap on Libya

2011-06-24T10:00:00.002-04:00

Democrats and Republicans have sharply divergent views about most political issues today. The proper role of government and how expansive a welfare state there should be are but two examples. Foreign policy though has turned out to be an exception to this rule in recent weeks...

To read this post, go here

Thoughts on the Ryan Plan

2011-06-17T16:02:00.003-04:00

Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin) is arguably the face of the Republican Party right now...

To read the rest of this post, go here

In Defense of Dartmouth-- The Merits of a Dartmouth Education

2011-06-05T18:26:00.003-04:00

I finally put my rebuttal speech from the DPU's "Resolved: Don't Come to Dartmouth" debate on Youtube. Send it to every kid you know thinking of applying or on the fence about going.

A Blotter on Your Reputation

2011-04-26T18:36:00.003-04:00

On Friday The Dartmouth published this article -- an addendum of sorts to their usual, disappointing police blotter -- in which they named an undergraduate student arrested for credit card fraud. Since the blotter does not directly name students (while this article did), the piece has generated bit of controversy.

Such articles are, of course, not new in The D. In 2007 it published the details of a professor who was arrested for shop lifting (the prof was later acquitted). This past winter it was there to cover the 2014 Class Secretary busted for triple felony drug possession. And who could forget its riveting coverage of the SAE Three and their interesting cocaine habits?

There are two teachable points here:
First, there are no longer such things as youthful indiscretions. In the age of social media and stronger google searches we can no longer escape our pasts. As more information is put online, more and ever more dirt is searchable and therefore instantly accessible. Not only that, but any schmuck who wants to trash someone's reputation only has to mention their name online and voilá! reputation ruined!

Second, like it or not, in today's age the public equates accusation with guilt. Think Duke Lacrosse. Better yet, think Swift Boat Veterans for Truth! If a lying right-wing scumbag who never served an honorable day in the Navy says John Kerry was a self-wounding coward, then it's true. If a college newspaper says that you were arrested for credit card fraud, you must have done it.

So grow up undergrads. Like it or not college is no longer the reputation haven it once was. If you have a problem with that, take it up with Mark Zuckerberg.

The Making of a Shadow President

2011-04-20T15:34:00.004-04:00

In recent posts, this space endorsed Will Hix '12 in his race for Student Assembly president. In addition to his bona fides as a campus leader and considerable gravitas, we believed that Mr. Hix's candidacy constituted a valuable cause for the student body. An egregious decision by the S.A. election board ruled that any student who had run afoul of Parkhurst was barred from holding office. Mr. Hix, who was once arrested for consuming alcohol underage, was thus ruled ineligible.

Mr. Hix launched a write-in campaign and performed quite well, securing 37 percent of total votes cast, compared with 39 percent for Max Yoeli and 24 percent for Aaron Limonthas. Given his contentious battle with the election board, this is an impressive feat.

In a sense, however, we at LGB understood our endorsement to be in vain. Even had Mr. Hix won in vote totals, he would not have been permitted to take office. So why endorse Mr. Hix at all?

A Likely Counterfactual

First, it is likely that Mr. Hix would have won this race had the election board not barred him from the ballot. The margin separating him from the winner, Mr. Yoeli, was quite thin (48 votes). As a general rule, write-in campaigns are particularly difficult since, among other things, casting a write-in ballot is more arduous than simply selecting a name already displayed. Write-in ballots are also more likely to be incorrectly apportioned due to spelling mistakes or voter misunderstanding.

Beyond that, students were warned that Mr. Hix could not win, even if he secured 100 percent of student votes. Harry Enten '11, the chairman of the election board, made sure to advise students that, while they could vote for Mr. Hix, his votes would not be officially recognized.

Even under the best circumstances, write-in campaigns are difficult. Add in the fact that the write-in candidate would not be allowed to assume office and they become downright impossible. The fact that Mr. Hix came within 48 votes of beating Mr. Yoeli strongly suggests (though this is admittedly probabilistic) that Mr. Hix could have -- indeed, should have -- won.

Shadow Leadership

Even knowing that Mr. Hix could not win, we at LGB endorsed him. Mr. Hix clearly has a connection with Dartmouth students, and we believe that he should capitalize on that over the next year.

Students need a powerful voice to express their views to the administration. Rising tuition, skyrocketing fees (many of which are underreported), and several unpopular and unwise moves by President Kim yearn to be refuted. Mr. Hix's strong performance in the recent election, and his consistently sapient positions, show that he can -- and should -- accept that mantle.

Mr. Yoeli will ascend to the throne of Student Assembly, where he can mingle with other officers deemed worthy of election by Mr. Enten's board. How he performs as an executive has yet to be seen. All the while, though, Mr. Hix can serve as a lightening rod on student issues. He can mobilize students, galvanize alumni, and rally the College into holding Mr. Kim and his administration to account. In short, Mr. Hix could become the shadow president the student body needs.

How Mr. Hix chooses to do this is a decision entirely his own. We at LGB only hope that he steps up to the plate and campaigns as hard over the next year as he did for his own election.

Hix '12, Dartmouth Student Body, both shafted in student election

2011-04-16T15:52:00.008-04:00

Election outcomes:

Student Body President:
Max Yoeli '12 -- 691 votes (16.5% of the undergrad student body)
Will Hix '12 -- 643 votes (15.3%, disqualified by EPAC/ ran as a write-in candidate)
Aaron Limonthas '12 -- 427 votes (10.2%, write-in candidate)

Student Body Vice President:
Amrita Sankar '12 -- 906 votes (21.6%)
Brian Holekamp '12 -- 510 votes (12.2%)

Notes:

* If Hix were on the ballot, he would have won this election. Not since the if-you-don't-vote-for-me-you-support-rape campaign of Tim Andreadis '07 have I seen such an effective write-in campaign, and never with as much adversity. The Elections Planning Advisory Committee's (EPAC) decision to bar Hix had no basis in history or reason and singularly denied Dartmouth what might have been a galvanizing and effective Student Body Presidency. Hix's 48-vote margin of defeat must be especially difficult for him given that he lost the Vice Presidency last year by a mere 7 votes.

* 4 out of 5 dentists recommend crest, but less than one of them voted for Yoeli. One benefit of approval voting is that it enables voters to 'approve' of candidates independently ('yes' to Obama, 'yes' to Hillary, 'no' to Palin) instead of selecting one over another. The candidate with the highest approval rating wins. This usually means that multiple individuals will achieve more than 50% approval, but in this election only 16.5% of the student body 'approved' the victor. How is Yoeli suppose to talk to the Board of Trustees without the mandate of the students? Oh, that's right, he got a higher vote share in his contested election than they did in their uncontested one! (zing!)

* It's heartening to see the stone-faced Sankar beat the bro-y, bored@baker-meme/person Holekamp, who had better stuff to do than attend debates and stuff. Not-giving-a-shit-about-student-politics-while-running-for-office was soooo two years ago. Let's just hope that Sankar takes is able to convert the abstract political interests, disjointed extracurricular resume, and choppy declaratives of her manifesto into SA managerial competence.

Will Hix for SA President

2011-04-15T12:42:00.003-04:00

Today, Dartmouth students will vote for new representation on the Student Assembly. We at Little Green Blog urge students to write-in Will Hix for SA President.

The staff at LGB has endorsed Mr. Hix previously, and we stand by our reasoning. Mr. Hix, more than any other candidate in the race, has advanced substantive, pragmatic steps to focus the Student Assembly on those tasks to which it is best designed.

Further, Mr. Hix has become the symbol of protest to a recent decision by S.A.'s election committee to bar the candidacy of any student who has previously run afoul of Parkhurst. Mr. Hix was once cited for disorderly conduct and possession of alcohol by a minor -- a crime of which many Dartmouth students have been convicted -- and was thus ruled ineligible to run for SA President. This standard is both ridiculous and insulting, as it insinuates that Dartmouth students need an electoral committee to weigh ethics and rationality in their stead.

The role of S.A. president can be a powerful platform. And at a time when Parkhurst seems intent on degrading the value of a Dartmouth education, while charging students ever-higher prices for it, the students need a powerful spokesman.

Mr. Hix would be that president. Voting is ongoing and ends tonight at 8:00 PM EST.

Bachmann Exploring a Run

2011-03-24T11:55:00.002-04:00

Michele Bachmann (R-MN) of Tea Party fame is toying with a run on the White House. This would make for an outstanding debate. Amongst her many memorable comments include encouraging Minnesotans to engage in an armed revolution and leading her own witch hunts against "anti-American" members of Congress.

She would, of course, lose the primaries. But it would be endlessly amusing to watch Republican presidential candidates balance the need to win over the Tea Partiers who support her with the desire to not torpedo their general election bid. Best of luck to them on that.

President Kim's Great Misstep

2011-03-18T12:53:00.003-04:00

To date, President Kim has maintained an extended honeymooner's popularity at Dartmouth. Even as Mr. Kim has faced increasing scrutiny from students, he has appeared as strong as ever amongst alumni. That may be about to change.

Though it has received little attention in Dartmouth's mainstream press, Mr. Kim plans on opening a new office in the financial district of Boston, Mass. Mr. Kim claims that the new space -- which will likely cost more than $300,000 per annum -- is a necessary step toward better management of the endowment.

Critics are crying foul. Joe Asch, erstwhile petition candidate for trustee, writes over on Dartblog:

Setting up premises in Boston is hardly necessary for the good management of Dartmouth’s money. The College’s leading investment maven, billionaire Chairman of the Board of Trustees Steve Mandel, does an excellent job running Lone Pine Capital from Greenwich. [...] Technology has brought us a long way from open outcry trading in a crowded stock exchange pit.

Indeed. So far, the administration has not explained precisely why telephones and teleconferencing are insufficient, or how Dartmouth has survived so long without a posh Boston office.

At any rate, one cannot question the personal convenience for Mr. Kim or his top deputies. Mr. Kim, senior vice president Steven Kadish, and chief facilities officer Linda Snyder all maintain homes in Boston. And much of Mr. Kim's personal and professional networks still center on Bean Town.

Against the backdrop of painful cuts and an economy still shaking from its flirtation with the brink, Mr. Kim's chimerical and self-indulgent scheme is particularly inept. Even clever accounting tricks, which ensure that costs associated with the new office never appear on the College balance sheet, will not halt the deluge of questions like: What else could $300,000 per year buy? Is this the best use of College finances? Whom is this office really going to benefit?

For the first time in nearly two years, Mr. Kim's critics have a winning issue. Mr. Kim is looking less magnanimous and more perfidious. If Dartmouth United can mobilize, I predict that the history books will trace Mr. Kim's fall from grace to this very maladroit move.

Dartmouth's (latest) meaningless election

2011-03-15T15:35:00.006-04:00

The Dartmouth Association of Alumni must really be trying to reach me. They sent me an email, they mailed me a letter, and they sent me another email all to get me to cast my ballot in the 2011 Trustee and AoA Executive Committee election! And the deadline is only a month away!! With all that effort, this election must be pretty important, so I signed in using the codes they sent to view this ballot:

That's right, one vote for every one candidate. No write ins. No democracy. They even made a handy little button you can press to automatically vote for all of the preselected, election-guaranteed 'candidates'.

Not only is this a waste of my time, it's also a perversion of democracy. The reason we have a democratic process ingrained in our government and society is because when public opinions/desires conflict we appeal to the masses as the most just method of choosing a winner. In the era of petition trustee candidates, there was a real difference in opinion among alumni: one that could be well settled by elections. But when confronted with unfavorable election outcomes, the board declared that the alumni wrong, democracy was flawed, and that they alone should be king.

So they inflated their control of the Board by suddenly and arbitrarily packing on sympathetic new members. They destroyed democracy in the name of making elections 'efficient'. And they had the nerve to beg alumni for money even after they shredded their 1891 agreement. Even if we like the mandatory choices on this particular ballot, the process is undeniably sketchy and the legitimacy of it inevitable victors, shaky. Just because you check a box doesn't mean it's a democracy. So this year, I suggest that you check none.

#13: Seven Samurai (1954) conquers the West of the Far East

2011-03-11T20:14:00.008-05:00

(Part of my series on watching every movie in the IMDB's top 250)

What do The Dirty Dozen, X-Men, The Sandlot, The Oceans 11(+ n) Series, and pretty much every heist movie have in common? They all owe their plot lineage to Seven Samurai.

Seven Samurai follows the plight of a farming village in Japan just after the Ashikaga shogunate of the 1500s, and their quest to enlist the support of Seven ronin samurai to help defend themselves against gangs of raiding marauders. What follows is a simple three-act set-up -- the conflict and recruiting, the development and cohesion, and the mission and farewell-- that has come to define such movies made subsequently. As in the modern movies mentioned above, each character is brought into the group because of the unique contributions that he can bring to the mission. The themes of honorable 'hired guns' coming to rescue innocents (especially helpless, undeveloped sexy female characters) from violent lawlessness are all common to American Westerns and therefore will be familiar to modern audiences. However, given the timeframe that the movie was made, it is clear that these themes are meant to send a political message against the samurai-inspired militarist ideals exhibited by Japan in WWII.

With an original run time in excess of 3 hours and 20 minutes, Seven Samurai really is far too long, but the story never drags. Each scene builds to an important goal: explaining the motives and histories of each of the Seven, showing the pitifullest of the farmer's plight, hinting at a briefly actualized romance. The character of Kambei Shimada, the master (though he never calls himself that) of the Seven, must already be in the pantheon of great cinematic teachers of morals; the other characters demonstrate a humour and manner of speaking that is surprisingly relevant. As a 'Samurai Western' it would be nothing without violence, which is still thrilling (if not graphic) today and must have been epic in its time.

As for the critiques, the Japanese language is not one that flows gracefully from the tongue, and three hours of it shouting while you try to read the subtitles can get tiring. The farmers are often too pathetic, the samurai too pushy, the drunks too shrill, and the other characters too eager to laugh at inappropriate and random times.

See it
Rent it
Skip it

Social Space: The Long Goodbye

2011-03-02T16:29:00.002-05:00

It's long been a cause célèbre for Parkhurst to wrest social spaces from the monopolizing Greek community. When the prime option for students to socialize is a fraternity basement, the argument goes, we would expect higher incidents of drinking and related transgressions.

Curious, then, that the College is announcing the renovation of Thayer Dining Hall into a pay-per-meal venue, where students will have to cough up eight dollars just to enter. Reflecting back on my time in Hanover -- not so long ago! -- I recall many nights spent regaling with friends at Food Court while sipping a coffee and nothing more. Food Court was a safe, comfortable social space for those who wanted to temporarily escape the stress of final exams and term papers. Food Court was, in short, a reliable social space for students to join, relax and engage.

No more. By placing a steep price on entry, few students will care to join a group of friends on a whim. Ate an early dinner? Too bad. You're not likely to pay eight dollars to join your friends' later dinner just to spend time with them.

And what message does this send students, anyway? The all-you-can-eat style surely incentivizes overindulgence and waste. Not to mention the additional cost -- on top of what were already exorbitant DDS prices.

What a curious move, indeed. Why write the rules so that your $30 million investment hinders your stated efforts in other areas of College life?

One has to wonder how students will react to this. Or perhaps if the administration cares at all.

Review: Snuff- Where the reader gets screwed.

2011-03-01T19:49:00.009-05:00

Reading Chuck Palahniuk's novels have convinced me of one simple fact: that ever since Fight Club, ol' Chuck is coasting.

Snuff tells the story of a come-back-seeking porno actress trying to break the world group-sex record, as told by the 600 men waiting off-camera to screw her. Now Fight Club was and remains one of the most brilliant books I've ever read, but the disjointed narrative style, repetition, disaffected characters, and aggressive violence that served that book so well have frankly flopped in his other work. Instead we are left with a gross and simple little story. Gross in the childish way where the point is to shock the reader but too immature to be effective or engaging. Group sex is naughty. Peeing on a floor where people walk on bare feet is gross. Guzzling ranch dip, scooping it up with the same chip every time, is something mommy would never let us do.

On a structural level, Palahniuk makes his characters all sound the same. They all say "true fact" and they all like to listlessly recount pornographic and cinematic trivia to anyone trying to hold a conversation. The plot is singular (the entire book is just a bunch of people waiting around in the same room), the twist at the end isn't that consequential, and the end, well, isn't. I will say that the premise is decently interesting as are the various "true fact" stories the Palahniuk tells through his characters. Snuff is the kind of book that can easily be put down and resumed, but all and all really isn't worth your time.

Read it.
Skim it.
Toss it.

#92: The Apartment (1960)

2011-02-01T18:51:00.004-05:00

(Part of my series on watching every movie in the IMDB's top 250). Think of it as a 22-year-old's analysis of classic American cinema.

Some movies age well. The Apartment did not. There is really nothing in the movie (using your flat as a shag-pad for your co-workers, blatantly porking your secretaries, open nepotism, sexism, smoking constantly, drinking early) that would be acceptable at a major corporation today. But more importantly the premise is not very believable and the romance of the movie is almost completely confined to a game of cards. The plot centers around a love triangle that is basically awkward and the ending was glued on with little regard for the plot's concluding acts.

I will say that except for the wrinkles, Jack Lemmon is the same in The Apartment as he was in Glengarry Glen Ross many years later.

Great
Good
Hype

#84: All About Eve (1950)

2011-01-31T17:31:00.004-05:00

(Part of my series on watching every movie in the IMDB's top 250)

All About Eve is easily the cleverest movie I've ever seen, dialogue-wise. Despite the fact that I was watching it with company, on more than one occasion I rewound the movie just so that I could appreciate all the nuances of particularly well-crafted line.

All About Eve is also one of the few movies where every single premise is believable. It tells the story of a freshly 40-year-old stage actress who grows anxious that she's getting too old to play 20-somethings characters like she used to, and grows increasingly paranoid that the raving (and very attractive) 20-something-year-old fan that she just hired as a valet will be the one to take her spot. It's a story that very closely mirrors the actual lives of the actors in the movie, making their portrayal so much more convincing. In a way it's like a really well written reality show-- to the point that you may forget you're watching a movie at all.

Not much action takes place in the film -- one person on the commentary remarked that the most eventful scene is Bette Davis rushing briskly down some stairs -- but it remains gripping all the way to the end, where it quickly morphs from a drama into a mystery of sorts. Marylin Monroe has a scene or two, where she is well cast. But more importantly, George Sanders plays exactly the character I wish to become in life.

Great
Good
Hype

#69: Modern Times

2011-01-30T23:15:00.002-05:00

(Part of my series on watching every movie of the IMDB's top 250)

I had always been shown clips of Modern Times in high school as artistic examples of the feeling of dehumanization that modernization and mechanization created at the start of the last century. I was please to discover that Modern Times is so much more than that and is, in fact a rather cute and very enjoyable movie. While much of the comedy is in Charlie Chaplin's famous slap-stick style, it's actually rather clever and unpredictable in ways that make it mature and laugh-out-loud funny even today. The satire is there, but it's really much more pantomime, though Chaplin never gets tiring or awkward. As someone who grew up on Cartoon Network, I can see the artistic and comedic influence of Modern Time throughout decades of subsequent cartoons and today appreciate it as a very fine movie.

Great
Good
Hype

#29. It's a Wonderful Life (1946)

2011-01-29T18:59:00.008-05:00

(Part of my series on watching every movie of the IMDB's top 250) Every family has a movie they traditionally watch on Christmas. For some families that movie is A Christmas Story or one of the many versions of Dickens's A Christmas Carol. In my family -- we being Italian -- that movie was, of course, The Godfather. And so it wasn't until now that I finally watched this most celebrated of Christmasy movies, It's a Wonderful Life.

In no other movie have I seen such an idealistic portrayal of American civilization throughout the many phases of the early twentieth century. Nor have there been many characters quite as sympathetic and American as the ones played by Jimmy Stewart. In this movie, it's somewhat difficult to pull off given the fact that the 'aww shucks' character of George Bailey (played by Stewart) is a tragic one. He lives exactly the opposite life he wanted for himself in order to satisfy the needs and desires of those around him. He instantly and methodically does what is right, at high cost to himself. And in doing so, grows resentful of a business, community, and family that does not seem to appreciate the sacrifices he has made, and he grows jealous of those who enjoy success in everything he's wanted to do.

Everyone at one point or another has shared George Bailey's feelings of not being appreciated, and maybe (like him) contemplated ending their own lives. But while we never get the catharsis of seeing how different the would would have been without us, Bailey does and discovers the movie's moral: "Each man's life touches so many other lives. When he isn't around he leaves an awful hole, doesn't he?"

I've never been moved as much by a movie as I was at It's a Wonderful Life's climax, when everyone who has enjoyed material wealth and acclaim off the sweat of George Bailey's brow, toast him as "the richest man in town." And that perhaps the the timeless moral of this great movie. That there is more to life than what you earn and own, and that even those with little in their pockets can be wealthy men indeed.

Great
Good
Hype

Tackling IMDB's Top 250 Movies

2011-01-29T16:00:00.004-05:00

Finding every blockbuster around me in New York closed, I stopped by my local public library and found exactly where all those old DVDs went. Rows and rows, and drawers and drawers of free DVDs all at my disposal -- 100 items at a time, for 7-day rentals each -- presented too great an opportunity for me to pass up. I knew exactly where to start. Out came the blackberry, IMDB's list top-250 movies, and my eye at the top. This was to become my mission: to see them all. And not the old lady, blocking the 'S' shelf as she slowly reads each movie back, or the family man with the shopping card full of Dora the Explorer DVDs will stop me!

After printing out the full list at home, I found that of the 250 titles, I had already viewed 98 of them. Not quite a failing grade on the cinematic literacy test, but certainly not enough to win me prizes on Jeopardy either. But with the simple dedication to view one movie a day for the next 152 days, I can finish my task by June 20th of this year.

While this means that I'll finally get around to viewing classics -- the kind that make friends and parents alike recoil in disgust when they learn I haven't seem them -- it also means viewing a considerable number made pre-color and pre-sound. In my experience, these 'ancestor' movies continue to receive high ratings, not based on the pleasurably of viewing them today, but rather based on the reactions they generated in their own time, and their influence on the great movies of the contemporary cinematic age. Will The Apartment be as good as its inspired descendant American Beauty? Will The Great Dictator still be relevant satire some 70 years after Hitler? Time and three tons of popcorn will tell.

An Open Letter to the Alumni Council

2010-12-03T12:49:00.002-05:00

This morning, I submitted a letter to the Alumni Council representative from my own Class of 2009. In it, I urged Mr. Lane to push for fair reviews of electoral processes, particularly in light of our recent analysis of the 2010 alumni elections. The full letter is below.

Andrew,

In response to your recent request for input from members of the Class of 2009, I wish to address a concern about alumni elections.

Before, during and after the elections, many members of the Alumni Council and its nominated candidates decried the negativity of the petition candidates, including Joe Asch ’79 and the Dartmouth United slate. These claims seemed particularly unusual to me considering the negative tone that many Council-nominated candidates used over the course of the election.

As I recently posted on The Little Green Blog, Mr. Replogle and Mr. Kondracke – both of whom you supported – mentioned and attacked Mr. Asch several times on their websites and in their official communications. Mr. Asch, by contrast, never mentioned his opponent -- by name or otherwise -- on his website.

The Alumni Council did not rebuke the attacks leveled against Mr. Asch. Councilors also did not refute claims that Mr. Asch opposed funding for needy students or that he is a racist. Such base attacks are unbecoming members of the Dartmouth fellowship and deserved the unwavering disapproval of the Alumni Council and its nominated candidates.

The Alumni Council was also silent on the scurrilous attacks published on the website “Joe VS Dartmouth.” Typically I would dismiss such an attack site as an inevitable evil of campaigns. This site, however, was directly tied to Mr. Replogle’s campaign. The site was published by Chris Allen, who also designed Mr. Replogle’s and Mr. Kondracke’s websites, and was publicly advertised by Mr. Kondracke at alumni events.

I hope that these issues will be honestly discussed at this weekend’s Council meeting. A fair evaluation of the campaign tactics used in the 2010 alumni elections will reveal, as I posted on The Little Green Blog, that most negativity was directed at the petition candidates, not by them.

In considering rules to curb the negativity of future campaigns, the Council should adopt measures that ensure that the nomination process is open and transparent, that all candidates have fair access to mailing lists, and that all alumni are given a fair chance to assess the Council’s nominees and petition for office if they so desire.

Further, I hope that you will encourage Council members to discourage negative campaigning from all sides. Using this meeting as a chance to weaken the hand of future petition candidates while ignoring the considerable negativity expressed by the Council’s nominees would be a regrettable result.

Please remember that, while we may disagree on how best to govern the College on the Hill, we are – as President Wright said in our commencement ceremony – “ever a part of Dartmouth undying as Dartmouth is forever a part of [us].” Let us be worthy of that distinction and design future rules for alumni elections accordingly.

I hope this finds you well,

Brice D. L. Acree ‘09
Webmaster, Class of 2009

An Assessment of Negative Campaigning

2010-12-02T22:49:00.007-05:00

As the Alumni Council meets this weekend to discuss, in part, how to curb negative campaigning in alumni elections, one must ask the obvious question: whom should we blame for negativity? Members of Dartmouth Undying seem to take as a matter of course that petition candidates are injecting bile into the system, but further inspection rebuffs this claim. Someone should set the record straight.

A recent content analysis by Little Green Blog considers the websites for John Replogle ’88 and Mort Kondracke ‘60, the Alumni Council-nominated candidates for Trustee in 2010, and Mr. Replogle’s petition opponent Joe Asch ‘79. Our findings were as follows:

The Context

A common theme from erstwhile College president Wright’s office, particularly during the height of the Lone Pine Revolution, was to belittle petition candidates as negative and divisive politicians. Supporters of Wright and the Alumni Council nominees, such as Jonathan Hancock ’06, called on petitioners to end their campaign of “stoking divisiveness and negativity at Dartmouth”.

After the most recent round of alumni elections, prominent Dartmouth leaders were just as quick to decry the negativity of the campaign. President Kim remarked that new rules should be adopted to calm the “acrid, negative [and] angry campaigning.” Martha Beattie ’76, President of Dartmouth Undying (a group supporting Alumni Council nominees) referred to the result, which strongly favored her slate of candidates, as a call by alumni to end “contentious elections.”

The Findings

Despite alumni councilors and Dartmouth Undying bemoaning the negativity of the petitioners in the last election, the websites of the trustee candidates points to a different conclusion.

Mr. Asch: The website for Mr. Asch does not specifically target Mr. Replogle or reference the Dartmouth Undying slate. On his site, Mr. Asch frequently states his support for President Kim while also supporting fiscal prudence and a restoration of parity on the Board of Trustees. Some letters of support published on Mr. Asch’s site do make thinly veiled references to his opponents, but no outwardly negative attacks are made.

In total, Mr. Replogle’s name appears zero times on Mr. Asch’s site. Mr. Kondracke’s name likewise never appears. Mr. Asch’s site makes no reference to Dartmouth Undying or the Alumni Council nominees for other offices. (The only reference to the above parties comes in a letter linked to on the site in which Mr. Asch attempts to respond to the attack website “Joe VS Dartmouth”. Even in this letter, Mr. Asch does not critique either Mr. Replogle or Mr. Kondracke, only indicating that Mr. Kondracke urged audience members at a round table in Minneapolis to visit the “Joe VS Dartmouth”.)

Mr. Replogle and Mr. Kondracke: The websites for Mr. Replogle and Mort Kondracke ’60 (who ran unopposed for the other open seat on the Board) are a different story. Mr. Replogle and Mr Kondracke published many letters that were openly critical of Mr. Asch, in addition to publishing independent critiques of Mr. Replogle’s opponent. A letter from Phil Kron, Gene Kron and Jim Adler calls Mr. Asch a micromanager, claims he is “ill equipped to serve on the Board of Trustees” in addition to mocking Mr. Asch for an letter supporting Mr. Replogle signed by several members of the Class of 1979.

In another letter published on the sites of Mr. Replogle and Mr. Kondracke, Merle Adelman ’80, a former acting president of the Association of Alumni, accuses Mr. Asch of a “flip flop” on the alumni lawsuit blocking the Board’s 2007 expansion. Weighing in on the letter, Mr. Kondracke and Mr. Replogle intone that the letter proves “Asch will say whatever it takes to get himself elected.”

In total, Mr. Asch’s name appears 16 times on Mr. Replogles site, with a conservative estimate of eight instances where Mr. Asch is criticized or attacked. Mr. Asch’s name appears 15 times on Mr. Kondracke’s website, with a conservative estimate of seven instances where Mr. Asch is criticized or attacked. (This latter figure is particularly noteworthy considering that Mr. Kondracke faced no opposition in the campaign, from Mr. Asch or otherwise.)

Attacks From Without: Mr. Asch was also the subject of a particularly negative website entitled “Joe VS Dartmouth” which derided Mr. Asch’s qualifications and character. Typically this brand of attack site would not be considered a part of the Replogle-Kondracke campaign, except that the engineer of the site also built and maintained the campaign sites for Mr. Replogle and Mr. Kondracke. Neither candidate explicitly condemned the site, either. In fact, Mr. Kondracke publicly directed traffic to the site on at least one occasion.

“Joe VS Dartmouth” advances several negative claims about Mr. Asch, including that Mr. Asch hid aspects of his business past (in reality, Mr. Asch had once mistakenly paid taxes to the U.S. instead of the French government, and the issue had been amicably resolved), that he opposes Pell Grants and federal support for needy students, and that he “denigrates” supporters of Dartmouth’s Greek system. The scant support for these claims is often taken wildly out of context or is overtly false.

Conclusion

The board at Little Green Blog makes no normative claims about negative campaigning in alumni elections -- that question is beyond the scope of this study. Instead, we hope to provide alumni with useful facts with which to analyze the 2010 alumni elections.

This analysis is not exhaustive. The staff at Little Green Blog could not include a comprehensive survey of all reported communications during the course of the campaign. (A cursory glance, however, points to more negativity from Mr. Asch's opponents, including the rather spurious and unsupported charge that Mr. Asch "has demonstrated racism on numerous occasions.")

That said, candidates' official websites can reveal the general timbre of their electoral efforts and allow for the most reliable analysis of the strategies employed by each campaign. Mr. Asch, whatever our personal assessments of his merits as a candidate, made a painstaking effort to put forth only a positive campaign message. As we showed, Mr. Asch did not critique his opponent or the Dartmouth Undying slate in his web communications. This strategy stands in stark contrast to the websites of Mr. Replogle and Mr. Kondracke, which each mention Mr. Asch more than a dozen times, frequently criticizing him.

The campaigns of Mr. Replogle and Mr. Kondracke seem more vociferously negative when we consider the campaign site “Joe VS Dartmouth” which was built and maintained by an active member of the Replogle-Kondracke team and publicly advertised by Mr. Kondracke. The entire site was dedicated to attacking Mr. Asch’s qualifications and character. The claims published on the site often relied on information drawn out of context or ad hominem attacks.

Disclosure Statement

The directorate of Little Green Blog endorsed Mr. Asch’s campaign for the Board. This report’s primary author and publisher submitted an endorsement letter for Mr. Asch as well as other commentary on the election.

It would be easy to use this information to dismiss our findings. Readers would be remiss in doing so. We urge readers to visit the sites linked above and explore them. The numbers speak for themselves.

While our opinions of Mr. Ach moved us to support him in the election, we were not a part of his campaign and are not in close communication with him at the present time. The findings reported herein are based not on subjective evaluations but on factual content analysis of four websites frequented during the election. Final judgment of our methods of course rests with the reader.

The Great Class Gift Debate

2010-11-17T12:10:00.006-05:00

Toward the end of the last academic year, the senior class (the Class of 2010) engaged in the annual ritual of raising funds for the "senior class gift". In an effort to top the Class of 2009's 96 percent participation rate, the '10s attempted to solicit contributions from 100 percent of seniors. Inspired, the Class of 1960 agreed to donate $1,000 for every percent of the '10 class that participated, and an additional $100,000 if the class reached 100 percent participation.

For those who have not yet been subjected to the class gift campaign, it is quite the ordeal. A committee of your peers, charged with meeting ever higher expectations, have access to the names of all seniors who have not contributed. They contact these seniors repeatedly until they give. The process, though effective, has more than a few drawbacks. Other than being devilishly annoying, it also risks putting undue pressure on seniors to contribute when they may not care to do so.

This happened in the last campaign. The name of the last holdout, who had her own reasons for not donating to the class gift, was released. She was criticized in College media (including an attack by a former contributor to this blog). The ensuing controversy earned Dartmouth a spot in The Chronicle of Higher Education for the coercive pressure placed on seniors to donate.

Today, Senior VP for Advancement Carrie Pelzel submitted an explanation to Dartmouth alumni. She claims that the issue was unfortunate, but not evidence of a systematic problem with Dartmouth's fundraising process. With all due respect to Ms. Pelzel, her letter does little to put the issue to bed.

The full letter after the jump.

Dear Alumni Leaders,

You may have seen recent news stories about Dartmouth’s 2010 Senior Class Gift (SCG) campaign or been asked about it by fellow alumni. I want to make sure you have accurate information about the campaign and a clear statement from us about our fund-raising practices.

The Senior Class Gift effort is led by four student interns, a committee of student volunteers, and an administrator from the Dartmouth College Fund Office. Funds raised from the SCG support student scholarships.

The Class of 2010 volunteers, including 70 members of the Class, formed a strong and enthusiastic group. They wanted to demonstrate their support for Dartmouth and their successors, setting an ambitious goal of 100 percent participation (the Class of 2009 had achieved 96 percent participation). They recruited more volunteers than any previous senior class and worked diligently to educate their peers about the value of the Senior Class Gift. Inspired by the spirit of the ’10s, the 50th reunion class, 1960, offered a challenge, pledging $1,000 for every 1 percent of seniors who donated, and an additional $100,000 if they achieved 100 percent participation.

All volunteers involved in the Senior Class Gift effort went through several training sessions in which they were prepared to ask for gifts. The training emphasized handling information about donors with confidentiality and respect. As in any volunteer effort, SCG volunteers were kept up to date on who had given and who had not, since they needed to solicit those who had not yet participated while thanking those who had. The Senior Class Gift interns ran an exceptionally thoughtful and creative effort.

One student declined to donate, and regrettably, the student’s name was revealed. That student was subjected to criticism in the Dartmouth.

The student leaders and all of us in Advancement believe strongly that giving is a personal choice. We respect the right of individuals to make that choice and deeply regret that this incident occurred. We do not encourage or condone releasing names of students who do not contribute to the Senior Class Gift.

In future campaigns, we will continue to teach about the role of philanthropy in the life of the College, and we will discourage setting goals that create unrealistic expectations and undue pressure.

I want to close with thanks to the 2010 SCG interns who worked tirelessly over many months to show their appreciation for their Dartmouth education and to help make it available to their successors.

Best regards,
Carrie

Undue Influence

2010-11-16T13:11:00.004-05:00

Sarah Palin may be able to influence our politics, but I draw the line at her influencing our language. This is a sad day for English.

From the New York Times:

At the start of the year the word “refudiate” didn’t exist. In mid-July Sarah Palin, Alaska’s former governor, changed that when she used the word in a Twitter message, somehow mashing up “refute” and “repudiate,” while trying to say something like “reject.”
Now refudiate has been named the word of the year by the New Oxford American Dictionary, published by the Oxford University Press, beating out a number of other locutions — many technology-related — that have spread through the language and the Web over the past year.

Stevenson '10 for MN Senate

2010-11-02T22:45:00.004-04:00

Taylor Stevenson '10 is locked in a tight race for the Minnesota state senate from MN District 12. We will keep you posted as results are published.

Gazelka (R): 52 percent
Stevenson (D): 35 percent
Koering (I): 11 percent
Smith (C): 3 percent

5 precincts reporting.

note: Updated results drawn from the Brainerd Dispatch

The Associated Press does not break down the votes by precinct. We expect votes from Morrison County to favor Gazelka (R) and votes from Crow Wing County to favor Stevenson (D).

Update: This race should still be considered wide open. That said, Stevenson's window is closing. If the reported precincts come from Brainerd and/or Baxter, Stevenson will lose. If these reports are coming from outlying areas, particularly from Morrison County, Stevenson may yet win. (If forced to guess, this analyst would assume early reports come from the city centers of Crow Wing, but that is only a guess.) Stevenson still has a fighting chance.

Voting 2010: New Hampshire Second

2010-11-02T19:06:00.011-04:00

Ayotte Wins, Lynch Narrowly Ahead.

Polls will close here shortly, and here's the latest from the Granite State:

NH 02:

Bass (R): 50.5

Kuster (D): 44.4

11 percent reporting.

NH Senate:

*Ayotte (R): 63

Hodes (D): 34

11 percent reporting.

NH Governor:

Lynch (D): 50

Stephen (R): 48

11 percent reporting.

The Bass-Kuster race will likely tighten as Hanover and other Democratic areas report, but Bass will probably maintain his lead. Lynch's lead will shrink but he will win the race. Hodes's lead disappeared when Merrimack and Hillsborough Counties reported, and Hodes will likely lose.

Aside: Anyone who's been following the Rand Paul circus might be interested to hear that the Washington Post and New York Times have called the Kentucky senate race for Paul. Dr. Paul currently holds 56 percent of ballots to Conway's 44 percent.

Update: Joe Manchin III will win the West Virginia senate contest, making the probability of a Republican takeover of the upper house very low. The hilariously scary Christine O'Donnell will lose her contest in Delaware.

Update: Expectedly, Dartmouth alumnus John Hoeven '79 (R) will win the North Dakota senate contest by a wide margin.