Monday Politics
Benson Battle Bruises CU Image
By Richard Martin, 2-11-08
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The candidacy of Republican fundraiser Bruce Benson to become the president of the University of Colorado received another blow over the weekend when CU regent Cindy Carlisle announced she would no longer support him. A candidate for state Senate from Boulder, Carlisle had previously been the sole Democrat on the board of regents to come out in favor of Benson.
Late last week the CU faculty assembly postponed a vote on whether to support the proposed appointment of Benson, who has been an oil and gas CEO and is the former chairman of the Colorado Republican party. He is the sole finalist for the job of CU president.
The strikes against Benson are easily compiled: he has no experience as a scholar or a college administrator; he holds no advanced degrees; he has been a partisan political figure (helping head up, for instance, the right-wing Trailhead Group); he doesn’t believe in global warming (at one campus gathering last week he cited National Geographic as proving that current climate change could be part of long-term cycles); and he has no apparent qualifications to head a major state-funded research university.
“How would it look for CU, the flagship institution of higher learning in Colorado, home to Nobel laureates and nationally ranked programs, to be represented by someone with just a bachelor’s degree?” asked former regent Jim Martin in a guest editorial in The Daily Camera.
Now there’s one more reason: Benson’s appointment, carried out with little public involvement or transparency, is simply too poisonous at this point to go forward. CU is emerging from a rough period that has included football recruiting scandals, big funding shortfalls thanks to the Taxpayers Bill of Rights, the Ward Churchill mess, the tenure an interim president, Hank Brown, fraternity-hazing outrages that included the death of a freshman, and other black eyes. It doesn’t need a right-wing activist at its helm as it tries to repair its international image and attract top-flight faculty and students. The CU administration should stand down now, for the good of the institution, and withdraw Benson’s candidacy – or at least restart the process so there’s more than one finalist.
[End of article]Hey whats the hold up. He sounds like just the ticket for president of one of the nations more progressive universities. I suspect he will go to Berkeley if they don't appoint him in Boulder..?
Comment By Craig Moore, 2-11-08Seems this battle only reveals CU's image. Any bruising has been during the type of administration that this column and the entrenched intelligentsia wish to continue. Too bad that ideology trumps accomplishment as credentials for CU leadership. People like Bill Gates need not apply.
Comment By flounder, 2-11-08Maybe he could write a nice editorial about how he also believes the Earth is only 6000 years old and how Jesus rode around on a dinosaur just to cement his frontrunner status.
Comment By flounder, 2-11-08This Trailhead group sounds really wingnutty, right down to the accounting irregularities and "fuzzy math" we've come to expect out of Republicans:
http://coloradoconfidential.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=653
Of course he might be able to solve the financial problems at CU with some good old Republican accounting and get some of his cronies some corporate welfare in the process!
Much better to have only left-wing activists, they're so tolorent of those with whom they disagree. Maybe Betsey Hoffman is available?
Comment By Bruce, 2-11-08If Benson gets th CU job; I wonder if the following classes will show up eventually:
Agricultural Trespass 101-
NCIC: Proper use in a political ad-
Ruining the Lives and Careers of ICE Agents-
Chicano studies: Castorenas-Ibarra-the Colorado revolutionary pay-off Mastermind-
Physical Education: Ducking for Cover-
Men's Studies: Rich Boy's Suffrage Movement
and finally: Cory Voorhis: A study in how to eleminate key witnesses against Mexican drug cartels and fake ID rings.
I read where the Archbishop of Canterbury may be seeking new employment soon. Perhaps CU could become the test tube for his Shria law and burkah experiment.
Comment By Bruce, 2-11-08Craig: Let me educate you about Sharia Law. We don't need it here in MT, CO or NM. For one, only men can hold bake sales on campuses on colleges, you have only 3 days to rennounce a sin like betting on Nebraska over CU, you can't own a wolf hybrid dog, and an individual can't watch Roller Derby and drink beer.
In fact right now, I'm sitting here wearing nothing but a cigar and a glass of scotch...(hold on....someone yelling at me to close the drapes....)
Am I mistaken or do American aborigines currently hold court and administer tribal justice in in the grand old United States of America?
Comment By Craig Moore, 2-11-08Bruce, did someone CU?
Comment By Bruce, 2-11-08Craig: .....good one....snork! snork! gaggle gaggle gaggle....
(pour another scotch).....
sigh......
Back to Mr. Benson...
Isn't there a secret society in Boulder...some sort of right-wing group that conducts false flag operations diguised as left-wing activism meant to enflame the heart and souls of chicken-wing
ding-bats who will flock to the polls and vote wing-nuts in for the sole purpose of legitamizng the right-wing programme so the wankers wing it too far and alienate the wing-it-at-home crowd who want nothing more than precreate, pay taxes and eat?
I'm going to take a nap............ZZZZZZZZZZZZ....plop!
Bruce, it sounds like you've been drinking those Sharia's with the umbrellas in them. One Sharia, Two Sharia, Three Sharia, Floor!
Comment By Bruce, 2-11-08That's pretty good. Craig and I always stay on topic. What was Benson's first name again?
Comment By cordell brown, 2-12-08The University of Colorado is already competing with such lustrous institutions as the University of Mississippi and the University of Alabama when it comes to funding, but we're going to try to go lower when it comes to leadership.
Since good ole boy Bruce Benson, Vice-Chairman of Romney's ill-fated campaign has raised all of this money for the Republicans where does he stand on global warming, the Iraq debacle, water boarding, evolution--yeah this guy really is qualified to run a University just like George W. was qualified to run a Nation.
Colorado, not ready for prime time.