Seat with a privileged view

The view from my seat at Tuesday's LSU-North Carolina game at the College World Series was stellar.

The game? Not so much.

In my humble opinion, my town -- Omaha -- is becoming America's next great city. Officials in other towns like to say things like that; Omaha just does it.

MY HOPE, and my expectation, is that the old cow town on the banks of the muddy Mo will just keep up the good work, surviving even the ideological idiocy of its new Republican mayor, Jean Stothert, who as a councilwoman last year took the lead in negotiating a new fire-union contract that broke the city budget and who now vows to balance it without raising taxes or diminishing essential city services.

That's an easy task if you believe in magic.

Unfortunately, we're now starting to get an idea of how Her Honor defines "essential city services." Public libraries would not be among them, according to the Omaha World-Herald. 

Omaha Public Library branches could close and other service cuts could be made in light of budget cuts proposed by Mayor Jean Stothert, the head of the city’s Library Board said.

The Omaha Public Library Board will discuss the potential cuts today, board President Stuart Chittenden said in a Tuesday memo to the mayor.

Chittenden said a $13.1 million library budget suggested by Stothert for 2014 “will require reductions in both services and resources.”

According to Chittenden’s letter, the library is facing a potential cut of nearly $393,000 for the rest of 2013 and all of 2014.

Last week, Stothert said city department directors had submitted 2014 budget proposals that exceed forecast revenue by roughly $20 million. The city also faces a revenue shortfall of about $13.5 million in its 2013 budget.

Stothert asked the directors last week to cut their 2014 budget requests to certain targets, although she declined to identify the specific numbers for each department.

Department directors were to submit their trims to the Mayor’s Office by the end of business Wednesday, Stothert said.

LIKE THE I-got-mine right wing of her party (And is there any other wing in the GOP anymore?), Stothert is happy to give a free ride to those who don't need one while balancing the municipal ledger on the backs of those who can't afford a beautiful view from the ol' ballgame . . . or regular cybertrips to Amazon.com.

The genius of Omaha is an engaged citizenry and a civic elite fiercely protective of the family jewels -- the city's economy and its quality of life. Pray God that Omaha's own Marie Antoinette shortly will be put in her place by her betters -- an expansive group here in River City, as it turns out.

Now back to your regularly scheduled ballgame.

The quadrangle of broken dreams

Since I had given up hope, I felt a whole lot better.

And since I had been feeling a whole lot better, I hadn't been writing much about the perils of the Pelican State lately. For one thing, I'm a Nebraskan originally from Louisiana, not a Louisianian who has to put up with that s***  anymore. For another thing, if people in Louisiana were willing to listen to a little common sense, they wouldn't be in the perpetual mess that is their lot in life, apparently.

Finally, it's not like I'm planning on moving back.

But I was asked to write a guest post about Louisiana's woes being a matter of culture and not politics -- always remember . . . culture precedes politics -- for LSU journalism professor Robert Mann's excellent blog, so I opened up a vein, and there you go.

IT WAS the least I could do for someone at my alma mater, filled as it is with faculty and staff busting their asses to give Louisianians more education than they're willing to pay for, as well as a better flagship university than the state deserves. Like Rhett Butler, apparently, they've "always had a weakness for lost causes once they're really lost." 

And the experts say, as J.R. Ball outlines in the Greater Baton Rouge Business Report, that LSU's national cause really is lost, thanks to an indifferent public and an execrable pile of politicians befouling the capitol that Huey built:

Connect the reality dots discussed during the meeting and it's clear LSU's situation will get worse before it begins—hopefully—to get better. LSU is not a top 100 school in the U.S. News & World Report list, nor is it in the top 100 on the more respected National Science Foundation rankings. The current trajectory is research grants are declining dramatically as top faculty, tired of an institution held together by duct tape and rubber bands, are leaving for universities in states where higher education is actually taken seriously.

All of which makes reaching the goal of LSU2015—transforming the state's flagship institution into a nationally recognized research university able to attract and retain the world's best academic and research talent—about as likely as finding Bo Rein's plane in the Atlantic Ocean.

Jim Firnberg, a member of the committee and a former consultant for the NSF, says LSU should focus on six research areas where it has a legitimate chance to compete nationally—environmental science and coastal research, biomedical sciences, energy, arts and humanities, computation and digital media, and natural and renewable resources. Yet, he warns, the tomorrow of LSU becoming a top 50 research university will never come. At best, LSU could become a top 75 institution.

Putting that in sports terms—which seems to be the only thing associated with education that people in this state understand—LSU will never be a BCS-caliber academic school; the best it can hope for is mid-major status.

Just one day after this somber reminder of LSU's place in the world of higher education, a bid to end almost 20 years of tuition control by the Legislature died when the same elected officials who, over the past six years, have cut some $650 million in higher education funding, did not see the need to give university boards the right to increase tuition rates that, by national standards, are pathetically low. In other words, the actions of Gov. Bobby Jindal and legislators are loudly telling university leaders they need to find a way to operate with minimal state subsidies, but legislators aren't about to let them do it with much-needed tuition hikes.

We now have a new definition for “moronic.”

Even with the most optimistic Jindal-backed accounting method, higher education has been whacked some $300 million over the past six years, much of that absorbed by LSU. Yet we hear nothing from those wielding the ax about the resulting job losses, or the fact that higher education is supposed to be the key to our economic success in a world powered by knowledge, research and creativity. When officials at LSU and other state universities complain, those who complain too loudly are eased out of their jobs and those that remain are told to shut up and figure it out.

AND INDIGNANT Louisianians say I hate the Not-So-Great State. Whatever lets you sleep at night, man. Whatever lets you sleep at night.

The perils of philanthropy

Breaking news: The Baton Rouge campus of Louisiana State University will take another severe budgetary hit next fiscal year, this time reportedly to the tune of $7.2 million.

Gov. Bobby Jindal's 2013-14 spending blueprint will mark the fifth straight year of severe cuts to LSU, but he is expected to announce next spring that the cut in state support for the flagship university will have virtually no impact.

"Things will operate on the Baton Rouge campus just as they did last year," Jindal will say. "Academic programs at LSU won't lose a single penny despite our ongoing program of creating efficiencies in higher education."

The governor expects no problem in getting the cuts through the Legislature.

"I expect they'll make the cuts if they know what's good for them," he will intone . . . somberly. "As a matter of fact, I think we might even find a few million more in efficiencies if the Tigers have a really big year in football."

Now I am no soothsayer, but I know this will happen. "How?" you might ask.

WELL, I'm happy to answer your question. The foreknowledge came to me while I was reading a press release from the LSU Athletic Department:

A policy believed to be unique in major college sports that would ensure that the academic mission of LSU would share in the financial success of the LSU athletics program will be considered Friday, Sept. 7, by the LSU Board of Supervisors.

The LSU Athletics Fund Transfer Policy would formalize an annual transfer of $7.2 million from the Athletic Department to other components of LSU for use in supporting LSU’s academic, research, public service and other missions. In addition, it would establish a revenue sharing component that could provide additional funds to the university’s mission and ensure that all facets of LSU share in the success of the athletics program.

“I am not aware of another university that has formalized a financial agreement such as this one,” said William Jenkins, interim president and chancellor at LSU. “The university has long been a beneficiary of the success of our financially self-sustaining athletics program, but this policy will solidify the connection between athletic success and advancement of the university’s academic mission.”

Over the years, various informal practices have been adopted for the transfer of funds from the Athletic Department to other components of LSU. As LSU has faced increasing budget pressures over recent years, fund transfers from Athletics to other components of LSU have increased. Most recently, the Athletic Department transferred an additional $4 million and assumed financial responsibility for the Academic Center for Student-Athletes at the cost of approximately $1.5 million to help offset a shortage in the university budget, staving off budget cuts and potential faculty and staff layoffs.

“It is important for an athletics program to play a role in the overall success of the university, and this policy breaks new ground in establishing the role of LSU Athletics in the mission of LSU,” said Joe Alleva, vice chancellor and director of athletics. “LSU Athletics has long-been a financially self-sustaining program and has transferred significant funds to the core mission of the university each year. This policy will take that support to an entirely new level.”

LISTEN, it's Louisiana. It's not rocket science.

Bobby Jindal's Louisiana

Them that's got shall get
Them that's not shall lose
So the Bible said,
and it still is news
Mama may have,
Papa may have
But God bless the child
that's got his own
That's got his own . . .

The University of Louisiana System Board of Supervisors heard Tuesday that state budget cuts caused a wide range of dismal conditions in the state’s higher education system, from low morale and program cutbacks to tuition hikes and faculty layoffs.

Board members for the system that oversees nine public universities received testimony that state budget cuts may be the cause of an increase in employee thefts on campuses, particularly the institutions that haven’t been able to keep a full-time internal auditor on staff.

Board members learned about the increased thefts moments before adopting a $762 million operating budget, which leaves the system’s nine universities with about $38 million less than last year.

“There is a lot of cash on campus and we’re starting to see where the cash is not getting into the bank,” said Robbie Robinson, UL System vice president for business and finance.

Yes, the strong gets more
While the weak ones fade
Empty pockets don't ever make the grade
Mama may have, Papa may have
But God bless the child that's got his own
That's got his own . . .

Without going into specifics, Robinson mentioned an ongoing investigation on one UL System campus, where administrators believe an employee diverted about $40,000 into a credit card account.

Robinson said something that auditors call the “fraud triangle” comes into play when times are tough.

The fraud triangle is a term coined by sociologist Donald Cressey. The points of the triangle are made up of the three most common factors that occur in cases of fraud. They are incentive, or financial stress; rationalization, where the person believes the money won’t be missed; and opportunity, where a person may see a weakness within the organization.

Money, you've got lots of friends
Crowding round the door
When you're gone, spending ends
They don't come no more
Rich relations give
Crust of bread and such
You can help yourself
But don't take too much
Mama may have, Papa may have
But God bless the child that's got his own
That's got his own . . .

UL System President Randy Moffett said some employees have spouses who have lost jobs, making them more prone to stress.

“Their financial situation has changed,” Moffett said. “Most of them haven’t had an increase in pay for four years.”

Moffett, however, said the system’s campuses have “done a great job” reporting when money isn’t accounted for.

On the budget, the UL board sat through a presentation that showed largely the same trend Louisiana’s other three college systems have been going through.

The reduction in state dollars is a continuation of a familiar trend in Louisiana’s higher education system that has seen state funding cut by $426 million since 2008.

Cuts to the UL System have totaled $207 million during the same period.

Mama may have, Papa may have
But God bless the child that's got his own
That's got his own
He just worry 'bout nothin'
Cause he's got his own

Song: "God Bless the Child" -- Billie Holiday and Arthur Herzog, Jr., 1939
News story: "UL budget cuts cited as thefts rise" -- The Advocate, 8/22/2012

If Louisiana were capable of shame . . .

. . . the following "fun" fact would do it.

But it's not.

C'est la vie.

SO, WE'LL just have to let J.R. Ball of the Greater Baton Rouge Business Report be ashamed . . . verklempt . . . mortified on its behalf.

Here's a fact that should make anyone who breathes the contaminated air in this state shudder: Haiti commits a greater percentage of its budget (13%) to higher education than Louisiana (11%).

That's right, the government of a third-world, impoverished nation still struggling to recover from a massive earthquake in 2010 invests more, on a percentage basis, in higher education than the government of Louisiana. That would be the same Louisiana that supposedly is in year five of the eight-year Louisiana miracle.

For those conditioned to respond to such dismal news by saying, “Well, at least we're not Mississippi,” consider that the Magnolia State commits 17.7% of its state budget to higher education, nearly 7 percentage points more than the Bayou State.

So pardon me if my reaction to the just-concluded regular legislative session is a bit more muted than that of those celebrating the “historic” reforms that were approved by Gov. Bobby Jindal and friends. No doubt it was a great session for those demanding reform of K-12 education, but it was another dismal one for higher education. It's gotten so bad that we're forced to celebrate a cut of just $66 million because it could have been as much as $225 million. Yet, remember, higher education must also cut $25 million between now and the end of the month, for a total hit this session of $91 million.

If you are keeping score at home, that's $451 million in budget cuts to higher education since the Jindal administration took office. Moreover, the administration -- thanks to gutless special interest legislators—is now oh-fer-two in its attempts to merge a struggling four-year institution with another university, including one involving Southern University at New Orleans, recently rated as the worst-performing university in America.

FOR YEARS, every time the wife and I head down to Louisiana for a visit, we have commented on the ongoing "Port-au-Princification" of vast swaths of my hometown, Baton Rouge. This refers to how what was nice-to-average now just has become shabby and vaguely Third Worldish.

And now I'll be damned if Louisiana won't even allow me to use ever-so-modest hyperbole to illustrate a bloody point. No, it insists on seeing my dramatic license and raising me a "WHAT THE Fµ¢#???!!!"

Alas, beating your head against the reinforced-concrete wall of the Gret Stet's cultural and political dysfunction is the height of futility. Unfortunately for Ball, someone's got to do it.

Sigh.

Go to L. ('S' and 'U' are getting pink slips)

Louisiana's governor, Huey P. Jindal, believes in robbing Peter's budget to tide Paul over until the magical thinking pays off.

Louisiana's House of Representatives believes in a meat-ax.

Louisiana's college administrators believe they're about to get screwed. Yet again. Really badly.

Etymologists, after considering the Gret Stet, believe they really need a more descriptive word than "clusterf****" to put in their Funk & Wagnalls.

The Advocate's capitol-beat writers probably believe in a couple of pops before sitting down at the laptop to depress themselves and others:

LSU System Vice President Fred Cerise told the committee that additional cuts to the state’s public hospitals would result in reductions to the programs that train doctors and other health-care professionals.

He said an emergency room training program already is facing possible accreditation problems.

“We’re going to get back a list of things that’s going to be quite dramatic,” Cerise said.

The state’s public universities could lose more than $225 million in state funds next year. Those budget cuts would be on top of the $360 million hit higher education has taken since the decline in revenues to state government began four years ago.

“We will be on the brink of cataclysm,” said Interim LSU System President William Jenkins.

If the cuts stick, LSU will be in line to lose nearly $98 million in state funding next year including a $42 million loss for the main campus in Baton Rouge, according to numbers released by the Louisiana Board of Regents.

Jenkins estimated the LSU system would also have to furlough or lay off more than 1,300 employees.

The Southern System could see two more of its campuses declare exigency next year if changes aren’t made to the HB1, said Kevin Appleton, the system’s vice president of finance and business.

The $42 million in cuts the state’s community and technical colleges are facing — $3 million at Baton Rouge Community College — means the difference between putting medical equipment in their nursing classrooms or not, Louisiana Community and Technical College System President Joe May said.

I BELIEVE that Louisiana should put up state-line road signs that warn "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here."

Tell me lies, but hold me tight

What.

A.

Whore.

With "leadership" like this -- and, believe me, system president John Lombardi is how most "leadership" ends up at Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College -- the Gret Stet generally gets the kind of higher education its tarnished reputation can be proud of.

I read the Times-Picayune article below, and I wonder whether folks here in the Gret White Nawth might believe that my degree is from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.

NAH . . . I'm not nearly well-educated enough.

Higher education leaders didn't testify Thursday morning as Gov. Bobby Jindal's administration presented its 2012-13 state spending plan. But, if a memo from LSU System President John Lombardi to his fellow LSU executives is a reliable forecast, then lawmakers and the public will hear no complaints from the state's largest university system.

The email, sent hours before the Joint Budget Committee convened and later obtained by The Times-Picayune, offers an inside view of the political machinations that precede the public budget process. And it parallels Commissioner of Administration Paul Rainwater's emphasis that the budget "protects essential services" in higher education and health care.

Lombardi did note some of the budget maneuvers that are part of a long-term negative trend for higher education: Whatever the bottom line, state taxpayers play a smaller and smaller role each year in direct appropriations to LSU and the rest of the higher education system.

To support claims that higher education is spare drastic downsizing, the budget counts tuition increases in the system's total state budget allotment.

The budget includes tuition paid through the college scholarship program, TOPS, and new tuition revenue from recent hikes the Legislature allowed schools to make for the upcoming school year.

It's the same budget framing the administration used in recent years to say they protected higher education while using grants from the 2009 federal stimulus act to prop up colleges and universities. But Lombardi did not complain, and he suggested that Jindal expects the entire higher education hierarchy to follow suit.

"In exchange for this good treatment," Lombardi wrote, "the administration would appreciate" higher leaders "recognize that the budget gives higher ed special treatment and thank the administration for their attention and concern for higher ed."

He said the administration wanted support for Jindal's plans to overhaul parts of the state retirement system, proposals that include increased worker contributions, effectively the payroll taxes for those employees since they don't participate in Social Security. Further, Lombardi said the administration preferred "coordinated" public relations messages so "all units of higher education respond in the same generally positive and supportive way to the Administration's efforts." That's also the preferred strategy, Lombardi suggested, of the LSU Board of Supervisors, which a Jindal-appointed majority now controls.

TIGERS put on the red light. Tigers put on the red light. Tigers put on the red light. Tigers put on the red light.

Tigers put on the red light.

Not. Helping.

Alas, after the embarrassing performance by my LSU Tigers tonight, I fear there just may not be enough booze in the world.

Alabama Coach Nick Saban is a genius. An evil genius, but a genius nevertheless. LSU's Les Miles? Not so much.

Listen. I can screw up just as badly at just about anything as the LSU coaching staff and quarterback Jordan Jefferson did Monday night at football. Please . . . somebody pay me $4 million fo f*** up just like Les did.

Better yet, how about the Gret Stet of Loosiana throw a few more million at its flagship university's actual reason for being, which is education. I am sure there are plenty of professors who can teach as bad a class as Les coached a game. I also am sure there are plenty of undergrads who can take as bad a final exam as Jefferson played a final game.

FOR GOD'S SAKE, show those f***-ups as much money love as boosters and fans show the football program. Then maybe Louisiana natives like me won't be thinking -- before the Big Game -- "Please, God, let the Tigers win. It's all we got."

Furthermore, I have theories about the inexplicable performance of LSU that are not based in reality. Well, at least not likely based in reality. Unfortunately, they make much more sense than anything that's remotely plausible -- of which I got nothing.

Congrats to hated rival Alabama. I wish the Tigers could have given you a game.

Screw football, I wish Louisiana could have given its children a national-championship future.

The Big Game vs. the budget game

Jeré Longman of The New York Times, by my reckoning, was seven years ahead of me at Louisiana State University.

He was a working-class kid from Cajun country. My daddy worked long decades at the Esso refinery and Enjay Chemicals in Baton Rouge -- now Exxon-Mobil but forever Standard Oil to my hometown.

We both worked on The Daily Reveille at LSU. He went all the way to the Times. Me, not so much.

But in a wonderful essay in Friday's newspaper, he speaks for me and for God knows how many other alumni for whom the Ole War Skule opened up worlds that were closed to our parents, and did it at a price good country folk and Baton Rouge plant workers could afford.

SOMETHING had to be said, and bless Longman's heart for saying it to the world:

I am forever grateful to L.S.U. for the opportunities given to me and countless other rural children, many of us the first in our families to attend college or graduate. Yet, 35 years after leaving campus, I worry that football success has obscured L.S.U.’s escalating academic ambition and its struggle to maintain excellence over the past three years in the face of about $50 million in state appropriation cuts and the loss of a tenth of its faculty.

“If we sent the football team out with only 10 players, how would people feel?” said John M. Hamilton, L.S.U.’s executive vice chancellor and provost.

Let’s be clear: budget cuts are not the football team’s fault. L.S.U. has one of the few self-sustaining athletic departments. It does not use state tax dollars or student fees. Instead, the athletic department contributes 5 percent of its budget to the university annually — about $4.25 million at this point — and has spent millions to help finance a band hall and business school.

There is nothing like Saturday nights at Tiger Stadium. Tailgating summons the best of Cajun culture — geniality, cooking and storytelling. And football success buoys a state sagging under the weight of poverty, educational lethargy and high rates of cancer, obesity and infant mortality.

“When we’re No. 1, it’s usually for something bad,” an L.S.U. fan named Rudy Penton once told me.

DO GEAUX NOW and read the whole thing.

Public school buses for Jesus

Back in my Louisiana hometown, the East Baton Rouge Parish School Board is considering a list of $37.4 million in budget cuts as a start on tackling what officials think will end up being a $39 million budget deficit.

Class sizes will increase. Three schools will close. Staffers will face furloughs. Direct bus routes -- 62 of them -- for gifted and magnet-school students will be eliminated.

One thing that won't be cut, however, is bus service for parochial schools.

Non-Louisianians might react to this with a great big "WTF???" They might wonder what the name of "separation of church and state" are taxpayers doing funding bus service for Catholic schools.

LOUISIANIANS, however, probably would wonder why taxpayers wouldn't provide school buses for parochial-school students. They'd argue that white kids ought to have just as much access to school buses as black ones.

Absurdity, after all, is so prevalent in the Gret Stet as to not even be noticed.

In today's newspaper, The Advocate reports on the abjectly insane machinations of what passes for self-governance in Louisiana with nary an eye roll:

Carnell Washington, president of the East Baton Rouge Federation of Teachers, said parochial school children should also lose direct bus routes if magnet and gifted children lose there’s.

“If we have to give up something, they should give up something,” Washington said.

Dilworth said he struggles with some suggested cuts, including ending after just one year an experiment in year-round schooling at Claiborne and Park elementary schools, saving $4 million in the process.

“So I spend $4 million at those schools and then look at the cuts I’m going to have to make across the district … can I justify that? No,” Dilworth said.

Washington placed the blame for the cuts on Gov. Bobby Jindal whom he described as “selfish.”

“We are here because the state of Louisiana has refused to fund public schools,” Washington said.

GOD, I HOPE someone makes a federal case of this.

It probably won't be the commenters at the bottom of the article -- the one yearning for a return to "neighborhood schools" and another who wants the school system to be rid of all its "magnate" programs.

Gee, if I were in charge, I'd make every school a "magnate" school. Them magnates would have enough money to pay for their own damned school buses.

'Cornhusker Kickback,' my ass

Greetings from Nebraska, one of the states that pays other states' bills at considerable expense to itself.

Research by The Daily Beast this week ranked the Cornhusker State 45th on its list of "states that sponge tax dollars," with it receiving a paltry 82 cents back from the federal government for every dollar Nebraskans send to Washington.

And right-wingers enjoying disproportionate suckage at the federal teat in places like Mississippi (No. 1, $2.83 for every dollar paid) and Sarah Palin's Alaska (No. 6, $2.24) had the nerve to get all indignant and pissy about Sen. Ben Nelson's ultimately deleted "Cornhusker Kickback" in the struggle to pass health-care reform. Hell, that probably wouldn't even have gotten us back what we pay in.

AS THE unicameral frets and fights over how to close a big hole in Nebraska's biennial budget, I think we may have stumbled upon a solution here. Everything will be all right, with nary a budget cut on the horizon . . . if we just secede from the union and levy taxes at the combined state and federal rates.

We even could be generous toward the Americans and allow them to keep Offutt Air Force Base, headquarters of the Strategic Command. We know how one can get attached to one's nuclear deterrent.

But it would cost them some serious rent.

Just between you and me, 'Mr. Koch' . . . .

Punking a governor like Wisconsin's Scott Walker -- not to mention exposing his real agenda -- is about as good as it gets.

Maybe not as good as punking Fidel Castro (definitely not "one of us" in the Walkerian continuum of "us" and "not us."), but pretty dang good.

From the Chicago Tribune:

On a prank call that quickly spread across the Internet, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker was duped into discussing his strategy to cripple public employee unions, promising never to give in and joking that he would use a baseball bat in his office to go after political opponents.

Walker believed the caller was a conservative billionaire named David Koch, but it was actually a liberal blogger.

The two talked for at least 20 minutes a conversation in which the governor described several potential ways to pressure Democrats to return to the Statehouse and revealed that his supporters had considered secretly planting people in pro-union protest crowds to stir up trouble.

The call also revealed Walker's cozy relationship with two billionaire brothers who have poured millions of dollars into conservative political causes, including Walker's campaign last year.

Walker compared his stand to that taken by President Ronald Reagan when he fired the nation's air-traffic controllers during a labor dispute in 1981.

"That was the first crack in the Berlin Wall and led to the fall of the Soviets," Walker said on the recording.

The audio was posted on the Buffalo Beast, a Web site in New York, and quickly went viral.

Editor Ian Murphy told The Associated Press he carried out the prank to show how candidly Walker would speak with Koch even though, according to Democrats, he refuses to return their calls.

AT ONE POINT during his conversation with Not Koch, the cheesehead-in-chief was sounding quite the revolutionary, in an aristocratic, send-in-the-Pinkerton-agents-to-bust-some-union-heads Andrew Carnegie kind of way:

On the call, Walker said he expected the anti-union movement to spread across the country and he had spoken with the governors of Ohio and Nevada. The man pretending to be Koch seemed to agree, telling Walker, "You're the first domino."

"Yep, this is our moment," Walker responded.

YEP, it's your moment, all right, governor. A great big "OOPS!" moment.

Enjoy.

Save Soutehrn. Recall Jimdel. (Timdel?) Aw, screw it.

Gov. Bobby "Jimdel" (Timdel?) laughs. Louisiana weeps. (Then again, ma-bee nout.)

And "Soutehrn University" is soooooo screwed.

I don't know what to say about this. Explication is so superfluous right now, considering the overwhelming nature of just the unvarnished reportage.

So here you go. The latest on the proposed merger of Southern University of New Orleans and the University of New Orleans. From The Times-Picayune . . . or is that Tha Tymze Picounne . . . or Thee Teyems Pickeyun . . . or . . . oh, screw it.

I'm really sick and tired about

graduation rates. Graduation rates
mean nothing. Southern University was
not developed to graduate people.

-- Randolph Scott,
alumni president

HERE'S the story from the newspaper. Satire is dead:

Starting with a fiery invocation and continuing with a long line of angry speeches Wednesday, speaker after speaker voiced support for Southern University of New Orleans and condemned the proposed merger with the University of New Orleans. In the prayer that opened a town-hall meeting in a packed SUNO gymnasium, Darryl Brown, a professor of English, asked God for guidance but said: "If this merger goes through, this will be the end of SUNO. We're not going to let that happen. We are here to fight."

In a voice that rose steadily throughout his invocation, Brown concluded by saying, "We stand in vision for one goal ... to retain SUNO forever."

That set the tone for the meeting at the 52-year-old historically black university. "They want you gone. They don't want SUNO here," said W.C. Johnson, a community activist.

"SUNO," he said, "is going to be a thing of the past unless you stand up and be counted and do your share."

The rest of his comment was drowned out by long, loud cheering, which was the response most speakers received from the several hundred spectators sitting in bleachers and in folding chairs on the gym floor.

AND WHAT are folks tryeing . . .tryyng . . . treyying . . . and what due do folks want to save? This.

Several speakers Wednesday emphasized the importance of historically black colleges such as SUNO for the work they do to nurture students who are poorly prepared for college work while in high school.

One criticism of SUNO has been its low graduation rate, which most recently was 9.28 percent, according to SUNO records. The most recent number from the federal Department of Education is 5 percent.

SUNO officials contend that the federal figure undercounts the number of people who earn degrees there because it counts only full-time freshmen who finished undergraduate work at the same institution within six years.

This is not possible for many students because they have to juggle jobs and family responsibilities, several speakers said, and many return to college after years away from academics.

Anthony Jeanmarie, a 35-year-old senior, called SUNO "the only place where a 35-year-old ... who walked away from college and came back can earn a degree. If not SUNO, where?"

UH . . . Delgado Community College, for starters? And then UNO?

Louisiana: It's more doomded than you thought.

The ghost of Fred Preaus

Color Louisiana State University's chancellor, Mike Martin, the most surprised man in Baton Rouge -- at least until he got to Page 6A of his morning newspaper.

Meanwhile, Provost Jack Hamilton -- the school's former dean of mass communications -- might be forgiven for fervently praying that The Advocate didn't employ as many LSU journalism grads as it used to. Having Lizzie Borden in the governor's mansion is bad enough without the Ol' War Skule getting blamed for the "Why try harder?" ethos of the state's No. 2 daily newspaper.

Or . . . as the late Gov. Earl K. Long once said of a rival in the 1956 gubernatorial election:

"Fred Preaus is an honest man. If I were buying a Ford car, I'd buy it from Fred Preaus. He would give me a good deal. If I had trouble with the car, he'd give me a loaner while he got it fixed — that's just the kind of man he is. But if I was buying two Fords — well, he's just not big enough to handle a deal that size."

"BUT DAT DON'T make no sense," you might say.

Sure it does.

Uncle Earl may have been crazy, but he wasn't dumb. Some things just don't change much, you know? And you can substitute a lot of names for that of ol' Fred Preaus.

Borrowing your demagoguery

The trouble with Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal is that he's just so very unoriginal.

He stole his name from Bobby Brady and The Brady Bunch. He stole his response to President Obama's 2009 congressional address from Mister Rogers.

And now he's stolen the bright idea of demagoguing university sabbaticals from the Iowa Republican Party. He picked up that idea, no doubt, during all the time he's spent in the Hawkeye State -- as opposed to his own.

In November, as reported by The Daily Reveille, this was the Jindal Administration's party line against such "bad values in education" as the state's flagship university, LSU:

State Commissioner of Administration Paul Rainwater says Gov. Bobby Jindal's office is looking into University faculty workloads to see if students are getting the best return for their tuition.

"It's important to make sure resources are focused on the classroom and the students and taxpayers get the most value from investments," Rainwater said.

Rainwater said instructors in the LSU System are teaching 77 percent more credit hours than tenured professors. Instructors at the Baton Rouge campus teach 133 percent more, he said.

One area where faculty members do less teaching than instructors is in sabbaticals — a leave of absence to focus on research, writing or acquiring new knowledge. Rainwater said tenured faculty earn the right to have a sabbatical but not during a budget crunch.

"At a time when we're facing a very large deficit, I think it's important that we justify what sabbaticals are taken," Rainwater said.

NOT ONLY is Jindal unoriginal, he's milquetoasty. He's an Iowa Republican watered down to the point of BLECCH!

Watered down and nine months late.

In February, the Republicans in the Iowa House sought to eliminate every single sabbatical at its regents universities -- Iowa, Iowa State and Northern Iowa -- for the next year at a savings of . . . $6 million.

The Iowa Board of Regents had considered canceling sabbaticals in December 2009, but ultimately decided such a move would harm recruitment and retention of faculty, as well as create disruptions in research and a logjam of future sabbatical requests. There were 111 requests for sabbaticals across the three universities for the 2010-11 academic year -- down 25 percent from the previous year.

The University of Iowa led the pack with 52 sabbaticals for professors. Iowa State requested 37 and Northern Iowa 18.

A year later, the ascendant Iowa Republicans are at it again. The state's GOP lawmakers propose -- again -- banning all university sabbaticals. And the new House speaker, Kraig Paulsen, is leading the charge against the eggheads, saying taxpayers just can't afford to give profs a paid "year off."

From an Associated Press article Wednesday:

But professors said the savings Republicans are promising won't materialize, and the move would cost universities in grant money and productivity.

Sabbaticals -- a paid semester or year off from teaching to write books, conduct research, create classes and write grant proposals -- are standard practice at major research universities across the nation. But at a time when other employees are facing pay cuts and furloughs, they have become an easy target for critics and an area where universities can cut to show they are making sacrifices, too.

Several schools across the country have already reduced or canceled sabbaticals, according to the American Association of University Professors. The University of Iowa has cut its sabbaticals in half over two years.

John Curtis, director of research and public policy for AAUP, said he was unaware of any case where lawmakers rather than schools themselves have cut sabbaticals, and he doubted that it would become a trend because of the tiny amount of potential savings.

"I'm sure they feel it has great symbolic value," he said. "But the loss, of course, is what the whole purpose of sabbatical is: to allow faculty members to do research, to engage in understanding new developments in their discipline and then to bring all of that back to their teaching."

A potential fight is already brewing in Iowa, where its three public universities have asked the Board of Regents to approve sabbaticals for professors in the budget year that begins July 1. Details are expected to be made public Thursday.

The regents could approve the requests next week, but Paulsen said they should allow for public debate on the plan to cancel them first.

"It seems to be tough budgetary times. Why should the taxpayers of Iowa be paying to basically give these folks a year off from teaching?" asked Paulsen, a Hiawatha Republican who will lead a chamber that flipped to Republican control in November. "It's as simple as that."

Board of Regents President David Miles said through a spokeswoman that he will withhold comment until next week's meeting. Last year, he urged presidents of the three public universities to ensure any sabbaticals "serve to enhance the core missions of the universities."

The University of Iowa has asked the regents to approve 58 sabbaticals for next year, a slight increase after two years of sharp cuts, said Faculty Senate President Edwin Dove, who defended the practice. UI professors wrote 26 books in 2009 while on sabbatical, published 147 research articles, created and updated nearly 100 classes, and submitted 50 grant applications, Dove said.

SO IN IOWA, we have a debate over highly debatable savings in the mid-seven-figure range. But hang on a second:

House Republicans have said their plan would save $6 million and be part of a budget-cutting package introduced next year. But their projected savings apparently includes salaries that professors will earn whether they are on sabbatical or not. The actual savings would be the roughly $250,000 universities spend to hire replacement teachers, university officials said.

THE STATE'S GOP legislative contingent would appear to be disingenuous here, at a minimum. Some might say they're just playing the booboisie for a bunch of suckers, trying to appear as if they're doing something while proposing next to nothing.

At a minimum.

So, back in Louisiana, what to make of Jindal's quixotic demonizing of LSU professors?

Well, let me put it this way: Remember the number of sabbaticals Iowans have been fighting over? Keep that figure -- 111 . . . 50-something of that total at UI -- in mind.

This year, LSU has 19 professors on sabbatical. Nineteen.

One-nine.

One less than 20.

That's what the Jindal Administration has seen fit to harp over whenever someone frets about a worst-case $60-something million cut to Louisiana's flagship university next year. We're probably not even talking about a million bucks in highly debatable savings, here.

One thing, however, has become crystal clear. What Louisiana's absentee governor lacks in the originality or comprehensiveness of his demagoguery, he certainly makes up in audacity.

Barking up the Ducks' tree

Washington's athletic director didn't mince words -- or make an attempt at being a gracious guest -- during the Huskies' visit to Oregon last weekend.

Instead, he went on and on to the Huskies' radio crew about how the university in Eugene had become an embarrassment because of state budget cuts, and about how UW was superior in every way. (Except, of course, on the gridiron.)

NORMALLY, I wouldn't give a duck's tail (or a Husky's hind quarter) about Pac-10 pissing matches. I don't have a dog in that fight. Then again, neither did Washington, as it turned out.)

One thing occurred to me, however. This, as reported on Sports by Brooks, is exactly what somebody's going to be saying about my alma mater, LSU, if and when Gov. Bobby Jindal gets his budgetary way and finishes his ongoing work of destroying the state's flagship university:

Mahler to Woodward: “What do you make of this place? When you come down here, you see the new baseball field, you see the brand new turf, you see the atmosphere. And don’t know if motivation is the word but obviously this is kind of where Washington wants to be, ranked #1 in the country and have all eyes on them.”

Woodward: “Sure, it’s not really where we want to be Softy (Mahler’s nickname), because it’s an embarrassment what their academic institution is, and what’s happened to them as far as their state funding has gone. In my mind it’s a wonderful athletic facility but they’ve watched it at the expense of the university go really down.

“The athletic facility is impressive. The fans at Oregon should get down on their hands and knees at night to Phil Knight and pray to him because this is an incredible facility he’s built.“

Mahler: “Talk more about what you were just mentioning, about academics, is that backed up by some stats that just came out? Or numbers? Tell me about that.”

Woodward: “Sure, any of the rankings you look at, you watch how far they’ve (Oregon) dropped because of their state funding. And it’s a message for us too. Our state needs to get its act together because we can’t continue to progress without investment in our institution. But we’re doing extremely well and we’re very proud of that fact.

“We’re a part of the whole University of Washington. That’s who we are.”

OK, TIGERS. You have been warned. You will be embarrassed . . . that is, if anyone in Louisiana still is capable of such.

Not waiting for locusts, exactly

"You talk to relatives and friends who aren't from here and the first thing they ask you -- they give you that special look -- is, 'Are y'all going to be OK?'

"You know what they're really thinking, they're just too polite to say it. What they're really thinking is, 'What's wrong with you people? Are y'all waiting for locusts?'"

-- Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal
Oct. 29, 2010