This Anti-Clinton Donor Just Wrecked UNC's Reputation (A Must Read Article)

[TheBlackAdder]

.

You'll need to go to the link and read this article, in its entirety.

The snippets below don't do it justice but show you where it's heading.

You know who probably wasn’t surprised by Walter Hussman’s meddling in the hiring of Nikole Hannah-Jones and consequently damaging the reputation of UNC's journalism school? Bill and Hillary Clinton.



In a surprise checkmate move, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones informed the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill that she would not be accepting its delayed offer to join its journalism school, and would instead become a tenured professor at Howard University.

The announcement came after the school stumbled through an extended public controversy over Hannah-Jones’ hiring, and revelations that a conservative mega-donor to the journalism school, Walter Hussman, had worked behind the scenes to make sure the overqualified Jones wasn’t initially offered a tenured position, unlike her white predecessors at the school.

UNC’s journalism school was renamed the Hussman School of Journalism and Media in 2019, after the wealthy media magnate and publisher of the anti-Clinton Arkansas Democrat-Gazette committed to donating $25 million to UNC, although most of the money from the gift has not yet been given. The school had recruited Hannah-Jones, a MacArthur “genius” and the driving force behind the New York Times’ “1619 Project,” an ambitious journalistic reexamination of American history that focused on the central role slavery had in shaping the nation and its institutions.
.
.
The anti-Hannah-Jones pressure campaign ran counter to how universities are supposed to deal with mega-donors, as they protect academic freedoms. In fact, by so clearly using his privilege and overstepping his bounds by inserting himself directly into university hiring protocols, Hussman violated the journalistic ethics that he claims to support.
.
.
For the journalism school, the sad episode will leave a permanent stain. “Nikole Hannah-Jones is one of the most prominent journalists in the United States, frankly in the world, today,” according to UNC journalism professor Daniel Kreiss. Yet bowing to right-wing pressure, the university shrank from its responsibilities. Across the campus, some acclaimed UNC professors are already heading for the exits in the wake of the controversy, which they say broke their trust in the university’s commitment to academic freedom.
.
.
more at the jump

https://crooksandliars.com/2021/07/nikole-hannah-jones-clinton-hussman

.

[tulipsandroses]

1. I am glad she turned them down

There should be no rewards for racism. There is renewed passion for black students, including student athletes to attend HBCUs. Having Ms. Jones at Howard, will further drive black students to attendHoward or other HBCUs.

[BComplex]

2. This type of academic interference is far more pervasive than people realize.

The most egregious violation is at Baptist seminaries. Any person with any type of liberal leanings will never be ordained any longer in a Baptist seminary. Donors have made absolute certain of that. But it's happening at all major universities.

[certainot]

10. pervasive, like a uni supporting rw radio that attacks particular regent and chancellor candidates?

with everything republican, talk radio played/plays a critical part while liberals ignore it ----that's the effect of rw radio and it would be easy to fix that kind of interference - for eg, in NORTH CAROLINA 16 RW/exlimbaugh and major talk radio stations depend on students faculty and community to ignore that North Carolina 8, North Carolina State 3, Duke 3, East Carolina 2 broadcast sports and support the radio stations that sold big lies - global warming is a hoax, trump is a billionaire and won, there is no racism so why do they want CRT, dems are importing illegal aliens to vote for them and that's why we need voter suppression that keeps their own students from voting, and on an even more local level - those regents and chancelor candidates are way too fucking communist for OUR university! and we still love limbaugh even after he told us covid was a hoax, like smoking causes cancer!, and the grandparents died

[Duppers]

3. GOOD!!

We knew this move would wreck UNC's reputation. What did they think would happen?!

[Demnation]

4. UNC Tar Heels, alma mater of Michael Jordan, disgracing themselves over a few bucks from a racist.

[Hekate]

5. $25 million isn't "a few bucks from a racist." It is a gold-mine of bucks from a racist. Still...

…they should have explained “academic freedom” to him, and told him theirs was not for sale.

[Warpy]

8. Yeah, like that is ever going to happen

They generally have to wait until the old buzzard dies before they can rediscover their principles.

Jones absolutely did the right thing. By offering her a non tenured position, they were offering her tokenism in order to use her as window dressing for a school with some real problems, thanks to their knuckling under to the bigotry of a big donor. Good for her for accepting the tenured position at Howard. She won't have fatuous wingnuts breathing down her neck there.

[Hekate]

9. She absolutely did the right thing. The UNC wrangling was unseemly & insulting...

Howard is going to have a lustrous journalism department.

[onetexan]

16. Yup she gave them the middle finger.

I'll have to remind myself when we have grandkids to tell them NOT to apply to UNC.

[Hekate]

17. She did so in a very classy way, too. First, she made them capitulate. Then she walked away...

…with a much better offer.

[certainot]

11. jordan could point out how NC uses black athletes to support 8 racist radio stations

NORTH CAROLINA 16 North Carolina 8, North Carolina State 3, Duke 3, East Carolina 2

[not fooled]

6. More

Charles Koch, CEO of Koch Industries, has overseen over $458 million in grants to over 550 universities and higher ed adjacent non-profits since 2005. Unlike other philanthropists backing higher education, Koch gives to schools with the explicit goal of creating intellectual fodder for his network of political interest groups, and recruiting and training students to integrate into that network.

Using recently released tax records, we discovered that in 2019, Koch university funding totaled $112,044,071. This is an increase of $23.9 million from 2018. It’s the second year in a row that Koch outspent its previous annual total by over $20 million. This one-year total is over a hundred million dollars more than Koch foundations spent annually on universities a decade ago, at $10.5 million in 2009.

https://www.unkochmycampus.org/]

Amerikkka's arms-length dictator 666koch666 has been wrecking higher ed for years.

[ancianita]

7. Yep, Koch. A one-man wrecker of liberal arts and sciences universities.

He buys up hiring and curricula influence in economics and related departments.

[certainot]

12. and that wouldn't amt to crap if dems stopped letting 87+ unis support 260+ xlimbaugh stations

that is why the kochs have power - their stink tanks (and later putin's) feed rw radio and unlike fox can coordinate them on the local level to create made-to-order constituencies to deny global warming, oppose deregulation, push voter suppression based on lies.

some day the collective stupidity of progressive orgs based in cities to ignore rw radio will be recognized as the biggest political mistake in history, considering the time lost on global warming. really fucking dumb.

[MetalMama]

22. Yes

Two excellent books on all the behind the scenes shit the Koch brothers and their ilk have been doing at universities and colleges. Dark Money by Jane Mayer and Democracy in Chains by Nancy MacLean. Both are scary and disturbing to read.

[Pas-de-Calais]

13. Very telling statement from the article,,

UNC journalism took name of Hussmann after he
committed to donating $25 million to UNC, although most of the money from the gift has not yet been given.

[Wounded Bear]

14. How very Trumpian of them...

[GulfCoast66]

15. The Arkansas Gazette and Democrat used to be different companies. I know. I threw both.

Started throwing the Democrat in 79. I was 12. It was a small paper with afternoon delivery. It had a very conservative editorial line while the Gazette was much larger and had a center left editorial board. It was the oldest paper west of the Mississippi River and was a serious paper.

But the Democrat had a great plan. Each Wednesday every resident had a free paper delivered in their driveway which had their most conservative editorials. We are taking Arkansas. People liked it.

My dad was a journalism major so we got both. He believed in reading all sides issues. But was an FDR democrat.

A few months after I started throwing the Democrat it went to mornings like the Gazette. So at 13 I got up at 4:45 every day of the week to throw my route. A few years later I switched to throwing the Gazette because at the time it still had the largest circulation. And it was a much better paper. But not conservative; in the Reagan years. In Arkansas. So after I left for college the Democrat, with it conservative editorials forced the Gazette to sell.

I threw for them till I graduated high school. By 14 I had a scooter and picked up a second route. Back then your paper was delivered on your front porch. Those who tipped me well got it right at their door. They only had to open the door, bend over, and get their paper.

I made more money from tips than my pay. I made $400-500 dollars a month. In 1983 in Arkansas that meant I had money like the rich kids!

Did not see it at the time. I was just a kid. But now I realize the rise of the Arkansas Democrat was a part of the south’s rebellion against integration. My dad did, but what kid at 15 listens to his dad? As in most things, he was correct. Unfortunately he died 6 years after I graduated high school. 2 year after I was out of college.

Sorry for the long post. But the OP brought back old memories.

[ms liberty]

18. Don't apologize. Your post was fascinating and well written.

[erronis]

20. Thanks for an interesting very personal view.

Small town newspapers are caught between trying to give the readers some good information, donors/owners who have particular viewpoints, and advertisers who want to appear on the best pages with inoffensive content....

Once mega-bucks come into play the field is completely changed - always against giving readers good information.

[OldBaldy1701E]

19. Well

There was already... tarnish?... on it.

[tishaLA]

21. This also comes on the heels of UNC's Silent Sam controversy

in 2018, students toppled a statue of "Silent Sam," a confederate soldier, that the university had spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in security to protect from defacement. This security also involved having undercover UNC PD officers who infiltrated student activists to gather intel.

After it was toppled, UNC put it in storage for safekeeping and eventually entered into an agreement with Sons of Confederate Veterans to hand the statue over to them *along with $2.5 million* to pay for the statue's upkeep.

As you can imagine, that angered people as much as the presence of the statue did, although UNC was sort of saved by the judge who'd initially approved the deal overturning his own decision because, he ultimately decided, Sons of Confederate Soldiers lacked standing (a position that was obvious from the beginning, but....).

Net net net, UNC is a fucked up place to be black and the administration seems not to get it.

Edited to add: One of the cops who was supposed to have been keeping the peace at the student protests happened to happen to have a three percenter tattoo and was later forced to resign.