Yorba Linda, California: When Past is Prologue, and Pickled (Red Emma)

Dissenters Attend George McGovern Book Event at Nixon Library…’Cuz We Like Irony…and Gore Vidal, Too (as the Egyptian God Ra)

By Red Emma

Photo: OC Weekly

     HARD TO KNOW whether to envy or pity the poor boob who stood up Wednesday night and interrupted Gore Vidal’s introduction of former Senator George McGovern, there to promote his book on Lincoln.

     Red Emma and Rebel Girl and the apple of their eyes sat in the front row of the mock East Room of the White House with sexy Ace Reporter Gal. Careful observers will notice that the Authentic has trouble, always, overcoming the Spectacular. 

     There we sat, in Nixon's Library in Yorba Linda while also sitting in the elegance of D.C., where the genuine struggled, but triumphed. 

     We waited an hour, with my seven year old, clever lad, passing the time reading “Calvin and Hobbes,” his latest passion. Golly, he is a smart boy. Takes after his mother.

      Suddenly a young, handsome man wheeled in an old, handsome man and somebody, I think it was me, stood up and began an ovation which lasted at least 3 minutes. 

     Gore Vidal was recognized immediately by it seemed a majority of the audience beyond this fan, and the others either thought, boy, George McGovern isn’t doin’ too hot these days or maybe just went along for the hurrah. 

     It was exciting. The Grand Man of Letters seemed to enjoy the reception, wanting to stand to acknowledge it. He couldn’t raise himself from the wheelchair, which he’s been in for some years.

     Happily, weirdly, he was soon lifted three feet in the air by a sturdy little ADA-required elevator right there in the pretend finery, Teddy Roosevelt’s portrait on the wall, up to the riser where he sat until McGovern and director Timothy Naftali arrived to more applause. 

     T.R. only looked on, bull-moosely.

     As an aside, I’ll observe that Naftali, a gifted scholar and seemingly really nice guy, bears an uncanny resemblance to, no, not Nixon himself, but to Harry Shearer, humorist, “Saturday Night Live” writer and NPR “Le Show” host and hard-core Nixonophile doing the Tricky One. Weird. But…fun! 

     After his generous remarks, including noting the death of Senator Kennedy and the half-mastery of Old Glory and the need to celebrate the work of the Library (governmental, nonpartisan, based on fact) and also the Nixon Foundation (private rich people, partisan, silly — my words, not his), Naftali explained that he had indeed invited Gore Vidal, Lincoln scholar and McGovern contemporary and remarked (the evening’s theme, sort of) on the lovely irony of these two liberals right here in Nixonland. 

     Vidal accepted more applause and offered his own reliable drollery and wit, which got big laughs and then suggested he would read “some pages” from Bernard Shaw, proceeding to read the (no surprise here) ironic and instructive (if you were listening) prologue to the Fabian Socialist’s play “Caesar and Cleopatra.” 

     So, to review. We were assembled forty years later in a faux East Room in Yorba Linda, at the real and yet also phony library with the liberal anti-war candidate McGovern who was victimized by Nixon and his gang and voted down by the frightened and not at all silent majority of ’72 AND with the essayist-novelist-playwright-candidate Vidal, two legends who survived to reappear together on the day Ted Kennedy died, as the USA killed on and on in Iraq and Afghanistan and a moderate First Black American President struggled with Blue Dogs and gun nuts and “birthers” at town hall meetings on health care “reform” of a system which is basically a gift to the industry.

       I could go on, but you get the idea. (And if not, you never will, pal.) 

     Oh, and did I mention that I was wearing my “I Don’t Care if He’s Dead, I Still Want to Impeach Nixon” t-shirt? And that Ace Reporter Gal wore a vintage button, “Kiss Me…I Voted for McGovern”? 

     In case you haven’t read “Caesar and Cleopatra” lately, I’ll summarize, briefly. Old Ra, wearing his funky Egyptian hawk’s head helmet appears. We are in Memphis. He talks to us, his modern audience, scoldingly. It’s a warning, a cautionary tale based on the political choices of old and new Rome, between the soldier Pompey (“The way of the soldier is the way of death”) and Caesar, whom the gods seemed to dig. Pompey, who represents “Mammon” (and, for our purposes, Northrup Grumman and McDonnell Douglass) makes war on Caesar, who runs away to learn a lesson from the gods, eventually gathers his wisdom and beats Mammon’s army, which runs off to Egypt, which is basically a colony of Rome.

     Afghanistan, Iraq, Bush-Cheney, get it? Hubris, war, empire. 

     Lucius Septimius seems to embrace Pompey in Sphinxville, but instead “welcomed him with one hand and with the other smote off his head, and kept it as it were a pickled cabbage to make a present to Caesar.” Wow, sauerkraut!

     Now, friends, if you were lucky enough to be sitting in the audience at this remarkable occasion on a summer evening in the waning days of our own pickled empire, waiting to hear from the man who should have beaten the war criminal, and were, yes, being read to by one of the greatest thinkers, writers in the history of our republic, wouldn’t you, like me, count yourself a pretty lucky duck, soak it up, be enthralled and feel just a little bit of, okay, hope for us all? 

     Not the boob. He stood up from the tenth row, and interrupted Gore Fucking Vidal! 

     “With all due respect, Mr. Vidal…” he began. Some members of the audience, expressing their own boobery, applauded in seeming consent. 

     Vidal only smiled, as if he had organized the whole thing, as if he had orchestrated not only the moment that we saw, but the moment, now, of the silly man, and what would follow. 

     The sly and wise old dude waited for the crowd to settle back down, and resumed. He just kept reading, as, of course the Big Moral had arrived, Bernard Shaw’s timing and Vidal’s own seeming to anticipate the chucklehead:

“Are ye impatient with me? Do ye crave for a story of an unchaste woman? And what I am about to show you for the good of your souls is how Caesar, seeking Pompey in Egypt, found Cleopatra; and how he received that present of a pickled cabbage that was on the head of Pompey; and what things happened between the old Caesar and the child queen…All this ye shall see; and ye shall marvel, after your ignorant manner, that men twenty centuries ago were already just such as you, and spoke and lived as ye speak and live, no worse and no better, no wiser and no sillier.”

     I kid you not. That’s how it happened, with Vidal completing the passage and the goof revealed as a sort of unknowing actor in the Great Man’s dramaturgy. Vidal is a playwright, after all. 

     He got another big applause at the end. Some people got it, some didn’t, and then McGovern took the podium. 

     He made some good cracks himself, including thanking Vidal and noting that, of all the events he’d read at lately, it was this one, at the Nixon Library, where circumstance and history conspired to get the introducer a standing ovation. I looked over in the direction of Mr. Interrupter, lost in the crowd but gifted at least with an embarrassing story to tell his friends and family, about being both a player and an object lesson. 

     Senator McGovern offered his thoughts on Lincoln, all solid and entertaining and thoughtful, including his observations about Lincoln’s own personal challenges (clinical depression, as the South Dakota senator’s own doomed daughter) and pointed out all that Abe got done while trying to save the union, and admired Lincoln’s writing, too. I think C-SPAN might have got all this for broadcast, which you can view I hope after reading my color commentary. 

     Then, during the Q & A, sexy Ace Reporter Gal sprang up to ask a question about McGovern’s recollections of Ted Kennedy. She got him to tell some pretty darn sweet stories. And afterwards, we three waited while she got in line to get McG’s signature. 

     I watched the crowd assembled around Vidal’s wheelchair, a dozen people wanting to shake his hand. I wondered if Interrupter might apologize, but he had gone off to audition for some other performance as stooge in life’s rich pageant, perhaps to ask Yo-Yo Ma not to play so loud.

 

Sexy Ace Reporter Gal peppers the speaker with sexy, ace questions

     My little boy shook the old peace candidate’s hand while I tried to identify all the names of “benefactors” of the foundation and library (more fun) and tried to make sense of the weird shit for sale in the gift shop, including a t-shirt with Tricky Dick’s face and the question “What Would Nixon Do”? I wondered who bought that, and I wondered about the occasion when they might find themselves looking down at their chest to ask themselves that. 

     Answer: Smear Jerry Voorhees, red-bait Helen Gahagan Douglas, develop a racist “Southern strategy,” bomb a country illegally, start an enemies list, beat up Pat, spy on Dan Ellsberg, get drunk with Kissinger, resign in disgrace, like that. Hmmm.

 

Limber Lou meets B-17 pilot and great guy George McGovern

     We stuck around long enough to take in the fountain outside and enjoy the warm night, congratulating ourselves on being part of a generous civic moment, then went to Mimi’s for dinner. I had fish’n’chips and a cold Newcastle Brown Ale in a tall glass. 

     At the intersection of Yorba Linda Boulevard and Imperial Highway on the way home we read the flashing Cal-Trans-style sign which warned, over and over, “Coyote Alert.” (They have, it seems, pretty alert coyotes out there in the Yorba that’s linda.) And what, friends, is that stretch of Imperial (SR 90) called, which we were helpfully reminded as we departed to our canyon home? 

     The Richard Nixon Parkway.

     From the conclusion of the “Caesar and Cleopatra” prologue:

“And fear not that I shall speak to you again: the rest of the story must ye learn from them that lived it. Farewell; and do not presume to applaud me.”

     Peace out!

The Rands love Randi

I'm not a fan of Ayn Rand (1905–82), but the Ayn Rand people share my admiration for James Randi--the "Amazing Randi."

Check out this tribute to the little fellow made by the AR people.

Wendy's new assignment

About five minutes ago, the IVC community received this email from Vice President of Instruction Craig Justice:

Colleagues:

I am pleased to announce the appointment of Wendy Gabriella, Professor of Anthropology and Academic Senate President, to Instructional Coordinator of Academic Programs, Office of Instruction, for the 2009-2010 academic year. Wendy will continue to co-chair the 2010 Accreditation Self-study Steering Committee. She will coordinate numerous operational projects for the Office of Instruction, including the Basic Skills Initiative grant program, Early College Program (Instructional Planning), some research projects conducted by the Office of Institutional Research, and will assist the Vice President of Instruction with enrollment management, program review, strategic planning, as well as other important projects.

According to the Academic Senate Bylaws, Professor Lisa Davis-Allen, Academic Chair of Visual Arts and Academic Senate Vice President, will become the President of the Academic Senate.

Please join me in extending our enthusiastic support for Wendy and Lisa as they serve in their new assignments.

It is my understanding that Wendy is receiving 100% reassigned time (i.e., reassignment from her regular teaching duties) to serve in this capacity and that she is not teaching any courses this semester.

It is no secret that VPI Justice, who has a reputation for intelligence and hard work, has been encumbered by startlingly numerous responsibilities since he came to IVC two or three years ago. (At IVC, deans, too, seem chronically overburdened.) That problem led to a proposal, last spring, to create a new IVC deanship—a Dean of Academic Programs, Student Learning, and Research. The proposal, however, was rejected by the SOCCCD board, perhaps owing in part to the need for frugality (or, anyway, its appearance) during this period of fiscal stress. (See April board meeting.)

A champion of openness and "process":

Wendy Gabriella has long been a faculty leader, but particularly starting in late 1996, with the emergence of a controversial conservative "Board Majority." (Arguably, the controversial "board majority" era continues to this day, though with somewhat different players.) In 1997, she and I twice sued the district board for its violations of the Open Meetings Law, when, repeatedly, the board met in closed session to make decisions that should have been made openly and with clear notice to the public.

(In those days, many objections to the board's conduct boiled down to the charge that the trustees and chancellor violated or circumvented established and legal "process"—something that nowadays is sometimes expressed in the demand for "transparency." It was during this period that the board violated its own policies and "best practices" (or so said the accrediting agency) in promoting the administrative career of Raghu P. Mathur over seemingly far more qualified candidates, especially in selecting him as chancellor of the district. Mathur continues to be chancellor of the district.)

Wendy also assisted in district students' repeated and successful challenges to the board's restrictions on student protests (initially with regard to administrative and board behavior that jeopardized the colleges' accreditation) and adoption of new "speech and advocacy" policies that violated student speech rights.

Most recently, Wendy led the effort to challenge the district over its disregard of a state statute giving faculty (i.e., the Academic Senates) the right to mutually develop (along with the district) a faculty hiring policy. That effort was successful and, by some accounts, constituted a landmark victory for faculty governance rights in the California community college system.

Epoch-shatteringly delightful!

Recently, I posted about a district almanac page that presents the distribution of grades given to students at our two colleges (during the Spring semester of 2006). The upshot: the faculty of our colleges—and especially Saddleback faculty—give lots more A’s than any other grade. (See What we have here is failure to evaluate.)

I’ve done a little research since then, and, as it turns out, this kind of grade information is fairly readily available, owing to such entities as the website Pick-A-Prof (PAP). According to Wikipedia,

Pick-A-Prof is a pay-to-use online website found at www.pickaprof.com that hosts professor reviews and other academic tools and services for university students and professors. …
…
The site posts grade histories of professors. The grade history graphs display the distribution of grades from A’s to F’s.

This feature displays the semester(s) a professor teaches a particular course and the average GPA each professor gives in that course. While searching for a course, the site shows the professors teaching the course, a 5-star rating system ..., the number of student reviews submitted for each professor and the percentage of students who dropped the class.
…
Many professors say the website portrays their courses unfairly and students will hesitate to take their classes if the grade distribution reported on Pick-A-Prof does not match their definition of earning an “easy A.” ….

I found a year-old article in UC Santa Barbara's Daily Nexus (New Web Site Evaluates Professors) that reports that

Pick-A-Prof won a lawsuit against University of California, Davis in 2006 that opened the gateway for the widespread publication of professors’ grades. The site sued the school claiming that professors’ grades were public record after the university had originally given out the grades but then refused to release them.

I’ve been told (but need to verify) that our own district has handed over grade distribution records per instructor to Pick-A-Prof.

So I visited PAP, and, sure enough, PAP has the data, at least for IVC. (One must register to access PAP's data, but there's no charge.)

I looked up Professor Roy Bauer and found that the fellow gives lots of A’s but many more B’s and his “G.P.A” (i.e., the average grade he gives) is slightly below 2.0 (C) for “Intro to Philosophy” and slightly above 2.0 for “Ethics.”

Bastard!

Naturally, I provided a review of this fine fellow. I gave him five stars (the maximum) and wrote that he is “epoch-shatteringly delightful.”

And it's all true.

For those youngsters who were mystified by my earlier allusion to Cool Hand Luke:



I think I'm beginning to like this Anderson Cooper fella:

Exit Tuffy

Tuffy the Titan gets pink slip from Cal State Fullerton (OC Reg)

Poll: Should O.C. colleges slash liberal arts to save money? (OC Reg)

One on One Interview with George McGovern (OC Reg)

McGovern gave a talk last night at the Nixon Library.

Rebel Girl's Poetry Corner: "that which we are, we are"

A lot of poetry invoked today by people who don't read enough. Sigh.


Here's the one that they are all looking for, the final stanza from Tennyson's poem, "Ulysses":

There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me—
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honour and his toil;
Death closes all: but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

(photo by Ted Soqui)

The school of Fish: "sham" writing courses

Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce
Special orders, don't upset us
All we ask is that you let us
Serve it your way

The New York Times’ Stanley Fish is at it again. (See What Should Colleges Teach?) Peevitudinal hectoring. You know.

He's worried about writing ability. Even grad students, he carps, can’t write “a clean English sentence.” What’s up with that?

According to Fish, it seems, the problem is that composition classes teach “everything under the sun,” but they don't teach composition.

Years ago, her writes, he secured the lesson plans of 104 composition classes and he found that

instruction in composition was not their focus. Instead, the students spent much of their time discussing novels, movies, TV shows and essays on a variety of hot-button issues — racism, sexism, immigration, globalization.

Yep, that’s what they do. Is that a bad thing? Students have to write about something, don't they?

Fish, being Fish, adopted a bold and unpopular position and then commenced bulldozing: “unless writing courses focus exclusively on writing they are a sham, and I advised administrators to insist that all courses listed as courses in composition teach grammar and rhetoric and nothing else.”

“Nothing else,” eh? Is that even possible? Perhaps, our readers who teach composition can weigh in.

Oddly (or no?), Fish says he now has “support” from a right-wing organization:

Now I have received (indirect) support from a source that makes me slightly uncomfortable, the American Council of Trustees and Alumni …, [f]ounded by Lynne Cheney and Jerry Martin in 1995….

Yep, that Lynne Cheney, the wife of you-know-who and the author of the notorious novel Sisters. (Gosh, it’s got lesbian action. OK, but surely this is surprising coming from Cheney, that right-wing culture warrior.)

He’s only “slightly” uncomfortable?

Fish does criticize the ACTA’s willingness to “monitor academic work from the outside.” The “cure for the politicization of the classroom by some professors is not the counter-politicization urged by ACTA,” he says.

Still, he finds much in ACTA’s recent report (“What Will They Learn?”) to agree with:

With respect to science, composition, foreign language instruction and mathematics, ACTA is simply saying, Don’t slight the core of the discipline.

In essence, Fish adopts the mantra: “teach the subject matter and don’t adulterate it with substitutes.”

Got that, comp instructors?

Students are offered too many choices, too many options, says Fish (and Cheney, et al.). Instead, college instruction should focus on a coherent “core curriculum.” Fish quotes Cheney and Co.:

An “important benefit of a coherent core curriculum is its ability to foster a ‘common conversation’ among students, connecting them more closely with faculty and with each other.”

Yeah, that’s been E.D. Hirsch’s big point. Communitarians sometimes harp on this. Makes sense to me. Up to a point.

From there, Fish does part ways with the restrictive right-wingers:

The nice thing about this benefit is that it can be had no matter what the content of the core curriculum is. It could be the classics of western literature and philosophy. It could be science fiction. It could be globalization. It could be anything so long as every student took it. But whatever it is, please let it include a writing course that teaches writing and not everything under the sun….

OK, comp instructors. What do you think? Are your comp classes a “sham”?