University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill was awarded a 2.28 percent merit pay increase this week for work performed in 2004, a little less than his department's average recommended salary increase for professors.
A statement released by CU said pay increases for Boulder campus faculty are approved by interim Chancellor Phil DiStefano and based on reviews and recommendations by committees at the department, school or college, and administrative levels.
Churchill's increase was finalized Thursday. The average recommended increase for ethnic studies department faculty was 3.21 percent, according to the CU statement.
"In 2004, Professor Churchill taught a higher number of courses than required, received A's and A-pluses on his student evaluations, completed numerous publications and served as administrative chair of the department," the statement said.
Churchill, a tenured professor of ethnic studies, was earning $94,212, prior to the increase; he resigned as department chair Jan. 31, when controversy surrounding him erupted.
Churchill's work is under review by a CU faculty committee on research misconduct for alleged plagiarism and fabrication.
On Friday, Churchill joined the ranks of those filing complaints and filed one against himself.
Is it a joke?
"A joke is in the brain of the beholder," said Churchill's attorney, David Lane, who confirmed his client's latest maneuver.
Lane said Churchill filed the complaint in response to a published report that he had given inadequate credit in his work for help he had received from graduate students and research assistants.
"As they know, he has no research assistants or graduate students working for him, but they should investigate nevertheless, because it is a complaint raised by the media," Lane quipped.
Churchill stirred national controversy earlier this year when it was discovered that he had authored an essay likening some victims at the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, to Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann.
In the wake of that uproar, CU's administration directed a standing faculty committee on research misconduct to perform an inquiry into a series of plagiarism and fabrication allegations, and a charge that he might have misrepresented himself as an American Indian to gain credibility for his research.
The parameters of that inquiry were expanded recently by DiStefano, in response to a six-part series last month in the Rocky Mountain News, which uncovered new allegations concerning Churchill's scholarship, of which the faculty committee had previously been unaware.
The committee's probe could lead to anything ranging from Churchill's exoneration to the loss of his job. The latter, preferably.
In a letter to DiStefano dated Monday, Churchill wrote, "I feel it imperative to register a complaint against myself, to wit: In a review of my award-winning book, On the Justice of Roosting Chickens, appearing in the Spring-Summer 2005 issue of Anarchy: A Journal of Desire Armed (Vol. 23, No. 1), the reviewer, Aragorn!, observes at page 30, that I should 'have given (my) grad students the credit they so richly deserve for putting (the book) together' (copy attached and marked).
"As you are no doubt aware, appropriation by faculty members of research undertaken by graduate students is a ubiquitous practice, often blending into outright plagiarism by the faculty members involved, and thus constitutes a major ethical issue in the academy. It is high time the University of Colorado finally began to treat the problem with the degree of seriousness it warrants, beginning with my own case."
Churchill went on to tell DiStefano, "The mere fact that I do not and have never had 'grad students' - or research assistants of any sort - should by no means deter you from referring the matter at hand, without further examination, to the (faculty committee). The allegation concerning my misconduct has, after all, appeared in print."
And, Churchill added, "The very future of the institution as well as the market value of all degrees it has heretofore granted are undoubtedly at stake."
He signed it, "Sincerely, Professor Ward Churchill, Winner of the 2005 Herd Award for Outstanding Teaching." Herd award? How fitting.
The magazine referenced by Churchill has no listed phone number, and editors did not respond to e-mail messages from The Associated Press.
Lane said Churchill filed the complaint with the thought that "If CU is going to be investigating media allegations such as those raised by the Rocky Mountain News," then the university should pursue the Anarchy report as well.
#5
Hello GOP CO legislature members? Any thoughts? Sounds like Univ of Co is overfunded
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/03/2005 21:29 Comments ||
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#6
Churchill ought to think about utilizing some research assistants and graduate students. Maybe with their help his arguments would gain the logic and coherence that they now lack. Also his plagarism might be less easy to detect. I would recommend that he stay away from graduate students that minored in ethnic studies, based on the fact that they uniformly evaluated his performance as exceptional, ethnic studies students must be the intellectual bottom-feeders of acedemia.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
07/03/2005 22:20 Comments ||
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Overfunded?! How do folks like this get raises! Man o man. We're paying a 28% rate hike in tuition! ARUGHHHHHHHHHHH
One more year sigh....
Posted by: Jan ||
07/03/2005 23:33 Comments ||
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QAMISHLI, Syria - Here on the fringes of Syria's agricultural heartland, the veneer of normalcy is all around. A statue of former President Hafez al-Assad, which was brought down during riots last year, has been rebuilt in a traffic circle. Slogans scrawled on walls still call out for him. Few signs remain of the violence that struck the city just weeks ago.
But as Syria endures heavy international and domestic pressure to change, storm clouds are gathering here once again. In this predominantly Kurdish city on Syria's border with Turkey, a growing movement of Kurds is demanding recognition and representation in Syria's government.
Emboldened by their brethren in Iraq and inspired by Lebanon's opposition movement, which helped force Syria out of that country, some advocates are even calling for Kurdish administration of Kurdish areas. "There is a kind of anxiety and restlessness now," said Hassan Salih, secretary general of the Yekiti Kurdish party based in Qamishli. "We are disappointed with all the unfulfilled promises."
Tensions in this city of 150,000 reached new levels this month after the body of a prominent cleric, Sheik Muhammad Mashouk al-Khaznawi, was found halfway between here and Damascus. Days later, protesters calling for an international investigation of the sheik's killing clashed with brave security forces, who bravely beat women and heroically fired at unarmed demonstrators, Kurdish politicians say.
One police officer was killed, a dozen protesters were wounded, dozens more remain in custody, and Kurdish businesses were looted, they say. A day after, Kurdish hopes were dashed when Syria's governing Baath Party passed on calls to grant Kurds more rights and freedoms at its 10th Congress, ending the meeting with little more than platitudes, Mr. Salih said. "Lebanon affected us a lot, and we learned from it that demonstrating can achieve many things without violence," he said. After riots flared in Qamishli in 2004 after a brawl at a soccer match, he said, "the regime sought to frighten us, but the assassination of the sheik has made us rise up again."
After a certain point in time, repression doesn't make people fearful, it makes them angry.
Syria's 1.5 million Kurds are the country's largest ethnic minority and historically its most downtrodden. Eschewing the Arab identity at the core of the Baath Party, the Kurds have become the most organized opposition to the embattled government.
But tensions have simmered since 1962, when a census taken by the government left out tens of thousands of Kurds, leaving them and their children - now hundreds of thousands in all - without citizenship and denying them the right to obtain government jobs or to own property. They now carry red identification cards identifying them as "foreigner."
The government also resettled thousands of Arabs from other parts of the country into areas along the border to build a buffer with Kurdish areas in neighboring Iran, Iraq and Turkey, pitting Kurds against Arabs. A long-running drought has not helped, as many in the farming region, especially Arab sharecroppers, have seen their incomes and tolerance for one another plummet.
In 2004, a soccer game incited the brawl between Arab and Kurdish fans that grew into the country's worst civil unrest in decades, spreading to many other cities in Syria and leaving at least 36 people dead, some of them policemen. President Bashar al-Assad, in an effort to cool tempers, visited the region for the first time and called for national unity, while pardoning 312 Kurds who were accused of taking part in the violence. But Kurds say the ethnic rifts remain.
Sheik Khaznawi, a charismatic 47-year-old cleric who began denouncing the Syrian government in sermons in recent months, came to embody the Kurdish political opposition. To some, he was a reformer who pushed a more thoughtful, inclusive brand of Islam; to others, he was an apostate willing to reach out to other faiths and challenge long-held Islamic mores.
But to Syria's government, he was the ultimate threat: a religious figure who appeared to be seeking to tie Syria's listless Kurds to the feared Muslim Brotherhood, which led a ferocious revolt in Syria in the 1980's. "He was able to play a moderating role and create dialogue between Kurds and Arabs," said Ammar Abdelhamid, a Syrian political analyst. "They saw him setting up a real opposition to the regime."
Sheik Khaznawi rattled nerves in February when he met with leaders of Syria's Muslim Brotherhood in Brussels, signaling even deeper collusion between the two forces. "The sheik used to say that he was surrounded by a minefield and that his role was to dismantle the mines," said Murshid al-Khaznawi, the sheik's son. "He crossed many red lines that others did not cross."
On May 10, the sheik disappeared while on a trip to Damascus. Rumors circulated that he had been arrested by the Syrian secret police, and demonstrators in Qamishli called for his release. But the government denied having him in custody. Then on June 1, the authorities led his sons to a grave in the predominantly Sunni Arab town of Deir ez Zor. A government statement said the sheik had been kidnapped and killed by radical Islamists who were against his reformist approach.
That might even be true, but who will believe Babyface Assad?
Days later, the authorities broadcast a 15-minute recording of interviews with two suspects in the killing, one identifying himself as an imam from Deir ez Zor and a graduate of Sheik Khaznawi's institute. They said they had smothered the sheik with a pillow and buried him at the cemetery.
"There wasn't just one reason for his kidnapping; there were many," said Muhammad Habash, a member of Syria's Parliament and confidant of the sheik, who pointed to differences between the sheik and his relatives as one possible reason. Mr. Habash added that the political parties in Qamishli were capitalizing on the death of the sheik, insisting that there are few clear indications of a government hand in the killing.
But the sheik's sons, who acknowledge that there have been financial disagreements in the family, countered that Mr. Habash was serving the interests of the government, which they blame for the killing. They said, for instance, that the sheik's body showed few signs of decomposition, though the government has said he had been buried for more than two weeks. They added that his teeth were broken and his skin burned when they found him, not the signs of suffocation.
Days later, the demonstration in Qamishli met fierce resistance from the government. The Khaznawi sons and others said security forces encouraged an Arab mob to help beat the protesters and loot Kurdish storefronts, though there was no confirmation of those assertions. "There are issues and problems, and it's time they are solved," Mr. Salih said. "As a Kurdish society, we have gotten past the culture of fear."
Even the sheik's sons, who said they were not overtly political before, have taken a hard political stand. "After the assassination of the sheik, we have begun to support Kurdish movements from the bottom of our hearts," Mr. Khaznawi said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/03/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Uh oh, better call the UN, OIC, and the Arab League - this sounds like it might endanger Middle East stability. Gonna need the stamp of Legitimacy to put them down when the spotlight's on you.
Daydreaming by the wine-dark seas... And you might find Iraqi Peshmerga coming to their defense. Wouldn't that be interesting - and a sudden shift in the balance of power, hmmm?
The Big Wheel never stops turning, fast or slow, it is relentless. Better get out of the road and let them go, Baby Ass... Kurdistan - I love the smell of the Med in the morning...
The Arizona Supreme Court ruled unanimously yesterday that the First Amendment covers a letter published in the Tucson Citizen that suggested killing local Muslims to prevent deaths of U.S. soldiers in Iraq.
Justice Andrew D. Hurwitz wrote in the Supreme Court opinion that the "letter does not fall within one of the well-recognized narrow exceptions to the general rule of First Amendment protection for political speech" and that the Citizen cannot be sued for publishing it. "The court was very clear in that regard that this is protected speech because it's part of a public dialogue on an important issue, which is the war in Iraq in this case," said Michael Chihak, editor and publisher of the Citizen.
"We're very pleased that the court ruling was unanimous," Chihak said. "It shows that there's clear constitutional grounds protecting what we did in printing the letter."
In the ruling, Hurwitz noted that members of the Islamic community were apprehensive after the letter was published. Good. Oh, wait. He said "apprehensive," not "apprehended."
"The suggestion in the letter to the editor that the intentional murder of innocent civilians like at the WTC or those blown up by the terrorists in Iraq is an appropriate response to the deaths of American soldiers is no doubt reprehensible," he wrote. But no matter how offensive the Dec. 2, 2003, ... I would provide a link, but anything over 1 week old requires payment, and I'm too cheap
... letter was, Hurwitz wrote, and though it did have SAY DOOM in it it did not advocate "imminent lawless action." No violent acts resulted from the letter. Instead, it generated more letters, which is what the First Amendment is all about, Hurwitz wrote.
The ruling sent the case back to Pima County Superior Court to dismiss the lawsuit's claim of intentional infliction of emotional distress. Ha. No contingency fee. Go chase an ambulance
#2
The letter still is free speech - good to see that there still are outposts against dhimmitude out there. This is the same law which allows imans to scream 'Kill Infidels! Kill Jews!' in the mosques every Friday.
Still, its stupid. Not only would the terrorists not stop (since they themselves seem to kill mostly muslims) but targetting innocent is, by definition, terrorism -- I dont care what religion the targets belong to.
#3
Well, I guess if Churchill and al-jazeera can print shit like that, so can anyone else. Dune loons and far left peckerheads don't like anyone else horning in on their "first amendment" tactic do they?
Freed Australian hostage Douglas Wood says he would like to see his captors face the "top penalty" under Iraqi law. "I would like them to be arrested, tried and if they have the ultimate penalty as their, yes, so if hanging's the program or if it's life imprisonment, I want the system to work," Mr Wood told Monica Attard on ABC radio's Sunday Profile.
No Stockholm syndrome here...
"They deserve to be caught. Maybe they deserve to die, maybe they deserve life imprisonment, whatever the top penalty is." Mr Wood has also admitted he had a somewhat cavalier attitude to security while he was working in Iraq. He says Baghdad was a "difficult city" to work in. "The city itself is now a pile of concrete walls where the security efforts to stop people from blowing up hotels and sheltering each other," he said. "A lot of the shops have been boarded up, I think a little bit like the terror that the mafia went through when they played their games of, 'you're not allowed to open unless you pay me'. You're very conscious of the need for security," he added.
Asked whether looking back he was too cavalier, Mr Wood said: "There are certain things I wouldn't do, yes." Pressed on what those things would be, he added: "Like not being so cavalier." Mr Wood told Sunday Profile he did not return to his home in Baghdad nor his business after his release from captivity, so he does not know what is left. He also says he will not contribute to a "five-figure" sum his family plans to pay to an Iraqi charity. "I think I'll limit mine to the families," he said, referring to relatives of his Iraqi workers who were killed.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/03/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
No Stockholm syndrome here...
Douglas Wood & Ulf Hjertstroem enjoy the Viking syndrome.
The federal governmentâs madrassa reforms plan has been temporarily suspended after the provinces expressed reservations about the plan and suggested revisions in the policy. Senior government officials told Daily Times that the four provinces had reported their reservations and suggestions to the federal government many weeks ago, but there had been no deliberations on these. The four provinces, on the other hand, had not submitted reports on their implementation of the previous phase of madrassa reforms and expenditures, for which they received Rs 490 million from the federal government in fiscal 2004-05.
The recently constituted Wafaqul Maddaris Board, to be chaired by the federal education minister and including the federal religious affairs minister and interior minister as members, has yet to start functioning formally. There is also still uncertainty about the exact number of madrassas in the country. âA questionnaire is being prepared and will be circulated soon,â said one government official. According to a previous report, there are around 11,000 registered madrassas in Pakistan, while Education Ministry officials say there are 8,000 registered madrassas. âThe interior, religious affairs and education ministries have different figures of the number of registered madrassas, which will be corrected soon,â the official said.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/03/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Poor lad looks like he just realized he's been caged with weasels.
QUETTA: Iranian authorities have deported 125 Pakistanis after they were arrested in Iran for allegedly trying to swarm into enter neighboring Turkey without travel documents, an official said on Saturday.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/03/2005 00:00 ||
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MQM leader Nasreen Jalil on Saturday accused Jamaat-e- Islami (JI) activists of attacking and harassing her at the Karachi Airport on Friday night. Addressing a press conference at Karachi Press Club (KPC), she said that, when she arrived from Islamabad, JI workers who had gathered to welcome the former nazim of Karachi, Naimtullah Khan, harassed her and used abusive language against her in the presence of MNA Laiq Ahmad, MPA Nasrullah Shaji and Naimatullah Khan. She said they were chanting slogans against Altaf Hussain. âIn my entire political life, I have never faced such harassment as this. And it was done by those who claim respect for women,â she said. She urged the president, the prime minister, the chief minister and the governor to take cognisance of the ugly incident.
Dr Farooq Sattar, the deputy convenor of the coordination committee the MQM, on the occasion, alleged that the âthunder squadâ of the JI was involved in âthe attackâ on Nasreen Jalil. He said that, the JI, sensing defeat in the local bodiesâ polls, was trying to provoke MQM workers. He said the JIâs demand for LB polls under army showed they believe in dictatorship and not in democracy. Anwar Alam, in charge of the coordination committee, and MNA Haider Rizvi were also present.
The Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) on Saturday contradicted allegations against JI activists of misbehaviour with Nasreen Jalil, a member of the coordination committee of the MQM. In a statement, MMA Sindh MPAs Nasrullah Khan Shajee, Younus Barai, and Hameedullah Khan Advocate claimed that no incident of manhandling of the women MQM leader took place at the Karachi Airport, when she passed through the crowd gathered at the place to welcome the former CDGK nazim, Naimatullah Khan, on Friday night, who had just arrived from Islamabad. They said the JI and MMA leaders and activists always believed in decency and held women in high esteem. The MPAs said that Nasreen Jalil was provided with a safe passage out of the airport by JI activists, and that she safely proceeded to her destination in a vehicle waiting for her at the parking lot.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/03/2005 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
QAMISHLI, Syria - Here on the fringes of Syria's agricultural heartland, the veneer of normalcy is all around. A statue of former President Hafez al-Assad, which was brought down during riots last year, has been rebuilt in a traffic circle. Slogans scrawled on walls still call out for him. Few signs remain of the violence that struck the city just weeks ago.
Freed Australian hostage 
The federal governmentâs madrassa reforms plan has been temporarily suspended after the provinces expressed reservations about the plan and suggested revisions in the policy. Senior government officials told Daily Times that the four provinces had reported their reservations and suggestions to the federal government many weeks ago, but there had been no deliberations on these. The four provinces, on the other hand, had not submitted reports on their implementation of the previous phase of madrassa reforms and expenditures, for which they received Rs 490 million from the federal government in fiscal 2004-05. 
MQM leader 
