Dennis Lennox gets a win. Go Dennis Go!
By Erick Posted in 2008 — Comments (18) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
I told you a while back about what was happening to Dennis Lennox up at Central Michigan University. You can read that post here. You'll recall that faculty were discussing him on their listserve because he had, in their words, "noxious political and social beliefs" and, obviously, mental health issues (don't all conservatives?!).
From my post:
A few weeks ago, Dennis filed an FOIA request for the professor's emails. Not only did the Dean of Humanities, Pamela Gates, refuse to acknowledge the FOIA request (a legal violation), but she tried to knock Dennis's video camera out of his hands when he confronted her.
The university has also ordered Dennis to stop filming professor Gary Peters, who is running for Congress. The CMU ban on videotaping professors at public universities in public settings was not imposed until Dennis took action.
Right Michigan reports that the ACLU has gotten involved on Dennis's behalf.
CMU's targetted ban (it didn't exist before Gary Peters and Dennis Lennox) is a direct attempt to scuttle his First Amendment rights and, in fact, the rights of every Michigan taxpayer. Props to the ACLU for getting this one right.This is a major win for Lennox who's been the target of some pretty despicable personal attacks both on and off campus because of his politics. But it's a bigger win for the Constitution.
Go Dennis Go!
Here is the ACLU release.
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Dennis Lennox gets a win. Go Dennis Go! 18 Comments (0 topical, 18 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
...it would likely be the state-level equivalent of FOIA. Same principle.
And it's been my experience that state universities are generally subject to their states' sunshine laws. I know this is true for California in particular under the California Public Records Act (CPRA).
to a state or polisub of a state except it might enter into issues involving federal funds or programs. As the poster below points out, most state have some sort of public records act, many of which give much more expansive rights to citizens than does the federal Freedom Of Information Act.
In Vino Veritas
This was the state equivalent FOIA request.
Fight On!
Credit where it's due
I don't care for many of their positions, but you can (usually) count on the ACLU to be consistent in promoting those positions, regardless of whom they are defending.
"There isn't a man alive who hasn't wanted to boot an infant." - W.C. Fields
This is fantastic, and Dennis is a great guy. Congrats Dennis!!
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And statesmen at her council met
Who knew the seasons when to take
Occasion by the hand, and make
The bounds of freedom wider yet
- Tennyson, _To the Queen_
The more I read of this I can't help but think the deadwood needs to be chucked out of our universities. The one worry I have is will there be anything left.
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"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."
-Thomas Paine: The American Crisis, No. 4, 1777
Tenure protects the few conservatives in academia.
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I don't think we can let partisan beancounting override the greater good here. Public servants shouldn't be able to get 'tenure.'
This country needs a lot of conservatives to become professors. It will take a generation or so just to start balancing the faculty of many of the universities, but it would be worth it.
This would be a deeply patriotic service.
"There isn't a man alive who hasn't wanted to boot an infant." - W.C. Fields
Without tenure in public universities, 1st rate professors will migrate to those institutions that will still provide tenure, namely private colleges. Perhaps that wouldn't make you too sad if it were limited to Humanities, but presumably the science, math, and engineering departments and the medical and law schools would also be affected. With one stroke, excellent public schools (eg UVa, UT) would become essentially fancy junior colleges.
You can lawfully and relatively simply discipline or dismiss a tenured teacher/professer just as you can do so with a public employee subject to a "just cause" provision in law or contract. Feckless management just hides behind this as an excuse for doing nothing.
What you can't do in either case is just fire them because you feel like it today; you must have some substantial basis in fact, be able to prove it, and the discipline must be appropriate to the offense. You also can fire them for their personal politics or for partisan reasons. Below the policy level in government, I think that is a good thing.
Much of the political speech by teachers, professors, and public employees that many here, myself included, find offensive can be regulated by the employers, but they don't want to or don't have the guts to. A teacher/professor speaking from a publicly funded lectern in a public building in a publicly funded university pursuant to a state approved curriculum is NOT engaging in personal 1st Am. protected speech, he is speaking as an agent of the employer, which has every right to regulate, even dictate, that speech. The school and college administrations don't want to because the generally agree with the speech. A Democrat government only wants to regulate the speech of employees who disagree with the administration. Republican governments are usually just not competent to effectively regulate or too afraid to do so.
In Vino Veritas
Because they defend the 'nutcases and renegades' of every political stripe.
Rush Limbaugh will probably never need their help but if he runs through his Billion$ and needs defending someday, the ACLU would be the best choice for protecting his free speech.
My community has a few ordinances I believe are demonstrably if not blatantly unconstitutional, but over the years when we've needed the ACLU, they've managed to find some small-town nativity scene case or something like that to waste their members' dues on.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I haven't heard of the ACLU weighing in on the many unjust eminent domain cases around the country.
That's because they don't believe in the private ownership of land... they are all about the 1st and 14th Amendments only... maybe some 8th and other stuff, but if it's about private property and the right to protect that property, you can bet the ACLU won't come down on the side of the private citizen against the socialist approach to government.
and the ACLU was right to step in.
That being said the kid seems like a punk and there does not appear to be much substance to Lennox's questions. They all seem to be variations of you need to quit your job as a professor if you want to run for office.
His effort seems to be aimed at being as annoying as possible in an effort to provoke those he is videotaping into doing something stupid and to give credit where credit is due, he succeeded in spectacular fashion.
This type of thing is becoming more and more common on both sides of the political spectrum. Run for office and you will have obnoxious partisans shoving a camera in your face trying to provoke a response that can be shown without context. It happens in convenience stores and university campuses alike.
I mean, it IS the holiday season. And, my "Peace Through Superior Firepower"(with the silhouette of a B-52 inside a circle making the "Peace" sign) sticker is beginning to fade a bit.
:)
"Who will stand/On either hand/And guard this bridge with me?" (Macaulay)
BTW, I know very little about FOIA. Are all public university emails subject to FOIA? Do the emails have to pertain to official university business to be subject to FOIA, or is the mere fact that you have a certain suffix on your email subject it to public scrutiny?