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Friday, July 23, 2004
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ONCE AGAIN, TENNESSEE
Incredibly, the state of Tennessee has done it again. Regular readers will know that after a lot of research, UD last April named Tennessee the state with America's most corrupt and embarrassing university presidents [see UD, 4/10/04]. Now, yet another Tennessee University - Fisk - has produced one of these, with a new wrinkle: Hazel O'Leary, Fisk's president, has not yet taken the job. She is humiliating the university before having stepped through the door. O'Leary, whose tenure as President Clinton's Energy Secretary was a scandal-ridden mess (she spent a lot of time before congressional committees explaining her excessive and lavish government travel -- it was not uncommon for her to go overseas with a retinue of sixty assistants), got upset the other day when the flight she was on diverted due to storms. After sitting on a tarmac for awhile, O'Leary apparently tried to storm the cockpit, demanding to be let off the plane. One supposes she had in mind to explain to the pilot how important she was, etc. [UPDATE: "I am your colleague," O'Leary yelled at the pilot by way of explaining why she, a board member of the airline in question, ought to be given special treatment.] Fisk's incoming leader was reportedly abusive enough to have been at one point physically restrained. Her behavior also drew the attention of the FBI, which interviewed her when it was all over. There may be a way to spin this story so that it's not about an arrogant, unstable person. We'll see. |