Steinhardt eventually got tossed from the BOT for being a comprehensive, all-’round, all-inclusive, across the board POS. Bartiromo – not a criminal, but certainly a national freakshow – remains on the board.
As the hilarious Fox/Dominion trial proceeds, and the judge gets madder and madder about the effort on the part of the Fox attorneys to hide things like the depth of Bartiromo’s conspiratorial delusions, observers at NYU are going to start asking – especially in the wake of the Steinhardt scandals – whether the school really wants to keep her seat warm. It’s obvious that more documentation of Bartiromo’s panting, I’ll do anything, Trumplove – an orientation somewhat at odds with her representation as a respectable journalist – is forthcoming, and it’s going to make NYU look even nuttier for retaining her.
It’s not about her politics – she’s free to love Trump. It’s about whether NYU wants Blanche DuBois helping to run the school.
April 12th, 2023 at 11:30PM
I was given to understand that University Trusteeships are like degrees honoris causa: Ceremonial and without power. Is this not the case?
April 13th, 2023 at 6:55AM
Premier Kissov: Yes and no. In many cases, trustees do review policy/appointments/etc., and they do have some influence. The fact of enormous numbers of trustees, at places like NYU, does tell you that the positions above all reward enormous gifts to the university from enormously rich people. But the cases of Steinhardt and Bartiromo make NYU nervous because trustees are very high profile — just look at the NYU trustees webpage — and (see Yeshiva University!) you don’t want high profile representatives of the university to be crooks/lunatics, etc. Big bucks, yes. Big stolen bucks, no.
April 13th, 2023 at 9:19PM
I take your point of it being more Borough than Board. Not an artist, scientist, writer, or musician that I could find among the voting and non-voting members at a uni known for all of those disciplines. Nothing comes amiss, so money comes withal.