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Friday, September 14, 2007
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How I Lost that Appointment Badly mismanaged opinion piece in the LA Times by Michael V. Drake, UC Irvine chancellor, in which he does the opposite of what the title of his seven short paragraphs promises. WHY I LET CHEMERINSKY GO got me all excited, and I'm not the only one. A lot of people are eager to know why he chopped Chemerinsky. But the piece is classic prose-nothingness. [For another example of prose-nothingness, go here.] It doesn't say why Chemerinsky was sent packing. It simply denies he was sent packing for political reasons. Drake says, in excruciating B-school speak, that he concluded he and Chemerinsky "would not be able to partner effectively to build a world-class law school at UC Irvine." That's it. Otherwise, the statement is a bunch of denials: It wasn't political; it wasn't about academic freedom. Then what was it about? Why did you let him go? The "partner" thing leaves only one strong possibility open: Drake doesn't like the guy. Personality clash. Can't work with him. In which case he shouldn't have hired him. The fact that he did hire him, and then, in what looks like a panic, flew down to Durham to unhire him, makes Drake out to be awfully emotionally volatile. |