Thanks to a large donation (of time), UCMeP now has a brand-spanking new website. Please change your bookmarks and visit:
Enjoy!
New UCMeP Website! Change your bookmarks!
Dangerous words…
From a recent article by Bob Samuels… don’t read if you are easily gullible by sound arguments and/or ethics.
Not only do the bond raters help to determine the cost of borrowing, but they also tell universities what they should do in order to attain a clean bill of fiscal health. For instance, Moody’s slipped into its bond rating for the UC system, the need for the institution to restrain labor costs, increase tuition, diversify revenue streams, feed the money-making sectors, and resist the further unionization of its employees. Like the IMF or World Bank, the bond raters tie access to credit to the dismantling of the public sector and the adoption of free market fundamentalism.
Samuels talks about the neoliberalization of the university like it’s a bad thing.
As Dan “The Monologue Mogulof” might say, “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot”?
Photos from the TOOL of the Year Award Ceremony are now online! Click on the photo above to view the entire album! (or click here)
TOOL of the Year Keynote Address by the Chairman of UCMeP
On Friday, January 29 UCMeP hosted a very special award ceremony in which UC Berkeley spokesperson Dan “Big-D” Mogulof was named UCMeP’s TOOL of the Year. Mr. Mogulof himself was on hand to receive the award. At Mr. Mogulof’s request, the public spokesperson was given the award in a private event before an audience of about 90 students, faculty, employees, and administrators. More on the event is to come, but you can find the keynote address delivered by the Chairman of UCMeP below:
Delivered January 29, 2010.
Today, we gather to recognize one loquacious man’s masterful service to the administration and police force of the University of California, Berkeley: our very own meister of the media, purveyor of public relations, titan of truth, Dan “Big-D” Mogulof.
Considering all this man has been through in recent months - the beatings, the arrests, the taserings, the tear-gassings, the police raids, the massive tuition hikes - we are just so pleased to give him the credit he deserves for keeping such a straight through it all.
Just to put all those wicked rumors to rest…
Absolutely nothing is happening on Friday, January 29.
No secret event.
No glamorous private gala.
Would UCMeP lie to you?
We are as trustworthy as the UC administration and UCPD (who by the way did not dupe the Wheeler 66 - or whatever their cute little name is - they simply outsmarted them).
Revised Award Letter to Dan Mogulof
Editor’s Note: The following is a revision of the letter sent to UC Berkeley spokesman Dan Mogulof from the UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP) on December 20, 2009. This letter, which announces Mr. Mogulof’s selection as the Top Outstanding Oratorical Leader (TOOL) of the Year, has been censored revised. During a lunchtime summit meeting with Big-D (what we like to call Mr, Mogulof) on Friday, January 22 , our honoree was kind enough to point out a number “factual” inaccuracies our award committee made in drafting the original announcement (note: our putting the word factual in quotation marks should not indicate that Big-D used the word factual at any point during our summit meeting). We thank Big-D for pointing out these mistakes and in making our corrections have taken inspiration from the mild revisions his office recently made to a press release about the attempted siege protest at Chancellor Birgeneau’s home on the evening of December 11. Also please note that due to security threats, Big-D’s January 29th award ceremony has now been moved to an undisclosed location.
Editor’s Note 2.0: Apparently the press release Big-D’s office released online and which the international press used for their reporting of the protest at the Chancellor’s home (and which may or may not being used as evidence in student conduct hearings) is technically not a press release. It is something completely and totally different, as Big-D recently informed us via email. We apologize for yet another “factual” inaccuracy and any emotional damage it might have caused anyone.
Dear Mr. Mogulof,
It is with deep respect and admiration that we here at the UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP) write to express our gratitude for your masterful performance as UC Berkeley’s Executive Director of Public Affairs. The past months have been trying for all of us here at the University of California. We have seen “radical elements” infiltrate the most hallowed halls of our beloved university. Fanatics have corrupted young and old minds alike with their Bolshevism and dangerous demands to democratize the university’s decision-making processes. These extremists have terrorized us all with “incendiary devices,” militant strikes, fascist spectacles, and “childish” building occupations. Yet in the midst of such threats, you have helped us make sense of the chaos.
As the official spokesman of UC Berkeley, you have been there whenever our administrators, “fearing for their lives” were forced to hide in “undisclosed locations.” You have spoken courageously and eloquently on their behalf, waxing poetically on the value of autocracy during times of emergency. You are always there to answer questions when our leaders refuse to have more pressing business to which they must attend.
Your words have been like a light in darkness, a sherpa in the Himalayas, guiding the UC community and the larger public to conclusions that we simply could not have arrived at without your help. You have taught us not to be fooled by appearances: the face of extremism, you have reminded us repeatedly, is not the one hidden behind the mask of a riot-gear clad police officer wielding a taser in one hand and a truncheon in the other. No, the face of extremism belongs to the unarmed undergraduate who demands her voice be heard and concerns addressed.
The “Unison”©: A Synergistic Model for the Solvent Merger of California’s Universities and Prisons (Part 2 of 2)
Abstract. The following is the second part of a two-part study drawn up by the UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP). Part One of this groundbreaking study gives approbation to the Governor’s recent public-relations-stunt-disguised-as-a-budget-proposal (to “support public education” by privatizing the state prison system). Despite their appreciation of the governor’s rhetorical maneuvers, Part Two explains UCMeP’s concern that the proposal unnecessarily pits prisons against universities. UCMeP then unveils an innovative proposal for unifying the privatization projects of education and incarceration in the State of California, calling for the synergistic creation of the world’s first combined university-prison institution, or the Unison©. To conclude, UCMeP details the remarkable and innovative steps administrators at UC Berkeley are already taking towards synergizing education and incarceration.
PART TWO: University + Prison = the Unison©
We here at the UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP) were cautiously thrilled by the innovative budget plan recently rolled out by our burly hunk of a governor, Mr. Schwarzenegger, on Friday, January 8. In Part 1 of our study (which you can read here) we celebrated Arnie’s wonderfully-wily plan to allow our once-golden state to cut its losses on its multi-decade long prison building spree (what UCMeP has long preferred to call “California’s Long-Term Penal Infrastructural Development and Beautification Project”) by deftly accelerating its plans to de-regulate the incarceration industry into a competitive private venture. We were especially encouraged by Schwarzenegger’s savvy decision to present this proposal under the inspiringly insidious pretense of “supporting” public education. What a brilliant move to demobilize the terrorist network currently wreaking havoc throughout our state in the name of preserving that wasteful (dis-)service of “public” education!
Despite Arnie’s honorably deceitful proposal, we here at UCMeP, like so many other groups at the University of California, could not help but be critical of the way in which the governor’s plan pits universities against students. Yet unlike those mischief-makers at OccupyCa (see the Marxist circuity and disgusting rationality of their response to the governors’ proposal http://occupyca.wordpress.com/), UCMeP is not calling for any “unity… in the struggle against the privatization of both schools and prisons,” but instead urges for the privatization of schools and prisons to be unified. Rather than separate the two privatization projects, we believe universities and prisons should consolidate their efforts. We aver that such unity must abide by the time-tested and fiscally sound corporate strategy of synergy.
The “Unison”©: A Synergistic Model for the Solvent Merger of California’s Universities and Prisons (Part 1 of 2)
Abstract. The following is the first part of a two-part study drawn up by the UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP). Part One of this groundbreaking study gives approbation to the Governor’s recent public-relations-stunt-disguised-as-a-budget-proposal (to “support public education” by privatizing the state prison system). Despite their appreciation of the governor’s rhetorical maneuvers, Part Two explains UCMeP’s concern that the proposal unnecessarily pits prisons against universities. UCMeP then unveils an innovative proposal for unifying the privatization projects of education and incarceration in the State of California, calling for the synergistic creation of the world’s first combined university-prison institution, or the Unison©. To conclude, UCMeP details the remarkable and innovative steps administrators at UC Berkeley are already taking towards synergizing education and incarceration.
PART 1: Two Cheers for the Guv
We here at the UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP) were cautiously thrilled by the innovative budget plan recently rolled out by our burly hunk of a governor, Mr. Schwarzenegger on Friday, January 8.
Ostensibly in response to the shrill whining and self-serving complaints coming from “concerned” citizens that California spends more on its 170,000 prison inmates (only 1 out of every 200 residents of California) than its students, Arnold and friends unveiled a wonderfully-wily plan that would allow our once-golden state to cut its losses on its multi-decade long prison building spree (what UCMeP has long preferred to call “California’s Long-Term Penal Infrastructural Development and Beautification Project”) by deftly accelerating its plans to de-regulate the incarceration industry into a competitive private venture.
We were especially encouraged by Schwarzenegger’s savvy decision to present this proposal under the inspiringly insidious pretense of “supporting” public education, by effectively swapping the pieces of the state budget pie that the prison system and the universities receive (in Arnie’s new budget, prisons will get no more than 7% of the budget while universities would receive no less than 11%). What a shocking reversal for a guy who during his tenure as governor of California increased spending on prisons by 32% while slashing education funding by a 1/10!
UCMeP Selects UC Berkeley Spokesman Dan Mogulof as the Top Outstanding Oratorical Leader (TOOL) of the Year
The following is a letter sent this morning to UC Berkeley spokesman Dan Mogulof from the UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP). The letter announces Mr. Mogulof’s selection as the Top Outstanding Oratorical Leader (TOOL) of the Year. The award will be given to Mr. Mogulof by UCMeP representatives at his office (101 Sproul Hall) during a very special ceremony on Friday, January 29 at 11:00AM. UCMeP would like to invite the entire UC community to celebrate this man’s wonderful and inspiring service to the University of California by attending the award ceremony.
12.18.09
Dear Mr. Mogulof,
It is with deep respect and admiration that we here at the UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP) write to express our gratitude for your masterful performance as UC Berkeley’s Executive Director of Public Affairs. The past months have been trying for all of us here at the University of California. We have seen “radical elements” infiltrate the most hallowed halls of our beloved university. Fanatics have corrupted young and old minds alike with their Bolshevism and dangerous demands to democratize the university’s decision-making processes. These extremists have terrorized us all with “incendiary devices,” militant strikes, fascist spectacles, and “childish” building occupations. Yet in the midst of such threats, you have helped us make sense of the chaos.
As the official spokesman of UC Berkeley, you have been there whenever our administrators, “fearing for their lives” were forced to hide in “undisclosed locations.” You have spoken courageously and eloquently on their behalf, waxing poetically on the value of autocracy during times of emergency. You are always there to answer questions when our leaders refuse to have more pressing business to which they must attend.
Your words have been like a light in darkness, a sherpa in the Himalayas, guiding the UC community and the larger public to conclusions that we simply could not have arrived at without your help. You have taught us not to be fooled by appearances: the face of extremism, you have reminded us repeatedly, is not the one hidden behind the mask of a riot-gear clad police officer wielding a taser in one hand and a truncheon in the other. No, the face of extremism belongs to the unarmed undergraduate who demands her voice be heard and concerns addressed.
On the Limits of Legitimate Protest: An Open Letter from UCMeP to the UC Community
We here at the UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP) were appalled by the actions taken on December 2, 2009 by an errant group of demonstrators who sought to disrupt the “non-political” commemoration of the 45th Anniversary of Mario Savio’s famous speech by pushing their own selfish political agenda. As hundreds gathered on Sproul Plaza for the free pizza and giveaways promised by the ASUC, this swarm of hooligans stormed the event bearing banners and signs that had nothing at all to do with the legacy and museumification of the Free Speech Movement. “Democratize the Regents”? “Reclaim Cal”? What do those demands have to do with selling stale coffee and over-priced salads to undergraduates?
While none of us here at UCMeP actually attended the event (most of us were too busy gleefully re-watching YouTube clips of riot-gear-clad police pummeling students during the November 20th Wheeler “burglary”), we read all about how these lawless criminals failed to respect what the Academic Council has recently described as the “limits of protest.” Once again, a violent minority of trust fund anarchists turned to inappropriate and illegitimate tactics, which threatened everyone’s civil right to enjoy free samples of Naked Juice (which were generously provided at the event by Naked Juice’s PepsiCo distributor).
Faced with such formidable threats, it is no wonder that Homeland Security felt it necessary to close both Sproul and California Hall yesterday, fearing that a bunch of unwashed hippies might invade the administration’s hallowed halls to hold a drugged-out techno-rave and transform the Chancellor’s office into the prized site of a 24-hour drum circle.
Don’t these so-called “activists” understand that like the Free Speech Movement, the moment for taking action has passed and the time for opportunistic revisionism is at hand? You all have had your fun. Now just sit back and look forward to the opening of “The Movement Against Privatization Bubble Tea Stand,” which the next round of student fee hikes will be used as bond collateral to build. Take pride in what you have accomplished. Maybe in 45 years you too can come back to Cal for a celebration of your own on Sproul Plaza, which by then will have been renamed British Petrolium’s Sony BMG Square for Advanced Weaponry Research.
