It’s almost Spring here in Ithaca, and all the upperclassmen (sorry, upperclassPEOPLE) at Cornell know what that means: The Cornell Daily Sun commemorating the anniversary of the armed takeover of Willard Straight. This year, the 40th anniversary, they are kicking it up a notch. Instead of just one or two feature articles, the Sun is running four interviews with people involved with the armed takeover, followed by a supplemental section some time after Spring break, and will then cap it off with a panel discussion in April.

The first interview was with New York City attorney Robert Gottlieb ’72. Gottlieb was a freshman at the time, giving him a first hand view of what the effects of the takeover have been. According to the interview he credits the takeover with leading to; the establishment of Student Trustees at Cornell (understandable), and Barack Obama getting elected (a bit of a stretch).

Gottlieb, who was one of the first four student trustees, then went on to lament the diminished role of the student trustee. During his time, there were four student trustees with voting rights, one of whom served on the almighty Executive Board. Now there are only two student trustees, and neither serves on the E-Board.

Is that really a problem though? Sure there may be some dinosaurs on the Board of Trustees who have no idea what issues students in the 21st century face, but most likely those aren’t the ones who serve on the E-Board, and if they do I think that’s fine. I would much rather have an experienced business executive, banker, lawyer etc. on the board than more wide eyed moonbat activists. Especially given the current economic state of the country and University. It is times like these idealism needs to take a back seat to the hard facts at hand. So far the Board of Trustees has done a decent enough job of that, instead of focusing on going green, they are working on saving green, this would be harder to do with more student activists on the board filibustering every move.

On a side note Gottlieb praised the students at NYU who staged a takeover of Kimmel Center for Student Life last month, likening their demands similar to the demands of the students who took over WSH in ’69, more student involvement in the administration, student seats on the board of trustees, and oversight of university investments. He even offered them legal assistance. Upon watching this video, filmed during the end of the takeover, you will hopefully lose all respect for Gottlieb due to his willingness to help these yahoos. My favorite part comes at the end when they claim the police won’t steal their reusable water bottles or clothes because they “drink corporate water… (and) don’t wear clothes, they wear suits”

In a seemingly innocuous op-ed in Wednesday’s edition of the Cornell Daily Sun, Daniel Eichberg writes about the differences between the Hotelie and ILRie mindset.

But apparently, Eichberg knows something none of us do:

Of critical importance to both Hotel and ILR is President Obama’s recent signing of the Employee Free Choice Act. This legislation aims to make it easier for unions to enlist workers because it would let them join unions by openly singing cards rather than through the traditional secret-ballot election system in which companies can campaign against the union. Needless to say, the Hotelies are pissed, while most ILRies need a change of pants due to happiness.

Perhaps that’s true in Eichberg’s world. But in America, EFCA has only been introduced in the House and Senate, not signed into law.

Although I don’t agree with the Sun’s decision to run an op-ed with such a glaring error, I do support their call for a “public editor” for obvious reasons. Giving its readers a public forum will make the readership more aware of the frequency of these errors. As the newspaper of record at Cornell, the Sun‘s fact-checkers [if they exist] should have the wherewithal to at least do a serviceable job.