Just a reminder that former New York Governor George Pataki will be speaking at Bailey Hall tomorrow (Tuesday) at 5:30. Doors will open at 4:45 and you can get tickets at Willard Straight Hall or at Bailey Hall (if there are any left).

Check later in the week for the Review’s coverage of the event.

The Sun reported today that this year’s headline act at Slope Day will be The Pussycat Dolls, the sex-filled pop singing group famous for pieces of musical genius such as “Buttons” and “When I Grow Up”.

The report has so far been unconfirmed by the President of the Slope Day Programming Board Mandy Hjellming ’09, who has said that the official announcement will come at todays Student Assembly meeting at 4:45.

Every year a large portion of the Cornell Undergraduate community complains about the main act on Slope Day but in my opinion The Pussycat Dolls represents a new low for the Slope Day Commission. The main acts over the past five years (Gym Class Heroes, T.I., Ben Folds Five, Snoop Dogg, and O.A.R.) are all big name musicians and favorites of some people in various circles. I severely doubt that ANYONE considers The Pussycat Dolls to be their favorite musicians. They are merely older, more provactively dressed versions of Hannah Montana that are quasi-talented singers whose voices are manipulated through mixing and editing to sound decent enough to listen to.

So if you want to see some good dancers lip synch on stage be my guest. Me? I’ll be celebrating the pomp and circumstance that is Slope Day at my house listening to the music I want to hear.

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”

It seems our neighbors to the north at Syracuse University have made a similar decision in regards to their commencement speaker for this year’s upcoming graduation, reports The Post Standard.

Vice President Joe “I just said what?” Biden will be gracing the Carrier Dome with his presence at the event on May 10th. In Syracuse’s defense the selection of Biden makes sense for them, as opposed to the randomness of Cornell’s selection of David Plouffe. Biden graduated from Syracuse’s College of Law in 1968 (four years before becoming a lifer in the US Senate), and he has maintained a relationship with the University, speaking at 3 previous law school school commencements, and receiving various awards from the institution. Furthermore, serving 36 years as a Senator and being Obama’s Left Hand Man is far more impressive than swindling people to vote for a candidate under the veil of “hope” and “change”, which is pretty much the only thing Plouffe has done.

Although Syracuse’s selection of Biden is a bit more understandable, it is indicative of a scary trend in academia: Republicans need not apply, only Democrats wanted to speak at graduation.

Obama Campaign Manager David Plouffe to be 2009 Convocation Speaker

At today’s Student Assembly meeting C.J. Slicklen, Chairman of the Convocation Committee and former SA President, announced that Barack Obama’s Campaign Manager, David Plouffe, will be the keynote speaker at this year’s convocation.

Plouffe, who does not hold a college degree, will speak at the event on Noon Saturday, May 23rd at Schoellkopf Stadium, one day before the class of 2009 graduates.
The announcement of this year’s speaker has come earlier than in previous years. Soledad O’Brien was not announced as the 2007 Convocation speaker until April 4th of that year, one day before she was demoted at her job as the host of American Morning on CNN, and last year’s speaker, uber-poet Maya Angelou, was not announced until March 27th.

The early announcement is possibly due to the use of an agent, the Washington Speaker’s Bureau. Slicklen could not comment as to whether the use of the agent was a result of the Committee’s inability to secure a suitable speaker on their own.

The selection of the Chief Campaign Manager of Obama for America comes as a surprise to some people seeing as Slicklen is an “out of the closet” Republican. Something he makes clear in his October 21, 2008 article in the Sun. However Slicklen justifies this by saying he “Put the needs of the committee before personal politics” adding that he thinks the audience will be “wowed by his speech” that he claims won’t focus on politics but rather his personal experiences.

Plouffe is currently “between campaigns” and is working on writing his first book: The Audacity to Win: The Inside Story and Lessons of Barack Obama’s Historic Victory.

Our extensive coverage of the “Black Flag” incident has received a little national coverage. The National Review’s blog on academia “Phi Beta Cons” has linked to us right here.

Also, The Review had one of its more enjoyable days yesterday when we celebrated “Bottled Water Appreciation Day” in response to a year long movement by various student groups (and The Daily Sun for all intents and purposes) to get bottled water banned on campus. For those of you who lost your temper a little bit when we offered you some cold refreshing h2o relax a little bit. It was a joke. It was merely a promotional event for our paper and it worked… it got your attention apparently.

I just ran into the ILR representative on the SA Rebecca Stein, one of the very few unabashed conservatives on campus and the Cornell Review’s biggest supporter on the Student Assembly.

She said she was “disgusted by the (original) flag display” continuing that the flags “celebrate the bombing of the only democracy in the Middle East”.

She said the SA likely would not get involved in the matter because nothing merited a resolution. However when told that the Dean of Students, Kent Hubbell ’69, helped fund the display her demeanor changed and stated she may look into passing a resolution that questions Hubbell’s actions.

For more on Kent Hubbell’s shenanigans check Jordan’s earlier post

Our “home away from home” was linked to on the Drudgereport today, check out this hilarious article: