Football, Critters, & Ward Churchill

Oh, what a wonderful football Sunday!  The three teams that I root for won their games - the Redskins, the Jets, and the Broncos.  And I was able to see all three - it was great.  For tonight's double-header, I'll be rooting for the Baltimore Ravens and the Oakland Raiders.  RGIII did the Redskins proud; the real offense showed up for the Jets (and Tim Tebow recovered a Buffalo on-side kick); and Peyton Manning threw for his 400th touchdown while leading the Broncos over the Steelers.  I make no bones about the fact that I heartily dislike Ben Roethlisberger - if he had been anyone else, he'd be in jail for his sexual escapades - so I really wanted the Steelers to lose, but there are also 3 Gators on the first-string offense.  I finally decided that Big Ben's transgressions were too great, and, so, rooted for the Broncos only.
   Shady slept with me last night, but Cloudy rubbed up against my hand, and then spat at me.  Lovey and Nedi have been really sweet this morning, and Remy was well enough for him to walk with me this morning.  He was very unhappy being left at home over the weekend when Rosie was out walking.  And the skunks are out and about in the neighborhood - Chelsea (a dog) was sprayed last week, and Bernie got sprayed Saturday, trying to stop a dog from chasing a skunk.  And someone broke into a series of cars in the Githens Acres neighborhood late Saturday night, or very early on Sunday morning.  Mark arrived home at 9 Saturday night, and was going to leave to ride in the Buffalo Bicycle Classic race at 5 in the morning on Sunday, when he discovered that all three of his family vehicles had been broken into.
   Ward Churchill, the ex-professor at the University of Colorado (CU), was finally heard by the Colorado Supreme Court; he wanted his job back at CU, as well as back-pay.  He was dismissed 5 years ago for plagiarism, but claims it was due to an editorial he had written about the bombing of the Twin Towers on September 11.  The Colorado Supreme Court found against Ward Churchill.  He and his attorney now state they will go the the US Supreme Court...  From The Denver Post:

'In its ruling, the Colorado Supreme Court said Churchill had five opportunities to present his own witnesses, cross-examine opposing witnesses and argue his case before the board following allegations Churchill plagiarized some of his academic writings, fabricated evidence and violated the university's academic standards. "Although we are mindful that a full-fledged, years-long investigation into a professor's academic record taken in bad faith could chill the continued exercise of free speech, we conclude that the federal case law in this area is too unsettled to defeat the regents' claim of qualified immunity," the state Supreme Court judges ruled. A civil jury in 2009 found the school unlawfully fired Churchill but awarded him only $1 in damages. However, a Denver District judge set aside the verdict and said university regents, who are elected, are a "quasi-judicial" panel with immunity from the lawsuit. Lane said the civil verdict was not about the damages but whether Churchill should get his job back with back pay.'

June!

The first day of June brings news that ex-CU professor Ward Churchill will have his termination of employment case heard by the Colorado Supreme Court - probably sometime in 2012. "Every judge that has heard this case has ruled that the university acted appropriately when we terminated Churchill," said CU system spokesman Ken McConnellogue. "We believe the Colorado Supreme Court will do the same." (CU's regents voted 8-1 to fire Churchill nearly four years ago because of academic-misconduct violations. Faculty members tasked with investigating Churchill's body of work found patterns of plagiarism, fabricated facts and other academic-misconduct violations they said were deliberate.)
Churchill sued the university, alleging he was really fired because of his controversial speech. The professor's 9/11 essay ignited national furor because it called some victims "little Eichmanns," a reference to Adolf Eichmann, who helped carry out Hitler's plan to exterminate Europe's Jews during World War II. Lane expects that oral arguments at the supreme court level -- which have not yet been scheduled -- will happen at the beginning of 2012 and a ruling could be made by that spring. "It's huge," Lane said. "First, they hear a small fraction of cases that come before them. It's more shocking that they've agreed to hear all three issues that Churchill has asked them to hear."
In addition to reviewing whether granting the regents quasi-judicial immunity comports with federal law, the Supreme Court will consider whether CU violated his First Amendment rights and whether Churchill can be given his job back. CU attorney Patrick O'Rourke argued before the Court of Appeals last fall that all of the university's scholars should be able to defend their scholarship should it be challenged on the grounds of plagiarism or findings that aren't sourced. O'Rourke said professors are protected if their work shows a difference of popular opinion or alternative interpretations of data. He said it would be inappropriate for the university to rehire Churchill because he's stated hostility toward the university, and his patterns of misconduct would hurt fellow professors and devalue the degrees of students. - Wow!
Silver Lake Irrigation Ditch has finally opened, and folks who live along the ditch are now able to water their property without using city or county water lines. Rosie and Remy had a super time running in and out of the sprinklers we ran across today. Poor Brandi "lost" me this morning, and stood in the den barking until I went to her. I gave her a treat and loved her, and she was OK again. The kits were happy to see me arrive home - but once I fed and loved them, they have disappeared onto the patio. That's OK - this is the time of year when we start taking our daily siestas in the early afternoon, so we can do more later when it's cooler outside.
I really had to laugh - the Equine Herpes Virus 1 outbreak has been going on since the first of May. But now, at the beginning of June, MSNBC is taking notice of it because of how the outbreak is hurting the sponsors of equine events - not how it's affecting all the local folks who like to trail ride from their home stables, or the deaths of the horses so far... I guess that I really should know, by this age and time, that the old adage is very correct: Money makes the world go around....

"Brutal" Humidity!

I've already had a good laugh this morning. We had a big thunderstorm last night with lots of lightning and thunder. I sat in the den with the lights out and watched the storm through the skylights and the windows. It was a glorious storm - it flooded parts of Broadway, and the Boulder Creek Path, which was re-opened yesterday afternoon, was promptly re-closed. This morning, it's 57 degrees with a humidity of 87% here in Boulder, while it's 61 and the humidity is 93% in Denver. One of the local meteorologists was talking about how "brutal" the combination of temperature and humidity is at 6 a.m. (They didn't grow up on the east coast, apparently.) So that's been my laugh for the morning.

Yoshi and Aiko enjoyed their two walks yesterday; Rosie and Remy went wild in the Silver Lake Ditch irrigation sprinkler system at Kathy and Jim's and both of them got completely soaked before we returned home. I met with Smiley and Silver's owner yesterday as well, and we discussed changes in their care, diet, and exercise regimen. Lovey declared that she was absolutely starving when I got to my apartment yesterday afternoon,but Banichi has decided that he's miffed with me and spent the first hour I was home under the bed, Then he realized that it really was me, and he curled up in my lap and wouldn't get out... and I had to have at least one hand stroking him at all times, too. The red kids go to the groomer's today, so I won't be walking them until tomorrow.

I am sorry to say goodbye to actor Karl Malden. He was 97 years old, and I can't remember a time when he was not on TV or in the movies. He was an icon of both the silver and the big screen. ... And a judge in Denver heard the arguments for and against the re-instatement of Ward Churchill as a professor at CU Boulder; he is scheduled to announce his ruling next week. Churchill said yesterday that he is seeking re-instatement as "a matter of principle, mainly" and that monetary issues had nothing to do with it. Somehow I just don't believe that; to me it seems that he is milking every last little bit of publicity and notoriety that he can out of this incident. I, for one, hope that he is not re-instated, because that (to me, anyway) would be a license for other professors to lie, plagiarize, and fake research and then claim they were only using their freedom of speech and that their First Amendment rights had been violated. - And, just think, it's almost Friday!!!