Conviction
“I decided it was worth a life in prison to do it.” — Daniel Ellsberg
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Problem Solved
Yale University has hit upon the magic solution to the problem of rape. Rape culture, at least within the confines of the ivy-covered halls of the institution that has given us Sinclair Lewis, John Hersey, Garry Troudeau, Aldo Leopold, Eero Saarinen, Meryl Streep, and…, and…, um, George W. Bush (nobody’s perfect), has been smashed to bits for good.
Fellow Elis: Sinclair Lewis & George W. Bush
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Rape shall be no more at Yale!
That’s because the university has now eliminated the usage of the word from its official lexicon. A provost’s report released this week addressing the Campus Sexual Climate for the school year just past, makes rape disappear by simply not calling forcible sexual contact, well, rape.
It’s now the much more palatable nonconsensual sex. Isn’t that better?
And just in case any Elis still harbor any desire to attempt a bit of the good old violent penetration, why, they’ll be deterred, no doubt by the dreaded threat of the written reprimand.
Wow. That’s tough, man.
And if some male student happens to commit a particularly egregious form of nonconsensual sex, he just might be put on probation or even suspended for a year!
Thank god. The women of Yale can now feel free to walk the campus in the nude, making come-hither gestures without fear of having creepy guys try to force themselves upon them.
Because that’s how women usually become rape victims, isn’t it?
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Get healthy — or else!
Let’s stay with academia.
Former football factory extraordinaire Penn State University also is getting tough, this time with employees who refuse to be healthy.
The Nittany Lion (What The Hell Ever That Is)
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See, professors, janitors, and clerks alike are being threatened with hefty — nay, borderline confiscatory — financial penalties for failing to submit to the U’s stringent wellness (a word I loathe) guidelines and reporting procedures.
Chief among those procedures is PSU’s mandatory “biometric screenings.” This means if you refuse to have your waist measured, step on a scale, have your blood sugar tested, and a raft of other peeks inside and around your holy temple, you’re going to have to pay a cool hundred bucks a month extra for your health insurance coverage.
Get ‘Em Up!
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Say you’re a brand new PSU hiree making $15,792 a year. That comes out to about $850 per month after taxes. Should you consider the university’s health spies poking into your bloodstream or running a measuring tape around your heretofore pleasing girth to be intrusive, well, you’re going to have to pay a full 12 percent of your ready monthly cash flow for your silly little principle.
Which, I suppose, is the U’s intent. You’ll have to slash your grocery budget to next to nil. That’ll shrink your waistline.
See? Now You’re Healthier!
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PSU, of course, is well known for its strict adherence to rules and law. Why, it took the less than a decade for the school to ban Jerry Sandusky from campus after he’d been seen sodomizing a ten-year-old in the shower.
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Not My Fault
You know — don’t you? — that scary-looking San Diego Mayor Bob Filner squeezed all those women’s asses, groped their breasts, and pressured them to have sex with him (a nauseating prospect, to be sure) because he’d never gotten harassment training.
Eek!
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At least that’s what he and his lawyer say in an effort to get the city to pay his mounting legal bills in the harassment lawsuits brought about by a number of women whose ladyparts now bear his cooties.
Hell, this revelation ought to cause the judge or judges in those cases to dismiss them forthwith.
How in the world can we expect anyone to know that groping and forcibly kissing co-workers is frowned upon if we don’t have a mandatory training session telling them so?
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Palin’s Payouts
Here’s what Sarah Palin’s squealer arm, SarahPAC, spends in a typical half-year, in case you give a good goddamn.
Palin created her PAC for the ostensible purpose of supporting candidates for office who share her (terrifying) views. So far in 2013, SarahPAC has spent a total of a half million dollars. Palin’s action faction in the same time has donated $5000, or 1 percent, to political candidates. That’s some overhead.
Click For Full Federal Election Commission Report
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