I wish they would have printed more of my letter to the editor, since they decided to cut/paste my letter together to fit their paper. I even offered to take them on a tour of the University when their hockey team visits in December, but apparently they didn't take me up on my offer. But at least they printed something in rebuttal to the one-sided column in their newspaper.

Nice work. I can't believe this lady's description! None of that crap is true...I've been attending for 20 years and have never seen that stuff.

Nice job! I couldn't get mine printed in the Pioneer Press, so my hats off to those of you who get yours printed.

Now this is funny! I don't care who you are, it's funny!

From The News-Gazette (Champaign-Urbana, Ill.):

UI asks prof to pay for postage meter use

If he wrote the letter and made the copies on the University's time, he should aslo be docked pay.

Along with the other people who's names are on it.

This man should be fired from his job, what he did constitutes theft.

I wonder if the idea that he used UI stationary was meant to infer that he was providing an official position of the UI, or writing the letter with the backing of the UI? That would be worse than a couple of hundred bucks of postage/paper.

The way I see it is that he works for a government agency sending his private mail using tax supported dollars which is a crime. Thats like using a government money/services to run for a politial office. Basically it is a theft of services. I know working for the government myself he would/could be fired quickly and could be prosecuted also for this. I hope his employer goes for his head on this one. I know if I was his supervisor he could be gone. If this had happened at UND I would be writing the chancellor of ND.

As a career government employee, I have thought about this issue lately. Are these professors, as employees of the university and state, using their own time or employer/taxpayer time to further their personal agendas? If the latter, then it’s at least a violation of the employer-employee contract. Universities need to crack down on this, much like it has been done at the federal government level. The Hatch Act controls what I can do and say in regards to politics, federal laws and agency regulations control what I can and can not do at work, as well as what I can or can not use office supplies and infrastructure for.

also, i don't know what's more pathetic: the idiot using official letterhead for personal gain, or believing that he didn't do anything wrong. these people would never make it on the outside. kick his rear-end out to the street UI!

now, have any of the UND admin/staff done the same?

I think under the FOIA I believe we could find that information out.

The only think about it this way. It is so hard to get a tenured professor fired, they almost have to kill or rape a student or support a terrorist org to get fired (the professor in fla that Bill Oreilly got fired). Look at Ward in Colorado, what he did would get any normal person fired from his job. The ALCU would also probably support these people in a lawsuit against the state or University.

He's right. It is VERY hard to fire a tenured professor. While my brother attended Northwestern University, he learned of why their chemistry or biology department was the way it was (I can't remember if he said it was all combined or seperated into different facets of the science). They had a tenured professor who actually moved to Florida and started working part time for a Florida college WITHOUT resigning from the Northwestern position. When it was discovered, they couldn't fire him because he had tenure. So they had to /close the entire department/ and redesignate the departments, transfer the professors they wanted to keep out of the defunct department, then retransfer them back in once the new department was formed. And they just didn't rehire that professor. After all, he was a member of a now defunct college department. Very convoluted and confusing, I know, but it is seriously that messed up.

understand the tenure issue... how about a reassignment then ... making sure the Chief's gear is well-maintained before and after public events.

From The Western Courier (Western Illinois University):

NCAA's rulings on college teams' mascots and nicknames unfair

From Central Michigan Life:

Psychologists: Ban American Indian mascots

Easier said than done.

From The Mercury News:

In Iowa, visitors see red over pink

I wish some of these reporters would mention that the NCAA considers Iowa a "model" insititution because of it's policy against playing teams with American Indian nicknames.

I think it is laudable that someone is taking a closer look at racism and discrimination in U.S. culture. All too often this becomes an issue of black and white, leaving out other minority groups (such as Native Americans). I do not think that a collective ban on Native American logos by the NCAA is a step towards ending racism in the United States. The real problem is socioeconomic boundaries and social problems such as poverty, alcoholism, and domestic abuse on reservations.

It is unfortunate, but ‘white privilege’ does exist in our society. Institutions such as UND are working to alleviate the true problem by providing Native American youth with scholarships for higher education and by raising cultural awareness. Education and economic opportunity are real solutions to improving life on the reservation, not changing ‘nicknames.’

I don't think anyone would argue that fighting racism is something that doesn't need to be done regardless of gender, race, etc. I think there has been more than enough evidence on all these threads that indicate racism exists towards virtually every ethnic group (of which I include white American males.) I personally disagree with your view about 'white priviledge'. Saying that white Americans are priviledged is like saying Americans of another ethnic group don't have the same opportunities as white Americans. This has been shown over and over in this board not to be true and in many cases is the opposite. White Americans are only priviledged because of what they have built for themselves over the past generations. Some of those actions were wrong, no doubt about it, but saying they compare to what happens today is ignorant. (By the way, I don't want to start a flame war because I admit that there are instances where white people disrespect those of other races, but nowadays I believe that there is a proportionally equal amount of disrespect in both directions. The real challenge is reducing that.)

What almost everyone on this board has been saying is that it is simply not up to the NCAA to make this decision, even if you believe the decision was the right one. This is just like a private group telling the public what to do, which is currently done in Washington, but it's called lobbying. If the NCAA wants to change the names, perhaps they should start by going to the dept of education where the people who control the money for public universities like UND work. If they do that, at least it may be possible to get a well thought out legislative decision on all mascots and none of this picking and choosing which mascots are ok. Of course, appeals would go directly to the court system, but you know the decision will be much more thought out than what the NCAA's decision.

First off, as I have stated before, racism is a term that is open to interpretation. That's where it is so disasterous. It doesn't matter what you, I, or any institution says or does, someone could dig deep enough or twist it enough to make it look racist. EVERYTHING is racist. White snow is neat. Black snow is dirty and ugly. Is that racist? If you look at the facts, no. No one likes eating dirty snow or playing in it. Would someone find it racist anyhow? You bet. Racism as a term is no longer what it was designed to mean. It is now something used by minorities every time that minority doesn't get its way. It's like being female and claiming a guy sexually harrassed you just because she didn't like a business decision he made.

White privilege doesn't exist. Period. If it did, then the percentage of whites on welfare and medicaid would be 0. We'd all drive brand new cars, make 100 percent of the money in the US economy, and, as a rule, become ignorant of everyone else. Rosa Parks would have been thrown off the bus. No one would have made any care of Martin Luther King Jr. The Civil Rights movement would have just been one big riot put down by our lackies and historically moved on. Did that happen? Nope. Rosa Parks changed history. MLK Jr. openned a society's eyes. Civil Rights was not a riot, but a revolution. Sure, at one time white privilege may have existed, but certainly not since the early 1900s.

Changing a nickname isn't opening a society's eyes. It does nothing for the Native American except whatever gratification they can reach for a minority of a minority winning a meaningless battle over a majority. What will they get out of this? Well, GK et al claimed they'd get their dignity back... How? They complain about the conditions on the reservation, alcoholism, drug use, the failure of education, and unemployment to name a few... how is the nickname going to change that? This isn't a world of entitlement. It is a world based on what you can do for yourself. Peers who've earned their place will always be looked upon with respect and listened to. People who expect to garner the same respect for whatever reason save earning it only become whiners and thorns in the side of society. Some Native Americans have earned the right to be respected and honored. Others feel that they deserve it because of some atrocity in the past. THese entitlists are pretenders in the area of respect.

I believe right here you have what the real issue are that are effecting our society, not just native amiercans. However in you next paragraph I believe you missed the point.



What your basically saying is as whites we are born with a silver spoon in our mouths and that we get all of the breaks. I say balderdash, I can't seem to find my spoon.

When I worked for Job corps many of the students who were white and didn't have a pot to pee in or a window to throw it out of. They had just the same problems natives living on the reservation had. These problems you discribe are experienced by all races, blacks, whites, Native Americans.

From the Dallas Morning News:

NCAA committee backs ban on mascots

Nothing new here, really.

Forum letter to the editor - 10/30/2005 from another "misguided" person.

I wish they hadn't published where he lives. The 'real' Indian amongst up may look him up.

I am sure this guy will be maligned and discredited as being disalusioned.

If the name is so bad, how can the very group it is "hostile and abusive" towards be split on the issue? Shouldn't it be virtually unanimous among this group of people that the nickname is wrong?

Just to quote the apparent 'party line,' there is no split and it is unanimous. They don't count those hang around the fort Indians, Indians who have fully integrated into American society (the 'lost' indians), or Indians that are not full blooded Sioux (even if you are .0000001 of anything else in the bloodline, tough crap. You don't count). Sioux on the reservations who support or don't care about the nickname are shunned into silence. The majority is cowed into cooperation. Even GK has admitted that that is what would happen if someone did speak out on it. Yes, on this issue, certain NA people are holding a number of other NA people hostage ideologically.

Just thought this thread on the Pitt State Gorillas' message board was funny. Apparently, Ralph Englestad was a bachelor-hermit who left his entire fortune to UND when he passed away. This should solve all funding problems for everything!

http://www.teamkong.net/cgi-bin/ikonboard....f=1;t=1588;st=0

Very well stated. I was wondering where GK was so we could get his spin on this.

I can do that if you want me to......

I am pretty sure that he would spin it as ________that person being wrong.

...."hang around the fort Indian" with a "plantation negro mentality".

Not really media, but today I talked to a retired member of the ND State Highway Patrol at the Fargo YMCA. I noticed on his duffle bag the emblem of the Sioux indian that is the same as that Highway Patrol patch and I asked him about it. He said he's gotten many compliments on it and how it was done to honor the Sioux Indians. That patch was adopted by the state of North Dakota, according to him in 1935. Interesting, no? The Indian on the patch was actually a NA police officer that served with the state of North Dakota in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

He told me (He saw my "Thank you Ralph" tshirt that I got that has the REA emblem on it) that in his 28 years of service to the state of ND, he's never heard naught but praise for the Fighting Sioux nickname and the emblem he wears on his shoulder and duffle bag.

I told him that the highway patrol is lucky he isn't affiliated with the NCAA. He laughed cynically, like a cop laughing at a guy trying to make a credible excuse as to why he ran a stoplight while being followed by a cop. He was a nice guy. He said that it is a shame that things will probably end up with the nickname probably being changed.

The Native American on the NDHP logo is Red Tomahawk. It was officially adopted by the Patrol in 1951.

He became a friend of the whites and was highered as a government policemen and actually arrested Chief Sitting Bull when the North Dakota settlers believed Sitting Bull's ideologies were harmful to them. Sitting Bull ended up dying in the battle that ensued when his son discovered he had been arrested.

From The Virginia Gazette:

W&M makes pitch to keep Tribe

From The Richmond Times-Dispatch:

W&M issues report
School responds to NCAA, defending use of Tribe as nickname

From The Daily Nebraskan:

Groups look to up NCAA restrictions on certain mascots
From The Star-Telegram:

Welcome the Fighting ...

Click here to read W&M's letter to NCAA:

http://www.wm.edu/NCAA/

Link to the self-evaluation report itself is in box at left of page

Bah. What do I know about dates. I probably heard him wrong. In any case, he was an interesting man to speak to.

---------

As for the WIlliam and Mary nickname issue:

Is anyone willing to bet that it won't be rejected?

Well ya got the date that the Patrol was founded right. That was pretty good.

From the Associated Press

Bradley Appeals NCAA Nickname Ruling

OK...how about the UND Fighting Highway Patrol....and keep the logo? Only kidding...just an example of how ridiculous this is getting. UND Fighting Sioux forever...'nuff said!

If I am not mistake if UND's next appeal fails, we will be taking our case to the 15 presidents and chancellors from Division II.

I've not been on as regularly as usual this past week, so forgive me if I missed it. But has UND filed it's appeal yet?

Phil Harmeson said yesterday during the roundtable discussion at the union that the second appeal would be ready for submission "very soon."

Dr. Kupchela said today on Mac Talk, KNOX Radio, that the appeal would be filed today or tomorrow.

On a somewhat related topic I was told by someone who knows that Kuppy is respected by the State Board and Potts. They trust him and when he says something, they know he is telling the truth. Not everyone on the Board likes him however.

They said the opposite is true about Chapman. He is self centered and self serving and will mistate the facts in order to get whatever he wants. He will screw and other schools including UND and doesn't see any point in helping the other schools out. The other presidents don't care for him because he is trying to dissociate the AC from the other Universities. Chapman frequently skips meetings and sends one of his subordinates instead. He remains aloof from the other presidents. At one of the meetings in Bottineau he flew at state expense to Bottineau for the late afternoon portion of a two day meeting, then rather than stay overnight in the "hick town" he flew back to Fargo for the night. He flew back to Bottineau in the AM for the rest of the meeting. Taxpayers picked up the tab. He uses John Q. Paulsen as his boy and Paulsen (who at times, as a supposed neutral board member refers to NDSU as "we" when discussing issues) does Chapman's bidding. I doubt the Fargo Forum would ever do a story on Chapman's relationship with the other Universities or his use of state funds.

On a distantly related topic, there is nothing in the Englestad Arena contract that would cause the Arena to be closed or the contract changed if UND changed the Fighting Sioux name. The Arena is leased to UND for 25 years and then will be deeded to UND. It can happen sooner if the controlling board decides to give it to UND. There are no bombs set to blow it up or arragements made to tear it down if UND changes the Fighting Sioux name.

I'm going to agree with GCWaters on this one, I'm afraid.

I know both Chapman and Kupchella. I admire Kup for his fight of the nickname issue instead of turning turtle (which is what I expected him to do), but comparing personalities is a bit much.

I don't pretend to know what the State Board thinks of either President, I can only speak about how they act towards me.

Chapman- Nice guy. Seems interested but is ambitious. It is clear he wants to put NDSU on the map any way he can. He is extremely charitable and is well connected with the Fargo community. Him and his wife donate all of the food to my church every Passover for the community seder (we're a group of MAYBE 40-60 families in a church who finished in the black by a whopping $67 last year so this is a real big deal to us) including all of the equipment needed to serve the dinner (sternos etc.). I hold Chapman in high esteem despite the fact that I don't hold the same for NDSU athletics.

Kupchella- Devious. Sneaky. Brilliant business sense. He's VERY smart but he is not very personable. He's done a few things in the Grand Forks community that has not made him too popular. He's been known to make decisions that were just flat out insulting towards the student populace (including lamenting at one time to the student body president why UND fans couldn't be more like Minnesota fans). He's just as ambitious as Chapman but without the veil put over it that makes people think he cares.

Kupchella and Chapman are pretty evenly matched in terms of the fundamentals of University Presidency but if I had to choose one or the other to invite to a function, I would invite Chapman over Kupchella.

Just want to say good luck to the ladies tonight....women's basketball that is...playing in Florida..first team they play is Merrimack.....Warriors....hmmmmm...haven't heard about them...although their logo looks like a Trojan/Knight...maybe that's how they get away with it...I'm sure they're not "hostile and abusive"! Any way...GO FIGHTING SIOUX!!!!

I agree Kuppy isn't very personable. I agree he has not communicated well with the UND community and that includes GF. I have been to functions with both of them and wouldn't disagree with you. I am not a big fan but he has a reputation for speaking the truth. Chapman has a reputation for making statements that need to be verified. I think Chapman has out hustled Kupchella and is a better politician. He has done a pretty good job for NDSU so far but I wouldn't trust him to do much for any school other than NDSU. Clifford and Loftsgard were not like that.
I have no knowlege or criticism of his community involvement but would believe what you say. I believe his meeting attendence at the presidents meetings can be verified. I think he missed another one in Bismarck this week. I would think four of the board members would be supportive of him especially Paulsen who communicates to the board he will control Chapman. I believe the facts are, it is Chapman who controls Paulsen.

How did this thread turn into a Kupchella vs. Chapman discussion? It doesn't belong in this thread, let alone this forum.

Back to the scheduled topic in this thread:

KFGO-AM News is reporting this morning that Dr. Kupchella and UND will be filing their second appeal to the NCAA today. This one (the way it was reported) will be more like Illinois' in that it will focus more on how the NCAA went about doing this. (Remember: A large portion of Illinois' appeal can be summed up by saying "you didn't and don't have the power to do this".) KFGO phrased the appeal as more "legalistic".