PCM

It takes people and equipment. You have to pay the people and you have to buy the equipment. Or are people here implying that the athletic department is just too lazy to do it?

All it takes is money. Open up your checkbooks.

Exactly. I'm glad I didn't have to draw you a picture this time.

As long as we're making points through YouTube...

Yeah. UND's athletic programs have sure gone to hell the last eight years, haven't they?

I, of course, am absolutely shocked.

I didn't say that you specifically did all those things. I am saying that all of them (and some even worse than those I described) were done by various individuals at one time or another on this board. They have a cumulative effect that creates a particular perception. The desired outcome was obvious to everyone reading this board.

If that's the case, what was the point of keeping up the steady drumbeat of anti-Buning posts for months? What was the point of telling people to flood Twamley Hall with e-mails and phone calls to do something about Buning? What was the point of "insiders" castigating anyone who dared to suggest that there might be another side to the story or that all in the athletics department might not be as bad as it seemed? Why did the "insiders" invest so much time and effort in berating anyone who dared to post something positive about Buning? I find it interesting that all those who so desperately wanted Buning gone suddenly want to absolve themselves of any responsibility for their role in making it happen.

You are a bad, bad man.

Someone needs to. You continually preach about journalism when you obviously know nothing about the subject. I told you in a private message that I was raised by a journalist, that I have a degree in journalism, that I have worked as a professional journalist, that I've won awards for journalism and that I've spent the past 25 years working in the field of media relations. While it's true that there are a great many people who know far more about journalism than I do, I'm reasonably confident that my knowledge of the subject far surpasses yours. I also told you that I don't consider my hobby of covering hockey for USCHO to be real journalism. That's why I have no problem hanging the "sudo-reporter" label on myself that someone here slapped on me several years back. I gave you a list of people who are professional journalists and who get paid to cover UND athletics full time. I suggested that if you wanted to berate real journalists for what they don't know, you call them up and give them a piece of your mind. Did you do that? Actually, I have a pretty good idea who it is. I have my soruces, too.

No.

Your question appears to assume that prior to the advent of Internet message boards, there was no way for incompetent people to be removed from their jobs. I don't know enough to make that determination.

Yes, I'm afraid you are stupid. Not even your Holiday Inn Express stay made any difference. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Sometimes, reporters don't reveal their sources, but almost always, they do. Watch the news. Listen to the news. Read the news. Practically everything on the news is attributed to a named source. Why? Because news is much more credible and believable when the public knows where it comes from. Without a named source, the public has no way of knowing if the person or organization the information came from was qualified or had the necessary expertise to make the comments or conclusions made. The public has no way of knowing if the source was objective, had an ax to grind or reason to engage in self-serving spin. That's why attribution is an important cornerstone of good journalism. You see, if Patrick C. Miller writes a story for USCHO citing an anonymous source who says that the Gophers will be very good this year, nobody would have any idea what that means. For all the readers know, PCM could be getting his information from some obscure accountant in Minneapolis. But if the story quotes UND Fighting Sioux coach Dave Hakstol as saying that the Gophers will be the team to beat in the WCHA during the upcoming season, then it means something. Most people -- even Gopher fans -- understand that Hakstol is a credible source of information on the strength of the WCHA. Sometimes journalists do stories in which it's important to protect anonymous sources. However, those stories are the exception, not the rule. Even when journalists use anonymous sources, it's their names and the names of their news organizations on the story. They are held accountable for what they write and broadcast. If it turns out that the anonymous sources a journalist cites are wrong or lied, the reporters and news organizations suffer the loss of credibility and reputation. And if you don't have credibility in the news business, you don't have anything. In addition, the threat of being sued for libel is always there. So even when journalists cite anonymous sources, they have a great deal of incentive to make certain that those sources are telling the truth because their names on on the stories they produce! I'm sorry for the lesson in Journalism 101, but I'm sick of people who have absolutely no idea what they're talking about pretending that they're experts on subjects on which they're totally clueless. While I'm the first to admit that I don't know all the gory details of the Buning situation, I do know a little bit about journalism and the news media. This will come as a shock to some loyal SiouxSports.com regulars, but anonymous people citing anonymous sources for the express purpose of discrediting a person, damaging his reputation and causing him to lose his job is not viewed favorably by the outside world. While I know that within the echo chamber of this board, the "get Buning" effort was viewed as a great and noble cause, "outsiders" (i.e. "the public") tend to form opinions based on what they know. And what they know hardly paints a flattering portrait of the situation. Even worse, UND's detractors are having a field day with the Buning affair. It will be a gift that keeps on giving for years.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Thursday, September 20, 2007 TICKETS FOR DIVISION I MEN

We should form a club.

I think the most likely explanation is that Buning's written request contained information that NDUS policy says must be kept confidential. UND released everything it could and WDAZ found a partial sentence that appears at odds with the official story. I don't see what UND has to gain by lying about the situation, which is bad enough as it is. And sometimes you have no choice but to follow the law and keep information confidential, which appears to be the case here.

The WDAZ story is available on the Web (there's a link to it on the Herald's Web site) and goes into a bit more detail. I'm not sure I understand what big secret they think they've uncovered. The partial sentence shown reads, "I am requesting that he be placed on immediate..." Here's what the North Dakota University System Human Resources Policy Manual says about leave without pay (empahsis added): I could be wrong, but it appears to me that what is being shown relates to the authorization for request from "the appropriate administrative officer." If Buning's request itself contained information that NDUS policy says must be kept confidential, then there's no way that UND can make it public.

From today's Grand Forks Herald (headline corrected): [url="http://www.grandforksherald.com/articles/index.cfm?id=50812

You know what that means: You must grow up to be a man.

I was referring to UND as the "institution," which is all inclusive. If it had been my intention to to blame UND's administration only, that's what I would have said.

When I say "UND," I'm including faculty, staff, alumni, students, boosters and, in this case, Sioux sports fans. In other words, the entire university and everyone associated with it. Who did you think I was talking about?

Obviously.

Miss the point much?

Regardless of how this comes out, it appears that UND is continuing the well-established trend of chewing up ADs and spitting them out. That should be of concern to us all.