A Hat in the Ring
Back in the ’90s, as a middle schooler growing interested in politics, I read a couple of amusing books by the comedian and future U.S. Senator Al Franken. Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot and Other Observations was the big seller, but there was also Why Not Me?, his offbeat satirical novel about bumbling into the presidency and the brief, tumultuous and absurd administration that might ensue. It was a bizarre volume, and seemed even more bizarre a decade later when Franken was actually elected to go to Washington. His tenure didn’t end well, with the former Stuart Smalley reluctantly resigning around the peak of the #MeToo movement after some of his more boorish antics as an entertainer came to light.
But that title, Why Not Me?, has been resounding through my head in recent days as the world watches Columbia University’s latest crisis of dynastic succession. During my entire eleven years as a reporter, flack, and in-house historian for Columbia, the university president was Lee C. Bollinger, a crafty and silky-smooth operator who managed to keep campus largely placid as the dollars rolled in, even embarking upon a major expansion in scruffier blocks up north—the so-called “Manhattanville campus”—that in previous generations would likely have sparked intense campus resistance to any such imperialist gentrification.
Other than a true gift for fundraising, Bollinger’s superpower was kicking cans down the road: unresolved ideological contradictions and festering ethnic tensions had long roiled just beneath the institution’s well-lacquered surface, but for many years could be shushed away with enough bread and circuses and scapegoating of disfavored demographic groups. The closer Columbia converged with Wall Street, the harder it pushed its woke bona fides to square the circle of how the university could be so wealthy and exclusive and yet so avowedly egalitarian. Happily for President Bollinger, he had the good fortune to step down after two decades just months before elite academia and Columbia in particular went up in flames following October 7, 2023.
Part of me felt bad for Bollinger’s ill-fated successor, the ineffectual Baroness Minouche Shafik, who proved distinctly unequipped to manage or damp down the chaos that engulfed Morningside Heights, let alone acquit herself credibly before Congress. In all fairness, the challenge was light years from what she’d actually been hired to do, raising big money internationally and maintaining institutional continuity. Perhaps even her nimbler predecessor couldn’t have survived all the PR catastrophes, either, and there was no doubt Shafik’s days were numbered.
It might not be popular to say at this juncture, but I was relatively impressed with Shafik’s interim replacement as of last August, Katrina Armstrong, the head of Columbia’s medical complex uptown, who knew a thing or two about negotiating intractable interests, dynamics, and personalities—and did just about as solid a job thanklessly navigating the impossible as probably anyone could. Columbia was bruised and beleaguered even before the Trump-Vance administration declared war, and the threat of losing some $400 million in federal funding in the near term and potentially much more later is foreboding to say the least.
Talk is cheap; it doesn’t cost student and faculty protesters much to denounce any and all cooperation with the administration’s demands, but it was more or less Armstrong’s fiduciary duty to do her damnedest to restore that funding. Some critics flippantly suggested that she draw down Columbia’s endowment—nearly $15 billion on paper—but the vast majority of that capital is too tied into real estate, investments, and legally specified purposes to be accessible for discretionary spending in any reasonable timeframe. Perhaps Armstrong ended up too clever by half, attempting to thread the needle of placating both the White House and campus activists at once, and her temporary presidency came to an abrupt end last week. Suddenly, Columbia announced its fourth figurehead in under two years: board member and former ABC News personality Claire Shipman, whom I used to watch around the same era I was reading Al Franken books, will serve as interim president until either she too is forced to resign or Columbia’s Board of Trustees can find some other sucker to take the job.
That refrain once again: Why Not Me? If you’re an ambitious academic seeking to capstone your career, you’d have to be crazy to want to take charge of Columbia right now. Yes, “university president” is a prestigious title that will probably make the first line of your obituary, but you’d be walking into an ambush. It’s a no-win situation—you’re asking to be hated and jeered across the political spectrum, and there’s a decent chance you’ll be tossed out in disgrace. Far smarter for aspiring senior administrators to keep their heads down and let somebody else take the heat until things blow over.
So why not me? I spent the bulk of my career portraying Columbia University in the most favorable possible light, including in the official histories of three different schools. I’ve covered hundreds of events, gladhanded thousands of donors and VIPs, contracted a nasty respiratory infection digging through some of the many basements and subbasements beneath campus, and spent months practically living in the university archives. When I left Columbia to become a whistleblower—before Ivy League malfeasance became frequent headline news—it was with the university’s best interests at heart.
The truth is, I still love Columbia, and it’s because I’m so familiar with its distinguished history and invested in its enormous potential that I’m so terribly disappointed with what the university has done to itself in recent decades. This former apparatchik may now be in exile, but I didn’t go very far: I’m still about a 15-minute walk from Low Library, at least when the barricades are down, and in a sense consider myself to still be working for Columbia from the outside.
Admittedly, I don’t have a graduate degree or any executive experience running a huge organization, but I also come cheaper than the competition. I’m willing to take the job for 90K per annum plus an expense account at V&T Pizzeria, and would even be open to converting the President’s House on campus to an Airbnb for the duration of my term. So how about it, Columbia University Board of Trustees? Why not me? You could probably do better, but you’ve already done worse.
Next: Pronoundemonium
"You could probably do better, but you’ve already done worse."
Dude this is crazy, I had no idea we use the same pickup lines.
As an alumni who hasn't given them a dime since they brought Angela Davis on board, you have my vote.