On a rainy lunchtime on Amsterdam Avenue, in front of the gates of Columbia University, hundreds of professors demonstrated this week, holding placards calling for the defense of our University against an unprecedented attack.
This is perhaps the best thing I have read on the Columbia conundrum. Columbia is clearly being targeted in bad faith and for malevolent political and perhaps personal reasons (see the NYT article about Trump's tantrums that Columbia turned down a $400 million real estate deal 25 years ago). There has been too little reporting in even the liberal media of "the thoroughgoing repression of the student-led pro-Palestine and anti-war movement," and the fact that "allegations of antisemitism [are being] weaponized by Trump's administration in its attacks on higher education." I am at Columbia three days a week and the idea that there is any meaningful degree of antisemitism is completely laughable. It is a myth propounded endlessly by the right for Trump's and Netanyahu's purposes (and endlessly repeating the same allegations). I grant that there were, very occasionally, chants at the demonstrations that could be taken as antisemitic, but very few, unless you buy the line that any protest against the egregious suffering of the Palestinians is antisemitic. I have seen no sign of classical antisemitism in the sense of hatred of Jewish people, and that is based on conversations with demonstrators, as well as a general sense of the tone of the campus. And the idea that Columbia is not taking action to "protect Jewish students" is even farther from the truth. In fact, Columbia is spending a fortune on security measures to keep outsiders off the campus (and some of the nutty lefties outside the gates have been truly antisemitic); it has taken harsh action against demonstrators in several instances; and it has imposed a new "anti-hatred" policy (with mandatory "training") that is clearly flexible and subjective enough to allow it to be used against any expression of any strong views about anything that becomes unpopular. I am sympathetic with the University's capitulation in an impossible situation. What bothers me most here is the complete lack of a defense of the actual facts with respect to alleged antisemitism and the University's response thereto. What bothers me most about the discussion of the weaponizing of antisemitism by the right is the fact that it is turning what should be a solemn and serious topic -- what could be more serious than antisemitism? -- into a shabby political slogan, no better than anything else in the battery of Trumpian schooyard namecalling.
Thank you for this comprehensive report -- it squares entirely with the experience of my niece who just graduated from Columbia last year. It's a useful and necessary corrective to some of the nonsense posts above your own.
"I grant that there were, very occasionally, chants at the demonstrations that could be taken as antisemitic, but very few, unless you buy the line that any protest against the egregious suffering of the Palestinians is antisemitic. I have seen no sign of classical antisemitism in the sense of hatred of Jewish people, and that is based on conversations with demonstrators, as well as a general sense of the tone of the campus."
I recall some unhinged zionist demonstrator screaming "I am a Jew!" at protesters, who proceeded to most brutally ignore her and her howls and demands for attention.
This is F'ckn brilliant.. Thank you for this crystallization of the complicated situation particularly at Columbia.... I would add the two decade push to make the University global, more corporate, decentralizing the undergrad mission (and hence student life / dialogue) and increasing reliance on the donors add to your argument.. .Kudos... Will be amplifying this among alumni... Kindest Regards.... PB CC '93
The “Middle East conflict” as you so politely call it, has at its heart a genocide that has arisen from the fact that western imperialist powers imposed an ethno state on an indigenous population that-was ethnically cleansed to make way for it. The remnants of that population have been subjected to further ethnic cleansing, apartheid and routine brutalisation ever since. That murderous, apartheid-based, violently expansionist ethno-suprematist state is propped up, armed and covered for by the US. US students are fully aware of this. Hence their protests regarding this particular ‘conflict’ rather than others. And hence the repression of those protests. In this respect, those Columbia students are way in advance in both political and moral understanding than some of their distinguished professors.
Professor Tooze, I generally appreciate your commentary, but here you are fully misguided and show yourself part of an institution so thoroughly corrupted by intellectual and moral rot that it needs to be starved of funds. The demonstrations were not about any “resolution” of the Jewish Arab conflict, but full scale, fully throated calls for Jewish extermination, along with actions demonstrating a willingness to prevent access to school buildings, and damage and trespass while shouting praise for terrorism and calls for the destruction of the west (replaced by what? The enlightened Islamic regimes?). The extent of university and faculty support for these lawless, intellectually incoherent, anti-Semitic, terrorism praising and historically ignorant (I will spare anyone reading this the 100 year plus rejection of any attempt to peacefully create two states by the Arabs) shows how deeply Columbia has been infected by the victimization narrative and the lies of Edward Said. The reaction of the Trump administration has been mild, and that of alumni withholding donations insufficient for real change. I live 10 blocks from Columbia and see the Keffiah wearing useful idiots of Hamas regularly. Your characterization of Israel and your defense of Columbia and your attacks on the Trump administration are wrong and beneath you. Stay away from a subject you are ignorant of, and ideally get away from Columbia.
Keffiyah. Sorry about the spelling mistake. And sorry for the many research scientists trying to advance knowledge in the crosshairs because of the pseudo-scientists under the same institutional umbrella.
Circumlocutions, of the finest quality. The issue at hand is literal textbook-definition genocide being carried out in broad daylight. If people are "allergic" to saying it plainly, maybe it's because it is so obviously wrong. But the facts of the killing (sadistic mass targeting of civilians, purposeful targeting of refugee areas and hospitals), and who is doing it (Israel), and how it is done (with US provided bombs and aircraft), are not even in dispute any longer.
It continues with US citizens' money, weapons, and G7-media propaganda cover. With full throated support of *both* US political party leaderships.
The majority of humanity can see thru it plain as day, but still, professionals who are by now perfectly aware, too scared to call it by name.
To water down this essential cause for action, dilute it into a protest of academic freedom, that is self censorship. Such plain lack of confidence won't stop anyone.
Adam Tooze makes a lot of sense re Columbia U. crisis, but does not note that Biden/Harris acceptance/enabling of Israeli Gaza genocide may well be the reason Trump 2.0 is in the White House.
PLEASE COVER The SAVE Act, which like the President's astonishing unconstitutional Executive Order, would have a chilling effect on elections in America. The bill would require onerous citizen documentation to verify citizenship status when registering. It is already illegal for noncitizens to vote and voter fraud has proven to be practically non-existent.. More than 21 million Americans do not have the documents required by the SAVE Act readily available; it bars Americans from registering with their driver's licenses. 69 million women do not have birth certificates with their current legal name on it, most often because they changed their name when they married; and approximately 146 million Americans do not have a valid Passport. Voter registration drives would be impossible. The Act also threatens election workers with civil and criminal liability, including fines and up to five years in federal prison, for purposefully or inadvertently registering a voter without meeting the bill's requirements. The bill is fast-tracked, allowing it to bypass committee, the amendment process, and the need or a rule to govern debate. Be afraid.
I’m actually cool with this. I need to know you are an actual citizen of USA 🇺🇸 to vote; then I’d like to see dual citizenship gone. Sorry Susan but I don’t share your concern. I can’t vote in Mexico 🇲🇽 or Cuba 🇨🇺… or elsewhere. I would need to prove my citizenship in order to do so. I appreciate your concern and thoughts but I ain’t feelin it.
You know, if you lie back and think about the situation in Israel—and strip away the detail of who did what to whom, and who’s to blame for derailing the peace processes—the answer becomes painfully obvious.
On both sides, there’s a hard core that refuses to compromise. For some, the only acceptable outcome is the complete elimination of Israel. For others, it's the total removal of Arabs from an expanded Jewish homeland. As long as those factions hold any levers of power within their respective communities, a negotiated, compromised solution was never going to be on the table.
The hope lay in globalisation. The dream was that the Israeli economy would grow in a way that intertwined Arab and Jewish lives with so much mutual benefit that the extremists on both sides would be marginalised—reduced to background noise. In the long run, maybe even a prosperous, integrated Levant could have emerged, showing the world a new model of cooperation. That was my dream.
But is that dream now fractured beyond redemption? In this new world of narrow nationalism and zero-sum conflict, the only solution seems to be genocide—one way or the other. And given the imbalance of resources, we all know which way that would go.
Yet this isn’t happening in isolation. The dream of globalisation and international cooperation seems to be fading everywhere. And if what scientists are telling us is even close to true, it may already be too late for a recovery cycle. If we’ve passed the sustainability tipping point for the current size and growth of the global population, then the breakdown of globalisation—and with it the mutual reliance that once gave us a shot at averting disaster—might be the final blow.
"The second intifada was followed by Hamas' seizure of power ..."
Not precisely. The second intifada was followed by all-Palestinian elections, won by Hamas. The US and Israel refused to accept this result and incited the Palestinian Authority to initiate a civil war, which Hamas won. It thereupon assumed control of Gaza, leaving the West Bank under the control of the PA. Israel, displeased with this result, tightened its blockade of Gaza, seriously compromising the health and liberty of the population.
There are a few other contradictions, specific to the American academy, that Prof. Tooze omits to mention, whose sudden intensification accounts for the troubles at Columbia.
1. The professors and administrator of America has been leaders in silencing, cancelling, deplatforming, firing, and expelling those who dissent from left-wing orthodoxy. Remember the administrators at Yale Law telling a student that his Federalist Society membership was "triggering"? It never occurred to the professoriate that there could ever be any substantial disagreement with bien-pensant opinion within the gates, as it were. But Israel is one issue on which a substantial number of right-thinking (i.e., left-thinking) people do not embrace leftist ideology. Unfortunately, the faculty at Columbia (or anywhere else) have no experience in civil debate or living with disagreement, so there can only be (as we see from Prof. Tooze and many commenters here) accusations of racism and criminality.
2. The professors and administrators of America have spent the past quarter century instilling an ideology which one can call "wokeism" (or you can call it "Rumpelstiltskin" for all I care) whose tenets include: (i) words are actions, (ii) psychic injuries are real and cognizable injuries, (iii) ethnicity is fundamentally constitutive of personal identity, and (iv) those in authority have a duty to protect their subjects from the psychic harms caused by words that impugn their ethnicity. There was a good article by Franklin Foer in the Atlantic about two years ago where he noted how thoroughly the Jewish students he spoke to had adopted these beliefs and applied them to their own situations. So it is unsurprising that Jewish students and faculty have complained volubly about anti-Semitism at Columbia and demanded that someone in authority do something. Now someone has.
Sorry too much pussyfooting around in this article. I dare say if I persisted, read more slowly, and took more time I could find lots to praise, but rather it feels like the good bits are being deliberately hidden (I accept the career issues, but then why write if it has to be so cryptic).
Missing or obscure is:
1. Not declaring Genocide is actively Unscientific, Unhistorical, UnAcademic. Intellectual Dishonesty.
Ok this follows a lot of nonsense on Covid science, Trans science and all kinds of social science claptrap, but it is a fundamental criticism of Columbia and most Universities.
Note the Dems have long been the Anti-Science party, they just got Universities to re-write the science to suit them (Global warming is the exception, but I doubt they care why). A stem Phd told me a few months ago that Race does not exist. Who is being anti-scientific - me or him?
2. There is no confusion between anti-Zionism and anti-semitism. Everyone gets the difference.
Just plain dishonesty.
3. It is not Academia that is failing, it is Politics on all sides. Most obviously the left who make the greatest claims about fairness, but all of them. Democracy has failed.
4. If Columbia were worth standing up for, Columbia would have stood up for its students last year. It failed every decent person's expectations.
5. The Real Macro view. Israel is Existential for USA.
The probable death of the remaining 1.8 million Gazans (recently 2.2 million) is minor compared to the real issue. The end of US empire and the Thucydides trap as China takes over.
When Israel Falls, the US's curtain is pulled away and it is naked.
Defeat in Afghanistan and Ukraine have been well hidden. The loss of Israel is the end.
Biden's handlers were was as obsessed about making America sound great as Trump.
Thanks. As usual, you noted the most interesting/dangerous part of the current situation involving higher education, which is that no one can discuss it or define the true issues, and that there is no useful set of terms to discuss matters. I am past despair on this, but I am glad that the first step (perhaps) in addressing the issue has been taken.
Tooze was brave to attempt this overview of the context for the troubles at Columbia. He has been criticized in some comments here from utterly predictable directions on several sides, but he has given us some very thoughtful commentary.
This is perhaps the best thing I have read on the Columbia conundrum. Columbia is clearly being targeted in bad faith and for malevolent political and perhaps personal reasons (see the NYT article about Trump's tantrums that Columbia turned down a $400 million real estate deal 25 years ago). There has been too little reporting in even the liberal media of "the thoroughgoing repression of the student-led pro-Palestine and anti-war movement," and the fact that "allegations of antisemitism [are being] weaponized by Trump's administration in its attacks on higher education." I am at Columbia three days a week and the idea that there is any meaningful degree of antisemitism is completely laughable. It is a myth propounded endlessly by the right for Trump's and Netanyahu's purposes (and endlessly repeating the same allegations). I grant that there were, very occasionally, chants at the demonstrations that could be taken as antisemitic, but very few, unless you buy the line that any protest against the egregious suffering of the Palestinians is antisemitic. I have seen no sign of classical antisemitism in the sense of hatred of Jewish people, and that is based on conversations with demonstrators, as well as a general sense of the tone of the campus. And the idea that Columbia is not taking action to "protect Jewish students" is even farther from the truth. In fact, Columbia is spending a fortune on security measures to keep outsiders off the campus (and some of the nutty lefties outside the gates have been truly antisemitic); it has taken harsh action against demonstrators in several instances; and it has imposed a new "anti-hatred" policy (with mandatory "training") that is clearly flexible and subjective enough to allow it to be used against any expression of any strong views about anything that becomes unpopular. I am sympathetic with the University's capitulation in an impossible situation. What bothers me most here is the complete lack of a defense of the actual facts with respect to alleged antisemitism and the University's response thereto. What bothers me most about the discussion of the weaponizing of antisemitism by the right is the fact that it is turning what should be a solemn and serious topic -- what could be more serious than antisemitism? -- into a shabby political slogan, no better than anything else in the battery of Trumpian schooyard namecalling.
Thank you for this comprehensive report -- it squares entirely with the experience of my niece who just graduated from Columbia last year. It's a useful and necessary corrective to some of the nonsense posts above your own.
"I grant that there were, very occasionally, chants at the demonstrations that could be taken as antisemitic, but very few, unless you buy the line that any protest against the egregious suffering of the Palestinians is antisemitic. I have seen no sign of classical antisemitism in the sense of hatred of Jewish people, and that is based on conversations with demonstrators, as well as a general sense of the tone of the campus."
I recall some unhinged zionist demonstrator screaming "I am a Jew!" at protesters, who proceeded to most brutally ignore her and her howls and demands for attention.
Oh, very well, then....
https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/as-an-american-jew-i-feel-completely-reassured-for-my-safety-now-that-trump-has-targeted-the-epicenter-of-american-antisemitism-columbia-university
Well written, well thought out and frankly pretty damn scary. You have a very good grasp of the contemporary world.
This is F'ckn brilliant.. Thank you for this crystallization of the complicated situation particularly at Columbia.... I would add the two decade push to make the University global, more corporate, decentralizing the undergrad mission (and hence student life / dialogue) and increasing reliance on the donors add to your argument.. .Kudos... Will be amplifying this among alumni... Kindest Regards.... PB CC '93
The “Middle East conflict” as you so politely call it, has at its heart a genocide that has arisen from the fact that western imperialist powers imposed an ethno state on an indigenous population that-was ethnically cleansed to make way for it. The remnants of that population have been subjected to further ethnic cleansing, apartheid and routine brutalisation ever since. That murderous, apartheid-based, violently expansionist ethno-suprematist state is propped up, armed and covered for by the US. US students are fully aware of this. Hence their protests regarding this particular ‘conflict’ rather than others. And hence the repression of those protests. In this respect, those Columbia students are way in advance in both political and moral understanding than some of their distinguished professors.
Professor Tooze, I generally appreciate your commentary, but here you are fully misguided and show yourself part of an institution so thoroughly corrupted by intellectual and moral rot that it needs to be starved of funds. The demonstrations were not about any “resolution” of the Jewish Arab conflict, but full scale, fully throated calls for Jewish extermination, along with actions demonstrating a willingness to prevent access to school buildings, and damage and trespass while shouting praise for terrorism and calls for the destruction of the west (replaced by what? The enlightened Islamic regimes?). The extent of university and faculty support for these lawless, intellectually incoherent, anti-Semitic, terrorism praising and historically ignorant (I will spare anyone reading this the 100 year plus rejection of any attempt to peacefully create two states by the Arabs) shows how deeply Columbia has been infected by the victimization narrative and the lies of Edward Said. The reaction of the Trump administration has been mild, and that of alumni withholding donations insufficient for real change. I live 10 blocks from Columbia and see the Keffiah wearing useful idiots of Hamas regularly. Your characterization of Israel and your defense of Columbia and your attacks on the Trump administration are wrong and beneath you. Stay away from a subject you are ignorant of, and ideally get away from Columbia.
You live in the neighbourhood and know all about Columbia, while Tooze works there and knows nothing about it. Alrighty then ...
Keffiyah. Sorry about the spelling mistake. And sorry for the many research scientists trying to advance knowledge in the crosshairs because of the pseudo-scientists under the same institutional umbrella.
One might wonder how you would have responded to the Vietnam War protests on that same campus
Every sentence of yours is nonsense. You simply support the subjugation and genocide of Palestinians by Israelis. For shame.
Keffiah. Very scary.
Circumlocutions, of the finest quality. The issue at hand is literal textbook-definition genocide being carried out in broad daylight. If people are "allergic" to saying it plainly, maybe it's because it is so obviously wrong. But the facts of the killing (sadistic mass targeting of civilians, purposeful targeting of refugee areas and hospitals), and who is doing it (Israel), and how it is done (with US provided bombs and aircraft), are not even in dispute any longer.
It continues with US citizens' money, weapons, and G7-media propaganda cover. With full throated support of *both* US political party leaderships.
The majority of humanity can see thru it plain as day, but still, professionals who are by now perfectly aware, too scared to call it by name.
To water down this essential cause for action, dilute it into a protest of academic freedom, that is self censorship. Such plain lack of confidence won't stop anyone.
Adam Tooze makes a lot of sense re Columbia U. crisis, but does not note that Biden/Harris acceptance/enabling of Israeli Gaza genocide may well be the reason Trump 2.0 is in the White House.
PLEASE COVER The SAVE Act, which like the President's astonishing unconstitutional Executive Order, would have a chilling effect on elections in America. The bill would require onerous citizen documentation to verify citizenship status when registering. It is already illegal for noncitizens to vote and voter fraud has proven to be practically non-existent.. More than 21 million Americans do not have the documents required by the SAVE Act readily available; it bars Americans from registering with their driver's licenses. 69 million women do not have birth certificates with their current legal name on it, most often because they changed their name when they married; and approximately 146 million Americans do not have a valid Passport. Voter registration drives would be impossible. The Act also threatens election workers with civil and criminal liability, including fines and up to five years in federal prison, for purposefully or inadvertently registering a voter without meeting the bill's requirements. The bill is fast-tracked, allowing it to bypass committee, the amendment process, and the need or a rule to govern debate. Be afraid.
Susan Schwarz
Tarrytown
(914) 715-1539
I’m actually cool with this. I need to know you are an actual citizen of USA 🇺🇸 to vote; then I’d like to see dual citizenship gone. Sorry Susan but I don’t share your concern. I can’t vote in Mexico 🇲🇽 or Cuba 🇨🇺… or elsewhere. I would need to prove my citizenship in order to do so. I appreciate your concern and thoughts but I ain’t feelin it.
You didn’t address a single concern that was raised. If you’re not a bot, you might as well be.
I’m not a bot. Preventing voter fraud is important. It is self explanatory.
False on all counts. You might as well be a bot. Go away, Nazi
Here is the ABA CRSJ webinar about that from yesterday https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjMbgA6ALBY
You know, if you lie back and think about the situation in Israel—and strip away the detail of who did what to whom, and who’s to blame for derailing the peace processes—the answer becomes painfully obvious.
On both sides, there’s a hard core that refuses to compromise. For some, the only acceptable outcome is the complete elimination of Israel. For others, it's the total removal of Arabs from an expanded Jewish homeland. As long as those factions hold any levers of power within their respective communities, a negotiated, compromised solution was never going to be on the table.
The hope lay in globalisation. The dream was that the Israeli economy would grow in a way that intertwined Arab and Jewish lives with so much mutual benefit that the extremists on both sides would be marginalised—reduced to background noise. In the long run, maybe even a prosperous, integrated Levant could have emerged, showing the world a new model of cooperation. That was my dream.
But is that dream now fractured beyond redemption? In this new world of narrow nationalism and zero-sum conflict, the only solution seems to be genocide—one way or the other. And given the imbalance of resources, we all know which way that would go.
Yet this isn’t happening in isolation. The dream of globalisation and international cooperation seems to be fading everywhere. And if what scientists are telling us is even close to true, it may already be too late for a recovery cycle. If we’ve passed the sustainability tipping point for the current size and growth of the global population, then the breakdown of globalisation—and with it the mutual reliance that once gave us a shot at averting disaster—might be the final blow.
this is a brilliant effort but it begs one big question.why is zionism the established american religion?and no,mearsheimer hasn't got the answer.
"The second intifada was followed by Hamas' seizure of power ..."
Not precisely. The second intifada was followed by all-Palestinian elections, won by Hamas. The US and Israel refused to accept this result and incited the Palestinian Authority to initiate a civil war, which Hamas won. It thereupon assumed control of Gaza, leaving the West Bank under the control of the PA. Israel, displeased with this result, tightened its blockade of Gaza, seriously compromising the health and liberty of the population.
The way Brits silenced the Irish Famine and other genocides, Israelis want to silence their own genocide:
https://exiledonline.com/war-nerd-newsletter-100-amateurs-talk-cancel-pros-talk-silence/
There are a few other contradictions, specific to the American academy, that Prof. Tooze omits to mention, whose sudden intensification accounts for the troubles at Columbia.
1. The professors and administrator of America has been leaders in silencing, cancelling, deplatforming, firing, and expelling those who dissent from left-wing orthodoxy. Remember the administrators at Yale Law telling a student that his Federalist Society membership was "triggering"? It never occurred to the professoriate that there could ever be any substantial disagreement with bien-pensant opinion within the gates, as it were. But Israel is one issue on which a substantial number of right-thinking (i.e., left-thinking) people do not embrace leftist ideology. Unfortunately, the faculty at Columbia (or anywhere else) have no experience in civil debate or living with disagreement, so there can only be (as we see from Prof. Tooze and many commenters here) accusations of racism and criminality.
2. The professors and administrators of America have spent the past quarter century instilling an ideology which one can call "wokeism" (or you can call it "Rumpelstiltskin" for all I care) whose tenets include: (i) words are actions, (ii) psychic injuries are real and cognizable injuries, (iii) ethnicity is fundamentally constitutive of personal identity, and (iv) those in authority have a duty to protect their subjects from the psychic harms caused by words that impugn their ethnicity. There was a good article by Franklin Foer in the Atlantic about two years ago where he noted how thoroughly the Jewish students he spoke to had adopted these beliefs and applied them to their own situations. So it is unsurprising that Jewish students and faculty have complained volubly about anti-Semitism at Columbia and demanded that someone in authority do something. Now someone has.
Sorry too much pussyfooting around in this article. I dare say if I persisted, read more slowly, and took more time I could find lots to praise, but rather it feels like the good bits are being deliberately hidden (I accept the career issues, but then why write if it has to be so cryptic).
Missing or obscure is:
1. Not declaring Genocide is actively Unscientific, Unhistorical, UnAcademic. Intellectual Dishonesty.
Ok this follows a lot of nonsense on Covid science, Trans science and all kinds of social science claptrap, but it is a fundamental criticism of Columbia and most Universities.
Note the Dems have long been the Anti-Science party, they just got Universities to re-write the science to suit them (Global warming is the exception, but I doubt they care why). A stem Phd told me a few months ago that Race does not exist. Who is being anti-scientific - me or him?
2. There is no confusion between anti-Zionism and anti-semitism. Everyone gets the difference.
Just plain dishonesty.
3. It is not Academia that is failing, it is Politics on all sides. Most obviously the left who make the greatest claims about fairness, but all of them. Democracy has failed.
4. If Columbia were worth standing up for, Columbia would have stood up for its students last year. It failed every decent person's expectations.
5. The Real Macro view. Israel is Existential for USA.
The probable death of the remaining 1.8 million Gazans (recently 2.2 million) is minor compared to the real issue. The end of US empire and the Thucydides trap as China takes over.
When Israel Falls, the US's curtain is pulled away and it is naked.
Defeat in Afghanistan and Ukraine have been well hidden. The loss of Israel is the end.
Biden's handlers were was as obsessed about making America sound great as Trump.
Thanks. As usual, you noted the most interesting/dangerous part of the current situation involving higher education, which is that no one can discuss it or define the true issues, and that there is no useful set of terms to discuss matters. I am past despair on this, but I am glad that the first step (perhaps) in addressing the issue has been taken.
Tooze was brave to attempt this overview of the context for the troubles at Columbia. He has been criticized in some comments here from utterly predictable directions on several sides, but he has given us some very thoughtful commentary.