War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; Ignorance is Strength; SPEECH IS VIOLENCE! So many words in English, in Chinese only 4 characters are needed--指鹿为马。
California, USA
Joined August 2017
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Thanks Bill! I used to have so much respect for MIT. All the major institutions have been compromised by SJW style evil gangs. @MIT you need to correct your wrong and rebuild your integrity.
Five years ago, an important miscarriage of justice occurred.
The story began in April 2018 when David Sabatini, an MIT, Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), and Whitehead Institute scientist and professor began a consensual intimate relationship with Dr. Kristin Knouse, a principal investigator with her own lab at the Whitehead.
By January 2020, David sought to end the relationship, but Knouse apparently did not want it to end. When David thereafter started a new relationship and Knouse learned about it, she began a secretive campaign to destroy him by attempting to end his career as a scientist. She did so by damaging his name, reputation, and that of his family with false sexual harassment and other claims, thereby making him unemployable.
Knouse conspired with Dr. Ruth Lehmann, the then- and still current Director (i.e., President) of the Whitehead Institute, in her efforts to destroy Sabatini.
The record presented in court demonstrated that Dr. Lehmann committed to Knouse in October of 2020 that she would fire David. Dr. Lehmann made this commitment to Knouse before any investigation of the facts had taken place.
Seven months after committing to fire him, in March of 2021, Dr. Lehmann, on behalf of the Whitehead, hired the law firm of Hinckley, Allen, Snyder (HAS) to undergo an investigation of David. By July 2021, HAS shared a draft of its conclusions with MIT, HHMI, and the Whitehead, but not with David or his lawyers.
On the morning of August 19, 2021, David for the first time received the more than 200-page investigative report and a calendar invite for a meeting the following day with Dr. Lehmann, the president of HHMI, and the HR directors of both institutions. The report was riddled with errors and unsupported claims about David and his relationship with Knouse.
When David's lawyer immediately thereafter reached out to Whitehead counsel to ask whether David was about to be fired, they confirmed that he would be terminated at the meeting.
On the advice of his lawyer, David immediately resigned from HHMI and the Whitehead rather than attend the meeting. HHMI did not accept his resignation, choosing instead to fire him. MIT put David on leave and ultimately revoked his tenure. David thereafter resigned from MIT.
On August 20, 2021, one day after sending David the HAS report and before David had the opportunity to dispute the facts and the conclusions of the investigation, Dr. Lehmann emailed all employees at the Whitehead informing them that David had violated a number of Whitehead policies "including policies concerning sexual harassment."
The Lehmann public email, David's resignation and firing, and Dr. Lehmann's claims about David's sexual harassment exploded into a major global scandal covered in mainstream, social, and scientific media around the world as it had all of the requisite ingredients:
An attractive target with David, one of the most important scientists of his generation in line for the Nobel Prize, a purported inappropriate sexual relationship with a younger female colleague, and a political and institutional environment where punishing a man for sexual harassment advanced the career and reputation of the person and/or institution that destroyed the career and reputation of the accused, regardless of the validity of the allegations.
As a result of Knouse's claims, Lehmann's sham investigation, and the media onslaught that followed, David lost all sources of income and his reputation was destroyed. All prizes he had been previously been awarded were withdrawn. He was removed from all scientific advisory and other honorary roles other than as a member of our family foundation's (the Pershing Square Foundation's) scientific advisory board.
When I initially learned of the news about David in the summer of 2021, I hired him as a consultant to the Pershing Square Foundation as I believed our small foundation team would benefit greatly by his insights (and he now had the time to help us), and he needed the money to support his family.
At my request and under a confidentiality agreement, David provided us with many hundreds of pages of documents including texts and other communications with Knouse, the investigative report, and David's responses to the allegations so that we could do our own evaluation of Knouse's claims.
I and a member of our family office's legal team carefully reviewed the documents. After a careful review of the empirical documents -- in particular the texts between Knouse and David -- it became abundantly clear that Knouse's actions were that of an angry and jilted lover, not those of a sexually harassed junior colleague. And the investigative report appeared designed to deliver a pre-ordained conclusion rather than a dispassionate fact-based analysis.
The impact of the firings and the destruction of his career and reputation on David and his family was extraordinarily devastating, so much so that we became increasingly concerned that he might commit suicide.
[In order to make sure that David's important scientific research would continue, in February 2023, in partnership with an anonymous donor, we funded $25 million to support David launching a new lab. As you might expect, I was reviled in the press, in scientific journals, and on social media for doing so and for supporting a so-called sex offender.]
On October 20, 2021, David filed suit against Knouse alleging defamation and tortious interference in his career and his contractual arrangements. Thereafter, Knouse brought counterclaims against David.
Today, nearly five years to the date of the filing of the suit, he has finally received justice.
Today, a 13-person jury (seven men and six women) of David Sabatini's peers (12 jurors plus an alternate) unanimously determined that David proved that Kristin Knouse defamed him, tortiously interfered with his contractual relationships (his entire career as a scientist), and tortiously interfered with his prospective advantageous relationships (his future employment). The jury awarded him nearly $10 million in damages including interest.
The jury rejected all of Knouse's claims including her claims that David engaged in quid pro quo sexual harassment and created a sexually hostile work environment.
While five years is a very long time to live under a reputational cloud, justice was finally served today for David, but not completely in my view.
To this day, Dr. Ruth Lehmann remains Director of the Whitehead Institute. Dr. Lehmann worked alongside Dr. Knouse to destroy David Sabatini, an acclaimed scientist and professor. She did not follow due process before she intentionally destroyed David's career and reputation.
Dr. Lehmann nearly killed David with her actions, as had we not rescued David by finding him employment, supporting him publicly to buffer the reputational damage, and supporting his recovery, he could have ended his life and left his son without a father before the world understood what had transpired here.
And the reputational damage was not just to David.
David's brother, Bernardo Sabatini, is one of the most important neuroscientists in the world. To this day, he has had to deal with a large cloud over his family name and reputation. Recently, when the new CEO of our brain institute mentioned that Bernardo Sabatini was on our board, he was asked: "Wasn't he involved in some kind of sex scandal?"
For obvious reasons, the character of the person who runs a scientific institute is of utmost importance. Among other failures here, Dr. Ruth Lehmann committed to Knouse that she would fire David many months before an investigation was even launched and without consideration of the empirical facts.
How can one trust research produced by a scientific institute if its leader is not committed to observing the empirical facts before reaching conclusions that have life-threatening import? We have unfortunately seen massive amounts of scientific fraud which has harmed innumerable human lives and wasted billions of dollars of research funding and time.
For her ethical breaches here, Dr. Lehmann should be fired from the Whitehead. Based on her actions in this case, she is in no position to serve as the leader of an important scientific institute.
I speak with some perspective on how scientific and other institutions should be led. Including the recent launch of the Ackman Oxman Institute, we have funded approximately $1 billion of scientific research and institutions over the last decade or so, and this experience has given us the opportunity to meet the leadership of many of the most important scientific institutions in the world.
To put it plainly, we would not give a dollar to a scientific institute whose leader compromised basic moral principles as has happened here.
At an absolute minimum, the board of the Whitehead should immediately launch a detailed and independent investigation of Dr. Lehmann's actions in the Sabatini case. I would encourage the investigation, among other considerations, to carefully exam all of the correspondence between Lehmann and Knouse, as well their correspondence with the HAS law firm on among other areas, the various drafts of the Sabatini investigative report.
Alternatively, Dr. Lehmann could resign, minimize further distraction for the Whitehead, and save institutional time and resources that would be better spent on research that benefits humanity.
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This is the lawyer who insisted in the media that that Duke Lacrosse players were guilty of rape even after overwhelming evidence completely vindicated the players and exposed systemic prosecutorial misconduct.
When a woman says she didn’t consent, that’s it. Case closed. The investigation is over - let a jury decide if they believe her beyond a reasonable doubt. Women have a constitutional right of redress under the 1st Amendment. Let the jury-NOT patriarchal politics-decide. #Cornell
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When people in US mock China for its corruption, they don't realize that California is as corrupt as China. The only difference is that when Chinese politicians take the money, they get things done, when CA politicians take the money, nothing get done and they ask for more.
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This should be a litmus test for everyone to evaluate their social network circle.
"Do you believe the girl at Cornell was drugged and gang raped by 7 white men who all got out of punishment by writing essays?"
Every single gay and woman I follow in Instagram believes the girl at Cornell was drugged and gang raped by 7 white men who all got out of punishment by writing essays.
It is deranged. Society is collapsing. The leftwing propaganda machine is destroying civilization.
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Commbad retweeted
I mean... jokingly making odes to rape is pretty much something that only "far right" people do. Your actual politics don't matter at that point.
An supposed interview but looks more like a debate between competing politicians. That's pretty telling.
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This is how crazy and sick San Francisco is. The more crazy thing is that there are lots people that vote for those scumbags. San Franciscans, would you keep voting for your city's demise!
SF supervisors past and present are in the house. @SandraLeeFewer leads a “F*ck the POA” chant while @JaneKim, @MattHaneySF & others share the stage. #SFDA @KQEDnews
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Such crazy proposal helps nobody, but will only put millions of retirees in poverty.
Wondering who voted for such dumb people, must be equally dumb.
California’s affordability crisis demands a living wage.
The math speaks for itself.
#CASenDebate
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Commbad retweeted
Harvard's lawyers told the New York Post that Claudine Gay's plagiarized passages were "not plagiarism" before launching any investigation. Then the lawyers bullied the Post into silence, saying the paper "must not move forward with the proposed article." This is corruption.
Commbad retweeted
Imagine the following:
You're a man who serves as Chairman of the Board of a large University who led the search for the recently hired president.
Your wife runs a non-profit in the DEI space. She is the only full-time employee of the organization, serving as Founder, CEO, and CFO. You serve as Treasurer.
The non-profit ostensibly sells two principal products in the DEI space:
1. "Evidence-based 'how-to-guides' and
2. "The most comprehensive intersectional analytics platform of its kind..."
but the non-profit has no revenues.
It relies entirely on contributions to fund its operations, which principally consist of your wife's salary and some other ancillary overhead.
There have been only two contributors to the non-profit, the University whose board you chair, which has contributed:
2018 $100,000
2019 $300,000
2020 $150,000
2021 $600,000
2022 $789,000
and a donor advised fund (DAF) affiliated with you which has contributed:
2018 $0
2019 $0
2020 $0
2021 $10,000
2022 $20,000
Doesn't this seem very strange?
What if the University was @MIT?
What if the Chairman was Mark Gorenberg?
What if the non-profit is parity.org?
Why are there so many conflicts/scandals concerning DEI organizations?
All of the above can be found in MIT's and Parity.Org's IRS Form 990s which are available and summarized here:
instrumentl.com/990-report/p…
Commbad retweeted
Please see my letter today to @Harvard governing boards of directors:
December 10, 2023
Dear Members of the Harvard Governing Boards:
In her short tenure as President, Claudine Gay has done more damage to the reputation of Harvard University than any individual in our nearly 500-year history.
Because of her failure to condemn the most vile and barbaric terrorism the world has ever seen, for supporting rather than condemning 34 Harvard-branded student organizations who hold Israel “entirely responsible” for Hamas’ barbaric acts, for failing to enforce Harvard’s own rules on student conduct, and for her other failures of leadership, President Gay catalyzed an explosion of antisemitism and hate on campus that is unprecedented in Harvard’s history.
In light of Harvard’s leadership position, President Gay’s mishandling of October 7th and its aftermath on campus have led to the metastasis of antisemitism to other universities and institutions around the world.
President Gay’s actions and inactions have gravely interfered with the ability of students to continue to learn at Harvard and for its faculty to teach and do research. Classes are continually disrupted by protesters who use bullhorns and other disruptive methods, and the offending students suffer no disciplinary action.
Literally, as I write this post, highly disruptive protests are underway inside Widener Library while students are trying to study for final exams and finish their term papers during the last two weeks of the semester.
As a result of President Gay’s failure to enforce Harvard’s own rules, Jewish students, faculty and others are fearful for their own safety as even the physical abuse of students remains unpunished.
President Gay’s absurd explanation for the lack of disciplinary action for the October 18th HBS incident was that the University cannot discipline students until the HUPD and FBI investigations are complete. To date, I am unaware of any disciplinary actions taken for the October 18th incident nearly two months later.
President Gay’s principal response to address antisemitism on campus was to set up a task force. Within a few weeks of its formation, @RabbiWolpe, the only rabbi on the task force, publicly announced his resignation from the committee. In an @X post, he explained:
“The short explanation is that both events on campus and the painfully inadequate testimony reinforced the idea that I cannot make the sort of difference that I had hoped.”
He later explained on news television that:
“I came to the conclusion that I was not going to be able to make the kinds of changes I thought Harvard needed,” saying the committee had “accountability without authority.”
President Gay’s failures since October 7th led to a Congressional investigation of her conduct. This outcome on its own is an incredible embarrassment to Harvard. I have been unable to identify any former Harvard president being the subject of a Congressional investigation since the establishment of the Congress in 1789.
President Gay’s entire testimony was abysmal. She was disrespectful and condescending to the Congress. She was a hostile witness, unwilling to answer direct questions from members.
In words that will forever live in infamy, President Gay’s response to the question:
“Does calling for the genocide of Jews violate Harvard’s rules regarding bullying or harassment?”
President Gay: “It depends on the context.”
My X post which shared the excerpt of the three university presidents’ testimony has been viewed more than 106 million times, and condemned in comments and reposted by more than 80,000 people from around the world.
President Gay’s testimony was also slammed by Harvard Hillel:
“President Gay’s failure to properly condemn this speech calls into question her ability to protect Jewish students on Harvard’s campus... President Gay’s testimony fails to reassure us that the University is seriously concerned about the antisemitic rhetoric pervasive on campus.”
And by her most liberal supporters:
Professor Emeritus Larry Tribe @tribelaw: “[Her] hesitant, formulaic, and bizarrely evasive answers were deeply troubling to me and many of my colleagues, students, and friends.”
President Gay’s failures have led to billions of dollars of cancelled, paused, and withdrawn donations to the university. I am personally aware of more than a billion dollars of terminated donations from a small group of Harvard’s most generous Jewish and non-Jewish alumni. I have been copied and blind copied on numerous letters and emails to the University from alums who have written scathing letters to Gay and/or the Board withdrawing donations.
President Gay’s actions and inactions have exposed Harvard to substantial legal liability due to alleged violations of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 putting at risk Harvard’s Federal funding, tax-exempt status, and creating the risk of substantial financial liability to the University from private plaintiffs.
President Gay’s Failed Leadership Did Not Begin with Her Presidency
During her tenure as Dean and now as president, Gay has squelched speech she disfavors while defending and thereby amplifying vile and threatening hate speech, exhibiting a remarkable double standard. In the words of Professor Steven Pinker:
“Claudine was technically correct that students can’t be punished for political chants, but when Harvard et al. have no prior credible commitment to academic freedom, institutional neutrality & viewpoint diversity, the born-again appeal to principle seems incriminating.”
Free speech deteriorated materially under Gay’s deanship and presidency as evaluated by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE). Harvard’s free speech ranking has deteriorated each year over the last four academic years to a ranking of 0.00 or last out of 254 universities this past year. According to FIRE, Harvard is the only university with an “abysmal” speech climate. In my letter to the board of December 3rd, I quoted Harvard faculty I interviewed on the lack of free speech at Harvard. I encourage you to read what they had to say.
Gay has presided over discriminatory hiring practices at Harvard. The faculty have been told in no uncertain terms that candidates that do not meet DEI criteria will not be considered for certain faculty positions.
As Dean, Gay showed no respect for basic American legal principles when she fired Harvard Law School Professor Ronald Sullivan as residential dean for taking on the legal defense of Harvey Weinstein. President Gay should hope that someday when she needs counsel, she will be able to obtain quality representation for herself.
DEI and the Office of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging (OEDIB)
In recent weeks, I have learned a lot about DEI practices at Harvard and have come to the conclusion that the Office of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging, which was formed in 2019 under Dean Gay’s oversight and vision the year after she became Dean of FAS, is none of those things. In fact, the actions of the OEDIB have led to preferences and favoritism for certain racial, gender, and LGBTQ+ groups at the expense of other groups, and made some members of the Harvard community feel included at the expense of others that are excluded.
When I mentioned in my December 3rd letter to President Gay that among others, Jewish, Asian, Indian and straight white male students were excluded from the benefits of the ODEIB office, her solution to this problem, which she outlined in an email to the Harvard community, was to propose that the OEDIB include Jewish students in some manner. This is not right answer.
The OEDIB is a major contributing source of discriminatory practices on campus and highly damaging to the culture and sense of community at Harvard. It is beyond repair and should be shut down.
I do not mean to suggest whatsoever that the goal of a diverse university that is welcoming for all should be abandoned. Rather, the OEDIB is not the solution as it is fundamentally an organization with political objectives that are inconsistent with achieving true diversity and inclusion at Harvard.
The OEDIB’s definition of equity is also inconsistent with Harvard excellence. Over its nearly 500-year history, Harvard has been a beacon for excellence based on the equality of opportunity it offers, not by promoting a system or ideology which forces or requires the equality of outcomes.
On the Decision to Terminate President Gay
Last Thursday, December 8th, a bipartisan coalition of 72 members of Congress issued a public letter to the Harvard governing boards demanding President Gay’s termination. It is rare that our Congress has been able to accomplish anything in recent years in a bipartisan fashion, let alone in a matter of days. Congress’ decisive action here speaks volumes.
In the last 24 hours, a petition has been circulating among the Harvard community which asks the board to fire President Gay. I expect it may already have thousands of signatures.
As Charlie Munger of blessed memory advised: “Invert, always invert,” i.e., turn a situation or a problem upside down to better understand and solve it. Using Mr. Munger’s rubric, let’s assume that the office of president at Harvard were vacant.
Knowing what we know now, would Harvard consider Claudine Gay for the position? The answer is definitively “No.” With this simple thought experiment, the board’s decision on President Gay could not be more straightforward.
The Search Process for a New President
I was recently accused by several bloggers and other commentators of being a racist when I shared that the board, in the search process that led to the hiring of President Gay, would not consider a candidate for president that did not meet DEI criteria. I have confirmed now from multiple sources that the search committee that led to President Gay’s appointment excluded non-DEI eligible candidates from the process.
To set the record straight, my criticism of President Gay would be unchanged if her gender, race, and/or LGBTQ+ status were different.
As I am sure the board is well aware, a search process which excludes potential candidates based on their racial, gender, sexual preference or other similar criteria is inherently a discriminatory and/or racist process, which is illegal under the law.
In the likely event that Harvard launches a new search process for president, to state the obvious, all candidates regardless of ethnicity, gender, sexual identity, and/or political views should be considered for the position.
The board also needs to also launch a detailed investigation into discriminatory hiring practices at the University, and put in place measures to ensure that these practices never again occur.
The events of the last two months have taken a devastating toll on the Harvard brand and its community at large. With the right leadership and governance, Harvard can be restored to its historic stature as one of the world's leading research and educational institutions comprised of a diverse and welcoming community which fosters free speech, encourages diverse viewpoints, and provides an environment that preserves academic freedom.
I am highly confident that Harvard, the governing boards, and the Harvard community at large will greatly benefit and learn from this experience. As I often say, experience is making mistakes and learning from them. The mistakes that were made that led to recent events began many years, if not decades, ago.
Let’s make sure that we use this opportunity to fundamentally repair our beloved institution for it is incumbent upon us as the current stewards of Harvard. We are all collectively responsible for the currently impaired status of our historically esteemed institution.
I am grateful for the role all of you serve on behalf of the entire Harvard community. Thank you for your service.
I would be delighted to help the governing boards and Harvard in any way that I can. Please call upon me at any time.
Sincerely,
William A. Ackman, A.B. 1988, MBA 1992
Commbad retweeted
This is what actual privilege in America looks like.
BLM activist completely ruined the life of an innocent white girl with a false accusation of racism and gets a brand deal with Dove while Morgan Bettinger was kicked out of school and now needs medication in order to sleep.
I can get away with illegal acts as long as I don't leave evidence. This is the exact problem with progressives. They don't care about THE LAW except their own "law". The scariest part: how many people with such mindset become lawyers, judges, prosecutors and law professors?
EXCLUSIVE: Berkeley Law School dean Erwin Chemerinsky explains how he has secretly enacted a policy of racial discrimination in faculty hiring—which is illegal in California.
"If I'm ever deposed, I'm going to deny I said this to you."
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ESG is worse than a joke.
NEW: From S&P Global to the London Stock Exchange, tobacco companies are crushing Tesla in the ESG ratings. How could cigarettes, which kill over 8 million a year, be deemed a more ethical investment than electric cars?
One answer: Tobacco’s gone woke.🧵freebeacon.com/latest-news/h…
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Commbad retweeted
A delivery driver for Amazon misheard a automated doorbell for “racism” and reported it.
Nobody was home.
Amazon turned off all the lights, shut the entire smart home down before it even started it’s investigation.
Law enforcement via corporation with no due process.
Fauci fits really well in China or North Korea.
