Sacked

No, this is not about Republicans. But it could be.

I’m just using this as an excuse to avoid the primaries and won’t someone please hold Marc Ambinder down, pry his mouth open, shove a couple of Xanax in and then rub his throat until he swallows?

Onward.

The coedulicious and edjumacated mrs tbogg and I both attended San Diego State University. She graduated.

Me? Not so much.

I like the university and actually learned a few things during my stay for which I’m grateful, but, jeebus are they having a bad day:

Dozens of San Diego State University students were arrested after a sweeping drug investigation found that some fraternity members openly dealt drugs and one even sent a mass text message advertising cocaine, authorities said Tuesday.

Two kilograms of cocaine were seized, along with 350 Ecstasy pills, marijuana, psychedelic mushrooms, hash oil, methamphetamine, illicit prescription drugs, several guns and at least $60,000 in cash, authorities said.

Of the 96 people arrested, 75 were students. Eighteen of the students were arrested Tuesday when nine search warrants were executed at various locations including fraternities, said Jesse Rodriguez, San Diego County assistant district attorney.

Here’s the funny part:

A member of Theta Chi sent out a mass text message to his “faithful customers” stating that he and his “associates” would be unable to sell cocaine while they were in Las Vegas over one weekend, according to the DEA. The text promoted a cocaine “sale” and listed the reduced prices.

Theta Chi’s San Diego chapter declined to comment.

“We’re talking to our advisers,” said John Phillips, a past president of the chapter.

Dale Taylor, the fraternity’s national executive director, said he was “obviously shocked and saddened” by the allegations.

[...]

“They were on the upswing,” Taylor said. “They had improved their recruitment. They were trying to raise money for a new house.”

You can make your own jokes here.

But wait, there’s more:

The San Diego State football program ranks fifth-worst among 119 Division I-A teams in its four-year Academic Progress Rate, according to data released Tuesday by the NCAA.

The NCAA has put the Aztecs’ football and baseball teams on public notice for having poor historical records in the APR and will hit them with additional scholarship and practice time limitations if they do not improve this year. The Aztecs football team already has been penalized with six scholarship reductions over the next two years because of its poor APR, as previously reported by The San Diego Union-Tribune. The SDSU baseball team will be docked three one-hundredths (.03) of a scholarship, according to the NCAA.

[...]

In 2006, the NCAA hit SDSU football with a five-scholarship penalty, which was reduced to four on appeal. Last year, the NCAA penalized SDSU with three scholarship losses, but the Aztecs had that penalty waived under the condition that SDSU reach a single-year APR of 925 for the 2006-07 academic year. It failed to meet that condition this year. As a result, it was hit with the maximum nine-scholarship penalty, which was reduced to six on appeal.

Long, hired in December 2005, and Athletic Director Jeff Schemmel, hired in July 2005, have characterized football’s APR struggles as problems rooted in the past. They said they expect it to turn around soon and have noted improvements made in academic support for athletes, including the hiring of a learning specialist.

[...]

This year’s penalties mean SDSU football is limited to 79 scholarships overall, six under the maximum. It also is limited to 22 scholarships to new recruits, three under the maximum. Long anticipated the penalty in the latter and signed only 21 recruits in February.

The Aztecs record for the past six years: 26-46 with their best season in 2003 at 6-6.

In a nutshell one could make the case that the SDSU football team is bringing in student/athletes who aren’t very good in either role.

But wait! It gets worser (proving that I went to State):

A longtime San Diego State faculty member is sponsoring a resolution to abolish the Aztecs football program because of its failure to generate revenue as promised and because of the strain he says that puts on academics.

Leon Rosenstein, emeritus professor of philosophy, said the resolution will be introduced at Tuesday’s faculty senate meeting.

He and other faculty don’t expect the resolution to succeed, largely because even if it passed a senate vote, the resolution would only serve in an advisory role to SDSU President Stephen Weber, who steadfastly backs football.

[...]

SDSU football has failed to relieve an athletics budget that in recent years has needed about $2.5 million or more from other university sources to make ends meet. Last year, after an eighth straight nonwinning football season, SDSU athletics needed about $2.7 million in “one-time” funding, which came largely from a university broadband contract. This year, one-time funding has been projected at $2.645 million, out of a total budget of about $27 million. That’s in addition to about $5 million from the state general fund and about $5 million from student fees.

Rosenstein’s resolution states this shortfall of nearly $3 million could be enough to staff “approximately 550 courses with part-time faculty or to establish 35 new tenured full professorships.” Rosenstein, who came to SDSU in 1969, said the philosophy department formerly had 18 tenured members; now it has nine. Other departments have had similar staffing issues, he said, at a time when students in general education courses have increased.

From another article:

Nine years later, the goal remains elusive. While the current fiscal year doesn’t close until June 30, the athletic department again will receive about $2.8 million in “one-time” or “auxiliary” funding from other university sources to balance its budget of about $27 million.

The infusion is necessary despite a $160 annual student fee increase implemented in 2004 by SDSU President Stephen Weber, overriding a student referendum. That has added $4.8 million to $7 million to the athletic department coffers annually. An additional $5 million in athletics revenue comes from the state general fund.

How long can the athletic department count on this kind of support?

“It will go on as long as I am president of San Diego State University,” Weber said in response to an e-mail question.

Proving that there are all kinds of Presidents and all kinds of quagmires.

You may now commence the high-minded discussion regarding the relative merits of Div. I football and its importance to the complete college experience. Or we can just discuss the genius that is Charlie Weis whose team, incidently, gets to kick the shit out of SDSU on 9/6/2008.