He's a spindly figure with an alacrity for avarice. He's in a position of power. He's got friends in high places and enemies in low ones. And, according to allegations throughout the campus, he's single-handedly running the University into the ground.

For legal reasons, we can't tell you who he is. But we can say that the troubles began a couple years ago during a changing of the guard somewhere in the University's managerial structure.

We cannot use terms such as 'fat cat', 'living large', 'loaded', or 'solid gold toilet seats'. But we can say that this man's salary is 80% of what Bill Clinton made as president. That's over $3,000 a week--more than most students make in an entire summer's worth of sweaty labor--and it's coming straight out of your tuition. Nor can we use words such as 'embezzle', 'misappropriate', 'questionable', 'siphon', or 'big fat raise'. But we can say that he has a taste for expensive new rides, especially when the University is footing the bill. This, of course, is not to say that a high-maintenance trophy wife (more accurately, re-wife) would be the type to turn down a free ride, especially a trophy wife with a high-dollar-a-day interior redecoration habit. Maybe things just go in and out of style faster these days...or maybe the weekly repainting of Gates' Estates' posh rooms is merely to cover the acrid stench of found money burning holes in every pocket. It is physically impossible to burn through that much cash just buying gourmet bathroom tissues to powder an ersatz honker and a petrochemical posterior. Why does tuition continue to increase, and where does all that money go? It has been estimated that, if current trends continue, there will be no more Tri-State within twenty years.

Nor can we use words such as 'reorganization', 'personal matters', 'coup', 'grudge', 'expurgation', or 'political differences'. But we can say that what's been happening to University staff is more than routine spring cleaning. In the past year alone, three employees with positions relating to University finances have been axed. The positions have either been eliminated or filled with consultants and... We cannot even use words such as 'cronies', but we can say that the specimen to which this article is dedicated has few friends within the structure that he did not put there himself. To say 'Nobody likes this guy' would be a criminally obscene understatement. The susurrant sounds of ax-falls, like the aftershocks of an angry deity's recreational smitings, echo after watercooler whisperings and quiet words spoken in confidence. We can not use terms such as 'lockstep', 'informant' or 'double agent', but there are a lot of staff looking over a lot of shoulders, believing "Trust no one" to be more than just an alien-autopsy catchphrase. Those non-comrades that aren't fired outright fear relegation to crappy shifts, crappier pay and outrageous overtime debacles. When he and his henchmen are not screwing Security raw or giving the cleaning staff a (figuritively speaking) horizontal economics lesson, they can be found giving students the wrinkled, Cajun shaft. From brushing off student concerns, to ensuring no minor infraction goes unpunished, to 'sanitizing' the campus in ways Mr. Clean never intended, this self-professed party animal has done his part to pervert campus life with a stifling feeling of powerlessness only an accountant could love.

If I were a trophy wife, I wouldn't stand for all that fooling around...unless it funded my furniture habit.

 

THE RAG