The Starr Chamber

Five years or eight years and counting, the Starr Chamber stands as the worst committee of my time at Puget Sound.

Veterans of "Rump Parliament" must have wondered where my annual denunciation of the Professional Standards Committee [PSC] of 2003-2004 was. Never fear; it is here. Newbies who have stumbled across this blog may wonder about my recalling a committee eight years or five years -- depending on what and how one counts -- after its last malfeasance. Please find my entries in this blog for 6 February and 5 February 2011, 9 February 2010, or 11 February 2009 to catch up on the missteps of miscreant colleagues. The "St. Valentine's Day Massacre" of 2007, on which day at least five erstwhile members of the Starr Chamber disgraced themselves, is especially rewarding to read.

New or old readers should pay close attention to those old entries, for only three of the eight malefactors have left the University of Puget Sound. That leaves five fuck-ups colleagues who should not be trusted to make sensible or fair decisions.

As you read those old posts, please recall that a former Chair of the Faculty Senate called the Professional Standards Committee "the Star Chamber" long before I did. I added the extra "r" to the mocking to recall Judge Kenneth Starr, who exhibited similar fairness, objectivity, and sense in Javerrting President Clinton.

And to the five, if any of them read my blog: I have not forgotten who you were or what you did. I also have not forgotten that I volunteered to one of you more than eight years ago to argue the nonfeasance and malfeasance of the PSC before the self-same PSC. Yes, the prisoners in the dock and the jury in the box would have been the same eight persons. So confident was I that the errors committed by the PSC violated either The Faculty Code or commonsense fairness or both that I was willing to let the PSC adjudicate. My sucker bet generous challenge was not accepted. I wonder why.

I hope the members of recent Academic Standards Committees do not despair. [See "Rump Parliament" 7 December 2010 for a summary.] Those committees were every bit as wanton as the Starr Chamber, but there was far less at stake.

If anyone would like to learn more about how low colleagues can go, please stand me to martinis at Primo Grill.