Latest news with #IvyLeaguers
AU Financial Review
23-05-2025
- Politics
- AU Financial Review
Trump's war on Harvard is un-American
So many enemies: spineless judges, moaners about due process; fake news merchants; the Fed; Canadians (nasty); Europeans, same (except for Italy and Hungary); environmental hoaxers; regulators of shower pressure; cancer-causing windmills; tariff-haters; Venezuelans; the Cheneys. But the worst of the lot? Not even close. Professors! Radical left lunatics, or those soft on them, which is the same thing. Let's see how they like it when the money tap turns off. The trigger-happy firing range that is the Trump administration has put America's universities squarely in the crosshairs. The more liberal the faculty, the heavier the hit: billions in federal grants stripped from Harvard, hundreds of millions from other Ivy Leaguers. [On Friday, the administration told Harvard it can no longer enroll international students.]
Yahoo
29-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
The enemies list: Trump takes a page from Nixon's playbook
"We're all afraid . . . " Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, told a gathering of nonprofit and tribal leaders in her home state on April 14. "We are in a time and a place where I have not been before. I am oftentimes very anxious myself about using my voice because retaliation is real — and that's not right." Murkowski, one of few Republican senators to have publicly opposed President Donald Trump, was voicing concern about his administration's wide-ranging effort to seek revenge against a lengthy list of individuals perceived as political enemies. The New York Times listed more than 50 individuals who have been "targeted for retribution" by the Trump administration. The president and his appointees have attacked these people by firing them, stripping them of Secret Service protection and security clearances, ordering federal investigations against them and even threatening criminal prosecution. The list of Trump's targets includes former President Joe Biden, his son, Hunter Biden, former Vice President Kamala Harris, as well as members of the first Trump administration who later turned against him such as John Bolton and Mike Pompeo. Trump isn't the first modern president to assemble a list of political enemies to be targeted for revenge. After he won the presidency in 1968, Nixon spent hours plotting revenge against his enemies. Ken Hughes, a researcher with the Miller Center at the University of Virginia, as well as the author of two books on Nixon, said there were three groups Nixon fixated on in particular: Jews, Ivy Leaguers and intellectuals. "He believes that members of all those groups are arrogant, and that they put themselves above the law." In 1971, Charles Colson, a special counsel, known as Nixon's "hatchet man," organized a 20-person list soon approved by John Dean, then chief White House counsel. Dean wrote a confidential memorandum addressing "how we can use the available federal machinery to screw our political enemies." The planned methods included leveraging IRS tax audits, phone-tapping, the cancellation of contracts and even criminal prosecution. Colson's roster featured a diverse group of adversaries: two Democratic congressmen, several reporters, a labor leader, as well as the actor Paul Newman. On June 17, 1972, a team of burglars was arrested at the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate Hotel. The five-member team, nicknamed "the plumbers," was created by the Nixon White House to conduct espionage against perceived foes. After the arrest, the White House stopped harassing opponents and began the long, complicated cover-up of its covert espionage operations. In June 1973, during the opening days of the Senate Watergate Hearings, John Dean revealed the list of "enemies," which had by then expanded to a file "several inches thick." There was bipartisan shock and disgust at the existence of the administration's organized effort to silence political opponents. William F. Buckley, a leading conservative and the editor of The National Review, wrote that the "stealth and brutality" made it "an act of proto-fascism." Because he faced several major restraints, Nixon moved slowly in taking retaliatory actions. For his entire six years in office, the Democrats controlled both chambers of Congress. He was also faced with a powerful and often critical media. The three TV news networks then in existence — ABC, CBS and NBC — all fielded skilled reporters who questioned Nixon directly and cultivated leads in the administration. The Washington Post won a Pulitzer Prize for its fearless reporting on the Watergate scandal. Trump has no such restraints. Today, he enjoys Republican control of both the House of Representatives and the Senate, as well as something Nixon could have only dreamed of: the unconditional support of Fox News, the most-watched TV news outlet. Not to mention the small universe of radio talk show hosts, podcasters and social media personalities who relentlessly cheer Trump on and spew vitriol at liberal opponents. In contrast to Nixon's secret planning, Trump has been boasting about how he would retaliate against his enemies since his first presidential campaign. In 2016, he vowed to prosecute his Democratic opponent, former Secretary of State Hillary Clintion. Trump applauded as crowds of supporters chanted, "Lock her up! Lock her up!" After winning his first election, however, he ultimately did not pursue any legal action against Clinton. Rick Wilson, a veteran Republican campaign advisor, now a vocal Trump critic, compared the two presidents vengeful instincts. "Richard Nixon is typically considered the modern exemplar of a dark and vindictive president," Wilson wrote for The Daily Beast in 2016. "President Trump would be Nixon minus the keen intellect and work ethic." Amid his 2020 campaign, Trump made more than 100 threats against his political opponents. During his 2024 campaign, he repeatedly ranted against Biden. A year prior, he told supporters, "I will appoint a real special prosecutor to go after the most corrupt president in the history of the United States of America, Joe Biden, and the entire Biden crime family." Trump would later amplify false allegations of Rep. Lynne Cheney, R-Wyo. — then the head of a committee investigating the events of Jan. 6, 2021 — being a traitor who should face a military tribunal. In the first 100 days of his administration, Trump has wasted no time taking action against his perceived enemies, including prominent universities, major media outlets and top law firms. He has drastically cut budgets and reportedly fired at least 121,000 workers across 30 federal agencies. The Washington Post reported on April 10 that Trump had crossed "the Rubicon" when he ordered federal investigations of two senior executives from his first administration. The two former security officials, Chris Krebs and Miles Taylor, had spoken out against Trump's false claims of a stolen election in 2020. Most observers expect Attorney General Pam Bondi, who has displayed fierce loyalty to Trump, to follow through. The courts, the third branch of government, remain as one possible check against Trump's campaign of political suppression. So far, the administration has been hit with more 100 lawsuits. On April 19, the Supreme Court ruled against the Trump administration, halting the deportation of Venezuelan migrants. Another factor may be the public's increasing disenchantment with Trump. Noting his falling approval ratings, Karl Rove, the chief political advisor to former President George W. Bush, observed in an April 16 Wall Street Journal editorial that the nation is experiencing "Trump fatigue." "There's way too much retribution," he warned. "Most of the president's revenge attempts will end badly for him. Republicans could rue the day they set a new justification for retaliation from Democrats."
Yahoo
25-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
This university in Massachusetts was just named a 'new Ivy' by Forbes. See where.
While the nation's Ivy League schools — Harvard University, Yale University, Brown University, Dartmouth College, Columbia University, Cornell University, Princeton University and University of Pennsylvania — are perhaps the most prestigious colleges, there are many others around the country rising in exclusivity. Forbes Magazine recently released its annual list of the country's "new Ivies," and one university in Massachusetts made the list. Forbes' annual "new Ivies" ranking includes 10 public and 10 private universities around the country that are "attracting the best and the brightest, and graduating students that are outpacing most Ivy Leaguers in the eyes of employers." Tufts University is one of six colleges that are new to this year's list of "new Ivies." Forbes describes the school as "a crown jewel in greater Boston's crowded higher education market" and is "well-known for its international studies, computer science and pre-med programs." 'Their growing reputation has also expanded their applicant pool, attracting students who once focused solely on the Ivies,' Ivy Link founder Adam Nguyen told Forbes about Tufts and two other schools on the list — Washington University in St. Louis and William & Mary. Tufts was the only school in the Bay State to make this year's list. Last year, Boston College was named a "new Ivy," but it didn't return to the list this year. Forbes said it determined this year's "new Ivies" by compiling a list of colleges based on certain criteria requirements, including size, selectivity and test scores. The schools that met the criteria were voted on in a survey given to employers. The magazine said a large portion of respondents in the survey said they are more likely to hire graduates from non-Ivy League colleges now than they were five years ago. Meanwhile, only 6% of the respondents said they are more likely to hire an Ivy League graduate. "Over the past five years, Ivy League schools have become environments where groupthink is encouraged, dissent is discouraged, and graduates emerge lacking the resilience, adaptability, and practical skills necessary for success in competitive industries," one respondent said. These public universities were named to this year's "new Ivies" list by Forbes: Georgia Institute of Technology Purdue University The University of Texas at Austin United States Military Academy University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign University of Michigan-Ann Arbor University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University of Pittsburgh University of Virginia William & Mary These private universities were named to this year's "new Ivies" list by Forbes: Carnegie Mellon University Emory University Georgetown University Johns Hopkins University Northwestern University Rice University Tufts University University of Notre Dame Vanderbilt University Washington University in St. Louis Melina Khan is a trending reporter for the USA TODAY Network - New England, which serves more than a dozen affiliated publications across New England. She can be reached at MKhan@ This article originally appeared on Tufts University in MA named a 'new Ivy' by Forbes. Here's why
Forbes
26-03-2025
- Politics
- Forbes
The New Ivies 2025: 20 Great Colleges Employers Love
President Donald Trump's attack on what he and others insist is a 'woke' epidemic infecting the nation's higher education system has turned the Ivy League and other elite colleges into pariahs. While still offering rigorous and broad curriculums, these schools have prioritized diversity and inclusion, which the Trump Administration would like to abolish. Trump has not hesitated to wield executive powers, legally and not, to enforce his vision—one that hamstrings research, terminates DEI programs, and prioritizes workforce preparedness. Hundreds of colleges now face steep federal funding cuts, gutted programs and federal investigations. Even the most fiscally fit universities are staring down four years of financial uncertainty. But Trump's personal beef has mostly centered on the Ancient Eight. An example: Last Wednesday, the Trump administration paused $175 million in funding for his alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, because the university had allowed transgender athletes to compete in women's sports before the NCAA changed its policy in 2025. The freeze is 'just a taste of what could be coming down the pipe' for Penn, a White House spokesperson told Fox Business. That same day, Columbia University—the epicenter of pro-Palestinian student protests in 2024 that angered alumni, major donors and others—signaled it would comply with a slew of demands from the White House, including suspending and expelling some protestors and putting its Middle Eastern studies department under review. Earlier this month, the Trump administration cut $400 million in federal funding for the university, claiming university officials failed to address antisemitism on campus. While the ongoing political assault is perhaps the fiercest condemnation of the Ivies, employers share a growing distaste for America's oldest and most venerable colleges. In a Forbes survey answered by more than 380 C-suite inhabitants, vice presidents and other managers, 37% said they are less likely to hire an Ivy League graduate than they were five years ago—up from 33% who said the same last year. Another 12% said they would never hire an Ivy League graduate. Survey respondents pointed to graduates' attitudes and lack of humility as sticking points. 'I believe Ivy League candidates are over valued, and they frequently have a higher than real opinion of themselves,' one C-suite-level respondent wrote. 'Entry-level job candidates should be 'eager to learn, have no ego or be 'stuck-up' because of the school they attended,' said another. So if America's favor is turning away from its most elite private schools, where are employers, students and parents looking instead? For the second year, Forbes New Ivies has selected 10 outstanding public universities and 10 top private schools that are attracting the best and the brightest, and graduating students that are outpacing most Ivy Leaguers in the eyes of employers. These colleges are highly selective—applicants have a one in seven chance, or slimmer, to gain admission to one of the private New Ivies, and a 50% chance or less to enroll at one of the 10 mostly large public universities. And, they accept the best—the private New Ivies admit students with a median SAT score of 1530—slightly higher than the nation's largest Ivy, Cornell University, which has a median SAT score of 1520. The public universities, which educate a combined 396,000 students, admit students with a median SAT score of 1410. Many of these schools are making their second appearance on our list—Johns Hopkins University, Northwestern University and the University of Michigan, for example, continue to impress. But this year, we welcome six newcomers: Washington University in St Louis, Tufts University in Massachusetts; Purdue University in Indiana; the United States Military Academy at West Point; the University of Pittsburgh; and William & Mary in Virginia. Of all the public schools, the United States Military Academy, usually referred to as West Point, scored the highest amongst employers. Given the values instilled into West Point cadets—discipline, leadership, and teamwork, to name a few—it's no surprise. It's tough to compare the academy to any others on our list. Instead of students, West Point enrolls cadets. Instead of traditional academics, most classes are taught by military officers, often with combat experience. Tuition is free for all cadets-who graduate as lieutenants in the U.S. Army, and they must serve five years of active duty and three years in the reserves after graduation. Still, West Point has the trappings of a typical undergraduate college—with an undergraduate enrollment of 4,500, it offers 15 men's and nine women's sports teams, a bucolic campus in New York's Hudson Valley, and a range of study options in the arts and sciences, from English and philosophy to physics and geospatial information science. For students who are looking for an historic college with centuries-old brick buildings and a bucolic campus, William & Mary, founded in 1693, fits the bill. Of the ten public schools on our list, the Williamsburg, Virginia college is the most Ivy-like. The university enrolls about 7,000 undergraduate students—about a thousand shy of Brown and Princeton—and is older than every American college but Harvard. Primarily undergraduate, most students take a well-rounded arts and science curriculum, and the college is home to the oldest American Greek life organizations. Long-time college counselor and certified educational planner Chris Teare thinks of William & Mary as 'a great option for more scholarly students who relish academic rigor,' compared with a fellow New Ivy, the University of Virginia, which is a 'powerhouse pre-professionally and more fully into big-time D1 sports and campus rah-rah.' The two other public New Ivies newcomers—Purdue University and the University of Pittsburgh—better fit the public flagship university mold. Purdue, in West Lafayette, Indiana, enrolls more than 56,000 students (a portion of them who study online), and Pittsburgh enrolls about 35,600 students. New to this year's private New Ivies list, and a crown jewel in greater Boston's crowded higher education market, is Tufts University in Somerville, Massachusetts. The hilltop school, whose alumni include Ebay founder Pierre Omidyar, JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon and singer-songwriter Tracy Chapman enrolls about 6,877 undergraduates and about 5,500 graduate students and is well-known for its international studies, computer science and pre-med programs. Also joining the list of 10 this year is Washington University in St. Louis, a preeminent research university that enrolls about 7,300 undergraduates and 6,900 graduate students, and is lauded for its pre-med programs and Olin Business School. 'Tufts and Wash U have long been immediately in the conversation as 'what's next' for students who want the Ivies but might fall just short,' Teare says. 'Their growing reputation has also expanded their applicant pool, attracting students who once focused solely on the Ivies,' says college counselor Adam Nyguen about Tufts, Washington University and William & Mary. In 2024, William & Mary received 17,799 applications—a 25% increase over 2020 numbers. At Washington University, 2024 was the toughest ever for admissions—13% of the university's 27,900 applicants were admitted. 'Additionally, there is a rising demand for strong undergraduate research programs and faculty mentorship—areas where these universities excel.' To identify which public and private schools are eclipsing the Ivy League, we started with a list of all degree-granting, four-year public and private, not-for-profit colleges in the United States using the most recent data available from the National Center for Education Statistics. We removed the traditional Ivy schools—Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Penn, Princeton and Yale—as well as the four 'Ivy plus' colleges, Stanford, MIT, Duke and the University of Chicago. To be considered for the New Ivies list, colleges had to meet three criteria. First, size: the private schools must enroll at least 3,500 students, and the public colleges 4,000 students. Second, selectivity: private colleges must admit fewer than 20% of their applicants, and public colleges must admit fewer than 50%. And third, high test scores. The private Forbes New Ivies admit students with a median SAT of 1530 and a median ACT of 34. The public schools admit students with a median SAT of 1410 and a median ACT of 32. The schools that met all three criteria were put in front of employers in a survey to subscribers to Forbes' C-suite newsletters. One important caveat: the University of California system—widely considered one of the best state college systems in the country and home to UCLA and the University of California-Berkeley—does not report test scores, and was not considered for this ranking. While many employers have soured on what they consider entitled Ivy League graduates, they are increasingly willing to consider graduates of non-Ivy private colleges and public universities. About a third of Forbes survey respondents say they are more likely to hire graduates from non-Ivy private colleges than they were five years ago, and 38% say the same of public college graduates. Only 6% say they are more likely to hire from the Ivy League. 'The gap between graduates from Ivies and other public/private universities is shrinking,' says one vice president at a company with more than 5,000 employees. 'Public university students seem to exhibit more empathy than others, and passion to innovate and take up steep learning curves to master skills required in current situations is more important.' Four in 10 respondents say the Ivy League schools are doing a worse job at preparing entry-level job candidates than they were five years ago. Three in 10 said the preparation was about the same, and only 8% said the Ivies were improving in that regard. 'In recent years, we have intentionally shifted away from hiring graduates of Ivy League institutions,' wrote one C-suite respondent. 'Over the past five years, Ivy League schools have become environments where groupthink is encouraged, dissent is discouraged, and graduates emerge lacking the resilience, adaptability, and practical skills necessary for success in competitive industries.' Employers were most impressed with the changes at public universities. Forty-two percent said public colleges were doing a better job at preparing entry-level job candidates than they were five years ago. About 30% said it was the same, and 16% said public colleges were doing a worse job. For the non-Ivy privates, 37% of respondents said the schools were doing a better job at preparing entry-level job candidates, 33% said it was about the same, and 17% said it was getting worse. Despite high praise from the business world, our New Ivies are not immune to the political firestorm closing in on colleges. Johns Hopkins University, for example, is the highest-ranked school on our list among employers, but it's also the largest recipient of grant funding from the National Institutes of Health—an agency that recently slashed funding for administrative costs related to university research. Johns Hopkins earned an A+ on this year's Forbes Financial Grades, which is based on fiscal year 2023 data, but 40% of its annual revenues come from federal funding. Even with a $13.5 billion endowment, Johns Hopkins may be forced to shutter research programs, freeze hiring and limit the number of graduate students it enrolls if these trends continue. Last week, masked immigration agents arrested a Georgetown University post-doctoral fellow who is in the country legally, accusing him of spreading Hamas propaganda. Similar threats have been made to scholars at a host of other universities, including Brown and Columbia.
Telegraph
25-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Angry celebrities, ‘unlimited' expenses – life at Vanity Fair in the 1990s
Anna Wintour swooping about in dark glasses; Tina Brown a ringer for the then-Princess of Wales. Editors of glossy magazines seem to lead rarified lives. It must be because they're treated like royal babies, and gain a sense of entitlement. Graydon Carter, skipper of Vanity Fair from 1992 until his retirement in 2017, of this breed, except he's more likeable, perhaps because he's Canadian. As he relates in his new memoir, When the Going was Good, his ancestors had moved from London to Saskatchewan to trap beavers. Carter was born in 1949; during his childhood, there was nothing to do in the snowy wastes save play hockey and admire his father, a pilot, who could fart the entire 'Colonel Bogey March'. Carter watched a lot of The Phil Silvers Show on television. 'Everything I learned about running an office,' he quips, 'I learned from Sergeant Bilko' – who was an amiable and conspiratorial shyster, beloved by his platoon for his guile and chicanery. By these and no doubt other means, and after stints with student journalism, Carter was by 1978 in New York, embarking on a career that would encompass Time, Life, Spy, the New York Observer, Vanity Fair and, latterly, Air Mail. Apart from the latter, what a vanished world it already is: no sign of digital editions, tweets, cell phones, email or laptops. Carter recalls the telex room, pots of pencils, typewriters and carbon paper. Hard copies were laid out by hand with marker pens and glue; the finished item then had to be printed and shipped. What comes over strongly in When the Going Was Good is Carter's love of Manhattan, 'always a magazine city for me', full of Ivy Leaguers and Rhodes Scholars who knew their Wodehouse and Perelman. Outside in the sunshine, Cary Grant was spotted walking up Sixth Avenue. The spry fellow in the tan raincoat was Fred Astaire. Carter readily admits he's an addict for 'showbusiness shmaltz'. During Carter's prime, an apartment in Greenwich Village cost only $220 a month. To this day, he has never needed to use his kitchen, as meals are placed on expense accounts – La Côte Basque, La Grenouille, the Four Seasons. Banquets are always thrown around events and receptions, and if Carter has any advice to offer the reader, it's this: 'The moment dessert arrives, you make a run for it… Never say goodbye.' This sounds rude and ungrateful by Canadian standards, but then Carter normally must attend three cocktail parties a night. It has been one big life of luxury. Long-distance telephone calls are made for free. 'Cars took you home every Friday after the issue closed.' Medical concerns and dry cleaning are taken care of. 'When travelling on business, I stayed at the Connaught in London, the Ritz in Paris, the Hotel du Cap in the South of France.' Los Angeles meant suites at the Chateau Marmont and the Beverly Hills Hotel. (To put this in perspective, last week I was at the Bay Guest House in Margate.) Flights were made on Concorde. 'My passport picture was taken by Annie Leibovitz,' says Carter, unabashedly. The latter, a Vanity Fair regular, was paid millions for her snaps, and had 30 assistants and a catered running buffet in her studio. At Condé Nast, where in 1992 Carter's starting salary was $600,000, 'the budget had no ceiling'. That same year, for example, Norman Mailer was paid $50,000 for an article on the Democratic National Convention, which was spiked. He was paid another $50,000 not to write an article on the Republican National Convention. Flowers were sent to contributors 'at an astounding rate'. There were interest-free loans for staff – including two dozen fact-checkers – to buy their houses and apartments. 'Even moving costs were covered by the company.' Carter himself moved into the Dakota, on Manhattan's Upper West Side, where he was visited by Princess Margaret. He still lives in the city, and has other properties in Connecticut and the South of France. As regards the actual contents of his titles – owned by Si Newhouse, 'the greatest billionaire magazine proprietor of all time' – Carter had a nose or eye for feuds, scoops and scandals, or what he calls 'literate sensationalism'. His pages identified 'Deep Throat', of the Watergate saga. He exposed Michael Jackson's serial sexual abuse, and Mohamed al-Fayed's predatory behaviour at Harrods. He published an account of the Hatton Garden jewel heist, and gave space to Dominick Dunne, who was paid half a million dollars a year for his courtroom reports, 'plus generous expenses and months of free and continuous accommodation'. Carter revered Christopher Hitchens, who 'smoked even when in the shower' and consequently died of cancer at 62. Investigative journalism is all very well, but what readers want from the glossies is froth, and Condé Nast was peerless at sophisticated shallowness. For instance: one piece explained how 'in New York there is an inverse relationship between a woman's dress size and the size of her apartment. A size two gets a fourteen-room apartment. A size 14 gets a two-room apartment.' That kind of philosophy would today be blamed for precipitating body dysmorphia. Carter was expected to attend fashion shows in the days of fur. 'Do you know how many animals had to die for you to wear that coat?' yelled a protester outside one such event. 'Do you know how many animals I had to f--k to get this coat?' retorted a model. I agree with Carter that that was pretty good. Nothing pushed up sales more than celebrities. Carter's job came mostly to entail organising the Vanity Fair Oscars party, which required 'more movie stars per square inch than any party in the world'. Yet what a lot of avaricious blockheads they were, pickpocketing the toiletries, glassware and ashtrays. Adrien Brody, Carter says, was intercepted stealing an electrical candle lamp, and is still apologising, in his 'charming' way, now. But Carter is funny about the true luminaries he has encountered. Gore Vidal fails to see the irony over suing because he's been called 'litigious'; Kurt Vonnegut tells Carter 'if you don't already have cancer, I hope you get it'; and when Richard Gere looks like he's about to punch someone, Carter observes that this is 'a strange way for a Buddhist to handle a situation'. Carter himself enjoys needling Donald Trump, calling him a 'short-fingered vulgarian' who had a cashmere sweater cut up the back with scissors because he refused to pull it over his head and disturb his 'elaborately assembled confection of hair'. Like Jane Austen's Emma, Carter, 75, has had very little to distress or vex him. When the Going Was Good is very breezy, almost complacent. For balance, readers might seek out Toby Young's brilliant How To Lose Friends and Alienate People, which covers the same period and the same ground – white vinegar to Carter's white sugar. In the film adaptation of Young's memoir, Carter is played by Jeff Bridges, who in the clips I saw seems to be giving an unkind impersonation of Jan Morris. Carter, splendidly in on the joke about his bouffant hair-do, has said the person he actually resembles is Barbara Bush.
