FW: [Husker] The Family

[Steve Reichenbach]

> HP still needs fired.  The cancer will not be gone until he is run out
> of town - for being so exceptionally stupid.  STUPID.  STUPID.  STUPID.
> Accountability is absolutely necessary to keep people from repeating 
> stupid mistakes.  This entire soap opera was based on stupidity.  We
> must root out stupidity.  Stab it through the heart.  Fire HP.

I can't tell if this is based on (a) a lack of understanding of the
role of the chancellor or (b) an over-reaction to something not going
as desired.

Having worked at the university for a long time, now as a professor
and formerly as department chair, I have seen several chancellors.
The chancellor is very important to the university; Perlman is an
excellent chancellor.  Firing him would be bad for the institution
internally (as it would be viewed as a stupid move about something
that isn't even at core mission of the institution), it would be
perceived by the wider academic community outside the university as
a boneheaded and misguided action, and UNL would likely get someone
who is less successful (especially given that subsequent candidates
would be wary of an institution whose top academic officers were
subject to the success of the football program) in running the
university.

That said, Perlman isn't perfect.  He made a big mistake in letting
Pederson, who looked to be a pretty good hire coming in, run the
athletic depeartment as he wanted.  I complained in email to him
(but he wasn't convinced).  Then, he was convinced by last season's
success, the pre-season hype, which had NU rated (and so was not so
foolish), and Pederson's say-so, that all was going well.

He made some mistakes.  So, why don't we fire him like we did with
Devaney in 1968 and Osborne (take your pick 1978 or 1990) and Solich
in 2003?  Oh wait, we weren't always so short-sighted to as to fire
someone doing a good job when things weren't perfect.  Sometimes,
we looked at the bigger picture before firing one of the "family".

Take a look at the big picture before you jump from the frying pan.
Haven't we learned _that_ lesson in the last five years?  (I'm
afraid the answer is no.)