Asbury Park Press: Cultural showdown at OCC

Wow! Kudos to you, Bill Handleman!

In this piece from today's Asbury Park Press, Mr. Handleman takes a position in support of Prof. Karen Bosley and the Viking News while taking several shots at Ocean County College President Jonathan Larson, V.P. Tara Kelly and its board of trustees.

Here is an excerpt:

Anyway, I was granted an audience with the president only because I sweet-talked the watchdog. Tara Kelly, a young vice president in charge of riding herd on the media, initially had balked at my request to speak with her boss. She told me he was too busy. She could answer any questions I had. There wasn't much of a story anyway. But if I insisted, she would supply me with any background I needed. That's the way it works, she said.

"I've been doing this a long time, you know," she assured me in a most condescending manner.

I then told her that I would be writing a column with or without any input from her boss, that I would most certainly mention that he didn't have time to see me, and that I, too, had been "doing this a long time."

"Just a minute," she said, and put me on hold.

Moments later, she was back. It was a miracle. She had found a free half-hour in Larson's busy schedule, and he'd agreed to meet with me. Oh, happy days.

[EDITOR'S NOTE: Unfortunately, Ms. Kelly and I are both products of Rider University. I don't know who she had for her public relations courses, but none of my professors taught the tactics she employs...it's disgraceful and an embarrassment to me as a fellow Rider grad.]

Here's another excerpt...

"It was never about content," Larson said, restating his position. "It was never about the First Amendment. It was about her performance. It's time to move the newspaper into the 21st century."

He went on to say that no one pays attention to a student newspaper anyway. "We don't care what they write," he said, adding that "it's a shame to see the professional media can't put this in proper perspective."

Take The New York Times. What were they thinking, running an editorial just last week, titled "Censorship 101"? Dead issue. Tara Kelly told me so.

There are many more great passages in Mr. Handleman's piece, so I encourage you to read the full story.