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Nesbitt on U of Nike, Knight on Penn State

8/20/2013: This man gets a t-shirt! Fortunately it looks like Kitzhaber responded to Knight by appointing a pretty reasonable UO Board. From today’s Op-Ed in the Oregonian:

… When we deal with public funds, we debate trade-offs and opportunity costs. But we tend to ignore these issues when we deal with private money. Still, the trade-offs are there, if not in dollars, then in time, attention and image. For every national headline, every discussion at the legislature and every student tour on campus that focuses on the new football palace, we highlight the entertainment aspect of our university rather than its education and research. 

The appointment of new university boards is timely. We shouldn’t give up on pursuing private support for our public universities. But we should expect community leaders who serve on these boards to place academics above entertainment. Oh, and if there’s any renaming to be done at the UO, we should open the bidding at $7 billion. 

Tim Nesbitt writes on public affairs, has served as an adviser to Govs. Ted Kulongoski and John Kitzhaber, and is past president of the Oregon AFL-CIO.

And here’s Phil Knight’s speech to the Penn State boosters on Joe Paterno, whom he called their “real trustee.”

        <a href="http://msn.foxsports.com/video?videoid=a4f05d91-a347-4968-93eb-60b3c15e5069&#038;src=v5:embed::" target="_new" title="Nike's Knight rips PSU Trustees">Video: Nike&#8217;s Knight rips PSU Trustees</a>

5 Comments

  1. Anonymous 08/20/2013

    The video of Knight is 1) years old, 2) unrelated to the story, 3) something you’ve posted many times before, and 4) made before all the facts were known.

    The Bill Harbaugh smear train chugs on.

    • Anonymous 08/20/2013

      You don’t get it, Jim. Knight is unchanging. Sort of like God, you know? That video is no less relevant than the day it was captured.

      (You on the other hand… )

    • Anonymous 08/20/2013

      You are mentally ill.

    • Anonymous 08/20/2013

      The books, after Knight dies and the knives come out, will reveal a lot about the “Just Do It Nike Culture.”

    • Anonymous 08/21/2013

      That “mentally ill” line cracks me up, Jim. I love it when you come out swinging.

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