Duke gets two new trustees

The Chronicle reported that two new trustees are joining the board, as well as two junior trustees with observer status.

✔ Fact Checker here.

Yale has just gotten a new member of its governing board too, and allow me, please, to quote from the official university news release:

"Yale graduates from around the world have elected renowned pediatric surgeon and educator Dr. Francisco Cigarroa ’79 B.S. to serve........."

Yes, there were three candidates. A choice!!

The candidates spoke to their fellow Yalies. They told them of their dreams for the school, where they stood on issues. And then the alumni actually voted actually voted from among the choices and selected the best!!!!!!!!!

Compare that please with the clandestine process that brought Dukies two new trustees. Conducted behind closed doors, the two were put forth by the Brodhead Admnistration and were approved by by the lemmings on the current board of trustees at their meeting last December (not in May as Chronicle states), and then submitted for the charade of ratification by either the Methodist Church or the alumni leadership.

Fact Checker tried to find out in December who had been selected. We tried to find out again after the alumni leadership ratified. And the Allen Building Gang kept it secret -- not because there is any reason to, but because that's the way they think and that's their penchant.

Fellow Dukies, all this should change!!!!!!!!!!! Revolution!!!!!!!

Loyal Readers will recall my prediction that Bill Gross would be elected. Stay tuned, we'll get him some day, unavoidable as we move into a high gear fund-raising campaign. He's the West Coast bond guru who parlayed Duke dorm poker games -- and his uncanny ability to analyze the risk of making a bet -- into becoming a multi-billionaire. Quite a colorful guy too -- for example he spent more than $30 million for a beach house -- and is now tearing it down to use the land to put up his own dream. Hey, if you got it, go for it.

✔Bishoop Hope Morgan Ward.

Her election as a trustee is best viewed as a sop to the Methodist Church. While clearly qualified in her own right, Fact Checker believes Ward bubbled to the top because we have lost, or are about to lose in the next expiration of Trustee terms, three church stalwarts: retired Bishop J. Lawrence McClesky, Rev. Clarence Newsome who is the former President of Shaw University in Raleigh, and Rev. Charles Smith who has been pastor in residence at Duke Divinity School.

Keeping the myth alive that this is a Methodist institution!!

✔Laurene Sperling

Though the Chronicle story on Sperling doesn't mention her husband, Fact Checker believes he's a good reason for her rise from an obscure Library advisory panel to the top governing body. Scott Sperling is a heavy hitter in the financial world, co-president of Thomas H. Lee Partners -- THL for those in the know -- a vast private equity firm in Boston. Enormous bucks. Mansion north of Boston.

If that script sounds familiar, Duke followed it too with Martha Monserrate, neglecting to tell us that her spouse is Herbert Hardinge McDade, president of Lehman Brothers before its collapse. Enormous bucks. Mansion in Great Gatsby country.

The Sperlings met as MBA students at Harvard and have been very very loyal there, writing regular big checks not only to the B-school but to the Harvard medical school's teaching hospital. Their other big contributions have been to Jewish charities, with Fact Finder uncovering no indication that Scott's undergraduate alma mater, Purdue, has gotten gravy. So far as I can trace -- and I'm pretty good at these things -- the first six digit contribution to Duke came three years ago.

Loyal Readers, watch for more!

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