Your civic duty. A while back, we mused that more of you tuned into President Barack Obama’s State of the Union Address than would do the same for Sunday’s Super Bowl. Whether you decide to root for the Seahawks, Patriots or for Katy Perry, we challenge you to prove us wrong.
All the more reason. You can also root for Yale — Pat Graham ’01 will be on the sidelines Sunday as the Patriots’ linebackers coach. A Connecticut native, Graham is no stranger to the big stage, having played for the Elis’ 1999 Ivy League championship squad and, more recently, coached the Patriots during their last Super Bowl appearance three years ago.
Press pressure. Major personalities with Yale ties collided on national television last night, when Anderson Cooper ’89 hosted New York Times columnist Charles Blow on his show, Anderson Cooper 360, to discuss last week’s on-campus incident between Blow’s son, Tahj Blow ’16, and a Yale Police officer.
The other guys. Meanwhile, a story on the New Haven Police Department could re-emerge: Having dealt with the consequences of a confrontation with a Yale Bowl usher last fall, NHPD Chief Dean Esserman may soon have to answer to allegations that he similarly lost his temper in an exchange with Secret Service agents during First Lady Michelle Obama’s visit to Connecticut in October.
A natural selection. A recent article by The Onion chose (real) Ecology and Evolutionary Biology professor Richard Prum as the expert source for commentary on its (fake) story: “Natural Selection Kills 38 Quadrillion Organisms in Bloodiest Day Yet.”
Not The Onion. Back in the serious news world, the Wall Street Journal reported last night that the University of Texas (the entire school system) has passed Yale in the national university endowment rankings. Right: Everything’s bigger in Texas.
Remember him? George W. Bush ’68, in many ways a bridge between Yale and Texas, once ran this country with a certain Dick Cheney as his right-hand man. Today, the former VP and one-time Yalie turns 74-years-old.
Go Greek. So says world-famous ECON 116 professor Robert Shiller, according to Bloomberg. The Nobel Prize winner has a hunch that investors should capitalize on cheap Greek stocks in light of the country’s plans to renegotiate its debts.
THIS DAY IN YALE HISTORY 2014 Yale upgrades to a new campus-wide security technology system.
Follow the News on Twitter. @yaledailynews