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Now!
I have received the report of the Investigative
Committee of the University of Colorado and consider it a travesty.
This "investigation" has all along been a pretext
to punish me for engaging constitutionally-protected speech and,
more generally, to discredit the sorts of alternative historical
perspective I represent.
There is blatant conflict of
interest involved. Interim Chancellor DiStefano, who has consistently
and publicly declared his bias against me, has served from the
outset as both "complainant" and judge.
Despite my repeated requests
for an investigation conducted by unbiased experts, the committee
was composed primarily of CU insiders. Although both were available
and willing to serve, the investigative panel included neither
American Indian scholars nor persons competent in American Indian
Studies.
To all appearances the committee
was composed with an eye toward precluding
the involvement of individuals knowledgeable in my discipline,
as well as the context of indigenous history and belief that
I have quite consistently brought to bear in my scholarship.
As a result, it was necessary
to devote much of the 120-day investigative period, not to examining
"the facts" at issue in my case, but to acquainting
the committee with some of the most rudimentary procedures employed
in American Indian Studies. Had qualified individuals been included
on the panel, this preemption of my ability to respond to substantive
matters would not have occurred.
Although the rules allow for
extensions of the "deadline" for reporting, and despite
the fact that I repeatedly requested an additional 30 days in
which to formulate adequate responses to the highly complex and
steadily-changing questions posed by the committee, the committee
declined to allow any extension whatsoever.
The upshot is that the committee's
report is often self-contradictory. It frequently misrepresents
or conflicts with the evidence presented. In many respects,
it is patently false.
As things stand, the entire
procedure appears to be little more than a carefully-orchestrated
effort to cast an aura of legitimacy over an entirely illegitimate
set of predetermined outcomes.
It follows that I reject and
will vigorously contest each and every finding of misconduct.
Now
Available
from CounterPunch Books!
The Case
Against Israel
By Michael Neumann
CounterPunch
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