Unquestionably

The U of M paid Nikole Hannah-Jones $50K to speak at the U – and complied with a demand to conceal the evidence (emphasis added by me):

Hannah-Jones participated in a Dec. 6 “moderated discussion” as part of the Humphrey School of Public Affairs Distinguished Carlson Lecture Series.

According to a contract obtained by Alpha News, the university paid Hannah-Jones’ agents $50,000 for her appearance on campus. The contract prohibited the university from recording the live event, which some school officials took issue with.

“Is the no recording item firm? I would like to remove that if possible. I am looking at one of our local news reporters for the moderator, and we’ve had great success with replaying the conversation via Minnesota Public Radio when we use their hosts. This, along with providing the recording to classrooms for instruction and discussion is important to us,” wrote Gail Fridlund, an events manager with the Humphrey School of Public Affairs.

But of course, the U acquiesced.

Tom Gagnon, executive vice president of the Lavin Agency, said “that provision is firm” but offered to explain the “good” reasons for the recording prohibition.

“I don’t want folks to think she’s being a diva!” he said in a later email.

The university ultimately agreed to prohibit recording and covered the costs of Hannah-Jones’ travel and lodging expenses.

Those “good reasons” are none other than you and me – taxpayers with the capacity for critical thinking. They’ve seen what happens when the plebs see how the grift works.

If someone knows someone with a samizdat recording, let me know.

10 thoughts on “Unquestionably

  1. If the U paid a speaker & had the rights to record & distribute the talk, they would get something tangible for their money (e.g., intellectual property).
    As it is, the money paid to Hannah-Jones was a pure payoff.
    They got nothing of value in return for their $50k. They would have gotten as much value for their money if she had just said “blah blah blah” on stage for an hour.

  2. I see she won the Walter Duranty Fraudulence in Journalism Award in 2020 for her work on the chimerical “1619 Project”. Notre Dame and UNC ought to be so proud….

    Really, one would have hoped that after her major project was so thoroughly debunked, that the Pulitzer committee would have withdrawn the award, but no such luck, evidently.

  3. UMMP;
    I agree with you.

    This little grifter and her grifter handlers, are worried that recordings of her spewing her ridiculous stance, could be used by their critics to further skewer them, which is what they deserve.

  4. I once had the responsibility at work of bringing in speakers for large client events. Speaking is a great gig if you’re an “expert” – you get your expenses covered, roll up and deliver your canned presentation, pick up your check (we played in the $10k – $30k range), and move on to the next nice hotel in a warm climate and do it again. (I wish I had some expertise to hang my hat on.)

    We’d negotiate for sharing rights; typically speakers were ok if we let attendees access the full recorded presentation afterwards to share with others, but no wide-spread distribution or YouTube posting allowed. After all, if your “product” is your presentation, why should others get it for free on YouTube?

    (The only time we really felt burned, btw, was when we selected Bill Bradley as one of our speakers because 1) he was a name, and 2) we thought he had some background related to the overall topics of the conference. We made it clear in advance where we thought his experience and insight would tie in. He didn’t return calls leading up to the event to go over details, and then showed up 15 minutes before his speaking time and asked my event coordinator (who met him in the resort lobby), “What do you want me to talk about?” He then did 40 minutes of his same old stories, didn’t take questions, and was back to the limo. Cost: $35k. If the topic of the conference had been Grift in D.C., though, he’d have been perfect.) I think everyone at the conference learned something, though.

  5. but no wide-spread distribution or YouTube posting allowed

    Yea,, I make sure to have my counters sign in blood that my presentations would be kept for paid participants only and yet they invariably show up on different platforms. Pisses me off to no end, especially when I find my content plagiarized without attribution. So I’m with Mitch, there has to be a samizdat version out there.

  6. Politicians are mostly lawyers, they know how to best hide graft. This is true for both D’s and R’s.
    Ideally you want someone to be able to bribe without the cash transfer having an objectively measurable value. If you give a politician $100k, that bad. But suppose you buy $100k worth of their stupid memoir and donate the book to libraries across the US? This is why making all state and fed politicians tax returns would be a good thing.
    Another bribe dodge is speaking fees. If you pay a person $100k to give a twenty minute speech, how can you prove that is a payoff and not just a fair value exchange of bux?
    take Hunter Biden’s artwork. He spends an afternoon painting something, a buyer gives him $100k for it. How can you prove that is a bribe to the Biden crime family & not just an art collector making an investment?
    You know Slow Joe has a granddaughter he will never mention. This is the child of Hunter Biden and a stripper named Lunden Roberts. The child’s name, whom Biden will never mention and whom the press never ask either Biden about, is named Navy Joan Roberts.
    Lunden Roberts has a right to know the details of Hunter Biden’s finances because she has a claim to child support from Hunter Biden.
    Lunden Robert’s lawyers want to know the details of the sales of Hunter Biden’s paintings so she can get her cut. And it is all moving through the courts.
    It is all just . . . sordid, but then, “sordid” describes the lives of the Biden clan perfectly. Slow Joe has no talent as a lawyer or as a politician. It’s all just graft.

  7. Pingback: In The Mailbox: 01.06.23 : The Other McCain

  8. Hunter is the worst example of a grifter, but Buttplug is a close second. The difference is, Buttplug is actually paid by the taxpayer directly, without the Big Guy middleman.

  9. Well, Elaine Chao (aka Mrs Mitch McConnell) was Trump’s secretary of transportation. The swamp is both wide and deep. At time it resembles an ocean.

  10. The U of M is a total clown show, run by clowns for clowns. Sadly, it’s no different from any of the myriad of woke institutions now polluting the minds of impressionable youth.

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