Changing the name of Confederate Drive at Ole Miss is violation of state law

    There's a little glitch in Ole Miss Chancellor Dan Jones' plan to desecrate the memory of our Confederate War dead by changing the name of the spur road that serves to access the cemetery. He announced plans last Friday to change the name of the road from Confederate Drive to Chapel Lane.
    Such a name change is apparently against the law.
    Mississippi Code 55-15-81 provides that most streets named in honor of military units, organizations or events may not be renamed. This would certainly include a street serving a Confederate cemetery, named in memory of the men interred therein.
    Dan Jones has shown an unwillingness to adhere to the Ole Miss Creed regarding civil discourse. His hatred of Ole Miss and its history is so great that now he wants to break the law to erase memorials to the dead. Isn't it time we had a chancellor who would adhere to the Ole Miss Creed and obey the law?

    The relevant code section reads as follows:

(1) None of the following items, structures or areas may be relocated, removed, disturbed, altered, renamed or rededicated: Any Revolutionary War, War of 1812, Mexican-American War, War Between the States, Spanish-American War, World War I, World War II, Korean War, Vietnam War, Persian Gulf War, War in Iraq or Native American Wars statues, monuments, memorials or nameplates (plaques), which have been erected on public property of the state or any of its political subdivisions, such as local, municipal or county owned public areas, and any statues, monuments, memorials, nameplates (plaques), schools, streets, bridges, buildings, parks preserves, reserves or other public items, structure or areas of the state or any of its political subdivisions, such as, local, municipal or county owned public areas, which have been dedicated in memory of, or named for, any historical military figure, historical military event, military organization or military unit.

UPDATE AND ADDENDUM: In the space of 10 hours this has become the second-most-read post I've had on this blog, as determined by direct click-throughs. Of course, I do have a few regular readers who just type in the blog name (in fact, I think this is becoming more common).

I really did not come up with this idea on my own. Someone posted a comment on Facebook which cited a Senate or House bill, not the code section. I read this on my phone, and when I tried to find the post on my computer I couldn't. I wanted to give whoever it was credit. But to whoever it was, next time cite the code section! You made me do some work. Also, my good friend John Cofield said he was aware of this information for the past few days and was just waiting for someone to publish it.

Longtime sportswriter Caldwell says Dan Jones needs to go

    Longtime sports writer and former sports editor for the DeSoto Times-Tribune Ron Caldwell called for Ole Miss Chancellor Dan Jones' replacement in a column that appeared in the Friday, Oct. 28 edition.
    The column, entitled "Back to the Future for Ole Miss," begins as follows:

I have covered Ole Miss sports for more than 35 years. I received an undergraduate and graduate degree from Ole Miss and spent hard-earned money doing it. I worked at Ole Miss in media and public relations.

I have out-lasted football coaches Johnny Vaught, Billy Kinard, Ken Cooper, Steve Sloan, Billy Brewer, Joe Lee Dunn (sort of), Tommy Tuberville, David Cutcliffe and Ed Orgeron.

I have out-lasted chancellors J.D. Williams, Porter Fortune, Gerald Turner and Robert Khayat.

Ditto for athletic directors Johnny Vaught, Warner Alford, Pete Boone (round one) and John Schaffer.

And, let’s not even mention basketball and baseball coaches.

I have also out-lasted Johnny Reb (in a real Confederate outfit), Colonel Rebel and the ill-fated Traveler the horse, as well as the Rebel flag, “Dixie,” “From Dixie with Love,” cars tailgating in the Grove, panty raids and streaking.

I have ranged from the inconvenience of almost no restaurants, motels and stores to today’s horrendously, contemptible over-commercialization.

So, what’s the point other than to demonstrate that I’m old?

After seeing it almost all at Ole Miss and experiencing almost every conceivable emotion as a Rebel, I have some ideas of what needs to happen at “paradise on earth.”

First, Dan Jones needs to go as Chancellor. . . more

    You can click on the title above to read the rest of the column. I should note that Caldwell is not alone in suggesting that Jones simply is not up to the job of Chancellor of a major university. Many, if not most, Ole Miss alumni feel that he is way over his head.
    Jones has no one but himself to blame for this mess. It was he who chose to let the Pete Boone situation fester, and to send out an outrageous letter filled with falsehoods and name-calling. It was he who has taken part in public meetings where those who dared to disagree with him were slandered. Most people simply find this behavior repugnant and want no affiliation with a chancellor who is going to behave in such an uncivil manner.
    It takes courage to speak truth to power, but Ron Caldwell has done so. Dan Jones can turn things around both for Ole Miss and for himself. But to do that he has to set his ego aside and start listening to the great mass of alumni and students that he is supposed to serve. If he just can't or won't do this, then he does need to go.

New Forward Rebels release devastating to Pete Boone, Dan Jones

    The Forward Rebels organization has come out with some new information that is absolutely devastating to Ole Miss Chancellor Dan Jones and Athletic Director Pete Boone. To say this newly released info paints them in a bad light is an understatement.
    In the newest post on its website, called "The Case Against Pete Boone," Forward Rebels presents an actual letter written in 2009 by a major donor to Ole Miss Chancellor Dan Jones, in which he carefully outlines problems with the Ole Miss athletic program. I'll get to some of the contents of the letter in a minute, or you can read it for yourself. But after the letter was written the donor got an email from John Hartwell, Senior Executive Associate Athletics Director, informing him that because of his letter he would not be allowed to travel with the team for the upcoming year, even though his large donations apparently entitled him to.
    Also included is a letter written in March 2011, from 161 major supporters expressing similar concerns. This group in particular wanted the physical education major to be immediately restored, as all coaches have requested, and for an outside consulting firm to do a thorough review of the athletics department. Jones gave them a hem-haw about the phys-ed major and told them he had already done a thorough review when he took office, and Pete hires consultants all the time. Of course, the idea is not to have consultants hired by Pete!
    When Pete Boone has acted so maliciously towards a major donor, how can Dan Jones claim that he is the victim of "malicious" attacks -- of which he has been unable to identify one? How can Dan Jones say that the demands of Forward Rebels are being made by anonymous people when he's met with them and exchanged correspondence with them?
    There are a couple of things in the lengthy letter to Dan Jones that just pop off the page. One is that Pete Boone apparently interferes with and tries to micro-manage all of the coaches. Relations between Boone and football coach Houston Nutt are so strained that John Hartwell was hired specifically to work as a go-between to smooth things out. It hasn't worked very well. Boone is by all accounts a jerk, and sending a proxy over to do his jerky meddling doesn't make things any better.
    You might remember the lawsuit filed a couple of months ago by former Ole Miss Coach David Saunders. See Former Ole Miss coach serves notice of claim. Saunders claims that he was offered a job by Nutt and that the job fell through because Boone didn't like him. He says in the suit that the reason Boone didn't like him was because he wanted to recruit students with severe learning disabilities.
    Now I pointed out in my earlier post that a "severe learning disability" is often a fancy way of saying "low IQ." And if Saunders' claim is true, I might very well side with Boone, in that I would rather try to recruit really smart players than really dull ones. But in the end I would want to recruit players who could play football, regardless, and if that means recruiting a struggling player, so be it. And the AD shouldn't be going around behind the coach's back undercutting his decisions.
    What the David Saunders story tells us, if true, is that Boone is getting heavily involved in all of Houston Nutt's decisions. This is backed up by the letter from the big donor to Chancellor Jones. This is no way to run a football team! We have a problem and it is Pete Boone.
    There is a second tib-bit of information in the letter from the big donor to the chancellor. This is really only a rumor or concern that the big donor had, but he had apparently heard that checks were being written from the athletic department to the academic department, possibly taking funds that were legally allocated or donated to athletics and improperly transferring them to academics. Obviously just a concern, but sunshine is the best disinfectant, and it's time for a complete audit of the athletic department budget to properly account for these funds. It's a matter of public record, and we deserve to know where this money is going.
    There was one more bit of bad news for Pete Boone on Monday. Former Ole Miss standout and current K.C. Chief Jerrell Powe, who struggled for two years to gain academic admission to college, posted a letter on his Facebook page which is highly critical of Boone. Said Powe: "While you would think Mr. Boone would want me to go to school, and even more to play for Ole Miss, he was, if anything, discouraging to me during my struggle. Although many are familiar with Mr. Boone's desire to keep me out, I have held it back for a while." You can read the entire letter on the Forward Rebels Facebook page, as it has been reposted.
    If you read the David Saunders Notice of Suit, it's pretty obvious that Jerrell Powe was likely one of the players that Saunders was recruiting and working with.
    There are a lot of threads to this whole affair, but they all come back to point zero: Pete Boone needs to go.

We can thank Dan Jones and Pete Boone for new Delta State ad

ADDENDUM 10-22: A reader comments that the ad below looks like a Photoshop production rather than an actual newspaper ad. It's been posted on Facebook and no doubt sent by email, but hopefully hasn't made an appearance in print. Plenty will see it, however, as Facebook is as good as any newspaper these days.

    If you don't believe Chancellor Dan Jones and Athletic Director Pete Boone are harming Ole Miss, just take a look at this ad, apparently placed by Delta State University. Delta State has been enjoying remarkable success with their Division II football program and is currently ranked first in the nation.
    Jones is known for his remarkably uncivil discourse, which is harmful to the Ole Miss family. His refusal to do the right thing and either have Boone resign or fire Boone is harming not only the athletic program but the entire school.
    The quality of a football team shouldn't matter when students decide where they will attend college, but it does. Everyone enjoys the thrill of victory. Ole Miss has been getting a remarkable amount of good press as the most beautiful campus and the best tailgating school in the nation. Unfortunately, Ole Miss was also rated as having one of the worst 10 football teams in the nation by ESPN.
    Pete Boone is harming our school by his inability to manage an athletic program and his refusal to resign. Chancellor Jones is harming our school by his refusal to do his job and fire Boone and his uncivil behavior. While these two prance and bray like jackasses, the Ole Miss family -- and our football team -- continue to lose.

(Click on the photo, perhaps twice, to enlarge)

University speakers compare Forward Rebels to violent segregationists; Dan Jones basks in it

    I just returned from a ceremony honoring James Silver, who was a professor from the 1940s until 1965. He was a supporter of integration and was essentially chased from the Ole Miss campus. I wrote about the plans a couple of days ago.
    I didn't think my opinion of Ole Miss Chancellor Dan Jones could get any lower, but it has. Journalism professor Curtis Wilke described attacks on Silver by the Klan-like Rebel Undereground newspaper and Citizens Council. He praised Silver for standing up to these attacks. He then introduced Chancellor Dan Jones, and compared the Forward Rebels movement lobbying for a new athletic director to the Rebel Underground, Citizens Council, and segregation supporters, and praised Jones for standing firm.
    Jones had every opportunity to call for civility and point out that the Forward Rebels movement had nothing to do with any of these groups, but he didn't. Instead, he essentially ratified Wilke's comments by saying nothing, and going into a long spiel about about how the Ole Miss administration today stands firm against efforts to interfere with academic freedom. It was an obvious allusion to efforts by alumni to get Jones to fire athletic director Pete Boone. Earth to Dan Jones: The athletic director is not an academic post!
    William Winter, who has written a letter against Forward Rebels, then gave a fine talk as he always does. But when he described those who attempted to prevent Hodding Carter from speaking on campus he referred to them as "Forward Rebel types."
    The purpose of Forward Rebels is to push for improvements in the athletic department, including the firing of Pete Boone. I'm sure some supporters would like to have the Col. Rebel mascot back; most Ole Miss fans would. But as a practical matter that ship has sailed. That's not what the group is about.
    For university speakers to take advantage of a public forum to paint members of Forward Rebels as Klansmen, Citizens Council members and segregationists is a sign of just how desperate these people are becoming. Dan Jones knows he is losing and is adopting a scorched earth policy is a last-ditch effort to win.
     The Forward Rebels corporate structure is in a bit of disarray right now but the alumni-at-large don't care. There are almost 6,000 Facebook supporters and growing who support getting rid of Pete Boone and making other changes. If Dan Jones keeps up his despicable behavior he may need to go, too.
     It's time for Curtis Wilke, Dan Jones and William Winter to offer formal apologies for these outrageous comments. A failure to do so would be an act of incivility.