This satirical take on Tom Friedman by two Columbia undergrads on how the Times columnist might cover the university’s continued expansion across New York’s Upper West Side is one of the funniest things I’ve read in a long time.
A terrible storm is brewing—a bubble, if you will—in a territory
uncomfortably close to our allies. Our open society is at stake if we
do not rise to address the threat of the property bubble enveloping
Manhattanville. Columbia University is a force for good in the world—a
green-friendly power hoping to globalize upper Manhattan and bring
prosperity and openness to the native people in this flat world.I met Brandon, an astounding young man, on my recent trip to what
was South Harlem. He is a Columbia University student who, like all of
our allies in Morningside Heights, has already benefited from our
generous policies in the post-1968 world. Despite what those who
opposed Columbia’s gentrification efforts—let’s call them the “Property
Generation”—would have you believe, Columbia has brought a green
revolution and a jobs revolution to the neighborhood.This “Property Generation” needs to take a lesson from China and
India, where the principles of civic and social responsibility are
merging with the technology boom. The next six months—which will be the
decisive test for Columbia’s Manhattanville strategy—are the most
important six months in Columbia history. Now is not the time to give
up hope in the gentrification revolution. In six months we will find
out whether we have liberated a neighborhood from the property bubble
and brought security to both our allies in Morningside Heights and the
natives of Manhattanville.
Read the whole uproarious thing here. Just the thing to ring in the New Year.
