#by accepting a massive donation from some rich white guy who

[chain-unchained]

July 11

Summer was well and truly upon the valley by the time of the Luau, making the escape to the beach for the festival a welcome relief from what would be the hottest day of the year; the salty breeze coming off of the ocean helped to cool the festival area down to manageable levels, but it was still hot enough to be quite uncomfortable. Still, that didn’t stop Pelican Town’s inhabitants from flocking towards the delicious scent of food wafting up from the shores. 

Carrying a platter of stuffed tomatoes, Ashe nervously made his way there himself; even though he thought he was an okay cook he’d never had other people try something he’d made before. The fact that this was the first time he’d attended a Luau only compounded his anxiety, even though he kept telling himself it was going to be fine and he would have a good time. If things got to be too much, he could always just hang out with Shane, since Shane tended to stay away from everyone anyway.

The beach was lively, decorated with a sort of tiki theme to give it a tropical vibe. The star of the whole affair, the massive potluck, was being lovingly tended to by Marnie in the middle of the beach, with Mayor Lewis and an unfamiliar, portly man standing nearby, watching and chatting with one another. Off to the left, a makeshift dance floor had been set up south of Elliot’s hut, with a pair of massive speakers pumping out some beachy dance numbers; there were several people enjoying the setup, including Jas and Vincent who were doing a very cute little dance together—but they were almost completely overshadowed by Emily, who was performing such an elaborate jig that it was hard to tell if she was just having fun, completely drunk off her rocker, or was in the middle of a strange seizure.

Off to the right, meanwhile, was the buffet, setup in a series of long tables covered in pristine white tableclothes and laden with delicious looking food. Just from a quick glance, it was clear to see what was home-cooked food from the likes of Marnie, Jodi and Caroline, and what was prepared by arguably the best cook in town, Gus. That wasn’t to say that the food made by everyone else wasn’t good, but Gus’ cooking was in a league of its own—in fact, he’d once told Ashe that he’d had a few cooking competition wins under his belt. Just as Ashe had anticipated, Shane was getting all up in the foodie offerings, following the trend of the rest of the townsfolk in wearing warm-weather clothing and trading in his hoodie for a loose fitting shirt to go with his stretchy shorts.

Almost as if he could tell that Ashe had been looking at him, Shane tore his eyes off of the deviled eggs he had been eying, waving a little to indicate he’d seen him. Relaxing a little at the sight of his best friend, Ashe began towards the buffet—

“Ah, Ashe! Ashe!” Lewis called, noticing Ashe before the farmboy had a chance to take more than three steps; hearing his name, Ashe immediately froze in place, visibly tensing up. ‘Drat.’ He thought with an internal sigh as he turned on his heel and started towards the mayor who was gesturing him over. “This is the newcomer I was telling you about, Mr. Abbott. Ashe, this is Mr. Abbott, Stardew Valley’s governer.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Abbott.” Ashe greeted with a friendly smile, as every cell in his body yelled at him to get his happy butt over to the buffet where there weren’t so many people around. He knew that would be extremely rude to do, though, and kept his feet firmly planted where they were.

“The pleasure is all mine.” At least the governer seemed like a friendly enough man, sweeping off his purple bowler hat to bow courteously to Ashe. “It certainly is good to have a face to put to the name, though I can’t say that you look at all how I expected.”

“What’s even more unexpected is just how much he resembles his grandfather when he was that age.” Lewis commented with a laugh. “Sometimes I forget what year it is and think that I’m speaking with Yogi again. But the boy’s got his old man’s green thumb. You really should swing by the farm before you leave today and see for yourself the kind of products that Ashe is putting out—”

The sound of a throat being cleared cut off Lewis’ enthusiastic gushing. “Pardon me for interrupting,” Percy spoke with a smug smile as he strode over, bearing a platter of fancy-looking drinks, “but I would be doing Pelican Town a huge disservice if I let the governer believe that Muhinyi’s farm is the best that we can offer. I think you would be quite pleased if you stopped by my ranch and got a first-hand experience there, Mr. Abbott.”

As he spoke, Percy offered the men the drinks on the tray, all smiles and charming charisma. “Oh? And who might this be, Lewis?” Abbott inquired, graciously accepting the offered beverage.

“Ah, yes, forgive me for not introducing our other newcomer as well.” Lewis too accepted a drink from Percy. “This is—”

“Percy Wellington III, at your service.” Percy placed his hand against his chest and bowed deeply to the governer. “Truly, it is a pleasure to make your esteemed acquaintance.”

“There was a…. minor dispute over the farmland.” Lewis explained to Abbott as Percy practically blocked Ashe from their view. “Percy and Ashe decided to settle it with a friendly little wager to see who could make the best use of the land in three years’ time.”

“I see, I see.” Abbott nodded his head. “I daresay that was a brilliant solution to the problem. May the better man win.”

Realizing that nobody was even talking to him at that point, Ashe gave up and silently left, sneaking over to the potluck to deliver a half-dozen of the tomatoes he hadn’t used for his dish before finally getting over to the buffet table. By the time he got there, he felt completely exhausted, even though the day wasn’t even half-over yet.

“Oh, there you are.” Shane commented as Ashe practically dropped his platter onto an empty spot on the buffet. “… Yeah, that’s how I feel too bud.” He looked over to where Percy was effortlessly schmoozing with the mayor and governer. “That guy really knows how to kiss ass, huh? I bet that silver tongue of his can convince the governer to actually donate this year.”

As Shane had been talking, Ashe poured himself a cup of punch; hearing that last bit, however, he paused mid-drink. “Donate?” He asked, coughing a little as a few drops went down the wrong tube.

“Yeah. The only reason Lewis holds the Luau every year is to try and get Abbott to give the town some money.” Shane popped a deviled egg into his mouth and closed his eyes in bliss; half of the reason why he came to the Luau was just to eat Gus’ legendary eggs.

“I… Is the town really that strapped for funding?” Ashe’s brows furrowed together in concern; Lewis had mentioned once or twice that money was a bit tight, but he never made it seem like things were dire.

Shane shrugged his shoulders. “It’s impossible to know since Lewis never gives a straight answer.” He answered simply, setting his plate down to get himself a bowl of hot pepper chutney. “But that’s just the feeling everyone has, considering most of the requests made during town hall meetings never get fulfilled.”

“…. I see…” Ashe gazed down to his punch as he fell quiet. ‘… That’s it.’ He thought, an idea hitting him after several seconds of deep contemplation. ‘When I win grandpa’s farm back, I’ll donate every bit of G I have to Pelican Town.’ He certainly wouldn’t need the money; nearly everything he needed he could get for himself on the farm, after all.

“Mm-MM. Damn, this chutney’s good.” Shane’s ecstatic praise of the food brought Ashe out of his thoughts. “Here, try some.”

He offered a taste to Ashe; seeing the excited look on his friend’s face, Ashe couldn’t bring himself to turn down the offer, despite being a huge wuss when it came to spice. “Ah, thank you~” He chimed, happy that Shane was happy and wanting to share with him. He could smell the spice even before the spoon got to his mouth, but that didn’t stop him from popping it right in. “…. Mm!”

It was a mixture of ‘tasty’ and ‘ouch’ that made the ‘mm’ sound; in the brief moment before the spice kicked in, Ashe enjoyed the rich, slightly sweet flavor of the peppers—and then the heat ramped up to 11, making his entire face red. “I-It’s delicious!” He commented with a laugh, as beads of sweat ran down his face. “I’ve never t-tasted anything like this before!”

“Pfft…” Shane saw right through the tough-guy act. “It’s fine if it’s too spicy for you. You don’t gotta pretend like you liked it. That just means there’s more for me, hehe.” He had to admit, though, it was pretty cute, the way Ashe was trying to play tough. “Here, try one of Marnie’s goat cheese poppers. Dairy cuts through the burn like nothing else.”

He grabbed a few of said poppers and set them on a plate for Ashe before handing it to him, taking pity on him since he was quite clearly suffering. “Th-thanks.” Ashe sputtered, wasting no time in gobbling up three of them; Shane could see the exact moment that the dairy cut through the capsaicin, as a blissful expression came onto Ashe’s face and his entire body relaxed. “Mmm…. These are so good~”

“You’re so over the top sometimes.” Shane snorted with a grin. “You better be sure to tell Marnie you liked them.”

“I will~” Ashe helped himself to some more. “… Just not right now. I still need to recharge before I’ll be up to talking with other people again.”

“Man, I get that feeling.” Shane felt that; it was how he felt right then, after all, and how he felt pretty much every day. But talking with Ashe didn’t drain his batteries like it used to; in fact, it was actually kind of nice to be able to bullshit and make jokes with someone during these festivals. “So what is this that you brought?” He asked, finally moving to look at Ashe’s dish.

Having just popped another popper into his mouth, Ashe hastily swallowed it so he could answer. “O-Oh, uh—it’s just some stuffed tomatoes.” He laughed nervously, as Shane stabbed one with his fork and set it onto his plate. “You don’t have to try them. I-I doubt they’re actually any good.”

“Ashe,” Shane looked to his friend with a deadly serious expression, “you should know by now that if it’s on the buffet table, I’m going to eat it. Besides, there’s only one way to find out what it tastes like.” He used his fork to cut into it, making sure to get equal amounts of the roasted tomato and the stuffing inside it before he popped it into his mouth.

“… No good?” Ashe asked meekly as Shane chewed with a contemplative look on his face.

In response, Shane held up a finger as a ‘wait a second’ gesture. “…. What makes you think this isn’t good?” He asked, once he’d swallowed his mouthful. “This isn’t half bad, Ashe. You grew the tomatoes, right?”

“Ah…” Ashe looked completely surprised that Shane liked it. “Y-Yeah, I… actually picked them this morning... It really tastes good?”

“I think so.” Shane took another bite. “You could seriously give Gus a run for his money with this. What’s in the stuffing?”

Bolstered a little by Shane’s praise, Ashe straightened up as his face brightened. “Bread crumbs, some herbs, a tiny little bit of hot peppers, some garlic and some parmesan. It’s one of my mom’s recipes, but I never made it before so I didn’t know how it would turn out.”

“You should tell her that it’s damn good. Marnie would probably kill to get the recipe from her.” Shane went to get another one, unaware of the knife he’d unwittingly stabbed into Ashe’s heart with his comment.

“… I’ll definitely let her know.” Ashe continued to smile despite it, not wanting to ruin the good time. “I’m sure she’d be happy to hear how much you liked it~”

Thankfully, Shane didn’t seem to notice that anything was off with him; before long, Ashe was able to get over it, forgetting about everything as the two of them chatted over good food and mutually kept each other in check about their weaknesses—there was an ample amount of booze available that was continually tempting Shane, and Gus’ signature cornets were present as well, practically calling out to Ashe in their sweet little chocolate-filled voices.

As the Luau began to wind down, Lewis gathered everyone for the main event: the potluck. As with every year, Abbott was given the ‘honor’ of having the first taste, taking his time to let it mull over his tongue before declaring that it was a pleasant soup indeed. Nothing groundbreaking, but he seemed to like it well enough. Whether it would be enough to secure a donation to Pelican Town’s coffers remained to be seen.

When the leftovers had been distributed to everyone, and the party setup was being torn down, Ashe spotted Percy leading the governer off, presumably to give him the ‘grand tour’ of the farms. “….” For some reason, it really ruffled his feathers that Percy was basically using politics to try and get even more of an edge over him, rather than letting his farm work speak for itself.

“Ashe.” Lewis spoke, getting the farmboy’s attention. “If you need to leave, you can. You don’t need to stick around to help with the teardown.” He too had seen what Percy was up to, and was just as perturbed that the man had basically stolen the spotlight from him.

The offer was nice, but… “Uh-uh.” Ashe stubbornly shook his head. “Everyone else is helping to clean up, so I should too. It’s only fair, don’t you think?”

No matter how desperately he wanted to win the bet, Ashe refused to let the win come at the expense of others. He would win through his own blood, sweat and tears, even if such a resolve made the task all the more harder. And now, even more than that, he wanted his work on the farm to benefit everyone in town, not just himself.

“….” Lewis smiled a little at Ashe’s insistence on staying. “You’re a good kid, Ashe.” He commented, patting Ashe’s shoulder lightly. “Thank you.”

He sincerely, fervently hoped that Ashe would win. Driving Joja out of town once and for all was his dream, and had been ever since they’d set up that godforsaken supermarket. It weighed heavily on his mind that such a heavy burden rested on such young shoulders, but with every passing day, he found himself believing just that little bit more that Ashe could pull it off.  

[itsworn]

Coolest Junkyard Mopar Ever! 1969 Dodge Charger “Scraptona”

When you look at a machine like this and find out it’s the result of a risky, hare-brained business decision, you know you’re hanging with passionate car guys. That’s the ethos that drives Michael Hunt and Lee Clayton, the owners of TredWear. Their business revolves around permanent tire graphics that can be applied to any tire to dress them up. The best way in the automotive world to display your product is to build cool cars that embody the spirit of what you’re selling, so that’s what they’ve been doing, and as it turns out, this hare-brained idea is actually pretty business savvy.

TredWear’s last creation, the “Tarantula,” was featured in the July 2018 issue of HOT ROD magazine and debuted on the 2017 HOT ROD Power Tour. The 1939 Chevy had been turned into an open-wheel modified dirt-track racer that the guys converted back into a street car. Going into the 2018 SEMA show, a new car was needed to represent the brand. Michael tells Car Craft: “We wanted to do something racecar-based, but we wanted to take it to the next level.” Their starting point again tapped into the world of circle-track racing with a 2001 Rocket chassis that they were going to use as the foundation for the build. They were also toying with the idea of building something with a Mopar flavor—something from the beginning of the smog era. End-of-the-line Challengers and mid-’70s Chargers were at the top of the list, until a 1969 Charger popped up on the radar screen. Michael was appointed the hands-on guy behind the project, while Lee took care of the day-to-day running of the business.

The Charger was located in North Alabama, so Michael went to see if it fit the profile for what they were trying to accomplish. “The guy was thinning down his collection. It was an old parts car that had been cut up and used for another car 28 years ago and it was resting on blocks out in the woods. We had to cut down three trees and use a front loader to get to it.” It was still wearing hints of its original Q5 Bright Turquoise paint and was actually a slant six car when it rolled off the assembly line. You Mopar guys know that is a rare beast, but sadly it was so far gone and picked over that it was unsalvageable. From the floor pans to the rear tail panel, it all had been cut out. There were no doors, engine, trans, subframe, and no rear. The only thing left was the front suspension, cowl, and roof.

Once they had the body in their shop the next step was to do something with it and the dirt-track chassis. Their initial thought was to clean up the chassis a bit and skin it. “I started Googling Charger racecars and it just showed Daytonas, so that’s when it hit me that we could actually build a wing car,” he explains. The shell was then sent to Ozan Chassis Shop—owned by John Alexander— who was also responsible for much of the work on the Tarantula. When John took a look at it and started diving into what it actually took to reskin the dirt-track car to look like a Charger, his conclusion was that it was much simpler to take all the hardware from the dirt track car and build a tube frame around what was left of the car.

The frame was planned around the engine and a set of huge dirt track wheels and tires. Their challenge was to build a chassis that was narrow enough to accommodate those tires, but also wide enough to accept the engine. They were also going to tap into all the hardware from the dirt car. It donated the entire Wilwood brake setup, which included the wide-five hubs, quick-change rear, and all the bits for the running gear. Using all of these pieces meant that the Charger would end up being a wide-body design.

The change to a wing car also meant that they needed to source some very specific parts to make it happen. Original pieces were out of the question, so the guys at Janak Repros in Spring, Texas became their source for reproduction hardware. They purchased a wing, a pair of fender scoops, and a Superbird nose. “We ended up going with a ’bird nose instead of a Daytona nose,” Michael notes. “The ’bird nose was a little more rounded and a little more voluptuous.” Using that nose meant that a set of 1970 Coronet fenders was needed, and those came courtesy of eBay. At all four corners changes needed to be made to accommodate the larger rubber. At the rear there was still plenty of metal left of the original quarter panels to widen the body but they needed a mounting position. They didn’t want to cut and stretch them and ruin the lines, so they bought some new AMD quarters and left about an inch on the original ones to make it racecar friendly with Dzus fasteners. This gave the back end of the Charger an additional 2.5 inches on each side.

At the front, they didn’t know how to deal with the 15-inch wide rubber and thought they might have to slap on some wheel arches, which would have stylistically killed the wide-body look. One thing was clear, they weren’t going to mess with the dimensions of the nose, so Michael took a chance and did a pie cut down the whole length of the top of the fenders and welded some new metal in. That covered the rear of the front wheels, while two smaller pie cuts at the front drew the front out of the fender. This gave the front of the car an additional 2.5 inches on each side, making it a lot smoother of a transition.

As a result, the scoops from Janak were rendered useless because they were just too small. Michael had to improvise and the first thing that came to mind was to cut down some motorcycle tanks. They had a pair of Kawasaki KZ650 tanks hanging in the workshop, so he started cutting until they met that complex fender profile. Also on the table was the rear window. They didn’t want to use a Vega plug, or a fiberglass plug, because they had made a louvered Polycarbonate window, which required a bespoke piece to be crafted. They ended up fabricating all the windows from Polycarbonate and made them flush fit.

All of this stretching was in part due to the use of the wide-five hubs and the massive rubber. The problem was that there were only a few wheels available with that unique bolt pattern wide enough to mount on those hubs. That was remedied with a set of barrels they sourced from a wholesaler. They drew up a design, cut and machined them in-house, and crafted wheel centers that worked. Wrapping them was a set of Mickey Thompson SS Street radials.

A mill that was in keeping with the character of the car was also on the list. When it was just another budget build, the plan was to drop in a 440 with a set of aluminum heads they had purchased out of a motor home. “When we decided to do the wing car, we knew that we should step up to the plate and do something pretty fantastic,” Michael explains. “We didn’t want to do what everyone else has been doing by dropping in a Hellcrate. I knew about these R5-P7 engines that are sort of sitting around. I’ve seen them pop up on eBay from time to time and they are usually a fantastic deal.” What he was looking for was what Dodge had developed for their Winston Cup cars and are plentiful on the secondary market. That led him to Scott Eatmon at Eatmon Race Parts in Wilson, NC. Scott had an engine that was pretty fresh and didn’t need a complete rebuild, so they bought it, which included the dry-sump system and everything all the way back to the bell housing, including the Tilton race clutch. Before it was shipped out, it was put on the dyno where it pulled 740 horses at 8,300 rpm. It would be mated to a Tremec TKO 600 5-speed.

While that addressed the mechanical side of the equation, the visual side was undefined. When they initially did the renderings they planned to do a full livery on the car that was aged just like the Tarantula. Michael says, “As the pieces came together they spoke to us. The ugly brown fenders, the red and yellow door, and the rusty trunk lid started to speak to us and told a better story of how the car came together than we could tell people verbally.” He adds, “The main body was the only thing that I had to add color to, but when I did it, I wanted to do it in the most legitimate way possible. I went to Lowe’s and got them to mix up some enamel tractor paint matching the original color and got the closest match I could. I wanted to have that rough look so I laid down a lot of paint at once using a paint roller, so in one afternoon I just got in there and rolled the whole body. On the fenders I did the same thing. I blended in brown where new metal was.” They spent a lot of time blending it all in. On the turquoise they added white, black, and brown in strategic areas and blocked it to bring out all the existing patina. He notes, “You have to cover up the new and enhance the old.” The same treatment was done on the Le Mans style livery they chose. It was vinyl printed and treated to some steel wool. They hand-rubbed every decal to give it an original richness that went with everything else.

All of this was taking place days prior to SEMA. It was coming down to the wire and they didn’t have a hood. Part of the original design was to craft a large shaker hood. On their second option rendered by Pfaff Designs, they had the idea of using an inverted wheelbarrow on top of the engine. He states, “We put it on top, looked at, and knew right away there was no way to make it look right. We already had a couple of carbon fiber air cleaners so we went with that. We had a big enough piece of Polycarbonate left behind and we were already so pleased with the way things had turned out on the windows that this would be the perfect way to show off all the hardware and also give the car the finished look it deserved. We got some square tubing, built a frame, and worked the extractor into the hood just in time for SEMA.”

The final product was christened “Scraptona” and debuted in Las Vegas, where it was well received for its irreverent approach to a classic shape. Topping this one might be a tough act to pull off when Michael and Lee start planning their next build!

Tech Notes Who: Michael Hunt and Lee Clayton What: 1969 Dodge Charger “Scraptona” Where: Columbiana, AL

Engine: The engine of choice was a departure from the expected mills used in most Mopar-flavored builds. It is an R5-P7 that was developed by Dodge for their return to Winston Cup racing back in 2001. It is an open-decked, deep-skirt engine with the block, heads, and intake specifically designed for racing. Petty Racing Enterprises built this particular engine in 2005. It displaces 358 cubic inches with an 11.5:1 compression ratio. It features a Jesel belt drive instead of a timing chain, and also has Jesel roller rocker arms, roller keyway lifters, a Comp solid-roller camshaft, and a dry sump oil system.

Induction: On the top end a ported Dodge aluminum intake is crowned with a Holley XP 750 and a carbon fiber air cleaner.

Electronics: Sparking the engine to life is an MSD distributor, MSD 6AL ignition box, and an MSD Master Blaster 3 coil.

Gearbox: The use of a 5-speed was set in stone as a key element of the road race theme. TredWear opted for a Tremec TKO 600 sourced from American Powertrain to mount on the Tilton bell housing. The clutch is a Tilton 3-stage semi-metallic unit.

Rearend: The rear is a classic Winters quick-change unit stuffed with a set of 3.55:1 gears.

Chassis/suspension: The chassis for the Scraptona was built around the Charger body and is a tube frame design. The front suspension consists of Aldan coilovers with 550-pound springs, Rocket chassis upper A-arms and two-piece lower arms, Afco severe-duty ball joints, a Speedway 1.25-inch sway bar, and a Woodward steering rack. At the rear, Aldan coilovers with 300-pound springs are also used. It’s a three-link setup with a torque arm and a magnesium tube that houses a Winters quick-change rear.

Brakes: The braking system was lifted directly from the dirt track car. It was upgraded to include new Wilwood 13-inch rotors up front and 12-inch rotors at the rear. Calipers are forged Superlite 6R units.

Wheels/Tires: Wheels and tires were a key component that influenced other aspects as the car came together. The wheel barrels were selected as the foundation for the massive tire size. The wheel centers were custom made to allow mounting onto the Wilwood wide-five hubs. The end result was a set of 20 x 12 wheels that were the wrapped in 29×15.00R20 Mickey Thompson SS Street radial rubber.

Paint/body: The Scraptona foundation is a 1969 Dodge Charger shell infused with 1970 Coronet fenders and an array of Superbird and Daytona reproduction pieces. The fenders were mounted on the car and modified to keep the massive rubber tucked within the body. They were sectioned with metal added giving them an additional 2.5 inches of width. At the rear, AMD reproduction quarters were cut down and installed with Dzus fasteners for quick access. The addition of these added the needed 2.5 inches at the rear to also keep the rubber tucked inside the body. The rear window plug was fabricated to accommodate the louvered Polycarbonate rear window that has inspired a new product line that will be available from TredWear in 2019. The headlights are a wing car departure in that they are fixed using a set of BMW E30 headlight buckets. The nose was hung using an internal structure built from .5 inch square tubing. Paint on the body is a mixture of original factory applied color and tractor paint from Lowe’s. The tractor paint was applied with a roller and was distressed with additional colors, steel wool, and Scoth-Brite pads. This technique was carried over to the livery.

Interior: The interior is very basic; a pair of Kirkey Vintage Class 18-inch bucket seats was installed along with 5-point Simpson harnesses. Instruments are minimal, consisting of a RacePak IQ3S display.

The post Coolest Junkyard Mopar Ever! 1969 Dodge Charger “Scraptona” appeared first on Hot Rod Network.

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[duaneodavila]

Follow The Money, College Edition

While the trial proceeds in the case against Harvard for discriminating against Asian applicants, pushed by a guy whose agenda is to end affirmative action merely because he caught Harvard red handed, defenders of diversity have focused their attentions on the last refuge of the woke, the tu quoque logical fallacy.

A lawsuit against Harvard University has put a focus on admissions policies that the plaintiffs argue hurt Asian-American applicants. I disagree with the suit, seeing it as a false flag operation that aims to dismantle affirmative action for black and Latino students.

It’s unclear how one can “disagree with the suit.” It’s not an agree or disagree thing, but a mechanism for proving a cause of action. One would expect someone as bright as Nick Kristof to understand enough about how law works to not write such a silly paragraph, particularly since he indulges in the mod use of “false flag,” a “covert operation designed to “disguising the actual source of responsibility.”

Of course, if so, then a trial would reveal the “actual source” of responsibility. Even if the motives of the guy backing the suit proves nefarious, as may well be the case, that doesn’t mean the thrust of the suit is wrong or that Harvard isn’t responsible for its discrimination under the guise of diversity.

But when you can’t defend the practice, the next best thing to do is point out hypocrisy.

We progressives hail opportunity, egalitarianism and diversity. Yet here’s our dirty little secret: Some of our most liberal bastions in America rely on a system of inherited privilege that benefits rich whites at the expense of almost everyone else.

I’m talking about “legacy preferences” that elite universities give to children of graduates. These universities constitute some of the world’s greatest public goods, but they rig admissions to favor applicants who already have had every privilege in life.

And there can be no argument that legacy admissions is a perpetuation of privilege. Whether egalitarianism and diversity are the only values, to the exclusion of all others, gets swallowed up in the vagaries of “hail” is another matter, but it is undoubtedly correct that legacy admissions can’t be justified as a matter of progressive values. And progressives find such banalities as wealth and privilege tantamount to the tools of the devil.

But the suit has shone a light on a genuine problem: legacy, coupled with preferences for large donors and for faculty children. Most of the best universities in America systematically discriminate in favor of affluent, privileged alumni children. If that isn’t enough to get your kids accepted, donate $5 million to the university, and they’ll get a second look.

Dirty, filthy lucre will buy a second look, if not a seat itself, at America’s most prestigious universities.

Isn’t it a bit hypocritical that institutions so associated with liberalism should embrace a hereditary aristocratic structure? Ah, never underestimate the power of self-interest to shape people’s views. As Reeves put it dryly: “American liberalism tends to diminish as the issues get closer to home.”

One of the more curious aspects of progressive ideology is its denial of human nature, the peculiar belief that a good progressive will be willing to sacrifice his child on the altar of diversity. “Sorry, Muffy, but it’s community college for you as Harvard needs the seat to give to a marginalized student” said no parent ever. Of course, once Muffy is handed her art appreciation degree and is firmly ensconced as a doyenne at the Met, both parent and child will march for the sake of the downtrodden. It’s the least they can do.

But the virtuous self-reflection of pundits like Kristoff, who sips tea in meetings of the Harvard Board of Overseers, fails to consider how such institutions manage to pay their very important professors, maintain their centuries old buildings, tend the ivy and amass their massive endowment, albeit poorly managed.

Do the math, Nick. It’s wonderful that Harvard has the wherewithal to accept students too poor to pay the tuition, the room and board, the occasional Tasty Burger. But where does that money come from? It didn’t appear in Harvard’s bank account by magic, but from the pockets of your privileged, hereditary aristocratic alumni. And occasionally, by a usurper who can afford to buy a plaque to put his dad’s name on a building.

You want to talk about hypocrisy, Mr. Rhodes Scholar? Fair enough. There would be no prestigious Harvard College today but for the privileged who left their legacies to pay for their legacies. You have some brilliant academics there, Larry Tribe notwithstanding, but they’re not working for free, are they?

Even if Harvard decided to refuse legacy admissions for the sake of egalitarianism, and used its not insubstantial endowment to pay the freight, it’s still free-riding on the philanthropy of its aristocracy. And its endowment would eventually run dry. What then? Would they close the gates around Harvard yard, or would your profs teach pro bono, your buildings be painted by their marginalized inhabitants or fall into decay? What about the dildos and anal beads given out for free during Sex Week?

As fashionable as its become to denigrate the privilege for being, well, privileged, it’s disingenuous to enjoy their beneficence while speaking ill of them. In the gushing of emotion over the poor and downtrodden, who most assuredly deserve their opportunity to rise and succeed, it doesn’t serve the cause to ignore the harsh reality that someone has to pay for it.

In a world without shallow malarkey that extols its virtues without being patently full of shit, one would recognize that a school like Harvard must be both home to big money, full tuition payers, philanthropists and, yes, hereditary aristocrats, if its going to simultaneously roll out the ivy carpet to the marginalized. Without the legacies, there would be no ivy carpet to roll out. Rather than castigate the legacy admissions for their privilege, it might be wiser to thank them for covering the cost of progressive egalitarianism.

Follow The Money, College Edition republished via Simple Justice