Inmates running the asylum

Thus it continues.

The news hit today that University of Tennessee Pride of the Southland Marching Band director Gary Sousa has been placed on administrative leave for insubordination, inability to work with others and misrepresentation of facts.

My, oh my.

I told you my take on a lot of things in this post. I won't repeat them.

Truth be told, I could see this coming. It's the way Tennessee rolls in UT (BS).

I am not privy to everything regarding Sousa's job performance or his interaction with university personnel.

I do know that UT isn't the military and "insubordination" is an interesting term for employees at a land-grant university.

Sources who know tell me that Chancellor Jimmy Cheek is a few cards short of a full deck. Maybe so. UTK hasn't had chancellors with a clue since Jack Reese and Bill Snyder.

Tom Mattingly says it better than I, and, as usual, with his good-hearted fairness and sportsmanship.

Whatever Cheek's case, I say that athletic director Dave Hart and president Joe DiPietro are ultimately responsible. The buck stops there, or at least it did in Harry Truman's day.

"The inmates are running the asylum (at UT)," says a super source.

Tom has a different take:

"Never thought it would happen, but the band’s performance the last few days has done the impossible: make the campus administration look almost reasonable. That’s a tall order, but they’ve come close."

His are points to ponder.

My $1.98 take is that Tennessee has become a national joke and I'm not just talking about the gridiron. (In fact, Butch Jones is a bright spot in a bleak cesspool.)

Academic rank, prestige and prowess have dipped. But, hey, at least we don't top the Playboy party school list anymore.

The jury is still out on Sousa's supposed sins, but this is just sickening.

Strike up the band and play "Send In the Clowns."

Don't bother. They're here.

UPDATE Tuesday, Oct. 15, 11 a.m.: Here is Tuesday's story from the Knoxville News Sentinel (paywall). According to the story by Kristi L. Nelson, band alums are split on Sousa.

Looks like Provost Susan Martin, whom Tony Basilio on his AM talk show just called "the biggest troublemaker on campus," had to mop up for the Chancellor.

Basilio says he doesn't want to see stories like this in the press and isn't taking sides.

Whatever the case, the kids are the losers.

An orange-and-white afternoon

Tom Mattingly has some good advice for would-be writers.

Use more periods than commas.

Indeed. My version of it is to "think more Hemingway and less Faulkner." Don't write three page sentences, in other words. Three word sentences are much better.

Mattingly spoke this morning to a group of high school interns we're hosting at the newspaper this summer. He has become known as the Vol Historian. He's written a couple of cool books (including that sweet UT Vault thing), posts a daily blog on the News Sentinel Web site and writes a weekly column on UT football history.

Tom says a big chunk of publishing is getting lucky. Being in the right place at the right time. He should know. Tom is the only writer I know who received a five-figure advance for a book without having written a word. Perchance to dream. A wave and a handshake led to the official Peyton Manning biography endorsed by Peyton's dad Archie. Which meant that Tom received permission to use a lot of cool photos.

Tom is a great guy. Go buy one of his books. You can find them at Borders or Books-A-Million here in Knoxville. I'm sure they are on the Web, too.

Later in the day, Powell editor Greg Householder and I took the interns over to the UT campus. Marketing guy Doug Kose showed us around the ultra cool Pratt Pavilion, Thompson-Boling Arena and the Neyland-Thompson Sports Complex. From there, we ducked into Stokely Athletic Center, that endangered species that holds so much history, to hear Halls guy Bud Ford talk about media relations.

Mattingly had said I needed to ask Bud about winning a Chevrolet Camero in 1969 at a football game. Bud did. He said it was an orange-and-white deal. He later wrecked it. Bud laughed when I asked him about it and said, "It was a long time ago."

Don't tell anybody, but I had as much fun as the interns did this afternoon. Maybe more.