National Media Only Covers Embarrassing Things About Princeton

The New York Times profiles Smashcraft Heroes, Princeton's videogaming club. Its members? "Mostly Asian, mostly male" engineers. Classic. (Our latest 21 Questions is on Mona Zhang '12, the president of the club.)

The reporter describes a recent match of Starcraft against Tsinghua University in Beijing. Of course, being Princetonians, one participant felt the need to relate the game to international relations and geopolitics:

Ke Wan, a graduate student from China who is studying operations research, detailed each world’s character traits: Zergs are prolific and fast, Terrans are sophisticated strategists, and individual Protoss units are extremely powerful. Wan drew a geopolitical analogy. “Zerg is like China,” he said. “It depends a lot on its large population. The U.S. is Protoss because it emphasizes the value of the individual. And Terran is Russia or the former Soviet Union, a huge high-tech war machine.” He plays as Terran.

Read the article, reflect upon on what Princeton has become, and shed an emo tear or two for Old Nassau.

BKN
(image source: nytimes.com)

NY Times profiles Orszag '91

The New York Times recently profiled Pres. Obama's budget director, Peter Orszag '91, who has been tasked with the unenviable job of overseeing the federal budget. We learn that he is a "supernerd" with grand ambitions:

Everything about the way he has interpreted his new job speaks of ambition: the policy heavyweights he has hired for the Office of Management and Budget, his efforts to persuade cabinet secretaries to let him help shape their plans, a public profile as high as that of any budget director since David A. Stockman’s polarizing tenure under Ronald Reagan a quarter-century ago.

He is also a sex symbol?
More...

“He’s made nerdy sexy,” said Rahm Emanuel, the White House chief of staff.

And then, of course, he's also a Princetonian:

In classic political fashion, Mr. Orszag trained for Washington rivalry through family rivalry, not just with his father but also with his economist brothers. Peter, Michael and Jonathan Orszag have worked and written papers together and still compare electronic gadgets and their Princeton grade-point averages. [emphasis added]

Is this what Princeton alumni do when they become important? Oh dear God... Save us from ourselves! And who are the magical parents who birthed three Princeton economists? Michael was Class of '89, Peter was Class of '91, and Jonathan was Class of '96, and all three were econ majors.

Do they compare their theses as well? If so, Peter is the loser with only 80 pages, while Michael wrote 187 pages and Jonathan wrote 104 pages. Even worse? Peter's thesis title: "Congressional Oversight of the Federal Reserve: Empirical and Theoretical Perspectives." It sounds so exciting it sends a shiver up my leg!

BKN

(source: nytimes.com & http://libweb5.princeton.edu/theses/index.htm)