I wait too long to get back in the field sometimes.

In this case, it wasn't about researching a story, but . . . hmmmm, I hate to use this word but (promoting?) one.

As I mentioned in the last post, I spent the afternoon yesterday talking to three classes at the Air Force Academy about Columbine. I had been toying with the idea that the public seemed overripe for a book finally addressing what that tragedy was really about, and nothing could have convinced me more.

The professor warned me in advance that like any other college students, they could be both apathetic class material and shy about speaking in class. They were positively riveted. Right out of the gate, they were jumping in with questions, and we could have gone on for hours. And I was surprised, too, by the extent of their knowledge, and the depth of their probing. They were really fascinated by the whole topic.

If this is any indication of the interest level out there among young adults--and I have no doubt that it is--there is a considerable market out there for the book I've been messing with for years.

So, I'm going to take the advice many of you have given me here, get off my ass and get that book proposal together. (And start pitching it to magazines as well.)

There are several new movies surfacing on the subject--I'm going to see Gus Van Sant's Elephant at the Denver Film Festival next week--the five-year anniversary is coming up next April, and I have so much more to tell on this topic. (Particularly about what drove Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold to do it.)

I'll let you know how it goes.

I spent about six hours inside the Academy again yesterday--in some rather unusual situations--and it's always refreshing when I do.

They have a very real problem with the rape situation there, and also an enduring problem with the climate toward women, but that really is not the whole story about the place.

I don't want to come off as a member of the booster squad, but I think it's important to put things in perspective. And I think much of the country just sees that place as some sort of horrifying den of evil, where young robots are lobotomized and marched around to the beat of somebody else's brain, where the only original thought a cadet ever has is "Who can I rape tonight?"

Hardly. I have been developing some contacts there for awhile, and yesterday I was the guest speaker for three classes on Columbine (more on that in a separate post in a minute), and also sat in to observe three lengthy sessions where some of the brightest cadets were grilled by a small faculty panel (I'd rather not go into details.)

Wow. Actually sitting down and talking to--or listening to--cadets down there will turn your head around in a hurry. The classes were in a discussion format, where I mostly responded to questions from both the professor and students, and they were one of the best audiences I've spoken to in years. Bright, thoughtful, highly engaged. You can learn a lot about how people think just by listening to their questions, and these were three really dynamic and impressive groups.

And if you think military cadets must be some mindless automatons, you just need to let go of that stereotype. They laughed, they smiled, they furrowed their brows--one big tough guy in the front row teared up when I responded to a question about Principal Frank DeAngelis, and described how he handled the crisis.

I'm tempted to say that they're just like the students on any other campus, but that's not entirely true. They tend to be more conservative than most college populations, more Christian, more rigid in their thinking unfortunately, and way, way, way more polite. But I have to dredge up the old cliche here, that their similarities to other students are far greater than their differences.

I wish everybody could sit down and have a disucssion with groups of them for an afternoon. Not discussing their own situation, because they can get defensive and sometimes denialistic about that, and they are going to parrot back the party line much of the time. Don't talk about that, just talk to them. At heart, they're just normal 20-year olds struggling with all the same problems as any other 20-year old. Plus the whole military regimine added on top.

And as for the kids facing the panels, of course they were among the top students selected for the opportunity, but two of the three cadets I saw were just stunningly impressive. Sharp, witty, funny, open-minded and wise beyond their years. The cadets are not all like these two, but if this kind of cadet can rise to the top of the Air Force, I feel very secure about the direction the service will take.

Of course they'll hate me for calling it a "rape scandal," but they'll get over it.

If you haven't checked out edodo.org, it's a very interesting place. It's the underground gathering spot for former (and occasionally current) Academy cadets. The current are less common because the Academy bans it and won't allow it to transmit over their lines, so only the most tech-savvy cadets can get to it during the school year (I'm told).

The gist is, they are none too happy with the Fowler report, though most of the people posting tend to focus on details, not so much on the bigger picture. And to most of them it's about blame rather than looking forward. Still, it's an eye-opener. Civilians tend to be highly ignorant of what the military is all about, and that's a bad thing. This will give you a glimpse. It will be an extremely angry glimpse, so you might take it with a grain of salt, but it's worth recognizing how angry some members of the military are, and sometimes for good reason. It's a start.

Just be careful about posting. Most vicious message board I've ever encountered, including the rabid political boards. You might learn something, but you will come out feeling like you've been to war. You have been warned.

Two days ago, a panel empowered by Congress to investigate the rape scandal at the Air Force Academy issued a scathing report.  It charged the Pentagon charged with knowing about the problem for ten years and doing very little, and then accused it of a coverup on this issue this summer. It also issued 21 new recommendations. Yesterday, the Academy announced that its top general would hold a press conference today to respond. And the general said . . .

He agrees. Enthusiastically. He is totally behind the new report, and in already ramping up measure to implement its recommendations.

Which could be utter bullshit or PR, but I don't think so.

I have met this guy three times now since he arrived in July (and commented very briefly each time), and he has earned more and more of my respect each time.

He is candid, honest, straightforward . . . and frankly, thoughtful and wise. His answers aren't typical canned bullshit responses, they're frequently illuminating and insightful.

I've talked to other reporters who have been covering the story (every major news org in the country had people there today--look for the story tonight and tomorrow), and that seems to be the consensus. And cadets I have spoken to have also been impressed. I hope I'm not proved wrong on this, but so far, I really think they found the right guy for this mission.

(Dare I say he reminds me a lot of General Wesley Clark? I swear, he does. Every time I listen to him, that's who I think of. And that's high praise.

They have a whole lot to do there to bring about lasting cultural change, and that will take awhile, but they're definitely moving in the right direction, and moving at warp speed for a glacial institution like theirs.

There is one area that I think he's all wet on, though, and it's a whopper, which is victim confidentiality. I'm scrambling to try to sell an op-ed-type piece for a magazine or major paper on that though, so I won't say more about it yet.

Stay tuned. This story is not dying any time soon.

Lt General Rosa--top man at the Air Force Academy--is holding a press conference today at 1 mountain time to respond to the blistering report on its rape crisis, which was released this week by the independent panel installed by Congress.

I'll be there, and report back later today.

Where to start with the report released Monday afternoon on the Air Force Academy rape scandal? This one comes from the panel ordered by angry Congressmen this spring, tired of the BS they were getting from the Air Force. (The prime movers were Colorado Senator Wayne Allard, and Senator John McCain. You can read the entire 141-page report in PDF, or the NYT story, or the better Denver Post story (yes, the Denver Post did a much better job than the NYT on this one.)) 

The first thing to say is that it really is a breakthrough. It is the first independent review from outside the military, and it shows. (It was hand-picked by Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, but composed of outsiders who obviously felt no obligation to cover his butt. It was led by former Florida congresswoman Tillie Fowler.)

It gives credit where credit is due--praising much of the pentagon's spring solution, the Agenda For Change--but slamming the hell out of not just Academy leadership, but Pentagon leadership, who were repeatedly made aware of a severe problem for at least a decade and ignored it. And then it accuses the Pentagon of a coverup.

It also delivers a thorough assessment of the Agenda being implemented to improve the culture, identifying key holes in the plan. Rape advocates will be overjoyed that they have finally been heard. I spoke to both local and national rape advocates this spring in my Salon story analyzing the Agenda, and they were thrilled with some provisions of the Agenda, but dismayed that seemed doomed to failure because it did nothing to get women to come forward to report their rapes. In fact, it made reporting less likely, by eliminating the only confidential options. Today's report discloses that a 1997 Inspector General report acknowledged that as few as one in ten rapes were being reported, a figure validated again late last month, by another IG report. If much of your solution addresses fails to address 90 percent of the problem, that's a gaping hole. This report finally addresses the insanity of that approach (using much milder language, of course, but highlighting it in the exec summary).

Now about that coverup:

Late this spring, the Air Force dispatched its own "Working Group," to investigate the problem, and in June, the Air Force general counsel released its report clearing itself of "systematic acceptance of the problem." This group flatly rejected that finding and stated, "This Panel believes that the Air Force General Counsel attempted to shield Air Force Headquarters from public criticism by focusing exclusively on events at the Academy."

The new report dedicates more than a quarter of its executive summary to details of the coverup. It then concludes that the Pentagon is responsible and "Those responsible should be held accountable." It laments that many of the culprits are retired and out of reach, and again states "there must be further accounting."

It's hard to know exactly how to read that, but they could be calling for the head of Air Force Secretary Jame Roche, who President Bush has attempted to promote to Secretary of the Army, pending Senate approval.

The Denver Post say, "The report makes 21 specific recommendations for change at the school," though I have not read all of them yet. It praises the Agenda For Change several times, while noting some key flaws, which is exactly what my analysis showed last spring. Which has to make me wonder--couldn't the initial Air Force team involved more outsiders and avoided some of its inherent myopia in the first place?

All I did was talk to an assortment of nationally-recognized military scholars, rape advocates, faculty and cadets. They spoke to a lot of the same people, but it was exclusively Air Force officers conducting the interviews and making the decisions (along with AF Secretary Roche). If they could have accepted the existence of their own blinders and included some outsiders in the decision-making, they could have arrived at the current, more enlightened report months earlier.

There's a nice summary of the Agenda in the new report, which goes to the heart of what still needs to change:

The Agenda for Change is evidence that the Air Force, under Secretary Roche's leadership, is serious about taking long-overdue steps to correct the problems at the Academy, but in certain respects it does not go far enough to institutionalize permanent change. The most important of these shortcomings are:

• Culture and Climate of the Academy. The Agenda for Change recognizes that the sexual assault problems at the Academyare related to the culture of the institution, yet it does not go far enough to institute enduring changes in the culture and gender climate at the Academy.
• Command Supervision. The Agenda for Change does not address the need for permanent, consistent oversight by Air Force Headquarters leadership. [Because Academy leaders roll over every two years, so there is no consistency for a long-term solution.]
• External Oversight. The Agenda for Change does not address the need to improve the external oversight provided by the Academy's Board of Visitors.
• Confidentiality Policy. The Agenda for Change effectively eliminates the Academy's confidential reporting policy for sexual misconduct. In doin go, however, it reomves critical options for sexual assault victims to receive confidential counseling and treatment, and may result in the unitended consequences of reducing sexual assault reporting.

They're dead-on with all of those, particularly the last one.

Here are the other passages I found most illuminating:

The Panel examined and reviewed the culture and environment at the Academy. It found an atmosphere that helped foster a breakdown in values which led to the pervasiveness of sexual assaults and is perhaps the most difficult element of the problem to solve. . . .

The Panel has found deficiencies in the Honor Code System and in the Academy's character development programs that helped contribute to this intolerable environment. . . .

The situation demands institutional changes, including cultural changes. these changes are incremental and cannot be made overnight.

Lot of wisdom coming from this panel. I'm really impressed. They demand aggressive change now, while facing the reality that true cultural change takes a long time--and that actually effecting it is a delicate art form.

Nice work independent panel. Very nice work.

The panel appointed by Congress to investigate the rape scandal at the Air Force Academy released its report this afternoon.

I'm reading it now, hope to have first impressions within the hour.

Wow, these are pretty horrifying numbers. And directly from the Pentagon. (Thanks to TalkLeft for the heads up.) Story from Friday's NYT:

WASHINGTON, Aug. 28 — Nearly 12 percent of the women who graduated from the United States Air Force Academy this year were the victims of rape or attempted rape in their four years at the academy in Colorado Springs, with the vast majority never reporting the incidents to the authorities, according to a survey by the inspector general of the Defense Department. . .

The survey of some 579 women at the academy found that nearly 70 percent of them said they had been the victims of sexual harassment, of which 22 percent said they experienced "pressure for sexual favors." There were 659 women enrolled at the academy at the time of the survey.

Of the entire enrollment, 19 percent said they had been the victims of sexual assault and more than 7 percent said that assault took the form of rape or attempted rape. Four out of five women never came forward to report that they had been assaulted, the survey shows.

Want to hear the bigger scandal? Send your daughter--or yourself--to another university, and your chances for rape are probably even worse. Much worse.

I have spent much of the past six months covering the Academy for Slate, Salon, and others, and unfortunately, the story goes much deeper and gets much grimmer. In my opinion, there are at least three major scandals here:

First: The Academy's response to rapes. Also from the Times story, via the IG report:

The survey, given to women in May 2003, appeared to confirm the claims of the half-dozen or so former cadets who initially came forward earlier this year, revealing a problem of sexual assault at the academy that they described as widespread and the product of a culture hostile toward women. The women said victims of rape who came forward were routinely punished for minor infractions while their attackers escaped judgment, prompting most victims to remain silent. . .

That has got to stop. It was well documented all spring, starting with an excellent cover story breaking the scandal in Denver's alt weekly Westword. Since then, the Pentagon installed a new regime at the Academy, and began implementation of an Agenda For Change, and hopefully it will work. It is pretty extensive, though some of the measures have been tried and failed before. Worse, it fails to provide an environment likely to spur many cadets to report. But it's a complex, difficult problem that every university is grappling with poorly, and this is an aggressive start.

I have also met the two new generals a handful of times. Not enough to know them well, but my initial impression of the top general, Rosa, is very high. Until proven wrong, I trust the guy.

The bigger scandal: college women are in much greater danger than this new story suggests. Check out this Department of Justice study published in Dec 2000, The Sexual Victimization of College Women. Figures on reported rapes are notoriously unreliable, because (according to the same study), fewer than 5 percent of rape victims report to the police. That makes for one hell of an extrapolation. The most reliable data comes from anonymous surveying. The Justice Dept study used a similar methodology to the IG report; a random phone survery of 4,400 women attending 2- or 4-year colleges or universities across the country. Key finding: it estimated that nearly 20% of women would be raped during a 4-year college career. (The report indicates the total is probably higher because five years is more common now, but it's not at the Academy. Most cadets graduate in four years, so we'll stick to a four-year comparison).

The least-necessary scandal: The press knew about this all through the Air Force Academy scandal all spring. They focused on the horror of dozens of women reporting sexual assault (last I checked the number was up to 56 reported over ten years, including sexual harassment). We should be so lucky that it is only 56. That's a BS number and the press knows it. The number across the country is in the millions. We'll see how much that gets reported. Watch the press on this story. Watch them fixate on the Air Force Academy, ignoring Harvard, Princeton and everywhere else. Just watch.

UPDATE:

Please read the comments (and follow the link), for some insights from people who probably know more about the methodology in gathering rape data than I do. I'll try to address it better once I'm over the flu and can think clearly.

The Denver Post published a magazine-length (4,200-word) would-be expose on its front page today:

A culture of hostility
For 27 years the Air Force Academy has allowed female cadets in its ranks. The roots of the current sexual-assault problem are deeper still, a tangle of abused power and misplaced loyalties.

I'm just making my way through it and will have more later.

Attended my second press conference with the General Rosa, the new guy in charge of the Air Force Academy, yesterday. It was very brief, but just long enough to feel that same rush of sincerity and candor.

Either he's an incredibly good bullshitter, or a really good guy. There was no faking that smirk when I asked him what the new troops asked him when he briefed them yesterday, and he said something like: This was a one-sided conversation. There are times when I'm going to ask their opinions, but this wasn't one of them.

He didn't hesitate to answer it, either. Somebody trying to effect an air of openess (a key talking point at the Academy right now) might have worried about the image there. But how stupid that would be: sometimes you come in as the commander and order the troops to do some things, sometimes it's a give and take session. He wasn't about to fake that, and the smile on his face expressed everything.

Some people you just know you can trust from the moment they open their mouth. My early instincts are usually on the money about that. And I really trust this guy. Please don't let me be wrong.