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Title: The hardest job in America? (Bio on Alan Bersin, Possible Obama Border Czar)
Source:
San Diego Jewish Journal
URL Source: http://www.sdjewishjournal.com/stories/cover_sept03.html
Published: Sep 1, 2003
Author: Micah Sachs
Post Date: 2009-04-14 23:26:35 by Deasy
Keywords: None
Views: 235
Comments: 7
The hardest job in America? Alan Bersin is accustomed to success. He was an all-star linebacker at Harvard. He is personal friends will Bill Clinton. He was lauded for his work as America's first border czar. But as superintendent of San Diego city schools, he faces challenges unlike any he's ever seen before. So how does he keep his preternatural cool? by Micah Sachs The headquarters for the San Diego Unified school district is a depressing place. The exterior is painted a pale pink, the halls are drenched with water stains and even the office supplies come out of a vending machine. But step into Superintendent Alan Bersin's office and you almost forget your drab surroundings. Like a museum, his office offers miscellany of such quantity and variety that there's something to disarm any visitor. For me, on the right wall, it was an award from the American Jewish Committee with elaborate Hebrew calligraphy and a quote from Rabbi Hillel: "If I am not for myself, who is for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? If not now, when?" --snip-- Pictures of Bersin's family co-mingle with a red, white and blue candle signed by Schwarzenegger. His desk (presumably used for work, but eerily neat) is plastered with a finished jigsaw puzzle of the U.S. and Mexico. On the front left corner there are a series of bookmarks with quotes from the likes of Teddy Roosevelt and Harry Truman, including one from Thomas Jefferson: "I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past." Overflow Beanie Babies teeter on the front-right edge of the desk. --snip-- A charmed life Born in 1946, Bersin grew up in a traditional Conservative Jewish family in Brooklyn. He went to Hebrew school four days a week and was bar mitzvahed. Like many young Jews of his era, he developed an attachment to Israel early on. Bersin was an outstanding student. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard in 1968, where he was also an all-star linebacker. He was a Rhodes Scholar and studied at Oxford University from 1969 to '71. In 1970, he spent six weeks on a kibbutz in the Galilee while rockets rained down from the Syrian-controlled Golan Heights. His connection to Israel remains strong; he has returned to Israel twice since and plans on bringing his daughter Madeleine there for her bat mitzvah in 2005. --snip-- Despite the so-so results of the reform he has staked his reputation on, despite the challenges and demands from all quarters, despite the 12-hour days, Bersin expresses no regrets about becoming superintendent. To this day, he still possesses an air of philosophical nonchalance about his sea change of careers in 1998. Continually pressed, all he says is, "Left turns are part of life." I guess we'll have to wait for his memoirs to find out his true feelings. Suggested working title? The Bersinator. 
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#1. To: HAPPY2BME-4UM, litus (#0)
Can't they find anyone who isn't Jewish or from Harvard or Yale or a member of the CFR-Bilderberg Society?
For this job? A black or other minority might side with us against illegal immigration.
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#2. To: Deasy (#1)
#4. To: Horse (#2)
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