oh my bad. obama wrote his stuff on Columbia after he left NYC. So we don’t really know what he thought when he was there.

I agree with some of the posters. Columbia was relatively safe between 110th & 125 and RSD & Morningside Ave in the 70′s & 80′s when I lived there. Outside of those areas the neighbohoods turned dicy. Gentrification on the west side started in the 80′s. I regret that the old Thalia theatre on 96th st & Bway was torn down. But one of the first new big high rises went up there.

The afrocentric politics of obamas church in Chicago pretty much represent the PC politics of columbia in the 70′s & 80′s. And too, judging by the very different way in which Columbia treated Iran President and the president of the minutemen–columbia politics remain the same.

It was nice having McCain advocate bringing back the ROTC to Columbia. I’m sure that gave Bolinger fits. But who knows the ROTC might improve columbia’s football team. Columbia has the longest football losing streak of any team in America. It made me conclude that morals and morale are closely related not just in terms of spelling but of meaning.

The difference between what the TV networks on 59th St and B way were producing in the 1980′s and the actual experience of NYC were just profoundly different.

I agree with the posters who say that in the 1970′s-80′s in the columbia area you were just cheek by jowel with people from all over the world.

My politics changed starting about 1986 when I started seeing large groups of Mexicans congregated on the corners 96 st. This was something wholly different because old world migrations have very meanings in the USA than New World Migrations. Nobody else in that area –that I knew — however, saw things the way I did.