After the disappointing news yesterday that two other universities (including evil arch-rival MIT) were scoring better press than Harvard, the Crimson sets our minds at ease with news that Shanghai Jiao Tong University ranked Harvard numero uno in its seventh annual Academic Ranking of World Universities.

The Crimson reports the University of Michigan and, gasp, MIT, now get better media coverage than Harvard, according to some group that tracks that sort of thing.

The Crimson reports on the shame brought down on the Harvard Business School because of an altercation outside a party at a Lansdowne Street bar on Friday that ended with one student charged with assault and battery on a police officer and at least one injury: A "male student who badly cut his foot after removing his high heels."

Joel Brown writes up some award some saxophonist who went to Harvard is getting from the U, but, honestly, we couldn't read the post because we were too busy staring at the photo of the guy made up to look like the Jolly Green Giant. Only with a saxophone instead of a bag of peas.

The Crimson reports the woman was walking on Grant Street near DeWolfe Street around 10:15 p.m. on Tuesday when somebody grabbed her from behind and tried to put a rope over her head.

Channel 4 reports; doesn't say if Gates and Crowley had a beer as they talked at River Gods for an hour.

"It is often noted that Harvard plans decades or even a century into the future," writes the broadsheet in a mind-blowing editorial this morning. "Allston residents, however, aren’t in a position to look that far down the pike." And just think of the terrible consequences for Harvard of its predilection for thinking of the future - if only it had chosen instead to think of the short-term, it might never have been afflicted with its huge endowment or national preeminence. Making plans with an eye toward their long-term costs and benefits isn't some effete Ivy League quirk. It's just common sense.

There's actually a good argument buried in the editorial. Harvard does indeed have an obligation to sign short-term leases for its vacant storefronts, and to think more creatively and proactively about maintaining and improving the neighborhood. The problems with Harvard's Allston development have been amply and ably documented on this blog. Harvard's ambitious plans were derailed by the slumping economy, and it is now mothballing its properties, with devastating consequences for the local community. But this editorial elevates the popular sport of Harvard-bashing to newly self-destructive heights.

Floon finally realizes there are better backdrops for press conferences than City Hall, travels to the Brighton Mills Shopping Center this morning to denounce the way the BRA "steamrolls" neighborhoods.

Some Allston residents (including blogger Harry Mattison) have taken to picketing wherever they think politicians would show up (such as last night's at-large council forum in Brighton), to protest the way Harvard bought up much of the neighborhood and now is just letting it lie fallow.

Harry Mattison posts copies of BRA correspondence related to the Charlesview project that he got under a public-records request. As is usual with such stuff, the BRA gave him photocopies of printouts of the e-mail, rather than, oh, a CD with text.

Just in the first couple of pages, it's interesting to see BRA hostility toward a neighborhood group.