And he says he's not going to make any special efforts to change his personal style.

"I have tried to be really patient and I will continue to be, though it is also true that my sense of humor and 'flippant' demeanor may at times offend them," Burton writes in an e-mail message. "As Rodney King should have said: 'Can't we all just relax a little bit?'"

Darling, for one, seems to have accepted Burton's somewhat unconventional style.

"Some of his comments are kind of off-the-cuff, but that's just his personality," Darling says.

More than anything, Burton says he just wants to be left alone.

"There's constructive criticism and there's persecution," he says. "I've gotten a lot of both this semester as vice president but I still don't understand why everyone is trying to make me famous."