I have an idea. How about having the president of Liberty University announce that he’s invited HBO comedian Bill Maher to give the commencement address next year and that he will pay Mr. Maher $30,000 for the privilege and bestow him an honorary degree. Does Kirsten Powers think that maybe the students and faculty at Liberty University might issue a petition protesting that decision? Does she think that it would be appropriate to invite someone to Liberty to speak to the graduates who thinks that God is a “psychotic mass murderer”? Does she think an honorary degree for Richard Dawkins would go down any better?
I’m not going to defend every example of college faculty and student bodies protesting commencement speakers, but inviting Condi Rice to do the commencement at Rutgers and giving her an honorary degree is roughly equivalent to sending Madalyn Murray O’Hare to do the commencement at Bob Jones University. It’s poor judgment, bad taste, and completely inconsiderate. An apologist for torture and an architect of George W. Bush’s foreign policy is in no way consistent with the values that Rutgers tries to instill in its students. Honoring Dr. Rice with a degree diminishes to a great extent the degrees the graduates have earned and are receiving.
This isn’t about intolerance. It’s about morality. It’s about common sense. It’s about protocol. It’s about manners.
If Dr. Rice wants to come to Rutgers during the school year and explain why she told us that Saddam Hussein was going to surprise us with a radioactive mushroom cloud, I am sure the students would hear her out. But she doesn’t belong within a country mile of a commencement speech, and she sure as hell doesn’t deserve to be honored. Not her. Not in Jersey.
She can join the S.E. Cupp analysts of the world; they’re wankers any time they open their mouths.
Like Condi Rice needs another FCKNG DEGREE???
For giving a little talk?
Maybe she should pay full tuition, give the talk, then they give her a degree. Like the rest of us cretins are doing.
She’s on staff at Stanford. Seriously. Ridiculous.
How about having Jane Fonda give the commencement address at the Air Force Academy?
Of course, actually making a coherent criticism of the Rutgers protests against Rice would require engaging with why she’s being protested, and explaining how what she’s done doesn’t merit that level of of opposition. It would mean making a substantive defense of Rice giving the commencement speech, rather than a merely procedural one. Doing that would acknowledge the right of the rabble that teach and study at Rutgers to judge someone like Condoleeza Rice being, which is the real outrage here.
The elite political class must not be shamed.
Aw, Condie haz a sad at being disinvited to Rutgers?
I bet we could get her a commencement gig at the Leiden University campus in Den Haag.
With some “special events” after the ceremony, oh yes.
The critical distinction is the difference between a guest lecturer who comes to help foster and exchange ideas (and which students and family members can chose to skip without sacrifice)’ and commencement speakers who represent what the university stands for and who the students should take a lesson from.
Second to that is an wide unwillingness of the press and academia to distinguish between factual truth and lies. Lies and just being wrong on the facts are defended as “alternative points of views” or dismissed as “political posturing”.
“This isn’t about intolerance. It’s about morality. It’s about common sense. It’s about protocol. It’s about manners.”
Booman, oh Booman
‘People” like us are NOT afraid to say your quote.
Republicans will call us RACIST
How cum Republican leaders have such problems with “synonyms” when defending(?) themselves.
SHORT VERSION:
“This isn’t about intolerance. It’s about morality.”,
AND Reality!