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Honestly, would Rutgers be a good choice? Maybe Liberty Univ or BYU or some other conservative school.
The school invited her. Honestly, I think people could stand a little more exposure to people and ideas they disagree with. Might learn something.
Honestly, would Rutgers be a good choice? Maybe Liberty Univ or BYU or some other conservative school.
True.
But at the same time the school should not pick someone just to get controversy.
I attended Rutgers as a dual history/poli-sci undergrad during the Iraq war and as a graduate student (in a notoriously liberal field of study) immediately following the Iraq war.
During that time, and as an alum, I've attended numerous colloquiua and lectures (Eagelton series and other) related to the Iraq/Afghanistan wars and American foreign policy more generally.
I've been a member of RUSERVS (the Rutgers student veteran organization) since it's inception in the mid 2000s.
Other than a handful of undergrad rallies nothing ever gave me the impression that the Rutgers student body was excessively absorbed in anti war sentiment.
Given the nature of my dual undergrad major, and the courses I took, I expect that if there were an aggressive anti war sentiment among the faculty I would have been exposed to it.
Sure I had professors who were overtly liberal in terms of their views of the war, but I also had professors who were overtly conservative.
Most were somewhere in between, trying to provide instruction based on a balanced view without injecting their personal philosophies into the course material overmuch.
In in-class discussions with other students related to topics of war and peace generally and the GWOT specifically I think the majority were always of an anti war bent (both generally and specifically), and I think that's what you'd expect from a population of service-age young adults who didn't have the balls (my opinion) to man up and serve their country, but I never saw it get to the point of disrespect or combativeness.
The relationship between the faculty and the student body at large with the veteran sub-community was always cordial if not clearly respectful.
The following article (granted, it's from FOX, which I'm not a fan of) expresses the kind of sentiment I'd expect from the Rutgers community:
In a nutshell, it says that an handful of faculty and students created a stink, so she backed out, but the overriding sentiment of the wider Rutgers community was disappointment in her decision to do so:
Rutgers students frustrated after Rice withdraws as commencement speaker | Fox News
Rice is also a self made woman, not coat tailing on her husbands laurels. ie Hillary. Anyone that would not want her to speak at their school is clearly a narrow minded fool that will do nothing with their lives in the future.
They stood for nothing. Worse they stood for being whiney little children who held their breath and stamped their feet to get their way.A narrow minded fool, or a group of courageous youngsters willing to protest a war criminal and enemy of the US Constitution?
Maybe somebody taught them that old bit of wisdom, "If you don't stand for something, you will fall for anything"?
eace
They stood for nothing. Worse they stood for being whiney little children who held their breath and stamped their feet to get their way.
True.
But at the same time the school should not pick someone just to get controversy.
I attended Rutgers as a dual history/poli-sci undergrad during the Iraq war and as a graduate student (in a notoriously liberal field of study) immediately following the Iraq war.
During that time, and as an alum, I've attended numerous colloquiua and lectures (Eagelton series and other) related to the Iraq/Afghanistan wars and American foreign policy more generally.
I've been a member of RUSERVS (the Rutgers student veteran organization) since it's inception in the mid 2000s.
Other than a handful of undergrad rallies nothing ever gave me the impression that the Rutgers student body was excessively absorbed in anti war sentiment.
Given the nature of my dual undergrad major, and the courses I took, I expect that if there were an aggressive anti war sentiment among the faculty I would have been exposed to it.
Sure I had professors who were overtly liberal in terms of their views of the war, but I also had professors who were overtly conservative.
Most were somewhere in between, trying to provide instruction based on a balanced view without injecting their personal philosophies into the course material overmuch.
In in-class discussions with other students related to topics of war and peace generally and the GWOT specifically I think the majority were always of an anti war bent (both generally and specifically), and I think that's what you'd expect from a population of service-age young adults who didn't have the balls (my opinion) to man up and serve their country, but I never saw it get to the point of disrespect or combativeness.
The relationship between the faculty and the student body at large with the veteran sub-community was always cordial if not clearly respectful.
The following article (granted, it's from FOX, which I'm not a fan of) expresses the kind of sentiment I'd expect from the Rutgers community:
In a nutshell, it says that an handful of faculty and students created a stink, so she backed out, but the overriding sentiment of the wider Rutgers community was disappointment in her decision to do so:
Rutgers students frustrated after Rice withdraws as commencement speaker | Fox News
Very interesting and you make me rethink my OP. Maybe Rice should not have let this small group of misfits run her off.
They stood for honor and dignity, objecting to having their school bring a war criminal on campus to address the students.
They stood for something, rather than falling for anything, as seems to be the case here. They objected to the sophistry and coverup advanced by the federal government.
Part of free speech that you obviously HATE is that people can protest. Why do you hate free speech so much?
war criminal?... or the peson that kept you safe post 9/11....
Yes, how quickly they forget how afraid everyone was that there would be more attacks following 9-11 and state sponsors of terrorism would increase their efforts to bring the US down. Having been protected from that they have nothing but contempt for the people who defended them.
Yes, how quickly they forget how afraid everyone was that there would be more attacks following 9-11 and state sponsors of terrorism would increase their efforts to bring the US down. Having been protected from that they have nothing but contempt for the people who defended them.
Left wingers often confuse free speech with threats of violence and hooliganism. One can support the former while condemning the latter.
Disrupting a ceremony and shouting people down is not free speech.
Yeah, good thing we got those WMDs!!
:roll:
Look, as I've said, I think Rice is a class act, and she's a far cry from a war criminal.
But to imagine that the "war on terror" was necessary, successful, useful, effective, or anything like that, is insane.
Iraq has become a breeding ground for terrorism and Afghanistan is about a year away from going back to the same old, same old.
If anything, Bush admin policies have destabilized the world and added to the threat of terrorism (which, paradoxically, was never that enormous a threat to begin with but, if anything, has only gotten worse) .
Meanwhile, the same people who were prosecuting a fruitless two-front war in the Middle East turned the United states into the closest thing to a militarized police state that its been since British troops were being quartered in farmhouses.
One more thing, Bush, Rice, Rumsfeld, et al. played absolutely no role in defending anyone from anything.
They, themselves, were among the most insulated and defended people to ever walk the Earth.
To the extent that anybody can receive credit for anything approximating "defense" it's the folks who wore uniforms, not the assholes in suits.
Don't take this to mean that I "hate" George Bush or anything like that. I voted for the guy twice and have NEVER attacked him personally.
His failed policies, and questionable legacy, however, are another matter.
Failure is failure, regardless of whether it's Red or Blue.
They threw billions of dollars and thousands of lives down a bottomless hole and have succeeded in accomplishing virtually nothing by doing so.
Not confusing it at all with that, but nice try at deflection. The right typical does that when they can't refute anything.
war criminal?... or the person that kept you safe post 9/11....