Thursday, September 20, 2007

Columbia--A Strange Set of Values

From The Weekly Standard:

Meanwhile: As Columbia welcomes Ahmadinejad to campus, Columbia students who want to serve their country cannot enroll in the Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) at Columbia. Columbia students who want to enroll in ROTC must travel to other universities to fulfill their obligations. ROTC has been banned from the Columbia campus since 1969. In 2003, a majority of polled Columbia students supported reinstating ROTC on campus. But in 2005, when the Columbia faculty senate debated the issue, President Bollinger joined the opponents in defeating the effort to invite ROTC back on campus.

A perfect synecdoche for too much of American higher education: they are friendlier to Ahmadinejad than to the U.S. military.


Update: Instapundit quotes an email from Michael Barone.

Columbia doesn't host ROTC or (I think) military recruiters on campus, because it would be just too offensive to do so, because the military obeys the law passed by a Democratic Congress and signed by Bill Clinton which bars open homosexuals from serving in the military. OK.

But Columbia does host Ahmedinejad who heads a government which executes homosexuals for the crime of being homosexuals.

So it's obnoxious beyond belief to exclude homosexuals from military service, but it's not obnoxious beyond belief to hang them from the neck until dead.

How many times must I say it? Consistency isn't a strong suit of the left, but hypocrisy is.

Update #2, 9/22/07: I heard about this yesterday--Columbia has un/disinvited Jim Gilchrist, the founder of the Minuteman Project.

In response, Gilchrist yesterday said, "It would have been a great revelation for the student body and it would have redeemed the Columbia University student body's reputation of being comprised of a Paleolithic - a caveman - mentality."

Nail. Head. Whack!

Update #3, 9/23/07: Of course we'd invite Hitler to speak!

4 comments:

Ellen K said...

Since when did you expect anyone from the liberal left to make sense? It's all smoke and mirrors. It's all about the appearance of propriety. It's like Victorian men who wanted their wives to be icons of purity and then wasted their time in brothels. There is no reason in it. There is only power. Or perhaps Zool.

Darren said...

Zool? Now *there's* a term I haven't heard in a very long time!

Ellen K said...

From one of the funniest all time movies "Ghostbusters" "There is only Zool." I bet Hillary thinks she's "Zool". Does that make Bill the Keymaster or Barak.....?
On a lighter note,I wonder what would happen if the feds decided to stop funding student loans at Columbia. Bet there would be a great deal of political shifting among the students and their parents if they suddenly realized that radical decisions sometimes have consequences. Just a thought.

Unknown said...

since we all know it is better to support leaders who commit crimes against humanity instead of the us military ... because damn isnt what they are doing the same thing?