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About ArmaVirumque ( AHR-mah wih-ROOM-kweh) In the Aeneid, the Roman poet Virgil sang of "arms and a man" (Arma virumque cano). Month in and month out, The New Criterion expounds with great clarity and wit on the art, culture, and political controversies of our times. With postings of reviews, essays, links, recs, and news, Armavirumque seeks to continue this mission in accordance with the timetable of the digital age. Recent posts
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Nov 14, 2007 11:22 AM by James Panero
"President of Columbia Is Criticized" Was I the only one who read this morning’s New York Times headline with disbelief? Lee C. Bollinger, the president of Columbia University, was confronted yesterday by discontented professors who gathered more than 100 faculty signatures for a document criticizing his leadership.Did you also read this first paragraph of the story and say to yourself, "too good to be true"? Of course, it was. Yes, some of Columbia’s most hardened professors are censoring President Bollinger with a "statement of concern" over his handling of Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Not over the invitation, certainly. But over Bollinger’s critical introductory remarks. No, I too agree that Bollinger’s speech was just more peacockery from a career administrator aiming for the presidency of Harvard. It allowed Ahmadinejad to play the underdog and provided him with a sympathetic audience. But that’s not the issue for these tenured radicals. Nor did these professors wonder whether it’s right for a tyrannical politician to be invited to make a stump speech at an academic institution. Mahmoud! You can deny the Holocaust all you want, but you can’t deny that there’s something between you and Columbia’s faculty. They have yet to find an anti-American, anti-Western, anti-Semitic dictator not to love. But don’t worry, Lee. You’re still no Larry Summers. Afterward, several faculty members stressed that there had been no call for Mr. Bollinger to step down and nothing like the anger that led to the resignation last year of Lawrence Summers, Harvard University’s president.That’s big of ’em.
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