Letters to the Editor
temperance
Published Letters: 45 Editor's Choice: 3
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This isn't Real Debate
[Read the article: The great debate]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I couldn’t relate to this description of debate in the slightest and I’m wondering if other readers felt the same. The “debaters” discussed in the piece sound clever and quick-witted enough, but they’re really engaging in dueling oratory. That’s not the same thing as debate.
So, here it comes. When I debated in high school and college (late-80s/early-90s) I had to walk five miles to school with several bankers boxes strapped to my back, through the blinding snow, and uphill (yes, both ways). Our judges judged our debates based on our evidence and arguments (not on how pretty or witty we sounded). To get this evidence, I, my partner, and everyone else we competed with had to read high-brow stuff like Foreign Affairs and Dissent to find the best and latest doomsday scenarios. I remember routinely staying up well past the point of serious sleep deprivation to “cut cards” (assemble the evidence in a useable format). I remember begging my parents to send me to the extra-long session of the summer debate institute. I remember the deep camaraderie. I remember how all my conversations had something to do with debate (“I hear Glenbrook North is running a new disad”) – well, almost all of them (“do you think that girl from round 2 was cute?”). The debaters and coaches I knew centered their entire existence on the activity; it was all-consuming. Does anyone else have similar memories?
For the record, I credit whatever success I have in my current career (university professor) to my debate experience. I learned it all from debate: library research, argument construction, argument evaluation, public speaking, etc. I doubt, however, I would’ve learned the same skill-set (or anything for that matter) from the “debate” described in the article, which sounds a lot like “Lincoln-Douglas,” “Parli” or CEDA in the 1980s -- the styles of U.S. debate that are/were universally mocked by the real debaters.
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sounds like a grad student
[Read the article: Betrayal Week, Day 2: I was fired for doing my job as a teacher]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Based on my limited (13 years) experience in academe, the letter writer sounds like a classic grad student archetype: "My ideas [teaching methods] are just too HEAVY for you to understand. Real high-end stuff . . . the masses just don't understand."
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pottymouth necons
[Read the article: Debate with Frank Gaffney]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I thought Gaffney's moments of cursing & losing it spoke volumes. He was literally reduced to bad words.
As a few others have noted, Gaffney's line "You're entitled to your opinion" was entirely bizarre because he was chirping it in response to Glenn's "these are basic & fundamental American ideas" argument. To me, it sounded like:
GG: "hanging someone for speaking out against the government is antithetical to America's founding principles"
FG: "you're entitled to your opinion"
creepy . . .
Anyway, it's always a joy to hear Glenn fight the good fight on the airwaves.
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"Rumsfeld pulled out a pencil . . .
[Read the article: Did David Broder "prop up" the Bush presidency?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]. . . and drew a simple chart." Yes, I'm getting an image of this and it's not pretty. It looks like foreign policy scrawled on cocktail napkins.
You make a solid case for the Broder prop-up, but that was a lot of Broder for the average reader to take in on a Saturday morning. I'm overwhelmed.
I think the paragraph beginning: "Let me disclose my own bias in this matter. I like Karl Rove." really says it all.
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Gannon = more funniness
[Read the article: Unbearably, painfully, depressingly funny]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]If you can stomach it, you might want to check out Jeff Gannon’s take on the Priest WaPo article. http://www.jeffgannon.com/archives/general/index.html#a000875
Gannon, that exemplar of journalistic integrity, titles his post “Washington Post = Fifth Column” and then offers: “Fifth column: Any clandestine group or faction of subversive agents who attempt to undermine a nation's solidarity. (Britannica.com)”
It has gems like: “Two glaring omissions in the article: 1. There is no mention of the morale among many of the troops recovering at Walter Reed - which is overwhelmingly positive.” Feel better now? Jeff Gannon says the morale is “overwhelmingly positive.”
And this: “Priest’s latest effort is aimed at the survivors of the global war on terror and pits them against the country for which they fought and sacrificed.” Got that? She’s, like, totally pitting.
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Reynolds, Althouse, etc.
[Read the article: Various matters]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Did anyone see this article about a proposed Arizona law that would fine professors $500 if they talk about politics in their classrooms. It will die the quick death it deserves, but it's still disgusting:
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/02/19/ariz
I wonder if it covers assasination advocacy?
And did you make any sense of Althouse's vapid NYT piece today? Anyone? I have nothing intelligent to say about it because there's little substance to respond to. I had to read it, though, because she makes such a big deal about Glenn's supposedly poor writing ability.
AA: "I had set aside that obsolescent hippie balkiness and adopted a pragmatic attitude for the task ahead." SUCH stirring prose. My word.
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to the casual observer
[Read the article: Various matters]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"the school found that the advocacy for murder was antithetical to the stated mission and standards of the college."
Saying something antithetical to the mission of a university is amply covered by academic freedom. For instance, in a Sociology of Education class I could assign a bunch of reading from Ivan Illich and advocate "deschooling" (the abolition of all schools) in my lectures. Clearly that's antithetical to the mission of the university (schooling), but I have every right to advocate it, test my students on it, and make them write papers on it. Further, I have no obligation to "balance" that with the pro-schooling view (athough pedagogically it makes a world of sense to do so).
(by the way, I'm not a fan of Illich -- it's just an example of something clearly antithetical to the idea of a college or university)