Heard some audio of this on NPR. The students were definitely giving him a hard time.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/local/story/419332p-354128c.html
New School President Bob Kerrey, a former Democratic colleague of McCain’s in the Senate, said he expected worse.
“I am fine, thanks to alcohol,” Kerrey joked following the ceremony.
Haha, great quote.
McCain earned it.
I dunno, I think it’s pretty rude to behave that way. Those students were acting like 13-year olds.
On the contrary, this is exactly the kind of reception that political stump speeches should get when directed at students who turned up for more important matters, like their graduation.
It’s a prevalent problem amongst students. My University newspaper had a theme of sorts in the editorial pieces last issue (unintended, actually); it amounted to a call for balance. Students are happy to criticise the right and protest about, let us say, George Bush, but very few people are prepared to stand up and criticise the left.
Those that do, for example the pro-animal testing movement (recent development in student bodies, started by Oxford) tend to be scared or attacked, in all senses of the word. Witness the woman whose body was stolen from her grave in order to pressurise a family to shut down their guinea pig farm.
Vast left-wing conspiracy strikes again, eh?
Try reading the comments here:
http://www.cw.ua.edu./vnews/display.v/ART/2006/05/03/445850af60e8b
Oh, goodness me no. I just think things are not quite balanced in terms of student protests. In the UK, at any rate. I can think of very few anti-left protestors. I don’t say that it is good, or bad, but it is certainly unbalanced.
Sorry, I should have made that clear. Student bodies in the UK.
Crap, that has no relevance to US bodies. Damn it.
You sure about that? When the republicans have all the power, what can the democrats do that can be protested? What is there to protest with a party not in power, not making decisions, not controlling anything?
Or, maybe the left isn’t really doing that much worth protesting?
Fairness does not imply attacking both sides equally. It implies attacking both sides for the same things. What have the Democrats done that compares in any shape or form to what the Republicans have done?
As education increases, a person tends to skew left. Also correlated are being less religious and not liking NASCAR.
H.
In the case of the executive branch, throwing tomatoes is a no-brainer for nearly every private citizen involved whether you are democrat, ‘social’, GOP, or ostensibly centrist… y’know… like the U.K. public has done with Mr. Blair on more than one occasion. That, and no person has ever created a popular viewpoint by being polite all or even most of the time. People tend to be nasty when presented with widespread hypocrisy, pandering, and extortion in public office and not having any viable means to do something about; grow up and deal with it.
Vast left-wing conspiracy strikes again, eh?
yes, I believe the polarized left is capable of everything the polarized right is. Simply because the Democrats are not the party royally screwing over the nation atm does not at all imply that their shit doesn’t stink… in so many words.
At that, I don’t necessarily believe the American equivalent of Mao Tse Tung is patiently waiting to sieze power, but I’ll be damned if there isn’t someone capable of some of his leftist antics. “Sieze the world from your priveledged overlordz1!@!!!” isn’t a far cry for most liberals in my view.
Please, convince me otherwise at your own peril.
I love how everything not Republican can be tossed in the Left basket: Democracy, Socialism, Communism. It’s very convenient.
What I’ve always found interesting about this correlation is that some people (guess who?) take it as a sign that there is something wrong with education. It never occurs to them to wonder why more educated people reach different conclusions than they do. What I mean is it never occurs to them that the education may be leading people in the correct direction.
BTW, left and right are very broad terms, so we have to be careful when using them. We all know this, but it bears repeating. I am a well educated person. In fact, I am a college professor. My views are “leftist” when it comes to most social issues (pro-choice, no problem with gay marriage, etc.), but I am “conservative” about financial issues (anti-welfare, anti-social security, etc.). Even that oversimplifies.
It’s frustrating being lumped in with some supposed “academic political stance” that is not as unified as people are led to believe.
All that said: NASCAR sucks. I mean really…driving around in circles for hours?
That’s fucking bass ackward.
That’s like saying CEOs of today must be more productive than they were 20 years because they earn at least 15 times what they were during such a time, ADJUSTED for inflation.
Cry me a fucking river.
Even if that were a genuine statement (which it isn’t), one could argue leftward beliefs, education, and cultural superiority are not mutually inclusive, easily.
Perhaps liberal views are socially reinforced without any logic at higher levels of your so-called education. Perhaps an educated person is predisposed to know more about the world beyond their nation’s border, and are more inclined to feel pity for those with immeasurable poverty and hard times thus creating ideology that has a bit in common with liberal ideology as a whole. Maybe they feel guilty for the nice things in their lives, that they take for granted and that others don’t have. This just happens to be categorized in a very real and obnoxious modern trend known as “Liberal Guilt” (compare “conservative rage”). Maybe it’s just plain fashionable to lean left at certain levels of cultural sophistication.
Join a crowd at hollywood. Most common links between people besides expensive lifestyles? Employed by or volunteering for by any of the following: ACLU, Amnesty, PETA, Human Rights Watch; commitee; defenders; Global Justice, anti-globalization, ACORN, National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, Alliance for a New Humanity… the list is a mile long.
Perhaps these entities are more educated than their 'winger equivalents, for what you said to be true?
Well either way all this means is that education is NOT ever porportionate to intellectual superiority.
I love how everything not Republican can be tossed in the Left basket: Democracy, Socialism, Communism. It’s very convenient.
I love how wanting to close my nation’s borders to an impoverished, filthy, drug filled, crime smothered, dilapidated cesspool of a neighbor with little or no redeeming value in it, makes me a racist.
As a matter of fact, egalitarianism, enviromentalism, pro-labor movement, unionism, and ‘elite liberals’ -rich, pseudocompassionate posers who are in fact, disconnected from the rest of the world- all lie on the left of political spectra by ironclad definition… sorry if it bruises your ego.
But you are derailing and none of what we type is either here or there. GJ. Maybe in a few years you will manage to goad a few centrists into calling you “treehugger motherfucker”. There’s irony in such a possibility, yes?
And then back again to the right.
I love how wanting to close my nation’s borders to an impoverished, filthy, drug filled, crime smothered, dilapidated cesspool of a neighbor with little or no redeeming value in it, makes me a racist.
Who the fuck called you a racist?
As a matter of fact, egalitarianism, enviromentalism, pro-labor movement, unionism, and ‘elite liberals’ -rich, pseudocompassionate posers who are in fact, disconnected from the rest of the world- all lie on the left of political spectra by ironclad definition… sorry if it bruises your ego.
Ego doesn’t enter into it. I’m just amused by the tendency of people like you seeing two viewpoints: CORRECT (which happen to coincide with all opinions you currently hold) and LEFT (everything else).
But you are derailing and none of what we type is either here or there. GJ. Maybe in a few years you will manage to goad a few centrists into calling you “treehugger motherfucker”. There’s irony in such a possibility, yes?
You don’t know me and you don’t know my viewpoints, unless you’ve been lurking here longer than your 35 posts would suggest. So fuck you and your “treehugger motherfucker” comment too, you isolationist, jingoistic, flag-thrusting, Bible-thumping cocksucker. Or are you an individual and not a stereotype after all?
You want something relevant to the topic? I’ll give you something relevant to the topic. McCain’s a tool. He’s been a typical Republican since Bush came into office, that is, showing no dissent whatsoever, no matter how harmful or stupid the BushCo policies become. He’s been giving the same campaign speech to a multitude of universities, and the students called him on it. Good for them. As for the maturity of their actions, well, given the so many other options open to them for making their opinions known to those who need to listen (i.e., none whatsoever), I don’t begrudge them for doing what they did.
Besides, what obligation are they supposed to feel at a commencement address? Shouldn’t a speaker be tailoring HIS speech for the STUDENTS, and not the other way around?
Actually, it makes you an idiot.
If there’s a cesspool on the edge of your property do you think putting up a fence is going to solve the problem?
How about figuring out how to help your neighbor clean up the cesspool?
Meanwhile the balanced protest argument is nonsensical on it’s face. People respond to the actions taken by other people. When the left starts a failed war based on lies, runs on discrimination, and panders to religious extremists (or the equivalent) I think we’ll see some protestors show up.
The idea that protest should be portioned out based on some kind equal basis is ridiculous on its face.
From your tone, I’m already looking forward to what comes next, where you, playing the part of the loudmouth newbie, start whining that we’re not treating you fairly, or that we’re too insulated, or out of touch, or all blinded by the left wing, or something. Then, after a blaze of posting, and some hand wringing by the regulars over how we should treat idiots who post without any respect for the community they’re posting to, you vanish back down whatever hole you appeared from.
Happens a couple of times a year. But maybe it won’t be you. There’s irony in such a possibility.
Actually, my next post was going to run along two lines.
One: That will teach me to post things I have not thought 'through properly. Especially with a headahce.
Two: I would like to formally retract what I have said, before the burns become permanent.
The only real example I can come up with of unbalanced protesting is the animal rights issue in the UK. That was recently rectified, but made the situation a little surreal (protests about protestors…). So, I was wrong.
Careful you aren’t mistaking wealth for education.
Anyway, fun to see people flip out over this, but it remains true. It’s also true that as education nears zero, people tend to skew left as well. Read into it what you will, but dem’s da facts.
H.
Or maybe it’s that what passes for “right” in the US these days are an embarrassment to anyone who holds true conservative values since they are, in short, a bunch of populist clap-trap intended to placate the masses by appealing to a false ideal of “americanism” while the cynical elite communicating it are exploiting them and their country for all it’s worth, and anyone with an ounce of education will come to realise this (not all of them are inclined to turn to the opposition party, however).