Unbiased NYT Reporter gives commencement speach, booed off stage

[Ned]

Chris Hedges, NY Times reporter, gave a commencement speech at Rockford College. His mike was unplugged at one point. He was later booed off the stage.

You be the judge, was this speech unbiased?

http://www.rrstar.com/localnews/your_community/rockford/0521hedgesspeech.shtml

[Cruddy]

Now he knows how Tony Blair feels at public speaking sessions.

EDIT: Biased or not, it certainly was inflamatory. This guy needs an education in diplomacy if he ever wants to make friends and influence people.

[Ned]

Originally posted by Cruddy
Now he knows how Tony Blair feels at public speaking sessions.

EDIT: Biased or not, it certainly was inflamatory. This guy needs an education in diplomacy if he ever wants to make friends and influence people.

So, Blair has some problems in being heard above a disapproving audience?

I thought the Brits were polite?

[Shi Huangdi]

I am curious as to why he chose him as a commencement speaker. I know I would certainly be upset if I got someone like that as mine.

[GePap]

And "unbiased speech" = a lecture. All speeches are biased, if bias is the word you want to use to descirbe having an opinion.

The speech in inflammatorey, and not the sort of thing to give at a commencement anyway. if the guy wanted to make a point, thn he could have done it ni much better ways.

[Tuberski]

"We worship death"

What a jackass!

ACK!

[Dinner]

The real question is what leftist idiot in the school system picked their fellow leftist idiot to make this speech?

[GePap]

The problem with the speech is not that the man is anti-war, it is that he gave an overly politiczed and obviosuly inflammatory speech at a commencement. Going in he knew what he would say would be inlfammatory, whether to a minority or majority of students, and that is the wrong thing to do since your speech is for the benefit of ALL students there, and their families.

[Ned]

Actually, Shi, I thought that all NY Times reporters were unbiased. Maybe the folks at Rockford thought that Hedges was going to speak in a more "balanced" fashion on his war experiences.

His speech does get very good towards the end when he cuts out the "Empire" bit and focuses in on the "comradship" that war creates. In a recent story on the civil war, one historian noted that the Civil War forged a nation out of a group of states because of this shared "comradship." The Civil War was transformative.

WWII was equally transformative. It brought the nation together as it had never been before, in one common purpose. It energized the US and made us into a great nation.

In some sense, we repeatedly get into wars because of WWII. We somewhat need wars to bring the nation together and to reaffirm our values. The war in Iraq was not so much about WoMD, or about liberating the Iraqi people, it was about our need to actively defeat dictators and liberate peoples, a mini-reinactment of WWII.

[Cruddy]

Originally posted by Ned


So, Blair has some problems in being heard above a disapproving audience?

I thought the Brits were polite?

It's the Parliament lower house. Seeing a bunch of supposed leaders behave like a bunch of schoolkids means they get heckled, jeered at and in Tony's case, the slow hand clap.

We Brits are not polite with each other. You must be mistaking us with the Japanese.

I think this guy was out to create the biggest publicity splash he could.

[Imran Siddiqui]

The problem with the speech is not that the man is anti-war, it is that he gave an overly politiczed and obviosuly inflammatory speech at a commencement.

Very true. I wonder what kind of moron, thought a NY Times reporter who they knew had a certain point of view would be a good commencement speaker? Come on! It may be one thing to invite a Congressman with the same POV, because he'd be more diplomatic about it (he wants to get elected, a cynic might say).

[CyberGnu]

The real question is what leftist idiot in the school system picked their fellow leftist idiot to make this speech?

I don;t know, but possibly related to the rightwing idiot who picked Bush to give the commencement speech at the United States Coast Guard Academy?

College commencement speeches are often used for political purposes... Nothing new here.

[Imran Siddiqui]

But they shouldn't be... it's disrespectful to those on the other side of the aisle, whatever their beliefs are.

[CyberGnu]

True. The speech should be about advice for the graduating class, right?

[orange]

not appropriate for commencement, but otherwise an awesome speech