Get ready for Brandeis University's annual commencement speaker controversy, now in its 20th consecutive year- and this year, it doubles as about the fifth "controversial speaker" scandal of the last six months.
The choice is Thomas Friedman, the three-time Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist and Brandeis alum, who briefly returned to school last year to teach. He's just about a perfect choice: He's brilliant, he's well-known and well-respected, he's got the 'deis pedigree, and he's known for speaking very well about important things.
Why's he controversial? Well, far leftists have long treated Friedman with disdain because he's not a sufficiently leftist, while ultra-Zionists have never trusted him much either, for not being sufficiently Zionist. And pretty much everyone on campus is one or the other. Oh well, better him than John Glenn or Peter Lynch.
Interestingly, the school's first choice for the address was another all-world journalist: David Halberstam. But Halberstam is, alas, no longer available.
Other honorary degree recipients include author Joyce Carol Oates, vocalist Marilyn Horne, and (argh) architect Daniel Libeskind.
Posted by Stephen Silver at April 27, 2007 12:14 AMDon't forget Whoopi Goldberg, the former chancellor of Germany, and the least objectionable person alive, John Glenn, who 'deis students still bitched about.
also, didn't the Stache go to your high school also?
Posted by: LilB at April 27, 2007 12:33 PM