"And we all stood up to applaud the six students who represented the 'No To Rice' movement that organized the demonstrations of the last ten days: the enthusiastic commitment they expressed to humanistic values was a reminder that there is real hunger among our students for more knowledge of history, of foreign cultures, of the very notion of 'culture,' of political science, of economics, as well as a deep interest in questions related to ethics, public policy and the place of media in our culture. Students like these give a special meaning -- and responsibility -- to our teaching and research."
Rutgers was against students learning about unapproved reality
No free speech was harmed in the unfolding of these events, except at the Rutgers president's office (where student speech was met with threats of arrest). By cutting and running, Condoleezza Rice may have lost a paid venue (her net worth is about $4 million), but she has hardly been muzzled; on the contrary her exercise of her own free speech got us into a deceitful, destructive failure of a war for which millions of Iraqis continue to pay with their own freedom and lives. The Rutgers administration lost students' respect for promoting an apparent war criminal, but there's no sign the administration is sensitive to any of that.
Academic freedom is a big winner at Rutgers, where faculty let some air and light into discussion of 15 years of American crimes against humanity that are usually left to fester down the memory hole. And perhaps the biggest winners are Rutgers students whose determined integrity allowed their voices to be heard on issues of principle that the Rutgers administration got wrong on both substance and morality.
Like Rutgers, Smith College in Northampton, Mass., announced its choice of commencement speaker in February and protest began soon after, but the two protests are very different responses to two very important elephants in our collective cultural-political living room. Where Rice is emblematic of the elephant of illegal war, torture, war crimes and crimes against humanity about which we are not supposed to speak, Lagarde represents the much tidier elephant of financial plunder and economic "austerity" that probably leaves millions more innocent people to suffer and die without hope.
It's not that Christine Lagarde sold people an illegal war as Rice did, but as head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) since 2011, she carries out a prior ordained policy that is as inhumane as it is merciless. In Ukraine now, some people are hoping that $17.1 billion from the IMF will somehow help to save a country that can hardly pay for gas these days. But that $17.1 billion is not a gift, it is a loan to a country that can't support its current dept load, and so, thanks to the IMF, Ukraine can look forward to another decade or more of even worse debt servitude than it has suffered in the past. The IMF $17.1 billion is typically reported as a good deed, but there are 46 million Ukrainians (except for a small number of oligarchs and bankers) who will have no reason to be grateful for this "beneficence." The IMF has just bought the right to be the unelected ruler of Ukraine and the purchase is so sweet, the Ukrainians will have to pay for it, with interest.
Objections to Lagarde are institutional and philosophical
Christine Lagarde is a well-regarded attorney, whose specialties were antitrust and labor issues. She has held several French government posts, including Minister of Finance. She was the first female chairman of the international law firm Baker & McKenzie. She is an undeniably accomplished woman about whom the worst, easily available personal criticism is her apparent callousness toward the Greeks in 2012. Any real skeletons she may have remain tucked away in her closet.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
1
1
1
