In one of a pair of Sunday posts at his web site, New England talk show host Michael Graham added an emphatic exclamation point to Brent Bozell's and Tim Graham's Saturday column condemning the cowardice and hypocrisy of Brandeis University's decision to revoke its commencement invitation to Ayaan Hirsi Ali. In the other, Graham roasted the Boston Globe for backing Brandeis.
Bozell and Tim Graham rightly pointed to the university's embrace of particularly nasty anti-Catholic and anti-Israel speakers. Michael Graham found yet another example adding toxic icing to an already rancid cake, and noted that three of its female graduates have achieved a unique level of infamy (links are in each original; bolds are mine throughout):
Brandeis Says “No” To Feminist, “Yes” To….TERRORIST?
... It is impossible to parody American liberalism, because every example you would invent to mock them is in fact something they have already done.
When Brandeis University decided to kow-tow to religious extremists and withdraw their honorary degree/opportunity to speak from Ayaan Hirsi Ali, I made an off-hand comment on the air about how these same liberals would have no problem inviting unrepentant terrorist Bill Ayers to speak on campus.
D’oh! From 2009:
Former radical William Ayers will finally get a chance tonight to be heard on a Massachusetts college campus. ...
... For those of you keeping score at home, this is Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers. “I only regret I didn’t do more” bombing Bill Ayers. The Designed-A-Nail-Bomb-Like-The-One-The-Boston-Marathon-Bombers-Used Bill Ayers. The guy whose nail bomb would have killed new Army recruits at Ft Dix, except his idiot Weather Underground pals blew themselves up instead–that Bill Ayers.
I’m in the “once you decide to blow people up, you lose your seat at the conversation table” camp. The students of Brandeis who brought Bill Ayers to campus are not ...
The same students who–no joke–couldn’t say for sure they would oppose HITLER speaking at Brandeis (yikes!) are now happy to ban a feminist currently living under a death threat imposed by religious extremists. But for Brandeis, this story is just getting good.
Because Brandeis’ relationship with terrorism isn’t just theoretical:
"… around 1970 ... Brandeis saw three of its women students posted to the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted List (Angela Davis, Susan Saxe and Katherine Power), no small feat since only seven women were ever put on that FBI list in all of its history.”
... Katherine Ann Power ... started at the Brandeis University SDS chapter, then migrated to Weather Underground terror and murder. She killed a local Waltham cop, then went into hiding until 1993. Now she’s a popular campus speaker, acclaimed by liberals.
But heroic feminist Ayaan Hirsi Ali is untouchable.
Separately, Graham skewered the Boston Globe for supporting Brandeis's commencement decision:
The Boston Globe-Democrat Joins Racist/Sexist Attacks On Black Feminist By Brandeis
In a surprise to absolutely no one who’s paying attention, the “courageous” truth-to-power editors of the Boston Globe-Democrat agree with the decision of Brandeis University to stop feminist Ayaan Hirsi Ali from speaking at their commencement and stripping her of an honorary degree:
SOMALIA-BORN feminist author Ayaan Hirsi Ali has every right to criticize Islam, the faith into which she was born. But this right should not be confused with an entitlement to receive an honorary degree. Brandeis University, a nonsectarian Jewish-sponsored college, recently rescinded its invitation to honor her after understandable complaints by Muslim students who were offended by her blanket condemnation of their faith. Hirsi Ali is justified in feeling whipsawed by the university, which should have looked into her more extreme statements before now. But it made the right call in the end.
You may recall these are the same brave Boston Globies who reported on the violence inspired by the Dutch “Mohammed cartoons,” but refused to let their readers actually see the cartoons because they were terrified of Muslim pressure. The Globe-Democrat went so far as to compare supporters of a free press printing news to “Nazis.” No joke.
It’s funny, but when I googled looking for a similar editorial from the Boston Globe-Democrat denouncing Brandeis for their honorary degree to Tony Kushner (He calls the creation of Israel a “mistake” and says pro-Israel Jews are the most “repulsive”)–I got nothing.
And I’m trying to imagine what a Globe-Democrat editorial celebrating a Catholic university for dis-inviting a pro-gay-marriage speaker would sound like? What would the lede be to their editorial praising an Evangelical college for defending its principles by disinviting a pro-same-sex-marriage commencement speaker?
It’s almost as if the Boston Gl0be-Democrat has NO principles, that they just find a way to promote their partisan, far-Left views–with a little self-protective kow-towing to potentially-violent Muslims thrown in for good measure.
On Saturday, Bozell and Tim Graham wrote:
Now let’s wait for famous Brandeis faculty, past and present, to speak out. What say you, Robert Reich? And how about you, Anita Hill? A black woman has been silenced.
We're still waiting.
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
