It is commencement season, and at colleges all over the nation, big-names speakers are getting jeered at, heckled and protested.
In Beantown, some of the peace-loving professors and students at Boston College on Monday stood and turned their backs on Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice as she spoke of the importance of education, the New York Times reported. Her pro-Iraq War occupation seemed at odds with the Jesuit nature of the university and its pacifist mission.
Over at Madison Square Garden a few days earlier, Senator and presidential candidate John McCain was ready to impart some wisdom to the graduates of New School, fresh from his butt-smooching of Jerry Falwell. His appearance likewise met with jeers and back-turning, but he got the extra bonus of being fileted like a Gulf grouper by the student speaker who preceded him.
This article appears in May 17-23, 2006.