Inside Higher Ed: SMU’s Deal With Bush

[jtstang]

As I said elsewhere, every school has a liberal faculty. Ours is already balanced by the ultra-conservative right wing rich kid student body. And if this was no big deal then why has Turner gone out of his way in every public conference to point out that he thinks the institute will not affect "open thought and dialogue" or whatever words he uses at the time.

And East, you are misrepresenting what the leader of the institute said even though I quoted it for you. It is not clelbrating "the ideas of President Bush"--its stated mission is to "celebrate the President and his tenure in office." That has nothing to do with ideology.

And how do you respond to the criticism of the library itself in light of Dubya's executive order? It is the first censored presidential library in history.

[peruna81]

Rev. McElvaney states his concern about the integrity of free-thought and the danger of censorship with this agreement...I wonder about his concern about associating the United Methodist Church with SMU, and rather difficult work of rationalizing the evangelism by one John Wesley...he intruded on the thoughts and practices of a generation of colonials without apology, while still holding firmly onto the ideals of free will for each man.

It would seem that Rev. McElvaney will have to abandon one position or the other, or develop an interesting means of determining relevance....SMU will have a comfortable arms-length relationship with the church ( and doctrine ) of it's origin, or submit to a selective censorship that is governed by folks like himself when it comes to issues and individuals that raise his ire.

SMU is a university, with all the joys and difficulties of a myriad of opinions. The merit of those opinions is tested in the crucible of both
debate and pragmatic life experience. To exclude one viewpoint because of the threat of "censorship" is poor fare...

I disagree on any number of points with our current president. But much like this thread and others concerning the Bush library, I rather suspect it will tease out opinions that will be thrown into that crucible. I am glad that variance of opinion will be happening at my University, whether I agree with the institute's positions or not.

[OC Mustang]

If the Theology school wants to hired Father Curran who was ex-communicated from the Catholic Church and fired from Catholic University to teach theology, it can.

Has nothing to do with the thread, but Curran reminds me of Ian McKellan in The DaVinci Code. He carried on about the Gospels of Mary, St. Thomas, etc. Interesting guy...very interesting guy.

[EastStang]

And how do you think the Institute is going to Celebrate this President and his tenure in office? Is it going to have a bunch of scantily clad cheerleaders in the institute going Bush, Bush he's our man!! (And if that's the case I know jt will change his tune). Or is it going to do so by engaging in research into the ideas behind this Presidency. Like for example, the thought regarding Nation Building in Iraq when Bush was against Nation building when he ran for office. His cheerleaders will have to find reasons to justify this position change. And currently all Presidential Libraries are under the same Executive Order which by the way if you noticed the timing, had a lot more to do with the deaths of Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford than this President's desire for censorship. Also I think many of the Kennedy documents came into the public view recently, and that the Kennedy family was none too pleased with John's autopsy photos being put on the internet. Although one might surmise that he was also thinking down the road about his father's age and library. Living Presidents have always had the right to censor access to the library as Bill Clinton is now doing with regard papers relating to Hillary's role as First Lady. This Executive Order only extended the time period of limits on access. I love how people twist the facts to fit their argument.

[jtstang]

This Executive Order only extended the time period of limits on access.

No, it also allows heirs to maintain the veil of secrecy in perpetutity. I hope whoever wins revokes it.

[EastStang]

This Executive Order only extended the time period of limits on access.

No, it also allows heirs to maintain the veil of secrecy in perpetutity. I hope whoever wins revokes it.

Isn't that extending the time limits?
I wonder does that mean that Sally Hemmings family can censor the Jefferson library now?

[PonySoprano]

Doesn't perpetuity mean there is no longer a "time limit"?

Prior to the executive order, I believe the law stated a 12 year period between the time the president left office and when documents were to be released.

[EastStang]

http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=2001_register&docid=fr05no01-104.pdf

Here is the actual Executive Order.