The OTHER Debate That Proved Bollinger Right

Stanley Kurtz puts it this way:

Let’s acknowledge that the Ahmadinejad event at Columbia was a huge success, which does indeed prove that debate and dialogue work. It’s just that the debate in question wasn’t between Bollinger and Ahmadinejad. The debate that mattered was the one between Bollinger and his American critics. Once Bollinger was called out on the blunder of his invitation, he was forced to redeem himself by publicly speaking the truth about Ahmadinejad. The real success of that event was Bollinger’s introduction, and it happened before Ahmadinejad said a word.

The problem is that true debate and true dialog only work when the participants actually respect what debate and dialog are really all about.

Here are two quotes that illustrate the point.

Bret Stephens on the suggestion by Dean John Coatsworth suggestion that Columbia University would be willing to invite Hitler to speak:

Hitler at Columbia would merely have been a man at a podium, offering his "ideas" on this or that, and not the master of a huge terror apparatus bearing down on you. To suggest that such an event amounts to a confrontation, or offers a perspective on reality, is a bit like suggesting that one "confronts" a wild animal by staring at it through its cage at a zoo.

Rich Lowry:

Liberals like to say of the Bush administration’s allegedly militaristic foreign policy that if the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. Likewise, if the only tool you have is dialogue, everyone looks like a reasonable interlocutor.

Bollinger's success is illustrated by what happened outside of Columbia University. Judged solely by what happened inside Columbia University yesterday, Bollinger's idea could be judged a failure--and a critique of Columbia's failure to apply it's dedication to free speech equally.

Technorati Tag: Bollinger and Columbia University and Ahmadinejad.