To the Editor:
I stumbled into a lecture sponsored by the War & Peace Studies Program entitled "U.S. Policy in the Middle East: Where To Go From Here."
This lecture was organized and moderated by Prof. Allan Stam, and included a panel of four speakers.
One of the panelists was Daryl Press, a professor of government here at Dartmouth. Prof. Press began his segment by thanking Prof. Stam for bringing the Dartmouth community a panel with a "broad range of ideas" and a "balanced" view on the topic.
With all due respect to Professors Press and Stam, the idea that this was a balanced panel is completely ridiculous.
There were three speakers who were against the U.S. policy, with one even going so far as to call Saddam Hussein a "freely-elected leader".
Only one panelist, Mr. Dennis Goodman of the U.S. State Department (ret.), did not call the U.S. Middle East policy a mistake and predict a terrible outcome in Iraq.
This is not what I would call a balanced and open discussion of ideas, something President Wright and his enormous administrative bureaucracy have been touting as a "great mission of the College."
In reality, it more closely resembled a public brainwashing of the type one would expect to hear from Dan Rather.
During an especially radical portion of the lecture, I overheard a woman in front of me whisper to her husband: "I feel bad the students have to hear this. This is insane."
Of course, after four years here at the College and many hours spent in Government department lectures, I have become all too familiar with the College's idea of a balanced academic environment.
Debate from all sides is a truly remarkable and democratic ideal, but to tarnish this ideal by calling such one-sided lectures "balanced" is a disgrace and a complete misrepresentation of reality.
