Daily Campus

Can we change the topic of conversation, please?

Abstract:
When a colleague and I co-authorized an op ed piece for the SMU Daily Campus Nov. 10, little did we realize the firestorm it would ignite. Because we both love SMU, and because we then deemed the proposed Bush Presidential Library, Museum and Policy Institute to be inconsistent with SMU's mission and its grounding in the United Methodist heritage, we expressed our conscience as a matter of record-definitely not because we had any self-inflated notions we could stop the whole thing....

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George Purvis M.Div. Perkins, '67

posted 1/23/07 @ 1:41 PM CST

Thank you, Dr. Johnson. You display geinune conscience and courage by: 1)"going public" with the critically important article, written by you and Rev. Bill McElvaney - 2) using your authority/privilege/ responsibility as a professor of theology, to "speak truth to power", especially when your colleagues and HPUMC are hiding in silence - 3) raising the confrontation to an academic level by teaching those who question your motives, the radical, life-giving meaning of "being political" - 4) the informed/wise decision to totally reject a partisan institute that is based on proven, policy failures/catastrophies. You model what all of your students need to follow if they seek Ordination.

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John Jose

posted 1/23/07 @ 8:32 PM CST

For what it's worth, speaking as a baptized and confirmed member of the Methodist Church, I sincerely hope that theology students, if they are going to propose spiritual argumentation, will not follow the trend set by the protesting Methodist clergy. If there were Scriptural support or some sort of religious justification as to why the Bush Library complex should not be associated with the Methodist church, I could sincerely consider their views. But because the only argument presented so far is that it would be "utterly inappropriate," and nothing further, I can't merely accept their word on face.

John Jose
First Year Senator
jjose@.smu.edu

Originally posted by
George Purvis M.Div. Perkins, '67
Thank you, Dr. Johnson. You display geinune conscience and courage by: 1)"going public" with the critically important article, written by you and Rev. Bill McElvaney - 2) using your authority/privilege/ responsibility as a professor of theology, to "speak truth to power", especially when your colleagues and HPUMC are hiding in silence - 3) raising the confrontation to an academic level by teaching those who question your motives, the radical, life-giving meaning of "being political" - 4) the informed/wise decision to totally reject a partisan institute that is based on proven, policy failures/catastrophies. You model what all of your students need to follow if they seek Ordination.

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Benjamin Hufbauer

posted 1/23/07 @ 2:34 PM CST

In my recent op ed in the New York Times ("Archives of Spin," which was not my title, by the way), I suggested that *if* a presidential policy institute is put on a university campus that rigorous academic oversight is essential. Ultimately, however, I believe that a partisan institute should not be placed on a university campus because it would conflict with the university's academic mission. For what it may be worth from someone who has studied presidential libraries for years, and who has also worked at a university for years, I think that the proposed Bush Institute should not be placed on SMU's campus. President Bush could still have the institute, but simply locate it somewhere else in Dallas, or somewhere else in Texas.

Benjamin Hufbauer
professor of art and architectural history
University of Louisville's Hite Art Institute

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