Cindy Sheehan is speaking this Monday at 7 PM at Uconn, in the 500-seat Student Union Theater. I was just watching the O'Reilly factor, and the first segment featured Emily Salisbury, the executive director of the Uconn College Republicans, a self-professed libertarian whose facebook photo features her wearing a 'Halliburton' hat, as well as the editor (I don't remember his name) of the Daily Campus, the student newspaper.
Of course, Bill would not usually give publicity to Sheehan, if he were not using the relative obscurity about her invitation as a contrast to the controversy caused by Ann Coulter's upcoming appearance on Wednesday. (Coulter, Keith Olbermann's second worse person in the world today, will be speaking in the 2600 seat Jorgensen Center, which will then have to be fumigated.)
I've talked about this elsewhere, and I think much of the controversy comes from the fact that the College Republicans have a history of inviting offensive speakers and encouraging offensive behavior by such speakers. Further, Emily Salisbury is the Undergraduate Student Government Senator who proposed the funding, and also voted to approve it, which caused her to be reprimanded in the USG minutes. Her action was in violation of the bylaws, but the laws have no teeth, and so the funding was approved.
Cindy Sheehan's appearance fee was approved at around the same time, and there was little controversy about that. The Daily Campus is planning an editorial decrying the use of student funds for Sheehan as well, and I have to admit that to some degree I agree with that sentiment. Fortunately, the College Republicans cannot make that same argument, since they have accepted an even greater amount for a speaker who is even more partisan and controversial than Sheehan. (Naturally, this assumes that blatant hypocrisy is even a deterrant to Republicans.)
All of this is kind of besides the point of this diary, which I want to use to point out that Salisbury remarked on the Douchebag Factor that the College Republicans plan to hold a counter event, 'not a protest,' at the Student Union during the Sheehan event.
It is certainly their right to hold a counter-event, although I am curious to see how many people show up, and how many of those are even university students, but given their history, I am inclined to question whether they are holding their event out of sincere support for the troops, or merely out of a desire to start conflict with attendees of Sheehan's speech.
Which brings me to the point: What better way to support the troops than to stand alongside them on the battlefield? To that end I hope to get the attention of anyone who knows anything about 'Operation Yellow Elephant.' I am sure that military recruiters would be interested that a group of young and eligible potential recruits will all be in one place at Storrs this Monday. I would love to see the College Republicans put on the spot, especially since I think they care far more about being 'right' and 'beating' Democrats than this war or the troops. So does someone here know how to go about this?