Recent complaints revolve

around foreign policy, not Tenet
It is awesome that people can complain about the fact that they were not informed about a private meeting. The issue here most likely has nothing to do with CIA Director George Tenet’s presence, but the general discontent around this school with our nation’s foreign policy and the CIA. Many high-ranking officials, both former and current, hold conferences and give private speeches, and since privacy is a liberty we at the university understand so virtuously, it’s amazing how quickly we expect that to go away when it’s to one’s benefit.
If his coming to this university were for answering questions or to hold a public forum, the students would have been made aware. However, as a closed-door meeting with University officials, alerting the students to his presence would only serve the purpose for those who would wish to harass him, likely causing the reaction that University is so well-known for: protest. It is not the University’s job to alert the students every time a person is in town, especially when it’s private. The point is that as a university, we are going to have important people here and not every single meeting is public, even if this is a public institution. Maybe it was his request that his presence not be made public; you would too if you were head of an organization, meeting with officials from a university whose students have the audacity to turn a private visit into a public berating, even after you leave.
As to the rumor of $10,000 spent to spruce up campus for Tenet’s visit — if it was even spent — his arrival coincided with the beginning of the major possible student campus visits. So who do you think the money was really spent for: one guy or the future payer of salaries for the University?

Nathan von Colditz

senior, history