Karl Rove No Longer Graduation Speaker Third Time’s A Charm?
By William Mullen ’08
Editor
In what many have characterized as a surprising move, on Monday Headmaster Edward Shanahan announced in a school-wide email that Karl Rove, former chief political adviser to President Bush, will not be giving the commencement address, but instead will speak at an all-school special program Monday, February 11th.
Headmaster Shanahan said in his email to seniors: “After thinking long and hard about your comments, and having received many emails…I contacted Mr. Rove and shared with him your and my concerns about our plans.” Mr. Rove accepted the idea of an alternative date to visit campus and to speak.
Dr. Shanahan quoted Mr. Rove as saying: “I would not want 12 minutes of remarks to be used as an excuse by a small group to mar what should be a wonderful day of celebration for the members of the 2008 graduating class and their families.”
The announcement by Headmaster Shanahan on January 8th that Mr. Rove would make the commencement remarks had been met with controversy both in the school community and in the national media.
The story over the controversy surrounding the speaker was picked up on the AP wire and featured in newspapers from the Chicago Tribune to the San Diego Union-Tribune to the International Herald Tribune. The New York Times wrote a story Tuesday about the decision to change Mr. Rove as the commencement speaker, as well as being featured on MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Olbermann.
Two opposing Facebook groups were created, one entitled “Choate doesn’t want Karl Rove” and the other: “Choate Students for Karl Rove.” There were whispers of an alternate graduation featuring Stephen Colbert, putting iPod headphones on while he spoke, and even turning the chairs in the opposite direction of the podium, forwarded in an email around to students who did not want Mr. Rove at graduation. According to Dr. Shanahan, some students even posted signs around his house late Saturday night containing information about Karl Rove’s questionable history.
Senior Erik Rahtjen ’08, a member of the opposition group spoke of the power of electronic media: “It’s crazy that something so trivial, like our commencement speaker exploded into an Associated Press and New York Times article.”
In an interview Tuesday, Headmaster Shanahan credited “a variety of circumstances” for his call to Mr. Rove over the weekend. The most influential circumstance, he said were his conversations and emails spawning after he requested seniors to email him after he met with them last Wednesday. “After receiving emails, some just 15 minutes after the [Wednesday] meeting,” I found them to be balanced, I found them to be temperate, and thoughtful. They were truly impressive,” he said, and more “fair and balanced than those of the adults.”
The executive committee of the Board of Trustees also conferred with Headmaster Shanahan and said according to him, “This is your responsibility.” However the trustees, as well as the media coverage was not as influential as the senior’s responses, according to Mr. Shanahan.
In a previous interview with The News last Friday, Headmaster Shanahan stated “I would never have withdrawn our offer [for him to be commencement speaker],” and he had stated earlier that there would be “0%” chance of a change. After writing an opinion piece to the Hartford Courant on Friday that ultimately ran in that paper on Sunday, Dr. Shanahan contacted Mr. Rove and they mutually decided on the Monday date, once the headmaster told Rove of “his and the student’s concerns.”
In his Courant commentary, Shanahan stressed the idea that Choate was an “educational marketplace,” and that Rove would “identify for our students a perspective that will encourage them to engage politics more, and to put their shoulders to the wheels of leadership our country so desperately needs.”
In choosing Mr. Rove, Dr. Shanahan spoke of a “litmus test,” consisting of someone, “nationally prominent,” with “an interesting point of view,” and someone who would “provoke students to think in a different way about the world they are about to enter.”
Dr. Shanahan stated about the special program in Tuesday’s interview that “virtually all the seniors expressed an interest in having Mr. Rove come to talk….and most are excited about February 11th.”
Paul Ryder ’08, a senior who had opposed Mr. Rove’s visit as commencement speaker agreed: “I feel like the students won. We still get to hear what he has to say; however it will not detract from our graduation, which was a pressing issue for many seniors.”
Not all are pleased about this decision. Christophe Lirola ¹08 a member of the Young Republicans and the ‘Choate Students for Karl Rove’ group on facebook said “Karl Rove would have given us a great commencement address, I was looking forward to having the final speaker of my Choate career be someone who has played such a major role in recent political history. Like him or not Karl Rove is a brilliant man who would have had some great advice for the class of 2008.”
Lirola did say however “I am excited to see this program because I know that Karl Rove is more than equipped to deal with the questions and comments of a bunch of 17 and 18 year old kids who dont like him.”
Although President Bush has referred to Mr. Rove as the “architect” of his presidency, Mr. Shanahan believes “folks are laying at Karl Rove’s door everthing that they dislike, if not abhor, about the last seven years. Some of this is rational, some is irrational.”
Shanahan said. “Do I think any politician is a choir boy? I don’t think so, everybody gets a little dirty—however, I believe Mr. Rove is innocent until proven otherwise.” He went on to say “Karl Rove is by all accounts, brilliant, shrewd, phenomenal self-educated historian.”
Headmaster Shanahan’s other concern was with outsiders “presenting a problem,heckling and disrupting what should be a day for the seniors. I wasn’t concerned with someone in Omaha, Nebraska reading this story, more with those who within driving distance.”
In terms of how the visit by Mr. Rove is viewed by the outside world the Headmaster said, “It says we are an open community, that kids here, almost more than adults, are more open to ideas than most. Students want to hear what Rove has to say, but some parents were too closed-minded” Shanahan stated.
Rove was given some suggestions for his talk by Dr. Shanahan, but he will have freedom, if he wants to speak on a topic of his choice. “I hope and expect our students will be gracious, pointed in their questions, and that we won’t get into the applause and the boos that I have rarely seen,” he said.
Headmaster Shanahan announced that it was his “intention” to give the commencement remarks, however said “I am not in the searching-for speaker mode right now, but it’s crazy and we’ll see what happens.” If he speaks, he would be the first Headmaster since Seymour St. John, who addressed the students in 1972 at his farewell commencement.
