Letter to the editor:

Too often we hear about what someone is saying and less often actually hear them say it. One of the services a great university can provide is first-hand exposure to public figures even, or especially, those who are obnoxious. It’s a characteristic of the information age that news comes prefiltered, and filtering, regardless of the best intentions, is bias.

Demagogues like David Horowitz love to play the martyr — they need to be exposed and confronted in daylight to be defeated. I would love nothing better than to stand next to Mr. Horowitz on a stage and eviscerate his “arguments” point by point. But I would need to hear his points first to know how to combat him.

The College Republicans should be commended for having the strength and courage to invite Horowitz on campus to hear his views first-hand. Critics of providing him a forum should realize they are arguing in favor of ignorance in the middle of one of the best universities in the nation. Now that is an argument they are most unlikely to win.

Tom Lillis IV
Class of 2015
Fourth-year in Political Science
[email protected]