So, Hillary Clinton is giving this year’s commencement address for RPI. There has been some fairly vocal opposition to this, mostly but not entirely from the student Republican organization. There are those who feel that the school should stick with more glurge and less pot-stirring. I think this is silly. Hillary Clinton is a NY senator, a successful woman, etc., and therefore in an ideal position to give advice to new grads. What’s your take?
Who would they rather instead? Laura Bush? Maybe they could ask her to discuss the last book she read and you’d have a 50/50 chance she’d discuss either the Bible or ‘The Pokey Lil Puppy’ by Golden Books…
Sounds like a good choice to me. MY RPI friends are always complaing about the lack of women in Troy, anyway. 
Oh, and if you’re graduating this year, congratulations!
No, I’m not graduating this year. Next year. Thanks though.
Yeah, they probably would rather have Laura Bush. Lately I’ve been surprised at the rampant republicanism on the RPI campus.
Spatial Rift, you’re an RPI student? I had no idea!
As an RPI alum, I can only say neat. I had someone I had vaguely heard of, (Robert Metcalf…apparanlty pretty big in the internet world) and wold have liked someone more well known and universal. The graduating class my freshman year got Bill Cosby…I told my friends in the senate to push for Scott Bakula, but they said no. Bastards.
I wonder if Yale Republicans reacted this way when Shrub was their speaker? Really, there’s nothing wrong with a speaker who arouses strong opinions just by existing, presuming that they’re smart enough not to inject unnecessary political jabs into the speech that they actually give at graduation. During my junior year at Harvey Mudd, one of the gay rights groups was up in arms about the choice of Orson Scott Card because of some comment he’d made in an interview a long time ago. All these people seem to ignore the fact that if you give each special interest group veto power, then you end up with bland and uninspiring speakers.
Besides which, big names bring in publicity, and there’s no such thing as bad publicity.
She’s also speaking for my alma mater, Agnes Scott.
Iokiardi.
My father graduated from RPI in '51—“goooo [whatever your mascot is]!”
Henry Kissinger delivered the commencement address at Boston University in 1999. The damnest thing about it is I couldn’t understand a blessed word coming out of that man’s mouth, other than a vague mention of Kosovo. Had he been subtitled, I would now be a wiser man for the experience.
Hey, I didn’t know you were an RPI student either, Spatial Rift 47! Welcome to the RPI/Dopers’ clique! There seem to be a few of us around here.
Aside from the political crap that surrounds her speech, Hillary Clinton’s not a bad choice. But when I graduated, we had Bill Cosby. That was much cooler.
And Eve, we’re RPI Hawks. Or Engineers. Depending on the sport. I think. It’s not entirely clear. As an aside, I know someone who graduated in '51 too!
Redhawks. Unless it’s the men’s hockey team, then it’s the engineers. But yet, the actual mascot for the engineers is…a giant puck. Yeah, I don’t get it either.
Hey, Puckman is COOL!
I think it’s time to start an RPI appreciation thread in MPSIMS. 
RPI alum here as well, '93. I can’t even remember who my commencement speaker was. I think it’s cool to get someone so high profile at commencement. Sure beats someone bland, any day of the week.
Oh, and if nothing else, I think it’s much better to have someone famous - even if you don’t necessarily like that person - than to have someone that no one’s heard of. You’ve got to sit through hours of a really boring ceremony so at least you should be able to say you heard someone famous speak and not some inane nobody.
The class of '03 had some doctor and he was REALLY boring and a bit sanctimonious. But on the other hand, they got the flyover by the stealth bomber which was just about the coolest thing I’d ever seen, so I guess it balanced out.
I think it was Resnick (y’know, as in Halliday & Resnick)–he was retiring that year.
I woulda been class of '92, but a long internship made me class of '93.
Speaking of Resnick, when we were freshmen a friend had a Physics quiz with a question on the definition of energy. She wrote down “the ability to do work” but this was marked incorrect by the TA. She and I thought the definition was acceptable, so I tried to call Prof. Resnick to ask his opinion but he was out of town. So instead I called Prof. Halliday in Hanover. He said he thought the answer was OK, so she went to the TA with that. (Something like, “Although you said the answer was wrong, the author of the textbook said it was correct.”) The TA said he still didn’t agree, but gave her the credit for sheer chutzpah.
Hillary Clinton gave the commencement speech when my husband graduated. He said she was excellent.
I don’t care what your politics are-- give the lady a little credit for being a good speaker. Secondly, I think it’s kinda cool to have a former First Lady give your commencement address regardless of whether she’s Republican or Democrat.
Way cool to have (Future President) Clinton speaking!
My university had some captain of industry that nobody had ever heard of, and nobody ever heard of again.
Lissa said it better than I could. She could be a smegging Whig for all I care, she was the First Lady, for the luvva Mike. That there is perspective, that is.