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“Err McNair”

Tuesday, March 13 at 12:00 AM

This Speakout has not been edited

By Steve Lester, MA English-Creative Writing, CU-Boulder ‘05

George Norlin, president of the University of Colorado from 1917-1939, was a great man. For some time during his tenure, the Ku Klux Klan controlled the state legislature. They ordered Norlin to fire all the Jews and Catholics in the faculty. When he refused, the state cut university funding to nothing.

That Norlin kept CU afloat while taking an ethical stand testifies to a legacy no library can do justice.

In contrast, G.P. “Bud” Peterson, in his first year as Chancellor of CU-B, defends creative writing graduate student and resident white supremacist Joshua McNair in the name of free speech. Before conclusions, facts: In 2004, McNair brings convicted holocaust denier David Irving to campus.

The same year, McNair wins a $1,125 contest judged by Grand Dragon of the KKK David Duke for an essay titled, “Organization, Cooperation, and Action.”

Josh advocates, among other things, more “Pro-Whites” in academia.

In 2007, he teaches two undergraduate classes of 20 students apiece in CU-Boulder’s very own Norlin Library.

Coincidence?

In 2006, Josh weepily recants his beliefs to get into grad school, blaming the neo-Nazi foray on, among other things, personal and chemical problems.

In 2007, his profile, “Deadmansdeeds,” and prize-winning tract remain on Stormfront.org (http://stormfront.org/), a premier “white pride” site. Both mysteriously disappear the same day McNair is outed by CU undergrad Max Karson in a Thomas Paine-like broadside distributed - quite fittingly - on President’s Day.

Coincidence?

I am amazed that Josh outlined a plan of academic infiltration he is now so brazenly executing - and that nobody seems to care. This testifies to his being a man of at least modest intellect (said attempts to cleanse himself from Stormfront being foiled by The Internet Wayback Machine ( www.archive.org) and Google cache notwithstanding). Just think of what could be accomplished if his mind were dedicated to eradicating malaria instead of, you know, Jews. But I’m not here to debate the relative merits of national socialism.

Arguing with such folk is like taking up scientific discourse with people who believe that water doesn’t contain oxygen. I do, however, take umbrage at CU “spokesperson” Bronson Hilliard’s notion of punishing “conduct, not ideas.” This is a false dichotomy constructed to let the administration do exactly what it’s been best at doing in the face of controversy in recent history: nothing.

So, we who don’t want white supremacists teaching at our universities need a little organization, cooperation, and action of our own. Josh’s students, parents of CU students, faculty members, people of the Jewish heritage and faith, and other concerned members of the community, I implore you: make your voices heard. Protest a true “little Eichmann.” And by all means, contact Err McNair directly and let him know what you think: (303) 818-6676.

Perhaps local media can be sufficiently roused into playing “journalism,” instead of “slow-pitch softball.”

Above all, Bud Peterson needs to step up in the pocket and show some long-awaited leadership in his rookie season. We’re talking about a school that ran Adrienne Anderson out of town on a fossil-fueled railroad and fumbled over Gary Barnett at the cost of Nobel Laureate Carl Wieman. Don’t add to this the message that CU is a sanctuary for white supremacists.

Take a stand, Bud, and cease betraying the legacy of George Norlin.

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