******* http://www.cluebot.com/article.pl?sid=01/04/20/1711257 Yale Censors Student Paper Over Bush Flap by cicero on Friday April 20, @12:06PM If you didn't know any better, you might think that Yale University cared about free expression for its students and campus newspapers. Just look at its breathtakingly sincere official policy on how important free speech is to the health and diversity of the campus community: http://www.yale.edu/ycpo/undregs/pages/II.html ...a free interchange of ideas is necessary... the university must do everything possible to ensure within it the fullest degree of intellectual freedom... we commit ourselves to the idea that the results of free expression are to the general benefit in the long run, however unpleasant they may appear at the time... Because few other institutions in our society have the same central function, few assign such high priority to freedom of expression... What a sham! As soon as a student newspaper published something that controversial about one of President Bush's daughters, Dean of Student Affairs Betty Trachtenberg called the editors into her office and gave them a severe dressing-down about how some kinds of speech is less worthy than others. The article in question had appeared in Rumpus, and quoted friends of Yale student Barbara Bush saying that the Secret Service wasn't doing a particularly splendid job of protecting the president's daughter. "On April 12, nearly a week after the issue had appeared in dining halls and newsstands around campus, Trachtenberg called Rumpus Editor in Chief Jared Leboff '03, Managing Editor Matt Johnson '03 and the article's author, Nathaniel Pincus-Roth '04, into her office. Following that meeting, Rumpus removed the current issue from the tabloid's Web site," the Yale Daily News reported on Friday. The Rumpus website, www.yale.edu/rumpus, now says: "Issue is Currently Unavailable." We know that Secret Service agents have an unfortunate habit of intimidating everyone from 58-year old women upset over anti-gay politicos to people who photograph agents picking their noses to gaming companies, so it's not a stretch to say they didn't like how they were portrayed in the Rumpus piece and complained to Trachtenberg. The truth, though, is that censoring the article from the paper's website won't accomplish much. It had been published a week prior, so anyone on campus who wanted to read it probably did. A better -- and far more distressing -- explanation is that Trachtenberg and Yale wanted to curry favor with the newly-inaugurated president and his administration. No word yet on when Yale will rewrite its "free speech" policy to bring it into line with reality. (PS: Yale has a habit of blocking non-university visitors from reading its policies, so its free speech policy will be mirrored here: http://www.cluebot.com/docs/yale.speech.042001.html) ******* http://www.yaledailynews.com/article.asp?AID=15559 Published Friday, April 20, 2001 Rumpus scolded for Bush story Yale tells tabloid to yank Secret Service story from its Web site BY CHARLOTTE DEWAR YDN Staff Reporter Rumpus is no stranger to controversy, but a recent article the campus tabloid ran on the first daughter is giving it national exposure and trouble with the Yale administration. A story that ran in Rumpus' April edition about alleged mishaps in the Secret Service's protection of Barbara Bush '04, the daughter of President George W. Bush '68, landed the tabloid's editors in hot water with Dean of Student Affairs Betty Trachtenberg, who charged Rumpus staffers with exploiting Bush's presence on campus. At least two national publications, The Washington Post and tabloid The Star, have also taken an interest in Rumpus' report on Barbara Bush's security detail. The cover of Rumpus' April edition screamed "O Daughter, Where Art Thou," and included a story on Barbara Bush's Secret Service attache at Yale. On April 12, nearly a week after the issue had appeared in dining halls and newsstands around campus, Trachtenberg called Rumpus Editor in Chief Jared Leboff '03, Managing Editor Matt Johnson '03 and the article's author, Nathaniel Pincus-Roth '04, into her office. Following that meeting, Rumpus removed the current issue from the tabloid's Web site. [...] The original Rumpus story claimed that on at least two occasions, the Secret Service officers assigned to Bush have inadvertently lost contact with her. Sometime last month, Rumpus reported, Bush and friends were driving to New York City when the agents following them got stuck at a toll booth for lack of the "E-ZPass," which electronically deducts tolls as cars drive through. [...] Trachtenberg was critical of the story's accuracy and appropriateness, and called it "the most irresponsible kind of press that could possibly happen." [...] **** ------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- Declan McCullagh's politics and technology mailing list You may redistribute this message freely if it remains intact. To subscribe, visit http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------
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