OU Paying Left-Wing Journalist $115,000 for Speech

To deliver its 2006 Commencement address, the University of Oklahoma has somehow managed to secure the services of none other than ... Katie Couric. Presumably Geraldo Rivera was unavailable.

OU vice president for public affairs Catherine Bishop tells me Couric’s fee of (gulp) $115,000 will be paid from "private funds." Three cheers for private funds. Since money is fungible, state legislators can in good conscience appropriate 115,000 fewer dollars to my alma mater this session than they otherwise would have.

Let’s review some of the more memorable statements Couric has uttered over the last several years. These quotes were collected by the good folks at the Media Research Center.

"Considered one of the most charismatic leaders of the 20th century," Couric once said of a mass murderer, "Castro traveled the country cultivating his image and his revolution delivered. Campaigns stamped out illiteracy and even today, Cuba has one of the lowest infant mortality rates in the world."

Yes, his revolution delivered. Writing recently in The Wall Street Journal ('Counting Castro’s Victims'), Mary Anastasia O’Grady reminds us that "in the earliest days of the revolution, summary executions established a culture of fear that quickly eliminated most resistance. In the decades that followed, inhumane prison conditions often leading to death, unspeakable torture and privation were enough to keep Cubans cowed."

O’Grady reports that the Cuba Archive project "has so far verified the names of 9,240 victims of the Castro regime and the circumstances of their deaths. Archive researchers meticulously insist on confirming stories of official murder from two independent sources. Cuba archive President Maria Werlau says the total number of victims could be higher by a factor of 10."

Interviewing the National Rifle Association’s Tanya Metaksa on May 19, 1995, Couric said: "As your convention begins today, there is reportedly a power struggle going on within the NRA. More traditional ... NRA members, conservative sportsmen, and a more radical branch of Second Amendment fundamentalist zealots." (In case you’re wondering, radical fundamentalist zealots are bad.)

On August 18, 1994, Couric asked Democratic National Committee adviser Tony Coelho: "Why do you think that he [Bill Clinton] doesn’t get credit for the good news that’s going on? And if Reagan was the Teflon President, it seems like Bill Clinton is the Velcro President. Every bad piece of news just sticks to him." Oh yes, the indefatigable liberal media were notorious for chasing down every Clinton scandal and making sure it stuck to him.

On May 24, 1993, Couric said to New Jersey Governor Jim Florio: "Just last night on television I saw your opponent for governor complaining about your record, saying how you had raised taxes, how it had cost 300,000 jobs. Are you afraid your politically courageous moves are, in fact, going to cost you the election?" It takes courage, you understand, to buy votes by raising taxes and passing out goodies to your base.

Here’s another embarrassing softball, this one from November 13, 1991. "And finally President Carter, you are now considered one of the world’s foremost statesmen. You've been called the best ex-President this country has ever had. Your reputation has been bolstered tremendously since you left office. How does that make you feel?"

This one’s my favorite. "Let’s talk a little bit more about the right wing," Couric said to former Texas Governor Ann Richards on March 3, 1999. "This is actually not necessarily about the right wing but perhaps a climate that some say has been established by religious zealots or Christian conservatives. There have been two recent incidents in the news I think that upset most people in this country -- that is the dragging death of James Byrd, Jr. and the beating death of Matthew Shepard. I just would like you to reflect on whether you feel people in this country are increasingly intolerant, mean-spirited, et cetera and what if anything can be done about that because a lot of people get very discouraged when they hear and see this kind of brutality taking place."

Couric helpfully connected the dots for us, you see. Intolerant Christian conservatives ... climate of hatred ... dragging and beating people to death. It’s all so clear.

In 1999 an intrepid conservative student at OU had the good sense to go to the Cleveland County election board and look up voter registration of professors in 19 OU departments, mostly in the College of Arts and Sciences (economics, history, political science, etc.). He found that Democrats outnumbered Republicans 208 to 36. (And you thought liberals believed in diversity.)

Unfortunately, this imbalance shows up also in the selection of commencement speakers and other high-profile campus speakers. Higher education bureaucrats have no problem thumbing their noses at the (overwhelmingly conservative) taxpayers of this state who are paying the freight.

Conservative syndicated columnist Marvin Olasky, a journalism professor at the University of Texas, recently pointed out that most of these liberal universities "are heavily dependent on government funding, and some Republicans are asking why they should continually subsidize their opponents." Good question.