Sing with us

I can't honestly comment on Sen. Richard Lugar's commencement speech since I was out of town attending my brother's graduation from The College of Wooster in northeast Ohio. However, the impression given by its coverage in this week's IDS, assuming our reporting is accurate, is that some of you found it less than inspiring. This is not surprising, since it was not really written for you. That is, unless someone in IU's class of 2003 was thinking of designing a "global accountability system to track nuclear, biological and chemical weapons" (Associated Press, May 12). By the way, if you are, may I recommend lots of tin cans and a really big ball of twine?\nThe commencement speech I attended, on the other hand, at least was written with the new graduates in mind. Unfortunately, as it was long, and as it followed a rather slow and pretentious invocation, I mainly felt inspired to flee before my arse fused lichen-like to the bleachers. In picking The Chicago Tribune's Mary Schmich for this year's address, the college made the mistake of breaking my old Dad's maxim on selecting graduation speakers: "Never give the microphone to a preacher or a journalist." \nI bring up my father because, after 20 years serving as an administrator and faculty member at a university in northwestern Ohio, he has become something of a connoisseur of graduation speeches. And, in his estimation, such events are more often something to be endured rather than enjoyed. Yet, from time to time, he has told the family about one graduation that he found particularly inspiring.\nMany years ago, the vice president of this Ohio university decided that for commencement they would invite and award an honorary degree to the late, great Fred "Mr." Rogers. The president at that time, unfortunately, was a pompous fool, who upon hearing that Mr. Rogers had been invited, ordered the vice president to uninvite him and get someone more "prestigious." The provost refused and, following a tussle, the two reached a compromise: Mr. Rogers would get the degree but would not talk. The speaker, instead, would be the journalist and political pundit William F. Buckley Jr. For those of you too young or too distant from politics to recognize the name, Bill Buckley is a conservative columnist who uses words like "airily," "abeyance" and "jejune" in the course of both articles and public speeches (see his Jan. 10, 2003 article in the National Review).\nNow, in those years, graduation at this university was much more disorderly than it is today. In fact, from year to year the graduates had evolved into a mob reminiscent of the one that cheered the beheading of Marie Antoinette in 1793. Beachballs were launched across the crowd, and the hated president was regularly booed. Into this mix strode Buckley, bravely, if not wisely, delivering a speech in his traditional style. Consequently, it was not long before the audience started chanting, "Buckley Shut Up! Buckley Shut Up!" until he finally did. Mr. Rogers too had to face the horde. As he rose to receive his degree, the crowd demanded, "Sing With Us! Sing With Us!" Stepping up to the microphone, Mr. Rogers replied, "I'll sing if you will." And so, for the next few minutes, the entire assembly was united in a chorus of "It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood." \nThe fact is that a speaker's power to inspire lies not in their prestige, but in their ability to reach the audience. Without resonance, at best they simply provide information -- at worst, noise. Sadly, inspiration is not always the goal of commencement speakers or of those who choose them.