Governator Speaks at USC Commencement

The Govenator, Arnold Schwarzenegger gave this year's Commencement Address at USC. Despite some initial worries that the trademark Austrian accent might prevent some graduates from actually understanding his address, he performed admirably. The Governator's speech had all the essential elements required to make a good commencement address, including a celebrity speaker, some humor, and an easy to remember and cliched take away lesson.





I wonder how this commencement address will compare with the upcoming address at Dartmouth College on June 14th. The featured speaker will be one Louise Erdrich.

Don't be alarmed if the name didn't ring a bell. As my friend Julia (also graduating from Dartmouth this June) said today "I can't even remember who we have speaking at ours. I just know that she's an alumna with a kid here now and she ALMOST, but not quite, won a pulitzer for a book." (Full disclosure: it was this quote and the Schwarzenegger speech, which she forwarded to me, that were responsible for this post.)

Frustratingly, both Bill Russell and General John Abizaid (ret.) are receiving honorary degrees during this year's graduation ceremony. Bill Russell is the 11 time NBA Championship winning player and coach, who was voted NBA MVP 5 times in his incredible career. John Abizaid was the 4-star general in charge of USCENTCOM from 2003 to 2007.

If you ask me, both Bill Russell and John Abizaid would have made much more interesting and appealing Commencement Speakers. Instead, we get to listen to the winner of the 1984 National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction speak. The excitement is so underwhelming, I don't know how I'll be able to contain it for another three weeks...

These Guys are Awesome...

...as long as they don't take themselves too seriously. Which, based solely on their name, I really doubt they're capable of. Anyways, here are Harry and the Potters, who are playing a free show at Dartmouth tonight at 9 pm in FUEL. Doors open at 8:30.





From The Dartmouth:

Harry and the Potters is the independent project of brothers Paul and Joe DeGeorge, fans of the megapopular novels by J.K. Rowling who began giving spontaneous concerts in their backyard dressed like two Harry Potters in 2002. Since then, the Massachusetts-based band has released three studio albums, “Harry and the Potters” (2003), “Voldemort Can’t Stop the Rock” (2004) and “Power of Love” (2006).

The whole show was made possible through the efforts of one awesome dude, Harry Potter super-fan David Schmidt '09.

edit: The House of Spode will be there tonight to check them out. I'm looking forward to some goofy Harry Potter inspired tunes!

College Education

I saw this quote earlier today, and it was interesting enough that I wanted to share it.

"True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running this country" - Kurt Vonnegut


The quote was featured in a rather cool photograph that I saw this morning. The irony was that this looked very much like a homemade button that some kids from my high school would wear in their desperate hipster campaigns.

Which led me to think, I don't know if I'm comfortable with my college classmates running this country either. After all, I'm about to graduate from Dartmouth College, and I am not entirely certain at all whether my friends or I are at all ready to be entrusted with running anything.

Sure, we're (for the most part) ready to enter the labor force, sad as we are to be finishing school in just over a month. I don't think, however, that our classes have taught us at all on how to run this country.

Sure, over these last four years college students around the country have acquired the skills to live on their own and to productively contribute to society (at least some of us). Yet the jump from college life to real life is scary enough. When are we actually going to get the training we need to run this country?

This has already been on my mind for some time. A favorite conceit of the ivy league education is that the colleges are there to create the leaders of tomorrow. Yet, despite this oft-repeated maxim, neither Dartmouth nor any other school (as far as I'm aware) has yet to issue a handy course reader on running this country.

Which, like so many other things in life, is entirely disappointing.