My senior year at the University of Notre Dame there was an incident with the senior class. When the commencement speaker was announced that spring, the Lt. Governor of Indiana, a few of the class officers did a very foolish.

They went to members of the local media complaining that this man was not what they considered to be the caliber that they felt a graduating class of Notre Dame warranted. I'll admit that when I found out who the commencement speaker was, I was disappointed too. I, however, had the good sense to share my views with only a few friends and not a few media outlets.

These few officers brought the wrath of the community and alumni alike upon our class. It turned out the Lt. Gov. was an alum of the university, a POW in the Vietnam War, and the mayor of South Bend, home of Notre Dame, quite successfully and popularly for nine years. Oops. Local media outlets reported the response of an angry South Bend who considered our class to be a bunch of snobs with no class or proper sense of respect. Alumni wrote letters to the editor of the student newspaper agreeing with the locals and indicating that they were not pleased that we would soon be joining their ranks. Upon further recollection, who was I to argue? The real salt on the wound was when it was revealed that the committee of seniors given the task of nominating the commencement speaker had basically botched the job and we were lucky we got anyone. I'll admit that I don't remember the speaker's name but I still remember some of the advice he gave in his fine speech.

Earlier this year, it hit the press that a group of ND alum had written a petition to the university about the flailing football program and the athletic department's poor leadership in hiring Tyrone Willingham as the head coach of this program. The petitioners caught more flack than Willingham and were decried as whiners. I myself had proclaimed the letter an embarrassment on a ND message board.

Tonight, I found a new post on the message board and a link to the original letter encouraging the message board members to read it themselves rather than the media response. I couldn't really argue with that. So I went to the link and now you can too at

As I read it, I could feel myself growing more upset over it. Angry upset, not worry upset or sad upset. Afterwards, I began to think back to those senior class officers. While there are more than 412 members of the class of 1998, I'd like to think we learned our lesson and few, if any, of our ranks are represented in that number. While it is distressing that this time the number involved has grown since the '98 incident, it is encouraging that the number is relatively small considering the pool from which it was drawn.

In the meantime, I can't help but pondering the following things. 412 people all but profess themselves the saviors for a crumbling university. Instead, 412 people embarrassed a much larger number of the alumni population. 412 people have given me reason to write to the head football coach, the athletic director, and president of ND and explain all the ways in which I think that these 412 people don't really reflect my views regarding the university and how I'd rather not be grouped in the same category as them. 412 people have proven great fodder in getting my weblog off to a roaring start.
I wonder if those 412 people are glad that they wrote/signed a whiney letter and leaked it to the press. I wonder if those 412 people are ever going to read this.