Category Archives: Speakers, Panels and Events

Glenn Loury. Photo credit: Bob Turner

Glenn Loury’s keynote speech at the 2nd Annual Meeting of the Jefferson Council last week was a hit. We have received an outpouring of praise for hosting Mr. Loury, as well as thanks for providing a platform for one of America’s most brilliant but insufficiently appreciated conservative intellectuals. We are delighted to inform Jefferson Council members that the good feelings were reciprocated. He sent us a message this morning:

My visit with the Jefferson Council of U.Va. was the most encouraging campus speaking engagement I’ve undertaken in years. I was delighted to see the assembled hundreds of alumni and friends of the University, coming together out of love of the institution and commitment to liberal values, to fight for what they know is right and best for the school. They’re pushing back — with passion, with humility and with determination — against the zeitgeist in the modern university world. They’re resourceful, well-organized and well-led. They’re bound to make a difference. I wouldn’t bet against them. GL

We will post Loury’s speech as soon as the video has been processed.

The Jefferson Council invites you to hear George Will April 25th at the University of Virginia. The topic of his address could not be more timely: “The Bad Ideas Fueling Today’s Attack on The Best Idea — Free Speech.”

Will began writing national syndicated columns in 1976, making him one of the longest-running pundits of our time. He’s also one of the best, winning the Pulitzer Prize for commentary in 1977. Age has not in the least dimmed his way with words or the incisiveness of his critiques.

The assault on free speech has been a top-of-mind issue for the conservative columnist recently. Consider a recent column he wrote about campus radicals at Stanford who shut down the speech of federal Judge Stuart Kyle Duncan.

The noun “parent” has become a verb as many people embrace the belief that perfectibility can be approximated if parents are sufficiently diligent about child-rearing. So, “helicopter parents” hover over their offspring to spare them abrasive encounters with the world. And “participation trophies” are given to everyone on the soccer team, lest the excellence of a few dent others’ self-esteem — the fuel that supposedly propels upward social mobility.
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