Taking a cue from the undergrads, students of Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs are complaining about their graduation keynote speaker. Citigroup CEO Vikram Pandit, who graduated with an M.S. in 1977 and a PhD. in 1986, has inspired rage in students of his year's graduating class. Student Daniel Safran-Hon told the Daily News, "He represents an industry that, even when it was stable and not in crisis, paid itself outrageous salaries."
Another student thinks the school should have opted for a humanitarian speaker, saying a banker "doesn't fit into the spirit of what public affairs is supposed to be." Hey, just because Citigroup more than doubled their profit since last year while having possibly engaged in fraud does not mean Pandit doesn't have humanitarian leanings. The grad students' top choices were either Stephen Colbert or Hillary Clinton, neither of whom graduated from Columbia.
One former student says the complaints are just par for the course. "John McCain was too conservative, Jack from Lost was too famous. Joel Klein was too unfamous, and the undergrad speaker this year is too racially sensitive. It's kind of tradition, to be honest. Columbia students always have to be unhappy or complaining about something."
