The Scopus Award Dinner
For Terry Duffy

Introduction of George F. Will by Leo Melamed
March 11, 2010

I could make this introduction short and sweet by simply saying: Tonight's keynote speaker is the Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper columnist, journalist, and author, George Fredrick Will.

Or I could add, as a columnist, television personality and author, George F. Will is one of the most widely recognized, and widely read, writers in the world---in more than 450 newspapers, a biweekly Newsweek column, and appearances as a political commentator on ABC---addressing diverse topics from politics to sports.

Such introductions would be eminently correct---but patently inadequate. And terribly unfair to the keynoter and the guests in attendance.

For one thing, such a simple introduction would neglect to divulge that this Illinois native received his Bachelor and Masters Degree from the University of Oxford and his PhD in politics from Princeton. Or that he taught political philosophy at Michigan State University, University of Toronto, and Harvard University.

For another, it would fail to highlight some rather salient attributes: Few news columnists are as erudite, opinionated, controversial, and witty as George F. Will. That his writings are famous for their vocabulary, allusions to political philosophers, and frequent references to baseball. Oh yes, George Will is a baseball afficionado of the highest order. Listen:

"Baseball, it is said, is only a game. True. And the Grand Canyon is only a hole in Arizona. Not all holes, or games, are created equal."

"Baseball's beauty, its craftsmanship, its exactingness---is an activity to be loved, as much as ballet, or fishing, or politics, and loving it is a form of participation."

And in case you asked, George Will said that:

"Football is a mistake. It combines the two worst elements of American life. Violence and committee meetings."

And guess what---eat your heart out Sox fans---George Will is a died-in-the-wool Cub fan. Only a real Cub fan would know to say:

"Chicago Cub fans are ninety percent scar tissue."

And

"Every player should be accorded the privilege of at least one season with the Chicago Cubs...That's baseball as it should be played...in God's own sunshine."

And how could any introduction of George Will fail to point out that he is a staunch political conservative who served as editor for the National Review, launched by his comrade-in-arms, William F. Buckley. A magazine from which, in Will's words,

"flowed the ideological electricity that powered the transformation of American conservatism from a mere sensibility into a fighting faith and a blueprint for governance."

Still, Will's political views and pronouncements are eminently balanced, often to the consternation of his Republican colleagues. Will says it as he sees it!

For instance, he was widely praised by liberals for condemning the corruption of the Nixon presidency. He expressed reservations about Bush's Iraq policies---describing some of the optimistic assessments as "rhetoric unreality." In June of 2008, this conservative champion unabashedly stated that he was an agnostic because he was "not decisive enough to be an atheist" And, yes, after John McCain selected Sarah Palin as his running mate, Will harshly criticized the selection, admonishing McCain in an Op-Ed piece entitled "Call Him John the Careless." Indeed, in a recent column, Will flatly predicted that Palin:

"Is not going to be president and will not be the Republican nominee unless the party want to lose at least 44 states."

While such refreshingly honest diversions make Will highly respected by both the right and the left, they take nothing away from his credentials as a committed conservative.

"Socialism," he said, "born and raised in France, is unpersuasive even to the promiscuously persuadable French."

Will often writes about what makes America distinctive:

"The simple virtues and decencies that can make communities flourish and that have made America great and exemplary."

And:

"Americans are overreachers; overreaching is the most admirable of the many American excesses."

In this vein, Will often chronicles prominent figures who have shaped our cultural landscape. His words, sometimes biting, are laced with wit and always succinct. And he is not reluctant to tell tales out of school whenever they are the facts. Here are a few examples from his latest book "One Man's America:"

Of Joseph McCarthy, Will stated, "he had tainted conservatism in the process of disgracing himself with bile and bourbon."

Of John F. Kennedy, Will reported, "The soaring arc of Kennedy's truncated life combined success achieved by discipline, and sexual recklessness, that risked everything."---seventy calls through the White House switchboard to a mistress he shared with a Mafia don; Marilyn Monroe, he reports, once remarked "I think I made his back feel better."

Will called John Marshal: "The most important American never to have been president."

And both Terry Duffy and I, as well as I dare say, most everyone in this audience would endorse George Will's assessment that Milton Friedman was "America's most consequential public intellectual of the twentieth century."

George Will, of course, is frequently referred to in the popular media, as well as in TV shows. So I will give the last word about our keynote speaker to that other erudite national observer, Kramer, of the Seinfeld TV series. Said Kramer in a defining moment in a 1995 Seinfeld episode:

"I think George Will is handsome but he's not that bright."

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. George F. Will.

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