Hannity speaks to UVSC audience
Sean Hannity, one of the country’s top cable debate show hosts and radio personalities, spoke at Utah Valley State College Monday evening to thousands of students and community members, accusing Michael Moore of cowardice and challenging Kerry’s views on the war and economy.
“I love Utah. I belong here,” Hannity said to the crowd. “You believe in love and faith and in God and in country, and those are things Sean Hannity believes in.”
The audience gave Hannity a standing ovation as he walked on stage and cheers of approval erupted throughout his speech.
Hannity is part of a political speaker series UVSC is sponsoring that will
also include liberal film-maker Michael Moore Wednesday, Oct. 20.
“Michael Moore isn’t worth one red cent of student funds,” Hannity said, who waived his normal $100,000 speaking fee for the event. “Please send him a message that Sean Hannity says he is a coward for not showing up tonight.”
Hannity said he challenged Moore to a debate, offering to waive his speaking fee and then donate the $40,000 used to bring in Moore to a charity the winner of the debate would choose. Moore refused, Hannity said.
Jim Bassi, UVSC’s student body president, said he believes scheduling Hannity was the right thing to do.
In his introductory marks before Hannity spoke, Bassi said there has been a lot of excitement and political dialogue taking place between students because of the two speakers.
“I think this is an example of what student government can do and how they can use their authority to involve the whole community,” Bassi said.
Hannity said one of the biggest flaws in the current Democratic party is the belief that there is no real terrorist threat.
“To say ‘There is no terrorist threat’ is the moral equivalent of saying ‘I
am a moron,'” he said. “Liberals do not understand the threat we are facing.”
It is important to realize evil exists, Hannity said, and that it needs
to be combated.
“This [terrorism] is not a nuisance,” he said. “One of the things we learned from the 9/11 Commission is that they were at war with us and we were not at war with them.”
Modern liberals have abandoned traditional democratic beliefs, Hannity said, including those of political greats like Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry
Truman.
“What would America look like if it weren’t for America beating back the forces of fascism,” he said. “We are a great people. We have gone out and fought the battle and paid the price of liberty around the world.”
About 15 protestors stood outside the McKay Events Center, where Hannity spoke, while ticket-holders stood in line.
Protestors represented groups ranging from the Constitution Party, the
Democratic Party and those expressing their anti-war views.
Several members of the UVSC philosophy department were also present.
“Since he is obviously in favor of the war, we are here to express a
dissenting opinion,” Dennis Potter, protestor, said. “We totally support the idea that he should be able to speak. If you’ll notice none of the signs say
anything about Hannity. It’s about taking a position on a political issue and
we embrace free speech entirely.”
“I think it was bit of a cheap shot to have to have balance to Michael Moore when we usually have a majority of conservative speakers come to this campus,” Shannon Mussett, a UVSC philosophy professor, said. “However I also understand Seder berg’s [UVSC President] decision, because it’s an election year, to placate the people and bring Hannity.”
Kayomi Bulick, a junior at UVSC, said she feels it is completely unbalanced to bring in Hannity considering the large number of conservative speakers that have been brought to the school in the past.
“I guarantee if Hannity was announced first no one would be crying, ‘Bring on Moore, we don’t have balance.’ It reeks of hypocrisy,” she said.
Hannity spent the majority of his speech promoting Bush and explaining the reasons he feels Kerry would make a weak leader for the nation.
“In these troubling times we cannot elect somebody that waffles, that
vacillates, that doesn’t have a core to lead this war on terror. John Kerry
settled in on his position only 40 days outside the first debate,” he said.
Hannity said in the 20 years Kerry has served in the United States Senate, no one can point to one thing he has accomplished.
Kerry voted 98 times for a tax raises, totaling $2.3 trillion while in the
Senate, Hannity said, and has been inconsistent with his comments during the
war.
At one point during his speech, Hannity brought up a student who identified himself as a liberal named Vinnie and asked him to name one thing Kerry accomplished in Congress and to reconcile the contrasting comments Kerry has made about the war.
“Vinnie, your party has gone stark raving mad,” Hannity said.
“I think its great. It’s a good opportunity to let the conservatives have
their own little rally because Michael Moore is coming,” Jennifer Forest,
a student at UVSC, said.
Controversy has raged on campus, Jennifer said, over the decision to bring Moore here, and said she was angry at first when she found out how much of the student fees budget was being spent to bring Moore to Orem.
Most students said they don’t have a problem with Moore coming and expressing his views, but the large amount of money being spent on Moore was a concern.
“Where it was something where they spent all the money, I wish they would have asked the student body what they wanted all the money spent on,” UVSC student, Bethany Burr said.
“The media is so biased, its nice to hear something different,” Ryan Burr
said of Hannity. “We were lucky to have someone like Sean Hannity to come in.
Jim Hahn of Sandy, said he came to Hannity’s speech as his own private
protest against Moore.
“If UVSC wanted to promote academic freedom they could have picked someone better to represent the liberal community than a propagandist,” he said.
Throughout his speech Hannity entertained the crowd with imitations of Bill Clinton and John Kerry, and encouraged audience participation. A question and answer period was held at the end and several times throughout the speech the audience recited “flip-flop” in response to accusations against Kerry’s inconsistency.
The McKay event center holds 8,000 people and both Hannity and Moore’s speeches have sold out.
-bnelson@cc.usu.edu