Editor,
It is with sadness and regret that I learned about Professor Berthold's retirement. I was attending classes on the old GI Bill and I was fortunate enough to be his student back in 1977.
I found him to be an excellent instructor with his door always open to his students. After the military, where free and creative thought was viciously discouraged, Berthold helped me discover critical and independent thinking.
Over the years, I have continued to read his columns with interest and delight because he is an original thinker. Attempts to pigeonhole him as a liberal or conservative only reveals the prejudice and shortcomings of the would-be classifier.
And then there was Sept. 11. His remarks are totally indefensible and his enemies, opponents and critics saw the opening that they had waited years for. They swarmed him with all the grace and elegance of crack-heads fighting for that last bit of cocaine.
The Daily Lobo reported instances of people falsifying evidence against Berthold.
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But Berthold and the First Amendment protections on free speech, both bruised and battered, survived.
And now, he is calling it quits. Perhaps he saw the writing on the wall. In these times, it is not healthy to stray from the norm. Maybe it is a good time to shut up and take care of business. Who knows what type of files Attorney General Ashcroft is compiling on us all.
But I couldn't help noticing that most of the people calling for his head were retired military. Let me point out, as an expert witness, there is no free speech in the military. These people have spent most of their early, professional careers working in an environment where any expressions of individuality and nonconformity were suppressed.
What is sad, is that they have spent years defending the Constitution and that they have no appreciation for the gifts of the Constitution.
George Gray
UNM alumnus
