Letter to the editor: Money talks

To the editor:

The new academic building on the Kansas University campus breaks the back of our 150-year-old tradition of naming buildings after KU chancellors and other prominent individuals. As an alumnus, I respect the names of our academic buildings: Fraser Hall, Snow Hall, Marvin Hall, Lippincott Hall, Strong Hall, Lindley Hall, Malott Hall, Murphy Hall. Wescoe Hall, Chalmers Hall, Budig Hall, and so forth.

Lastly, we have the new four-story Capitol Federal Hall with its opulent state-of-the-art facilities, incredible classrooms, “interview rooms,” Wi-Fi, numerous large-screen and giant video displays — including a large, continuously running stock market ticker. This building, all “privately funded,” with a 65-piece original art collection, and its extravagant “Dean’s Suite,” is a financial monstrosity, putting to shame every other building on campus. The only thing remaining is to erect a huge neon four-story “$” on the building, so all will know what’s inside. 

I expect this building will become the home of the “Citibank School of Business,” and soon we will have the “Koch Brothers Memorial Stadium,” and, in the end, the “Sprint University of Kansas” (SUK). With Capitol Federal Hall, KU announces that, in fact, corporations ARE people. This not only proves that money talks, but in this case, as Bob Dylan said, “Money doesn’t talk, it swears.”