Even finishing with a losing record at the national tournament can't slow down the publicity train that the Liberty University debate team is riding. The AP now has an article about it, picked up by, of all outlets, the Detroit News. I just sent a letter to the editor of the News taking them to task for reprinting that misleading article about a team that is mediocre at best, while ignoring two teams from Michigan that just finished in the top 4 in the nation. Wayne State made the semifinals while Michigan State won their 2nd national title in the last 3 years, and got not a drop of ink from the Detroit papers. Absurd.
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Over the last few years, a bizarre situation has been going on here in Michigan.
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At least the Detroit News pointed out that Liberty is rarely a winner:
"In truth, Liberty's debaters rarely defeat head-to-head the giants of collegiate debate...But Falwell was impressed enough to commit more money to the program, whose budget has gone from $14,000 a year when O'Donnell started to $500,000 this season. It now has a coaching staff of five and spacious quarters, and Liberty offers debate scholarships."
Geez, I remember delivering the Detroit Free Press every morning during winter months so I could pay $800 to attend UMHSDI. I seem to remember that Bette Kashi's budget was just $500 for debate and forensics. The students earned the rest by selling candles and cheese/sausage fun packs. Uggh. I still can't eat a piece of summer sausage without recalling selling the stuff door-to-dor
It doesn't matter that they bury their little "shhhh, well, maybe champion doesn't really mean what you think it does" at the bottom of the article where no one will ever read it. It's the fact that they cover this story at all that's bizarre. If you want to do a story on debate teams, why not do a story on some of the ACTUAL best teams in the nation?
What, other than the fact that Fawell is sending memos to help reporters ghostwrite a lazy article, justifies all this coverage for a sub-par debate team no more interesting than any other.
There is no doubt that Liberty University's public relations department is stoking these stories.
Where is the PR department for Michigan State? Wayne State? All the other double-octa qualifiers?
Perhaps the attention is due to the fact that people are surprised that Liberty has a debate team, like Samuel Johnson's remark about female preachers: