Anniston Star Publisher Brandt Ayers Addresses UA Grads During Winter Commencement Exercises

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – Speaking today at The University of Alabama’s winter commencement ceremony, Brandt Ayers, editor and publisher of The Anniston Star, said that the Baby Boomer generation, like the World War II generation, should be considered great for what they have accomplished.

“Our generation faced an agenda of tyranny, war, poverty and race about which it was impossible to be ambivalent. So with apologies to Tom Brokaw, you might call our generation the ‘Second Greatest Generation’,” said Ayers.

“Our generation achieved a victory over fear and prejudice which made the Founding Fathers balk and lose heart, a victory that even 620,000 dead in Civil War couldn’t secure. We helped bring down the curtain on an entire civilization, which was a denial of the Declaration of Independence. We have stood at the Berlin wall and seen it chewed to bits, as if by giant rats, and witnessed the sudden disappearance of an Iron Curtain. We have seen the triumph of Democracy from the Urals to the Rhine,” he said.

However, Ayers said current events have put America on the defensive.

“Wrestling in the desert with a puny dictator isn’t a real test of either military or moral power. Surely we should hunt down and swat cold-eyed, murderous terrorists wherever we find them, but Homeland Security is merely a chain link fence – no more effective against the pestilence of terrorism than disease-bearing mosquitoes,” he said.

Ayers encouraged UA graduates to also become a great generation.

“You can end the defensive crouch, regaining the offensive with the most powerful weapons we have, America’s most admired weapons: the incredible transforming power of our ideals and our economy.”

“ To achieve a final victory over terrorism, the Next Great Generation will need to focus the arsenal of diplomatic, economic, intelligence, informational and moral power on draining the swamp of Islamic hatred, replacing the feudal breeding ground of terrorism with 21st century democratic capitalism in the Middle East.”

In his speech, Ayers also spoke of the Institute the Anniston Star will form to train journalists at The University of Alabama.

“As our day lengthens into twilight, we want to leave something worthwhile: an Institute that will keep our newspapers from becoming just an undistinguished link in a long corporate chain and, in partnership with the University and the Knight Foundation, advance the art of community journalism,” said Ayers.

Yesterday, The Anniston Star announced the formation of a nonprofit institute that will train journalists through The University of Alabama and eventually own the northeast Alabama newspaper. The Star and three smaller newspapers comprise Consolidated Publishing Co., of which Ayers is chairman. Consolidated Publishing eventually will transfer all its stock to a nonprofit foundation that will support the newspapers, the institute and other projects. Under the plan, the company will form the Ayers Institute, which will work with the university to establish an honors graduate program in community journalism, with classes taught at the papers.

For the past three generations, the Ayers’ family has run The Anniston Star, which the Columbia Journalism Review recently ranked among the 35 best newspapers in the nation. Time Magazine has twice named it “one of the best small newspapers in the United States.” Ayers, a 1959 alumnus of UA, has also had articles, essays, and reviews appear in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times and many other papers and magazines. Over 30 newspapers carry his syndicated column, “Out Here.” He has co-authored or contributed chapters to five books, including “Dixie Dateline: A Journalistic Portrait of the Contemporary South” and the highly acclaimed “You Can’t Eat Magnolias.” He is also a frequent commentator for National Public Radio’s Morning Edition. He was inducted in UA’s Communication Hall of Fame in October 2000. His other honors include a Nieman Fellowship to Harvard University, serving as a Pulitzer Prize juror, and receiving an honorary doctorate from The University of Alabama at Birmingham.

With this graduating class of 1,100, UA has awarded more than 183,000 degrees since its founding in 1831 as the state’s first public university. UA holds commencement ceremonies three times a year.