Josh Weingast completely missed the mark in his recent viewpoint about football coach Rich Rodriguez’s comments at last week’s press conference (A message for Rich Rod, 11/18/2008). If Weingast had bothered to read the full quotation, he would have found that Rodriguez did not instruct all of Michigan fandom to “get a life.” He was actually referring specifically to people who make personal attacks on players, coaches and staff on Internet message boards.
I won’t attack Weingast, though — he is simply the victim of media that seek to misinform and manipulate us into thinking Rodriguez is an immoral, scheming brigand of sorts. I find it unfortunate that the Daily perpetuated this misinformation by publishing Weingast’s viewpoint without checking the facts. The Daily does not stand to profit from generating controversy like the rest of the media, does it? It would be a greater service to the student body to provide clarification on these non-issues than to rile us up with baseless slander. I think you owe it to the readers to provide accurate information on our coach.
Andy Petrovich
School of Public Health