Marquette's College Republicans are angry at the administration now after officials told them to take down a fundraising table in the union on Monday. (Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel article here.) The student group had asked permission for the table as a "support the troops" table, but decided for a more targeted campaign to "Adopt-A-Sniper." When officials saw the table and the some of the slogans, the table was shut down. The "Adopt-A-Sniper" program is run by a nonprofit called Snipersonline, which the students say raises funds for special equipment needed by snipers in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I am assuming that this organization only raises funds and provides dissemination of training information to legitimate U.S. military and police snipers, but the website actually never says that. It speaks more broadly about "the sniping profession." When I first read the article, I thought that the snafu was based on a poor name ("Adopt-A-Sniper" sounds like something out of Soldier of Fortune for mercenaries) and poor slogans ( "1 Shot, 1 Kill, No Remorse, I Decide."), but after looking at the website, I'm less enthusiastic about it. If this was a U.S. government program, I think I would be more defending of the students and argue that war is not pretty. If we are going to support war, then we have to support even the cold, ugly parts of it.

Marquette is a private school, so I assume they have more leeway in content-based restrictions, although that is not my area of expertise. Marquette officials are saying as a Catholic, Jesuit institution we don't want to be parts of organizations that do not reflect more seriously on the value of human life than the statement "1 Shot, 1 Kill, No Remorse, I Decide." My favorite part of the article, however, was the statement by the students that Marquette administrators are "ultra-liberal." I almost fell out of my chair.

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