<p>I don’t think I’ve heard the Idea of Chicago so well articulated before. That was a great speech. The student speeches were very good, too.</p>
<p>Mayor Bloomberg’s was adequate, if a little boilerplate. You can read that one [url=<a href=“http://www.nyc.gov/portal/index.jsp?epi_menuItemID=c0935b9a57bb4ef3daf2f1c701c789a0&epi_menuID=13ecbf46556241d3daf2f1c701c789a0&epi_baseMenuID=27579af732d48f86a62fa24601c789a0&pageID=mayor_press_release&catID=1194&doc_name=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nyc.gov%2Fhtml%2Fom%2Fhtml%2F2006a%2Fpr194-06.html&cc=unused1978&rc=1194&ndi=1]here[/url”>http://www.nyc.gov/portal/index.jsp?epi_menuItemID=c0935b9a57bb4ef3daf2f1c701c789a0&epi_menuID=13ecbf46556241d3daf2f1c701c789a0&epi_baseMenuID=27579af732d48f86a62fa24601c789a0&pageID=mayor_press_release&catID=1194&doc_name=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nyc.gov%2Fhtml%2Fom%2Fhtml%2F2006a%2Fpr194-06.html&cc=unused1978&rc=1194&ndi=1]here[/url</a>]. The first half was obviously constructed from bullet points about the city of Chicago and the University. There were audible groans at some of the comments, and everyone with whom I spoke afterwards complained about how low-level it was, especially compared to the speeches that came before. The second half was better – there were a handful of moments when people broke into spontaneous applause – but the way in which he tried to weave the ideas articulated in Chandler’s speech with the political issues raised were just really, really awkward. He just seemed to underestimate his audience. Oops!</p>