Lee Bollinger, the president of Columbia, says that hosting Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is just the latest in "Columbia's long-standing tradition of serving as a major forum for robust debate." One of the school's deans says that Columbia would host Hitler, were he alive. But just nine years ago, Columbia University used scores of guards to barricade their campus from conservative speakers and their student audience. Some people are more vile than Hitler, I guess. They banned a conference I had organized, entitled "A Place at the Table: Conservative Ideas in Higher Education," after taking more than $10,000 to provide food and meeting space and contractually agreeing to the event four months in advance. After threatening to cancel the event on the day of the event should I not come up with $3,000 to pay their on-campus security, Columbia, after receiving the money, cancelled the two-day conference the next day. The school cited phony "security concerns." Terrorist-supporting Mahmoud Ahmadinejad? Racist Khalid Muhammed? Communist Angela Davis? Columbia is all about free speech when their likes come to campus. Dinesh D'Souza? John Leo? Reginald Jones? Well, they get kicked off campus and are forced to speak in a public park to get heard.

Dan, does Columbia usually pay a speaker's fee? Is there a standard, or does the speaker set the rate?

For our conference, AIA paid for everything. I'm guessing that the Iranian president spoke gratis, and that student groups, funded by Columbia, probably paid Davis and Muhammed. Sometimes Ivy League schools can attract big-name speakers without paying them much, if anything. Those same speakers, if invited by a less prestigious school, might charge $20,000, $30,000, or more.

Two years ago Colin Powell spoke at my school for over $100,000.