The following item from the Associated Press in the “News in Brief” feature of today’s Philadelphia Inquirer, “Two Calif. Colleges End Spain Program Over Iraq Pullout,” caught my eye (fourth post; links added):

Two Southern California community colleges have ended their study-abroad program in Spain, citing the country’s troop withdrawal from Iraq. Trustees of the South Orange County Community College District, comprising Irvine Valley College and Saddleback College, voted 5-2 last week to cancel the 14-year-old summer program. “Spain has abandoned our fighting men and women,” said trustee Tom Fuentes, a former head of the Republican Party in Orange County. “I see no reason to send students of our colleges to Spain at this moment.”

God forbid a few Orange County kids, whom the odds favor are Republicans, just might travel to Spain and engage in meaningful debate about American foreign policy. Or maybe conservatives just can’t handle themselves in such freewheeling discussions. Fuentes, after all, seems to have a problem in that very regard.

[Post-publication addendum: See also “Spain Off College’s [sic] Student Itinerary,” by Marla Jo Fisher, the Orange County Register, March 5, and “Colleges End Study-in-Spain Program,” by Sara Lin, the Los Angeles Times, March 6.]

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