I was very surprised and saddened by the front page of Wednesday’s Daily Texan. I attended Mikhail Gorbachev’s lecture Tuesday, and I feel like your article has completely corrupted and distorted the character of the talk. It is very disappointing to think that my university’s newspaper was unable find a better way to sell such an interesting and unique story other than by emphasizing the wrong points.

In my opinion, the article made the talk sound very political and critical to current American foreign policy, while Gorbachev tried to stay away from those topics as much as he could. Although the Texan did mention that Gorbachev “said he does not make it a habit to give advice to other countries,” it also stated that he said America “acted arrogantly and tried to build a new empire instead of working together with other countries and needs to think in terms of cooperation for the future.”

The story could have talked about how, before coming to power, he could not talk about all the policy changes he was to make and how, if discovered, he would have been imprisoned or killed. The Texan could have also mentioned any of the stories he told about his relationship with President Ronald Reagan during the Cold War negotiations. After all, he is Mikhail Gorbachev!

Cristina Portales is a Biochemistry sophomore