This letter says it all;
There are no benefits to a land-grant university from sharing its president with a multi-national corporation. Monsanto is in the business of making money. It pulled down a profit of almost $1 billion in 2008. It is eager for more and has no boundaries or allegiances to anyone other than shareholders.
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A university is in the business of education and research. It should be an incubator of ideas and visions and should be free to entertain ways to make residents more independent from corporations.
Monsanto and other biotechnological corporations have been restricting university scientists from researching and publishing information on patented crops (see the Feb.
20 issue of the New York Times). A land-grant university cannot serve its mandate of freely disseminating information to farmers and other residents with a president who wears a Monsanto logo.
Monsanto is working on its image after a decade of bad press from hauling farmers such as Percy Schmeiser to court for allegedly planting patented seed on the sly. Monsanto is attempting to associate with esteemed institutions in hopes of blurring its achieved image: an ogre.
My biggest complaint is my tax money being intertwined with this corrupt corporation.