NEW DEVELOPMENTS REGARDING ROTC at Columbia University:

Emboldened by a high-turnout student referendum two years ago that put support for ending the R.O.T.C. ban at 65 percent, a politically eclectic group of undergraduates has raised the program’s profile.

The debate has done more than expose predictable fault lines over the Pentagon’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” regulations and the war in Iraq. It has also signaled a shift in student attitudes toward the military and encouraged vigorous conversation on campus.

“From the point of view of a veteran of ’68 here, which I am, it’s a different world,” said Allan A. Silver, a professor of sociology, referring to the year that student protests convulsed the campus. Mr. Silver, who has taught at Columbia for more than four decades, favors the R.O.T.C.’s return.

Read the whole thing, which certainly seems newsworthy. And note the byline.