No, Ivy Mom, College Is More Than Putting a Ring on It

Donna Brazile joins the brouhaha over a letter a Princeton mother wrote to the school newspaper urging female students—"the daughters I never had"—to make sure they find their future husbands on campus before graduating. Gee, writes Democratic strategist Brazile at CNN, if only that letter came out when she was in college 30 years ago, "perhaps I could have avoided the costly mistake of focusing on what makes me come alive and then pursuing it for a living."

She could have skipped all those "pesky classes" and "instead concentrated on designing my hair, makeup, attire, and personality to create the perfect man-catching machine." Sarcasm over, Brazile also wonders how wise it is to ask a 22-year-old to lock down a mate so young. Click for her full column. Or read Susan Patton's original letter, which the Daily Mail has in full. Or her response to the media frenzy it created, in the Huffington Post. (There's too much focus on advising young women how to succeed professionally, she argues, and not enough on how to do so personally. "Honestly, it was intended as little more than honest advice from a Jewish mother.")