November 2006

NO PROTECTION FROM THE TRUTH
Even a personal bodyguard and three local constabularies couldn't protect David Horowitz during a debate with philosophy professor Kurt Smith at Pennsylvania's Bloomsburg University in September. In a well-reasoned and researched attack, Smith repeatedly exposed Horowitz for misrepresenting the truth and pegged his shrill accusations of left-wing extremism on campus as "politics, pure and simple." Smith discredited Horowitz's tale of abused conservative students—a student driven to tears by classmates chanting "abortion, abortion, abortion" to convince her that her pro-life opinion was flawed—by confirming that no record of the alleged event existed. And, borrowing from Horowitz's method of personal attacks, Smith also pointed out that, for someone presenting himself as an expert on campus climate, Horowitz hardly measures up—he has, said Smith, "only ... a master's degree in English," has never sat on a hiring committee or even taught."

STUDENT EJECTED FROM HOROWITZ DEBATE
Less civil was the presentation Horowitz made at the University of Texas at San Antonio, Sept. 20. Reacting to Horowitz's spiel, including such remarks as, "All that drives the left is its hatred of America," students started heckling. The San Antonio Express-News reported one student called Horowitz a "racist windbag," and another shouted he was "full of [expletive]." But it wasn't until David Oguayu challenged Horowitz, who had hesitated during the question-and-answer period, shouting, "Stop making excuses and answer the question," that police got involved. According to the Express-News, Oguayu was escorted out amidst protests of racism (the student was the only African American who had spoken out, and the only student removed from the event).

INDOCTRINATION U COULD BE NEXT
The publication of Horowitz's book, The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America, was preceded by a spate of articles by Horowitz on the Discover the Networks Web site. And now, eerily, a similar Horowitz series, called Indoctrination U, has begun on the same Web site. Another book on the way? So far, Horowitz has attacked the universities of Texas and Colorado, Arizona State and Willamette in Oregon (a college he can't seem to spell correctly). Attacking entire departments and courses, Horowitz maintains, for example, that classes "are devoted to ideological and political agendas, and are in fact advocacy programs designed to instill in students one-sided views of controversial issues." The material is similar to The Professors in that much of it is unsubstantiated, jumping to weak conclusions made from course descriptions, rather than actual time spent in the classroom. Willamette's Liberation Theology and Social Change class, for example, is framed as "doctrine that integrates Marxist ideology with the Christian faith. ... This is not an academic course examining liberation theology from a disinterested and scholarly perspective. It is a program of advocacy and indoctrination."
Daily Kos  is taking votes on the title of Horowitz’s next book. Our favorite: Indoctrination U: Various Syllabi Copy-
and-Pasted into my New Book.

STILL BANNING BOOKS
Working for intellectual freedom, the American Library Association celebrated the 25th year of Banned Book Week Sept. 23-30, pressing for rights to read such titillating titles as Harry Potter (most challenged book of the 21st century), It's Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex, and Sexual Health (most challenged in 2005) and that die-hard, The Catcher in the Rye. In addition to publishing lists of the most frequently challenged and banned books, the ALA provides information about how to find out why your favorite book might be on the blacklist, what to do to change that, and why intellectual freedom is so important. "Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions," wrote Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, quoted on ALA's Web site. "It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us."

SATIRE, IN GRAPHIC DETAIL
If you didn't get around to reading Michael Berube's new book, What's Liberal About the Liberal Arts? you can check out Chris Clarke's graphic novel version for a hilarious and satirically twisted laugh. Berube's original defends academe from vituperative conservatives deploring the "evil" liberalism infecting our campuses, and makes a solid case for liberalism's positive influence as an agent for human rights, freedom of ideas and the allowance for many points of view. The "graphic novel" approach marches little communistas, as they herd metaphorical graduate assistants, toward upholding a course called "Bush is Hitler," through "a storm of conservative reaction."