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Home Front: Culture Wars
Rutgers' Tenured Stalinist
2005-01-19
Posted by:tipper

#19  I got a call last night from the University of California Berkeley Alumni people, talking about the 25th reunion coming up, blah blah blah. Then they started talking about money, like gifts to the University. That got my boiler pressure going so I started off in fine Rantburg style about how I did not send my children there, due to the sick leftist atmosphere, and how I really want nothing to do with them any more. I told them that all is not well, especially with many of the professors, and I am voting with my pocketbook. Good luck and have a good life and I hope you get that stinking town of Berkeley, California cleaned up. Then I hung up and eventually calmed down. Heh.
Posted by: Alaska Paul   2005-01-19 6:51:04 PM  

#18  Tu: yeah, you don't get grades, you get "evaluations" (which is a feature I actually like). As for the nude senior class picture, I shall have to make inquiries.
Posted by: Matt   2005-01-19 4:53:59 PM  

#17  Typical lefty, refuses to walk his talk. Why didn't he move to Cuba?
Posted by: Chinese Unomoger1553   2005-01-19 3:48:46 PM  

#16  Matt, are they still on the "no grades" system they used when I was around there? What about the nude senior class picture?
Posted by: tu3031   2005-01-19 3:40:56 PM  

#15  Tu, my son goes to Hamp. It really has been an education-- for me, at least.
Posted by: Matt   2005-01-19 3:23:43 PM  

#14  Don't know, Raj. I figured by now they'd taken their bloated state pensions and retired and became overpaid consultants at Hampshire College down the road. Hampshire makes UMASS look like West Point.
Posted by: tu3031   2005-01-19 1:43:07 PM  

#13  some are Krugmaniacs
Posted by: Frank G   2005-01-19 1:41:20 PM  

#12  tu3031 - and that differs from nowadays in what way?
Posted by: Raj   2005-01-19 1:38:58 PM  

#11  When I went to UMASS in the mid '70's, the entire Economics Department was all self professed Marxists. The business majors were all thrilled when they found that out.
Posted by: tu3031   2005-01-19 1:04:12 PM  

#10  Large universities faculties tend to look like the UN in makeup. Universities faculties, more and more, are made up of foreign nationals who have become citizens--not all of which have allegiance or are friendly to the U.S. Conservative students tend to cloister in business and engineering.
Posted by: John Q. Citizen   2005-01-19 12:47:57 PM  

#9  You made my point for me, Professor. As the left becomes increasingly incoherent, its good for the students to be exposed to what it used to be. Then downsize the English departments.
Posted by: trailing wife   2005-01-19 12:38:58 PM  

#8  RA - Lol - thanks for confirming our kids aren't dupes, heh. Definitely a good thing, since so many of my (our) peers are insane, lol! You might enjoy conversing with AC (Atomic Conspiracy) - a regular RB poster / commenter and also a Professor (patiently?) enduring the loonies of the academic world. ;-)
Posted by: .com   2005-01-19 12:09:27 PM  

#7  Hi Folks,

I have taught at a major research university for 25 years. It is certainly the case that almost all faculties in almost all universities are astonishingly liberal. But it is also the case that most surveys indicate that young adults today are remarkably more conservative in their views than their baby boomer parents. I believe there is a cause and effect relationship here. Students go to college, get direct ongoing exposure to loonies like this guy, and pretty soon figure out that the whole liberal schtick is bogus claptrap.
Posted by: Republican Academic   2005-01-19 11:49:44 AM  

#6  It's a good point, Anonymoose. Just like the "torture" of the Abhu Gharib and and political hacks human rights groups wasting breath over the "torture" at Guantanmo. It deflects from meaningful discussion and makes people just scoff when you say "torture" or "prison abuse".
Posted by: 2b   2005-01-19 11:16:26 AM  

#5  My annoyance with this toad is that, by his endorsement, he condemns a real issue, that is, prison abuse in the US. Living in Maricopa County, AZ, home of the psychotic sadist Sheriff Joe Arpaio, I can attest to both his willingness to openly abuse his prisoners *and* to his great public popularity. The public *likes* prisoners to be abused. And by abuse, I don't mean his well publicized use of pink underwear and chain gangs. I mean things like forcing people to live outdoors in tents in 115 degree heat, feeding them *only* coarse and often spoiled bologna and trail mix, which often causes mass food poisonings, and then, just under the amount they need to live so that they are constantly hungry, though it would take them a year or two to starve to death. Denial of medical services, even inexpensive support medicines for chronic diseases (which resulted in an inmate needing four horrifically major operations (split from crotch to throat) and a $300K lawsuit, for want of a 25 cent a day pill). Forcing prisoners to bury the indigent dead and perform their last rites (the local reverends and priests boycotting such services). He even wanted to force his inmates to kill shelter animals with injection needles, a task so horrible that no one can be paid to work that job for even $25/hr. He even interfered with an FBI investigation into the murder of prisoners by his guards, destroying evidence and intimidating witnesses. So, to his credit we can proudly say that he beat the FBI.

He is the most popular elected official in Arizona.
Posted by: Anonymoose   2005-01-19 10:56:32 AM  

#4  The English Department is the great flaming joke of any university in the US today.

It would be nice to see literature studies in general cut by some 60-80% from most universities and the savings applied to means-based scholarships for undergrads. The academic cost would be minimal, insofar as most of the research put out by lit profs today is sheer silliness of no use to anyone. THe only lit courses that are really necessary for undergrads are Great Books survey courses taught by the very best and most experienced instructors in the university.
Posted by: lex   2005-01-19 10:55:27 AM  

#3  Egghead bonehead. Stuck in '60s leftish fog.
Posted by: John Q. Citizen   2005-01-19 10:50:36 AM  

#2  After reading the article I wonder why anyone would use his books? He isn't qualified to write about history. He is a freeking english lit professor. I guess being laughed at by your more serious peers isn't a problem for some LLLs. This guy more than qualifies.
Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom   2005-01-19 10:21:57 AM  

#1  What a fossil. Put him and his wife in a museum as a relic of the 60's for all to see. Gigantor Looneybirdus Usefooltoolosas
Posted by: 2b   2005-01-19 10:13:48 AM  

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