As David Gelernter writes in his recent book, America-Lite: How Imperial Academia Dismantled Our Culture (and Ushered In the Obamacrats):
In studying the cultural revolution and its meaning, we come face to face with the amazing stuck-in-timeness of the establishment left. They re-enact the same ceremonies of communal confession they invented in the 1960s (Woe unto us for we are bigots!), even while blacks rocket forward if they choose to, and girls swamp boys in grade school performance and college attendance, and the establishment at large strains every nerve (like a sailing ship with every rope creaking-tight) to favor blacks and other officially deserving minorities, along with women and other officially deserving majorities, over white males who were born a full generation after affirmative action became the taken-for-granted law of the land; white males who have never known a society that did not choose blacks and women over them. White males—what did they ever do anyway, aside from oppress people? Huh?
In contemplating our schools and colleges, we’re struck by their bizarre stuck-in-timeness. The 1970s mood of relentless, this-is-good-for-you, take-your-medicine-and-shut-up disillusionment now thoroughly permeates teaching and textbook writing; in fact, much of book writing at large.
That same stuck-in-time mindset travels downstream from America-Lite’s academia to to America-Lite’s media, whether it’s reflecting on past American history, or writing their self-described first draft of that history. A handful of otherwise disparate links show how the MSM’s 1972-era worldview is causing them to lose their grip on reality — even reality as they’ve constructed it over the years:
- “It has taken more than three months, but the New York Times today published a sort-of correction of its erroneous description about the napalm attack in Vietnam in June 1972 that preceded the famous photograph of children terrified and wounded by the bombing.”
- “Meanwhile, if you look at NBC’s RNC video page, it’s as if Mia Love and Artur Davis never spoke” last night at the Convention.
- “**Shock** In ABC Webcast, Yahoo News Chief Says Romneys ‘Happy to Have a Party When Black People Drown.’”
As Roger L. Simon writes today, “Racism is stalking the Republican Convention in Tampa. But it’s not from the Republicans. It’s from the mainstream media…In his own bizarre way, David Chalian has become the poster boy for Election 2012. His story has gripped this convention because everyone knows he is not all that exceptional. That is what they think.”
…But why do their consumers put up with it?
Update: Michael Medved tells Newsbusters, as they paraphrase in their headline, “MSM Thrill Might Be Gone, But Press Still ‘Ideologically Committed’ To Obama.” From now until November, the legacy media will be making that perfectly clear. But will anyone in the GOP besides Newt get in their faces and punch back twice as hard, to coin a phrase?
And to bring this post full-circle:
As faculty members at Ohio State last week double-checked their syllabi, glanced at their rosters, and ran through the usual routines for the start of fall courses, some of them found a surprise in their e-mail in boxes. A senior English professor invited his colleagues to open their classrooms in the weeks ahead to organizers in the Obama campaign. They would first encourage students to register to vote and then, if the instructors were willing, encourage students to volunteer for the Obama campaign.
“In studying the cultural revolution and its meaning, we come face to face with the amazing stuck-in-timeness of the establishment left…”
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