Lifeofthemind:
To a certain extent, I agree with you that restraint should be used.
However, my problem is that major Universities’ chief benefactor has become the government, with the decision making done primarily by the bureaucracy of government. This bureaucracy is thoroughly controlled by leftists, often through the Public Employee Unions. As a result, Universities have become even more leftist, forcing out anyone of conservative opinion.
There are a multitude of ill effects on society and democracy as a result. Too many to describe. The following is just a couple of examples.
By slowing winnowing away conservative voices at the Universities, the Democrats have slowly eliminated the intellectual underpinnings of conservative thought. Many of the new ideas of the right used to come from University professors. Arthur Laffer of USC formulated the beginnings of supply side economics. Milton Friedman at the University of Chicago formulated monetarism. Now, few Universities even teach supply side economics even after the success of the Reagan tax cuts, Prop 13, the Capital Gains cut of the 90′s, and the Bush tax cuts. I have several Ivy league educated MBA acquaintences who if you mention tax cuts or propose oil drilling, they look at you as if you made an obscene gesture. Look at the top 25 Econ blogs, many of which are run by University professors, only one or two are supply siders .
More and more, the democrats want to push policy making away from legislative and executive branches of government to boards, panels, or commissions of so-called “experts”. This way they can deflect criticism of their ruinous policies on the “experts”. But the Democrats know that these “experts” will almost always be Democrat experts. Controlling the Universities largely means you control the expert debate. Conservatives are often overwhelmed by the sheer number of public funded leftist experts. Look at the Global Warming debate, or the Polar Bear Threatened Species listing. Conservative voices are drowned out.
In California, our politicians have relinquished policy making to these same “expert” agencies and boards like the Coastal Commission, the Air Quality Management District, the Southern California Air Resources, and the Department of Fish and Game. These agencies and boards have been given a broad mandate to enact policy in the name of environmental protection without hardly any public input. All sorts of inane and destructive regulations, like the banning of wood burning fireplaces, have been enacted with no public recourse.
Slowly but surely, largely behind closed doors, our lives are being controlled and our rights are being taken away.
