RE: Professor Punished for Witty Remark
Eric Cordian[SMTP:emc@artifact.psychedelic.net] wrote:
There's also a blacklist on the Web of people in academia who have publicly stated less than glowing support for Bush's war against "evil."
Where is it? [...]
Eric Michael Cordian 0+
Peter Trei
Peter Trei writes:
There's also a blacklist on the Web of people in academia who have publicly stated less than glowing support for Bush's war against "evil."
Where is it?
It was released by ACTA, formerly the NAF, run by Lynne Cheney, formerly arch-conservative Bill Bennett's heir at the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the wife of the federal government's favorite cardiac patient, Vice President Dick Cheney. Imagine the joy of being a university professor, and waking up one morning to find that a big powerful organization run by the Vice President's wife has issued a report practically calling you a traitor. from http://arizona.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=2175&group=webcast <<Lynne Cheneys American Council of Trustees and Alumni, a well-financed conservative group devoted to curbing liberal tendencies on campuses, already has issued its first blacklist of professors it considers insufficiently patriotic. Many will be fired or eased out, many more will tone down their criticism -- as many journalists already have -- and the message will be quite clear: Do not dissent too vocally.>> and from APSCUF's Higher Education News Blits <<* THE AMERICAN COUNCIL OF TRUSTEES AND ALUMNI, an organization that says American higher education plays down Western intellectual teachings, on Sunday issued a stinging report that condemns colleges and faculty members for what it calls a "blame America first" response to the terrorist attacks of September 11.>> and from WebNetInfo.com <<A conservative academic group founded by Lynne Cheney, the wife of Vice President Dick Cheney, fired a new salvo in the culture wars by blasting 40 college professors as well as the president of Wesleyan University and others for not showing enough patriotism in the aftermath of Sept. 11. ''College and university faculty have been the weak link in America's response to the attack,'' say leaders of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni in a report being issued today. The report names names and criticizes professors for making statements ''short on patriotism and long on self-flagellation.'' Several of the scholars singled out in the report said yesterday they felt blacklisted, complaining that their words had been taken out of context to make them look like enemies of the state.>> You might want to wade through http://www.goacta.org/ and see if you can find the report. I took a quick look, but my javascript and .pdf patience levels were quickly exceeded. I saw one of the frightened professors bleating "but I'm not a traitor" on CNN the other day, and a smiling ACTA droid saying that their list was merely "academic criticism." High drama. -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law"
On Tue, Dec 11, 2001 at 12:58:49PM -0800, Eric Cordian wrote:
Imagine the joy of being a university professor, and waking up one morning to find that a big powerful organization run by the Vice President's wife has issued a report practically calling you a traitor.
I'm hardly defending the group's "blacklist," but "big and powerful?" Come, now. -Declan
Declan opines:
Imagine the joy of being a university professor, and waking up one morning to find that a big powerful organization run by the Vice President's wife has issued a report practically calling you a traitor.
I'm hardly defending the group's "blacklist," but "big and powerful?" Come, now.
OK. How about "well-funded?" :) I count $1,270,000 in grants to the organization since its creation as the National Alumni Forum. The NAF sold the idea that alumni should contribute to the NAF's "Fund for Academic Renewal" instead of directly to their institutions. The NAF then gave the money to the institutions as targeted donations, removing the institution's discretion over how alumni donations were spent. They went after the $2.9 billion alumni gift market with big ads in Ivy League magazines. Later they changed their name to the more impressive sounding American Council of Trustees and Alumni, and broadened the spectrum of pressure tactics employed to shove patriotism down the throats of universities behind the smokescreen of "promoting intellectual freedom and raising academic standards." In what sense is such an undertaking neither "big" nor "powerful?" -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law"
On Tue, Dec 11, 2001 at 05:01:11PM -0800, Eric Cordian wrote:
OK. How about "well-funded?" :)
I count $1,270,000 in grants to the organization since its creation as the
Compared to giants like Brookings? Not well-funded, well-known, big, nor powerful. Few folks even in DC have heard of it. $1M in grants over a period of years is not much by Washington policy group standards. -Declan
participants (3)
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Declan McCullagh
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Eric Cordian
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Trei, Peter