It isn’t only the infamous Kochs, of course, and it is a feature of our current political discourse that drives me up the wall.
Wealthy businesspeople and corporate pooh-bahs are entitled to their political ideologies, but they are not entitled to the embarrassing lack of self-awareness that allows them to lecture poor people about the evils of dependency while they themselves are feeding greedily at the public trough.
Charles Koch is an excellent example, although certainly not the only one. He was recently quoted as saying that “prosperity grows where economic freedom is greatest, where government intervention in business affairs is kept to a minimum.” Yet the Kochs “dependency” on government is extensive:about $85 million in federal government contracts mostly from the Department of Defense, not to mention that Koch Industries benefits directly from billions in taxpayer subsidies for oil companies and ethanol production. Koch industries lobbied extensively against the Affordable Care Act, and is even now running an inaccurate ad campaign against it, that hasn’t kept them from applying for business subsidies that the Act provides.
The truth is that most –not all, but most–of the privileged and self-satisfied “job creators” who preach self-reliance are perfectly willing to benefit at the public’s expense. I guess its only “welfare” when it goes to the other guy.
Let’s talk about censorship and academic freedom and Mitch Daniels‘ desire to use the power of government to protect unsuspecting students from “wrong” ideas being foisted on them by books with which he disagreed.
There is no principle more basic to the academy and to the American constitutional system than the principle that forbids such behavior.
The Founders did not minimize the danger of bad ideas; they believed, however, that empowering government to suppress “dangerous” or “offensive” ideas would be far more dangerous than the expression of those ideas—that once we hand over to the state the authority to decide which ideas have value, no ideas are safe.
As Justice Jackson so eloquently opined in Barnette v. West Virginia Board of Education, “If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion or other matters of opinion…”
In these United States, We the People get to decide for ourselves what books we read, what websites we visit, what videos we watch, what ideas we entertain, free of government interference. Your mother can censor you, and in certain situations your boss can censor you–but not your Governor.
Academic freedom is the application of that foundational principle to institutions of higher education.Free intellectual inquiry is an absolutely essential ingredient of genuine education (albeit not so central to job training, with which Mitch often seems to confuse it). Education requires the freedom to examine any and all ideas, to determine which are good and which not so good. It also requires that we protect scholars who come to unpopular conclusions or hold unpopular views from reprisals (that protection is the purpose of tenure).
Some citizens will make poor choices of reading materials or ideologies. Some Professors will embrace perspectives that disturb or offend students and Governors. Despite hysterical rhetoric from the Right, the percentage of college professors who use their classrooms to propagandize is vanishingly small, but just as putting up with Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and their clones is the price liberals pay for free speech, and putting up with the likes of me is the price conservatives pay, putting up with the occasional academic ideologue is a small price to pay for intellectual freedom.
The search for truth requires that we examine contending ideas, but it does not require the sort of artificial “balance” that ignores scholarly integrity in order to teach creationism in a science class, or that the holocaust never happened in a history class. As a statement from the AAU put it some years back,
Self-appointed political critics of the academy have presented equal representation for conservative and progressive points of views as the key to quality. But the college classroom is not a talk show. Rather, it is a dedicated context in which students and teachers seriously engage difficult and contested questions with the goal of reaching beyond differing viewpoints to a critical evaluation of the relative claims of different positions. Central to the educational aims and spirit of academic freedom, diversity of perspectives is a means to an end in higher education, not an end in itself. Including diversity is a step in the larger quest for new understanding and insight. But an overemphasis on diversity of perspectives as an end in itself threatens to distort the larger responsibilitiesof intellectual work in the academy.
So what are we to make of the disclosure that, while Governor, Mitch Daniels tried to use the power of that position to ensure that teachers and professors did not use a book of which he disapproved, and that he tried to cut funding for a professor who had criticized his policies?
The emails display a breathtaking arrogance, ruthless partisanship, and an autocratic mindset. But most of all–and most troubling, given his current position–they display an absolute ignorance of, and disregard for, the essential purpose and nature of the academy.
Howard Zinn was a reputable if controversial historian. Much of what he wrote was a valuable corrective to the histories of his era; some was oversimplified twaddle. But opinions about the value of his–or any–book are beside the point. The question is “who decides what books are used in the classroom,” and the answer is not “the governor”. Government functionaries do not get to decide what scholarship is acceptable for classroom use or debate, and elected officials absolutely and emphatically do not get to retaliate against critics by cutting their funding or getting them fired.
I think I was most struck by the unintended irony of Daniels’ emails. He rants about indoctrination while trying to control what students read and see. (I guess it’s only propaganda when its done by someone with whom you disagree.) A Governor who talked endlessly about “limited government” and “freedom” when he was pushing his economic agenda evidently had a very different approach to the marketplace of ideas. (It’s sort of like those “family values” guys who frequent prostitutes and play footsie in airport restrooms.)
Bottom line: the politician as hypocrite and wanna-be autocrat are one thing.
Allowing someone who is so clearly contemptuous of the very purpose of education to lead a great university is an absolute travesty.
I see that Walmart threatened to move out of Washington, D.C. if the city raised its minimum wage to 12.50.
The D.C. council raised it anyway.
Bravo to D.C. for calling Walmart’s bluff. Let’s hope the Mayor signs the measure; evidently, he’s expressed some concerns, since Walmart was proposing to create jobs and to expand into neighborhoods currently underserved by retail.
Those neighborhoods deserve to be served, and jobs are important–but are they worth $6000 of taxpayer subsidy for each person Walmart employs? Because that’s what the research shows: for every job Walmart creates, taxpayers are filling the gap between the low wages being paid and what workers need to survive. Walmart employees are overwhelmingly dependent upon the social safety net for food, housing and medical care.
Walmart has a great business plan: Those of us who pay taxes subsidize Walmart’s costs of doing business. So long as they can get away with paying below-subsistence wages, our tax dollars will continue to fatten their bottom line.
Defenders of these rapacious business practices defend Walmart by pointing to the low prices of their merchandise. Low prices benefit consumers, particularly poorer consumers. But keeping prices low does not require paying poverty wages.
The big box store most famous for its stockpiles of toilet paper and $1.50 hot dogs also has a reputation for paying its workers a higher wage than most of its competitors. The average Costco worker made about $45,000 per year, Fortune reports. By comparison, Walmart-owned Sam’s Club, a Costco competitor, pays its workers $17,486 per year, according to salary information site Glassdoor.com….Costco’s insistence on treating its workers well hasn’t come at the expense of the company’s bottom line. The retailer’s profit jumped 19 percent to $459 million last quarter, while Walmart’s sales suffered during the same period.
So that claim about helping low-income shoppers by offering bargain prices doesn’t fly–Costco manages to keep prices low (and profits high) without screwing over its employees. Or picking the pocket of the taxpayers.
Washington, D.C. should take a leaf from my mother’s book. When I was a little girl and threatened to run away from home, she’d offer to make me sandwiches for the trip.
A former student–President of the Chamber of Commerce in his small Indiana town–sent me a link to this Ted Talk.
There are several “nits” one might pick, but it is a fascinating argument, and well worth the 20 minutes it takes to listen. At the very least, it’s a reproach to arrogant assumptions about the way others should live….
That said, it brings to mind an important point raised by Fareed Zakaria in his book The Future of Freedom: the issue is not democracy, it is liberty. Living under the tyranny of a majority is not appreciably different than living under the tyranny of an autocrat. There can be a wide variety of mechanisms for making decisions about governing. We should judge them not just by their effect on the material well-being of the governed, but by the degree to which they respect fundamental individual rights.
Deconstructing the escalating battles over food is anything but simple.
We have critics and foodies like Michael Pollan counseling us to avoid eating anything our grandmothers wouldn’t have recognized as food. We have “food activists” insisting on labeling foods containing any ingredient that has been genetically modified. And we have Oscar-nominated films like “Food Inc.,” focusing upon the practices of the huge corporate farmers who have largely displaced the romanticized family farm. Those who have paid attention to the “natural food” movement (a cohort that would not include Paula Deen aficionados, or those cheering the return of the Twinkie) hardly know what they can safely eat.
I often quote my cousin the cardiologist, whose scientific expertise I respect. When Whole Foods announced that the company would be labeling genetically modified foods, he sent me an extensive tract, arguing that fear of GMs was ill-founded and the labeling movement dangerous. (You can read the whole thing here.)
As he pointed out, “genetic modifications” used to be called hybrids. Humans engaged in growing foods have spent generations selecting for desirable traits, and combining and propagating them. Historically, this has been a lengthy process. In many cases, genetic manipulation simply accelerates that process. (In other cases, however, the modifications may include the introduction of genes not native to that plant.)
He also points out that genetically modified plants promise to correct nutritional deficits in developing countries where the population depends primarily on a single foodstuff, like rice. Furthermore, the greater yields of modified crops keep many people in those countries from starvation. And it is true, as he notes, that foods derived from genetically modified crops have been consumed by hundreds of millions of people across the world for more than 15 years with no reported ill effects.
Or at least, ill effects that can be reliably connected to such crops.
It is probably obvious that I am less sanguine than my cousin; although I agree that most GM crops are no different from the hybrids farmers have long produced, I harbor some concerns–for which I admittedly have absolutely no evidence–about the long-term effects of those modifications that involve the introduction of “new” genes to a plant’s DNA. (Somehow, I don’t get a warm and fuzzy feeling when I hear that Montsano has modified seeds to withstand its pesticides….)
That said, I think the uproar about GMs distracts us from far more concrete dangers posed by factory farming.
For example, most of the beef produced in the United States has been fattened on corn, because corn is cheap, abundant, and allows cattle to come to the market in 12-14 months. In order for cattle to be raised on corn instead of grass, however, the cows have to be given antibiotics in feed, feminizing hormones, and often protein that comes from other animal parts. Even if you overlook the inhumane conditions that have been amply documented, the large-scale production of chickens and pigs involve similarly unnatural processes. Unlike the situation with GMs, there is substantial evidence that these practices pose health risks for consumers.
Another legitimate cause for concern is the increased and often indiscriminate use of pesticides that linger in our food, and that run off into our water supplies.
Unfortunately, the “food fights” we are engaged in tend to conflate these different issues, confusing consumers and policymakers alike.
What is “natural”? Breeding crops to be disease-resistant, or more nutritious, allows us to meet human needs. We’ve done that for generations, and so long as we don’t get carried away–so long as we don’t create new and strange “Frankenfoods,” we probably don’t have much to worry about. Medicating livestock with hormones and antibiotics so that they can be fed foods they did not evolve to eat, in order to fatten them more and more quickly, is much more troubling.
As with so many of the issues people fight about these days, it’s complex, and most of us lack the scientific knowledge to make sound judgments.We used to trust the FDA to ensure food safety, but thanks to over a quarter-century of being told that government can’t do anything right, we no longer trust anybody.
