The devil you know: David Horowitz do-over
| By Alan Franklin - Mar 6th, 2006 at 6:15 pm EST |
| Also listed in: Metro State College of Denver Students | Statewide Student Progress |
In the spring of 2004 a group of Metro State students, including myself, rallied in opposition to a censorious campaign being waged against our professors by right-wing ideologue David Horowitz. By exposing the efforts of astroturf College Republicans to entrap professors with baseless charges, and by mobbing the legislature with testimony on Horowitz's duplicitously-named "Academic Bill of Rights" legislation, we helped kill the reactionary effort to frighten Colorado college professors into milquetoast silence.
In that effort we were assisted by college administrators who understood what was really happening. Former CU President Betsy Hoffman was far from perfect, but she defended her professors from the assault of David Horowitz and then-Rep. Shawn Mitchell. So did former Metro State President Ray Kieft. It's important to remember that this debate occurred prior to the controversy over Ward Churchill's now-infamous "little Eichmanns" essay. The debate was focused on vague charges of 'discrimination' against conservative students then. Ward Churchill simplified Horowitz's argument, but didn't really change it: underlying both controversies was the desire to censor opinions he found "anti-American."
In the two years since the fight over House Bill 04-1315, a great deal has changed. Betsy Hoffman was forced to resign; partly over legitimate administration problems (read CU rape scandal) but mostly for daring to not immediately terminate Ward Churchill over his "anti-American essay." Ray Kieft wanted to stay on at Metro State but ran afoul of its Republican-dominated Board of Trustees.
In 2005, CU and Metro State both changed presidents. Metro, after a convoluted two-year search noted for angry clashes between faculty and the Board, appointed Dr. Stephen Jordan. Republican. CU installed 'interim' President Hank Brown, former Republican Senator.
We began to realize at Metro State that Dr. Jordan would mean trouble last semester, when he published his first missive to the campus on the subject of "academic freedom." And essentially quoted the language of HB 04-1315. I speak with professors every day now who tell me that for all our efforts in 2004, it seems as though Horowitz won - they find themselves self-censoring in the classroom. Just a little bit, here and there, you know, to 'stay out of trouble.'
Fast-forward to the spring of 2006, where in the legislature the other shoe is dropping with HB 06-1284.
The first problem is that nobody at the Capitol, Republican or Democrat, has got a clue what he's talking about.
The second problem is more subtle: I don't personally believe that Hank Brown is a Horowitz mercenary. I believe there's some sincerity to statements he makes like "the pursuit of understanding, even in controversial areas, is what academic universities are all about." And it's common knowledge that HB 06-1284 survived the Education Committee by surprise, and faces an uphill battle in the full House.
In the end, I think that Hank Brown is playing this situation to obtain maximum funding for his school. That's tough to condemn. The ancillary benefit of cozying up to Republicans whose support CU needs as well as sneaking in a partisan hit on the General Assembly leadership probably also works out for him, but let's keep things in perspective. I don't think he realizes that the joke's on him, too.
Because CU's failure to take a stand on this ugly bill will have the effect of furthering the censorious aims of people like David Horowitz - even if it fails, and even if Hank Brown himself is no David Horowitz. While administrators remain silent, students and faculty will insist that this bill is unnecessary because public colleges "can police their own house." "They already do," they'll claim to disbelieving TV news audiences. They can "take care of the problem" without being forced to by dubious legislation. And to prove it, here are a couple of sacrificial lambs to appease the mob...
So it begins again - players of varying wit in an analogous story better told by Ward Churchill.
In that effort we were assisted by college administrators who understood what was really happening. Former CU President Betsy Hoffman was far from perfect, but she defended her professors from the assault of David Horowitz and then-Rep. Shawn Mitchell. So did former Metro State President Ray Kieft. It's important to remember that this debate occurred prior to the controversy over Ward Churchill's now-infamous "little Eichmanns" essay. The debate was focused on vague charges of 'discrimination' against conservative students then. Ward Churchill simplified Horowitz's argument, but didn't really change it: underlying both controversies was the desire to censor opinions he found "anti-American."
In the two years since the fight over House Bill 04-1315, a great deal has changed. Betsy Hoffman was forced to resign; partly over legitimate administration problems (read CU rape scandal) but mostly for daring to not immediately terminate Ward Churchill over his "anti-American essay." Ray Kieft wanted to stay on at Metro State but ran afoul of its Republican-dominated Board of Trustees.
In 2005, CU and Metro State both changed presidents. Metro, after a convoluted two-year search noted for angry clashes between faculty and the Board, appointed Dr. Stephen Jordan. Republican. CU installed 'interim' President Hank Brown, former Republican Senator.
We began to realize at Metro State that Dr. Jordan would mean trouble last semester, when he published his first missive to the campus on the subject of "academic freedom." And essentially quoted the language of HB 04-1315. I speak with professors every day now who tell me that for all our efforts in 2004, it seems as though Horowitz won - they find themselves self-censoring in the classroom. Just a little bit, here and there, you know, to 'stay out of trouble.'
Fast-forward to the spring of 2006, where in the legislature the other shoe is dropping with HB 06-1284.
The new bill, proposed by State Rep. Keith King, R-Colorado Springs, comes in the distant wake of the Ward Churchill scandal, which raised questions about the tenure process. Churchill, an ethnic studies tenured professor, compared some 9/11 victims to a major Nazi, in an essay published Sept. 12, 2001.
The Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News reported that Brown said state legislators threatened to halt funding if CU did not take an official stand against the bill. Legislators in the State House deny allegations that members threatened to block further funding from CU.
Democrats control the House, while Brown and King are Republicans...
The first problem is that nobody at the Capitol, Republican or Democrat, has got a clue what he's talking about.
"It's just a fact of life that there's not enough money to spread around," said JBC member Sen. Dave Owen, R-Greeley.
The second problem is more subtle: I don't personally believe that Hank Brown is a Horowitz mercenary. I believe there's some sincerity to statements he makes like "the pursuit of understanding, even in controversial areas, is what academic universities are all about." And it's common knowledge that HB 06-1284 survived the Education Committee by surprise, and faces an uphill battle in the full House.
In the end, I think that Hank Brown is playing this situation to obtain maximum funding for his school. That's tough to condemn. The ancillary benefit of cozying up to Republicans whose support CU needs as well as sneaking in a partisan hit on the General Assembly leadership probably also works out for him, but let's keep things in perspective. I don't think he realizes that the joke's on him, too.
Because CU's failure to take a stand on this ugly bill will have the effect of furthering the censorious aims of people like David Horowitz - even if it fails, and even if Hank Brown himself is no David Horowitz. While administrators remain silent, students and faculty will insist that this bill is unnecessary because public colleges "can police their own house." "They already do," they'll claim to disbelieving TV news audiences. They can "take care of the problem" without being forced to by dubious legislation. And to prove it, here are a couple of sacrificial lambs to appease the mob...
So it begins again - players of varying wit in an analogous story better told by Ward Churchill.
Comments are closed for this post.
In the past, most of us did not hear a vigorous political critique on contemporary events from professors, nor do students today. That doesn’t hold Horowitz back. Instead, he takes some examples that he has heard of (some of which don’t amount to much) and appeals to those already prejudiced against academics and students.
The overwhelming majority of professors, right and left (in the past as well as today) let you know their beliefs, but try to keep them out of the classroom or at least present them in a manner that is fair to those who disagree. Horowitz finds some exceptions, makes an amalgam of them with the fact that most teachers today are liberals (the result of the fight against the Vietnam War and for human rights in the 1960s and 1970s) and then attacks the universities who hire them.
Even the examples that Horowitz presents are only random bits of excited language and are not a balanced assessment of the individual’s views or value as a teacher. It is as if your worse enemy found some fault in your life and then spread that around as a definition of your whole personality.
One of Horowitz’s most recent forays was at Temple University.
This was his claim: “I can say this with confidence because I have interviewed at least a hundred students in this state and every one of them has been in a class or in several classes in which their professors have railed against George Bush, the war in Iraq, and the policies and attitudes of Republicans and conservatives.”
Link
Knowing what we all know now and many of us knew then, it is no surprise that some teachers might express some degree of outrage over the transparent lies and false premises that were used to justify the invasion of Iraq.
However, I don’t believe that Horowitz, who has a lot to do, interviewed a hundred students in Pennsylvania. If he or his associates did and for this purpose, wouldn’t he have a record to show for it, i.e., a tape of his interviews or at least a listing of the interviews or events so one could check it out?
If he doesn’t, why doesn’t he? Without it, we are to accept him on faith—that is to say, his right-wing followers are to accept him. He assumes that no one will challenge him and, like McCarthy in the early 1950s, he throws out a smear and moves on. We have to catch up with him after he leaves the building.