| There is a university which is so open-minded it has failed to take the side of the United States in the Global War on Terror, by admitting into its vaunted ranks and supporting through controversy the lead propagandist of one of the most virulently anti-American state regimes in modern history: A regime which is guilty by common agreement of supporting the terrorists who attacked the United States on September 11, 2001, which oppressed women, slaughtered innocents, and imposed Shari'ah law on everyone who made the unfortunate decision to impress its soil. A regime where girls and ladies who committed the crime of having been raped were sentenced to have rocks thrown at their heads until death. There is a university who, in diversity-competition with its likeminded peer, has made itself so deeply diverse that the strategist charged with coldly calculating global rhetorical defenses for this behavior--for convincing the world that Islamic fundamentalism is O.K. and ought to be left alone--has for support a full stonewalling university administration. This is Yale, of course. My gut tells me that the Yale Taliban, who is called Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi, won't be around much longer. But that, shamefully, is only because of political pressure filling with gaseous volume the space normally occupied by decency, common sense, and love of country. There was a speech given at Yale this week, by a Columbia professor--the erstwhile King's College has its own problems, you'll note--who is called Todd Gitlin. He teaches journalism and sociology uptown. You can read a report in the Yale Daily News about the speech he gave. It was about liberalism--not real liberalism, because virtually all Americans are liberals as the word's original meaning applies, but modern left-wing liberalism--and patriotism. Specifically, the professor was wondering why the argument that America's left-wing academics are unpatriotic is so common and so effective. I have no idea what the professor said, and I don't care. Here is what I care about: "The Intellectuals and the Flag". It's the title of his new book (the one he was plugging-but-not at Yale) as referenced in the Daily News article linked above. It explores the strange relationship between the intellectual community and our Stars and Stripes. This is what he lectured on: what he called "the political left's strategic failure in addressing contemporary national issues." And, aye, there is the rub. It is not a strategic problem when an entire constituency gets queasy at the thought of running up Old Glory and thinking, "glory." Or of singing our national anthem in unison. Are these activities frighteningly nationalistic? "On the way" to some regressive autocratic empire? There are many people who would say so, and they are therein committing not a strategic error, but some other more soulful error. Not much of America feels any special obligation to help them figure out what it is, but here's a hint: Academics will not win the heart of America so long as on their nightstand is a 192-page book whose warp and woof is to reconcile their deepest political beliefs with the act of saluting the flag of the United States of America.  |
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