One of the really bad guys of that administration.

How it’s done and what’s being done in academe these days.

The college classroom is a major front in the growing culture war between right and left. Those on the right view much of what is taught in the humanities or social sciences as indoctrination. Those on the left—who dominate the academy—see little to complain about. They favor a definition of academic freedom that is so broad that it blurs the lines between scholarship and advocacy. After all, who is to say what is political activism and what is education?

But the division between indoctrination and education is actually quite stark. Education presents an objective inquiry into a topic. It deliberately presents opposing perspectives, where they exist, and allows students to derive their own beliefs from the light of facts and logic. It does not demand that every issue have a single, definitive solution.

Indoctrination, on the other hand, seeks to convert the audience to a specific ideology, which cannot be contested. This is frequently accomplished through distortion of facts and the avoidance of alternate perceptions.

It’s like a big mind-bending exercise, throughout the country.

For instance:

An academic program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the minor in Social and Economic Justice, illustrates the difference between education and indoctrination. While the program description claims that it is “designed for students who want to better understand how to think about issues of justice,” it is possible for a student to avoid any contact with meaningful intellectual discourse on justice. On the other hand, by a judicious selection of specific courses, it is equally possible for a student to come away with a deep and valuable intellectual experience.

Yes.

U. of N. Carolina flim-flam.

When you hear the term “social justice,” be prepared to empty your wallet, particularly if it is paired with the word “economic.” “An academic program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the minor in Social and Economic Justice, illustrates the difference between education and indoctrination,” Jay Schalin of the John William Pope Center for Higher Education Policy alleges.

Southern b.s.

And misunderstands and misunderstands and misunderstands.

Remarks made at the Vatican press conference revealed more serious misunderstandings about the market economy which, if put into practice, would do real harm to those who are already poor and vulnerable.

Poor people do better in a free market. Command economies not so.

Trump has shifted a bit on immigration, but not enough for Wall St. Journal.

Feeling crazy? Maybe this is why.

Society seems to be growing steadily crazier. And maybe it doesn’t just seem to be. Maybe it actually is growing crazier. In the 1930s, science-fiction writer Robert Heinlein dubbed the early 21st century ‘the Crazy Years’, a time when rapid technological and social change would leave people psychologically unmoored and, frankly, crazy. Today’s society seems to be living up to that prediction. But why?

The estimable Glenn Reynolds offers an answer.

Will never cease to amaze me.

What delicious reading it makes going back over Paul Krugman’s missive in the New York Times on the morning after Donald Trump was elected in 2016. ‘Global recession with no end in sight…when are markets going to recover? A first pass answer is never…’ Those words should be carved into a façade somewhere in Wall Street and held up for ever after as an example of hubris of economic forecasters.

Tsk.

Trump the healer: What do you know?

‘Tis a sad day that has no women deacons around to get us over the rough spots.

There are, apparently, still some priests left in Ireland for the tens of people who still want the sacraments. Evidence for this claim is found in a story at IrishCatholic.com. It concerns that pungent group, the Ass. of Catholic Priests. Have a look at this spittle-flecked nutty against Francis concerning the deaconette situation.

Have a look if you want your heart rendered.

Pied Piper extraordinaire this Zinn fellow.

Leftist friend of mine some years back was delighted to see the book in his son’s hands (hadn’t known of it) at Carleton College, a top-rank selective school. Oh those professors were hard at their (misguided) task.