Patricia Johnston

When Brandeis shut down an exhibit of Palestinian art last week, the organizer promptly found a new home for it across town at MIT. Then this week a group of Brandeis faculty started a petition drive to have the exhibit brought back to Brandeis. They have gotten 90 signatures, including many Jews. I've posted it below. Yes the art was censored, but it's up again, with a ton of attention.

The support underscores something Alan Dershowitz says—that universities are hotbeds of leftwing thought. I agree. The question is why? Why are leftwing ideas that are marginalized elsewhere in the culture doing fine at universities?

I think the answer is, There's nowhere else for these ideas to go; and they are less dangerous in universities than, say, in Washington. Consider the alternatives. It's virtually impossible to be a leftwing intellectual in the Washington thinktank community: you don't get funded. Yes there's George Soros, but he's the exception that proves the rule. It's fine to be a leftleaning liberal in the Maistream Media, where everyone is a Democrat who supports abortion and has murmurous questions about Iraq; but you can't be too outspoken about it, or again you'll get marginalized. Weekly opinion magazines are also not very hospitable to lefties, and it can't be easy to be a leftwing analyst in the Executive Branch staff positions that help form policy. All those Arabists at State, for instance, keeping their heads down. Colleges are the only game in town.

It is a conservative-dominated country. Big business plays a huge role in our public life. It funds the thinktanks and the media. It funds campaigns. There are tons of privileged Americans with leftwing views, but not many places for them to actually apply their thinking. The universities are deemed harmless enough. There these thinkers will only educate young people, in places far from Washington.  read more »

The sad part for the left is that its braintrust is so unengaged in the real world. Its idea-people are alienated, and don't have a practical bone in their bodies. They get to hold forth at dinner parties.