Harvey Mansfield Laments the Decline of Higher Education, and Succinctly Summarizes the Difference Between a Liberal and a Progressive

The June 1-2, 2024 edition of The Wall Street Journal includes an interview titled The Long View of Higher Ed's Decline. Harvey Mansfield, the subject of the interview, may go down in history as the last conservative professor at Harvard. The entire interview deserves careful study, but two of Mansfield's points should be emphasized:

1) The combination of lowered admission standards and grade inflation throughout our higher education system has had a negative impact not just on the quality of college education but also the competency of the work force; when objective standards are discarded, excellence is no longer desirable or even measurable.

2) Mansfield provided a succinct summary of the difference between a liberal in the classical sense (an all but extinct species now) and the progressives who have taken over the Democratic Party: a liberal acknowledges America's flaws, but considers America to be redeemable and is proud to be an American; a progressive has a "loathing for his country. It goes beyond embarrassment to real dislike of America, and in a way, therefore, of themselves, because after all they're Americans."

Conservatives are often labeled "anti-intellectual," but an essential part of the intellectual life is the search for objective truth, and the willingness to engage in robust debate is part of that search. If you are so convinced that you have discovered the absolute truth that you are no longer willing to even listen to opposing views then you are not an intellectual, no matter how many college degrees you have. The extent to which progressives deride the value--or even the existence of--objective truth is jarring, and their unwillingness to consider opposing views is a major threat to our way of life: it has become commonplace for Left-controlled colleges to either refuse to let conservatives speak, or else to enable "protesters" to disrupt conservatives who are allowed to speak.

Three years ago, I noted that Critical Race Theory has infiltrated our education system to disastrous effect: 

If you are not familiar with Critical Race Theory, it is not difficult to find the source material and understand its Marxist, anti-democracy, anti-freedom, and anti-American underpinnings. Here is a good summary from Critical Race Theory: An Introduction, a 2001 book from Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic: "Unlike traditional civil rights, which embraces incrementalism and step-by-step progress, critical race theory questions the very foundations of the liberal order, including equality theory, legal reasoning, Enlightenment rationalism and neutral principles of constitutional law." 

I graduated from law school and passed the Ohio bar exam, which means that I am quite familiar with both the strengths and limitations of our justice system. I know from firsthand experience that our system is flawed, but that it is also the best such system in the world. I do not want to replace it with a system based on a Marxist theory that seeks to undermine "the liberal order...legal reasoning...and neutral principles of constitutional law." Those sound principles that Critical Race Theory seeks to subvert and destroy are what separates this country from such failed and failing states as the Soviet Union, Iran, North Korea, Syria, and Cuba. 

Proponents of Critical Race Theory recklessly assert that without Critical Race Theory we cannot have a fair and honest reckoning with our past. That is false, but very much in keeping with the narrow, binary thinking of the proponents of Critical Race Theory: according to them, everything is either racist or antiracist, so if you oppose Critical Race Theory then you must be a racist who refuses to acknowledge evil acts and suffering that are woven into U.S. history. I reject such binary, simplistic, and incorrect thinking.

The undermining of "the liberal order...legal reasoning...and neutral principles of constitutional law" is a foundational principle for self-proclaimed "progressives," including those who conducted violent insurrections on college campuses targeting Jews in general and Israel in particular. It is neither a surprise nor a secret that Iran is funding these campus insurrections; the fact that self-proclaimed "progressives" gladly take money from an Islamist theocracy that persecutes not only Jews but also women, homosexuals, and other minority groups demonstrates that the insurrections are not about justice for Gaza (or justice anywhere) but rather about destabilizing and overthrowing American democracy. The self-proclaimed "progressives" are deluded enough to be believe that they are fighting the evils of colonialism, which makes them the proverbial "useful idiots" serving Islamists who could not care less about--and, in fact, oppose--the "progressive" agenda.

As Mansfield noted, the decline of higher education results in a general societal decline. We see this in the work force in general, and in particular in the Left-dominated media outlets that shape public opinion in ways that threaten our freedom and our way of life. 

Perhaps nowhere is the general societal decline more evident than in our government. Former World Chess Champion turned political activist Garry Kasparov astutely noted that the United States used to be about striving for excellence, but recent Presidential elections have been about choosing the lesser of two evils. We see that yet again in this election cycle, with Republican Donald Trump--whose character flaws are well-documented--facing a Democratic Party in search of an identity and a competent candidate: first the Democratic Party attempted to prop up an obviously senile (in the practical if not clinical sense) Joe Biden, and after that misguided effort failed they anointed Kamala Harris, whose pronouncements and policy positions align with the morally bankrupt "progressive" agenda that is a major threat to Western civilization. This election is not about excellence and it is not about saving democracy; it is about choosing the lesser of two evils, and hoping that in four years both parties will present us with better options.

The Media's Agenda-Driven COVID-19 Coverage is Symptomatic of a Larger Problem

Reporters are supposed to do research and ask questions designed to discover facts, and then report those facts. A reporter's job is not to persuade, but to inform. A commentator's job is to utilize facts to persuade the audience that a given policy or viewpoint is more logical than the opposing policy or viewpoint.

It is unfortunate that far too many reporters and commentators either do not understand the above job descriptions and/or refuse to do their jobs appropriately.

It has become a widespread practice for reporters to highlight the facts that they believe are favorable to whatever "higher truth" they support, and to suppress the facts that they believe are not favorable to that "higher truth." It has also become a widespread practice for reporters to deliver commentary. If you are a reporter covering an election, the reader/viewer should never know which candidate you support; it used to be said of sports reporters that "there is no cheering in the press box," and that should be the approach taken by political reporters. Instead, reporters feel free to tell us how elated--or despondent--they feel about an election result. Viewers can decide for themselves how to feel after reporters do their job of reporting what has happened. It is appropriate for a commentator to express elation or despondency, but those feelings should be grounded in facts: elation because an election result will likely produce a desirable policy impact, or despondency because an election result will likely produce an undesirable policy impact. The commentator's job is to analyze the facts and explain what outcomes are most likely based on the facts. 

The media's agenda-driven COVID-19 coverage has been awful, but it is symptomatic of the larger problem described above, and that problem has existed for a long time--though it seems to be getting worse--across many different subjects, ranging from life and death topics such as Mideast politics to lesser matters, such as determining who is the best player in the NBA. Some issues have much greater existential importance that others, but issues great and small are affected by this problem.

For example, by any objective measurement President Trump's Operation Warp Speed vaccination program has been a huge success, as noted by The Wall Street Journal:

President Biden announced Tuesday that the U.S. should have enough vaccine supply for every American adult by the end of May. Last week the Food and Drug Administration finally approved Johnson & Johnson's vaccine, and this week J&J struck a deal with Merck to manufacture the single-shot J&J vaccine as well. With the Moderna and Pfizer shots already going into more than a million American arms each week, thousands of lives will be saved.

It's important to appreciate what an achievement this is. Critics scoffed when President Trump set a target of having a vaccine approved by the end of 2020, and Kamala Harris suggested she might not take a shot recommended by the Trump Administration.

The Biden-Harris Administration has now changed to full-throated encouragement—though not before continuing to trash the Trump efforts. White House aides have suggested that they inherited little vaccine supply and no plan for distribution. Both claims are false.

The supply was ramping up fast, and while there were distribution glitches at first, the real problem has been the last mile of distribution controlled by states. Governors like New York's Andrew Cuomo tried to satisfy political constituencies that wanted access to vaccines, adding complexity and bureaucracy that confused the public...

Mr. Biden ought to give the vaccine credit where it is due--to U.S. drug companies and Operation Warp Speed.

In Joe Biden's Trump-Like Fabrication on Covid (The Wall Street Journal, March 2, 2021), Gerard Baker discusses how former President Trump's recent CPAC speech is being used by many media outlets as a pretext to focus coverage on the former President instead of focusing coverage on how President Biden is rewriting history to benefit his administration:

The primary problem with having Mr. Trump back is that it allows the media to focus again on the many deceptions of the 45th president while conveniently ignoring the large, central deception that is intended to define the administration of the 46th.

The Biden team is concocting a fiction, elaborately developed and assiduously repeated. It is designed to cement the new president's legacy, ensure the political success of his party and ineradicably defame their opponents.

It is that before Jan. 20, the Covid-19 pandemic was out of control, threatening an even larger catastrophe than the one that had already claimed more than 400,000 lives and destroyed so much productive economic capacity. It had been allowed to do so, the narrative asserts, by Mr. Biden's callously indifferent predecessor, who ignored the virus, disparaged science and did nothing to protect Americans. Only the heroic efforts of the Biden team, with deference to science and carefully targeted economic relief, averted catastrophe.

It is a preposterous fabrication.

Covid cases peaked in the U.S. at the end of the first week of January and by the time Mr. Biden took office had already fallen by a third. 

The claim that the administration inherited no vaccine program at all, initially propagated through the ministrations of a kindly reporter, is so at odds with the evidence that even the most friendly newspapers were obliged to call it out.

So developed was the vaccination program in place when Mr. Biden took office that it was close to achieving his supposedly ambitious goal of a million shots a day. Credit the pharmaceutical companies (institutions Democrats love to despise) and the incentives provided by a capitalist market (a system Democrats love to despise). But the Trump administration gets much credit too--for identifying the opportunity early, and crucially for committing public funds to minimize the risks for drug makers...

The Biden Fabrication demands, at least for now, a steady drumbeat of negative Covid news from the administration--itself another cruel deception on a nation desperate for the good news that is actually the truth. The president tells a town hall not to expect much before Christmas, and the way Dr. Doom, a k a Anthony Fauci, speaks, you could be forgiven for thinking that we may all be triple-masking well into 2020.

A cynic would say that the only good thing about "The Biden Fabrication" is that it also necessitates telling the public at some point that all is well thanks solely to President Biden's efforts. You can expect the media to start actively broadcasting that message later this year, and--barring some unforeseen development, such as COVID-19 mutating into a vaccine-resistant variation--most likely before the end of the year we will be told that life can return to normal (or as close to the pre-COVID-19 normal as is possible, given that certain things will inevitably change as a result of the pandemic). I would not be surprised to see large numbers of fans attending sports events in person this fall, and perhaps we will even see championship teams visiting the White House, providing a photo opportunity for President Biden, as well as an opportunity for the media to note that many athletes refused to visit the White House during President Trump's administration.

President Biden is a politician, and like most politicians he is reluctant to give credit to the opposing party for anything that the opposing party did well. That is why it is so important that reporters and commentators do their jobs. When President Biden acts as if he is single-handedly bringing COVID-19 under control, it is the responsibility of reporters to report the facts: the vaccination program that is the main reason that cases and deaths are declining now was put into place by President Trump's administration. Commentators may have various opinions about what else could/should have been done to fight COVID-19, and whether or not Biden would have implemented a similar vaccination program had he been President when the pandemic began, but any reasonable and intelligent conversation about this topic must begin by stating the basic facts.

Reporters would be well advised to cultivate humility in general, and also to cultivate humility specifically regarding the many specialized fields of inquiry for which they have little to no training or expertise. After Dr. Robert Goddard wrote that it would be possible to launch a rocket that could travel to the moon, The New York Times sneered in 1920 that Dr. Goddard failed to understand "the knowledge ladled out daily in high schools." A mere 49 years later, the newspaper published a retraction: "Further investigation and experimentation have confirmed the findings of Isaac Newton in the 17th century, and it is now definitely established that a rocket can function in a vacuum as well as in an atmosphere. The Times regrets the error."

False media reporting about scientific issues can have disastrous consequences. Outraged by the mocking media coverage of his research, Dr. Goddard spent much of his career avoiding the press. He just filed his patents and he did his rocket launches. While the mainstream American media scoffed at Dr. Goddard, others actually studied Dr. Goddard's patent filings; after a captured Nazi scientist was asked about the origins of the Nazis' deadly V-2 rockets, the scientist replied, "Why don't you ask your own Dr. Goddard? He knows better than any of us." 

It has become a popular mantra to say "Follow the science," but science is properly understood as a method of inquiry, not an infallible source for one indisputable truth; it has become evident that often when a media member says "Follow the science" the reader is meant to understand this to mean "Have faith in the higher truth I am bestowing upon you." Einstein's Theory of Relativity is perhaps the most successful scientific theory of all-time, but scientists still do experiments to test its limits, so the notion that there is one scientific truth about the COVID-19 pandemic would be laughable if that notion were not so potentially threatening not only to our lives but also to the spirit of scientific inquiry.

When any media outlet tries to convince you that there is just one absolute scientific truth about a given issue--particularly if that issue is highly politicized--remember how the media treated Dr. Goddard. We would all be better off if people who do not know what they are talking about kept their minds open and their mouths shut.

Is America Heading for Violent Revolution?

"Intelligentsia" is a nice-sounding word with a sinister undertone. Gary Saul Morson, a professor of Russian literature at Northwestern University, explains in a Wall Street Journal interview that in the classic period in Russia (approximately 1860-1905) "the word did not mean everybody who was educated. It meant educated people who identified with one or another of the radical movements. 'Intelligents' believed in atheism, revolution and either socialism or anarchism."

Professor Morson is concerned about the extent and nature of the riots that took place in America after George Floyd's brutal death under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer. Professor Morson declares, "To me it's astonishingly like late 19th-, early 20th-century Russia, when basically the entire educated class felt you simply had to be against the regime or some sort of revolutionary." He adds that we have reached a dangerous point in which, as writer Barton Swaim paraphrases Morson's analysis, "well-intentioned liberal people often can't bring themselves to say that lawless violence is wrong." The intelligentsia sparked a revolution that led to decades of socialist oppression not just in the Soviet Union but also in every country that had the misfortune of being behind the Iron Curtain. Professor Morson is concerned that America is heading toward a similarly violent revolution.

How often have we heard public figures say that mass violence/rioting is understandable, and that it does not matter because insurance will pay for the damage? Such reckless statements are the recipe for the unraveling of societal order. At least as worrisome as the casual condoning of violence is the current climate in which it has become unacceptable--if not impossible--to have an intelligent and meaningful dialogue about complex issues; all we have now are competing, angry monologues. Morson states, "You get into a revolutionary situation because people can't hear. Can there be a dialogue on important questions, or is there only one thing to say about every question? Are people afraid to say, 'Well, yes, but it's not quite as simple as that'?...When you can't do that, you're heading to a one-party state or a dictatorship of some sort. If one party is always wrong and another always right, why not just have the right one?" (emphasis added).

We appear to be at a crucial and historic juncture. Will America's two party system collapse? Will either the Democratic Party or the Republican Party wipe out the other? Will America have just one "right" party, with no dissent permitted? There used to be a sense that the two main U.S. political parties agreed in a large sense about the goals for America, but disagreed about how to best obtain those goals. Now, the parties barely speak to each other in any meaningful or productive way. Partisans for each side don't just disagree with their opponents; they demonize them.

Professor Morson calls this "ideological segregation." He explains, "It was very easy for white people to believe evil things about black people when they never met any. But when you live with somebody, you realize that they're no worse than you are...We've increasingly had ideological segregation on both sides. Each side has caricature views of the other."

Meanwhile--perhaps due at least in part to understandable frustration with both parties--it has become fashionable for many young people to play around with socialism or anarchism, much like a small child who does not know better (and is not properly supervised) might play around with matches until he or she starts a big fire. If you are young and/or misinformed then you have neither the life experience nor the educational background to know about how Stalin murdered tens of millions of people in the name of socialism, or about the killing fields of Southeast Asia, or about how anarchism has proven capable only of destroying but not of building anything of lasting value.

Professor Morson somberly concludes, "we have a major depression, we have terrible fear from the illness, and now we have mass riots in the street, which our leaders do not seem to know how to handle. That's a very rapid slide from only a year ago. And there's no reason to think it will slow down. The slide could well continue."

I share Professor Morson's concern about America's future. Perhaps the one saving grace for America is that this country, however flawed and divided, was founded as a liberal democracy, while Russia has a history of authoritarianism and totalitarianism that dates back many centuries; socialism and tyranny found fertile soil in Russia, while here the soil may not be as well-suited for socialism and tyranny--but anyone who cares about this country's future cannot be satisfied with the hope/expectation that socialism and tyranny could never take hold here: we must fight to preserve what is great about America, while also striving to improve our country where improvements are needed.

There is no doubt that America needs to improve in some areas, but those who assert that America is somehow founded in sin and/or is irredeemably evil should well consider the lessons of world history. A country based on liberal democracy with a capitalist economic system is far from perfect--but it is infinitely better than a country built on the illusions of socialism or the disarray of anarchy. We must work together to save what deserves saving, fix what is broken, and develop creative solutions to both old and new challenges.

In the words of Winston Churchill, "It has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."

In the spirit of Abraham Lincoln and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we must work together not to destroy America but rather to build America up to the point that this country fully lives up to the ideals upon which she was founded.

Seeing Light in the Darkest Times

November 9 was the 79th anniversary of the beginning of Kristallnacht (German for "Night of Crystal" but usually translated in this context as "Night of the Broken Glass"), a two day state-sanctioned pogrom in Nazi Germany, German-occupied Austria and German-occupied Sudetenland during which over 260 synagogues were burned to the ground, nearly 100 Jews were killed and as many as 30,000 Jews were sent to concentration camps. Nazi Germany then imposed a one billion Reichsmark fine (equivalent to $400 million in U.S. dollars at the time) on the Jewish community to make sure that the Jewish people--not German-owned insurance companies--paid the economic price for all of the destroyed Jewish properties/businesses.

Minnesota Supreme Court Justice David Stras' family experienced the horrors of Kristallnacht firsthand; his grandfather--who was 14 years old at the time--saw Jewish stores being looted, Jewish books being burned in bonfires in the street and signs declaring "Kill the Jews." Stras' great-grandfather was sent to Dachau, the Nazis' first concentration camp. Stras recently wrote an article for The Wall Street Journal about his family's experiences during Kristallnacht specifically and the Holocaust in general. Stras noted that four years ago, for the first time, he spoke publicly about what happened to his family during the Holocaust and how his grandfather narrowly survived Auschwitz. Stras explained that his grandfather never lost his faith in humanity:

My grandfather had the uncommon gift of being able to see the light of human generosity in the midst of near-total darkness...

Only after years researching their stories and reflecting on their lives do I understand the message my grandparents had tried to impart--one of hope and gratitude, not bitterness or pity. As my grandfather said in a memorial service speech in 1979, we remember those who "lost their freedom, the freedom of us and the freedom of mankind." He emphasized that "we, the survivors, have to let the world know that we will never again allow another Holocaust" and told the audience that "you, and you alone, have the responsibility to speak up for our fallen relatives and friends."

My grandparents always said they were the lucky ones, and that they were left on earth to speak for those who had perished. Their guidepost was humanity, not indulgence in their own sorrow and suffering.

The human capacity to do evil and inflict suffering is terrifying and tragic but the human capacity to endure, survive and retain compassion/hope despite suffering is inspirational.

Here is a link to the entire article (subscription required): My Grandparents Saw Light, Even After the Dark of Kristallnacht

Perfectionism, Despair and Meaning

The October 16, 2017 edition of The Wall Street Journal contains a book review by Emily Esfahani Smith entitled "Redefining a Well-Lived Life." Smith offers her take on Iddo Landau's Finding Meaning in an Imperfect World. Landau, a philosophy professor at Haifa University in Israel, seeks to understand why the rates for suicide, depression and alienation have been rising for quite some time. Smith notes that much research on this subject has concluded that despair is the primary reason that so many people decide that their lives are meaningless and she adds that Landau concludes that the issue is not so much that people's lives lack meaning but rather--in Smith's words--that people "have distorted ideas about what a meaningful life actually is."

Landau ticks off several arguments that are commonly made to prove that life is meaningless: (1) Nothing that we do individually matters because we are tiny specks in a vast universe; (2) We will be forgotten soon after we die; (3) Everything that we do and everything that we value will ultimately decay or be destroyed.

Landau asserts that the crucial flaw in each of these arguments is the idea that the only valuable life is a perfect one: "According to this presupposition, meaningful lives must include some perfection or excellence or some rare and difficult achievements." Smith powerfully amplifies this point: "Does the life of a child with Down syndrome have less value than the life of a healthy child? Is a retail clerk leading a less meaningful life than, say, Elon Musk? A perfectionist would have to say yes and yes. But Mr. Landau wisely points out that it's cruel to hold ourselves or others to this standard for meaning, because it neglects life's inherent worth."

In The Good Inclination and the Bad Inclination, I quoted David Holzel's take on perfectionism/trying to always do the right thing: "If one is overly righteous, one is likely to become suicidal." Perfectionism sounds noble but it can have pernicious effects on the mind and soul, because perfection is not attainable--and the fact that perfection is unttainable can easily transform a noble pursuit into a race toward oblivion.

I have always admired perfectionists and I have always strived for perfection but perfectionism seems to be a trap that leads not to excellence but to suffering. How does one ramp down the pursuit of perfection without sacrificing the competitive edge/edginess that seems to be necessary to achieve greatness? One point of view is that the world is not bifurcated into successes/failures but rather learners/nonlearners and that the value of new experiences is not defined by always winning but rather by always learning. For several years I have tried to embrace and embody this approach but it is not easy to tame the fires of perfectionism after they have been lit and after they have swelled to massive proportions. Kobe Bryant once declared that he was "not with" the idea of it is OK to fall short of your goals as long as you tried your best. I admire and identify with Bryant's determination and relentlessness but I wonder if this way of thinking is healthy.

My Mom has always emphasized to me that success is not defined by material goods or accomplishments but rather by service to others. During times when the vicissitudes of life have buffeted my mind and soul, she consistently told me that the path to healing involved focusing less on myself/my goals and more on helping others.

I see the wisdom in this way of reframing one's thinking but it is not so easy to rewire one's brain.

Smith's book review offers a simple conclusion that could have been written by my Mom: "Holding your child's hand, volunteering in your community, doing your job, appreciating the beauty around you--these are the wellsprings of meaning all of us can tap."