BERKELEY CHANCELLOR TIES LOUGHNER TO IMMIGRATION REFORM:

There are two possible explanations:

1. Birgeneau believes there is evidence that Jared Loughner was somehow connected to anti-immigration activism. If so, Birgeneau simply hasn’t been following the news about which he has used the authority of his office to opine, or has been on the inside of a bubble that keeps out the plain facts of the shooting.

2. Birgeneau has seen the news and knows there is no connection, but believes Jared Loughner was incited to violence by a vague ethos of hatred that permeates Arizona. If so, that tells us more about Birgeneau’s prejudices and irrationality than Arizonans’.

The Loughner affair has certainly served to reveal the prejudices, and lack of concern for facts or logic, that seem to animate much of our credentialed-but-not-educated class.