JESSE SINGAL HAS QUESTIONS:
But at a moment when liberals have less political power than we’ve had in a long time — a situation that will maintain, at the federal level, for at least the next two years — it’s vital we take an honest, self-critical look at how we’ve wielded the power we have had in recent years. Instead, many people are embracing a nonsensical — if comforting — worldview in which the only actors with agency are conservatives, and in which we liberals have no power to choose how to run our institutions, to make tough but strategic decisions, to weigh trade-offs, and so on.
None of this is actually the case.
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“How have we liberals used our power in recent years?” is obviously a big and complex question, and it goes without saying that I’m going to be able to give a partial answer. So a few examples will have to suffice.
The university system is an obvious place to start, because universities tend to be overwhelmingly dominated by liberals. And here, it’s beyond obvious that liberals have instituted — or allowed to be instituted — unpopular policies that violate most Americans’ notions of fairness.
Writing in The Chronicle of Higher Education, Michael Clune, an English professor at Case Western Reserve University, rails (thoughtfully) against the politicization of higher ed. “We Asked for It,” argues the headline, and Clune makes the case that if the Donald Trump 2.0 administration is as harsh on higher education as it is bragging it will be, that’ll largely be the fault of these institutions themselves. . . . Who asked for any of this? Who thought it was a good idea?
Is there a place or an institution run by the left anywhere that is a good advertisement for letting the left run things?
