America in the Balance

THE TRAVESTY AT HARVARD (CONT.)

by

Ken Eliasberg

Picking up where we left off last week with Cornel West, I have to confess to a more personal experience; I actually forced myself to endure one of his presentations to make certain that I was not doing him an injustice. But again, I get ahead of myself. I have maintained a warm and cordial friendship with a dear black friend of mine since our mutual service in the government some 45 years ago. At the time the friendship was struck, we were both liberals; as you know, some time ago I saw the error of my ways. She has remained loyal to the liberal cause, and, in the course of one of our very rare conversations, she had expressed her admiration for Cornel West. I’m afraid that my reaction did serious violence to our friendship. So, in order to make certain that I was not being unfair to my friend, let alone professor West, I decided to attend one of his lectures at Claremont/McKenna College. It was a truly amazing experience. Let me say at the outset that nothing that happened changed my mind; on the contrary, it confirmed my worst assessment of the man—he is quite simply an academic fraud—a shameless opportunist who has ridden the guilt and gravy affirmative action train to academic glory. But that’s not what got my attention.

I have been to numerous presentations at Claremont/McKenna’s visiting dignitary program at the Athenaeum, and, for the most part, the scholarsip is somewhere between very good and excellent—and rarely dull.

However, what really caught my attention was the crowd. Now, granted, Universities today are very much in the thrall of the left-wing, but this session confirmed just how hostage to radical liberal causes they have become. Your typical turn out is decent, except, of course when a more conservative speaker is involved. Then, no matter how well known the speaker may be, the crowd is typically quite modest. For Cornel West, the crowd was overwhelming. Fortunately, due to my compulsion to be on time, I arrived early. The crowd was forming, and they were passing out chits or some form of crowd-identification mechanism, to make certain that only those people would attend for whom there were adequate accomodations, i.e. there was a huge overflow.

Again, fortunately, or unfortunately (depending on one’s perspective), I got in (God, what some people will do to sustain a friendship). And West confirmed my worst fears—he proceeded to bore the living daylights out of me with a torrent of clichés, slogans, and assorted bromides. He is part preacher, part teacher, and all nothing. He is truly a case where the sum of the parts are greater—far greater—than the whole. He has an afro, an attitude, and an academic imprimatur (one that doesn’t get any better since it’s from Harvard)—and that’s all. And they loved him—that was the kicker for me; it was at that moment that I fully realized just how far Academia, in general, and Harvard, in particular, have fallen. In my day, he would have been an embarrassment. And, frankly, even today, were he white, and thus unable to find cover in White guilt, he would be embarrassingly inadequate. But, again, they loved him. And, to my credit (or, again, detriment, depending on your perspective), and in deference to my old friend, I sat through every bloody moment of his charade (and it wasn’t easy—he is simply an Elmer Gantry-like bag of hot air). His approach is something akin to a Rodney King can’t-we-all-get-along moment; you know a kumbiya effort (while he is buttering up to charlatans like Al Sharpton and Louis Farrakhan).

To make matters worse, I returned to the Athenaeum some time later to hear a truly interesting speaker, and, as is the case in this forum, you are (or can be, depending on the mix of the moment) seated with students (as well as visiting guests). And these students, I must tell you, are pretty bright—a good deal brighter than your average college student today—Claremont is an excellent school. Well, in the course of the dinner conversation, while discussing this evening’s speaker, one of the students—a prepossessing fellow—said to my friend and I that we should have been here several weeks ago when Cornel West was the speaker. It was all I could do to contain myself—to not look this fine young man in the eye and tell him that I had been there for West’s presentation, and that it was one of the worst I had ever witnessed. However, I thought that approach would not be compatible with the decorum of the moment, so I let it pass. My friend looked at me, almost admiring my restraint (since he knows that restraint is not always my strong suit).

But it was a great lesson—before West’s presentation and the student response, I don’t think I fully realized just how far left-wing indoctrination had proceeded in our universities—even our best universities (indeed, especially in our best universities—how else could one explain West’s employment at either Harvard or Princeton). Guys, we’re in worse trouble than I even imagined. I realize that it is quite natural to be liberal when you are young; before you have had time to experience life and thus fill up your mind with a good dose of reality. What was it that Churchill said—something to the effect that—if you’re not a liberal when you are young, you have no heart, and, if you are not a conservative when you are old, you have no brain (check out a Ralph Shaffer letter to the editor to confirm this reality, i.e. he’s the exception that proves the rule). Nonetheless, it is one thing to know it; it is quite another to see it in operation.

Another somewhat irksome aspect of West is his hypocrisy—an hypocrisy that is rampant in left-wing academia today. West, while purporting to be a Marxist, lives a charmed life as the result of capitalism. His salary is in excess of $150,000.00 a year, he gets somewhere between 20 and $30,000.00 for a speaking engagement, and he has various consulting and extra curricula sources of revenue. How’s that for a good Marxist? I love these academic Marxists like Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky (professors who have set the tone for American history instruction in our colleges and universities) who have become multi-millionaires thanks to good old fashioned capitalism—guys who have sucked vigorously on the economic breast of America while trying to bite off the nipple.

However, my real sadness with people like West is that they are filling our young people’s heads with a lot of Marxist cotton candy instead of teaching them anything of value—like how to think!

In all fairness to Cornel West, the real tragedy here is that his ascension to academic heights says more about academia, in general, and Harvard, in particular than it does about West. In the final analysis West, like Ward Churchill, is merely a sympton of the disease that currently afflicts our institutions of higher education“ he is little more than a circus barker in the carnival that is now academia. Another aspect of the tragedy is what it says about race conditions today—that to assuage white guilt, we have to cater to—nay, celebrate - black mediocrities like Cornel West.

Back to Summers (forgive me for spending so much time with West, but I think it important that you be familiar with the type of man with whom Summers was dealing)—what did he want from West? Scholarship!! Is that too much to ask for from an alleged scholar—a highly paid University professor, no less? Apparently, it was, for West, who, as previously noted, had spent the better part of the preceding year either making a rap record or serving as a consultant to Al Sharpton in his presidential campaign, took heated exception to Summer’s having dealt with him in this fashion—apparently, you just don’t make any such request to a tenured member of the faculty, let alone a “University professor” at Harvard—as one anonymous faculty member put it “tenured professors answer only to God” —as you probably have guessed, that is part of my problem with tenure.

West proceeded to storm out in a snit, immediately bring to bear his legions (Jesse Jackson and Charles Ogletree) to assert the race card, and threaten to leave for Princeton, taking the entire African American studies department with him. In the old days this type of conduct was referred to as Mau Mauing the white opposition. They requested—nay, demanded—an apology from Summers. Can you imagine—asking a gifted and highly respected University president (and a liberal, no less—recall, he was Clinton’s Treasury Secretary) for an apology for having had the nerve to ask one of his “scholars” to consider providing a little scholarship

What did Summers do? Apologize, of course. This was the first step in Summers groveling campaign to get back in the good graces of the faculty of the Arts & Sciences department

What did West do? He left for Princeton! Of course, this, in and of itself, would suggest a happy ending. Good Riddance—Harvard’s gain is Princeton’s loss. But it is far worse than that. It sort of reminds you of professional sports today—no matter how bad a star athlete behaves, there is always a team that will pick him up if they feel that he can help their team. This is not a particularly good message to send in the field of professional sports; it is an incredibly destructive one to send in the field of higher education.