For some people, “academic freedom” is not a principle, but a means to an end. When it ceases to be useful, they drop it like a hot potato.

JT75, thank you for your post. It is a useful and valuable perspective.

It also got me thinking. Suppose there was a professor in a hard science (astronomy) who was nationally known and recognized by his peers as insightful with interesting ideas but who was an outspoken communist — someone who defended Castro.

What would the powers that be say about a professor who sought to deny him tenure on those terms? About students who defended him?

When the liberals protested in vain in the 1960′s they were told that in order to change the system you had to change it from within. So they were told to enter the universities, the press, the government and push their liberal agenda from within.

They learned their lesson well and now 40 years later control the universities, the popular media, the press, the legal profession to some extent and are entrenched at upper middle levels in most government agencies. Few ever went into business which is where most conservatives went starting at the same time. Business school degrees sky-rocketed starting in the late 1960′s.

Most people don’t care as long as the economy is doing well and they can go to the mall and shop when they want, watch their favorite sports team or take a nice vacation once or twice a year.

It will only change when the economy tanks. Then there will be an outcry. Now people are doing everything they can to get their kids into prestigious schools at sky high tuitions because the country is incredibly rich.

Nobody cares and we only debate what the liberal want to debate because they control the press and the news.

The Scubaredneck

Could these or similar questions, be forwarded to the afore-mentioned legislators and newspapers? I’d be curious to hear the answers.

Fire Avalos, discontinue religious studies altogether, and put all the savings into the science** and engineering departments.

**Except for evolutionary biology which of course must be discontinued with the other religious studies.

http://scholar.google.com/scho.....#038;hl=en

Heads should roll at ISU. Namely the president and whatever asshat hired an atheist to be a professor of religious studies which might be same asshat first mentioned.

I agree that denying a seasoned expert like Gonzalez tenure based upon such considerations is a gross prejudice; I just thought everyone might like a fuller picture.

Very sorry for Guillermo but let us remember the famous citation: “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.” (Quintus Septimius Tertullianus).