Wednesday, May 21, 2014

Some Headlines Just Rub You the Wrong Way

Neil Macdonald doesn't appear to be the worst thing that the CBC foists upon us. But the blurb for this editorial really rubbed me the wrong way.
IMF head Christine Lagarde, former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, religious activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali — all smart, conservative women being 'disinvited,' shouted off university podiums. What gives in America's halls of learning?
Did you catch it? I mean, I don't know much about the other two women, but Condoleezza Rice as "smart"? She of the "smoking gun in the shape of a mushroom cloud" mixed metaphor? Her of the "birth pangs of a new Middle East" nonsense? "Smart"? I think not.

And then there's this bullshit about freedom of speech. First of all, Neil, I'm sure you'd be opposed to Paul Bernardo giving a convocation speech anywhere, right? Well, it was a long time ago and you might have forgotten Neil, but that stupid idiot Condoleezza Rice lied her country into a war that's killed about a million people and caused disruption and misery to many millions more. Also, she sat with her fellow cretins in the bush II regime and discussed the methods of torture that they would approve of in their great bullshit "War on Terror."

Rice is a war criminal and the students at that university that was stupid enough to invite her were under no obligation to have to listen to her yammerings or endure her defiling presence.

9 comments:

opit said...

I recall a time when 'the Shooter' Cheney had to flee France as a charge of war crimes had been filed against him. One could hope for a similar interlude for Condi.

Owen Gray said...

Those who possess PhD's aren't necessarily smart, thwap.

Come to think of it, those who possess a Master's degree in Economics aren't necessarily economists.

Anonymous said...

From what I've heard, it was Rutger's President Robert L. Barchi that made the decision to invite Condi. I know some of the Professors there had a problem with it.

thwap said...

opit,

I think Rumsfeld and Kissinger have also had to curtail travel plans because of such charges.

Imagine how our newsmedia would report on Cheney defending himself before the ICC? It's a neat thought exercise.

Owen,

Indeed. Much of higher education is merely higher indoctrination.

Anonymous,

Whoever did it, I'm happy for them!

Dana said...

At this time there are more highly educated people of all kinds on the planet and they are in charge everywhere.

And they are within a long lifetime of destroying civilization.

The international University system has a lot to answer for.

And they will never be called to account.

thwap said...

Dana,

A little while ago, it occurred to me that the poverty of the assumptions of mainstream economics makes genuinely decent people fanatical adherents to inhuman policies.

There is a body of literature that says that free trade produces the best results, that taxing consumption and not production spurs investment and protects jobs, that price stability produces economic benefits greater than its costs, etc.,

but it's all based on selective use of facts and it doesn't respond well to reality-based evidence that can't be processed by its formulas.

Dana said...

Yup. And it's not just the dismalists. It's almost every academic discipline you can name outside of the humanities.

Some of the hard sciences are leading the way.

thwap said...

Dana,

Can you name some of these hard sciences you speak of; and how they're compromised? I'd appreciate it a great deal.

(I'm wasted.)

Dana said...

Geologists are required to identify drilling/fracking sites - and big oil funds chairs. Several different engineering disciplines are then required to get on with it. Dow and it's competitors hire graduate chemists by the tens of thousands - chairs and departments are funded here too. Who develops new weapons systems and then markets them? How is big agra managed and who develops the processes?

On and on and on. Name a problem the world is facing and people with PhDs and Masters degrees spend their working hours making it all worse.

To be sure there are plenty of those people also working to find solutions to the problems brought about by their peers.

But that's only a partial exoneration.

Academia has had the "we're not responsible for what people do with the knowledge we impart" gig going for a very long time now.

As far as I'm concerned it's only a hairs breadth away from "I was only following orders."