Posted on 01/19/2005 10:38:15 PM PST by kattracks
THIS inauguration marks the seventh out of the past 10 in which a Republican President parades down Pennsylvania Avenue.At the Capitol, the procession’s starting point, Republicans hold a 10-seat majority in the Senate and a solid grasp, for the 10th year in a row, on the House. The majority of governors, including those of the four largest states, are Republican, and the GOP controls most state legislatures.
Most significantly, Americans, by a 3 to 2 margin, identify themselves as conservatives rather than liberals.
The American left — liberalism, collectivism, statism, New Dealism (call it what you want) — remains firmly in charge of most powerful U.S. institutions. Here is a brief review of 10 of them, along with my rough estimate, by percentage, of conservative influence.
- Media: Put talk radio, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, FOX News and a few dailies on one side and practically everything else on the other. Nine-tenths of national reporters and editors vote Democratic, and they identify themselves as liberal over conservative by a 5 to 1 margin. The Bush administration has had no discernible effect even on NPR and PBS. Will the CBS scandal change anything? Of course not. The power of the big dailies and TV networks is crumbling thanks to the Internet, but slowly. Conservative influence: 20 percent.
- Government bureaucracy: For more than 70 years, liberalism has burrowed deep into the federal bureaucracy, where the people who know how to pull the levers of power work. At a few outposts — like the Consumer Products Safety Commission and, lately, the CIA — creative chiefs are rooting out the entrenched, but the task is daunting. Conservative influence: 30 percent.
- Entertainment and the arts: Liberals are more powerful in Hollywood than ever. “When was the last time,” wrote Andrew Klavan in the Hartford Courant, “that you saw a conservative politician who was the hero of a movie, as opposed to the slavering villains of ‘The Manchurian Candidate,’ ‘The Contender,’ or ‘The American President’?” Conservative influence: 10 percent.
- Religion: While the press highlights the power of evangelicals, religious institutions like the National Council of Churches and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops boost the welfare state and oppose the thrust of U.S. foreign policy. Conservative influence: 40 percent.
- Big business: Perhaps because it is afraid of being the target of zealous regulators and prosecutors, big business has become meek and mute. Wall Street, trapped in Manhattan, has always leaned left — as its main representative in Washington, Bill Donaldson, chairman of the SEC, demonstrates. Yes, there are groups which push tax cuts and tort reform, but big business, in general, is a paper tiger. Conservative influence: 50 percent.
- Small business: The white-hot center of conservatism is entrepreneurship. Conservative influence: 90 percent.
- Academe: Liberal and getting more so. The only exception is the tiny world of think tanks, where conservatives rule. In K-12 education, where the teachers’ unions maintain their stranglehold, reform is coming, glacially. Conservative influence: 20 percent.
- Philanthropy: Captains of industry make the money; their leftish progeny spend it on fashionable causes. But there’s reason for optimism as new philanthropies that stress market-style accountability, like the Gates Foundation, develop. Conservative influence: 30 percent.
- Military: Conservatives dominate here, and the military has been a key socializing force for personal responsibility and patriotism. But civilians, don’t forget, run the military. Conservative influence: 70 percent.
- NGOs: Non-governmental organizations, from AARP to the Consumers Union to the NAACP to the Sierra Club, comprise a leftist stronghold. Meanwhile, the U.S. government and the United Nations are farming out more of their own work to such groups. Conservative influence: 20 percent.
Not a pretty picture for the right: seven institutions in liberal hands, two in conservative, one split. Two big questions for conservatives: 1) Can political pressure be brought to bear to change institutions? No, and it’s probably best that way. And 2) should conservatives infiltrate existing institutions or grow their own? Infiltration works better, but thanks to the Internet, the start-up route holds more and more attraction.
Today, 25 years after Ronald Reagan’s victory, the work of changing American institutions is just beginning.
James K. Glassman is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and host of www.TechCentralStation.com
Cut income taxes and make up the difference with a Trustafarian Tax.
I thought the remake of the Manchurian Candidate was about John Kerry.
Nice quick take on the situation. I'd say Mr. Glassman just about nails it.
" In law schools the number is probably less than 3%."
I got my JD from the People's Republic of NYU back in the late '90s when it was still really, really liberal. But even back then, the whole law and economics paradigm was already ascendant. Only the most leftist professors like Sylvia Law went beyond some standard civil rights/affirmative action stuff in terms of lefty-ism. NYU Law even has more than two members in its Federalist Society now. Law schools aren't quite as bad as all of that.
BUMP
"Law schools aren't quite as bad as all of that."
True
And most people outside the university setting have no clue how bad it is.
Agreed that it's
I must be prescient. I just posted the following comments a couple of days ago in a different thread (check out the last paragraph in particular):
I just retired from UIC (Univ. of Illinois at Chicago) where I worked for many, many years. The campus is riddled with ideological liberals. You could count on one hand the conservatives on campus holding teaching positions. The famous (or infamous, depending on your point of view) Stanley Fish was the Dean of our College (I worked in the Math Dept. as Ass't to the Head). Fish was the Dean that hired a transvestite as a Professor of Economics on campus. Virtually all the hiring he did (he recently resigned) was of liberal faculty members. Our campus, like many, many universities in the U.S., was very pro-Palestinian cause, and the Israeli's were the bad guys. The petition to divest from Israeli businesses was all over our campus and discussed (pro-divestiture) on the campus e-mail bulletin board frequently. The bias against Jewish concerns was getting worse when I left, but the Jewish faculty on campus were fighting back, thank goodness. I think the UIC campus, just like the Columbia Univ. campus, are representative of a trend to be found on a majority of major univ. campuses in the U.S. (many of the publically funded ones). I think that those who have been removed from the university experience do not realize just how liberally monolithic these places now are. I would never want to send a child to a major liberal university, as the thought police are rampant, and if you do not toe the liberal line they will get you, by shunning, by giving of bad grades, by intimidation, by name-calling, and in particular, by looking down their elite, liberal noses at the ignorance of the masses (that's you).
Conservatives must wake up to what is happening on our college campuses as the indoctrination of students is insidious. I had many student workers that I hired to help with the work of our Dept. during my worklife at UIC. Virtually all of them would spout the liberal line they had been spoon-fed (not only at the college level, but virtually throughout K-12). No analysis of thought came into play, just repeating like parrots the party line they had been taught. Now, there are still colleges and Universities that are not totally corrupted, and parents should wisely seek them out through research before sending their sons and daughters to an institution of "higher learning". But believe me, what is happening at Columbia U. in NY is also happening here in the Midwest.
Conservatives really need to start taking a more active interest in what their children are being taught at these institutions, and by fighting back as alumni, by protesting text used in textbooks, by withholding money, or by telling the university administrators exactly why you chose not to send your child to their institution.
While conservatives busy themselves in the ordinary course of life, with emphasis on businesses and the marketplace, the liberals have taken over the cities, the courts, and the educational institutions, where they can best indoctrinate, and have the courts back up their hair-brained ideas. And, of course, there is the liberal mouthpiece, the mainstream media. So, all the major ways of shaping society most easily are controlled by liberals. We must fight back furiously now, which many of us are via the new media, to get our ideas out there, and we must get the courts out of the hands of liberal judges. May Bush succeed in that.
Thank goodness for The Rutherford Institute, for their advice and support, which allowed me to stand up to spurious charges filed against me in grad school. Few students stand up to it, I think, so the Inquisition was surprised when I didn't just confess and go off to sensitivity training. All charges were dropped (one by one, as I kept my resolve), but I'll admit that it did make me less outspoken for a while.
Conservatives must wake up to what is happening on our college campuses as the indoctrination of students is insidious.
YES!
Conservatives really need to start taking a more active interest in what their children are being taught at these institutions, and by fighting back as alumni, by protesting text used in textbooks, by withholding money, or by telling the university administrators exactly why you chose not to send your child to their institution.
OMGOSH, YES!
While conservatives busy themselves in the ordinary course of life, with emphasis on businesses and the marketplace, the liberals have taken over...
Holy Cow, YES!
When I left the university environment, and was in that penumbra between academe and industry, I could see clearly that the everyday world had no clue of what was going on. I was conveying this to the president of the board of trustees, and he warned me to not let that thought go... And I'm glad he said that, because all-too-soon I got into the everyday routine of life, and the rampant antics on campus were far from my mind. :-(
Sounds like we have similar observations and analysis of the situation. If interested in chatting about organizing some action on this, please FReepmail me.
Liberals still dominate the culture. Its not a trivial power but the public is shrugging its shoulders and moving on.
The only conslusion I can draw from this runaway situation is that Ayn Rand was right. Conservatives will not engage, but withdraw from the gargantuan bureaucracies as they fail.
But can we survive the mob in the street ?
BUMP
BTTT
read later
You mean the ones that believe in gun control?
Today, 25 years after Ronald Reagan’s victory, the work of changing American institutions is just beginning.
Work is fun. Work is rewarding. Let's work. Work. Work. Work.
It may be true of students or student organizations but I find the professors have not changed and I find this particularly troubling since the most liberal are often on admissions committees.
I could spend all day on this thread, and preach to the choir:) Thanks for the ping.
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