Does Trump Want to Destroy Harvard, or Reform It?/Barf

Compact ^ | 16/5/25 | Gregory Conti

[Eleutheria5]

he Trump administration’s campaign against higher education has proceeded on so many fronts, and at such breathtaking speed, that it is hard for individual elements of it to capture the news cycle for long. But one especially notable development occurred in the first week of May, when Secretary of Education Linda McMahon wrote a letter to the president of Harvard, Alan Garber, announcing that his institution would be cut off from future government grants. This followed the extraordinary list of demands that the administration issued (by mistake?) to Harvard a month earlier.

The more recent McLetter is worth reading for a few reasons. First, because the style is highly reminiscent of McMahon’s boss; it reads like a “truth” composed by Trump himself, and encapsulates the distinctive tone of the Trump era in many ways. But more importantly, unlike the prior letter which laid out a number of measures which the administration urged Harvard to take, this one does not enter the policy weeds and instead spends most of its word-count laying out justifications for the Trumpian animus to Harvard—and, by extension, elite universities generally. Beyond announcing that “Harvard should no longer seek Grants from the federal Government,” the rest of the two-page document consists of a list of grievances against the university and of grounds that McMahon believes vindicate this decision. It has the ring of something like “submitting facts to a candid world”: It is the government’s attempted Declaration of Independence from an institution that long predates it.

Given that the Trump administration has not, so far as I am aware, issued a statement of general principles regarding its higher-ed policy....

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TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Editorial; Political Humor/Cartoons
KEYWORDS: antisemitism; discrimination; harvard; hopefullydestroy; icanlivewithout; letmecounttheways; universities

[Eleutheria5]

The Harv-tards have spoken. They uses lots of big words.

[Celtic Conservative]

Either is acceptable. The latter is preferred.

CC

[nopardons]

BTTT

[Eleutheria5]

General principles:

No spitting on students or blocking their access to class and dorms on account of their ethnicity.
No complacency by administration to such outrages.
No calls for genocide during “demonstrations”.

Not very complicated.

[Celtic Conservative]

Complicated for those with hatred in their hearts.

CC

[Eleutheria5]

But they uses such big fancy werds./;-}

[Mustangman]

The Trump administration’s campaign against higher education…..

Ha! Expecting that your campus not be antisemitic is not being against higher education. If a bunch if white folks in sheets were talking bad and intimidating black students, it would not and should not be tolerated. This is no different.

[ifinnegan]

It could be cleaned up very easily.

[Eleutheria5]

Depends on the context.

[nickcarraway]

Does Harvard want to destroy itself or reform itself?

[faithhopecharity]

Hopefully the evil basturds will get shut down! But I realize this is not likely

[Eleutheria5]

Do any of their faculty, at least, know Latin and Greek? I think they destroyed themselves years ago. Present-day Harvard is to its past what Road Warrior movies are to contemporary Australia.

[MrRelevant]

Harvard is finding out , if you covet federal funding, there are rules to abide by. Its that simple.

[Eleutheria5]

You’d think with all those big-wig academics there, they’d know that. But they’re just finding out.

Harvard’s got deep pockets. If they never got another cent from the federal government, they’d still be solvent into the next century, research, sabbaticals and all.

[A_perfect_lady]

I vote Destroy. I mean, leave the buildings intact, and let Hillsdale college annex it, but yeah.

[Da Coyote]

“Either is acceptable. The latter is preferred.”

Well said.

And Emperor Palpatine agrees.

[Eleutheria5]

That building is cursed by the little Puritan boy who was buggered by the headmaster and then committed suicide, cursing Harvard forever.

OK. I just made it up. But maybe.

[Eleutheria5]

But anyway, just in case, don’t put Hillsdale anywhere near the old campus. Just let it rot.

[fortes fortuna juvat]

Expecting that your campus not be antisemitic is not being against higher education. If a bunch if white folks in sheets were talking bad and intimidating black students, it would not and should not be tolerated. This is no different.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Many “educated” people today will simply reject such a commonsense line of thought.

[Eleutheria5]

Terrorizing black students should have been justified because of all the nasty stuff that Idi Amin got up to. He was black, so all blacks are responsible, and since they weren’t held responsible back then, it’s time for some social justice catchup./s