Replies

Secretary Dr. Rod Paige
U.S. Department of Education
400 Maryland Avenue, SW
Washington, DC 20202

April 2, 2003

Dear Secretary Paige,

I am writing to express my outrage at the recent comments of Professor Nicholas De Genova, at last Wednesday’s "teach-in" at Columbia University. Professor De Genova told a crowd of 3,000, "Peace is not patriotic. Peace is subversive, because peace anticipates a very different world than the one in which we live--a world where the U.S. would have no place." He continued his anti-American diatribe: "The only true heroes are those who find ways that help defeat the U.S. military. I personally would like to see a million Mogadishus."

It is unfortunate and disgusting that De Genova is actually representative of many professors and instructors in universities all across America who shares this same self-destructive sentiment. Contempt for America and a Marxist socialist view is taught directly or indirectly on a daily basis to America’s youth, and has been for decades. The organizer of the Columbia event, Professor Eric Foner, the head of Columbia’s prestigious history department, was an anti-American Stalinist in the 1960’s.

What are professors such as these doing at Columbia? They are teaching our children what to think. Not how to think…what to think. Instead of joy of achievement, they teach entitlement. Rather than instructing in the effectiveness of teams and unifying a campus, the emphasis is paid to separate groups encouraging divisiveness then labeling it diversity. It is no wonder many businesses today actually prefer hiring candidates without a college degree. For them, it is worth the cost of training an individual, versus hiring a person poisoned by ignorance and possessing an elitist attitude.

As you know Dr. Paige, these same universities are funded with taxpayer dollars in the form of grants, research, and other programs. This practice must stop, and must stop immediately. All government funding of any kind, should immediately be pulled from any institution or instructor that advocates these views. While they have a right to free speech, there is nothing in the US Constitution mandating the public must pay for it.

The actions and rhetoric coming from these professors and universities is at best destructive, at worst, akin to treason. I urge you to take immediate action on this. As the Secretary of Education, you have an opportunity to make a difference before it is too late. I implore you to seize this opportunity for America’s sake. Stop funding the very people who wish to bring this country down. We The People deserve better.

Sincerely,

Pamela A. Morgan

versus hiring a person poisoned by ignorance and possessing an elitist attitude

Definition of a university by Adam Smith, the first man to make a study of political economy: "A sanctuary in which exploded systems and obsolete prejudices find shelter and protection after they have been hunted out of every corner of the world."

The following reminds me of Ayn Rand's collection of essays on the New Left, specifically the one titled "The Comprachicos ("child-buyers"). This quote is from Charles Dickens, from the Preface of Nicholas Nickleby:

"...ignorant, sordid, brutal men, to whom few considerate persons would have entrusted the board and lodging of a horse or a dog: they formed the worthy cornerstone of a structure, which, for absurdity and a magnificent high-minded laissez-aller neglect, has rarely been exceeded in the world.

We hear sometimes of an action for damages against the unqualified medical practicioner, who has deformed a broken limb pretending to heal it. But, what of the hundreds of thousands of minds that have been deformed for ever by the incapable pettifoggers who have pretended to form them!