Columbia's Mogadishu? Craige McMillan lays out battle plan to take back U.S. university

It's a good thing that Gen. Tommy Franks and not the Republicans in Congress are running the war effort in Iraq. Left to the Republican leadership in Congress, Saddam Hussein would now be occupying the Oval Office, and "Chemical Ali" planning the 2004 Republican Party convention.

I'm glad the spirit in the Grand Old Party isn't entirely dead. I just wish the flesh was a bit more willing, and the mind more fully engaged in the battle. If so, perhaps we could mount a more effective charge and capture a hill or two in the cultural battles facing America here at home.

The particular skirmish I'm referring to is Columbia University's anti-American faculty, represented – if not led by – lowly graduate teaching student Nicholas DeGenova. In concert with two dozen other Columbia faculty, Mr. DeGenova told a group of younger undergraduate students during a six-hour "teach in" that "U.S. flags are the emblem of the invading war machine in Iraq today. They are the emblem of the occupying power. The only true heroes are those who find ways that help defeat the U.S. military."

Mr. DeGenova then encouraged U.S. soldiers to kill their own officers, and pleaded "for a million Mogadishus," where vastly outnumbered U.S. troops were dragged through the streets and butchered.

That Mr. DeGenova is guilty of historical ignorance, generic leftist hatred toward all things American, and exceedingly poor judgment which should disqualify him from a faculty appointment – anywhere, ever – is beyond dispute. A strong argument could be made for mounting a prosecution for sedition as well.

As Americans, we have the right to disagree with the war. We do not have the right use our position and influence to give aid and comfort to our enemies in conducting the war by encouraging others to engage in treason or murder. Does anyone think for a moment that Mr. DeGenova would still be a free man had he encouraged the murder of blacks, Hispanics, Jews or homosexuals?

The Republicans in Congress, bless their collective heart, rose to the challenge and wrote a letter to Columbia University president in which they demanded Mr. DeGenova be fired. Columbia University President Lee Bollinger, however, declined to take any disciplinary action against his American-hating faculty on the grounds it would violate the concept of academic freedom, which appears also to guard general historical ignorance and blind hatred of all things American, except, of course, paychecks.

What the Republicans have failed to grasp is that they chose the wrong target in their battle. Mr. DeGenova is an academic private in the culture wars, who made a bold raid into the press limelight, where similar sentiments exist. The focus of the battle needs to be the general or commanding officer – in this case, Columbia University President Lee Bollinger.

In any organization, even one as racially diverse as Columbia (for intellectual diversity no longer exists in academia), the organization and its employees reflect the views of the man or woman at the top. The political equivalent of Gen. Tommy Franks in the Republican Party would know this. He or she would not have been distracted and taken pot shots at a dawn raiding party led by a private. He would have recognized that the plan for the incursion came from the top. Then he would have drawn up a battle plan to take back the ground that the enemy had seized. That ground is the university itself.

The strike against Columbia needs to be directed not at Mr. DeGenova, but at Dr. Lee Bollinger – and the university hierarchy. There is no point in picking off a private or two when the command center remains intact, the funding and supply lines open, and the assault against America and its values continues, all with taxpayer assistance.

A viable strategy to regain the ground lost in the academy would center around financial battles. Columbia, like nearly every other university public and private, has enthusiastically embraced federal grants and loans for students, and research grants from the Centers for Disease Control and the Defense Department.

This federalization of the university has been used by American leftists to promote racial quotas, discriminate against qualified white and Asian students based on their race, and create nonsensical departments such as gender studies, where tenured anti-American wackos use the classroom as a forum for their own confused ramblings on history, society and gender – all under the guise of "academic freedom."

A competent general would immediately realize that there is no reason the university cannot be purged of its vile leftist hatred for America and seditious tendencies by applying the same measures in reverse. Congressional Republicans should start by demanding the firing not of Mr. DeGenova, but of Dr. Bollinger, if the university is to retain its federally funded research grants and student-loan status. Since leftists have a severe aversion to working for a living and contributing to the private sector, this would get their immediate attention.

The Republican Congress can use the university's rapt attention to explain that restoring intellectual diversity to the university is now a top priority, that military recruiters will from this moment forward be welcomed on campus, and that leadership from the university president on down to the DeGenova shock troops need to re-implement intellectual diversity so they can once again serve America.

Universities have grown fat, leftist and lazy on a diet of taxpayer dollars. A bit of military discipline seems like just the thing to restore vigor and intellectual prowess. Let's start with Columbia.

Don't be upset; go into the dragon's maw and fight! As a student, you have more freedom to repel the leftist professors. I returned to college this year (at 38) and have had more fun disrupting the propaganda than I ever could have imagined! As long as you're not afraid to stand up to them, you will generally prevail--they rarely can refute logic. Truly, it is your moral duty to attend one of the leftist pigpens and reclaim the discourse. It is easy as long as you keep a good supply of antacid handy. LOL

Some of the professors will discriminate against you, but just don't worry about it. As long as you pass, it doesn't matter. (You don't want to work for a company that cares what you got in your diversity class!) The worst they can do is fail you and even then it is no big deal. I have been praying one of the liberal elite would fail me so I can take the bastards to court for discrimination, but they have all chickened out thus far. They are all cowards and are not at all even used to debate. After all, they have almost absolute consensus among their academic peers.

Truly the worst part of going back is seeing the effects of our school system on our youth. Most of them have been totally bereft of their minds and can only spout back the rhetoric that they memorized. That is really scary! The good thing is that they are open to learning new rhetoric as long as you don't ask too much of them logically.

The funniest part is that the leftists have truly become the establishment so you can play the rebel just by being yourself. Once you set the stage as antiestablishment, the leftists are lost. I have killed them on virtually every topic and I have done so using their own propaganda against them.

I've been pushing for Federal Defunding of Columbia for a week. Please see my letter of April 2 to Congressman Hayworth.

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Congressman Hayworth,

I would like to thank you for writing President Bollinger regarding the reprehensible and seditious comments of Professor De Genova. As patriots, we are disgusted both by De Genova's remarks and the fact that many other professors agree with him. However, we do not support the dismissal of any professor for their non-academic work or viewpoints. Columbia University's liberal arts departments are dominated by the politically correct left, who would love to have the precedent for firing the few remaining conservative professors and graduate students. The primary problem at Columbia is not that there are a few radical leftists calling for the destruction of the United States; it is that there are even fewer conservative faculty members. If Columbia is like the other Ivy League universities, then there are as many Greens and Communists as registered Republicans. In fact, given the relationship between the Working Families Party and faculty members at Columbia, the ratio is possibly worse than that of our peers.

Yesterday, we held a pro-war rally today, which had good turnout and brought national attention. Unfortunately, we were unable to find a single professor willing either to publicly support the war or to speak on behalf of the troops. Last week, 30 professors spoke at the now infamous teach-in. The students at Columbia are 53-47 against the war in Iraq. It is the radical faculty and employee unions that are pushing the anti-war movement. This is not 1968, when the students are occupying the administration buildings. Today the radicals work there.

The firing of an untenured assistant professor will do little to change the facts on the ground. Columbia University has become a prestigious forum for radicals to set the standards for indoctrination of students around the nation. For instance, professor Eric Foner, the former chairman of the History Department at Columbia, served as President of the American Historical Association. While Professor Foner rarely uses his class to impose his views, the fact is that he and his family were active in the leadership of the CPUSA. Professor Foner remains a radical. His comments rebuking De Genova come not so much from disagreement, but from the realization that the comments could expose the institutional bias at Columbia. It is no accident that Professor Foner is now trying to prevent the tape of the anti-war "teach-in" from becoming public. De Genova was neither the only anti-American activist speaking nor did the audience boo his comments. According to the accounts of many students and an article by Matthew Continetti in National Review, students cheered De Genova's seditious comments.

Another speaker, Professor Anders Stephanson, has made a career of attacking the United States. In his best-known work, "Manifest Destiny: American Expansionism and the Empire of the Right," Stephanson posits that America was founded as and remains a genocidal expansionist empire. In recent columns and speeches, Stephanson called President Bush a religious zealot who bases his foreign policy on an apocalyptic agenda straight out of the biblical Book of Revelations.

Professor Foner's successor as chairman of the History Department and another speaker at the anti-war "teach-in," Professor Alan Brinkley, will be the new provost for Columbia. In this position, he will be responsible for decisions regarding tenure, hiring, recruiting, and the curriculum. Finally, professor Manning Marable, the Director of the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia, uses his position to head the academic front of the reparations for slavery movement. These examples are quite representative of the intellectual climate that pre-dominates at Columbia.

Daniel Pipes of the Middle East Forum and Campus Watch wrote a column listing some of the communist and terrorist sympathizers at Columbia. Sadly, it is but the tip of an iceberg. Columbia did not acquire the nickname "Patrice Lumumba on the Hudson" by accident. The university has been dominated by the left at least since the 1930's, when the Institute for Social Research (the Frankfurt School) was relocated to Columbia University, introducing the concepts of Cultural Marxism, Political Correctness, and deconstructionism to the United States.

For all the talk about diversity generated by Columbia's new celebrity president, Lee Bollinger, there is but one political / educational orthodoxy. The only acceptable positions are acquiescent liberalism and strident radicalism. At best, your letter calling for the dismissal of De Genova will lead to his firing and becoming a celebrity martyr. More likely, the calls for De Genova's dismissal will guarantee tenure for an otherwise unpopular professor. What we actually need at Columbia is some balance in the faculty. A letter calling for true intellectual diversity and academic freedom would be far more beneficial. Columbia must have a semblance of ideological balance for it to be a true institution of higher learning, not indoctrination. Moreover, to promote national security, Columbia must start complying with regulations regarding the registration and processing of foreign students. Finally, if the university wishes to disavow itself of Professor De Genova's comments, it must reinstate the ROTC program. Until these criteria are met, I urge you and the other members of Congress who signed your letter to give withdraw all direct federal funds until these conditions are met.

Sincerely,

Ron Lewenberg
Founder, Columbia College Conservative Club
President 1999-2001
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/conservative
Student Coordinator, Colubia Conservative Alumni Association
http://www.columbiacons.net/intro.html

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