Free Republic

Illustrating that the jihadist enterprise transcends all borders, American Islamist groups typically preoccupied with remaking the U.S. have been leaving their fingerprints on the campaign to exchange secular authoritarianism for religious authoritarianism in the Middle East. As these organizations labor stateside to nudge the governing class to embrace Arab Islamists at the expense of liberals — prompting Egyptian intellectual Essam Abdallah to lament that "the most dramatic oppression of the region's civil societies and the Arab Spring … is led by the powerful Islamist lobbies in Washington" — several of the groups' past and current officials have emerged as key...

Here is some background as well as some related posts on the Klocek case. Neil Steinberg and the Chicago Sun Times: In September, 2004, Professor Klocek read this Steinberg column. What Neil wrote was the intellectual basis of Klocek's ill-fated discussion with the Muslim students at DePaul. That column was based on this op-ed by Abdel Rahman al-Rashed, the general manager of the al-Arabiya television network. This is the opening sentence of that article: It is a certain fact that not all Muslims are terrorists, but it is equally certain, and exceptionally painful, that almost all terrorists are Muslims. March...

Thomas Klocek, the fired DePaul professor whose cause I've championed since pretty much the first day of this blog, explains how he was trampled by DePaul's politically-correct hammer in a Quicktime video by Grant Crowell. (It takes a while for the video to download.) Klocek made the mistake of challenging the ossified political beliefs of some Muslim students--who view themselves an a protected class--at a student activities fair in 2004. There's a Ward Churchill tie-in, as the professor asks Ward to speak up for his free speech rights, too. But Pirate Ballerina (the site where I found the video), has...

The SPME petition to reinstate Thomas Klocek, the Roman Catholic faculty member who was fired by DePaul University without due process for challenging Muslim students' assertions of Israeli treatment of Palestinians to the Nazi's treatment of Jews, has already amassed nearly 1000 signatures in three days. The petition, which can be viewed and signed at http://www.spme.net/cgi-bin/display_petitions.cgi?ID=3"> calls for his complete reinstatement without prejudice or penalty. Morry Fiddler, a professor at DePaul University, writes, " If I'm not there for a colleague, then who will be there for me?" Other DePaul professors signing the petition to date are Allan Berele, Gary...

Now that denunciations of Ward Churchill have gained an official status, I'm just wondering: Will the administration of DePaul University issue an apology to the DePaul Conservative Alliance for its shameful conduct in trying to censor group's protest of the F-Troop Indian's paid campus appearance last fall? I know these guys, and they way got kicked around by DePaul was reprehensible. Here is the FIRE report on DePaul's misdeeds that revolved around the Ward Churchill appearance. And besides those outrages, there's also the case where DePaul stomped on the free speech rights of the DCA when they attempted to host...

DePaul University is rapidly becoming ground zero in the battle to reform academia’s corrupted political culture. For the third time in less than a year the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) has publicly rebuked the university for its politically motivated abridgment of free speech, this time for shutting down an anti-affirmative action bake sale and threatening to punish one of the organizers for violation of a newly instituted anti-discrimination policy. The DePaul Conservative Alliance set up a table in the Student Center where they were selling cookies and suggesting differing prices based on race, ethnicity and gender. It...

Earlier this month, Chicago's DePaul University, pressured by the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), agreed to drop its bizarre "propaganda ban" that the administration used as an attempt to silence DePaul College Republicans last fall. Controversial University of Colorado Professor Ward Churchill, in a paid appearance, spoke at DePaul, and the College Republicans faced several school administration roadblocks as they tried to protest that event. FIRE's interim president, Greg Lukianoff, stated earlier this month on the Hannity & Colmes show that in terms of free speech issues, DePaul was "a basketcase." Still, with its dropping of the "propaganda...

The latest edition of the DePaulia, the campus newspaper of DePaul, is out and online. For those new to Marathon Pundit, I've been blogging about the misadventures of Chicago's DePaul University for almost a year now. This MP post from last month sums things up pretty concisely. Last March 1, I reported on DePaul's suspension of Thomas Klocek, who defended Israel from exaggerated charges from some Muslim students. As with most American colleges, there truly is a deep liberal bias at DePaul. For instance, last fall, Dr. Harvette Grey invited that hero of the anti-American Left, Ward Churchill, to speak...

DePaul U Confronts Amerikan "Empire" By Steven PlautFrontPageMagazine.com | January 3, 2006Q: How do you know when America has crossed the line into an oppressive, occupational empire?A: When DePaul University begins studying it. The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at DePaul and its Dean, one Chuck Suchar (a sociologist), have officially announced a “College Theme Series” entitled “Confronting Empire” for the 2005-6 academic year. This is a DePaul faculty initiative involving the participation of various departments and programs throughout the college. The organizers call themselves the “Empire Committee,” sounding like something out of Star Wars. Naturally, the evil...

CHICAGO, December 21, 2005—A student group that protested a campus appearance by University of Colorado Professor Ward Churchill has become DePaul University’s latest victim of censorship. The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) intervened after the university banned its College Republicans from posting flyers protesting Churchill’s visit and actually changed its own rules to prevent the organization from attending a workshop that he would be leading. “Just as DePaul was free to invite Ward Churchill to speak, so should its students be free to object to that invitation,” said FIRE Director of Legal and Public Advocacy Greg Lukianoff. “DePaul’s...

Before he became an unlikely cause celebre, Thomas Klocek was an anonymous foot soldier in the bookish garrison of the ivory tower. The job title may be "adjunct," but their myriad ranks are a bulwark of higher education. They teach the introductory courses the permanent faculty disdains. That frees tenured professors to do research and work with graduate students. It also helps balance the budget. Adjuncts are paid by the course, at academia's equivalent of Wal-Mart wages. At DePaul University, where Klocek long taught, he reached a high of $34,000, one year. Other years, his earnings were $16,000. But he...

Thomas Klocek was, until September 2004, a popular adjunct professor in the School of New Learning at DePaul University in Chicago. A private university linked to the Vincentians, DePaul may not be prestigious, but it is one of America's fastest-growing universities. Many readers will recognize it as the home of the notorious anti-Zionist, Norman Finkelstein. Klocek taught at DePaul for fourteen years until his dismissal on what I can only describe, not merely as the flimsiest, but as the most prejudicial of grounds. During a Student Activities Fair, a group of eight students representing Students for Justice in Palestine and...

PRESS RELEASE: October 18, 2005 – Chicago, IL – The DePaul College Republicans, supported by several other Chicago-based Republican organizations and Jewish Groups, will be publicly protesting DePaul University’s paid speaking invitation to controversial professor Ward Churchill, scheduled to speak this Thursday, Oct 20th, 5:30 pm at the University’s Cultural Center on its Lincoln Park Campus. Churchill is to be DePaul’s headline speaker on the subject of human rights for men of color. The CU Professor has received major attention for an essay he wrote shortly after the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center in New York, where...

Pictured below in the dark jersey is DePaul hoopster Raymon Caplis, playing shortly before Christmas in 1951 under legendary Blue Demon Coach Ray Meyer. Caplis is fighting for the ball with Kentucky's Clifford Hagan. Hagan, like Ray Meyer, would later be enshrined in the Basketball Hall of Fame. It looks like Caplis got the ball, but Kentucky won that game. And what does that picture have to do with DePaul and Churchill? On Tuesday, a very well-poised blogger Nick Hahn, a DePaul political science major and Republican, was interviewed by KHOW Denver's Dan Caplis, son of ex-Blue Demon basketball player...

Ward Churchill, the let's-pretend Indian who rode political-correctness to a departmental chairmanship at one university, will soon be spouting his anti-American, murderer-friendly hatred at another university, one where they brand you a racist and shut you up if you don't toe the politically correct party line. It's the stuff of unbelievable satire... Let's start with Churchill, who gained tenure at the University of Colorado and was elevated to department head despite lacking a Ph.D. and having a record worse than undistinguished. His primary qualification, it seems, is that he was part Indian, only he isn't. This same man has spoken...

As regular visitors to this blog know, renowned aca-demon Ward Churchill will be returning to his native Illinois and speak at Chicago's DePaul University on October 20 and 21. (The second event, I believe, is not open to the public.) Information, courtesy of the DePaul University Division of Student Affairs' Cultural Center, is available here on their web site. Here is the "Psycho" Ward stuff: October 20, 2005 Lecture: Ward Churchill -Open to DePaul Community 5:30 p.m. - 8:00 p.m., Student Center 314-A) October 21, 2005 Multicultural Human Rights Education Workshop (2:00 p.m. 4:30 p.m., Student Center 314-B) -Ward Churchill–...

DePaul University, currently being sued by a professor terminated for a spirited discussion with Muslim students about Middle East politics, has invited Ward Churchill to lecture next month. Churchill is the University of Colorado professor who attracted national attention for his essay characterizing Sept. 11 victims as "little Eichmanns," for explaining that al-Qaida had a legitimate beef with the U.S. and for questions raised about his own background and resume. But Chicago's DePaul as a venue is of particular note given its treatment of professor Thomas Klocek, currently suing the university for defamation over his suspension for behavior in a...

One year ago today, DePaul Professor Thomas Klocek had a discussion with some Muslim students... ....and was suspended because his ideas didn't match the PC groupthink found on almost all college campuses today. On September 15, 2004, Klocek, an adjunct professor at Chicago's DePaul University for 14 years, was walking through a campus cafeteria where a student activities fair was taking place. He noticed a couple of display tables staffed by United Muslims Moving Ahead (UMMA) and the DePaul Chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) More on Students for Justice in Palestine here, courtesy of Frontpage Magazine's Discover...

Thomas Klocek, the DePaul professor who lost his job without due process after arguing with several students about the Middle East at a student activities fair, has now sued DePaul. Much of the suit focuses on claims that DePaul defamed Klocek, in part by providing the public with false and misleading information about his health. Klocek also claims breach of contract. In this case, DePaul has shamefully taken a single encounter where the facts are in dispute (the students and professor present radically different versions of the event), and has transformed it into a veritable festival of repression. First, DePaul...

Several weeks ago The American Thinker informed its readers about the plight of Professor Thomas Klocek, who was fired for daring to question the rabid anti-Israel display by some Moslem students at DePaul University, a Catholic university, in Chicago. Klocek, who is not Jewish, was an untenured professor who taught for many years at DePaul. But now Klocek has responded. An ex-DePaul University part-time faculty member filed a defamation suit Tuesday against his former employer in Cook County Circuit Court, alleging the university breached its employment contract and maligned his character following a verbal confrontation with members of Muslim and...