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Why Do So Many Students Hate Capitalism and America? TheBlaze Speaks to Author of New Book That Criticizes Colleges for Teaching Victimhood

Sep. 19, 2012 7:41am Sharona Schwartz

Just one year ago, throngs of college students took to the streets, “occupying” Wall Street and bashing capitalism. What was it that lured so many? And at those demonstrations, why did we see so many strange bedfellows finding common cause – socialists, environmentalists, pro-Palestinian activists and others? Turns out those allies are not so mismatched after all, but are rather unified by the common perception – real or not – that they are victims of three evil isms: imperialism, colonialism, and capitalism. For many, that worldview was born and nurtured on our nation’s campuses.

In his latest book, “The Victims’ Revolution: The Rise of Identity Studies and the Closing of the Liberal Mind,” author Bruce Bawer takes to task American universities for their emphasis on Identity Studies – that is, Black Studies, “Queer Studies,” Chicano Studies, Women’s Studies – which he believes inculcate into impressionable college students the idea that those minority groups are victims of the oppressive white man. This is the ethos rampant not only in those aforementioned departments but also in the study of literature, philosophy and history. In the past, humanities instruction focused on the great works, aspired to objective truths and emphasized the importance of logical analysis. Apparently, this is no longer the case. To Bawer, the higher education system is today predicated on moral relativity. No more focus on great works, or great men. Our youth are being taught to hate capitalism and to hate America and thus so many have bought into the tenets behind Occupy Wall Street.

The Wall Street Journal in its review of Bawer’s book wrote, “The most traditional branches of Western learning have been replaced by disciplines designed to serve radical political ends.”

Bawer describes the American college campus today as a dystopia, a world in which student and teacher alike present an air of being profound when really they say little that is new and even less that veers from the beliefs of their peers. It’s an exclusive — and wildly expensive — club with its own jargon and belief system, its own saints and sinners. If so many of them didn’t deride faith, one might call it a religion.

Besides examining numerous texts in the various “identity” fields from which he generously quotes, Bawer also attended academic conferences, including one cultural studies conference, where he observed the speakers:

They’ve been trained to reduce the rich complexities and ambiguities of human life to simple formulas about oppressors and oppressed, capitalists and workers, Western imperialists and their Western victims. And when they encounter a reality that doesn’t fit into this paradigm, they don’t know how to deal with it, other than to make statements that are demonstrably untrue.

For Bawer, this world is also characterized by inconsistency. The white man and black man can exhibit the same behavior, yet the oppressor (you know which of the above) is always to blame. For example, he describes a reticence among feminists in Women’s Studies departments to criticize the oppression of Muslim women under Shariah law, including the wearing of hijab and honor killings. Since the Muslim world is to those academics in the “colonized” category, it is not to be condemned. He writes:

In humanities departments today, it is an article of faith that all civilizations are equal – except for Western civilization, which, students learn, is unique only in the degree of its greed, brutality, and lust for power.

Politics aside, this fashion in education has a high price. No more analyzing texts for their aesthetic and literary value. No more objective truth. After he graduated, Bawer believed “even the greatest literary works were treated as mere texts that had no more or less intrinsic value than a phone book or shopping list.” He writes:

Once, the purpose of the humanities had been to introduce students to the glories of Western civilization, thought and art – to enhance students’ respect, even reverence, for the cultural heritage of the West; now the humanities sought to umask the West as a perpetrator of injustice around the globe. Once, the great poets, authors, philosophers, historians, and artists of the Western canon had been heroes whose portraits and statues adorned university campuses; now they were to be viewed with a jaundiced eye-for most of them were, after all, Dead White Heterosexual Males, and therefore, by definition, members of an oppressive Establishment.

In fact, a field of study called Men’s Studies has appeared in about 100 colleges in North America. Bawer believes this is yet a new forum for white-male bashing.

The founding father of the field, Australian sociologist Robert W. Connell, based his writings on feminist theory and a belief that society teaches men to dominate women. In 2008, Connell had a sex-change operation and is now a woman. This raises questions about the integrity of his academic pursuit a decade earlier – while believing privately he was a woman on the inside – considering he “helped establish an academic discipline the entire point of which is that men are authoritarian bullies,” Bawer writes.

Opposite Men’s Studies, Male Studies later emerged as an alternative to the bias of the feminist-theory inspired Men’s Studies.

Robert Heasley, president of the American Men’s Studies Association took a swipe at Male Studies by employing what he presumably believes to be an insult, comparing the discipline to Glenn Beck. Bawer writes:

When Inside Higher Ed asked Heasley what he thought of Male Studies, he called it “a Glenn Beck approach” to the subject; the even more hostile comments about Male Studies by Women’s Studies professors make it clear that, in their view, the idea of a nonfeminist approach to the study of maleness is sheer heresy.

There seems to be no end to those groups which merit their own departments and courses of study. Bawer notes that recently Fat Studies has emerged as a new discipline as has Whiteness Studies which Bawer says emphasizes that “to be white is, in essence to be by definition an oppressor.”

To learn more about what inspired him to write this latest book, TheBlaze interviewed Bawer – who has previously written books challenging the left’s approach to gay issues and books on the threat of radical Islam to the West. Here is our conversation:

What inspired you to take on the American university education system in your latest book, “The Victims’ Revolution”?

I did it because there is a kind of brainwashing going on in the universities today that has already had deleterious effects on society at large – and because nobody else, surprisingly, had yet tried to explain to the intelligent common reader the exact nature of this brainwashing – the ideology, the background, the jargon, everything. Certainly nobody had yet spelled out the facts about identity studies, which are a huge part of the academy nowadays and which, in a way, epitomize the absurdity of what’s going on in place of education in the humanities today.

What is your greatest concern about the higher education being offered to our youths today?

There are plenty of things, all connected. All too often, they’re taught to think of themselves as members of groups and not individuals. Instead of learning to cherish the heritage of Western civilization and freedom, they learn to despise the West as the fount of all evil in the form of capitalism, colonialism, and imperialism. They learn that it is wrong for them, as Westerners, to criticize any aspect of any other culture, however horrible. And instead of learning them to think critically and independently and fearlessly, they’re trained to become good little lockstep multiculturalists who are scared to articulate the obvious truths about certain things that are right in front of their noses. Morally, aesthetically, and intellectually, this is obviously a disaster.

What advice would you give those who – after hearing the alarm you are sounding — would like their children to go to college and receive a top-notch education but are concerned about the ideological focus you describe in your book?

Don’t go by the meaningless annual ratings that always place the same handful of world-famous universities at the top. Some of these places are the worst offenders. It can help to look at the website of the National Association of Scholars, which was founded in reaction to all this nonsense – there’s a lot of information there that can give you an idea of which colleges to avoid and which ones at least allow some room for dissent. A few quick Google searches will help you find out which colleges have “Great Books” programs, Western civilization requirements, and the like, and which ones are dominated by identity-studies claptrap.

Is there a connection between what our youths are learning on campus today and the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations which began a year ago? After all, many of the participants have been college students, some even encouraged by their professors.

Absolutely. They’ve been taught that capitalism is the root of all the world’s evil. They’ve been taught to despise it – and to despise the West, and especially America, and above all Wall Street. The history of the 20th century is one long lesson in the danger of rejecting democratic capitalism in favor of utopian economic schemes, but these young people, many of them very expensively educated, have apparently learned nothing about it at all.

The New York Times Book Review called “The Victims’ Revolution” out-of-date, unbalanced and a “caricature.” Would you like to answer that criticism?

Let me begin by pointing out that the reviewer for the New York Times, Andrew Delbanco, is hardly an objective observer. He is a faculty member at Columbia University, which is one of the greatest offenders when it comes to offering all this fashionable hokum. Among his newest colleagues there is Judith Butler, one of the founders of Queer Theory, and in the book I criticize both Butler and Queer Theory very severely. It may also be worth noting that I’ve written very critically in the past about Delbanco’s work – so it’s no surprise to see him trashing mine.

Delbanco’s criticism is utterly disingenuous. Out of date? The book is based on reportage done within the last two years. Unbalanced? Meaning what? I wrote about what I saw and heard, and didn’t exaggerate anything, and made a point of mentioning the rare instances in which identity-studies practitioners surprised me by actually disagreeing with the party line. A caricature? If the things I quote and describe make these people sound like cartoon characters, that’s precisely the point – this whole shebang is cartoonish. It is a caricature of education.

Why did you decide to pay homage to Allan Bloom’s 1987 bestseller, “The Closing of the American Mind,” in choosing your subtitle – “The Closing of the Liberal Mind”?

Allan Bloom wrote the first prominent book to point out the way in which reason, objectivity, moral and aesthetic values, and a spirit of free inquiry were being supplanted in the academy by ideology and relativism. He described, and decried, an academic revolution; my book, coming along a quarter-century after his, examines what that revolution has wrought.

What remedies do you suggest for bringing American colleges back in sync with American values?

I think this can only be done at the grass roots. I write in the book about David Clemens, who teaches at one of the Cal State colleges. He has singlehandedly created an oasis on that campus for students who want a real education in literature, history, Western civilization. In order to establish his program, he had to take on his colleagues, who recognized his efforts as a threat to what they were doing. But he won. Students support him and sing his praises. He’s turning that place around. Every college in the U.S. needs a David Clemens.

(H/T: FrontPage Magazine)

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Comments (186)

ShyLow
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:28am
If ShyLow wanted to start ShyLow’s landscaping service what all would he need to get started? A business licence from were? What building down-own to get that? A contracters licence, from where? Where is the test given and what does it cost? Does ShyLow need a lawyer? How about accident insurance? Is it manditory? What do you get first the business licence? Contracters licence? Lawyer? Accident insurance?
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- Gold Coin & Economic News
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:46am
  This is exactly why Obama can get elected. We value personality, bizarre studies and victim-hood instead of history, constitutional studies and the truth. We are producing zombies instead of leaders.
  
  Report this comment
- Shrugged
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:04am
  You are responsible and accountable for your success — and failure. Either are achievable BY YOU. Have some self respect and go FIND those answers dufus.
  
  Report this comment
- the_truth_or_not
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 11:04am
  @SHRUGGED
  
  I think you missed shylow’s message. that it seems rediculous the amount of red tape one has to go through in order to start a landscaping company. especially in a world where more regulations are being piled on top of each other. At least I hope thats his point anyways.
  
  Report this comment
- junkmaninohio
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 11:12am
  My daughter is trying to start a thriving bakery business for glutin free products but local government red tape and scandalous government fees are ending a great beginning all too soon.
  
  Report this comment
- Ray2447
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 12:15pm
  Yep, “Marxist Valley College” doesn’t teach self reliance in any of its Liberal Studies, Humanities, Sociology, Political Science, Journalism, etc. classes. They just indoctrinate students into the Marxist/Democrat agenda as shown in “Marxist Valley College” at Youtube. http://tinyurl.com/44btbq8
  
  Report this comment
- ShyLow
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 1:13pm
  I would like to see insurance companies double as one-stop shops to get new businesses up and going…They give the required tests, register you with the government, give you your licence and sell you your insurance.
  
  Report this comment
- desertspeaks
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 2:31pm
  Perhaps universities will one day just be honest and offer classes is being a professional victim and how to profit from it.
  
  Report this comment
- JRook
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 3:49pm
  Ah quoting the Wall Street Journal as a credible source. Guess that means their noting of Romney being stupid and arrogant is equally as valid.
  
  Report this comment
- ShyLow
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 3:50pm
  When you make colleges the gate-keepers to the American Dream of pursuing happyness, what do you expect?
  
  Report this comment
- MIBUGNU2
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:35pm
  I went to College so I could tell everyone, they would be
  acting “Stupidly” if they didn’t adore O’Blamer……….
  Acting “Stupidly” is paying $40,000.00 for a plate of food.
  while thousands are starving, and Homeless..SUCKA’ !!!!
  
  Report this comment
- Yourworstenemy
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 11:38pm
  junkmaninohio: whine whine my daughter can’t start her business. Gee do you think it may be her poor planning for such fees? wah wah that government is stopping her. Geesh at least learn how to spell gluten. Whine whine whine
  
  Report this comment
gperky
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:22am
This is one of the big reasons we are dealing with a poor public education system in America. In other countries, students are taught that in America, you can start a business or get a good job and become successful, owning a home, creating a family and living a great life. That is why we are seeing so many professionals coming from places like India.
Here is the good ole USA, we teach our children that they have been jilted and are owed something for nothing. That they should all be stars and live like a “Rapper” or Movie Star. As a result, out education system has fallen to one of the lowest in history and our engineering and professional positions are being taken by foreign graduates.
My company looked for over a year to hire 2 mechanical engineers. We ended up after a year hiring one from Nigeria and one from India!

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- JimFromOK
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 2:25pm
  Remember, the teachers who work in the school system learned how to “teach” in these colleges. Parents blindly trust these people to help prepare their children for the real world, only to have them learn that they’re either victims or aggressors who need to capitulate to those victims.
  
  Report this comment
- WATER-THE-TREE
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 11:44pm
  The stranger who is in your midst shall rise up above you very high; and you shall come down very low.
  
  He shall lend to you, and you shall not lend to him; he shall be the head and, you shall be the tail.
  
  DEUT 28: 43-44. These are just a part of the curses that are falling on this country for dissing GOD.
  
  Report this comment
ShyLow
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:14am
You should be able to take a test given by your insuance company and if you pass it, the insurance company gives you your business licence and sells you insurance for your business same day…The insurance company is the one that has to pay if you accidntally run a back-hoe over a water-main or into a gas-line

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- Shrugged
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:15am
  Wrong again. The policy holders pay since their premiums are based on the loss ratio of the insurance company. Insurance company profit is “premium revenue” minus “claims losses” and expenses. The minute they reject you for not being “insurable” you will be the first to tear down the capitalist system.
  
  Report this comment
- ShyLow
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 1:02pm
  The uninsurable could start their own insurance company…I would call it “Average Joes”
  
  Report this comment
PaulHausser
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:13am
Frankfurt School Red Diaper babies showed up in two waves last century. 1930′s and early 1950′s. They are the ringleaders of the late 1960′s social upheavals and all of the above

It carries on to this day after a reversal in the 1980′s.

PC and an anti white male program is key to the ultimate objective. A USSR system of balkanized different racial groups all under the yoke of Washington DC(Moscow).

Ultimately they want White Christian men of European heritage to be placed under the thumb of the state and worse case shipped off to gulags in different parts of the USA.

Then they can “create the workers paradise”. Same promise given to the Russian people in 1917/18.

Sounds crazy but truth is always stranger than fiction

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- Ray2447
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 12:48pm
  I see one review on Amazon that attacks this book for its criticism of women’s studies, but that review fails to perceive the witch-hunt that has been perpetrated against males, and originates in women’s studies programs on college and university campuses. Yes, women’s studies students are taught how to make false accusations by teachers and gender feminist advocates, and under the gender feminist interpretation, just about all heterosexual intimate relations are classified as rape. Did I mention the billions of taxpayer dollars that go into funding the radical feminist, women’s industries false accusation enterprises? They’re as near as your local VAWA funded, domestic violence shelter as explained by Phyllis Schlafly. http://tinyurl.com/9ky72jb
  
  Yes, there is a sexist agenda today that’s “Witch-Hunting Males” as shown on Youtube, http://tinyurl.com/65dpzwu and women’s studies programs and the Obama administration are the source of that misandrist hate movement.
  
  Report this comment
bandofbrothers
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:11am
I am in school right now and I am a disabled vet and 40 years old. My english teacher is so baised and when i asked her why we are bashing capitalism and hard work in class she said if i had anythin to ask her come after class than we followed up by watching a video of barrack obama explained social classes in america mmy head almost exploded don’t know what to do I need the class to graduate but cannot keep my mouth shut ugh!

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- dtbox
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:30am
  Keep your head down, graduate and go on to do great things. Succeeding is the best response to that bulls**t.
  
  Report this comment
- RJJinGadsden
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:59am
  BANDOFBROTHERS, I took a criminal psychology course….once. According to our professor, nothing was ever the fault of the person committing a serious crime. All of us in LE at the time came the closest to failing the course, yet we had for the most part the highest test scores. From then on, I learned to sit quietly in class and let others test the waters before I chose whether or not to express an honest opinion. That class was honestly more indoctrination for the younger students rather than education.
  
  Report this comment
- 3rdRockArchangel
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 12:52pm
  Hey Band’, first of all, it really gripes me that someone like you who fought for freedom has to go through this! Thanks, by the way. With plenty of hindsight, my simple goal would be to scam that so-called teacher out of an ‘A’, leave her talking to herself every chance I got and to leave her with the beleif that I was Karl Marx’s great grandchild. Every time she made even the slightest positive comment about freedom and capitalism I would challenge her and make her defend them. She’d probably choke on the words and you could at least laugh all the way back to the car. Good luck!
  
  Report this comment
- Shellyontheright
  Posted on September 21, 2012 at 7:12am
  Sir, as a conservative English professor, please take that teacher to task. Report her to her dean. She is NOT to push her political views on ANYONE. If I did that with Romney, Bush, or anyone else, all holy hell would be raised. These are the young voters she is indoctrinating, many of whom probably don’t care or, in my experience, don’t side with her. They won’t say anything, though, for fear of retribution. That is the WORSE thing to do. Good luck! I know it’s hard listening to that drivel!
  
  Report this comment
ShyLow
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:06am
Capitalism is a tainted word…You would be better served to use the term free-markets…Capitalsm is bought-off polititians making regulations to keep the little guy out of business and working for the big-man…Free markets is the little guy putting a business sign over or on his door and in business same day

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- chucksue351
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:41am
  capitalism is the means to finance business or government for that matter (the government taxes productive activity) so all societies use capitalism to some extent, the more industrialized the more it needs finance, even the soviet union and today china are capitalistic, the difference from say the usa is that the capital is controlled by the state in the soviet system and china, in a facist regime the capital is in the hands of business but the use of it is dictacted by the regime, this county needs to go back to a free market capitalism and not continue in the facsist model
  
  Report this comment
- Lloyd Drako
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:53am
  @Shylow: What you describe is “crony capitalism,” not capitalism as such.
  
  Report this comment
- OIF3survivor
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:17am
  @Band of Brothers:
  
  I hear ya brother. As a 40 year old vet myself who is also a college grad/grad student(on hold for the moment) I can definitely commiserate. Its amazing the absolute US hating propaganda that is passed off in the Colleges and Universities. Back in the early 2000′s I’ve had unabashed Socialists and one apologist for the “Great Soviet Union” (his words) at Indiana University South Bend as well as the chair of the Foreign Language Dept ( also one of my German professors) unabashedly using lecture time for anti conservative propagandizing. This continued when I moved to southern CO after my tour in Iraq (2004-2005) at Adams State. In fact they were just in the news for a scandal(currently being investigated I believe) in which students may have been offered compensation to work on Obama’s re-election campaign.
  All I’m getting at is I completely understand how hypocritical the University system is with its supposed emphasis on objectivity and critical thinking but the reality is bias throughout. All you can do man is carry on the good fight and present your dissenting position only with as many primary sources as you can find. Its the only way you can argue and not be torn apart by the lecturer and indoctrinated kids with no life experience.
  
  Report this comment
- 3rdRockArchangel
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 2:22pm
  Shylow, what you are describing has nothing to do with capitalism. It’s fascism. There is no such thing as crony capitalism. It is fascism. Why on earth should we abandon the words that accurately describe our beleifs and values? Many, including Beck for instance, would not mind if the Republican Party went away do to it’s corruption. I’ve heard him say it. What the heck are we saying? The party of Lincoln has to be abandoned, capitalism has to be abandoned because either or both the word or entity has become corrupt? How about we reaffirm our beleif in both and stand up and fight for them instead of always giving in to the new PC definition crap some are trying to feed us. Someone is always trying to reinvent the wheel. The wheel works fine. Fix the broken spokes!
  
  Report this comment
- ShyLow
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 3:57pm
  GE, Solendyra, General Motors and many other “companys” love the word Capitalism…I’ll stick with free-markets
  
  Report this comment
- ShyLow
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 4:09pm
  Free-markets now!!! Legalize atv’s for street use as actual free countries have done…Let drug companies compete with natural growing plants God put on this planet…Remove all hurdles for starting a small business or large one for that matter…Stop letting commie universties be the gate-keepers to the free-market system
  
  Report this comment
- 3rdRockArchangel
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:33pm
  Shylow, “GE, Solendyra, General Motors and many other “companys” love the word Capitalism…I’ll stick with free-markets”, if you’re even for real, I get your sentiment. I hate to break the news to you, but, free markets are a fundumental part of capitalism. My last thirty-two years of 36 years in the workforce was with GM. The last thirty as a member of management. There’s nothing wrong with GE and GM that a unionectomy and a progressive enema won’t cure. Once the academics started to take over in the early 80′s, then the so-called bean counters in the mid and late 80′s and finally the lawyers and the “diversity” infection in the late 90′s, many of us saw the handwriting on the wall. We knew and were fearful that we could actually fail. Everyone saw how it played out. This was absolutely predictable. For many years we hammered our executives over their caving to the unions contract after contract. They kept giving to and protecting the unions at the expense of the salaried workforce. It got so bad that they started to send people to calm us saying we promise, we’re going to take on the unions and they never did. It’s simply the same problem with our politics. These companies and capitalism have been corrupted by progressivism. Fix that problem and you’ll restore both.
  
  Report this comment
antitheist
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:05am
We have already seen what the conservative approach to education would be in states like Texas and Arizona, and that includes banning books by great Americans such as Walt Whitman and censoring the teaching of critical thinking and anything that goes against “values instilled by parents”. It also means giving public money to garbage christian schools that teach that the loch ness monster disproves evolution.

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- gperky
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:25am
  Sounds like to me that you have an issue with Christians in general. I suspect you were rejected in the local church at some time in your life or just rebel against your parents upbringing. You certainly don’t use logic to argue your point!
  
  Report this comment
- Shrugged
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:08am
  I took that class in college from Professor Loch Ness and he made a pretty good argument against evolution. Besides, there is NO empirical support for cross-specie evolution. There is more evidence that God exists than evolution.
  
  Report this comment
- acidovorax
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 7:12pm
  ANTITHEIST wrote: “We have already seen what the conservative approach to education would be in states like Texas and Arizona, and that includes banning books by great Americans such as Walt Whitman and censoring the teaching of critical thinking and anything that goes against “values instilled by parents”. It also means giving public money to garbage christian schools that teach that the loch ness monster disproves evolution.”
  
  In a free market for education, such issues are minimized as every school is independent and can tailor their curriculum as they see fit. Then parents can choose which method and curriculum they prefer. The current State monopoly of education mandates the curriculum and parents have little recourse, as private schooling costs are artificially elevated due to the government monopoly crowding them out.
  
  Report this comment
vaman
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:04am
This article is, at a minimum, misleading, but was written for a particular audience that finds colleges and higher education unpalatable. Also, freedom of thought and those that teach it are intuitively counter to religion and the blaze attracts that ilk. The more information that is readily available to people, the less they rely on religion for answers to life’s questions. Religion fails when there is free exchange of ideas and independent thinking. College is not a breeding ground for the next generation of freedom hating hippies. It does allow someone the ability to make more informed decisions. So, once again the blaze provides an article with a horribly bias slant, concocted to provoke and elicit a response from people that have been mislead in to believing that higher education is wrong because it takes away from “traditional American values”.

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- mersey
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:23am
  No one is against ‘higher education” when it’s used properly. It’s necessary for many applications in our society, like the sciences, medicine and engineering. We are talking about the nonsense that comes from useless degrees like liberal arts that only prepare the youth to spout out gobbledygook like your comment. You think you know so much about the world but in reality, you know nothing. There is a reason Obama spends so much of his time campaigning at college campuses. The youth are naive and easily led. Children can be told almost anything and they believe it. They haven’t lived a true life yet. You know the saying………free your mind and your a$$ will follow.
  
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- Godfather.1
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 3:48pm
  @vaman
  
  Exactly. This article only speaks in broad generalizations, i.e. “colleges make everyone hate America and everything Western and no school teaches anything differently.” Give me a break.
  
  It’s pretty funny that Glenn Beck, who never went to college, is now attempting to educated his fans on why college is unnecessary and ruining ‘Merica. Furthermore, because most of Beck’s fans likely have no education beyond 4th grade, they all eat this up. They resent those with higher education as uppity, freeloading, elitist, liberals.
  
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- Git-R-Done
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 4:46pm
  Godfather – The truth hurts that your beloved universities are nothing more than left wing indoctrination centers. It doesn’t take someone who’s been to college to recognize that fact. And you don’t need to go to college to learn about the history of this great country. Don’t get upset that your beloved academia no longer has a monopoly on education.
  
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- Godfather.1
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 5:08pm
  @Git-R-Done
  
  Do have a college degree? If not, then you are not qualified to comment on this subject as you don’t know what actually goes on in a university. And no, knowledge of Glenn’s rantings on what a college education entails does not qualify you either.
  
  Report this comment
- acidovorax
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 7:21pm
  Undoubtedly, there is some of what you state in this article. The writer throws together several concepts and insinuates that they are highly related and equally flawed theories, which is just sloppy, but understandable as it is written to many who are highly suspect of “isms”. Few realize that “imperialism” was a charge made by those on the RIGHT prior to and during WWI, who were against interventionism and Wilsonian policies.
  
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- backandtotheleft
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:00pm
  Wow what a tool. You just blamed Blaze readers for precisely what is going on in education. No one says the schools cannot teach those things. The problem is most university instructors, when they run up against facts, or are asked to prove their theories or just have a student that has a opinion that is counter to there own the resort to labeling, name calling and I dare say “bullying” because they simply cannot live in a world of fact or truth. So they make it up.
  In a real free market both schools could exist. But universities needed to get funding to become the established institutions that they are today. Because with out it on one would have ever chose those schools over one that provided a real education. Now after 2+ generations of this brainwashing most of their BS seems to be mainstream traditional thought. The only way that happened was to make teaching those thing compulsory( Dept. of Ed) There was a time when there was diverse thought inside of the several department of a university, no they all believe the same things and anything that diverges must be destroyed at all cost. It has become the antithesis of higher learning or cognitive thought. It is nothing more than negatively re-enforced operant conditioning. Sad Sad Sad…. just like you Antitheist, but all is not lost cuz “God Loves ya Baby!!!!” Kinda like Kojak
  
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- Git-R-Done
  Posted on September 22, 2012 at 2:20pm
  Godfather – Then by your standards, you have no right to comment on anything you’ve never experienced (which is anything).
  
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Gonzo
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:57am
When parents abdicate their parenting duties to Marxists, their kids become Marxists. It’s that simple.

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- HOOT_OWL
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:05am
  I will first say, The majority of this generation ,not ALL of them ,
  believe inInstant gratification .They are not wanting to put in the work ,
  that is required to reap the benefits. They have seen the over-night
  dot-com millionaires and say I should be them too .I deserver instant
  success on the first try. And if they fail ,they don’t learn from that
  mistake, they drop that whim and they carry the same failing attitude
  with them onto the next endeavor .And don’t even ask them to go
  through a apprenticeship program ,to work for ‘on the job training’
  for a lower than ‘expert pay’. Because if they cant be part of upper
  high end wage earners, they somewhere in their brain have concluded,
  that being a parasite is better . Because being a middle class citizen
  is below them. They believe if they show up at their job a half hour ,
  after starting time, you should be thanking God ,that they blessed you
  with their presence .
  
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davetrav
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:48am
The entire education system needs a overall, they meaning the schools start training kids from a early age that the government should take care of you. Brain washing by the left is even larger in college levels. We need to teach history about America and state history where you live. It is important to get our kids the truth. Kids today really don’t understand how America works, remember our country is made up of —WE THE PEOPLE— Obama has to go, Think about it , look around, this is not the America I grew up loving. I kids need to learn this.VOTE OBAMA OUT–HELP HEAL AMERICA FOR OUR KIDS FUTURE IF THEY STILL HACE ONE.

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nocommie
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:43am
Parents need to do a better job at teaching the value of being independent and not to sell your soul to the government.The young people do not understand that they are being domesticated like puppies.Sit and I will give you a treat,lay down and I will give you a treat,vote democrat and I will give you a treat.Whats going to happen to you when there are no more treats.Colleges have ruined the art of journalism.What in the He## are you going to do with a liberal arts degree?Some of these colleges need to be closed and the dope smoking perverted professors fired!!!
.

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Verceofreason
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:32am
No one hates capitalism.
That a right wing myth.
And universities are indoctrination mills’ is pathetic.
Santorum is upset because he hate having his bible and religion questioned by EDUCATED people
and know stupid people, will become Republicans, and eat it up.
He said so – in different words in his Values Conference speech.

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- RJJinGadsden
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:54am
  Interesting, you are calling those OWS clowns who are shouting about how horrible Capitalism is and displaying such on their placards and demonstrations signs, liars? I thought this was your crowd.
  
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- pookieamos
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:54am
  Capitalism has been under attack since Obummer walked in the door , excuse me, slithered thought the door .
  
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- pookieamos
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:58am
  Are you kidding me ? The attack on Capitalism has been on steroids since Obama slitherto through the door .
  
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- mersey
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:05am
  My question to you. Do the indoctrinated even know that they’ve been indoctrinated? By reading your comment, I’d say no. Get you head out of your arse and see the world as it is, not as you wish it were.
  
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- Zipit
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:12am
  YO! Verceoftreason…. Being “educated”, and being “schooled”, are two completely different things!
  To those of us who possess a measure of common sense, you appear to be well schooled in the subjects of, hatred, denial, envy, intolerance, jealousy, and, OH WAIT! I could have used just one word! LIBERALISM!!!!!!!
  
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- Shrugged
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:11am
  (1) Obama hates capitalism – he destroyed the bond-holders of GM and gave it to the unions
  (2) George Soros hates capitalism – and uses his billions to fund people like Obama
  (3) The ACLU hates capitalism because it places the decisions in the consumer’s hands and not theirs
  (4) Islamists hate capitalism because it violates their religion dominated political system
  
  Shall I keep going?
  
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- Walkabout
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 3:29pm
  Verceof Reason
  “and know_ stupid people, will become Republicans, and eat it up.”
  ***
  You have a problems with verb tense? Just how old are you? Your grammar seems to be getting worse. Maybe you should see a doctor.
  
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- Godfather.1
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 3:41pm
  @Shrugged
  
  I see you get all your information from Glenn Beck. Please explain how George Soros hates capitalism when he has made his money because of capitalism. Oh, that’s right, he must hate the system that made him one of the wealthiest men in the world. He must love communism despite the fact that he was instrumental in bringing down communist governments in Eastern Europe. Just because he supports causes different from you does not mean he hate capitalism. That is just something the Beck tells you and you eat it up.
  
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- Git-R-Done
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 4:52pm
  Godfather – Soros is what we call a hypocrite. It’s ok for him to make money but he doesn’t want anybody else to be allowed to make money. You’re stupid enough to believe that just b/c someone owns a business or is wealthy that it makes them lovers of capitalism.
  
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- Godfather.1
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 5:10pm
  @Git-R-Done
  
  And you’re stupid enough to believe the garbage that comes out of Glenn Beck’s mouth.
  
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- acidovorax
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:12pm
  GODFATHER, Soros wrote “The Capitalist Threat” where he posited that laissez faire capitalism was the new source of social and economic instability. “Hates” capitalism? Maybe, maybe not, but definitely not a fan of capitalism.
  
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- acidovorax
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:32pm
  VERCE wrote: “No one hates capitalism. That a right wing myth.”
  
  You really want to stand by this statement?
  
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- Git-R-Done
  Posted on September 22, 2012 at 2:21pm
  Godfather – Don’t be upset that Glenn Beck is smarter than you retarded progressives. People with brains don’t mistake academia or the media for the real world.
  
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Salamander
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:32am
“The Glenn Beck approach”? I predict that within 10 years, Harvard Business School will have a case study in its program covering “The Glenn Beck Approach: The Truth Has No Agenda!”

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Salamander
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:24am
Since when is the worker not a capitalist? People choose whether to be a capitalist or socialist or of another persuasion. But, just because one does not own the business he works for doesn’t preclude his being a capitalist! How many captains are on a football team? How many CEO’s run a corporation? Yet everone on the team is a football player and everyone in a corporation is a capitalist! Now, if you’re a government employee, it’s a different story! It’s not bad to be a government employee, but your participation in that role is NOT as a capitalist! That’s why the consumer experience in the Post Office (a quasi-government organization) is so much different that in Federal Express or UPS (both capitalist organizations)! Ever notice the ‘hustle’ in the step of a Federal Express or UPS employee? Ever notice the ‘shuffle’ in a post office employee! One cares about their employer, their job! And, the other doesn’t, he/she is just a part of ‘the system’. Workers of the World–don’t let anybody fool you! You can be a capitalist, too, if you choose to–and reap the unlimited rewards of capitalism, rather than settling for the rationed pittance of socialism!

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- Lloyd Drako
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:50am
  Working for a capitalist corporation does not make you a capitalist, it makes you an employee of capitalists. You are only a capitalist if you actually own a share or shares in the business.
  
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- acidovorax
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:36pm
  The technical definition requires ownership of some form of capital: investment in a company, ownership of the equipment, ownership of the land, etc. Workers owned money and their minor possessions, but were not capitalists due to the lack of ownership of the means of production.
  
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listeninginVT
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:22am
self educate. Why give your ‘mind’ (and $$) to people who don’t deliver a real education… cut out the middle man and just learn for yourself.

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- another mimi
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:49am
  BINGO! The Kahn Institute is showing us that we can self educate by accessing online courses — and many of them free. (Kahn’s are) That IS the future of education, and perhaps that is what will put a stop to all the nonsense we’ve had going on with liberal indoctrination in tax-paid universities.
  
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Wilsonpd
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:20am
I’ve been questioning for years now about why so many “progressives” are seemingly incapable of studying history and learning any lessons from it. I grew up watching film & seeing pictures of the long lines of people in Moscow queuing up for toilet paper, a loaf of bread. Grey people in a grey city wearing grey clothes all with blank and hopeless expressions. And these freaking “progressives” want to drag us to that utopia? WTF is wrong with these people? Do they own stock in a Vodka distillery?

Mr. Bawer has the same sentiment, but put oh so much more eloquently than I: “The history of the 20th century is one long lesson in the danger of rejecting democratic capitalism in favor of utopian economic schemes, but these young people, many of them very expensively educated, have apparently learned nothing about it at all.”

Personally I believe that the students and faculty alike has been duped by a relative few that want absolute power over others at any cost. Remember the current faculty was brainwashed when they were in school, and are now doing it to a second generation. I’m praying that these people will price themselves out of a job, but by that time the government will probably own all colleges, all professors, and dictate everything.

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oxycontinxx
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:20am
“Why Do So Many Students Hate Capitalism and America? ”

ever hear of the term…….DUMBMASSES………….??

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- floridareader
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:25am
  @oxy
  I think that more than hating capitalism, which they enjoy through the countless tech toys they have on hand, what happen with students nowadays is they have never used the neurons that came for free in the package.
  
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RIGS
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:02am
The same phony so called teachers with their bloated salaries and crooked unions spew out this moronic socialist agenda.

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jackact
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:02am
Liberal indoctrination begins in public school, not college.
A teacher in NY state, yesterday, just challenged her high school seniors to vote Obama.
Research this.
‘Cradle to grave’ is the false promise. From K-12 and then continuing, especially in STATE universities.
Destructive liberal parenting fills the gaps.
Yes we are producing subsequent generations of idiots that cannot act on principle and lack the EDUCATION to argue on point.
Repeal the 10th amendment.
Game over.

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- pookieamos
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:47am
  Glenn had a show in which he showed our reading books for elementary, history book . They are teaching them the Constitution says government is responsible for food, clothing, housing, education in our society ! WTF
  
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- jackact
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:28am
  Pookieamos,
  That way they will make great government employee when they enter the workforce.
  They will never question authority and continue to hide in the shelter of the public trust for the rest of their unproductive lives.
  Sad, huh?
  
  Report this comment
HKS
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 7:58am
The public school system in America is the incubator for socialism and communism. So from the age of five or six, kids are pounded with the socialist principals by teachers with an agenda. Schools are so corrupted that they can’t be saved. Time for a re-boot.

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The Third Archon
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 7:54am
Two of your “three evils,” “imperialism, colonialism,” are the EXACT SAME ACTION from active-passive perspectives respectively (that is to say, one is “done,” and the other is the “being done to,” of the same set of actions).

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- RJJinGadsden
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:26am
  In all of my life I have never witnessed an American Empire, although from the Vietnam related demonstrations from my high school days to now, I keep hearing that somewhere on the face of this planet is an American Empire. The same goes for American Colonialism. I’m sure that from your perceived loft perch that you consider so many of us lacking enough intelligence to understand this American imperialism, and colonialism. Here is your chance now to teach us simplistic low lifes about those things that we fail to see.
  
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- RJJinGadsden
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:32am
  Correction: lofty perch
  
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- Zipit
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:36am
  ARCH! I’m worried about ya! You need to chill out a bit! Your obviously, (and excessively), educated brain seems to be on constant overload! Your daily over examination ad analysis of just about everything, quite frankly, hurts my head! It’s 8:30 am, and after reading a couple of your posts, I find myself needing a scotch and a handfull of Advil! So maybe you cold slip a little something in your cup of Earl Gray, grab you walking cane, and take the standard for a walk. Have a little fun today!
  
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- Zipit
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:41am
  RJJ….. I have a lofty porch!
  
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- RJJinGadsden
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:48am
  ZIPIT, LOL, at least it is not a self perceived lofty porch. I hear you, Bud. I’m resisting pouring a shot of dark rum in my coffee about now too. But, nothing wrong with Earl Gray, I learned to enjoy it during my near nine years in Europe. Not from just watching Star Trek TNG.
  
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- The Gooch
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:48am
  I believe a good example illustrating both the bias & ignorance of a “shepherd” (i.e., educator) was recently posted as a video on the The Blaze for comment. A Professor Dyson referred to Muslims (not Muslims in the U.S., but Muslims throughout the world) as a “predictable minority”. Um, in the grand scheme of things, Muslims are NOT what any sane person would consider a minority. Dyson would have to answer as to what he meant by predictable. What I saw as predictable was the insinuation that any criticism of Islam was racist. Um, Islam is a religion, not a race. Dyson even went on to parse how Muslim violence (murder, hate) was “different” (READ: acceptable?) when compared to the left’s great bugaboo, Christianity. Bizarre.
  So to clarify to your like-minded brethren, critiquing a concern (a religion, homosexual activism, ideological opposites) is not a “hate crime.” It is allegedly a right. If I wanna wipe my rear on a Che Guevara T-shirt, I’m protesting ignorance of a murdering peacock. Perhaps you could join me by burning any tome glorifying a certain General Custer.
  I agree: Generalizations & ignorance are too frequent on both sides of the ideological spectrum. I believe the problem from too many folks (left & right) is a demand for a “just us” club… tolerance is not a virtue, it’s a word to throw in a conventient platitude.
  There is a bias at amongst the so called higher education field. You don’t have to acknowledge it…..
  
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- The Third Archon
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 11:16am
  @RJJ
  1) I liked the way you had “lofty perch” better the first time–loft perch, that sounds like fun.
  2) I never asserted American did those things, just made a comment about their definitions.
  3) However, I WILL now assert America did those things, since you wrongly assert the contrary–and I submit to you the colonies we STILL hold (of course we don’t CALL them that anymore, it’s not “PC” in the post-WWII era where WE told all other countries “hey guys, no more empires”): The U.S. Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, the Marshall Islands, the Falkland Islands, Guam, and American Samoa. I’m probably forgetting some. Also, colonies we USED to control and now don’t: the Philippines, and Cuba (both of which we only grudgingly relinquished in the face of violent protest).
  
  Just because you aren’t murdering the people of a place en masse doesn’t mean it isn’t a colony–it is sufficient that you subordinate its sovereignty to your own without any democratic approval of your authority to do so.
  @ZIP
  Should one mix Scotch and Advil? Also, there is no such a thing as “too educated”–might as well say someone can be “too undeceived.” Moreover, I relish every minute of it.
  
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- The Gooch
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 11:49am
  3rd,
  I believe the U.K. may be shocked to learn the U.S. has annexed the Falkland Islands. Meh, I suppose this is a forgivable mistake, but one some ignorant mouthpiece will ignore and adopt into their anti-U.S. rant. However, it does dismiss the actual history of the Argentinian people. That whole Falkland Wars… um, what role did the U.S. have in that again? Also, your claim that Cube was a U.S. colony is dubious. Do you know your Teddy Roosevelt history? Hell, I don’ know if your forgetting any colonies, but you’re sure as hell being sloppy in your list of “Who’s Who in American Colonialism.”
  This is one of the ploys that cheeses me off with leftists: Sloppy history. Read up on the Falkands and the history of Cuba and get back to us with that mea culpa. Granted, emotion can lead to mistakes (I’m as guilty as you in this at times), but you ran willy-nilly into a corner with your scolding. Oops.
  
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- The Third Archon
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 12:58pm
  @GOOCH
  You are correct about the current possessor of the Falklands–my bad, I must have confused the American FUNDING of the British war to retain control of their colony with the imperialism…oh wait…
  
  As for Cuba, were it not for yellow fever and the Teller Amendment we probably WOULD have retained it outright–as it was, we ONLY occupied and ruled it directly until we grudgingly gave it up, and even then we passed the Platt amendment, limiting Cuban sovereignty in foreign affairs, just one example of numerous interventions (exactly the definition of imperialism, i.e. autocratically supplanting sovereignty, I’ve offered supra) in Cuban politics specifically, and Latin America generally–and people like you wonder why there’s a history of anti-American sentiment in many Latin American countries.
  
  You conservatives make the oddest, and stupidest, decisions with regards to political criticism anyhow–you whine and complain about the most trivial or beneficial policies of government, but when it comes to the greatest atrocities committed by the same, you couldn’t be more apologetic blind shills for it. Exactly the kind of jingoistic idiot every tyranny loves its citizens to be, and exactly the kind of citizens who foster tyranny in the first place. Governments have enough incentive to abuse their power, without idiots like you justifying and apologizing for them every time they do.
  
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- RJJinGadsden
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 1:34pm
  THE THIRD ARCHON, Happy to have provided some entertainment. Enjoy your perch.
  I am not asserting that the U.S, currently has an empire either. Although some of our politicians from the beginning did try. Filthy business much like the slave trade that our colonies were anchored with by The Crown. In my near 60 years on this earth, I have known no such empire to exist under the American flag. Yes, we have had colonies about the world in the past. And yes, some of the former colonies are now considered territories. Much like the territories in Mainland America that are now states. Guam will eventually be fully returned to Japan, but considering the massive brutality of the Bushido Japan Empire and what they did to other nations from prior to WWII that extended well beyond their defeat. One of those results was Vietnam. I had no problem with the U.S. maintaining a military presence on Guam in the post war era. Now that Bushido is long gone, a new treaty with Japan, in my opinion a new treaty with Japan should be in the works. Actually, I believe that it is. I have been stationed in various places while in the Army with personnel from the Virgin Islands, American Samoa, and many from Puerto Rico. Never heard any complaints from them other than several Puerto Ricans complained that they were not yet a state. I do know that is not desire of all Puerto Ricans though. I did have a good friend in Heilbronn who was Iranian by birth.
  
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- RJJinGadsden
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 1:48pm
  Continued: The family settled in the Virgin Islands, and he loved America, and was proud to be a service member. Something that I suspect that you will never understand, but hey, each to his own right? I’ve also known a number of service members from American Samoa. That is a place that in my opinion that should be free of the U.S. Those who were in the service were sending their paycheck home to support their families who could not earn enough in the Pelosi family canneries. Yes, those islands should be pried away from those corporations. But, discuss that with Nancy. I’m almost positive that you at least in spirit support her. Now, the Falklands mention does befuddle me, unless you are referring to the USS Lexington raid in 1831. A short lived raid to recover four U.S. vessels taken by pirates in the area. Other than that I knew a good number of British troops who went there in ’82. While stationed in Grafenwohr the BAOR had training priority and one morning they were lined up to convoy back to their installations for redeployment to England, then the Falklands. The Phillipines and Cuba were a necessity of the time, but unless you think that Gitmo is a colony, we have no further involvement. Gitmo is part of the post 1899 treaty with Cuba. But, we do not attack nations and territories with the intent to empire build now, do we? If we do go to war, the land is generally returned almost immediately. Maybe you consider our involvement in the world an empire or colony.
  
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- The Gooch
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 2:03pm
  Hmm, not sure I deserved the “idiot” tag. I’m all for having an accurate account of history. If and when the U.S. acts as a bastard in the grand scheme of human events, it needs to be owned. I’ve made it no secret on this forum that neither political party owns me. I don’t wave the flag to feel good about myself. I can recognize our boils and realize we’ve made a damn solid try at attempting to pursue an egalitarian society. Human constructs, eh? Are they ever perfect?
  This brings up a question I have for folks who are insistent the U.S. is the end-all, be-all of history’s bastards: Can you please identify to me the one guilt-free concern of human history? I’ll take a religion, race, country… and they don’t have to be extant.
  Seems you reaffirmed my stance on the civility of folks who lean (hard) left. Thanks for your time. I don’t think you’re an idiot… you made a mistake and may be colored by bias. Wow. Your human. However, continuing such an ad hominem course could paint you as, in the end, pedestrian in his embrace of leftist ideology. Think and behave as you will.
  
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- The Third Archon
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 2:21pm
  @RJJ
  We significantly funded the British war to retain control of the Falklands (the Falklands War), which is the imperial involvement I was referring to. Originally, I did mix up the roles of the actors, which may be a part of the confusion, and if so I apologize.
  As to all the other examples of the result of colonialism at various points, by no means do I mean to say that the U.S.’ governance has always, or now, been vicious and cruel, and certainly not the worst in history. But that doesn’t excuse us from learning form the mistakes we HAVE made, nor does it change the fact that they WERE examples of imperialism, often explicitly for that purpose. Sometimes justifiable perhaps, but not always. And some of these mistakes have been quite damaging to the locals–we cannot forget, most importantly cannot forget, the more unpleasant bits of our history, or we will never learn to make NEW mistakes in lieu of continuing in the old.
  
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- The Third Archon
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 2:31pm
  @GOOCH
  Just because you don’t identify as “Republican” or “Democrat” doesn’t mean you don’t have an ideological allegiance, and more importantly doesn’t immunize you from being an ideological or nationalist apologist. You claim not to be an idiot, yet you engage in sweeping generalization about the civility of the Left (a civility I never claimed to take part in–whose engaging in groupthink assumptions now?). I called you an idiot because of things you assert, not because of a way you identify yourself.
  
  But to move on to substantive matters, I agree that America is not the worst country, or the worst empire, in the history of the world. That being said: (1) That’s irrelevant to whether or not we HAVE engaged in imperialism, and (2) That’s also irrelevant to the mistakes WE’VE made, and what we should do about them and learn from them.
  
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- The Gooch
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 4:13pm
  3rd,
  As one idiot to a smug prig, thanks (?) for bothering to put me in my place. There are moments when I foolishly believed there may be more to you than typical leftist blather. Oh, you’re polished, I’ll give you that, but I’ll not make the mistake of defending your one act show again. Still waiting on your dissertation regarding history’s guilt-free, squeaky clean entity (or entities). Let me guess: It was/is a secular concern. Or will you bother to state the obvious…. Or you can just dismiss this challenge (yet again). Funny with leftists: Quick to judge others… yet ready to howl in dismay when critiqued or questioned. Screw your rules, man!
  It is absolutely ridiculuous in review of your posts just on this article alone for you to scold others on the sin of generalizing. So much for playing nice when you’re revealed to be tripping over yourself in your enthusiasm.
  I’m REALLY an idiot because I don’t carry the same brand of water. Yep. That’s not new. Oh, I believe the left (“gasp” in general… and with posters on this forum) pines for civility from the opposition… but continuously reveals that’s a one way street of expectations. Meh, whatever. I’m a big boy and if you wanna go with the ad hominem approach, I’ve been there and done that. Yep, we all have our biases… and experience will reinforce them, yes?
  Not feeling the hate… just disappointment. Woe is me.
  
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- acidovorax
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 11:10pm
  RJJING wrote: “In all of my life I have never witnessed an American Empire, although from the Vietnam related demonstrations from my high school days to now, I keep hearing that somewhere on the face of this planet is an American Empire.”
  
  Why do you assume that “empire” must equate to total acquisition of a territory? Is our 500+ bases in over 40 nations not influential? How many foreign military bases are located in the US? Also, it’s seems confusing that so many conservatives wish to deny our “empire”, yet the current meme I keep hearing from talk radio is that the current Middle East crises is due to “America not leading” the world. Were we imperial before and now not? Are conservatives demanding we become or regain our imperial status?
  
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cubber
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 7:53am
They are victims. We have stolen from them and whatever it takes to fix that, we must do. Stop the spending madness. Zero deficit spending immediately.

Be Prepared.

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- The Gooch
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 9:04am
  Lots o’ pronouns with no antecedents. Who is this “we” and “they” exactly? I need to know which box I go in. Should I be on my knees begging forgiveness or standing over the prostrated villains and gnashing my teeth.
  
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- llotus
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 5:24pm
  cubber….when one brings something upon themselves are they truely victoms? Confucius. Lotus.
  
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The Third Archon
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 7:52am
1) Just because you criticize capitalism does not mean you “hate America.”
2) “WHY DO SO MANY STUDENTS HATE CAPITALISM AND AMERICA?” Sweeping generalization much?
3) Just because you criticize the POLICIES of the American government does not mean you “hate America.”

But I guess for conservatives “HAPPINESS IS MANDATORY CITIZEN!”

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- loriann12
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:04am
  Try that on your fiancee….I love you so much, let’s see if we can change everything about you and make you into something else….America is based on capitalism, and it isn’t evil. Evil is taking what people make through honest work and giving it to someone who wants to sit at home and do nothing, but still live comfortably. If you want to sit at home and do nothing, it is certainly your right. Get your family to support you. I don’t want to. I’m having a hard enough time supporting my family.
  
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- watashbuddyfriend
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:14am
  @ loriann12
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:04am
  
  “Try that on your fiancee….I love you so much, let’s see if we can change everything about you and make you into something else….America is based on capitalism, and it isn’t evil….”
  
  Dang, Lori, Excellent comment!
  
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- Stelex
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:28am
  3rd……..I’m guessing you went to Columbia
  
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- The Gooch
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:59am
  Happiness for way too many folks is being told what to think, being led by the nose and being driven by emotion. I see way too many leftists who believe sound discourse begins and ends with two simple responses: “F’ you!” and “Shut up.” Wow. Heady. And, yes, the same brand of moron is to be found on the right. But isn’t it odd that the F-bomb throwers and those wishing to shut down debate on the left are often those who are supposed to be educated and therefore (assumed) tolerant? I know one thing for sure: A helluva lot of progressives are anything but liberal.
  Neither side has a monopoly on ignorance or bullies. I just know from my experience the left tends to be more organized in its attempts to bully and dismiss. Think as you will… at least you present as a being that will bother to do more than emote. That makes you an anomaly amongst your like-minded ilk. Careful… if you think too much for yourself, that may make you suspect.
  
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- Individualism
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:29am
  it depends on the school and teachers. maybe the liberal thing is pushed more in the so called private ivy league schools, but in schools like Georgia Tech, Emory or UNC Chapel Hill there isn’t much of that going on and its more hard heavy work load and learning. each place is different and for that man to generalize only weakens his case. same for grade school depends on school and teachers.
  
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- The Third Archon
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 10:53am
  @LORIANN12
  America might have been founded during capitalism’s ascendance, but capitalism is no more fundamental and essential to America’s culture or polity than slavery was. Also, you clearly don’t understand what “capitalism” is based upon your conflation of it with completely unrelated vagueries and assumptions about what non-capitalist economic systems must necessitate. Capitalism refers to a specific system of ownership of the means of economic production, i.e. capital goods. Specifically, capitalism refers to economies dominated by the PRIVATE ownership of the capital goods of an economy. THAT’S it–nothing more, nothing less. It is not uncommon to confuse capitalism with other elements of an economy, such as the price-setting mechanism (i.e market, barter, and command economies). This is no accident, as the conflation and confusion only serves to advance the interests of capitalists and justify their ownership of the means of production as socially beneficial, regardless of whether it is, or whether the specific benefits they claim flow from such ownership are the CONSEQUENCE of that system of ownership, or completely independent economic factors.
  
  @STELEX
  I am honored by your assumption.
  
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- The Third Archon
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 11:05am
  @LORI
  Also, your analogy is flawed. A person has feelings–abstract economic policy does not. Moreover, you shouldn’t get engaged to someone who you feel is mostly flawed with regards to character and/or actions (much like the factors upon which capitalism is often criticized, i.e. for its comparative consequences and effects in relation to other economic systems) in the first place.
  
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- Walkabout
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 3:42pm
  The Third Archon
  Loriann12
  
  The statement “America is based on capitalism” is true.
  
  America was based on life, liberty & private property. That draft did not survive because of the evils of slavery. Some people who inherited from the past could not let go of slavery. Otherwise, we would not have the term pursuit of happiness.
  
  P.S. George Washington freed his slaves, but he did so slowly. He was afraid of taking the economic hit. But I don’t hold George Washington in disregard. Slavery still exists in Africa, Mauritania & Sudan, to this day. Plus we see so many politicians enriching themselves at a frenetic pace, AL Gore & Bill Clinton come to mind. No doubt in my mind that if they had inherited a plantation in 1776 they would have not freed any slaves.
  
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- Git-R-Done
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 4:48pm
  TTA – Yes you leftists do hate America since you want to take away private property rights, which is based on capitalism and it’s in the Constitution.
  
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Snowleopard {gallery of cat folks}
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 7:52am
We are seeing the results of 100 years of progressive poisoning of the system of our Republic. We have one chance to begin turning it around; or we go into the night for good.

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- Stelex
  Posted on September 19, 2012 at 8:32am
  Unfortunately Snow, I think its gonna take more than voting at this point.
  
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EddieGin
Posted on September 19, 2012 at 7:51am
From ******* teachers…where else?

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