Originally published at: The Trump Administration’s New Protection Racket for Higher Ed
This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis. A version of this article first appeared at Balkinization. The Trump administration last week attempted to make universities an offer we can’t refuse. With great fanfare, the administration announced that a short list of prestigious universities were being invited to adopt a “compact”…
This can’t stand.
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Pointing like that is rude, donald.
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The universities have to stand strong and put up a united front against this absurd and insulting “deal.”
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Great article, thanks for clarifying that bullshit.
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“Just say no.”
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Guv Newsom (America’s Favorite Governor!!) has the right idea: announce that any in-state U’s and colleges that collaborate by signing these extortion letters will get zero state funding.
Experience so far indicates that America’s colleges don’t believe that “academic freedom” is any part of their mission. I guess they just exist to front a variety of professional sports teams and build assorted structures named after big donors, right?
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I agree with Newsom. Six members of my family attended California public state universities, and three generations of us became college graduates. I was the first generation to attain a college degree.
By the way, Scott McKenzie donated millions to two of the state universities we attended.
Seeing what has happened to what used to be a democracy is sickening. I am on vacation in Ottawa and this morning the tour guide and I laughed about Mark Carney being interviewed by Jon Stewart on The Daily Show. It was very big news in Canada after the interview. There is nothing I can laugh about regarding the USA.
I dread the end of the vacation and returning home.
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that is the saddest statement i have read to-day…
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Go Bruins: Almost identical numbers with my family. I’m the first on the US side to go to university. My daughter is a law professor.
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I will be reposting this analysis onto my class’ alumni page at Brown, and writing President Paxton personally to make sure Brown is part of “The Resistance.”
No Kings Day, October 18. Be sure you attend one in your local municipality!
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An update from October 10: MIT is refusing the offer it “can’t refuse.” Alumni might want to send a note of thanks to its administration, and maybe even a check.
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Good GOD…I remember the days when Bush only hired lawyers from Liberty U because they were ‘good conservatives’. Today they are trying to make ALL Universities bow to the Republican ‘standards’. MANY of those making decisions barely made it thru 4 years, if that.
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This is an excellent article. I agree with every word. But I have spent my life in academic communities and long ago internalized the values of research universities. I would claim to be a “careful reader.”
My question is what to say to those whose ox is not gored by this latest ploy. Why should they care even a little about the threats to universities if the government controls them? Would they recognize the absurdity of the demand that noting anti-Semitic or anti-Christian can be discussed, when some of the historical roots of anti-Semitism are found the in distorted histories that are found in the New Testament?
I would guess that most TPM readers to not need anyone to remind them of what Trumpism is all about. Who can preach to those voters who are not in choir?
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My alma mater, MIT, politely but firmly rejected it. In addition, one of my classmates sent a copy of the Compact to everybody in our class so that we could see just what it really was. My own analysis of it strongly echoes this article’s author’s. I especially enjoyed one rather unobtrusive line in the rejection: And of course, MIT abides by the law.
I hope that the MSM are swamped by letters demanding that they offer a factual analysis of the Compact rather than more of the same old deceptive bullshit that they keep trying to deceive us with. I don’t expect that to happen until it becomes more obvious that Trump and MAGA are both losing every ounce of their vile control over the nation.
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Multitudes share your hopes - really, really want to see the pendulum reverse it’s toxic direction.
One apprehension - never have we seen the “pendulum” swing so far towards a totalatrian Right - wing path to a malevolent police state
… if we do get a reversal of direction - how do we implement momentum dampening? How do we (with 3+ years of “MAGA” Whitehouse control) set the coordinates for a path to humane sanity? Swinging from one toxic extreme to some unmanaged “other” extreme is not magically going to automatically be a path to the ideal …
IT IS SCARY -These bastards will have gotten inside of CDC, FDA, FEMA, STATE, IRS, TREASURY, ICE, FAA, MILITARY and on and on … and torn out all of the wiring & cut the fuel lines … what sort of dream team will conceivably be able to make the nation function if any crisis impacts the nation in ways that would depend upon the institutional knowledge & functions that have been decimated by these idiot MAGA IGNORANT luddites?
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