New York Post Online Edition:

Columbia's Bigotry is an article by Charles Millard in the New York Post. (Linked from Power Line concerning Columbia University's refusal to consider, or even debate, the return of ROTC after 36 years, even though 65% of the students would either welcome or accept it. The Law School finds a debate on the issue less productive than a "teach-in." It's obvious that the faculty hasn't purchased new calendars since about 1972. "Teach-in's?" Give me a break.

Columbia is rated as a major, influential university. So, one wonders, what is the school's committement to learning and intellectual diversity? I think you can find it in their Mission Statement , which start's with "In carrying out Columbia's great educational mission, today's faculty must answer many of the same questions that have always confronted outstanding teachers and scholars. What would we have our students know? What bodies of knowledge, what sets of methodologies, what worldviews should our graduates take away with their degrees?" I liked the part about the faculty answering the thorny question of "what worldviews" their graduates take away from the school. Sounds very much like the university's mission is thought police even though "the University is committed to preserving the quest for knowledge as more than simply a practical pursuit. Through its broad range of innovative multidisciplinary programs, and through the earnest exploration of difficult questions, Columbia provides students from the United States and around the world with the depth of understanding and intellectual flexibility they need to respond to the challenges we all will face in the years to come."

The quest for knowledge seems to be limited to a particular worldview dictated by the faculty. I'm sure that if anyone attempted to dictate an alternate worldview on the faculty, the screams about academic freedom would be heard across the country without aid of electronic enhancement.

If it is a matter of choice, I couldn't care less whether someone likes the military or not. I'm not even sure how viable an ROTC program at Columbia would be. However, when the learned scholars refuse to even debate the proposition; stifle free speech; and dictate a certain "worldview," nothing they say can convince me that they are not more dictatorial and totalitarian than the "evil" military they so hate.

I'm willing to bet that the senior military leaders are about as "educated" as the Columbia faculty. Maybe that's what they fear the most.