Vietnam Vets For Academic Freedom and Students for Academic Freedom

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A student at Bowling Green University in Ohio had enrolled in the ROTC program and was planning on getting a commission in the Army upon graduation. In his last term, when he had completed all the credits he needed for graduation, he decided to take a lecture course on the Viet Nam War — purely out of his interest in the subject.

The professor turned out to be a ’60s leftist who regarded America as an imperialist monster and the Viet Nam War an expression of America’s inherent racism and capitalist greed. Unfortunately for the student the course was on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and Thursday was also the day he attended his ROTC training class and was required to wear his military uniform.

Of course, a professor who regards his classroom as a political platform for indoctrination is not likely to respect the rights of students who disagree with his point of view and this professor was no exception. Having discovered a member of the military he hated sitting in his classroom, he could not resist the temptation to single out the uniform-clad student as a symbol of the imperialist enemy he was lecturing about. Naturally the student became very uncomfortable.

and then this From Vietnam Vets for Academic Reform:

“The suffering of the Indochinese people under Communism is one of the most tragic sagas of the 20th century. The terror that Communists perpetrated in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos after their victory in 1975 defies simple characterization. The leftists among us, meanwhile, continue to spout their lies about Southeast Asia and about the horror that Communism brought to that region. They love erasing the historical memory of the millions of people who were liquidated on the altar of socialist ideals . And engaging in historical amnesia is precisely where socialists and neo-nazis share one of their most sacred common bonds.

IMHO, the most putrid lies of the Left have to do with the assumption that the U.S. was somehow fighting the people of Vietnam, when it in fact it was actually fighting the Communists who were seeking to imprison them. The fact of the matter is that it was the North Vietnamese and the Vietcong, as well as the anti-war demonstrations in America, who were the enemies of the Vietnamese people – not the American government which sacrificed 58,000 of its young men in an effort to save them.

It was the American effort to save Indochina from Communism that was admirable. And it was the anti-war movement, of which many of the “progressives” are so proud, that was the shameful – and shameless – abomination.

“Every testimony by North Vietnamese generals in the postwar years has affirmed that they knew they could not defeat the United States on the battlefield, and that they counted on the division of our people at home to win the war for them. This is what happened. The blood of hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese, and tens of thousands of Americans, is on the hands of the anti-war activists who prolonged the struggle and gave victory to the Communists…and we wanted them to win.”

It is because of stories like this that I believe David Horowitz’s fight against the leftist agenda at universities is terribly, terribly important to our future as a nation. The leftists are well aware that what they have to do to gain control is further indoctrinate our youth. Horowitz created a national student organization with chapters on 140 college campuses. The goal is to stop the political indoctrination of students and to restore “intellectual diversity” to college campuses. They’re called “Students for Academic Freedom“.

A blacklist instituted by the left has purged conservatives from college faculties so that left-leaning professors will outnumber conservatives by a ratio of 30-1 in the next generation. We’ve already changed the policies of the State of Colorado to conform to the tenets of academic freedom, and David is currently moving legislation in 20 additional states. He’s also developed a campus ad campaign. He published ads on nearly 100 college campuses about the war on terror, reaching nearly 1 million members of the college community. Many of these ads have been censored! With the help of CSPC board member John O’Neill of Swift Boat fame and attorney David French, David is preparing to sue the papers at Texas A&M and other schools under the First Amendment so that the defenders of America can get a hearing on these campuses. “Peace study” programs indoctrinate students in sympathies for the terrorists and hostility to their own country. David picked the state of Indiana as a test case. Here is a conservative state funding terrorist propaganda programs. David is going to involve media and legislators to stop this outrage and set a precedent for other states. We’ve already gained the support of key legislators in Indiana and other states.

Our institutions of higher learning must have an Academic Bill of Rights that stresses intellectual diversity, that demands balance in reading lists, that recognizes that political partisanship by professors in the classroom is an abuse of students’ academic freedom, that the inequity in funding of student organizations and visiting speakers is unacceptable, and that a learning environment hostile to conservatives is unacceptable.

Universities should not be indoctrination centers for the political left. It should not be a fight for young students to get a complete education, to learn more than half the story. It shouldn’t be a battle for conservatives or Christians to gain teaching positions, to have their work seriously considered, and to be tenured.

Making our schools operate under the umbrella of the Academic Bill of Rights will change that. Every word in the Academic Bill of Rights goes the heart of ending the current crisis on our campuses. Here are some of the basic rights we’re demanding:

• Hiring, firing, promoting or granting tenure shall be on the basis of performance – not on the basis of political or religious beliefs. An absolute must to protect academic freedom!
• Tenure, search and hiring committee meetings will be recorded and available to duly authorized authorities empowered to inquire into the integrity of the process. Once again, political philosophy or religious beliefs may not enter into the picture.
• Students will be graded on their work … not their political beliefs or religion.
• Course content and reading lists in humanities and social sciences will reflect diverse concepts and viewpoints – not just the overwhelmingly leftist content that is being fed to our college students today.
• Selection of speakers, allocation of funds for speaker activities and other student activities will observe the principles of academic freedom and promote intellectual balance. A CSPC review of major university commencement speakers revealed that 99 percent were self-identified Democrats or liberals.
• Academic institutions and professional societies should maintain a posture of organizational neutrality.

Horowitz is working right now to get legislatures and university boards to ratify the Academic Bill of Rights, and already Colorado, Georgia and Missouri lawmakers are on the verge of doing just that. Now he’s asking everyone to join him in this important work. Work that will change the learning atmosphere on our campuses, and make our schools more reflective of the citizens funding those colleges — people like you and your friends and neighbors.

If you agree with this goal please take these steps with me now:

1. Sign the Academic Bill of Rights Endorsement. Our goal is to get more than 500,000 signatures — 10,000 per state — to present to lawmakers, alumni, regents and administrations across the nation! When they learn that Americans are angry about what has happened to our colleges they will take notice, I assure you.

2. Make a contribution of $20, $35, $50, $100 or even $1,000 if possible, to CSPC’s CAMPAIGN FOR AMERICA’S CAMPUSES. Our budget for the fall is $325,000 to fund every element of this vital project.

• Run ads detailing the Academic Bill of Rights in student newspapers across the nation.
• Alert alumni and state legislators to precisely what is happening on our campuses. Alumni associations hold the purse strings to the largest private funds colleges receive, while state legislators hold the biggest financial bag – your tax dollars.
• Publish and distribute 250,000 more copies of the new booklet, Unpatriotic University. The booklet gives a wealth of information about the bias in hiring, the anti-American rhetoric, and the shutting out of conservative points of view both in classrooms and on speakers’ platforms. Unpatriotic University is a powerful weapon in our fight to get the truth out to education leaders, alumni, and legislators. I’m going to send it to the same legislators, community leaders, alumni and faculty and staff who will get the Academic Bill of Rights Endorsement.

Horowitz is going to continue his work, traveling to college campuses to deliver the truth about America, about the conservative principles this country was founded upon and the remarkable society shaped by those principles. Our campaign is steadily gathering momentum . . . and we don’t want to lose it.

This is ambitious, but ask yourself: what options do we have? Do we just give up on our colleges and accept that the radical, anti-American left is in charge of teaching our nation’s future leaders? No. We cannot do that.

We can’t take this battle into the trenches without your financial support. Make a contribution of $25 or more today and Horowitz will send you CSPC’s special booklet, Unpatriotic University FREE. The booklet details the crisis on our campuses and offers solutions.

Another worthy cause, IMO, again here’s the link to Horowitz to support this initiative.

A CSPC survey found that 99% of graduation day speakers called themselves liberals, Democrats, or Green Party Members. This is unacceptable. Please endorse our Academic Bill of Rights and make as generous a contribution as you can afford to CSPC today. Thanks again.

And to my readers-the conservative college student bloggers, who’ve recently contacted me, KEEP BLOGGING!!!!

Education or Indoctrination?

Here is a list of the top 10 conservative colleges, compliments of the Young Americas Foundation.

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