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Comment by Larry Ross, December 30, 2004

The purposeful dumbing down of the population in the US is evident in films, mass media and now in schools and University. At all costs, students are taught to avoid the great new crime -"liberalism" by not allowing themselves to be too well-educated - especially in the humanities. Science and technology don't much challenge the ruling élite. The trends are indicated in the following article.

People are being taught not to question, dissent or criticise their great leader - not even when Bush invents a string of lies to get them into war. This invites and results in more terrorism and resistance.. Even when it is found that there is no substance to his lies or other excuses for the Iraq war, Bush and his neocons conduct the war with ever increasing intensity. So far they've managed to destroy and poison with DU much of Iraq. They've killed 100,000 Iraqis according to a medical survey published in Lancet. That 's just for starters. With a quiescent population, fewer and fading anti-war demonstrations, Bush will probably implement the next steps after January 20, 2005 - Inauguration day. They want the oil and middle east domination according to their plan. The potential wealth and power from waging continuous war is enormous. So God must have told him to do it. The God excuse is a Fundamentalist Bush trump card reserved for his use alone. He knows that can justify anything and that enough of the American people will believe, accept, and co-operate to allow it to happen. Not many will oppose what Bush claims is ordained by God.

Bush will call it bringing freedom and democracy to the poor, oppressed people in the middle east. Democrats and Republicans will applaud and John Kerry will call for unity and for loyal Americans to help win Bush's "wars on terror".
A pliant, fearful, unquestioning US population is essential to help make this Orwell's world.

Of course there will be a few American dissenters. But most dissent will be smothered, ignored by the corporate mass media, or talked down by rabid right wing commentators. He'll deal with dissent as Big Brother did in Orwell's 1984. Wait and see.

Who would have predicted that it would be so easy to con the people in the land of the free and the brave into sacrificing their sons and daughters for Bush's phoney wars and Imperial ambitions.

There are thousands of nuclear weapons at Bush's command, including those of Tony Blair's UK and Sharon's Israel. Bush's new permissive nuclear doctrines, and his enthusiastic neocon administration, have set the stage for nuclear wars. Americans accept that, as easily as Jim Jones loyal followers accepted his leadership (and poisoning) in order to go to a heavenly world. That's the prospect at this time. It is possible, but looks unlikely, that there will be enough sane Americans left with the power to stop Bush before he commits his arsenals to the unthinkable.

If the worst happens, that's the end of our existence. No second chances.

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Careful Not to Get Too Much Education...
Or You Could Turn Liberal

by Dr. Teresa Whitehurst, December 28, 2004

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1228-32.htm

I've been giving a lot of thought lately to a conversation I overheard at a Starbucks in Nashville last winter. It was a cold and rainy night as I worked away at my laptop, but the comforting aroma of cappuccino kept me going. My comfort was interrupted, however, by two young men who sat down in upholstered chairs near my table. One was talking, the other listening, in what appeared to be an informal college orientation.

"The only trouble with David Lipscomb (a conservative Christian college nearby) is that old man Lipscomb apparently didn't like football. So we don't have a football team, but we have a great faculty."

"But you do have to be careful about one thing," he said more quietly, coming closer and speaking in hushed tones, "My professor-I have this great professor-told me that you have to be careful not to get too much education, because you could lose your foundation, your core values."

The neophyte nodded solemnly, his eyebrows raised with worry.

"If you get a bachelors," the seasoned student reassured, "you'll probably be okay. But my professor said that when you get a master's, and definitely if you go beyond that, you can lose your values. He said that college students have to be watchful because if you get too much education, you could turn LIBERAL. He's seen it happen to a lot of good Christians."

Both young men looked around again to make sure no-one was listening (unfortunately my hearing is excellent, even when I wish it weren't), and shuddered visibly. They shook their heads at the terrifying fate that could befall them.

I found it hard to concentrate after that, my mind returning again and again to one question: "What would happen to higher education in America if this fear of "too much education", and this presumption that liberal views are the devil's snare rather than the logical consequences of exposure to science, philosophy, literature and diversity, became widespread?"

Sadly, it has already happened, and is growing on college campuses across the US. A recent article by Justin Pope, "Conservatives Flip Academic Freedom Debate: Liberal professors are accused of attempting to indoctrinate students. But some teachers say pupils are trying to avoid new ideas." (AP, 12/25/04) describes this anti-liberal movement, weakly disguised as "balancing" their courses with conservative views:

"Leading the movement is Students for Academic Freedom, with chapters on 135 campuses and close ties to David Horowitz, a onetime liberal campus activist turned conservative commentator. The group posts student complaints on its website about alleged episodes of grading bias and unbalanced, anti-American propaganda by professors - often in classes.

"Instructors "need to make students aware of the spectrum of scholarly opinion," Horowitz said. "You can't get a good education if you're only getting half the story."" The "other half" of the story may not be factual, however, but doctrinal. As the young man in Starbucks said just before he and the incoming freshman got up to leave, "Even at Lipscomb, you have to be careful what you pay attention to. My professor said that a few faculty members might lead you astray without
meaning to, by bringing in ideas that aren't biblical. He said that if you're ever taught anything that sounds questionable, you should talk about it with your minister to see if it's right."

Even as a Christian raised in the evangelical tradition, this shocked me. I suppose it shouldn't have; the Southern Baptist Convention recently considered a proposal to urge all parents to pull their children out of public schools to prevent their exposure to "non-biblical ideas" which, as it happens, run rampant in fields like medicine, physics, archeology, literature, philosophy, history, astronomy, psychology, theology-in short, everything.

What will happen to that innovative American spirit if radical "conservatives" have their way with our educational system? How will the US fare in the global marketplace when certain ideas, or entire fields, become off-limits to students who've been indoctrinated to consult their ministers before learning new information?

What will happen to medical research, for instance, if this movement proceeds to its logical conclusion: outlawing the scientific method, a method notorious for not relying on biblical principles?

I fear men like Horowitz because uncensored education is essential to our democracy, our people's well-being and the nation's long-term survival. The "conservative" movement that he's spearheading reminds me of the news reports coming out of Iran in the months just prior to the conservative religious takeover of that country when its professors were warned to present the "correct" views in class.

This movement pretends to be about "balancing" liberal with conservative views, but the reality is a lot uglier than that. As the conversation I overheard suggests, this movement isn't about balance, it's about censorship-or even better, self-censorship that's easily achieved by frightening students with social rejection, hellfire or both. Either way, scholarship is degraded in the process. According to the article, "many educators, while agreeing that students should never feel bullied, worry that they just want to avoid exposure to ideas that challenge their core beliefs - an essential part of education. Some also fear that teachers will shy away from sensitive topics or fend off criticism by "balancing" their
syllabuses with opposing viewpoints, even if they represent inferior scholarship."

Whether through self-censorship or junk education, our country's children are paying the price for the political aggression of the far right. Robert Frost once wrote, "Education is the ability listen to almost anything without losing your temper."

Tempers are short in today's radical "conservative" America, and the emboldened radical right is in no mood to listen to anyone.

Dr. Teresa Whitehurst is a clinical psychologist, author of Jesus on Parenting (2004) and coauthor of The Nonviolent Christian Parent (2004). She offers parenting workshops, holds discussion groups on Nonviolent Christianity, and writes the column, "Democracy, Faith and Values: Because You Shouldn't Have to Choose Just One", which is posted on her website, http://www.JesusontheFamily.org