Trump on Harvard University: “The students they have, the professors they have, the attitude they have is not American…So we'll pull back the grant.”pic.twitter.com/o9mID3CyJf
— The Intellectualist (@highbrow_nobrow) May 20, 2025
Harvard University IS America.
Harvard will sustain this attack on America's oldest university from where several of our esteemed presidents, scientists, jurists, writers, poets, philosophers graduated.
Trump will be gone in a little more than 3 1/2 years, and he will go down in American history as our least educated, most destructive, and most anti-democracy of all US presidents.
Harvard has stood for 389 years; Trump for 79.
Harvard will still be here when Trump is long gone and forgotten by his betters and all people of good will.
Trump talks big now and attacks Harvard. Let him. It's what weak, insecure little men do to make themselves feel powerful, because they know they've been a profound failure as a human being.
Trump has 3 1/2 more years to secure his place in history, and it will NOT be kind to him.
Harvard will survive and have the last word:
No lies detected.
ReplyDeleteHarvard is a brand that was captured by the Left during the culture wars after WWII and used to impose the Open Society consensus on the victors in that war under the banner of 'Never Again'. That consensus has proven unsustainable. It's time America returned to the closed society values that made them victorious in WWII, and not be hobbled with European civilizational guilt-pride.
ReplyDeleteI reject your premise. Open societies work to build inclusive democracies whose governments are accountable to their people. If you have a problem with that, North Korea and Iran would be your type of Closed Society you yearn for. Trump's demonization of DEI is anti-American at its core. There is nothing wrong with embracing diversity, equity, and inclusion in a modern society.
DeleteRight now we are witnessing a government NOT being accountable to its citizens. (a majority of Americans DO NOT agree with the Trump administration's plans on cutting vital social services to give more tax cuts to the billionaires). At this moment, America is being run by a cabal of oligarchs looking out for themselves and their heirs.
Then why are these Open Society institution cancelling democratic candidates from the USA (removing Trump from ballots).to Romania, to France to Germany. Its not "democracy" they're defending. It's democracy that they're ending. They're a liberal theocracy, imposing Ayatollah-like Guardianship of the Jurists theocracy on the West.
DeleteThis is the "premise".
DeleteThe Analyst Discourse has become the "new" University Discourse. Hence Trump's "Harvard is Un-American"
DeleteFukuyama was wrong. Hostory has achieved no "end point". It simply begins the next necessary cycle in its' "wheel of fortunes" game.
DeleteThis is what I'm watching now...
Delete"This is the 'premise' " link is not working.
DeleteThis is the broken link. Thanks for pointing that out.
DeleteI know, TMI...
DeleteStates attempted to remove Trump BECAUSE HE IS A CONVICTED FELON! I know you and your MAGA cultists don't believe he was fairly convicted, but the facts are that a jury of his peers found him guilty of felonies.
DeleteApparently you have no problem with having convicted felons run the country, but I and millions of other Americans do -- whether they are Democrats or Republicans. We the people deserve non-felons to lead us.
MAGA disagrees; therefore, we have not just the felon, Trump, but his fellow felons, Bannon, Navarro, Kushner, and others who have had problems with the law, including his Secy. of Defense, Hegseth. Also Secy. of Ed., Linda McMahon has a civil law suit pending against her and her husband that involves child sexual assault allegations.
This is MAGA's idea of good government.
No, they mostly complained that he was an "insurrectionist" under the 14th and were looking for a vote in Congress to declare him such, being the great "protectors of democracy" e-r-r-r, "open societies" that they were.
DeleteYou are wrong. You and your fellow MAGAs cannot accept that Trump is a criminal. People who have known him for years have attested to the fact that he is not just amoral, but he is also vindictive, mendacious, cruel, and stupid.
DeleteRex Tillerson, who was hand picked to be Trump's first Secy. of State didn't just say Trump was a moron, but with emphasis, Tillerson said Trump is a "f**king moron."
That's what you defend.
And preventing the rise of the next Hitler is the excuse that the post-WWII consensus uses to smother the baby of nationalism in the cradles of democracy.
DeleteWhat I defend is the right of voters to elect stupid people to represent them is fundamental to a democracy. Trump is Don Quixote. He's a madman. That doesn't prevent him from becoming the elected "Man of La Mancha".
DeleteI read Don Quixote de la Mancha in high school, so I don't remember a lot of it, but I do remember that to me, Don Quixote came across as intelligent and capable of profound observations about the world and human nature. IIRC, he was also deeply moral and compassionate, as seen in his willingness to help others and his commitment to justice, even when it leads to his own misfortune.
DeleteNone of that even remotely resembles anything about Donald Trump. You are pretending to yourself that Trump is some sort of hero, when in fact he's a manipulative con man, incapable of empathy, morality, or any other human trait that speaks to our better angels.
Perhaps you should stop viewing Trump in ,a href="https://youtu.be/Pl8E_9CTS1Y?si=MEwVti1RiL_T7Sr9">the mirror of hyper-reality and the media. He didn't get elected from the images that THEY were projecting. His supporters saw something profoundly different.
DeleteHis supporters, IMO, have something terribly wrong in themselves to ever think that Trump is some sort of "Übermensch." Trump has never displayed any motive other than self-aggrandizement and enriching himself and family. There are no higher moral goals in his ambitions. He demonstrates that every day.
DeleteTrump's actions—legal issues, divisive rhetoric—undermine moral credibility.
The best you can say about him is that he's a classic "Holmesian Bad Man," which is not saying anything to be proud of.
...and not a Kurosawan Bad Man?
DeleteSome day I hope we'll all be Nietzscheans and be willing to move "Beyond Good & Evil" and its' accompanying moralisms. Ecclesiastes 3. Meden agan!
Trump is a vessel of bloated abject ignorance. His narcissistic lack of self awareness will certainly secure his place in history as America's most unintelligent, incompetent and corrupt president.
ReplyDeleteAnd the MAGA cult supporting his ignorant a$$? Who knows. My guess is they'll be supporting whoever he tells them to support in 2028. Cause that's what cults do.
The biggest issue with DEI is is promotes discrimination which the democrats say they are against but that is just words.
ReplyDeleteThe latest issues with biden and the lefts accusations of mental issues with trump further illustrate the need for term and age limits and the only way that will happen is through public actions because out elected elite are not going to vote themselves out of office.
"The biggest issue with DEI is is promotes discrimination..."
Delete"Most progressives support DEI, including E, on the basis that systemic racism affects all members of a group. An individual Black woman may never have been blocked from being hired for the police, but she still suffered harm from a lack of Black police officers, and lower incomes among her relatives and friends. And she suffered harms from uncounted other instances of invidious discrimination and oppression. Moreover it is important to re-establish equity for groups, not just for individuals.
Most conservatives are skeptical of attempts to fix the harms of past discrimination with more discrimination, and to allocate benefits and costs on the basis of group identity rather than individual circumstances and merits. They believe a color-blind policy is the best way to move forward, treating everyone as individuals rather than as members of groups."
If the US was truly "color blind," then explain the unrelenting attack on former President Obama's birth. No other POTUS had his birthright challenged, even when evidence proving he was a "natural born" citizen of the US was provided.
Why did I see so many memes online showing Mr. Obama and his family as a group of apes? Why did I see so many memes online showing a noose hanging on a tree outside the White House.
In my lifetime, I never saw racial memes or slurs against a white POTUS. Why did I see them when former President Obama was POTUS?
Why do people at the Geeez blog refer to former President Obama as "halfrican?" That is using his racial inheritance to describe him. Why did the folks at Geeez blog refer to Nikki Haley as a "ni**er in the woodpile?"
I use that blog as an example of racism because they purport to be good conservatives who don't have a drop of racism in them.
And then there's this:
What are the racial disparities in police stops?
African Americans were 2.7 times more likely to experience an investigative stop. U.S. Young people received traffic tickets more often. Blacks and Latinos received more traffic tickets than White drivers, and 47% of drivers stopped were Black.
Do you really believe America is post-racial? And that there is no discrimination inherent in hiring or any other practice where people of color are involved?
I don't know if DEI could have solved our country's racial problems, but it could have worked toward solving some of the problems. It was not perfect and caused some unintended reverse discrimination, true, but it was helpful in trying to address the problems of racism in this country.
Well Shaw, the fears of Allport Scale progression are grossly overstated. It has led to censorship and the coddling of the American mind, and not the Harvard ideal of "Veritas".
DeleteSkud wrote... "The biggest issue with DEI is is [sic] promotes discrimination..."
DeleteNo Skud, you are wrong.
In a nutshell, what DEI does is make sure qualified minorities get a fair shake in hiring, promotions, admissions, etc.
For far too long, US industries, schools and even sports teams refused to even consider minorities for jobs and/or leadership roles because of their perceived bias that those minorities were unqualified.
To your discriminatory point, DEI and other affirmative action programs do advocate for the minority candidate when both a minority candidate and a white candidate are equally qualified. So in that case, perhaps you are correct.
But the great majority of time, data suggests minority candidates frequently are passed over for jobs and more even though they are more qualified and have more training and schooling than do other competitors for the same job.
A question Skud... when the above happens, when a more qualified minority gets passed over for a less qualified white person, what should happen?
But before you answer, think on this... white ppl have petitioned courts across California and the SCOTUS for help, because they say they cannot compete with Asian students and are being denied entry into universities across the country.
Think on how this impacts the UC system in California and the Ivy League, where these grievances are most prevalent.
Harvard is the gold standard of education around the world. Like every institution that has ever existed, it had and has its problems. No institution is perfect -- See the Catholic Church and other religious organizations, for example. And they work for God!
DeleteBut Trump, who is one of the least educated, intellectually vacuous, and amoral presidents in all of American history is not a thinker. Trump is not moored to any discernible first principles that guide his decision making. How could he possibly know the value of the institution that is Harvard and its contribution to making America what it is today.
Thinking about the "Open Society", with an assist from Wiki...
ReplyDeleteKarl Popper wrote the book "The Open Society and Its Enemies" in 1945. In it he defines an open society as one "in which an individual is confronted with personal decisions" as opposed to a "magical or tribal or collectivist society.".
Naturally MAGA Boogieman Soros makes an appearance in Popper's line of thinking. Soros argues that in the closed society, claims to certain knowledge and ultimate truth lead to the attempted imposition of one version of reality. Such a society, Soros argues, is closed to freedom of thought. [Witness the stifling of anti Trump rhetoric]
Popper saw the "Closed Society", [for which -FJ argues] as tribal or organic, favoring tradition and antithetical to western, liberal democracy. Further, he argued that the ideas of individuality, criticism, and humanitarianism cannot be suppressed once people have become aware of them, and therefore that it is impossible to return to the closed society, [Again, that which -FJ wants] but at the same time recognized the continuing emotional pull of what he called "the lost group spirit of tribalism", [Maybe MAGA?] as manifested for example in the totalitarianisms of the 20th century.
Interesting stuff...
Popper saw the complicity of western civilization and closed societies with the Nazi regime and Soviet Union. His "remedy" was to tamp down on the "strong gods" of "truth" and "family" and soften them to "opinion" and "individualism". "Hey, hey, ho ho, western civ has got to go" became the solution. Popper's pendulum is now swinging back.
DeleteSurprising -FJ that you'd note the 'complicity" of closed societies and the Nazi regime. The US was a closed society prior to WWII. And that closed society, we now know from recovered and public papers, was the darling of Nazi Germany. Hitler and his leaders were enamored of the US system of slavery and caste towards black people and in fact, in the 30s wondered why the US was mad at them for what were then less laws than we had in the US.
DeleteBut it was open societies that ultimately exposed these horrors and led to change.
Again Dave, meden agan (none too much). Polemics move from pole to anti-pole. At some point the Open Society needs to stop pushing towards the absolute pole. Their stance on open borders is a "pole-too-far" that benefits the capitalists, and not the proletariat/ workers within a once sovereign nation.
Delete...and the open society idea was, like most of Epimetheus' ideas, an Afterthought constructed with pure hindsight and without any inputs from Prometheus to point out the problems that might arise from its' implementation. Lindy has now arrived. Time to once again take stock as to the efficacy of the policy.
DeleteOpenness, vulnerability, transparency, honesty, diversity, inclusion, and equity/equality are not concepts that the MAGA cult supports. MAGA is a very restrictive, divisive, self centered nationalistic con that serves only the wealthy, connected, and powerful. A populist movement whose architect is a billionaire elitist and is supported by other authoritarian minded wealthy elites.
ReplyDeleteCreating the era of the Oligarchs and Kleptocracy.
Some of the "problems" not generally talked about from so-called "open societies"
DeleteMAGA believes in the concept of meden agan, although it may at times polemically attack certain liberal sacred cows.
DeleteIntended Link for "problems" in the first comment above.
DeleteClosed Societies - worked for the Neanderthals (for awhile)
ReplyDeleteWorked for America until 1945+
DeleteIf the US were a Closed Society until 1945, explain how my parents got into the country. And the parents who immigrated from other countries in Europe and Asia.
DeleteA closed society restricts or prohibits the movement of people into and out of its borders. This restriction on migration is a core characteristic of a closed society and is often associated with nationalistic or protectionist policies that aim to preserve the existing social, cultural, or economic structure.
You're right, it was not "absolute" in its' closedness.
Delete...but it did not tolerate ILLEGAL Immigration, either. The came LEGALLY.
DeleteYeah, and how my maternal great grandparents hailed from Germany. And the other side of the family from Sweeden, Ireland, maybe French and there is even a touch of Afrrican in the family bloodline we found out. So, I, like most Americans are a lot more interconnected (call it interbeing) than MAGA wishes to acknowledge.
DeleteHomogenous America never waa and will never be.
_FJ: "but it did not tolerate ILLEGAL Immigration, either. The came LEGAL"
DeleteThe US has ALWAYS had "illegal" immigrants entering the country. Heck, the Pilgrims and Puritans came to North America when it was already populated by Native Americans, and those "illegals" took over Native Americans' lands!
"Individuals who would be considered "illegal immigrants" today also entered the United States in the early 1900s. While there wasn't a legal term for "illegal immigrant" as we understand it now, there were individuals entering the country who did not meet the requirements for legal entry."
-FJ... the "legal immigration" system we had them was a pretty liberal/open system, except as it related to ppl from Asia, whom we saw as too culturally different for our society. In fact, during most of that time, we had a free flow of ppl from Mexico back and forth across our border. They paid a small fee and came in, worked and went home after a while, then came back again later.
DeleteThe system worked. right now we have no system at all, no policies, no target immigration numbers, nothing. The entire system is broken and is currently irreparable. And no one on the MAGA side wants to fix it.
The US is short workers for our economy to continue to grow and expand. That's a fact supported by data from multiple orgs across ALL political spectrums.
How can we fix that to ensure our financial economic status without immigration?
Nations had borders. Governments have limits. Neither is true today. negative liberties (and spaces) have been "eradicated". This, in an Open Society, they call "progress".. This in a closed society they call "The Panopticon".
DeleteLeave your life open...
DeleteThanks Shaw for mentioning Natuve Americans who had their native land taken from them by the Might Makes Right invading White Europeans. And then the invading illegals by today's standards essentially engaged in genocide. When that didn't ultimately fly the invading Europeans treated them like 3'rd class people, forced them on reservations, took their dignity and self sufficiency, and called it a day.
ReplyDeleteOf course MAGAts never consider or even acknowledge the evil perpetuated upon the indigenous peoples if the Western Hemisphere.
Post-colonialsm is bs, Les. The Oneida tossed the Iroquois out of Canada, and that's how they ended up in Upstate NY and MA. They did it with French supplied guns.
DeleteThere are no "indigenous autochthonous peoples". We're all migrants. The land belongs to those who can persist in defending it. And there is no guilt-pride shaming job you can attempt to make me believe otherwise.
Remember the 'Iliad' and Achilles' Mermidons? They "sprang from the Earth" like "ants" of the dragon's teeth that Jason spread out.
Have you studied any post-colonialism studies, Les? You should. Because today they're colonizing MINDS, not nations.
ps - I love Homi Bhabha... but I don't believe that perpetual Xenia should be an absolute right. It's conditional upon the behaviour of the guest. And to be a guest, one must first "ask permission", not simply camp on people's front lawns like the Roma gypsies.
Well Joe con, I use my own mind. I no longer follow the conservative BS anymore. In fact I now refuse to conform to the desires, reified beliefs, perceptions, thoughts, feelings, threats,
DeleteOnce again racist thing always a racist thing? Eh joe con?
Deleteor illogical ruminations of the MAGA con and its architect, the Felon "president."
DeletePerhaps the 'closed society' cracked some when the 442 INF RGT entered WW2- All American Japanese from the detainment camps - the most decorated unit in US History: or the all Black 337 Fighter Group in P-47 Thunderbolts. Shot down more of the new German jet fighter than any other
ReplyDeletebunch. We presume Joe would have kept them home?
Because they weren't Americans?
DeleteTechnically the only TRUE Americans are te remaining Native Americans. Those of us who are not Native Americans by birth are the from the murderous immoral colonizers who stole this land from the people it rightfully belongs.
DeleteOh, that's right, might makes right, Joe con?
Indeed it does.
DeleteDidn't the TRUE Americans cross a land bridge from Siberia? Weren't they once immigrants? If true means 1st, then maybe you're right. But the 1st probably died in Alaska. I used to work for the Inupiaq (ASRC). Now they own most of the DC beltway. Are they no longer TRUE Americans then?
What do I owe to the TRUE Americans. I'm inclined to believe much as Hannah Arendt...
Delete“There is no such thing as collective guilt or collective innocence; guilt and innocence make sense only if applied to individuals.”
I can't wait for the Inupiat to put me on a Reservation, or deport me back to Europe.
Delete“There is no such thing as collective guilt or collective innocence; guilt and innocence make sense only if applied to individuals.”
DeleteInteresting. But Christianity is predicated on the idea of collective guilt handed down to humans from the original sinners, Adam and Eve. That's what Baptism is for. So, billions of Christians would disagree with Arendt (I am not a believer, so I agree with her.)
Much as millions of secularly religious nationalists (Constitution = Bible). We have yet to organize as Individuals into Network States and transition from capitalist commodification of land (nationality) to capitalist commodification of information (computer networks).
Deletebtw- When I post here, am I "invading" four "network state"? Is that why you often throw my comments out (though not as much lately). Jes' wondrin'...
The secular state is merely a religion without an external god. It takes an internal "lawmaker" as His equivalent.
Deleteps - I'm glad you believe, as I do, in Hannah Arendt's argument.
...but only if the might makes right crowd also prove persistent.
ReplyDeleteMIGHT, in and of itself, does NOT make right. Taking anything from it's rightful owners is theft. So, we continue to disagree and we ALWAYS will.
ReplyDelete