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**APRIL 22, 2024**
On the Prospect website
The UAW's Chattanooga Victory: Score One for the North in Our Endless
Civil War
We still have two labor systems, and need mass unionization to end
our immense inequality, which has its roots in the South. BY HAROLD
MEYERSON
Minorities Don't Lack Financial Literacy. They Lack Financial
Fairness.
In California, no-fee accounts would combat systemic discrimination
in banking services. BY TERRI FRIEDLINE & DARRICK HAMILTON
American Climate Corps to Focus on Next-Generation Workers
The Biden administration's workforce development initiative aims
to boost green employment options. BY GERARD EDIC
Kuttner on TAP
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**** Self-Destructive College Presidents
They are making a fraught situation worse by letting the far right
define antisemitism and the necessary campus responses.
Last December, the presidents of Penn and Harvard did not grovel
sufficiently in trying to appease Republican inquisitors claiming that
they were insufficiently sensitive to episodes of antisemitism. So with
some crude prodding from large donors of the "Israel right or wrong"
camp, Liz Magill and Claudine Gay were pushed out of their jobs by
panicked trustees.
In the latest round of this self-abasement, other college presidents are
hoping to out-grovel the earlier batch and outdo each other in
sacrificing civil liberties. This never ends well.
At last week's hearing before the same House Education subcommittee
that destroyed Magill and Gay, Columbia's beleaguered president, Nemat
"Minouche" Shafik, who was born in Egypt, brought with her three senior
Jewish colleagues for the grovel-fest. At one point, Rep. Rick Allen, a
Republican from Georgia, asked Shafik whether she knew Genesis 12:3. She
didn't.
Allen explained: "It was the covenant that God made with Abraham, and
that covenant was real clear: 'If you bless Israel I will bless you,
if you curse Israel I will curse you,'" he said. "Do you want Columbia
University to be cursed by God?" Allen demanded.
Shafik meekly responded, "Definitely not." Seriously? The right answer
was "Congressman, we can discuss the difficult balance between
unpopular, even outrageous views and civil liberties. But I am not here
to be interrogated by you about the Bible."
Somewhere there is a courageous college president, but she was not in
that hearing room. All too predictably, on Sunday Rep. Elise Stefanik
(R-NY), who began the inquisitions of college presidents, called for
Shafik's resignation
,
in favor of someone "who will protect Jewish students and enforce school
policies." God save us from these friends of the Jews.
In Boston, students at MIT, Emerson, and Tufts have set up encampments
in solidarity with students at Columbia. At Yale, where a Jewish student
was injured by a protester, police have made arrests at a
pro-Palestinian encampment. Instead of debating Israel-Palestine policy
or the complex dynamics of antisemitism, the denial of civil liberties
has become the issue.
Meanwhile, back at Columbia, where Shafik invited police onto campus
last week to clear an encampment of pro-Palestinian demonstrators, the
university suspended upwards of a hundred Columbia and Barnard students
who supported the non-student demonstrators. And early Monday morning,
trying to contain the damage, Shafik suspended all in-person classes in
favor of virtual ones
.
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This will only escalate further and lead to more civil disobedience,
more disgraceful denial of free speech, and more loss of confidence in
Shafik by all sides. And count on opportunists to fish in troubled
waters.
Rabbi Elie Buechler, a rabbi at Columbia, sent a message to 300 Jewish
students suggesting they leave campus for their own safety and not come
back. The Hillel organization for Columbia and Barnard rejected that
advice in an X
post.
And Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) announced Sunday that he would support
Jewish students. "I will be coming to Columbia University to walk with
the Jewish students. If the University won't protect them, Congress
will!" Moskowitz posted on X
. He
will be joined by Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) and Dan Goldman (D-NY).
One brave exception was Rep. Jamaal Bowman
(D-NY), who joined six Columbia professors at a virtual press conference
Friday. "I'm very concerned with some of Columbia's actions," Bowman
said. "They seem to be folding to pressure from a right wing Congress'
weaponizing of the unfolding events in the Middle East as a means to
suppress fundamental freedoms of expression." Bowman is doubly
courageous because he is in a primary fight against AIPAC-backed
Westchester County Executive George Latimer.
Granted, some incidents at Columbia and elsewhere have moved well beyond
speech to explicit threats against Jewish students and even isolated
instances of physical harm. It's hard in these circumstances to find
the right balance between defending campus free speech and not
tolerating intimidation. But Shafik's ultra hard line is not the right
balance.
Meanwhile at USC, the university president, Carol Folt, has outdone even
Columbia's Shafik, in sacrificing civil liberty to appeasement. Folt,
whose salary is $3.9 million, first canceled the customary commencement
speech by the valedictorian Asna Tabassum following complaints by
pro-Israel groups. The university cravenly cited "security concerns."
Then, Folt, in full panic mode, shut down other commencement events,
including honorary-degree awards and speeches by film director Jon Chu,
tennis great Billie Jean King, and others.
USC students and faculty should emulate the great African American
contralto Marian Anderson, who gave a free concert at the Lincoln
Memorial in 1939 after being barred from the racist DAR's Constitution
Hall. They should hold their own counter-event off-site, inviting all of
the disinvited speakers. The withdrawn invitations could be treated as
badges of honor.
It doesn't take a crystal ball to discern that events on these
campuses will soon escalate, that these gutless presidents will please
no one, and that they will likely lose their jobs, leaving in their wake
a festering election-year mess to be further stoked and exploited by the
Republican right and Bibi Netanyahu.
A joyous Passover to all.
~ ROBERT KUTTNER
Follow Robert Kuttner on Twitter
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