Bloodless Coup

Smear Campaign Against Juan Cole

Due to work-related inundation of tasks, I completely missed the latest splenetic ravings from the forces of academic censorship.

Glenn Greenwald hasn't, and comes out swinging:

One of the most annoying victim movements around is the petulant and growing group, led by the odious David Horowitz, which incessantly whines that pro-Bush students on college campuses are treated very, very unfairly because their views are not praised by all that many people and sometimes are even harshly criticized.

As I've written about many times before, the examples of supposed victimhood almost never entail any actual repression of, or institutional punishment for, the expression of unpopular conservative views, but rather, are composed only of disagreement by other students and faculty members which make the right-wing students feel uncomfortable and unloved. In that regard, this whiny movement is nothing more than the mirror image of the worst elements of the PC movement of the 1990s -- while deceitfully parading under the banner of free expression, its true aim is to render impermissible the expression of political views which the conservative students dislike.

A vivid example illustrating their true agenda can be found in the blossoming "controversy" over what appears to be the imminent offer of a tenured professorship by Yale University to liberal Professor of Mideast Studies (and well-read blogger) Juan Cole, to teach at the Yale Center for International and Area Studies and in the Yale History Department. Many Bush supporters are arguing that Professor Cole espouses political views which apparently ought to be off-limits on college campuses, and there is thus a burgeoning movement to induce Yale to reconsider its decision. These efforts, of course, are coming from many of the same circles of sermoniziers who hold themselves out as defenders of academic freedom when they decry the oh-so-terrible reception which greets right-wing views on some campuses.

A lengthy smear piece by two students -- one an undergraduate at Yale (who happens to be Powerline Big Trunk's daughter, whom he calls "Little Trunk") and the other at Harvard Law -- was published yesterday in the New York Sun. The article selects multiple half-sentence snippets of Cole's writing in order to "demonstrate" that he harbors a "deep and abiding hatred of Israel"; that "if it were up to Mr. Cole, the country wouldn't exist at all"; and that he is "best known for disparaging the participation of prominent American Jews in government."

The usual suspects -- some of whom themselves have decried the (largely non-existent) suppression of right-wing views on college campuses -- have jumped onto the bandwagon, urging that Cole not be hired. Sharing the same McCarthyite talking points, they each suggest -- with zero basis -- that Cole even shares the same views as the Taliban; hence: "Taliban Man at Yale may soon have congenial company" and "A Teacher for Taliban Man."

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Anyone who has ever read anything written by Professor Cole -- and I have, and I have disagreed with much of it -- knows that the claim that he is anti-Semitic is a baseless and defamatory myth. It is a smear that is achieved only by the depressingly common attempt to equate hostility towards the political agenda of Likud with hostility towards Jews generally, a tactic that is nothing short of disgusting.

This false equivalence is intended to stifle all debate on any matters relating to the Middle East by positing an equivalence between anti-Semitism and a criticism of a specific, minority strain of political ideology. One either must refrain from criticisms of the actions of Israel, and refrain from commenting on the influence asserted by its government over American policy, or else one will be publicly branded an anti-Semite. One is perfectly free to criticize other countries, and even criticize the level of influence their governments exert on American policy (to name but a few, condemning the influence on American policy of China, or Mexico, or Saudi Arabia, is all the rage, including among many of these same people). But the same arguments applied to Israel makes one an untouchable anti-Semite.

The intellectual bankruptcy of the argument is self-evident. It is no different than accusing someone who opposes the French Socialist Party of hating the French, or accusing someone who opposes some South American right-wing party of hating Latinos. Or accusing someone of opposing President Bush of hating America and loving Al Qaeda. This tactic is an inane but destructive character smear that has been allowed to fester for way too long. But it festers because anyone who complains about it guarantees that they, too, will be similarly branded as an anti-Semite or terrorist-lover, and so most people prefer to avoid the issue.

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We have seen this repressive tactic applied repeatedly to American political debates over the last five years, and this is merely a specific strain of that tactic which uses the lowly art of character smear in order to exclude opposing views from college campuses.

But many of these same true believers seek simultaneously to render any opposing views prohibited, off-limits at any mainstream institution or college campus. The list of prohibited ideas includes the view that Israel is the principal antagonist of conflict in the Middle East generally, that American interests are harmed when the U.S. defends Israel too reflexively or blindly, and that Israel bears principal culpability with regard to the Palestinian issue. As the reaction to Professor Cole conclusively demonstrates, they want anyone who advocates those views to be blacklisted (and again, I am simply assuming, but not accepting, that those descriptions accurately describe Professor Cole's views).

It does not matter what one thinks about any of those views. Particularly at academic institutions, those issues ought to be debated. And the debates ought not to be one-sided. As I said, I disagree with many of Professor Cole's views. But the very idea that the views he expresses not only places him outside of the mainstream, but outside of the realm of what can be tolerated by a decent society or college campus, is, on its face, completely frivolous. This is not about anything other than trying to impose one's own views as academic orthodoxy and to ensure that one's political views on highly controversial political matters enjoys the status of unquestionable piety.

He's right. This has nothing to do with academic freedom, and everything to do with an attempt to impose orthodoxy.