John M. Ashbrook Quotes
A Harvard professor is an educator who thinks the American Eagle has two left wings.
John M. Ashbrook, 1928-1982, U.S. Congressman (Republican, OH), Quoted in Conservative Digest, August 1988
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Santorum’s view was not quite as absurd as this quotation would indicate. His concern was that he believed that colleges and universities were dominated by left wing, liberal faculty, who indoctrinate the students and turn them into Democrats or liberal Republicans. This he thought was bad for the country. The view is not complete paranoia. Higher Education is rarely indoctrination in America. Virtually every school has some politically conservative faculty as well as faculty who are in the political left and some are apolitical. However most of the good schools are liberal in the traditional meaning of the word and as it has been used in Europe and initially in the United States. This liberal tradition is characterized by openness to all ideas and points of view including those that the government or other institutions of society are sometimes uncomfortable with. This intellectual tolerance makes some ultraconservatives uncomfortable. However, other political conservatives are very “liberal” in the intellectual sense including most of the great conservative writers and philosophers and economists of the last centuries. There are people of all political and religious persuasions in most societies who are concerned that the ideas young people might be exposed to are harmful to them and detrimental to society. Most have more faith in young people and see the major role of education is to expose the student to new and different ideas for the student to consider. Santorum is one of the former; all his Republican opponents were of the other point of view.
Although, the Obama administration vastly improved on this requirement compared to the George W. Bush administration excesses, he was not able to eliminate it. Some would argue that it should NOT be eliminated in that military planning ought to be driven and controlled by the people in a democracy, and therefore the process is inherently political. However few would defend the Bush ideologically driven military planning and decision making.
John Milan Ashbrook was an American politician of the Republican Party who served in the United States House of Representatives from Ohio from 1961 until his death from peptic ulcer in Johnstown, Ohio in 1982.
