The Elite
By Speaking of idiotic arguments, Yglesias points to this little gem by Kathy Roth-Douquet and Frank Schaeffer on the DLC website. The argument is ostensibly aimed at a bipartisan “elite”, but it becomes clear that the authors definition of that term is roughly similar to that of John Gibson and Bill O’Reilly; namely, a wealthy, left-wing, East Coast academic class centered on Ivy League institutions. It is the “anti-military” attitude of these types that prevents the inculcation of discipline in our youth and a greater appreciation of military service in society at large. Witness:
In short, an anti-military college culture that may once have had political roots in the Vietnam era has now deteriorated into plain elitism and a set of fossilized, unchallenged anti-military assumptions. In 2005, Harvard Law School prosecuted a suit to allow it to ban the military from recruiting its graduates on campus, while still keeping the federal funding that the Solomon Amendment requires the school to forgo in such circumstances.
Also, see if you identify the problems with this passage:
The faculty members of many top universities seem to believe that their students are entitled not to be bothered with something like military service. We are reminded of one woman’s comment: “Military service isn’t for our kind of people. … You should aim to work at the cabinet level … if you want to serve your country, work to develop real leadership, to make a real difference.”
“Faculty” at top universities seems to believe some thing. Evidence? “One woman” made a comment. Is this comment representative? Indeed, is this person even faculty at a top university? Maybe so, but we’ll never know. Easier just to insinuate that faculty, who we all know are raging anti-military left-wing pacifists, also evaluate students based primarily on class and wealth.
There is a kernel of truth in the critique implied here. I’ve heard a fair number of anecdotes about anti-military behavior and attitudes in social science departments, and I know that it’s exceptionally difficult, for example, for a military historian to get a job anymore if s/he doesn’t also do something else. I don’t agree with Harvard’s policy regarding military recruiters. But it would be nice, when writing for what is supposed to be a Democratic Party organ, if the authors actually took care not to play into a Gibsonian vision of what the American “elite” consists of. The elite, believe it or not, is not best described as consisting of leftist university professors who don’t like the military. The elite, as George W. Bush once pointed out in a rare moment of honesty, is the most important base of the Republican Party.
It would also be nice if the authors had discussed the plethora of right-wing critiques of military service, including the contempt that Pentagon civilians seem to have for military officers, the disregard that right-wing intellectuals have for the idea that generals have anything interesting to say about war, and the general disavowal of anything that smacks of actual practical policy expertise. But then, this is the DLC, and it’s far more important to level the cannons at the left wing of the Democratic Party than it is to challenge the Republican Party…