🚀 go-pugleaf

As an ex-academic I agree with and appreciate much of what you say about 
academic freedom and the way in which the great universities go about 
recruiting and retaining people who will make a contribution to the 
university. But with academic freedom come the responsibility to speak with 
fact and .reason.. Demagogues or politicians, or talk radio hosts can play 
fast and loose  but the mark of the scholar is sticking to facts, even 
though they may be uncomfortable to many, and to reason with those facts in 
a new or different kind of way-this is what academic freedom is meant for.
   Does Ward Churchill meet that test?
  Do you, or anybody believe that . 500,000 Iraqui children were killed by 
the embargo on Iraq and or that the deaths that did result  were solely due 
to the US -this in the face of mounting evidence of fraud and corruption 
reaching into the UN and European corporations and  countries that  were 
working  with Saddam to make money off the embargo for him and his henchman. 
Churchill charges that Al-Queda exploded the twin towers to take revenge for 
these deaths-which fits into Bush's contention that there is a link between 
Al0-Quaeda terrorism and Iraq..-except that no link has ever been shown. 
Finally there is  Churchill's backward leap into history where he charges 
that the US was responsible for 500,000-600,000 deaths in their takeover of 
the Philippines better than a hundred years ago. As someone who knows 
something about the Philippines  I can tell you that the number of deaths 
was not even 10% of the figure cited. Churchill clearly plays fast and loose 
with facts in order to make his point that the US throughout its history has 
killed people all over the world.  The way he creates evidence to make his 
points makes me think his " scholarly " articles( assuming he has some)-will 
turn  out to be riddled with similar dubious evidence.

    Churchill portrays himself as a defender of the American Indian and is 
outraged at the treatment of native Americans historically and in Central 
America.  Nowhere in his diatribes I have  seen is there a mention of the 
hundreds of thousands of native Americans being killer  or robbed of their 
land recently and even now by corrupt military regimes, large land owners, 
drug runners in Mexico, Guatemala, Columbia, Bolivia., Brazil. The only 
villain in the world now or in the past, according to him, is the US.
  Chuchill clearly thinks of himself as  an outrageous character-maybe even 
drawing inspiration from his neighbor Hunter Thompson who just died by his 
own hand. If so, he ought to get out there and free lance the way Thompson 
did instead of hiding behind the safety of a college lectern and a tenured 
position.

"Barney Lyon" <fountaingrove@hotmail.com> wrote in message 
news:1109053339.063659.214940@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
> Carol Lee Smith wrote:
>> On 20 Feb 2005, Barney Lyon wrote:
>>
>> > "When They Came for Ward Churchill"
>> >
>> > Embattled Professor Ward Churchill speaks on the controversy over
> > Universities generally offer tenure to those without a Ph.D. or a
> minimum of 7 years teaching as an enticement to talented, accomplished
> and valuable people who have much to contribute to a student body.
> Most often these people come from outside of the academic community,
> having achieved success in a corporate career, in the field that they
> are being asked to teach (and offered tenure).  They may work at the
> University on a year to year contract, and negotiate tenure as a term
> of their continued employment.
>
> It's as free a market system as it gets.  You would think that
> conservatives would laud it.  But they don't.
>
>
>
> Obviously Ward Churchill is a remarkable teacher and extremely valuable
> to the University of Boulder.  You would know that by having heard him
> speak, or reading his essays.
>
> I don't care about the man's ethnicity, or what conservatives think
> about his heritage, or some backstory daytime drama they have concocted
> about "he's not a 'real' native American - another native American says
> he isn't!"  Who gives a shit?  You sound like old women gossips.
>
> Even if any of the conservatives' complaints about Churchill were true,
> it wouldn't change the truth of his speech or his essays.  But they
> don't want to hear that.  Before they will listen to him speak, or let
> anybody else hear him speak, the high priests of rightwing conservatism
> must vet.
>