[Cid_Yama]

The multiple failures that beset the country, from our mismanaged economy to our shredded constitutional rights to our lack of universal health care to our imperial debacles in the Middle East, can be laid at the feet of our elite universities. Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Stanford, along with most other elite schools, do a poor job educating students to think.

The nation’s elite universities disdain honest intellectual inquiry, which is by its nature distrustful of authority, fiercely independent and often subversive. They organize learning around minutely specialized disciplines, narrow answers and rigid structures that are designed to produce certain answers. The established corporate hierarchies these institutions service -- economic, political and social -- come with clear parameters, such as the primacy of an unfettered free market, and with a highly specialized vocabulary. This vocabulary, a sign of the "specialist" and of course the elitist, thwarts universal understanding. It keeps the uninitiated from asking unpleasant questions. It destroys the search for the common good.

These institutions, no matter how mediocre you are, feed students with the comforting self-delusion that they are there because they are not only the best but they deserve the best. You can see this attitude on display in every word uttered by George W. Bush. Here is a man with severely limited intellectual capacity and no moral core. He, along with Lewis "Scooter" Libby, who attended my boarding school and went on to Yale, is an example of the legions of self-centered mediocrities churned out by places like Andover, Yale and Harvard. Bush was, like the rest of his caste, propelled forward by his money and his connections. That is the real purpose of these well-endowed schools -- to perpetuate their own.

The unstated ethic of these elite institutions is to make as much money as you can to sustain the elitist system. College presidents are not voices for the common good and the protection of intellectual integrity, but obsequious fundraisers. They shower honorary degrees and trusteeships on hedge-fund managers and Wall Street titans whose lives are usually examples of moral squalor and unchecked greed. The message to the students is clear.

These elites, and the corporate system they serve, have ruined the country. These elite cannot solve our problems. They have been trained to find "solutions," such as the trillion-dollar bailout of banks and financial firms, that sustain the system. They will feed the beast until it dies.
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[shortonsense]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cid_Yama', 'T')he multiple failures that beset the country, from our mismanaged economy to our shredded constitutional rights to our lack of universal health care to our imperial debacles in the Middle East, can be laid at the feet of our elite universities. Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Stanford, along with most other elite schools, do a poor job educating students to think.

[Don35]

As I watch the US and the world collapsing, probably dying; I see a dog, mortally wounded, biting at it's wounds. We will not pull together and pull ourselves out, we will blame anyone available for the pain and difficulty we have. You see it in politics, economics, families, everywhere. It's a sad show to watch! Sorry Cid, I think the failures are all of us!

[errorist]

Sorry to hear that. So much pessimism in ones mind does seriously harm ones abilities to maintain informational-positive survival mind.
No, do not become sheep. REMEMBER, we still got plenty of everything we need.
[snip from random We-The-People-Speech from history]

Nothing fatal yet. Just time to choose side. Do not be afraid, it's only started to pour into fans. Minor corrections coming day-by-day. Stay informed. Study propaganda. Be well.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Don35', 'A')s I watch the US and the world collapsing, probably dying; I see a dog, mortally wounded, biting at it's wounds. We will not pull together and pull ourselves out, we will blame anyone available for the pain and difficulty we have. You see it in politics, economics, families, everywhere. It's a sad show to watch! Sorry Cid, I think the failures are all of us!

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cid_Yama', 'T')he multiple failures that beset the country, from our mismanaged economy to our shredded constitutional rights to our lack of universal health care to our imperial debacles in the Middle East, can be laid at the feet of our elite universities. Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Stanford, along with most other elite schools, do a poor job educating students to think.

[Fishman]

Gosh Planetagenet, I was going to rewrite Cid's whole piece and just substitute Obama's name, with a few added comments about Clinton having the most convicted staff of any president with Obama already working on beating that number starting before he's even inaugurated. You took away my cynical joy.

[TommyJefferson]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cid_Yama', 'T')he established corporate hierarchies these institutions service -- economic, political and social -- come with clear parameters, such as the primacy of an unfettered free market

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Fishman', 'G')osh Planetagenet, I was going to rewrite Cid's whole piece and just substitute Obama's name, with a few added comments about Clinton having the most convicted staff of any president with Obama already working on beating that number starting before he's even inaugurated. You took away my cynical joy.

[AlexdeLarge]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Fishman', 'G')osh Planetagenet, I was going to rewrite Cid's whole piece and just substitute Obama's name, with a few added comments about Clinton having the most convicted staff of any president with Obama already working on beating that number starting before he's even inaugurated. You took away my cynical joy.

[americandream]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cid_Yama', 'T')he multiple failures that beset the country, from our mismanaged economy to our shredded constitutional rights to our lack of universal health care to our imperial debacles in the Middle East, can be laid at the feet of our elite universities. Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Stanford, along with most other elite schools, do a poor job educating students to think.

[ReverseEngineer]

As someone who ended up with Doing Time behind the Ivy Walls, I can confirm that in essence what Cid is saying is correct. It is of course a vast generalization, and there are differences in the cliques and the disciplines inside each of these Universities. Where you find the most corruption is inside departments of History, Law and Economics more so than in the natural sciences, and it is to these areas that the scions of the wealthy flow, to gain the sheepskin necessary to take their place in the Political dynasty as Governors, Senators and Presidents.

You occassionally also get smart social climbers who get into these schools on their brains more than their money, and if you want to use your noodle in this way you can get the education you need and then find the backing you need to make it in Chicago Politics. The social climbers who do this aren't a whole lot better than the Scions of the Wealthy, they buy into the same bill of goods sold in the Economics 101 class of course. You are slightly better off with such folks in charge, because at least they got there on their brains and not their parent's money. The difference between George Bush and Barack Obama, both Ivy League graduates is that one is Stupid and Corrupt, the other is Smart and Corrupt.

Narrow thinking is systemic in the Halls of Ivy, and the Preppies form their own clique inside these walls, as do some Communists and Anarchists as well form cliques there. It was after all my School Columbia which had some of the biggest riots and takeovers of the campus in 1968. By the time all is said and done though, most of those who exited from the Ivy Slammer did in fact buy in to the culture of greed, and those with money and power have used it to retain that through the generations, through the kind of education you get in an Ivy League school.

It is NOT true however that every last person who went to an Ivy League school gets corrupted this way. There ARE occassional exceptions

Reverse Engineer

[seldom_seen]

Cid, you're right. Although you're only describing one piece of what Lewis Mumford calls the "Pentagon of Power." In his classic work The Myth of the Machine: The Pentagon of Power. He writes on higher education:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he Mexican painter Jose Clemente Orozco produced this grisly comment on higher education: it's desiccation and dehumanization, its sterile overspecialization, its indifference to human values and needs other that those that serve to support or embellish the Establishment.

[Cid_Yama]

If you read the article he talks about the marginalized intellectuals i.e. not saying EVERYONE who goes to an Ivy League school.

This is more about the system that maintains the system and it's ideology.

I did my best to cut out the author's obvious resentment and inferiority complex from being mistreated as someone coming from a working class background, but it does not affect the veracity of his view.

I saw it with my own eyes, although, since I was raised as a member of the elite, I just saw it as people tripping over each other to 'belong' to the 'in crowd'. Morons basically. You would never catch one of them in a philosophy course, or history, or ethics.

They didn't do well with the women, other than the ones that they paid for. And there were always ones willing to sell themselves. In general they tended to lack in respect for women.

Stunted shriveled souls.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('AlexdeLarge', '.')....under some form of Mos's mind control.

[ReverseEngineer]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('AlexdeLarge', '.')....under some form of Mos's mind control.

[shortonsense]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', ' ') For instance, president-elect Obama is a product of Columbia and Harvard, and he has been educated superbly and he does a superb job of thinking.

[HeckuvaJob]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cid_Yama', 'T')hey didn't do well with the women, other than the ones that they paid for. And there were always ones willing to sell themselves. In general they tended to lack in respect for women.

[Nickel]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('shortonsense', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cid_Yama', 'T')he multiple failures that beset the country, from our mismanaged economy to our shredded constitutional rights to our lack of universal health care to our imperial debacles in the Middle East, can be laid at the feet of our elite universities. Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Stanford, along with most other elite schools, do a poor job educating students to think.

[Nickel]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', 'T')hese kinds of sweeping generalizations are inevitably wrong.

[Nickel]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Fishman', 'G')osh Planetagenet, I was going to rewrite Cid's whole piece and just substitute Obama's name, with a few added comments about Clinton having the most convicted staff of any president with Obama already working on beating that number starting before he's even inaugurated. You took away my cynical joy.