Thursday 04 March '10 show notes

  • Guests:
    • Dr. Richard Brake, Director of University Stewardship at The Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI).
    • Conservative David Horowitz, ho wrote a book about his late daughter, Sarah, and their relationship: "A Cracking of the Heart".
    • Peter Ferrara, General Counsel for the American Civil Rights Union (ACRU).
  • Topics:
    • If going to college turns you liberal should we ban them?
    • Left and right may disagree, but we all love our kids
    • Why do the right wing crazies think that Obamacare is going to kill them?
  • Bumper Music:
  • Today's newsletter has details of today's guests and links to the major stories and alerts that Thom covered in the show, plus lots more. If you haven't signed up for the free newsletter yet, please do. If you missed today's newsletter, it is in the archive.
  • Quote: "Liberalism is trust of the people tempered by prudence. Conservatism is distrust of the people tempered by fear." -- William E. Gladstone.
  • Article: The Proof Is In: College Makes Graduates More Liberal: Groundbreaking New Report Reveals That Colleges Push Opinion To Left On Polarizing Social Views by The Intercollegiate Studies Institute.

    Among the findings in this scientific study:

    • More than one-third of college graduates cannot identify the three branches of government;
    • Only 24 percent of college graduates know that the phrase "government of the people, by the people, for the people" comes from Lincoln's Gettysburg Address; and
    • Only 17 percent of college graduates can accurately distinguish free markets from centralized planning.

    So what does college do? It pushes opinion leftward on the most polarizing social issues.

    •  
      • College makes people more likely to support same-sex marriage and abortion on demand, and less likely to support school prayer and the American work ethic;
      • A college degree moves a person toward the Democrat/liberal side of the political spectrum, while greater civic knowledge moves a person toward the Republican/conservative pole of the spectrum; and
      • College professors are more likely than non-professors to believe that America corrupts otherwise good people, that the Ten Commandments are irrelevant, and that educators should instill more doubt among students.
  • Article: Liberals and Atheists Smarter? Intelligent People Have Values Novel in Human Evolutionary History, Study Finds.

    More intelligent people are statistically significantly more likely to exhibit social values and religious and political preferences that are novel to the human species in evolutionary history. Specifically, liberalism and atheism, and for men (but not women), preference for sexual exclusivity correlate with higher intelligence, a new study finds.

    The study, published in the March 2010 issue of the peer-reviewed scientific journal Social Psychology Quarterly, advances a new theory to explain why people form particular preferences and values. The theory suggests that more intelligent people are more likely than less intelligent people to adopt evolutionarily novel preferences and values, but intelligence does not correlate with preferences and values that are old enough to have been shaped by evolution over millions of years."

  • Article: Fight For The CFPA Is 'A Dispute Between Families And Banks,' Says Elizabeth Warren by Shahien Nasiripour.

    Warren said the new agency should have four simple attributes:

    • A chief appointed by the president, confirmed by the Senate;
    • Independent budget authority, so it won't be subject to the whims of Congress or an anti-consumer administration;
    • Independent rule-making authority, without interference by bank regulators or others who may focus on bank profitability before focusing on consumers;
    • And independent enforcement powers, so the agency's investigators can go after abusive lenders.
  • Member of the day was Anjha, who won a copy of "Threshold: The Crisis of Western Culture" for blogging:

    Re: Educated Liberals

    If more education and higher intelligence are pre-cursors to Liberalism (or characteristics of,) and lower intelligence, levels of education and IQ are characteristics of Conservatism – then what explains Libertarianism?

    Are libertarians simply more intelligent conservatives? Are they conservatives, either through nurture or some negative experience that they associate with Liberalism, who are also intelligent enough to recognize the truths of Liberalism and our Nation’s history? Is their identity as a Libertarian really just the compromise of their inner conflict between believing that they are supposed to be conservative and their own personal experiences and knowledge proving to them that Liberalism is the truth?

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