Article: Book takes aim at two PSU profs

By Adam Smeltz
asmeltz@centredaily.com

Best-selling author David Horowitz, a leading conservative commentator, has named two Penn State academics as instigators of intellectual corruption.

Horowitz's latest book, "The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America," includes brief critiques of Michael Berube, a Penn State professor, and Sam Richards, a senior lecturer. Released last month, the 448-page tome excoriates "radical academics" who "indoctrinate our children."

"These people are dangerous only in that they're endangering the academic enterprise. ... Education is the opening of students' minds. You teach them how to think; you don't teach them the right conclusions to matters that have no right conclusions," Horowitz said Sunday.

He has been a driving force in a national movement to confront perceived liberal bias on college campuses, including in Pennsylvania. Berube, who teaches literature, has taken issue with a state legislative committee focused on the subject and has helped establish a local chapter of the American Association of University Professors.

The Horowitz book suggests that Berube "believes in teaching literature so as to bring about 'economic transformations.' " Citing excerpts of Berube's writings, Horowitz writes that Berube promotes "anti-religious prejudices" in the classroom.

Berube dismissed the claims. He said he is one of several academics listed in "The Professors" only because they irritate Horowitz. He said Horowitz appears to believe that "universities are the last stronghold for liberals and leftists and that they must be taken over somehow."

"I've been mocking him mercilessly on my Web site," said Berube, who maintains a popular Web log at www.michaelberube.com.

"Being in this book is like being denounced by Ann Coulter," Berube said, referring to the sharp-tongued conservative commentator. "You must be doing something right."

Berube said he hopes that "there aren't a lot of people who think I teach literature to bring about economic transformation. ... How much literature would you have to teach?"

Horowitz, however, said that Berube fails to "draw this distinction between education and indoctrination." He has dueled with Berube through his own electronic home, www.frontpagemag.com.

In criticizing Richards, Horowitz said the lecturer is not qualified to teach racial issues because his doctoral work did not center on race relations. Richards is the co-director of the Penn State Race Relations Project.

"Why is he teaching the sociology of race at all?" Horowitz said. In "The Professors," he says that Richards fails to balance his foreign-policy lectures and that his students can earn credit for attending left-wing events.

Horowitz also calls Richards a Marxist and criticizes him for introducing personal views in the classroom.

But Richards, who is teaching 850 students this semester, said Horowitz failed to note that students can also earn credit by attending politically conservative functions. A Richards syllabus posted online describes a course objective:

"To inspire you to think critically and actively about issues related to race and ethnicity. Notice that the objective is not to get you to think in any particular way, and it is certainly not to 'teach' you to think like me."

Richards said Horowitz failed to scrutinize conservative academics. He also said he is not a Marxist.

"(Horowitz) is not interested in rooting out liberal bias; he's interested in promoting his own agenda," Richards said. "There are many conservative professors who are around. ... It's really disingenuous of him to try to sell this argument in the way he's been doing."

Horowitz he didn't target right-wing ideologues in academia because "I don't know of any."

"There are so few conservatives (in academia), and they just walk on egg shells," Horowitz said.

A leading advocate of measures such as the Pennsylvania House Subcommittee on Academic Freedom, Horowitz said he wants universities to enforce existing policies that prevent indoctrination.

Richards said his only agenda is to have people "speak honestly with one another -- and it doesn't matter what they say." He called Horowitz "a knucklehead."

"But we're all nuts, you know," Richards said.