Tag Archives: Cornell University

The Need To Educate Our Students

Posted on by

On Sunday, The New York Post posted an article about a recent Democrat event called “Students vs. Billionaires” town hall in downtown Ithaca Sunday. Obviously, ‘students vs. billionaires’ is the kind of class warfare used by Marxists to push their agenda.

The article reports:

Cornell University’s lefty crowd gave Democratic Socialist superstar Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez a warm, hate-filled welcome by singing anti-Israel chants at a campaign event meant to gin up support for Democrats ahead of the midterms Sunday.

While warming up the standing-room-only crowd of roughly 2,000 people gathered for the congresswoman’s “Students vs. Billionaires” town hall in downtown Ithaca Sunday, Cornell University Young Democratic Socialists of America co-chairs Mina Petrova and Zoe Reisman led the crowd singing “from the river to the sea” and declaring “long live the student intifada.”

There are a few problems here. First of all, do the students understand that ‘from the river to the sea’ is a call for genocide of Jews? Secondly, do the students understand that an intifada is a holy war? Thirdly, do the Young Democratic Socialists know that after the communists helped elect the Mullahs in Iran, the Mullahs had all of the communists killed because they weren’t Muslim and they were a threat to the power of the Mullahs? Do they understand how Sharia Law treats women? Do they understand how Sharia Law treats homosexuality?

The article concludes:

The chant “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” however, was overwhelmingly ruled to be antisemitic by the US House of Representatives. Critics say the motto, which refers to the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, is a call for the eradication of Israel and its people.

Ocasio-Cortez voted against the 2024 resolution declaring the phrase to be hateful.

The Bronx-Queens congresswoman, who rose to stardom by shockingly defeating Queens Democratic boss Joe Crowley during Democrats’ last midterm surge in 2018, was planning on appearing with Gov. Kathy Hochul earlier Sunday.

A spokesperson for the Governor’s office said Hochul backed out of a planned appearance with Ocasio-Cortez earlier in the day in Ithaca.

Her office said the cancellation was due to the nor’easter hitting New York City, though Hochul did not have any public events Sunday.

I think Governor Hochul was smart to stay away. Our college students need to learn history.

We Can Fight The “Woke” Crowd

Posted on by

On September 29th, The College Fix posted an article about Cornell University and the bust of Abraham Lincoln.

The article reports:

A bust of President Abraham Lincoln that was quietly removed from a Cornell University library during the summer of 2021 after a concern was lodged will once again grace the halls of a library at the Ivy League school.

Elaine Westbrooks, the Carl A. Kroch university librarian at Cornell, said in a statement Thursday the bust of America’s 16th president is slated to soon be placed where it originally debuted — the school’s Uris Library when it opened in 1891.

“Over the summer, I directed the cleaning and return to public exhibition of a bust of Abraham Lincoln, a valuable item in the Cornell Library’s vast permanent collection,” she said in a written statement provided to The College Fix. “The bust will soon return to its original room in Uris in the heart of our Ithaca campus.”

Westbrooks was tapped as librarian in March 2022, roughly seven months after the bust was removed from the Rare and Manuscript Collections section of Kroch Library. The bust had been displayed there in front of a decal plaque of the Gettysburg Address since 2013.

“The Lincoln bust … had been featured in a temporary exhibit commemorating the 150th anniversary of the Gettysburg Address. That exhibit ended in August 2021 and the bust was moved to storage. Subsequent questions about this curatorial decision inspired thoughtful conversation among library staff. I was moved by the outpouring of interest in this historic artifact and made plans to return the bust to public view,” Westbrooks said.

You have to do a little reading between the lines, but the article tells an interesting story:

The Fix was told of the situation by Cornell University biology Professor Randy Wayne, who said at the time that when he asked around about the display’s fate, all he was told was: “Someone complained, and it was gone.”

In the months that followed, Wayne said he received an outpouring of responses from alumni grateful he sounded the alarm. He then prepared a report for the Cornell Free Speech Alliance about the controversy.

He said some donors and alumni were concerned about the bust’s removal as well as arguments from campus leadership that denied his claim the bust was a victim of cancel culture. Instead, administration said it was always only a temporary display, despite the fact it had been up for eight years.

Wayne’s report detailed a meeting he had in mid-July with Westbrooks on what might have prompted its removal.

The article concludes:

Asked what role concerned alumni and donors had in the decision to re-display the bust, Wayne said he believes it was a big one.

“They made all the difference,” Wayne said via email. “The alumni and donors have a deep love for Cornell and have sincere gratitude for the education that they got here. They did not want cancel culture to ruin it for their grandkids.”

Please follow the link to read the entire article. People who believe in not erasing history can make a difference.

Behind The Policies Of President Obama’s Second Term

Posted on by

Paul Mirengoff at Power Line posted an article yesterday which asked the question, “Does this mean it’s now okay to say that Obama is a redistributionist?”  The question was based on a Washington Post article posted on Friday by . Mr. Goldfarb is the Post economics reporter and posted an article about the underlying principles of President Obama’s second term as President.

The Washington Post reports:

Obama’s actions as president provide a glimpse of how he views legislation as a means to his end. His health-care reform law, aimed at covering as many of the uninsured as possible, takes a shot at addressing income inequality by imposing new taxes on the wealthiest Americans. Beginning next year, upper-income earners will pay new surcharges that will result in an average additional tax bill of $20,000 for the top 1 percent. The money will help finance insurance subsidies and other coverage in 2014 for people in the lower middle class and below. A recent study by Cornell University’s Richard Burkhauser estimates that “Obamacare” will add $400 to $800 in disposable income annually for these Americans.

The Post further reports:

Every president talks about education, but Obama’s rhetoric reflects an acute awareness of recent research. The data show that rising inequality is largely the result of a changing economy that handsomely rewards people with better skills or credentials — a college education — and leaves people with a basic education at a disadvantage.

Think about this for a minute. People with better skills or credentials are being rewarded, resulting in more income inequality. Good Grief! Translated loosely that means that people who work hard, go to school, and learn are being rewarded. Why else would they work hard and go to school?

Many (not all) of the basic income inequalities in America are moral and cultural. Studies show that young people who finish school. get married, and have children in that order generally do not wind up in poverty. A year of college will not hurt anyone who applies himself during that year, but without the desire to work hard at getting a college education and the desire to work hard afterward, success will not magically appear.

America is not a third-world country. The poor in America have cars, air conditioners, flat-screen televisions, and the latest cell phone gadgetry. Taking money from the people who actually earn it makes all of us poorer in the long run because it erodes the work ethic of those receiving the money.

President Obama has been re-elected, but it is up to Congress and Americans to protect the opportunity that has historically been America. Being in the welfare system is not an opportunity. If we begin to encourage people to work rather than simply take money from those that do work, income inequality will begin to correct itself. However, we will always have income inequality as long as some of us would rather let someone else work to support us.

Enhanced by Zemanta