Mr. Roberts Neighborhood

The Washington Post editorialized that Supreme Court Justice Nominee John Roberts is “a man of substance and seriousness.” The LA times reported that he is a “Judicious choice.” Almost. The New York Times brings us a slice of what we know best. Trying to create controversy where there is none, the editorial page of the old grey bitc… er… lady, says that the white house Failed to mention Roberts is a member of the Federalist Society. This act of omission concerns the New York Times which writes that only “washington insiders” knew about it. Hmm. Every other publication and major newspaper seemed to know about it. Maybe the New York Times needs a better Washington Editor. The times editorializes on the failure of the white house to “reveal” Roberts’ affiliation with the Federalist Society. “This apparent contradiction raises questions about how forthcoming Mr. Roberts and the white house has been.” Ah those contradictions! And those forthcomings! Looks like the desperate democrats are fishing for documents to sink Roberts. The times goes on; “for a politically well-connected lawyer and sitting judge, Mr. Roberts has a remarkably opaque record when it comes to his views on controversial issues.” This is good news for two reasons. Personal views on controversial issues like abortion should not be relevant in deciding the nomination of a Supreme Court Justice, and the “opaqueness” is a virtue in itself, indicating a solid commitment to foundation of the constitution rather than the whims of judicial activism. We will see further demands from most media outlets demanding for papers and other memos from Robers’ Past. This will be the Democrats last leg to stand on, exhausting two of three reasons to oppose a nomination; claim insufficient consultation by the white House and two; paint the nominee as a right-wing ideologue. As Duncan Currie of the Weekly Standard writes in this week’s edition, it will make the “aggressor look like the aggrieved.”
Bruce Fein, a constitutional lawyer and international consultant, wrote in the Washington Times this morning that recognizes Roberts’ modesty and willingness to strictly interpret the constitution, rather than make law. Roberts will bring the Supreme Court’s Constitutional law closer to the people who ratified it. He is an originalist. There is no place for the questioning of his views on Roe within this debate. (Or his wife’s)
But there are still hounds. Salivating and leading the charge is Sen. Chucky “Cheese” Schumer, whom John J. Miller of the National Review calls “The Inquisitor.” Interviewed by my host Greg Corombos on Dateline: Washington, Miller spoke in his vacuous, raspy voice (inbetween French jokes) that Schumer scored a perfected 1600 on his SAT. But Schumer’s greatest accomplishment doesn’t lie within his degree of Harvard Law, it lies within his main talent of grandstanding. First was his attack on guns inside the beltway. Then was his declaration that pro-life activists should avoid fines by declaring themselves insolvent. Schumer adores the spotlight. He craves it. Let the inquisition begin.
But some no likey Roberts… and its not based on his achievements or his qualifications. Roberts has and undoubtedly will not be scrutinized on these things. No friends, it’s based on his skin color, his style of dress and his… name. Oh isn’t the quota patrol ironic! But seriously… “John Roberts.” How much more conventional can you get? And how much more of a politically incorrect president can we have to go so far as electing a (gasp!) white male to the supreme court!

NJO: Originally posted on the blog Feathers of Steel at liberabit.blogspot.com.

2 Wishes for AFL - CIO when they blow out their birthday candles!

1)Freedom to Affiliate or disaffiliate
2)Spend mandatory Union Fees on recruiting new members rather than defeating Republican candidates when 43% of people giving us those union fees voted for Republican candidates.

NJO: This was the first post made by James O'Keefe on his blog Feathers of Steel at liberabit.blogspot.com.

Affirmative Action Bake Sale

Uploaded on Aug 27, 2009

So, at our annual Affirmative Action bake sale, we came across an inner city teacher visiting Rutgers with her class. Naturally, a discussion ensued about the merits of Affirmative Action. Who do you think won?

Uploaded on May 3, 2009

Inner city teacher loses debate to conservatives over the workings of Affirmative Action.

NJO: Videos and captions from the RUCenturion YouTube channel.

Original caption from rucenturion.com: 

Inner-city teacher shows children how to debate a conservative and lose.

Some photos of said conservatives at their bake sale table:

Additional information at these links:
Feel-good complacency or direct action? The lessons of Tent State Rutgers
Homophobic vigilantes chased from TSU Rutgers

WE ARE WATCHING

NJO: On this day, James or someone on Team James made this powerful two-line all-caps foray into the world of LJ drama...

an extraordinary machine (labyrinthyne) wrote,

2005-03-22 18:56:00

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• Mood: peeved
• Music: office silence

death, taxes, and idiots like you

to james and the rest of the centurion staff:

thanks for proving my point. you can't even ask me to print my own words? COWARDS. i DID write letters to james, so don't even try that as an argument. you are left with nothing. i write this in my blog because it seems it's unnecessary to submit my thoughts directly to you; you'll go looking for them here anyway, even after i've given them to you. you're ridiculous and infantile, and if, as it seems, you can't find any real story and must either wait for it to come to you or create it for yourself, go ahead. print that. and sign it with my name. i stand by it.

but please, if you discover any human decency among your editors' tools, let me know.

arielle.

p.s. if you're going to complain about spelling errors in blog entries, of which i caught none in any entry you printed, you might consider spelling "elitist" correctly before you pin the title onto me.





outsiders: part of my journal entry (and a very silly picture of me) has been published in this month's Rutgers Centurion (click here for a PDF file). i'm on pages 3 and 13. page 13 is a portion of my journal entry - they call me a coward for not writing my thoughts in a letter to the editor. page 3 is just the first of my THREE letters to the editor-in-chief, which i wrote before i published my blog entry. plus, the title of the whole schtick, "profiles in cowardice," plays off of comments i made in the second of my letters. whoops! a little fact-checking error, there, boys! better luck next time.
for background info on this whole mess, click here.

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• 6 comments

moooshy

March 23 2005, 00:36:37 UTC

wow, what a dumbass publication. i read through it.

jesus christ.

• Reply

Anonymous

March 23 2005, 09:11:47 UTC

WE ARE WATCHING

YOU TELL US WE ARE A DUMBASS PUBLICATION: TELL US WHY AT MAIL@RUCENTURION.COM, OR DON'T SAY ANYTHING AT ALL.

• Reply

labyrinthyne

March 23 2005, 14:39:06 UTC

Re: WE ARE WATCHING

centurion:

not all conversation has to be TO YOU. that's the thing about free speech. it's not restricted to any one direction.

• Reply

Anonymous

March 23 2005, 20:21:00 UTC

Re: WE ARE WATCHING

James go fuck yourself.

• Reply

addienfaemne

March 23 2005, 22:40:32 UTC

Re: WE ARE WATCHING

I'm interested in knowing exactly how Arielle was behaving "cowardly" when she had already written to the editors of the Centurion.

A blog is a place for your personal thoughts - your "if you don't like us, say it to our face" shtick is really tired because most people do use their blogs to vent and express their personal thoughts and opinions, and that's exactly what Arielle did.

It makes YOU look hypersensitive to call Arielle a "coward" - are you too devoid of your own fresh, positive political material that you have to make fun of others simply for not agreeing with your political statements? It also makes you look ignorant, as Arielle had previously written you a letter that is PUBLISHED IN THAT VERY ISSUE!

So go ahead, call Arielle a "coward". Just realize that your magazine will get more respect if you graduate the sixth grade first.

• Reply

anticode

March 23 2005, 15:37:48 UTC

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This is another situation where the term "cock monkey" applies.

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Source: http://labyrinthyne.livejournal.com/13382.html

The New McCarthyism

“You have no first amendment rights,” said Richard Dienst, Director of the Rutgers Undergraduate English Program, to Rutgers College Republican Darren Cimillo, when he dared to challenge Duke University guest speaker Susan Willis on March 8th, 2005. Willis “consider[ed] the history of the Ku Klux Klan and its relationship to current U.S. foreign policy.” Richard Dienst and English Department Chair Richard Miller called the police and physically chased Darren out of Murray Hall and onto College Avenue. A police report confirms this.

On March 10th, Justine Mertz and I confronted Mr. Dienst with a video camera and asked him a) why the English department’s procured student fees are sponsoring a highly politicized event with no relation to the subject of English Composition and b) why he doesn’t believe in the United States Constitution. He told us to take it to “judicial affairs.” The video can be viewed at www.rucenturion.com.

On March 11th, a letter written by Richard Dienst and Richard Miller was sent to Dean Kirschner of Rutgers College and Dean Stauffer of Mason Gross in what apparently was a request for disciplinary action against Justine and myself for our “misguided actions.” The letter continued, “If there is a pattern of disrupted and improper behavior…we hope that an appropriate response will be made by University officials.”

From The Alien and Sedition Acts, to the silencing of Abolitionists to the McCarthy era of the mid 20th century, throughout history this country has learned to accept the First Amendment. John Stuart Mill’s argument for unfettered free speech was simple: if one’s ideas are not constantly discussed and challenged, their ideas will become prejudices and we would be unable to explain why we believe in them. The moral philosopher would undoubtedly find it ironic that an institution as morally relative as Rutgers would begin espousing that there exists a”right and wrong” political view and way to speak. No professor or bureaucrat is omniscient or qualified enough to make such determinations. For in America, the “free marketplace of ideas,” all things compete for public acceptance without restriction, especially on college campuses where debate and discourse are needed.

But from recent events at Rutgers, it is has been established that higher learning and free speech are incompatible. Rutgers, a public university that must comply with the 14th and 1st amendments of the Constitution, has four draconian speech codes (www.speechcodes.org) that silence minority opinion and suppress speech that is vaguely deemed “offensive” or does not comply with the university’s political orthodoxy. It has also developed a resume of constitutional violations that undermine the pursuit of truth and threaten the very foundation the Academy is supposed to rest upon.

In September 2002, Rutgers violated the US constitution by banning the InterVarsity Multi-Ethnic Christian Fellowship from using campus facilities and stripped the group of university funding because it “violated anti-discrimination policies” by requiring that its leaders be committed to InterVarsity’s “basis of faith and purpose.” John Leo, a columnist from townhall.com, pointed out that after the campus sponsored witch hunt, Rutgers anti-defamation laws would require the RU Democrats to “allow a Republican president, a Jewish group to allow a Holocaust-denying president, and a Muslim group to accept a leader who believes in Christianity, animism or voodoo.” Touché.

Then on March 6th, 2005 THE CENTURION was banned from participating in Tent State University, apparently due to our views; clearly a violation of the university’s anti-discrimination policies. The organizers of TSU, an anti-war demonstration in support of state-funded education, published staff meeting minutes on their website at www.tentstate.com. Organizers of the event declared illegally “THE CENTURION as an organization is not welcome at TSU under any circumstance” and “[T]hey cannot be affiliated officially with TSU in any way.” No action taken by University officials.

On February 10th, 2005 Rutgers violated the US constitution by censoring fast-food sandwiches names, locally known as “Fat Sandwiches,” because the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered communities deemed sandwich favorites, including the Fat Bitch and the Fat Dyke “offensive.” Meanwhile, the LGBTQI (the ever expanding acronym) community has not been “offended” by Bitch Magazine (www.bitchmagazine.com), whose mission statement reads that they seek to be a “voice for feminism.” The magazine advertises its readers to “Join TeamBitch!” “Host a Bitch event!” and “Talk Bitch up on the street and on campus!” On the website, the editors of Bitch Magazine advocate taking the insult “bitch,” as a compliment, because it is another name for an “outspoken woman.” Rightfully so, but notice the contradiction.

While feminists and queer communities at Rutgers are successfully banning sandwiches and reforming language, they have been failing to recognize football players who get away with beating their girlfriends. Last semester, Rutgers Athletic Director Bob Mulcahy cleared starting defensive end Alfred Peterson to play football after he was indicted for allegedly assaulting a female student. Peterson was exonerated by a university judiciary committee before the season began, but pleaded guilty to assault charges last month. Given identical circumstances and considering the testimony he heard, Mulcahy said he would make the same decision. And where is the outcry by feminists? At a newspaper called The Medium.

Last semester, 5,000 copies of the The Medium were stolen by self-described “progressive activists,” who combated the paper’s feminist-mocking not with debate, reason, or due process, but with thievery and deception. Worse, before the crime, students of the class “Woman, Culture and Society” were required to sign a calling for a campus-wide ban. Barbara Balliet, Director of the Women’s Studies Department, disassociated the petition with the missing papers saying, “I don’t even know that they’re stolen… Do you have evidence that they’re stolen?” While women on Douglass Campus were “offended” by nude pictures of women in The Medium, the all-female staff of the of Douglass’s self-described “progressive” magazine The Caellian recently printed graphic pictures of a softball sized sphere lodged inside of a young girl’s anus. Aren’t men repugnant?

In March 2005, Rutgers violated the US constitution and academic freedoms by prohibiting The Daily Targum from investigating the University’s spending habits of a budget of more than $1.2 billion, some of which comes from our rising 9% state user taxes. John Palvik, the Chairman of the Rutgers Journalism Department, refused to allow students to make such investigations since Pavlik and his department were subject to an investigation about how student athletes receive special perks including reserved courses in communications.

Luckily there exist organizations which fight constitutional violations, such as the non-profit Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (theFIRE.org), a group dedicated to uphold freedom of speech, legal equality, due process and religious liberty on increasingly repressive campuses. Groups like InterVarsity continued to exist, but that took a lawsuit. Meanwhile, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance and Students for a Free Tibet are not required to consider for leadership students of opposing beliefs. Groups like Tent State are free to discriminate on the basis of belief, simply due to their views.

At Rutgers, a school that prides itself on “making diversity a way of life,” “diversity” is only about skin color. Freedom is given to those who have the “correct views.” The academic core values of freedom of thought and expression are in danger of extinction. In the words of Charlton Heston, we must not “let America’s universities continue to serve as incubators for this rampant epidemic of new McCarthyism.”

Depending on how seriously Richard Dienst’s false threats and accusations are taken, THE CENTURION may soon be victim to another of the Rutgers’ witch hunts, where constitutional rights are not a defense.

NJO: Originally printed in the March 2005 issue of The Centurion.

Does the Chair of the English Dept. believe in the First Amendment?

Uploaded on May 3, 2009

Video of the discussion with the Chair after he threatened a student.

NJO: Video and caption from YouTube channel RUCenturion.

James' summation of the incident makes up the first two paragraphs of an article titled "The New McCarthyism" in the March 2005 issue of the Centurion and goes as follows:

“You have no first amendment rights,” said Richard Dienst, Director of the Rutgers Undergraduate English Program, to Rutgers College Republican Darren Cimillo, when he dared to challenge Duke University guest speaker Susan Willis on March 8th, 2005. Willis “consider[ed] the history of the Ku Klux Klan and its relationship to current U.S. foreign policy.” Richard Dienst and English Department Chair Richard Miller called the police and physically chased Darren out of Murray Hall and onto College Avenue. A police report confirms this.

     On March 10th , Justine Mertz and I confronted Mr. Dienst with a video camera and asked him a) why the English department’s procured student fees are sponsoring a highly politicized event with no relation to the subject of English Composition and b) why he doesn’t believe in the United States Constitution. He told us to take it to “judicial affairs.” The video can be viewed at www.rucenturion.com.

Pursuit of Truth?

After being condemned by feminists and free-speech opponents for the suggestion that men and women might actually be different, Harvard University President Lawrence H. Summers was forced to apologize three times for his explanation that the lower number of women than men in the hard sciences is due to "innate sex differences." This is the second "controversy" for Lawrence, who once suggested after September 11th there be more patriotism on campus. In this instance, the President was citing empirical research that found differences in brain chemistries between the sexes. In some areas, like the languages, women were found to be more aptly suited. In other areas like math and science, men had the advantage. But the academic elite at Harvard decided to kill the messenger and began accusing their "sexist" president of being against "diversity" and "equality." (The two seem to contradict one another, but that's another issue). One female MIT professor at the conference left the room telling reporters "this kind of bias makes me physically ill." While dialogue about the findings of such research has been condemned in universities which "pursue truth," outside research has confirmed that increases in testosterone given to women enhance their spatial abilities while reducing their verbal abilities. Outliers (those who lie farthest away from the average on the bell curve) are slightly more prevalent among men. Thus exceptional genius is slightly more prevalent among men. Universities recruit the most exceptional geniuses alive. Thus male exceptional geniuses are more prevalent among science and math faculty than women. These are logical and statistical conclusions, not "biases." Just as Galileo faced the discrimination in the 17th century when he suggested Earth was not the center of the universe, now collegiate institutions which pursue truth are hushing important debates (and facts) about human nature. A petition was signed to have Lawrence formally withdraw his statements. Now a petition should be signed to have Harvard's motto, "Veritas," withdrawn as well.

James O'Keefe
EIC@ rucenturion. com

NJO: Originally posted at RUCenturion.com.

Cop Killer Comes To Rutgers

Reported by Matthew Klimek and James O'Keefe

On August 27, 1964, two Lodi, NJ, police officers, Peter Voto and Gary Tedesco, entered a night club to investigate a disturbance. Inside, a man name Thomas Trantino and an accomplice assaulted the officers, disarmed them, and then commanded them to strip to their underwear. Trantino and his sidekick then taunted and pistol-whipped the officers before finally shooting them execution-style. One of the officers’ brothers found the two slain policemen at the scene. Originally condemned to death, his sentence was commuted to life when the Supreme Court overturned the death penalty in 1972. Since 2002, this cop-killer has been walking the streets on parole. Within 18 months, Trantino was under arrest again for charges that he assaulted and restrained his girlfriend. He was acquitted. A conviction would have put him behind bars for the rest of his life. Following his release, Trantino had some difficulty securing work but he has now found a job, one that brought him to Rutgers-Camden on January 22. The Friends Transitional Support Services, a Quaker organization that reaches out to ex-inmates, was looking for a program director. They chose Trantino. Now, the FTSS and Prof. Drew Humphries, director of the criminal justice program at Camden, have cosponsored a panel to discuss “How to Survive on Parole and Probation.”

Of the thousands of NJ parolees, who should they chose as their public liaison but Trantino. Humphries was quoted as saying in the Star-Ledger that the panel was meant as “an open forum for discussion, no matter how controversial.” Rather it would seem she means “as controversial as possible.” Leah Morris, an employee of the Office of Public Defender, sat on the panel with Trantino and Humphries, though she was not acting in any connection with the office. The discussion was held in a university auditorium, which the two sponsors leased privately from Rutgers. No representative from the New Jersey State Parole Board was present at the event. Their delegate withdrew when the board learned that Trantino would be on the panel. Edward Bray, Parole Board spokesman, told the Philadelphia Enquirer, “It’s inappropriate for one of our officers to be sitting with a parolee... and be expected to treat him as a peer.” State law enforcement officials were outraged, and pleaded with the University to cancel, but to no avail. “He’s not someone we want to put up as an example of a good
parolee,” said Bray. Dr. Humphries would disagree. “Tommy Trantino is on the panel because he’s a role model for those who have come out of prison and are looking to turning their lives around,” she said. “Tommy is a very peaceful person. He’s done a good job. I don’t think he’ll turn into an ax murderer.”

And what if he were to turn into an ax murderer? How would that be any different than what he already is: a first degree double cop killer? If the purpose of this panel was to build a positive rapport between parolees and the community, why did the sponsors choose the perpetrator of a premeditated murder which left two families and an entire community bereft, and who is now freely walking the streets after narrowly escaping his capital sentence, as their lead man? To the Camden department of criminal justice, exactly what is their definition of the word “justice?” Still, Trantino wishes someone from the Parole Board had been present. “I’m willing to talk to those police officers,” he said. “I’m willing to go in to their training and talk to them. I used to talk to the police in prison and I have no problem with police.” No, he only executes them. “We recognize that Tommy is a controversial figure and for many people it’s rubbing salt in very tender wounds,” said Humphries. “But the difficulties of people in parole and probation is important work, so we do it.” More important, presumably, than the dignity of these two officers and the difficulties of their families following their loss. Two public servants, Voto and Tedesco, lost their lives, but their murderer not only still has both his life and his freedom, but is honored as a role mode. Of the law enforcement community, Trantino said, “It’s a club... The way they survive is, when Tommy Trantino’s name is mentioned, they snap to attention and say ‘RRRR.’”

NJO: Originally printed in the February 2005 issue of The Centurion.

The Conservative Manifesto - Part III

A spectre is haunting Rutgers — the spectre of conservatism. All of the powers of the ivory tower (Rutgers) have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre: “diversity” proponents, speech-code advocates, multiculturalists, feminist radicals, and your professors.

Where is the student that has not been decried as “conservative” by the liberals in power? Where is the opposition that has not hurled back the branding reproach of conservatism, against the more advanced liberal ideology at Rutgers, as well as against its reactionary adversaries?

Two things result from this fact:

I. Conservatism is already acknowledged by Rutgers to be itself a power.
II. It is time that Conservatives should openly, in the face of all their professors, publish their views, their aims, their tendencies, and meet this nursery tale of the spectre of conservatism with a manifesto of the ideology itself.

To this end, I have assembled the following manifesto, to be published in THE CENTURION:

A conservative believes in natural rights. A conservative believes in natural rights; those rights endowed to human beings by their creator. They believe in a system of government ordained around truths that are self-evident. Furthermore, he does not believe “No culture’s way of life is better than another,” as anthropologist Theodosious Dobzhansky has argued. Allan Bloom claims in his book The Closing of the American Mind that America promises, “the untrammeled freedom to reason,” and
therefore the highest achievement of truth and self-actualization. Conservatives are guilty of the sin of pride. We are proud of our nation and its values. We would rather study the political philosophies of freedom, justice, and liberty by John Locke, Adam Smith, and Thomas Hobbes which have inspired generations of prosperity. We choose not to buy into the political philosophies of conflict theory and revolution by Marx or Mao which have inspired only genocide. A conservative is not afraid to tell the multiculturalists and western intellectuals that ridding the world of genital mutilation, infanticide, religious discrimination, patriarchy, cannibalism, forced abortions and corrupt dictators is not “culturally imperialistic,” or “ethnocentric.” It is rather our civic duty to our fellow man.

A conservative believes in objective truth. A conservative professes external order. He is firmly opposed to relativism's claims that truth is relative to the eye of the beholder, or claims that it is contextually constructed. He defends his view that there exists an outside truth by pointing out that disagreement doesn’t entail interminability, that there are undeniable facts like “the world is round,” and if there was no ethical or moral truth, then there would be no distinction in virtue between Mother Theresa and Adolf Hitler. A conservative believes strongly in virtue: pursuing the good life for man for its own sake. He also beliefs in family and the traditions ordained in the family. Discipline, faith, self-confidence, personal responsibility and conviction are essential in all of man’s pursuits.

A conservative believes in limited government. “Government is not the solution to the problem, it is the problem” (Ronald Reagan). While law enforcement, basic education and maintenance of infrastructure are all necessary, the government does not have a good track record in succeeding at what it sets out to do. He knows this for two reasons. One, government is not some distinct, almighty, independent moral entity; rather it is comprised of human beings with all the innate characteristics and corrupt susceptibilities that affect those “evil” corporations and masses of ignorant citizens it attempts to govern. Second, government operated programs fail economically, because unlike profit, there is no measurable end to determine the level of achievement. The conservative prefers the alternative of privatization; private ownership of the means of production. Privatization is more successful that its government counterpart because it is vastly more efficient, self-regulating, and cost-effective. Examples of successful areas of privatization the conservative points to include health care, social security, mail delivery, prison operation, etc. While Norwegian president accused the United States government of being “stingy” with the tsunami relief effort and other charitable contributions, private United States companies had already donated hundreds of millions of dollars to the effort as well as to other charities worldwide.

Prosperity, incentive, free market, growth, human fulfillment and the pursuit of happiness are created from the bottom up, not the government down. He believes that a free-market will lead towards human prosperity and happiness. While doomsdayers and naysayers warn that overpopulation is due to prosperity, the exact opposite is true. The most industrialized places on earth have a birth rate far below what is needed to maintain their population.

Only when the human spirit is allowed to invent and create, only when individuals are given a personal stake in deciding economic policies and benefiting from their success — only then can societies remain economically alive, dynamic, progressive, and free, and only then can human beings achieve happiness. Trust the people. This is the one irrefutable lesson of the entire postwar period contradicting the notion that rigid government controls are essential to economic development.

A conservative is Politically Incorrect. A conservative reveals the facts regardless of whose feelings get hurt. He acknowledges there are differences between the sexes. He knows what a statistical bell curve is, and understands that an outlier or exception cannot disprove a rule, sin qua non. He is against language reform and other futile and aesthetic attempts to soften reality by calling toilet paper “bathroom tissue,” freshmen “first-year-students,” and more recently Christmas trees “trees of giving.” A conservative does his best to act rather than talk and does his best not to get caught up in names, labels, and terminologies. Buzzwords like “inclusion,” “tolerance,” and “diversity” are racist, hypocritical, and exclusive to, as Leo Strauss said, “those who have stated clearly and forcefully there are unchangeable standards founded in the nature of man and the nature of things.”

A conservative believes in equality of opportunity, not equality of outcomes. That being said, he is strongly opposed to racism. He recognizes there are many human beings who lack opportunities. But current programs that institutionalize racial consciousness, like affirmative action, must be reformed on the ground that they encourage racial identity, promote suspicion of minority success, and violate civil rights by putting skin color before character. Racism is most prevalent in college admissions where skin color alone determines how one acts and thinks. In some cases, race is all that matters. “Diversity” becomes nothing but skin tone. One’s desires, intellect and even background become irrelevant. The postmodernists, whose philosophy is founded upon fragmentation, assume skin color alone can determine how one acts and thinks, therefore bringing a range of perspectives. Conservatives suggest an alternative program based solely on socioeconomic need. Such an alternative would bring diversity of economic backgroun and benefit minorities because, as the left itself confesses, a disproportionate amount are “socioeconomically disadvantaged.” A conservative is against “identity politics” and racial pride movements on the grounds that they too identify and polarize skin color. The conservative recognizes that since the 1960’s, activists have shifted their cause from civil rights to racial identity, a cause which will serve as an impediment to racial equality.

- James O'Keefe

NJO: Originally published in The Daily Targum in 2004 and later printed in Issue 3 of The Centurion in February 2005.

"Tell me more about this class and any of the remarks your professor has made"

NJO: Originally appeared on the Rutgers Centurion's forum.


Topic: I can't believe I have to do this

hlcobassoon:
I can't believe I have to do this « on: January 24, 2005, 07:03:20 PM »
First, I apologize for not being able to make it to the meeting tonight.  I am sick and don't want to be too far from a bed.
For multiple reasons, most of which are too complicated to explain here, I have to take a women's studies course this semester (Douglass requirement).  I went into this hoping I would get a decent teacher who would stick to the original point of feminism and not be too extreme.  Well, for the course that fit in with the rest of my schedule, called Feminist Practices, I am required to read "The W Effect: Bush's War on Women," which has this awful charicature of him on the cover.  Now, I'm just assuming this is going to be dreadful, but before I assume too much, has anyone read this book and is it really as bad as it sounds? 

jokeefe:
Re:I can't believe I have to do this « Reply #1 on: January 25, 2005, 05:46:35 PM »
Tell me more about this class and any of the remarks your professor has made

James  

What Your Professors Don't Want You To Read, Part II

What Your Professors Don't Want You To Read

Letters to a Young Conservative" Dinesh D'Souza 01/26/2005

The closing of the American Mind Allen Bloom 01/26/2005

How Capitalism saved America Thomas DiLorenzo 01/26/2005

Shut Up and Sing Laura Ingraham 01/26/2005

Corps Value Zell Miller 01/26/2005

Leadership Rudolph Giuiani 11/26/2004

Our Character, Our future Alan Keyes 11/26/2004

The Savage Nation Micheal Savage 11/26/2004

Michael Moore is a Big Fat Stupid White Man Hardy and Clarke 11/26/2004

Why the Left Hates America Daniel J. Flynn 11/26/2004

A Dose of Conservative Thought

Where is the truth?

Certainly it is not in some obscure interpretation of Marx's Capital or in the works of Trotsky or Spinoza or Friedrich Engels, Clement Atlee, Julius Nyerere or Noam Chomsky. Maybe it lies within the graves of the human beings slaughtered throughout the 20th century coerced into being equal by a government of armed thugs they didn't have a choice but to trust. Complete state ownership and collective ownership have both lead themselves down a path of good intentions to a hell so barbaric it's amazing rationalizations for their existence still exist. Especially given the empirical evidence. Your professors make the death list a cliché, a footnote and in some cases, even an impediment. Mao Zedong's butchering of 65 million people. 25 million in Bolshevik and Stalinist Russia slaughtered. Cambodia. Africa. Eastern Europe. Latin America. Your professors can hide behind textbooks and theories – even the promise of a socialist utopia – call the atrocities anti-socialist. (I could call racism anti-American and anti constitutional.) The Problem lies in their belief in this mysterious utopia which has never manifested itself ever. A belief which makes them more religious than Pat Robertson. In order to succeed, even in theory, they must confront arguments made by F. A. Hayek and Ludwig von Mises about the inevitable failure of a controlled market. Have professors had their students read objections to socialism by Aron, Popper, Oakeshott, Sowell, Strauss, Blool, Kirk or Friedman? Absolutely not. Are your professors constituting a breach in academic responsibility by not offering you these extremely legitimate and historically proven objections to socialism? You betcha.

Have arguments been raised against these "utopian" paradises that currently exist on the planet earth anywhere at in the Academy? What about Sweden? Is this place heaven on earth or what? "Highest Standard of Living," they say. This tidbit seems to be based on wealth redistribution and median income. Not factored in are GNP, innovation or exchange rate. Neither is unemployment in the private sector (which has been close to 12%). Recent reports by the Swedish Institute of Trade indicate median income in Sweden is $26,900, compared to $39,400 in the United States. This is before taxes, and in Sweden taxes are everything. You're education and health care are certainly not "free." There is a national income tax of 55% not to mention a 22.5% sales tax on all items sold. Their socialized health care is on the verge of economic collapse, due to a funding dependency on a 30% private ownership of the means of production that is shrinking. Canada is facing similar problems. Meeting the costs of such welfare policies are barely possible in countries with 10 million people. Then how are they possible in America, with almost 300 million people?

I have seen students at the "Death of Humanity" rally as well as the extremist left-leaning conferences held throughout the month at Rutgers not address any of these objections. Should it be the responsibility of a couple of undergraduate students at THE CENTURION to challenge them? No. It should be the responsibility of Rutgers University. Professors should openly discuss both sides of the ideological coin as well as the benefits of electing both candidates for a presidential election (Especially if Students fees are sponsoring such conferences). In addition, our administration should pursue academic, conservative intellectuals to come speak who can pose defenses for our market structure, instead of conservative talking heads like Ann Coulter. It is the least they can do, if as our study indicates, the partisan ratio at Rutgers is a high as 13 Democrats to every 1 Republican.

Our Journal of conservative thought focuses upon the Rutgers Community and seeking balance within it as well as taking a stab at the current events. We recommend for students who want a conservative perspective devoted exclusively to current events read the impeccable prose of the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal or the columns of the National Review. Perhaps read one of the books we occasionally suggest. The differences between us and these other journals is our distinction of having the luxury of covering things that happen on our campus. By virtue of our firm belief in individualism, morality, and tradition our main goal is to challenge the students to see things through a different perspective.

Contrary to the sentiments of the angry and reactionary academic left, we are not on a coalition against benevolent causes like supporting of the environment and the need for racial equality. Our logic dictates that affirmative action programs should be based on socioeconomic need, not skin color. The majority of our student fees allocated from us towards NJPIRG, if collected from us without our informed consent, should go directly towards environmental causes. They should not go towards liberal lobbyists who pursue things other than the environment. We will attempt place needed scrutiny upon policies such as these because others seem not to for fear of some politically correct reprisal. Why call these arguments "racist" or "pro-pollution" when they could actually increase opportunity and decrease pollution, based on an increase in efficiency?

So you may very easily reject our humble attempts at introducing you to new perspectives. Laugh at us. Mock us. Call us "clueless." Our own faculty advisor did so in his December 1st entry of his weblog listed in the margin below. But in doing so, you'd just be rejecting yourself. Because our paper is not just a collection of legitimate or illegitimate points about particular political issues, rather it is the embodiment of the spirit of marginalized and isolated conservative students whose beliefs have much in common with the majority of citizens in the United States of America. Rutgers has an unchallenged partisan majority as witnessed in our study of campaign contributions. This threatens the impressionable youth who will soon depart the ivory gates of unregulated intellectualism into a real world, where contrary to the teachings of their sociology professors, anything is possible.

There is a world out there where is punishment for people who do bad things and there is no such thing as a free lunch. There is a world out there where your theories will be governed by consequences, your hard work rewarded by success and your destiny contingent upon your actions. Because that section of the world we live in is America, our potential as human beings is infinite.

And that is the truth.

James O'Keefe

NJO: Originally printed in the December 2004 issue of The Centurion (Issue 2) and also posted on the Centurion website.

What Your Professors Don't Want You To Read, Part I

What Your Professors Don't Want You To Read

NJO: Also: Books your professors don't want you to read. Basically the same page twice, hey ho.

Up from Liberalism "If you like liberalism, You'll Loathe Buckley"  William F. Buckley Jr. 11/26/2004

The Politics of Bad Faith Horowitz attacks the Acedemic Elite David Horowitz 11/26/2004

The Road to Serfdom Hayek proves that socialism will always lead to tyranny  F. A. Hayek 11/26/2004

Why we Fight Bennet reinforces a right and wrong with terrorism William Bennet 11/26/2004

Capitalism and Freedom Rutgers '32 connects political freedom with economic freedom Milton Friedman 11/26/2004

Why the Left Hates America Flynn exoposes the left for what it truly is  Daniel J. Flynn 11/26/2004

Michael Moore is a Big Fat Stupid White Man How Mikey edits those films very carefully Hardy and Clarke 11/26/2004

The Savage Nation Micheal Savage 11/26/2004

Our Character, Our future Alan Keyes 11/26/2004

Leadership Rudolph Giuiani 11/26/2004

James reacts to the 2004 election results

NJO: Source: RUCenturion.com.

The truth shall set you free

General George Patton once said "When everyone is thinking the same, no one is thinking at all." Throughout my life, in all my pursuits of obtaining knowledge, the one thing that has stimulated me most has been a good challenge. Everyone is in agreement that the only way to learn is through constant stimulation.

Conservatives and traditionalists are in this respect very fortunate in college. They are challenged. They learn material through postmodernism, historical revisionism and the plight of the disenfranchised. The are forced to disect morality and examine the ethical obligations of the West. They are lectured about the injustices and struggles of those who have been victim of systems favorable to those in power. They are drowned in relativism, concepts of distributive justice and redistribution of wealth. They are taught that there is no such thing as truth and you are not allowed to make judgments upon anyone or anything, except America. They are taught to be sensitive and defensive, emphasizing artifice and political correctness over fact. For Rutgers students who have not taken any classes in the liberal arts, look no further than your mandatory Expository Writing course. You read about the evils of capitalism and the gluttony of America. You read about the corruption of the elections processes which elect diplomatic morons. You learned about the consequences of globalization, the need for cultural contexts and the corruption of an all men's institution discriminating against women. Liberals are very unfortunate in college. They aren't really challenged at all.

Have advocates for progress with an alleged pursuit of tolerance ever attempted to understand or listen to their conservative counterparts, the same way they tell their America to listen to their political enemies? Have they been forced to read the Nobel Peace Prize winning works of free enterprise by Milton Friedman (A Rutgers graduate) or Friedrich Hayek the same way I have been forced to read the communist works of Karl Marx? Have they studied Ayn Rand's objectivism, Edmund Burke's belief in "sound practice" or William F. Buckley's "Up from Liberalism?" Do they see they are living in the most fruitful and prosperous country in the world, admiring egalitarian systems that in 20 th century have lead to more barbaric cruelty, famine and death than any privileged American intellect could ever fathom? Have those in academia been challenged morally? Have they studied the principles that this country was founded upon? Have they studied principles of liberty, freedom, justice, and equality, and truly compared them to the principles of other societies?

Why, in a country that is at least half conservative, do we not have this ratio represented in higher learning? Some will say conservatives shouldn't have a right to express themselves. Some say principles of limited government, personal responsibility or of an objective standard are flat out wrong. In the words of Michael Moore, "let's have that debate." But let's not have it through the filter of a professor who has endorsed a certain candidate or who always comes from a certain ideological perspective. Let Rutgers be a place as President McCormick envisioned in his Inaugural Address "where there is tolerance for the student who challenges the professor's ideas." If our arguments are so flawed, so unsound and so problematic, then let us expose them for everyone to criticize. Then we will rest our case.

There is nothing academic about an ideological majority. There is nothing liberal about a monopoly of thought, nothing enlightening about blatant partisan endorsement, and nothing equitable about discriminating against conservative students and professors because their beliefs are different than your own. Rutgers is a diverse research university with a goal not only to represent the citizens of New Jersey, but views and theories from all over the country and the world. More importantly, it is an academic institution that pursues something even deeper, beyond knowledge or ideology, beyond the rhetoric of a debate.

"Sol Iustate et occidentem Illustra." "Sun of righteousness shine upon the west also." For the past 200 years and to this day Rutgers lives by that motto. Give us virtue, give us justice, give us truth. So read about our truth to challenge yourself politically in the process. Find out that although we go about it differently, we are in pursuit of the same things you are. Disguising truth has helped every blood-thirsty tyrant and dictator keep the shackles on humanity throughout history. Let us rock the foundations of academia and challenge the thrones that have for too long indoctrinated us about our world and the context in which we live. As the Journal of Conservative thought at Rutgers university THE CENTURION will try its hardes to serve to that end. Turn the page. You may read things you agree with and you may read things that you disagree with. But at least you'll come closer to realizing your own truth, and in the words of Jesus Christ, "The truth shall set you free."

Cordially,
James O'Keefe
Founder, Editor-in-Chief
THE CENTURION
Veritas Vos Liberabit






NJO: Originally printed in the November 2004 issue of The Centurion (Issue 1) and also posted on the Centurion website.

So, some perspective.

James and some other students have just started a conservative-leaning college magazine. You pick up a copy of this new magazine, and right there on the front cover, James is telling you that if you get an abortion from an unregulated and unsafe practitioner and as a consequence suffer some horrible bodily harm which causes you to die, then as far as he's concerned it's really all a bit of a giggle because fuck you you dirty whore. It gets your attention in a trollish sort of way, so you turn to page 3, and you read the editorial above.

What are you supposed to think?

“Partial-Birth-Abortion” Ruling Kills Women

By DAVID OKRENT

NEW YORK, November 1 — Congress is again debating a bill banning partial-birth abortions. This sweeping legislation would deny women their right to terminate their pregnancies within one to three months before birth. A fundamentalist Christian doctor from a prominent anti-choice foundation claimed before Congress that brain waves, a heart beat, and complete organ systems were clear indications that the fetus is its own human being, and that anesthesia given to the mother during the procedure is nowhere near the level needed to induce a painless death in the fetus. He further argued that if a fetus is a human being, it is entitled to rights under the Constitution. The passage of this ban would open the way for increased deaths of women seeking to curb the loss of their control over their bodies by visiting unregulated and unsafe back-alley abortion clinics for lateterm procedures. Several hundred women protested outside the Capitol during the deliberations. Some of the protestors displayed coat hangers, to indicate the risky measures into which legislators will force women needing to terminate their pregnancies. Others decried the current administration with chants referring to Mr. Bush as “repressive” and “fascist.”

Continued on Page A13

NJO: Originally printed on the cover of Issue 1 of the Centurion in November 2004. The cover design took the form of a mock New York Times with a bunch of parody articles like this one, which I single out for its exceptional ugliness of sentiment and the according ugliness of character which it reveals its writer to have. The pseudonym "David Okrent" is probably a reference to Daniel Okrent, the first "public editor" of the New York Times. Whoever wrote it, James was evidently happy enough with it to publish it on the cover of his new zine, so it can reasonably be taken as an expression of his own feelings on the subject.