Reagan & Two Universities

[Lionel Mandrake]

Stanford and UC Berkeley are rivals. Their football teams meet in what's called the "Big Game" every year. But that's not the most important game in town.

During the 1950s loyalty oaths were imposed on UC professors, a number of whom refused to sign or resigned. For example, the physicist Wolfgang "Pief" Panofsky moved from Berkeley to Stanford and helped create the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC).


So the anti-communist witch hunt hurt UC Berkeley in the 1950s. But this was nothing compared to what Ronald Reagan later did as part of his campaign to become governor of California. This sordid chapter in California history is recounted by Seth Rosenfeld in an op-ed piece in today's LA Times:

Once upon a time, the University of California was a sacred trust, the top tier of a model educational system that helped lift the state to unprecedented prosperity. It was jealously protected from outside political interference.

Now UC is more often described in profane terms. The state's entire higher education system has been under assault for decades — free access is long gone; investment per student has shrunk; some rankings have slipped. The passage of Proposition 30 last year will help repair some of the damage, but UC's stature has been diminished and with it the dream of a truly excellent education for every qualified native son and daughter.

The causes are complex and largely economic, but in an important way, the troubles of the nation's greatest public university can be traced to the ascent of a California icon, Ronald Reagan, and his brand of anti-government conservatism.

UC's downfall was eerily anticipated by a man Reagan made his scapegoat: Clark Kerr, UC president from 1958 to 1967. Kerr, an economist and renowned labor arbitrator, sought to make a college education universally accessible. He oversaw the 1960 adoption of the influential Master Plan for Higher Education, coordinating the state's junior colleges, four-year colleges and universities to avoid redundancy, save tax dollars and deliver on the state's commitment to provide a quality education for its high school graduates.

That's only the beginning. I urge everyone to read the whole article:
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-rosenfeld-uc-reagan-kerr-20130510,0,7344574.story

What do people at Stanford think of Reagan? I suspect most of the students and faculty hate him, but there is one part of Stanford where Reagan is worshipped as a minor god. That is, you guessed it, Hoover's last erection:

That's Herbert himself standing proudly in front of the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. As I read about Reagan and what he did to UC, I can feel my blood pressure rise.

He was an obscenity, a huge blot on our state's history. What he did I fear cannot be reversed, given today's political climate.

K&R

[Lionel Mandrake]

2. I heartily agree.

And thanks for the K&R.

[Lionel Mandrake]

3. kick

[Lionel Mandrake]

4. kick