Margaret Soltan, author of the blog University Diaries is a professor of English at George Washington University, and a contributor at Inside Higher Ed. I first became aware of Professor Soltan when she began a (currently) 10-part series about learning about, for want of a better term, America’s love affair with the gun. I think Dave Hardy was the original link. Professor Soltan is, insofar as I can tell, not a particularly atypical academic, but her willingness to explore one of America’s gun cultures is unusual, and I was (and still am) supportive of that effort.
However, her most recent two posts at Inside Higher Ed have punched my buttons. The first, Charles Murray on Elites is an example of the kind of thinking that, IMHO, typifies the “liberal elite,” and I told her so. Checking back today to see if there had been a response to my initial comment (there had) I also noted that she had put up a new post, Palin Fire. That one really lit me off.
Instead of posting something long here today, I penned two more comments; one for the Charles Murray piece, and another, briefer one for the Palin piece.
I am endeavoring to remain civil, but this example of blind, blithering elitism by a member of the academic intelligentsia, one of Thomas Sowell’s “Anointed,” really yanks my chain.
If the exchange continues, it should get interesting.