The Actual Referendum

In 1964 Richard Hofstadter won the Pulitzer Prize for his new book "Anti-intellectualism in American Life." Forty eight years later, Americans are having a referendum on the intellect or, perhaps more accurately, on intelligence. It's not just the parade of republican politicians who seem to be holding a contest on who can publicly say the dumbest things; it's the heavy weight of public opinion stacked up behind them that not only doesn't care about intelligence but actually seems to admire the reverse. In Texas schools, they refuse to teach critical thinking on the grounds that it will undermine "the authority of the family." One is reminded that the first thing new militarist governments usually do is arrest all the professors and shoot their students. They can't tolerate criticism and the last thing they want is new ideas.

Economics is an interesting example. Academic economists have been studying the "business cycle" ever since the Great Depression and have developed an understanding of economic downturns as well as sensible policies for stimulating re-growth. Republicans, on the other hand, think the great geniuses of the "economy" are the richest businessmen --- "surely all that money says something about them!" ---  and want to run the national economy like a business. Of course, the national economy is not a business any more than it is a household budget. Of course, in all of this, we are asked to ignore the fact that it is businesses that get us into "business cycles" precisely by doing business as usual. Ignore whatever the academics say!

A century ago, the Spanish philosopher, Jose Ortega y Gasset, wrote "Revolt of the Masses" in which he described the evolution of "mass man" in modern times. One of the principal traits of mass man is that he completely loses sight of how modern times were developed out of science, literature, and the arts and begins to think of them as natural gifts, hence nothing that requires effort or sacrifice. Of course, Ortega was ignored as just another elitist intellectual.