Republicans demanding affirmative action for hiring more republican professors

[DetlefK]

http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/2/20/1635991/-Iowa-legislature-introduces-bill-to-require-university-faculty-applicants-to-state-party-affiliation

The legislation proposes that a “person shall not be hired as a professor or instructor member of the faculty at such an institution if the person’s political party affiliation on the date of hire would cause the percentage of faculty belonging to one political party to exceed by ten percent the percentage of faculty belonging to the other political party.”

The Secretary of State’s office would be directed to provide voter registration lists to the colleges so that new job applicants’ party affiliation could be checked before the hiring process gets underway. Graciously, Chelgren allows for people registered as No Party to slip through the process without facing the litmus test.

The obvious impact and purpose of this bill would be to ban Democrats from getting hired anymore at Iowa colleges. If you took a survey right now, it’s highly likely that Iowa professors are registered as Democrats at a much higher rate than Republican. So any new hires would be strictly limited to Republican or No Party voters.



Aside from the obvious plan, what about Third Parties? According to this legislation, every single political party would have a right to have a professor of theirs hired. If we just take the 4 parties who made headlines in the last national election, that means that each party gets 25% +/- 5% of the hires.

[no_hypocrisy]

1. If the college/university were hiring a music or art history professor, what difference would

political affiliation make?

[d_r]

7. Where would they

Ever find a music or set history professor that is republican?

Oh wait they would have to want a job so bad to apply at Iowa anyway after this that they would just change their voter registration. That would take about a minute .

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

47. Professor Ted Nugent?

[cstanleytech]

2. I can see this being challenged in court and the state losing as party is 100% a choice but you dont

get any choice before you are born with things like the color of your skin or what your gender is.

[TNLib]

3. So dumb they don't get it

Who are they going to hire? The GOP is now the party of toothless hillbillies and internet trolls living in their parents basement not qualified professors.

[Chemisse]

9. Exactly.

[lastlib]

11. Could they ever find that many GOPee-ers capable of earning a PhD?

Most PhDs are too smart to be GOPee..... jus' sayin'........

[moda253]

43. Bottom up tactic

They are going to destroy public education and make it a voucher system so that the only people that can afford to go through education are republicans. This is a long game ethnic cleansing they are playing here. They intend to marginalize POC and liberals to the point they are no longer a threat to their plans.

I have no doubt they will effectively enslave people that do not align with their political ideology by rendering them powerless to changing their station in life. To a degree that's what systemic racism has always been. We now have a group in power that seeks to push that into overdrive.

[lastlib]

50. you are absolutely correct!

I often cite the Thomas Jefferson quote that "an insightful and educated citizenry is the arch-enemy of tyranny". Since they don't want any arch-enemies for the tyranny they seek to impose, they have to wipe out the "insightful and educated citizenry." Hence, crush universal publicly-funded education that trains everybody how to think for themselves, and thus have the ability to oppose their corporate tyranny. Make education the sole province of their own. Uneducated and docile serfs who don't know how to think for themselves make for meeker workers who are less likely to challenge their existing order. That saves their profits, and keeps their order in place.

[Tanuki]

13. I see from the Wikipedia page of the bill's sponsor, Mark Chelgren,

that he does not have even a bachelor's degree. Perhaps that is part of the reason for his lack of understanding of higher education.

[DFW]

4. The First Amendment said WHAT again?

It seems not to have penetrated as far as the Iowa legislature.

[Throck]

5. What? More gym teachers?

[smirkymonkey]

46. *snort*

In the words of Woody Allen, "Those who can't do, teach. And those who can't teach, teach gym".

[Throck]

48. Those that can't teach gym.....

....run for office.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

6. Fascistic political tests, nothing less than that, in Iowa.

First they want plus or minus 10 percent.

Then they will say it has to be +10 percent for the leading party (their own RepubliCON Party).

Then they will go to 100%.

It is Authoritarianism plain and simple as soon as you require party declaration and mandating party affiliation.

If RepubliCons want more Republicon professors, then they should start funding better public school education in their areas and getting serious about deep learning rather than rote learning and 'skills'.

If they succeed in creating such an unwise faculty requirement, they will make their little island state so undesirable for educated enlightened people that they will start having to pay huge bonus salaries to attract Democratic professors there. But that might just be the plan, so that they will mandate flat salary levels ('commensurate with national averages' or similar) and allow an exception if they can't attract Democratic professors, thereby leading to a top heavy imbalance of substandard Republicon professors.

I think it was the Iowa Legislature that thought it would be a good idea to legislate the value of Pi to be exactly 3 instead of 3.14159....

[cab67]

15. the pi law was in Indiana

[Bernardo de La Paz]

19. thx

[certainot]

35. iowa and I-state already support 5 limbaugh/trump radio stations - what more do they want?

it's bad enough they parasitize our universities with rw talk radio.

here are 88 major universities that 257 limbaugh stations broadcast sports for. they depend on these schools, like leeches, to attract advertisers and community cred. that makes these schools great places to protest any issue - like fascism, trump, political tests for profs, etc.

they've been whining about liberal profs for years, while trying to defund public ed and helping get republican regents and chancellors in charge of our schools.

ALABAMA 8  Auburn 3, Alabama 2, Southern Alabama 2, Troy 1
ARIZONA 2 Arizona St. 1, Arizona 1
ARKANSAS 3 Arkansas 3
CALIFORNIA 5 San Jose State 2, USC 2, Fresno St. 1
COLORADO 4 Air Force 2, Colorado 1, Colorado State 1
CONNECTICUT 1 Connecticut 1
FLORIDA 20 Florida 10, Florida St. 4 Miami 2, South Florida 2, Central Florida 2
GEORGIA 14 Georgia 7, Georgia Tech 5, Georgia Southern 2
IDAHO 7  Boise St. 4, Idaho 3
ILLINOIS 7 Illinois 7
INDIANA 11 Notre Dame 6, Purdue 4, Indiana 1
IOWA 5 Iowa 4, Iowa St. 1
KANSAS 4 Kansas St. 2, Kansas 1, Wichita St. 1
KENTUCKY 3 Louisville 2, Kentucky 1
LOUSIANA 3 LSU 2, La.-Monroe 1
MARYLAND 2 Maryland 2
MASSACHUSETTS 1 Boston College 1
MICHIGAN 19 Michigan St. 11, Michigan 7, Western Michigan 1
MINNESOTA 4 Minnesota 4
MISSISSIPPI 6 Mississippi St. 3, Mississippi 2, Southern Miss 1
MISSOURI 6 Missouri 6
NEBRASKA 6 Nebraska 6
NEVADA 1 Nevada 1
NEW JERSEY 2 Rutgers 1, Seton Hall 1
NEW MEXICO 3 New Mexico 2, New Mexico St. 1
NEW YORK 7 Syracuse 6, Army 1
NORTH CAROLINA 16 North Carolina 8, North Carolina State 3, Duke 3, East Carolina 2
OHIO 10 Ohio St. 6, Toledo 1, Dayton 1, Bowling Green 1, Xavier 1
OKLAHOMA 5 Oklahoma St. 3, Oklahoma 1, Oral Roberts 1
OREGON 12 Oregon St. 7, Oregon 5
PENNSYLVANIA 14 Penn St. 11, Pittsburgh 2, Temple 1
SOUTH CAROLINA 4 South Carolina 2, Clemson 2
TENNESSEE 7 Tennessee 4, Memphis 3
TEXAS 16 Texas A&M 9, Texas Tech 4, Texas 1, Texas Christian 1, Baylor 1
UTAH 1 Utah St. 1
VIRGINIA 6 Virginia Tech 5, Virginia 1
WASHINGTON 6 Washington 5, Washington St. 1
WEST VIRGINIA 2 West Virginia 1, Marshall 1
WISCONSIN 5 Wisconsin 5

[BeckyDem]

44. Terrifying information you have there and it explains a lot.

[keithbvadu2]

8. Didn't republicans used to be against quotas?

[MyOwnPeace]

31. Don't worry.........

if it gets to the Supreme Court, Clarence Thomas will vote it down!

[YOHABLO]

10. There is so many things about this that are disturbing,

[longship]

12. More professors edumacated at Liberty University!!!!

It's got "liberty" in the name, so it cannot be about establishing a theocracy in the country, or something like that. Could it?

The W administration hired a lot of those folks.

After all, students holding hands is outlawed there!

Maybe we should have an education secretary edumacated at Calvin College... wait a minute... We do have one of those!!

[Proud Liberal Dem]

14. There are many disturbing elements to this

The creepiest one being people having to declare their political affiliation and being discriminated over it, which would inevitably happen one way or another under this legislation. Besides, I thought that Republicans believed in being hired on the basis of your own merits, not your race, religion, sexual orientation, political affiliation, etc.

[Volaris]

30. And that's exactly their problem with the current status quo.

Republicans as professionals (let alone professors) don't usually possess much merit to get hired on, so OBVIOUSLY that should be changed.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

37. They deride us for demanding to be treated like "special snowflakes" (we don't)

yet they're the ones always demanding special treatment, privileges, exemptions, etc.

[Volaris]

42. That's because in an economy based on math science and actual facts

There not gonna get any safe spaces for their Alternate view of things. They're bitchy because when we point out a mistake or injustice we usually get it corrected in short order (because we checked our shit like we're supposed to and made sure we were right before opening our mouths) and when THEY try it, usually they get laughed at. They're right that it's not at all fair, it isnt. That they think it SHOULD BE, despite all factual evidence to the contrary based on nothing more than its not fair TO THEM, is the problem.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

45. Exactly

n/t

[Augiedog]

16. Good grief, what respectable institution of higher learning would want one of those?

[Dustlawyer]

17. Oh Hell no!!!

You are not going to politicize college! This is a bridge too far to have professors with a "D" or an "R" after their name!

[Vinca]

18. Oh, good. Just what higher education needs - people who don't believe in science.

[KewlKat]

20. that was my first thought. the continued dumbing down of america.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

22. Republicons think emotions (political affiliation) trump facts. It's statistically common among Rs.

[rurallib]

23. Well I wonder if he will take into account all the minor parties

and religious affiliations and many other demographic factors.

I am so embarrassed to say I live in Iowa anymore.
Chelgrin is only slightly less embarrassing than Steve King and Terry (I am going to China) Branstad.

[Nitram]

24. I suppose they'll want quotas for right wingers, alt righters, redneck racists, urban racists,

evangelicals, right-to-lifers, gun nuts, xenophobes, homophobes, Islamophobes, the tobacco lobby, the oil lobby, the fracking lobby, the sugar lobby, Wall St, billionaires, etc.

[Thav]

25. "What about third parties?"

It doesn't apply to them, only to Republicans. It doesn't apply to democrats either, as if there is a university that has a majority republican faculty, democrats have no right to force this law on those universities.

[Trust Buster]

26. You mean the millions that the Koch's and other Right wind funders give to universities to set

up the "Institute of whatever" on college campuses and train instructors there who move on to Heritage is not enough ? Jane Mayer wrote an interesting book chronicling this network.

[GeorgeGist]

27. Amazing how much STUPID ...

these dipshits are capable of.

[Botany]

28. The coup is continuing .....

..... rig elections done ..... rig the media done ..... now rig education.

BTW Professor should not be hiried or fired because of their political
thoughts but because of the skills in teaching and their skills in their
field of study.

[malthaussen]

29. Why not just cut to the chase and make the Democratic Party illegal?

Clearly that is the direction of this twit's thinking.

I still am amazed when I see a headline that I'm sure is from the Onion, and it turns out to be straight news.

-- Mal

[NurseJackie]

32. This is stupid. It's a protest gesture. It's equivalent to that guy who an ANTI-GAY cake message.

(And he lost in court too.)

[Greybnk48]

33. They tried this malarkey in the late 90's as well.

I recall the movement (think bowel) led by David Horowitz, pushing that right wing "scholars" should be granted tenure with a so-called "Masters" degree, and progressives would still need a Ph.D. for the same position. This was one proposal that was hot for a while and riled us all up.

It went nowhere, of course. They want to politicize, or "Foxify" (toxify), our campuses like they want to Christianize or dumb down our public schools. Less science, more preachifyin'. If Gingrich and his thugs couldn't do it, hopefully Trump and his gang of the religiously insane, neo-Nazi's, and Russian con men won't succeed either.

[Initech]

34. The GOP hates anything liberal.

They don't know why they hate us so much, but they do. And now they're coming for the last two assets we have left: universities and the Johnson Amendment. They've destroyed everything else we hold dear. If they get their mits on higher education we're done for.

[DeadLetterOffice]

36. One of these days the GOP is gonna make my head EXPLODE. n/t

[Generic Other]

38. Affirmative action for Republican intelligentsia?

Climate deniers, creationists, holocaust deniers, racists, misogynists, Trump University graduates, bad spellers...

I have served on many hiring committees. I have never once known or cared about the political persuasion of a potential hire. Never even considered asking. Just as I never asked their religious affiliations.

Besides, what money-grubbing Republican is going to apply for a job as a low-paid professor anyway? Most academics are adjuncts and get paid slave wages.

Republicans are too busy getting rich by taking advantage of others. They are hardly interested in helping them become educated.

[skip fox]

40. Me too.

Many hiring committees.

In English (my department) many are liberal as they are in liberal arts.

Imagine if the Business Department was required to hire at least 40% Democrats! They'd love it.

This is Horowitz gone mad.

[skip fox]

39. Another major negative

I can imagine many mediocre grad students facing today's job market might change their party affiliation just to get hired. Therefore Iowa education would suffer.

[Adrahil]

41. blatantly unconstitutional. NT

[nikibatts]

49. Sorry, they just aren't critical thinkers. hehe

[TlalocW]

51. I got to know a lot of my professors

Most of them were liberal but kept their political beliefs out of the classroom except on rare occasions - a biology professor admitted he really enjoyed listening to (and agreeing with) Limbaugh; a classmate asked a Spanish professor what he thought of Limbaugh (this was the 90s when he first burst onto the scene), and he said that he didn't agree with his politics, but in the long run, he was no different than Madonna - paid to be outrageous, just doing it differently (classmate did not like that comparison). Physics professor had a liberal bumper sticker on his jeep. My math advisor (liberal) and the department head (conservative) would get into political arguments in the office, and I would often sit and visit with a physics professor in his office who was very liberal. None of them attempted to proselytize.

I think what the GOP is objecting to and labeling as liberal are good professors (of whatever political stripe) that make you think and in some cases, consider the view of other groups (if it's germane to the class). The only people I can't imagine going through college without even a little bit of opening of their mind and learning empathy are a few of the more religiously zealous classmates I had.

Even if they could find more conservative professors (I'm sure there's already a dearth of those), there are only so many departments where they would have any sway. You can't teach math, physics, chemistry, biology, computer programming, and a lot of other disciplines with a partisan bent. History, yes. Economics, yes. Psychology and sociology? Doubtful many conservatives to the GOP's liking would be in those fields since they require empathy. The deck is stacked against the GOP in multiple ways here, and it's because higher education that if done right teaches you HOW to think instead of WHAT and being on a campus where you're having to deal with people of different races, creeds, nationalities, sexual orientation, etc. (except for places like Liberty University) tend to erode conservatism.

TlalocW