In his Nov. 7 Perspectives column, “Invitation to noted historian deemed alarming,” Randall Balmer expresses his concern over the successful thwarting by antiabortion students of an address by a respected author and editor, and says it’s a “false equivalency” to mention similar behavior by left-wing students because their opposition is directed at “right-wing flamethrowers.”
But those with even foggy memories of the annus horribilis 2014 will recall that it was all the rage among students both conservative and liberal to cause the “disinvitation” of intended commencement speakers who — though one might not agree with their every word or act — were respected and respectable academics and civil servants.
In fact, the “Disinvitation Database” of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education reveals almost 500 attempts — some successful, some not — to squelch commencement addresses or other campus lectures going back to 1998.
Those efforts seem roughly equally distributed between left-wing and right-wing students. Sometimes a speaker was opposed by left-wingers on one campus and right-wingers on another. Some speakers (notably Mike Pence) were rejected on one campus and accepted on another.
Topics such as abortion, contraception or the Israeli-Palestinian conflict elicited hostility from the left on some campuses and from the right on others. (Each listing contains a link to the episode’s portrayal in mainstream media.)
Reading a list of such inconsistent objections to various topics from one side of the student political spectrum or the other leads one to question whether there’s any common thread and why they’re doing this. One answer is, “because they can,” which might mean “power trumps principle.”
While Balmer wonders whether a university president should resign after failing to dissuade such students from silencing speakers, what might be more entertaining for us bystanders would be for some courageous president to say, “OK, you students pick the speaker and organize the event.”
And then run a betting pool to see how long it would take — if ever — for them to find a speaker they could agree on.
JACK BARRETT
Lebanon
The dominant New Hampshire GOP recommended on Nov. 3 the most extreme gerrymandered map in state history. You can visit opendemocracynh.com/redistricting/USCongressionalMapAnalysis.pdf to see that the GOP majority on the redistricting committee has carefully carved out the Concord and Portsmouth-Durham areas and moved them into its proposed new District 1.
This lumps as many “university towns” as possible into the Democratic-heavy District 1, joining Keene State College, New England College, Dartmouth College and Plymouth State University. Since better-educated populations tend to understand civics more thoroughly and how U.S. politics really works, the GOP likes to cram them into as few liberal-likely districts as possible.
To handicap against a Democratic presence in New Hampshire’s federal delegation, this means one red district and one blue, since the GOP can create only one sure Republican district in two-district states like New Hampshire.
Scroll several screens farther to see how New Hampshire’s two districts have remained competitive over the past hundred years or so, to get a clear picture of how illogical and radical the proposed redistricting is, dividing and unbalancing both districts.
If you support the concept of real democracy — voters picking representatives instead of representatives picking voters — visit opendemocracyaction.org/redistrictingaction for suggestions how to take action to right this pending wrong.
Our GOP legislators know, and fear, that this single issue could — and should — get them voted out in the next election. Call, email or write a letter to your state representatives and make it known that is will be a huge issue in the next election.
MICHAEL WHITMAN
Lyme
In reference to the recent Washington Post opinion column on taxing unrealized capital gains (“Here’s why we need the new tax on billionaires,” Oct. 28): This “new tax” is unconstitutional, in my view. The U.S. Constitution, via the 16th Amendment, gives the federal government the ability to tax income, not confiscate wealth.
Private wealth is not evil. It is the basis for the type of investment that creates jobs for you and me and underwrites such “terrible battles” as those over “space funding.”
It is not news that entrepreneurs are better at allocating capital than the government. “Public capital,” whatever that is, is the “foundation” for potholes in our roads and for such highly unprofitable ventures as Amtrak. Whatever did happen to NASA’s space station?
There will be “tax creep.” The income tax was initiated a century ago with a top rate of 7% on taxable income in excess of $500,000 (about $12 million in today’s money). Does anyone doubt that wealth confiscation would follow the tax version of mission creep and that all of us will eventually be a target of those who wish to redistribute all wealth so that we are all equally poor in a socialist world?
It is impossible for the Internal Revenue Service to manage this concept — impossible to set the cost basis for all assets in the U.S. and impossible to figure out how to handle unrealized gains that turn into unrealized losses.
But we can all help by volunteering to work for the IRS, all of us, each and every one.
AL ROSSOW
Cornish