The one consistent theme for the left is to destroy that which previous generations have created and nurtured over generations.
One thing that the left in the US and Europe consistently does is to destroy that which was given to them by previous generations. Here are a couple of examples:
*New York. After the Giuliani and Bloomberg administrations, the city of New York was clean, safe, and thriving. Bill de Blasio was elected, and since his tenure, crime, and homelessness have gone through the roof, people have fled the city, the city is filthy, and now illegal immigrants are overwhelming city services. Why did New Yorkers pick someone to destroy their city? Republicans Giuliani and Bloomberg made New York great, so voters wrongly assumed that it would simply continue that way under anyone’s stewardship.
*California. One would be hard-pressed to describe all of California’s natural beauty and resources. Earlier generations wisely built dams and reservoirs to make sure that the farming regions would always have water for irrigating the billions of dollars worth of produce sent all over the world. But recent leaders have not only not built any new reservoir capacity; they are planning to destroy parts of the engineering wonders made in preceding generations, calling it unnatural. Billions of gallons of fresh water are flushed into the San Francisco Bay to help preserve a little fish, while private farms go belly up for lack of irrigation water.
And then there is Harvard, my erstwhile alma mater. Over nearly 400 years, Harvard built up an international reputation as one of the finest universities in history. Inventions, Nobel Prizes, top minds—they all seemed to come out of Harvard with a regularity not seen anywhere else in the US or the world. If the US sends 32 Rhodes Scholars to Oxford each year, half would be from Harvard. The Supreme Court had half of its justices with law degrees from Harvard Law School. Eight US presidents graduated from Harvard. Harvard was like Tom Brady, with his seven Super Bowl championship rings. A great player might have made two Super Bowls and even won one of them—something he could tell his grandchildren. But winning seven and playing in ten is beyond the stratosphere. And thus was Harvard, in every category, from the size of its endowment to a number of breakthrough discoveries to the annual October announcements of Nobel laureates. There was no better institutional name than Harvard. Thousands applied each year, hoping to have their names and that of Harvard attached for eternity for job advancement and standing in the community. As I previously wrote, in my life, I have only met one person who had never heard of Harvard before.
Recently, there has been some kerfuffle about the Harvard Extension School—is it really “Harvard,” as it certainly advertises itself to be? I cannot add anything to that debate, but Harvard Summer School was one place where I saw Harvard flex its muscles in a kind of bait and switch. I was a resident proctor for the college-aged summer students on campus for two summers. Friends of mine had the same job but for high school kids who came to Harvard for the summer session.
Harvard students finish their Spring semester and vacate campus. Harvard thus has massive numbers of dorm rooms available for summer school students. The summer program cost was hefty but college credits could be accrued for some of the courses offered. What I found was that nearly all of the faculty teaching at Harvard during the summer were not regular Harvard faculty members. Yes, there were some who did teach during the summer, but it seemed that most of the courses taught at both the high school and college level were given by people also brought in by Harvard for the summer. And while Harvard no doubt screens its professors and lecturers as it screens student applicants, the simple fact is that for all of the thousands being paid by students hoping to put HARVARD on their college applications or resumes, they were not being taught by the same faculty that made Harvard famous.
The situation reminded me of a restaurant that some freshmen friends and I visited in Boston. The food was amazing as was the service. Months later, we returned, and the food was awful; the portions came with a microscope to see them, and the service was non-existent. We couldn’t figure out what had happened. After our disappointing meal, we went outside and saw that an “S” had been added in fresh paint to the restaurant's name: new owners, new name, and new awful menu and service. Thus, Harvard sells itself to prospective summer students as the Harvard and then gives them courses taught oftentimes by individuals who arrived on campus a few minutes before their students.
I saw a similar phenomenon here in Israel where it seemed that many top Israeli officials claimed some Harvard degree or diploma. The Harvard Kennedy School had an arrangement—now canceled—with the Wexner Foundation to import future Israeli government and military leaders for coursework leading up to an official, lifetime Harvard association. Here, the courses were taught by the regular faculty, but some of the programs ran for a few months only. One cannot learn much, but it was enough to give a diploma with a shiny Harvard logo.
What Harvard built up over 400 years has been destroyed in a few decades by left-leaning faculty and administrators who were hellbent on introducing a DEI environment to the campus. Claudine Gay was the symbol of a failed system designed to advance people whose professional careers did not merit such advancement. The school has gone so far to the left that I recall a 2016 Harvard Crimson article in which a woman who supported Hilary Clinton said that she had to hide her views as everyone on campus was a socialist “Bernie Bro”. One can see the campus leftism in action with the demands for genocide of Israelis and Jews with the administration not yet figuring out which “context” is required in order to actually suspend or otherwise punish those wishing for the death of their fellow students. The Chabad rabbi who recently lit a menorah on the steps of Widener Library was told that he should not leave the menorah unattended as it would probably be attacked and damaged.
Harvard’s custodians have destroyed the value of the Harvard name. It has become the butt of jokes and people here in Israel are embarrassed to say that they went there. As graduates, we bought into “Harvard,” and the value added it represented for our future opportunities. We will soon be holding the Harvard Corporation legally responsible for its destruction of the Harvard brand. It’s like sitting on a bus where a drunken maniac suddenly replaces the responsible driver. Harvard’s actions not only affect the fearful students adversely affected today on campus or the future potential students and faculty who are now looking elsewhere for a safe academic environment. Their reckless destruction of one of the finest universities in the world has damaged the job and earning potential of hundreds of thousands of alumni who now wonder if Harvard is a boon or burden on their resumes. And Harvard will be made to pay for their arrogance.
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