It certainly didn’t match the coarseness of Rush Limbaugh’s characterization of an articulate Georgetown University law student as “slut.” But when Rick Santorum called President Obama a “snob” for encouraging American young people to attend college, it had about the same level of intellectual rigor as the radio blowhard’s gutter-feeding meltdown. Which is to say, not very much at all. Which qualifies, of course, as the kind of criticism one must expect from elitist pointy-headed media types.
Santorum ripped into the idea, as he put it, that Obama “once said he wants everybody in America to go to college.” Santorum tried to suggest Obama was trashing all the decent Americans who don’t go to college. “There are good, decent men and women who go out and work hard every day and put their skills to tests that aren’t taught by some liberal college professor trying to indoctrinate them,’’ Santorum said at a February 25 Tea Party rally in Michigan. “Oh, I understand why he wants you to go to college. He wants to remake you in his image.’’
Over the weekend, Santorum, like Limbaugh, was backtracking on his comments.On a forum televised by Fox News, an Ohio State University student told Santorum his comment that Obama was a snob for wanting everyone to have a chance to attend college “didn’t sit very well on my campus.” Santorum said he regrets calling Obama a “snob,” and said he shares the goal of everyone having access to college. What he took exception to was the idea that everyone should go to college — an attitude, Santorum said, of “we know better what’s best for you.”
As the Los Angles Times reports, there is no evidence that Obama has ever made the statement Santorum is ascribing to him. Obama has said everyone should pursue some type of degree or training program after high school, which smacks a lot more of basic common sense in the 21st century economy than ivory tower elitism. “We have now reached the once unthinkable point in this presidential race where even higher education has come up for debate,” writes Jena McGregor in the Washington Post. “A college education is no longer just a warm and fuzzy part of the American Dream. In today’s world, the cold reality is that having more and more well-educated scientists, engineers, and mathematicians is the only way for this country to compete.”
Still, some have not known when to leave a losing argument alone. The Globe’s Jeff Jacoby, while acknowledging that Santorum expressed himself “inelegantly,” says he was right to call out American campuses as havens of left-wing political correctness. But what was Jacoby’s point? What’s more, although college students, as a whole, are a liberal lot, University of British Columbia sociologist Neil Gross, who is writing a book on academia, says the best research evidence to date suggests college attendance does not make young people more liberal. Instead, he says, high school graduates who lean more to the left are are more likely to attend college.
Believing him, however, does require placing some stock in research hypotheses, data, and all that snobby stuff.
–MICHAEL JONAS
BEACON HILL
The Patrick administration is cracking down on red tape, the Wall Street Journal reports. Greg Bialecki, the governor’s secretary of housing and economic development, takes on conservative think tanks.
MUNICIPAL MATTERS
Boston magazine’s article on Lawrence, entitled “Lawrence, MA: City of the Damned,” is causing quite a stir. City Councilor Daniel Rivera has already responded and the Eagle-Tribune says in an editorial that city is not damned but cheated.
Boston residents, including Mayor Tom Menino, rally at the Charles Street AME Church in Roxbury to protest threatened foreclosure on the property by OneUnited Bank.
The suspended Cohasset town manager handed out contracts and raises to a dozen non-union employees as the town faces a $300,000 deficit.
Worcester County police chiefs say Civil Service hiring is holding them back, the Worcester Telegram reports. For more on Civil Service, read this CommonWealth story.
The wrestling coach at Bridgewater-Raynham High School, who was fired after reports of hazing on the team surfaced, says he was a scapegoat and is threatening to sue unless the district gives him back the job he had for 25 years.
NATIONAL POLITICS/WASHINGTON
Governing offers a state-by-state analysis of pension forfeiture laws: 23 states, including Massachusetts, have them while 27 do not.
George Neumayr, an editor at the American Spectator, says if anyone deserves an apology from Rush Limbaugh for his caustic comments about a Georgetown University LawSchool student it is prostitutes, who at least pay for their own contraceptives. Meanwhile, the furor over Limbaugh’s comments isn’t likely to die down anytime soon.
ELECTION 2012
State GOP head Bob Maginn discusses tomorrow’s primary here and in other states on Keller@Large and the upcoming fights for Republicans in some of the redrawn congressional districts where there seems to be some chances to make inroads. The crickets chirping that you hear (we know it’s the wrong season for this one, but we’re using it anyway) is the sound of the campaign rallies GOP candidates are holding in Massachusetts and Vermont, the two New England states that are voting tomorrow.
The Republican Party may have to learn the lesson of George McGovern and Barry Goldwater if the GOP is ever going to win the presidency again, argues The Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza. The negative tone of the primary season isn’t helping matters. Mitt Romney heads into Super Tuesday with endorsements from Rep. Eric Cantor, Sen. Tom Coburn, and John Ashcroft. Nate Silver counts the delegates before they’re awarded. The Times speculates that the four-way GOP nomination race could stretch on for months, since the primary calendar holds bright spots that could keep each candidate fighting. Romney tops his rivals in a Wall Street Journal/NBC poll for the first time since November.
Sen. Scott Brown leads Democrat Elizabeth Warren 49 percent to 41 percent, WBUR reports. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is in town tonight to stump for Brown. Kimberly Atkins thinks Joe Kennedy III missed an opportunity to score points with the base when he declined to take on Brown over contraception.
Margery Eagan lists all the Catholic orthodoxies Rick Santorum flaunts — on immigration, torture, the death penalty, and the minimum wage. None of it matters, the Herald columnist argues, because bishops are only interested in enforcing rules concerning gays, women, and sex.
The best magazine cover ever? Check out this New Yorker rendition of Romney and Santorum, with a nod to the late, great Seamus the dog.
The Republican bemoans the impending departure of Maine’s Olympia Snowe.
BUSINESS/ECONOMY
The growth of cloud computing could mean 20,000 new jobs in the Boston area by 2015, according to a report produced for Microsoft by Framingham-based IDC Corp.
CHARITY
An online poll by the Susan G. Komen for the Cure fund seeking to reassure donors on both sides of the political spectrum may backfire, some nonprofit observers tell the Chronicle of Philanthropy.
ENERGY/ENVIRONMENT
Refinery closings could mean even higher gas prices in the Northeast than elsewhere, the Globe reports.
A study of nearly 800 children born in communities around New Bedford Harbor near contaminated industrial sites has made a link between PCB exposure in the womb and ADHD in the children.
The state Department of Recreation and Conservation has drafted a list of 100 recommendations for Horseneck Beach in Westport but it does not include moving duneside campsites further inland as has been proposed several times in the past.
Cape fishermen are unhappy about a federal delay in instituting a quota on herring which led to overfishing in the region.
Deepwater oil drilling picks up again as memories of the BP disaster in the Gulf of Mexico fade, the New York Times reports.
The Boston Business Journal finds that drivers are actively seeking out more fuel efficient cars as gas prices rise.
CRIMINAL JUSTICE
More accusations of child sexual abuse leveled against the late clubhouse manager for the Red Sox, the Globe reports.
Journals from Lizzie Borden’s lawyer that were written during the course of her trial have been donated to the Fall River Historical Society.
MEDIA
Newspapers are having difficulty finding a new revenue model, according to a report from the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism written by Tom Rosenstiel and Mark Jurkowitz. The Wall Street Journal rounds up papers’ digital paywall efforts.