FORGET THE DEMOGRAPHICS: The Judis-Teixera thesis about the future strength of the Democrats makes a simple error. What if the Republicans succeed in winning over exactly those groups that until now have been trending Democrat? Or rather: what if the Democrats lose them? David Broder today sees the short-term future of the Dems - and it's clearly leftward. Who, after all, is going to pull the party to the center? The general loathing of Bush, Gore's disavowal of Clintonian centrism, Edwards' reliance on Bob Shrum, Pelosi's ascension to House leadership - all these play into Republicans' hands. (How, I wonder, can the Democrats elect a House leader who voted against war against Iraq? Are they serious?) The liberal intelligentsia - epitomized by the New York Times editorial page - shows no sign of rethinking and is actually urging more strenuous leftism, not accommodation or new directions. If the war goes well, and if the economy revives, it's therefore hard to see anything but Democratic collapse under this new leadership. (And it's never good for a political party to be pinning its hopes on military failure or recession.) I guess I'd vote for Harold Ford.

THE NEXT 'DIVERSITY' PUSH: It's no longer enough to admit students on the basis of their skin color to American colleges and universities. The students now have to socialize with other individuals of different races. The New York Times, in breathlessly uncritical tones, hails the move. One quote truly gave me the creeps:

Theodore R. Mitchell, president of Occidental College in Los Angeles, said, "It is our job as educators to construct conscious communities in which students and others spend time, work and play with people unlike themselves — ethnically, ideologically, politically."

"Conscious communities"? Blech. How about letting people get into college on the basis of their academic achievements? How about letting students interact privately with whomever they want in a free society? And how about some real diversity - i.e. intellectual diversity - among college faculty? Yeah, I know the chances are next to zero. But every now and again, you have to ask the bleeding obvious, don't you?

-- Anonymous, November 13, 2002