The Pulitzer Prize winner’s latest syndicated column is an offbeat gem about the “suspension of operations” that appears to presage the death of Antioch University in Yellow Springs, Ohio:

There is, however, a minuscule market for what Antioch sells for a tuition, room and board of $35,221 — repressive liberalism unleavened by learning.

Founded in 1852 — its first president was Horace Mann — Antioch was, for a while, admirable. One of the first colleges to enroll women and blacks, it was a destination for escaped slaves. Its alumni include Stephen Jay Gould, Coretta Scott King and Rod Serling, whose “Twilight Zone” never imagined anything weirder than what Antioch became when its liberalism curdled.

In 1972-73, Antioch had 2,470 students. In 1973, a protracted and embittering student and employee strike left the campus physically decrepit and intellectually toxic. By 1985, enrollment was down 80 percent. This fall there may be 300 students served by a faculty of 40.

There is a troubling undercurrent of seemingly routine violence and harassment that appears to have been the order of the day at the school:

Former public radio correspondent Michael Goldfarb matriculated at what he calls the “sociological petri dish” in 1968. In his first week, he twice had guns drawn on him, once “in fun” and once by a couple of drunken ex-cons “whom one of my classmates, in the interest of breaking down class barriers, had invited to live with her.” (Goldfarb’s full column, which originally appeared in the New York Times and is behind the TimeSelect firewall, can also be found here. — Ed.)

….. Steven Lawry — Antioch’s fifth president in 13 years — came to the college 18 months ago. He told Scott Carlson of The Chronicle of Higher Education about a student who left after being assaulted because he wore Nike shoes, symbols of globalization.

….. Lawry stopped the student newspaper’s practice of printing “announcements containing anonymous, menacing threats against other students for their political views.”

Yellow Springs is a community about 20 miles east of downtown Dayton, and about 70 miles north-northeast of downtown Cincinnati. Yet I recall no reports about the violence described in either the Dayton Daily News or the Cincinnati Enquirer over many years.

It’s possible that Antioch’s environment is (soon to be was) an off-the-chart extreme; after all, it IS the institution that earned international ridicule for its “ask at every stage of intimacy” sexual conduct code in the early 1990s. But the examples of assault and harassment cited do make one wonder if the concern over on-campus crime that at most schools has focused on perpetrators from the surrounding community has been at least partially misplaced — with the help of Old Media outlets reluctant to expose Far Left-inspired violence.

Out in the off-campus world, one has to ask how many supposedly peace-loving, wouldn’t-harm-a-fly graduates of colleges or departments with “curricula” similar to those found at Antioch are ready to react in violence at the least little perceived provocation.

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

The meme: Income inequality during the Bush Administration has widened, as the rich have gotten ever richer.

A sub-meme: Income inequality during the previous administration lessened, or at least didn’t get any worse.

But facts are stubborn things, as this information easily obtained from the Census Bureau shows (scroll down at the link to get to inflation-adjusted data):

From Table H-3. Mean Household Income Received by Each
Fifth and Top 5 Percent — All Races: 1967 to 2005

The highest quintile (fifth) and 5% of households had double-digit real income increases from 1996-2000, while those same groups experienced declines from 2001-2005.

It is likely that the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts caused the higher-income groups to have a slight increases in real after-tax income. But don’t forget that the tax cuts benefited every income group, thanks to the expansion of the Earned Income Credit and the reduction of the lowest tax bracket from 15% to 10%.

Other than the New York Times, which has been obsessed with income inequality since at least the early 1980s, Old Media rarely focused on the growth in income disparities that occurred the 1990s. In the runup to the 2000 election and ever since, that has all changed. Even Wall Street Journal writers who should know better like Arthur Brooks (requires subscription) take it as an article of faith. Democratic presidential candidates, especially John Edwards (noted near the end), have made income inequality a central theme of their campaigns, and reporters like NPR’s Mara Liasson simply assume it’s true. Apparently the best defense the Bush Administration can mount is that it has been happening for decades (second paragraph at link).

Why?

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

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Related Post:
- Sept. 29, 2005 — Income Inequality + Economic Mobility = Long-Term Prosperity

From Font du Lac, Wisconsin:

Jul 12, 2007 / 11:11 am (CNA).- A 108-year-old sister is preparing to celebrate her 90th anniversary of religious life this month.

Sr. Claude Feldner of the Congregation of Sisters of St. Agnes will join 45 other sisters on July 15 as they celebrate their jubilee anniversaries at Holy Family Sacred Heart Church in Fond du Lac.

Sr. Feldner told The Fond du Lac Reporter that she is living this time as one of gratitude and surprise.

“They didn’t think I would live this long,” she told the newspaper. “I was threatened with tuberculosis as a young woman and was sent to Kansas to heal. At that time, they thought a dryer climate would help a person. It must have worked because here I am at 108 years old ready to enjoy a party.”

Sr. Feldner made her first profession in 1917. Over the years, she taught music in grade schools and college. She continues to play the piano almost daily. She served for many years as a formator for the congregation, preparing young women for religious life.

The congregation serves in the fields of education, health care, social work and pastoral ministry in the United States and Latin America.