Yes, Stanford Has a Serious Intellectual Quality Problem Here: Why Do You Ask?

Yes, Stanford has a very serious quality control problem with its Hoover Institution: Brian Contreras, Ada Statler, and Courtney Douglas: Leaked emails show Hoover academic conspiring with College Republicans to conduct ���opposition research��� on student: "Emails between the Hoover Institution���s Niall Ferguson and well-known Republican student activists John Rice-Cameron ���20 and Max Minshull ���20 reveal coordination on 'opposition research' against progressive activist Michael Ocon ���20...

...Ferguson resigned from his leadership role in the Cardinal Conversations program on April 16, after Provost Persis Drell became aware of the email chain. ���I very much regret the publication of these emails. I also regret having written them,��� Ferguson wrote in a statement to The Daily. Drell said that Ferguson ���offered to resign,��� and that she accepted the resignation. ���The emails... were contrary to the spirit and intent of Cardinal Conversations,��� Drell said....

The emails use harsh and at times war-like language to describe liberals and ���social justice warriors��� (SJWs). ���Slowly, we will continue to crush the Left���s will to resist, as they will crack under pressure,��� Rice-Cameron wrote. ���[The original Cardinal Conversations steering committee] should all be allies against O. Whatever your past differences, bury them. Unite against the SJWs. [Christos] Makridis [a fellow at Vox Clara, a Christian student publication] is especially good and will intimidate them,��� Ferguson wrote. ���Now we turn to the more subtle game of grinding them down on the committee. The price of liberty is eternal vigilance,��� Ferguson wrote.

The previous messages were interspersed with greater discussion of the Cardinal Conversations committee and planning process, as well as a discussion appearing to be about student government. In the email chain, Ferguson wrote, ���Some opposition research on Mr. O might also be worthwhile,��� referring to Ocon. Minshull wrote in response that he would ���get on the opposition research for Mr. O.���...

When I look at the CC speaker invite list, I see: Reid Hoffman, Peter Thiel, Francis Fukuyama, Charles Murray, Anne Applebaum, Ted Koppel, Jessica Lessin, Christina Sommers, Andrew Sullivan, Danielle Brown, Claude M. Steele and John Etchemendy. Assume that a university should get the best speakers it can who are intelligent, well-informed, have interesting things to say, and are committed to engagement and raising the level of the debate rather than propaganda and driving their audience like cattle to a pre-chosen conclusion. Brown I do not know at all. Fukuyama, Applebaum, Lessin, Steele, and Etchemendy clear all three bars and would belong on the Cardinal Conversations podium. The rest do not���although you could argue for Hoffman and Thiel as development cases.

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