Hi, Hi, Hi Hi. Ask not what your country can do for
you, ask what you can do for your country. Mister garbachaw tear down
this wall. It is the Ricochet Podcast. I'm Rob Long. Joining me
today is Peter Robinson. James Lylax is the travel Our guest today is Glenn
Lowry. We talk about everything, including the spirit of Christmas. Stay tuned.
The right thing for herd to do is to step down, and I
hope that the Christian doesn't relent until she does that, because she's harming academia.
She's harming black people, She's harming everyone who had to work and earn
their way in academia. This is the Ricochet Podcast. This is number six
hundred and seventy. I'm Rob Long, one of the co founders of Ricochet
along with my fellow found under Peter Robinson in Palo Alto. Peter, how
are you? I am well, Rob, I think yet how many?
What is this? This is number one, six hundred and seventy. This
is believeable. I remember I remember number two so well. So we are
not joined as usual by James Lylex. He is not here, he's traveling
today. So this is just what we call in theater. We called this
a two hander. Just it's like the you know, driving this Daisy,
That's what this is. It's the you know, the gin game, one
of those you know, just to two characters on stage in a long one
act or is that what a Broadway puer told me, Yeah, who's more
who's Morgan Freeman and who's Jessica Tandy. Well, I think that that that
we'll leave that to the audience of the side. But I was going to
say that. A Broadway producer said to me years ago. He said,
listen, here's what we need. Ninety minutes no intermission. And I said,
okay, well like a comedy. No, you know, honestly,
ninety minutes no intermission, Like that's that's the most important thing if you're a
theater producer is people come in, they said, Anne, no intermission,
see the play, and they go out and have dinner. It's too late
because intermission you lose people. So I, you know, that's what we're
going to do today. Ninety minutes no intermission, not ninety Merry Christmas,
Peter, Merry Christmas. Rob. It has been a long time since I
was in New York at Christmas time, but I used to love it for
all the I think, all the right reasons, all the childlike reasons.
The decorations would go up. Yeah, the big public decorations at Rockefeller Center
the surprising number to me, it was alwa surprising. How how seriously the
people on the Upper East Side, which is where I live for one year,
took decorating their front doors with wreaths and red ribbons and so yeah,
and then of course the shopping, the window displays. Is it still like
that? It is, you know, it's still like that, still crowded,
It's still got like people coming in on the weekends and walking around,
which is kind of like, you know, there's a part of the fun
to begin New Yorkers. Oh, people get out of my way. But
in fact they are the the all the fuel that keeps the engine running.
We should be a little nicer to those people. Decorations everywhere. I mean,
I think, you know, my neighborhood people have their you know reads
out. I have my reads out, and they have their you know,
their stoops stooned with furs with the you know, evergreen stuff. So it
does feel like there's moments where you you know, you look away from some
of the other things and you just focus on the Christmas stuff, and what
about what do people say to each other? Is Merry Christmas still permitted or
is it happy? Yeah? Well, I think it's the problem with Merry
Christmas now is that the people who say it tend to say it and then
like they're mad about like, merry Christmas. Right, I can say that,
right, And I was like, well, yeah, but you know,
maybe different attitude when you say it. Almost everybody. I mean,
I don't know. I was seeing somebody says, can say Merry Christmas,
and I don't. I mean, I suspect there was a time when that
was controversial, although I think now it's been pretty much debunked. You now
you're supposed to say Marry Christmas. Although you know, last week I said
happy Honkah to people I knew who celebrated because it was the first day of
Honakah. I used to love that about New York, that the population,
the Jewish population of New York was about three million, the biggest Jewish population
of any city in the world, including Tel Aviv. And it was you'd
say happy Hanukkah if you knew someone was Jewish. But it was just a
kind of active generosity on everybody's part. Atheists, Christians, Jews alike used
to feel perfectly comfortable, well at least being greeted by by Merry Christmas.
Okay, now it's Advent, yes, and I feel that I must do
my duty and examine It is up to me to examine your conscience, how
seriously I am. I am. I am aware. Rob. We have
exchanged emails in conversation the odd side conversation. I am aware that you are.
I was about to say, returning to the roots of Episcopalianism, but
that's a preposterous formulation. But yeah, zachtly have you what are you doing
for Advent? I know you have, as I seem to recall, you
have a friendly church that's uptown or at midtown. Yes, well, I
mean Advent. The problem with the Advent is that it's I live. I
live in between two churches. Here. There's a Presbyterian church that I can
see from my window, and then there's an Episcopal church that I can see
like from the skylight here, which means that at various times at nude during
Advent, the bells play Oh Come, Oh comm Emmanuel, right, which
is really the only Advent carol that you're allowed to sing, you know allowed.
I'm not saying any Christmas carols, even though that's what everybody wants to
sing, you know, will come on ye faithful things like that. You're
not allowed to do that if you're you know, you're serious about it.
So Advent is a pain in the neck. Frankly, I think that we
should just be seeing Christmas carol. So the Episcopalians have this thing where they
go, we'll have lessons in carols, have a special service where you can
come and get your Christmas carols out by before the twenty fifth, uh,
and so there will be that caroling on the steps of the church next week.
And then I am I think I'm ushering on Christmas Eve in the city.
You're staying in the city, in the city, staying in the city.
So I think I'll be an usher, which I think I don't.
I'm always confused to what they actually do. You stand there and then you
sort of let let them let the rose get in line for the Eucharist.
So I think that's what I'll be doing. Excellent, all right, Well,
Merry Christmas. Is things emerge. Yeah, we wanted to talk at
some point I believe you are. I believe it was not idle conversation,
although we had had both had a drink. You're planning to apply to Yale
Divinity School. Is this? I'm thinking about it. It's one of these
things I'm thinking about doing. You know, it's time for the third act
to begin. I mean, what I hope is five acts, obviously,
I'm I'm hoping for the full Shakespeare, not for the not for the you
know, ninety minute no intermission life. I'm looking for it. Yeah,
something something different, something a little you know, to go and live among
you. Some people. Some people do move to Florida. I'm not planning
to move to Florida. I'm not crazy about well. I mean, I
love Florida. Florida is great, but I don't. I'm not ready for
that. I'm not ready for the the endless, endless sunshine. I need
a little sleep. Speaking of endless sunshine, we are joined by Glenn Lowry.
Glenn is a professor of economics at Brown University. He's hosted The Glenn
Show, which you can find right here on the Ricochet Network or at Glenn
Lowry dot com dot substack dot com. We'll give you all that in the
show notes. Glenn has been here before. I've seen him on stage.
He does this incredibly long, loopy, terrific, funny, thought provoking show
on stage here in New York about you know, I guess it says a
good a good wasp. I'll put it this way. At about a five
iron from my apartment, and he is here to talk about everything, including
Christmas, but especially about Hey, how bad is it for the IVY League
institutions as of Friday, December fifth, twenty twenty three. Glenn, Thanks
for joining us again. Thanks Rob, that was quite an intro. I
appreciate it. Hey there, Peter, Glenn, how are you man?
I'm doing well, doing well, Thank you, Glenn. I have I
want to get to this in a moment. We have to talk about Claudie
Gay. We have to talk about Mother Harvard because we just have to.
But I'm going to put down a market that I want to return to in
the converse, and the marker is this. Some of the ivyes are coming
out of this looking okay. I would argue that my alma mater is doing
fine, but one that is doing, my impression, is doing really pretty
well is Brown University. And I am convinced. You can talk me out
of this if you want to. But I am convinced that the presence of
Glenn Lowry, who is rigorous, who will call out nonsense. The presence
of Glenn Lowry at Brown University. I'm sure it has enriched Brown students in
all kinds of ways. But I also have the feeling that your mere presence
stop stops a great deal of nonsense before it even gets started. You flatter
me with that I had such power, But I will tell you this.
I have a student. Her name is Maya Rakoff. She's Jewish, as
it happens, and she's my intern for the podcast The Glen Shaw Right.
She had a one on one meeting with President Christina Packson as a student representative
of the Jewish community, with whom Paxson wanted to have, you know,
good offices and an open door right. And she reports that my president,
Christina Patson, who happens to be an economist and is a formal member of
my department, had nothing but good things to say about Glenn Lowry. Even
you're slipping no, well, well no, I tore into her back in
twenty twenty, during the George Floyd thing when she issued one of these Dear
Colleague letters that was basically, you know, a Black Lives Matter propaganda piece,
and I said, no, this is not what a university should be.
I'm sure it cost no end of trouble because it got quite a bit
of attention. My criticism of her did. But I think, you know,
I think she heard me a little bit. And my report that I'm
just giving you now for my student I think confirms that. So you know,
it's it's not all dark and grim here. Maybe Ivy League college presidents
can learn a thing or two from some of their obstreperous faculty members like me.
So, Glenn, can I ask you a question if you're Claudine Gay
and you're asked or any of those university professor for university presidents and now former
university professor for presidents, if you were asked that question at the House Committee
meeting, if you felt that statements that were you know, the shouting river
to see those things calling for genocide of the end to the state of Israel
was violence, if you thought that violated university speech codes, how could how
how could you possibly have answered that question yes, because that would mean that
you'd have to discipline all those students. Isn't that I mean? Isn't I
mean? I mean, I'm not trying to like guine up some sympathy for
people who probably don't deserve it. But I don't know. I've been thinking
of that past couple of weeks, like what are they supposed to say?
Because the next question would be like, Okay, well, how many of
those students are going to be suspended or expelled? Yeah? I see that,
And I'm not a lawyer. I'm not sure I've got under my fingers
every legal you know, nicety that applies here. It doesn't look like a
hard question to me, though. It looks like what you do is you
distinguish between you know, our bylaws may say the following with respect to speech,
but such an act is a you know, vicious and malicious and unacceptable
way of behaving in our community. Just as if someone were to say,
I think it's time for black people to go back and chains, and you
know, presumably that's protected speech technically speaking, right, if you're not inciting
and you're not direct threatening, presumably a person can, under the rules quote,
depending on the context, close quote, say that, but no university
president would hesitate in responding to such a hypothetical with that's an abhorrent way of
talking. In our community, it would not be tolerated. We would discourage
shit in the most strenuous terms, and whatever legal remedies were available to us,
we would avail ourselves of them. That brackets the question of whether or
not, technically speaking, it's actually a violation of university rules, but makes
clear where the values are. You know that the person who runs the institution
is standing for so I think they, by repairing to a legalistic posture,
dug a hole for themselves up there in front of Congress. That's what it
seemed like to me. And also, I guess I'm looking for some good
news here, and I don't think this is good news. I'm gonna throw
it at you. See what you think. For the past on a five
years, six years, maybe longer than that, we've been told that speech
is violence. Words are violence. What you say you can be You could
be severely punished for what you say. The former president of Harvard was fired
for saying that some innate sex differences may may be the cause of some perceived
differences in certain performance categories between men and women. And he was tossed out
on his ear. Now, two weeks ago we hear from the from the
grandees at these institutions that though actually it's very complicated and the context is important,
and there's sort of this anguished splitting of hairs and trying to sort out
the truth. Have we seen the end now to kind of crazy crackpots,
speech codes and wokesm gone amuck? Or are they just taking a breather?
Is this halftime? Is this a time out for them to huddle and drink
some gatoray and come back on the field and try again. I think things
have changed. I said this to Christina Pason here at Brown, I said,
if you hadn't come out with a letter declaring the values of the university
to be aligned with Black Lives Matter in twenty twenty, you might not be
under pressure to come out with a letter declaring your position on on Gaza.
And you know the Chicago Principles, the Calvin Report and all of that.
Universities are not supposed to be waiving political banners. They're supposed to be seeking
the truth and you know, holding up a higher standard of intellectual properity and
seriousness. So in a way, you've kind of dug yourself a hole here.
I mean, that thing that happened to Larry Summers was outrageous. You
were referencing that the former president of Harvard University was forced out. He lost
the support of the faculty, there was a vote of no confidence, the
trustees decided to not stand with him, and he graciously stepped aside. But
all he said was the really not controversial observation that men and women as populations
different with respect to certain traits that might bear on the frequency with which women
end up getting appointed professors of physics or mathematics or biochemistry at the university.
I mean, it could be right, it could be wrong, but it
was certainly not vicious, malicious or whatever. It was an arguable claim,
and he said regretfully, he said, we need to do something about this.
Indeed, that was the context, all right, So, but I
would tell you I'm not for forcing university presidents out based upon the extent to
which a comment that they might have made could have landed the wrong way with
this or that group. That that doesn't doesn't make me feel all that good
to see it happening, no matter who it's happening to. But again,
the needs are just exquisite. The University of Pennsylvania is trying to fire Amy
Wax for having an opinion, yes, for having an opinion and expressing it.
And there's really no question about whether or not her academic freedom and free
speech rights are sufficient to uh inoculate her against such an attack. And yet
they are proceeded with a formal uh uh you know, uh process that could
theoretically result in in then revoking her tenure. Uh and uh you know,
they in a way are digging their own digging their own grades. With that
kind of behavior, it seems to me how much trouble are they in do
you think, Glenn? I mean, how much? These are the These
are the some of the most out I mean the most long lived prestige brands
in American culture. I mean worldwide colature, Harvard, Princeton, Yale,
Brown, I mean, these are big deal. These are big names.
People come all over the world to come here, and it's hard to read
the news and not think, oh man, we got to start again.
We got to just stop it with this and build some new Harvards and some
new Yales and some new everything else. We can't keep how much trouble are
they in? Are they going to be able? Do you think having been
an observer of these people for a long time, you can be able to
fix this or papered over or I think they're going to go the American elitees
just too lazy, and they're like, well, you know what, I'm
going to spend sixty grand and send my kid to this stupid school and he's
not gonna learn a damn thing, but it'll help him in life. I
think they're going to try to write it out. I think they dug in
very deep. Yeah, you know. I think this DEI stuff, which
is now getting a lot of critical review because a lot of the DEI and
ethnic studies and postcolonial studies types and whatnot are the places from which some of
the offensive statements and so forth they're coming. They still have the upper hand.
And when I see a board of trustees or governors as they call them
at Harvard overseers actually step up, you know, maybe I'll see it different,
maybe I'll be singing a different tune. But I think they're dug in.
I think they're just going to try to write it out. They're just
going to try to, you know, make cosmetic adjustments and hope that this
blows over. Well, let's not forget that they are in charge of vast
sums of money. It's not as if they really need to go around rattling
their ten cups, even to very rich donors such as Bill Ackman at Harvard,
who he gave a hundred pledged one hundred million. I don't remember the
details. But when you're sitting on top of an endowment of fifty billion dollars
as Harvard is much smaller at Brown and Dartmouth, but still in the billions,
you can hunker down and wait for a lot to happen to pass.
So, glenn On Claudine, Kay, President of Harvard, you put up
a tweet. I'm going to paraphrase it. Correct me if I get it
wrong. This is I think it was two days ago. Yeah, that
the main charge against her was that she was she was insufficiently anti anti Semitic.
But that was the wrong charge. The real charge against her should be
that she's a mediocre scholar. Have I paraphrased you correctly? Yeah, that's
accurate, I said, intellectually. Bang well, okay, so there are
these plagiarism charges floating around now Christopher Rufo at the City Journal has been making
a big deal out of this. I have no information about that other than
what you know. I've read in the newspaper. Right. I saw a
reference to certain sentences extracted from some of her published work that bore a striking
resemblance to sentences that someone else had written. And again, the ironies are
just exquisite, exquisite. She's accused of plagiarizing Carol Swain. I don't know
if anyone knows who Carol Swain is, but she is a fervent Christian Blacks
for Trump political scientists who had tenure at Princeton and moved to Vanderbilt. And
you could go on a long story about Carol Swayin, but I want you
to know she's conservative. She's a conservative black woman who has written about voting
rights in the spirit of saying, basically, I don't think you have to
match the color of the congress person with the color of the constituent in order
for black people to have representation in the Congress. This is Carol's thesis that
goes back thirty years, and she makes strong argument to that. I mean,
she couldn't possibly be further away politically than Clauding Gay, and Clauding is
accused of having plagiarized. So I looked at these examples, and she should
have Clauding Gay given citations to Carol Swain when she paraphrased sentences from Swain's work
by way of summarizing the state of the literature, because gay rights also on
race and political representation. But the plagiarism, such as it is, such
as I understand the case to this point isn't nearly as serious as the fact
that the one is Vita is paper thin. I mean, I think she's
got a half dozen articles. There's no book there, there's no body of
work. She's got eleven articles. I can remember when she was first being
considered for an appointment, there was a lot of chatter on Twitter because she
had been out at Stanford and she got tenured there, and people were saying,
how did she ever get tenure there? One scholar I can't quote the
name, I just don't remember, prominent in the field, said if we
don't deny her tenure, when will we ever deny anybody tenure? The record
was just that then, and yet she got it, and the next thing,
you know, she's coming back to Harvard as a full professor in the
Government department there, and the next thing, you know, at a relatively
younger she's dean of the faculty. I mean, I knew Henry Rossovski personally.
Henry Vessovski was a very heavyweight economic historian, grizzled old dean in the
faculty back in there. You know, he was you know, he's a
white guy, but he was a heavyweight. I know Larry Summers. Summits
is a heavyweight intellectual. He's a very serious economist, one of the top
one hundred, one hundred and fifty economists of his generation. He's a very
serious player. And this field clouding Gay as a scholar with respect was a
lightweight. So if she had a record like Larry Summers had of contributing to
her field, this little peccadillo of not having put a footnote in because she
paraphrased somebody's sentence would roll off of her like water off of the duck's back.
But she's weak on the chops, on the issue of academic chops,
and that makes her vulnerable, it seems to me, to this kind of
attack. Glenn, I'm going to ask questions now that are I feel I
feel that I have a couple of questions that I'm going to ask because we're
friends. But for a white guy to ask these questions, I also feel
it might be a little rough. So you just reach across zoom and slap
me if I if I need it, or I absolve you of your sins.
Don't do that yet away now okay, Well, let me wait and
see how bad you see. I was gonna say, what's that? Okay,
So here's the question. Isn't making Claudine Gay who is a second rate
academic? Isn't making her president of Harvard? Simply the logical outcome of affirmative
action, That is to say, we make allowances for favored groups to get
into Harvard, we make allowances in giving them tenure, and yep, it's
about time to lower our standards to permit a member of a favored group to
become president of the oldest institution in America. Doesn't it all just sort of
line up and flow from Once you're committed to affirmative action, sooner or later
you'll lend up with a second rate president of Harvard. Well, there's nothing
offensive about what you say. It is it is. I mean I could
demand it the affirmative action plus the Peter principal, you know, and you
get what you get what you get. Here's the counter argument. Someone's going
to say, well, scholar is one thing, administrator is another. They're
going to say Larry Backhau who was president of Harvard before Claudion Gay. I
don't know what kind of scholar he was, but he's not up for a
Nobel prize. They're going to say Drew Foulest, who was president of Harvard
before back how was president of Harvard and was a literary scholar if I recall
correctly and with respect. I'm not going to say she was a bad one,
but I mean she also wasn't a Nobel laureate or whatever the equivalent of
that would be in literary criticism. And they're going to say Clauding Gay was
an adequate or more than adequate dean of the faculty. You know, this
is not my argument, but this is the argument that they would make.
And so you know, it's apples and oranges. You're asking her to be
something and that's not what. We didn't hire a scholar. We hired the
academic administrator. Beside, she's the first black woman. Here comes your affirmative
action to head this great and venerable institution. And we're in the twenty first
century, Peter, not the twentieth century, et cetera. So that would
be the argument. But it certainly is easy for me to understand why an
observer from the outside would come to the conclusion that you just enunciated affirmative action
has reached its kind of most fullest flower. When Harvard, it's Harvard,
it's venerable, it's the greatest university on the planet, led by well,
a black woman, and that's her main credential. I can see why a
person would say that, all right, I want to leave Harvard behind.
All my life, I've wanted to leave Harvard behind in some way, But
in this conversation, I'd like to leave Harvard behind and tell you where I
was earlier this week and ask a big question and just drop it in your
lap and see what you do with it. I was in Birmingham, Alabama,
earlier this week to record a couple of episodes of Uncommon Knowledge, my
little program here at the Hoover Institution with Condy Rice on the sixtieth anniversary of
the Birmingham campaign, of Doctor King's leading a protest in Birmingham and Bull Connors
turning the fire hoses and police dogs on people. That happened six decades ago,
and Condy was there. She was a little girl at the time,
but she could remember it. To her credit, she said, I won't
do this alone. People think that I'm a one off. Let's do it
with a couple of my childhood friends. And so Mary Bush, who grew
up in Condy's neighborhood, an all black neighborhood, and went on to a
brilliant career in business, joined us, as did Freeman Robowski, who grew
up as across the street from Mary Bush. And free Robowski just stepped down
after thirty years as president of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Three
really impressive people. I could go on. I won't. I'll just give
you my I'll get to the point as quickly as I can. In preparing
for the show, my first thought was these people are just heroic figures,
and they're impressive people. I don't retract that. But as I got into
it, as Kandy walked me around her old neighborhood, it was just born
in on me, the achievement, the achievement of the people who raised them,
and this lost century. As Tom Sowell often makes the point that academics
pay a lot of attention to slavery, then we hear nothing for a century,
and then we have the Civil Rights movement. And I was so struck
that in this neighborhood in segregated Jim Crow, Alabama, from the century between
the Emancipation Proclamation and nineteen sixty three the Birmingham Campaign. In that century,
African Americans went from nothing. They were Illiteracy was enforced, they were not
permitted to learn. Not only did they hold no property, they were the
property. In one century, what four or five generations, perhaps you end
up with in that neighborhood at least intact families, total literacy, deep literacy,
a sense of neighborhood, a deep understanding of church and community. And
I thought to myself, now that the whole country is dissolving, now that
you have out of wedlock birth rates over thirty percent among whites, Now that
we're in the same position. I had been thinking that we're in the same
position as the Victorians. Remember Gertrude Himmelfarb's great work about You get the urban
poverty of the nineteenth century in England, and they put their society back together.
They re establish marriage as a worthy institution. I just thought to myself,
the example for us to draw on is this century of Black achievement,
where these people put a society, they essentially refounded a kind of their own
civilization, black family shattered by slavery, and a century later again in that
neighborhood, at least we have a deep understanding of family relationships of husbands and
wives. Anyway, I thought to myself, Sorry, I'm getting long winded
here, but I thought, no, you're good, You're good. Okay.
I thought to myself, why isn't the history department of every major university
in the country working on that century. How did those people, in the
face of Jim Crow of real racism, how did they reconstruct a civilization?
Because we need to know how to do it ourselves? Now? Okay?
Is that just me losing my mind? Or is there something there now that's
brilliantly put There's a lot there. You channel Bob Woodson, the great Robert
Woodson in this respect, who's constantly talking about the vital importance of that historical
lesson, the lesson of what African Americans negroes is what we were called accomplished
in the decades the first couple of generations, three generations after emancipation. I
think it's historically unprecedented, to be honestly, I agree. I can't think
of another. I don't think you can find another example anywhere on the planet
of an enslaved or inserved population that at the literacy point is really a vitally
important point. I mean, this all happened within a relatively few decades by
the time you get to the turn of the twentieth century. I don't have
the statistics right at hand, but the literary rate among African Americans is comparable
to that that you see in middle income countries throughout the world. And they
started from nothing. And the ethoss the ethos that allowed this population to achieve
what they achieved, and it did involve religion, and it did involve conservative
cultural values and so on. There's this wonderful book by Scott Davis, the
author. It's called The World of Patience Groans, and it tells the story
of a young woman born in Hill country of Virginia to land owning, free
persons of color, who finds herself in Richmond and is you know, she's
a princess piano lessons a high standards religion, raising her kids in the nineteen
teens, the nineteen twenties, and he follows her into the forties, fifties,
and sixties and chronicles the early stages of this social implosion among African Americans
that she very much, deeply lamented and resented as it was happening all around
her. And it just in microcosm. It's just one little narrative, but
it captures the spirit of what's going on. And I mean it's clear why
it's not taught in history departments because it gives the lot to the claim that
the country has its nel on our neck, that it has its boot on
our backs, that we can't accomplish anything. Well, hell, we can
accomplish a great deal. We did accomplish a great deal. And it avoids
the chilling implication if this is what we as African Americans have inherited from our
four beers who suffered so much and achieved so much, the ball is in
our court? What are we going to do with this opportunity? You know?
I mean that the specter of failure or even a betrayal of the legacy
of African Americans of the country in the current generations. Because you know,
you said thirty percent among whites, the Ottawhite libraries is seventy percent among blacks,
right, you know, I mean, look at Detroit, look at
Chicago, look at Philadelphia, look at Baltimore, Look at Southeast Washington,
DC, Look at Oakland, look at New Orleans, look at Saint Louis.
I could go on, pick up the newspaper and read the failure is
palpable. Whose fault is that? Yeah, so white supremacy is one kind
of answer to that question, black failure, I say it advisedly, and
I said, Peter, not you. It's another kind of answer, and
teaching that history would make that latter answer much more compelling. Tuesday morning,
This is Tuesday morning. We began the day Condy and I went out to
the house in which she grew up. And by the way, it was
a pretty nice house. It was about the same size, well, I
grew up in sort of upper edge of the lower In any event, it
was maybe nine hundred to one thousand foot house, same size house I grew
up honestly, And I said, so what happened here in a school morning?
And she described all the children getting ready to school, ready for school,
And on a Saturday morning, everybody went off to lessons. Condy went
to her piano lessons. The little girl across the street went to French lessons.
Can you matt All Black neighborhood? And she said, and you see
that little hill there, We could skate down that hill, and that hill
over there that was wonderful for skating too. So we have this. She's
painting the picture of a happy, intact neighborhood where the neighbors know each other.
They all go to church on Wednesday as well as on Sunday and on
Saturday as the youth fellowship. And she said, an oh oh, up
at the top of that hill, and up at the top of that hill.
My father and other fathers in the neighborhood, when they heard that there
was trouble coming, they'd go up to those high points in the neighborhood with
their guns to keep the night writers out. Staggering. The accomplishment against that
kind of outside pressure unbelievable. And we don't hear about it. It's just
I just don't anyway, So Glenn, I'm giving you another homework lesson get
Brown to establish establish a chair in the hidden history, the hidden century of
Black accomplishment seems to me anyway. Well, I don't forget who was we
said. I think some Black American writer, I forget said, you know,
we didn't have a lot after being Civil War and civil rights. But
the most important thing that we didn't have was help. That was the help
that did it. And that sounds like something. Yeah, but you know
what, I'm I'm not done yet with Claudine Gay. I'm sorry, I
just want to I've been struck by something about her. I find I find
the the accusations of affirmative and that she's affirmative action higher to be really really
interesting because we're talking about a woman. Never met her. I'm sure she's
a nice person, but she's she's not African American. She's the daughter of
Haitian immigrants. She went to Exeter and then she went to Princeton, and
then she went to Stanford, and then she got a PhD from Harvard.
What what disadvantage are we trying to correct here? You're talking to the wrong
guy, I mean, yeah, Amen, And the documentary filmmaker Rob Mott's
Good Kid Productions has a little short out about how Roland Fryar the Great Economists
an a formal student of mine, someone I admire in his late forties now
Clark Medalists, MacArthur genius, half breaking empirical work in a number of different
fields, and a BS Excuse me? Can I say BS? On your
show? A BS four nine accusation that Stuart Taylor, the legal journalist whom
I have a great deal of respect for, has written about and you know
you can look it up, but it was a BS from a disgruntled employee,
a former employer who an employee who accused Roland of hostile environment, you
know, making statements that were offensive and what not to women in his workplace.
Got blown all out of proportion and clauding. Kate tried to get his
tenure revoked and came down on him with a ton of bricks from her position
as dean of the faculty at Harvard, sanctioning him, suspending without pay for
two years, closing his research laboratory which was nine figure funded a massive enterprise
of Roland doing path breaking research and education, law enforcement and race kind of
thing. And you know, Rob Mont's the filmmaker. Good Kick Productions,
Harvard canceled Rowland Fry. I can't remember the title of the short, but
it wouldn't be hard to find. Tell us the story of how this woman
who was a marginal scholar and was certainly a child of privilege in the name
of protecting because Roland's findings were sometimes pushing against the grain. I mean,
he was the one who investigated the police shootings in Dallas and came to the
conclusion that the use of lethal force by Dallas police pardon me, Houston,
Houston police officers was no more likely if the subject was black than if the
subject was white. In fact, maybe a little bit less likely, and
that was so controversial. Roland is also a big education reform guy, a
big charter school guy, and uh, you know, he thinks that we're
vastly underperforming with respect to providing opportunities to youngsters, low income youngsters in cities
around the country and so on. So he's pushing against the grain. Roland
is and they tried to cancel him, and Plooding Gay was a main instigator
in that, and uh, uh, who's the authentic black at the table.
You know who's the authentic black the son of Haitian immigrants. Her father
was an engineer, if I recall correctly, and she grew up in privilege.
Exciter, got any idea what it costs to go to Exeter? Uh?
Actually sorry? Uh? And here's Roland, who's you know, his
mother and him as a kid. His dad is in and out of prison.
He's raised by his grandmother and came apart. You know, heart scrabble
worked for everything that he ever got. And I had a closer, more
vital and intimate connection with the lives of everyday African Americans than Clauding Gay would
ever dream of. So the contrast is hard to miss. And I try
a thought experiment. A former president of Yale, not this one, I
think maybe the one reply. I can't remember which one told this story.
He said so off the record, so you know, keep it. You
can figure it out that in faculty meetings, when he was something important to
decide some budgetary issues, something that really mattered, he would make sure or
some crackpot idea that was just crazy, he would make sure to have a
STEM area budget item on the docket. Because what he discovered is science technology
all those people they don't want to Those pre teachers don't show up to these
stupid things. They don't want to sit there for a faculty meeting. Here
a bunch of like French whatever, intersectionals, whatever's talk. They just But
if you put something on there that they really need to decide to decide,
they're going to show up and then you'll finally have a meeting in which,
you know, the smart people prevail. So I mean, just a thought
experiment. President of Harvard, Claudine Gay was a professor of biology, and
she did research into you know, brain function, and would we be here
now? No, that was my point in reference to the plagiarism charges.
I don't think they would really stick because at the end of the day,
you know, with respect to Christopher Rufo, I mean, you know,
it wasn't real plagiarism. It was just a lazy writing and borrowing sentences from
people without attribution. I'm not advising that she should have, you know,
but but if she had a real research record and had the respect of colleagues
and a serious discipline for her intellectual half, as Larry Summers did and does,
no, I don't think we would be here. Hey, Glenn.
I'd like to ask a closing question, because I just got a note from
our producer that Glenn has other commitments. Imagine that he doesn't for the rest
of the day. Glenn observation, and then the question. The observation is
that it takes. It takes in some way, very little, in my
experience or my observation, to give kids at these elite campuses an alternative Robbie
George and really Robbie George alone. He's built a number of people around him.
But Robbie George alone did it at Princeton and has built up almost an
alternative university, or at least an alternative course curriculum within Princeton. I am
convinced that you, by your presence, make Brown a better place. Just
make it better, smarter, more rigorous, less self indulgent. All kinds
of people who might engage in public nonsense don't, frankly, because they don't
want to be attacked. They don't want to be made made to look the
fools they are, and you would do that. Okay, So it seems
to me that you don't have to turn Harvard University entirely upside down. You
need to find a few good scholars. You need Roland to be left alone
and permitted to do his work. Perhaps you even need Roland to be celebrated.
Is that a chie Are you hopeful that we can at least do that
much? The institutions will now feel that it is necessary. I don't want
to see conservatives, but well, I'll say that they need a few conservative
role ins. No conservative exactly. I don't know how we'd vote, but
that it can be done. Are you hopeful? Yeah? This is I
think the viewpoint diversity, you know, ideological diversity. I mean, we
don't have to have a fifty to fifty. You could have a eighty twenty.
And if you had twenty people who were heterodots in their orientation, conservative
perhaps in their instincts. We loved their country and we're not ashamed to say
so, revered the standards of excellence and meritocratic achievement within their disciplines and were
unwilling to compromise them. Took the idea that students are it's the erro points
forward, not backwards. It's not what they are when they walk in front
of me, it's what they've become after we acquaint them with the greatest things
that have been written and thought in the intellectual traditions that we inherit a few
people whinny out of one hundred, Sure it could make a difference. As
I say, I think the other side is dug in. They're dug in,
and they have anthropology department. They're dug in, and the after Studies
department and so more and so on, and you know ten years what it
is. So I don't think they're going anywhere. But you know, you're
very generous in your estimation of the impact that I'm having. I can tell
you that I hear that kind of report from my students who do take my
courses. And I have one hundred signed up for my Race and Inequality course
intelecture course that I co teach with my wonderful colleague of classical liberal and then
Eminily Scarbeck. I want to name her because she and I are partners now
in this enterprise teaching about race here. But they come in, uh,
and you know, I got the black kid over there, who's a typical
woke kind of kid, but he respects Professor Lowry because I come and I
don't pull punches, and I tell him what I really think. And we
argue back and forth, and then I got the Jewish kid over here,
who's you know in the mix? And there you know, and and uh
the Chinese kid who says I never thought we could talk honestly about these matters.
I've been keeping my mouth shut all these months because I was afraid of
offending anybody. Thank you, Professor Lowery for allowing there to be a conversation.
So I think there's a hunger amongst students for this, and uh,
you know, one step at a time, another Robbin George here, and
another Glenn Lowry there, forgive the self aggrandizement. We might just get there.
Let's hope. I got one question for you, and I got a
leap. And this is really more of a maybe it's a personal temperament question.
Why aren't you more pissed? You don't seem pissed. You seem well.
I invite you to when it comes out. May fourteen, twenty twenty
four, Late Admissions Confessions of a Black Conservative published by W. W.
Norton. It's in production, the book is done, and it comes out.
I try to give an account. I used to be really pissed,
I mean furious at the negro COCHNACENTI that's what I called them, who smugly
appropriated to themselves the right to speak to all things black, and who,
as our former president Barack Hussein Obama, did, look the other way when
demagogues and ambulance chasers like Al Sharpton define the voice of Black America for the
American public. I was furious with them. I think my fury was doing
more harm to me than it was to them. You know. So I've
you know, I'm seventy five years old, man, I mean, I
you know, I gotta I gotta give myself a stress relief opportunity, you
know. So I've become a little bit more you know, philosophical about it,
a little bit more trying to take the long view and just try to
tell the truth and you know, try not to let it eat me away
on the inside. You know, Glenn is good news. You have a
pub date. If you have a pub date, we need to schedule an
interview for about this book for ununcomming knowledge. Absolutely, I have a pub
date. I have a publicist. If you drop me an email, I'll
put you in touch with my team. And absolutely we need to do this.
May fourteen, twenty twenty four is the pub date and let it down.
You will have an email for me this day, my friend. Okay,
Peter Glenn, thank you for joining us Rasmus. Mary adds to YouTube,
thank you, thank you Mary. Christmas politically incorrect and revolutionary statement.
Merry Christmas. So long, guys, take care. You know it's like
a cockail hour and not now, I just mean like, it's that's what
I feel like when the holidays. You know, it's cocktail hour always.
You know, it starts early, starts around four o'clock. And let's face
it, Peter, after night with drinks, you and I don't bounce back
the next day like we used to. So I have to make a choice.
I can either have a great night or a great next day. And
that that was the way I lived until I found z Biotics. Z biotics
pre alcohol probiotic is the world's first genetically engineered probiotic. It was embedded by
PhD scientists to tackle rough mornings after drinking. So here's how it works.
When you drink, alcohol gets converted into a toxic byproduct in the gut,
and it is this byproduct, not dehydration, which people always think blame dehydration,
but it's not it's this byproduct that's the blame for your rough next day.
So z biotics produces an enzyme to break this byproduct down and it's designed
to work like your liver, but in your gut where you need it the
most. Just remember to drink z biotics before drinking alcohol and drink responsibly and
get a good night's sleep and you will feel your best the next day.
So go to z biotics dot com slash ricochet to get fifteen percent off your
first order when you use ricochet at checkout. You can also sign up for
a subscription using our code ricochet, so you can stay prepared no matter what
time or occasion. Z biotics is backed with a one hundred percent money back
guarantee, so if you're unsatisfied for any reason, they'll refund your money,
no questions asked. All you got to do is head to zbiotics dot com
slash rise ricochet. That's Z letter z biotics all one word dot com slash
ricochet and use the code ricochet at check out your fifteen percent off. We
thank you z biotics for sponsoring this episode, and we also think it's timely
here during the holidays to think a little bit about zbiotics, and the day
after that said man in Glenn Rowy, Glenn Glenn Land is fantastic. Yeah,
I love that man. I just love him. He is fantastic and
so so courageous and so rigorous and so productive. He's the one who made
mend himself that he's seventy five, He's got his own podcast. He makes
time to talk to us, he has carries a full teaching load, and
he's got a book coming out next spring. Yeah, and you know,
what the hell have you done? Not much? Right? But if you're
if you're in the New York City area or you're I think they do it.
I mean now they do it elsewhere he used to do it. I
think he still does it a little kind of a I don't know, like
it did it in a comedy club. This like a conversation with John mcwarter.
And they would sit and they would talk and then they would yeah,
and then they bring some comedians on and the comedians would do some jokes and
they would four of them sit, five of them to sit there and have
a conversation that was just absolutely riveting and it you know, I was trying
to describe it as somebody said, well, what is it a panel?
Like? No? Is it a comedy show? Kind of, it's kind
of a little bit of everything, and it's fantastic. It's ribbting, and
it's all because I think his general personality and John McWorter two is, you
know, it's a little weary, world weary. You know, you can
see glancing you know this again. But it's optimistic. And I guess that's
why I asked him for a question about anger, like it isn't curdled,
you know, is something about the I think, especially the progressive left that's
so embittered and curdled, and I think probably the far right too, that
is kind of just I think it's missing the point. M m okay,
listen, could I a slightly different topic, but one that is far more
important than I think we've discussed so far, far more important? Eggnog bourbon
or rum? Oh, that's a really good question. I prefer bourbon just
in general because I'm an American and I like bourbon, but rum eggnog is
delicious too, but a super super cheat for eggnog, Yes, get yourself
some really good not the best, not in the little pints but like you
know, good vanilla ice cream, frinch ranill ice cream and let it melt
oh real, and then thin it out to the extent that you want.
And if you use with milk or heavy, well with milk or cabin half,
however have do you want it? And if you if you use rum,
put in a little coconut milk, oh real, and a little rum,
not a lot, so it's not so much. It kind of gives
a little good, but it doesn't really work with bourbon. The coconut and
rum for some reason. Just go just great together, uh and tell everybody
you made it from scratch, okay, and that, ladies and gentlemen,
is why you listen to the Ricochet podcast. Yes, and they will say
this is really good. How'd you do it? Well? You know,
and then they'll kind of you kind of look like wearied and tired from it.
And then people say, did you actually make a custard temper the egg
yolks? Did you do that? And then you kind of shrug like you
don't want to take credit for it because you didn't, but you just you
know, let the lie just sit there. It's not a lie if you
don't say it. It's only a you know, Oh, that's the episcopalian
division. You're basically plagiarizing egg. Yeah, exactly, yes, yes,
I can't wait for you to get this degree underway, because that's exactly I
can't wait for your book on moral theology, which will be entitled the Eight
Commandments. Well I had to yes, the eight, well, the two,
the ten commandments, choose any seven? Yeah, but the seven suggestions,
the seven, the seven guidelines I did. I had dinner on Tuesday
night or Monday night camera Tuesday night with our old friend John O'Sullivan and Jerry
Baker from the Westy Journal. Oh wow, And I told I said to
John, you know, I'm thinking about this. I'm thinking about this.
And he looked at me and he said, oh my god. Those are
both Catholics. By the way, I mean, you're insufferable. Yeah,
you're insufferable. Now, what's going to be like when he's absolutely right?
Correct? Uh, if you don't get a book out of this, I
will be just so cross. So give me too. But I'm going to
say this publicly because I've said it to you a couple of times, and
I'm going to say it publicly because I want other people to pile on.
You've written two books. You've written two books, well three if you count
the one that nobody bought. Wait, really right, that one that was
called Bigley, That the book that trump Yes, yes, yes, I
mean that was a clever idea. But two books that were autobiographical Conversations with
my agent and set up joke, set up joke, And both of those
books were brilliant, really brilliant, brilliant, pros funny, kind jammed with
information. And that's not just my opinion. Andy Ferguson, who does not
toss compliments around, gave you a rave review in the Weekly Standard. He
did it was very kind, a magazine that no longer exists, which is
which is my point. Why haven't you written? The time has come for
you to write a new book, Journeys in Divinity, Journeys in Holiness,
a comedy by Rob long conversations with my divine Yeah. Well okay, so
start taking notes immediately. I will do it. I will do it.
Speaking of selling me, Yes, we would love for you, if you
enjoyed this podcast, to go to Rickchett dot com and join. If you
join, you get to do a lot of cool stuff, plus Ricochet members
like to get together. There will be a meetup in Chattanooga, Tennessee,
January fourteenth. That's a long weekend, holiday weekend. And if you not
have you not been to Chattanooga. I got in try bowl by saying,
you know, Tennessee has all these great cities, and then I kind of
made a joke about Memphis not being one of the Memphis is a great city,
but Memphis is already on the map. He everbody knows that Memphis.
Places like Chattanooga and Knoxville, they're a little less known. Those are great
cities, really, you know, incredibly, We're great, great places to
eat, great places to see. You know, really, those are amazing.
Tennessee is one of the states that I think people just forget how big
it is, Like it just goes on forever, you know, It's like
a big rectangle, very thin rectangle. So Chattanooga, Tennessee. That'll be
Sunday, January fourteenth, that is a holiday weekend. And before we close,
we'd like to thank Zibiotics. You can support us by supporting them.
They are fine and very loyal advertisers at a great product. If you have
a minute, we would love for you to give us this birthday, this
Christmas gift. You go to Apple Podcast give us a five star review.
I know we keep saying it actually really does matter. It's one of those
stupid algorithm things that matters a great deal. Peter, what are your Christmas
plans? Uh? We're staying right here because all five children are coming to
us for Christmas, and getting that arranged is a moonshot elon Musk's plan to
colonize Mars. Cannot be more complicated than the arrangements that had to be made
to get all five children inbound. So we're staying here through Christmas, and
then the plan is to go up to Tahoe for a couple of days in
the first few days, first couple of days of the new year. What
about you? Where are you going to be? I'm going to be right
here in New York City, Right here in New York City. I've never
done that. I've never been here for Christmas. So I'll be here for
Christmas. Amazing, amazing. But but then we'll be going out to Connecticut.
You've got to meet up with your mother and brother at some point,
right or no? Well, yeah, but that's there. They're gonna You're
all going to gather. Oh they're coming, are They're coming Everyston. So
it's going to be kind of a it's going to be an old movie New
York City Christmas and Christmas Day. Saint Bartholomew's or what's the Saint James.
Saint James James that means seventy first and Madison, So that makes depending on
you know, Saint James obviously is my church. But if you want you
know, pageantry and uh and you know you want the full, the full
experience, you could go to the cathedral or Saint Thomas on Fifth Avenue was
sort of giant, amazing. But the cathedral it means Saint John, the
Divine Way way, Saint John Devine way up there right right where where the
Christmas pageant doesn't it used to include horses in the sort of in the in
the church, didn't it the christ You I think it might. I mean
I don't think it's this still does. But all right, because as you
know, I'm sure Pete has gotten involved. But but I mean, yeah,
it's big enough you could have you could have a whole thing. But
also the city's beautiful, it's at its best in the Christmas everything's all decorated
and looks beautiful. Right, well done, well, but I think we
might see I might see you next week and in between, have a great
week and see you in seven days. Merry Christmas. I'm off to Merry
Christmas. Yeah, make it easy. Way Ricochet Join the conversation.