[detbuch]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

Scott, Kathy Bowdin was planning to bomb the library at Columbia University. The same school where she now works. Had she been successful (and killed a few kids and staff), do you suppose the school still would have hired her? She tried to bomb the school, and the school makes her a professor.

Is that a fact or a conjecture? Are you referring to the failed bombing plan that ended in the bombers blowing themselves up? Wasn't that supposed to be in preparation for a bombing at a U.S. Army dance at Fort Dix? I saw one article that says it might be about either the dance or Columbia U., but not definitive. The rest all pointed to the Army dance as target. And if the plan had succeeded, be it against the Army or against Columbia U., and with the botched robbery turned murder conviction, she would still be in prison. So Columbia would not be able to hire her, and your question would be moot. And, anyway, Columbia U. of 1970 was not the same as Columbia U. today. It was just beginning its travel to the present more open acceptance and admiration of radical 60's activists. Just as present day progressives don't accept the principles of America's founding and have no compunction about abandoning and disassociating from those principles, even revolting against them if necessary, so too would progressive administrators of Columbia U. not view the university's past, its founding principles, as something to uphold against hiring one who contributed to changing the culture to a more egalitarian and just one. Columbia of 1970 was still evolving toward the progressive transformation of society and the 60's radicals were children of that transformation. Why would they now be rejected when the transformation was happening apace? They would, more rationally, accept them if they believed in and aspired to the social justice promised by the progressive agenda. A promise certainly aided by the actions and continued dedication to that agenda by those very radicals?

I don't think detbuch's post explains why the school would be so stupid as to hire someone that tried to commit mass murder on campus.

No it wouldn't explain that since it was trying to explain something else. As Spence likes to say, "pay attention."

You have to admit that's amazing, even for liberal academia, where anything goes.

That's a teeny bit closer to what my post was explaining--the anything goes part, which is not really "anything" or "goes" but about why someone like Boudin would be hired by a prestigious university.

I wonder how liberals would react, if one of these home-grown terrorists turns out to be an alumni of Columbia or University Of Chicago, and is thus inspired by the likes of Bill Ayers or Kathy Bowdin. Why is that a far-fetched scenario?

This whole "liberals" and "conservative" bit is so misleading that your "wonder" cannot properly be addressed. Most present day Americans are "liberal" in one degree or another. The founding of this country was a "liberal" revolution. Yours is not a far-fetched scenario, but how liberals would react is so diverse, it would take a book to answer your question as to how they would react.