The argument against granting tenure to professors (much less public school teachers) gets stronger with each passing year. Since freedom of intellectual inquiry demonstrably does not exist on campus (as Larry Summers about his freedom to inquire into the sources of lagging female employment in the sciences at Harvard), tenure protects nothing. It only insulates the likes of Ward Churchill from accountability.

Moreover, granting tenure has become thoroughly politicized. The latest instance comes UC Berkeley, where a Hispanic professor used demonstartions and other familiar tactics to wear down the university.

Get rid of tenure. A friend of mine who studies contemporary China from a faculty sinecure call it "the iron rice bowl."

Thomas Lifson   5 23 05