Hoya Philosopher-Kings

Today's entry is addressed primarily to my alumni peers, but will be of interest to anyone interested in what leaders and ideas emerge from the Georgetown School of Foreign Service, former stomping ground of President William Jefferson Clinton, and many other Future Leaders of the Free World:

The Atlantic Monthly, which in my humble opinion is one of the two top magazines in the United States (standing shoulder-to-shoulder with The New Yorker), just opened its website to non-subscribers, as well as its archives back to its genesis as an abolitionist paper in the mid-19th Century. Here is a very interesting 2005 article about fellow Hoya and (former) radio host John Ziegler, which gives an enlightening glimpse into the world of right-wing talk radio:

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200504/wallace



That being a medium that the more liberal populace is only vaguely aware, and totally unacquainted with directly. However, in its aggregate, this crackling chorus of immigrant-bashing, "Islamo-fascism" rabble-rousing, Bible-thumping, shout-you-out-of-the-room "straight talk" is the bass-line of propaganda which delivers a pre-chewed spoonful of opinions to half of the electorate every morning. The faithfully regurgitated refrain "Rush [Limbaugh] is right" is code for the unquestioning fervor with which devotees of these modern-day Joseph Goebbels demure to he loudest voice they can find on the AM spectrum. Concerning Mr. Ziegler, it is interesting to consider how a "recovering Catholic" who studied government and philosophy on the Hilltop would court an opinion of "the Arab world" as follows:

"We're not perfect, we suck a lot of the time, but we are better as a people, as a culture, and as a society than they are, and we need to recognize that, so that we can possibly even begin to deal with the evil that we are facing."

Now, Mr. Ziegler graduated in 1989. I wonder how many Georgetown graduates have carried such zealous ideas into the seats of power from that era, and how many might exit Healy Gates thinking the same today? Does a Catholic institution, which is based upon the continuing Vatican ideology of the "One True Church," encourage such feelings of cultural supremacy? Has this the oldest university in Washington, DC, which traces its genesis to the birth of the Constitution in 1789, inherited and fostered the old Puritan conception of the "New American Israel" carrying out God's Divine Plan in the world?


Cotton Mather (1663-1728), influential American Puritan, Salem Witch Trial rabble-rouser, and author of Theopolis Americana: An Essay on the Golden Street of the Holy City and The Negro Christianized: An Essay to Excite and Assist that Good Work, the Instruction of Negro-Servants in Christianity (PDF).

The pedagogy of the government department--if it includes references to "the Arab world" at all--tends to do so through the prism of terrorism or the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (i.e. lumping the region with Africa as a land of unremitting and irrational ancient violence). Philosophy courses too include mainly Plato, St. Augustine, Aquinas, Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche, Heidegger, etc. but only peripheral coverage of "Eastern philosophy" (and only then with a quick and dirty gloss). Don't believe me, check the Spring 2008 course listing for yourself. Browse too the government department offerings, and notice the consistent theme of "security" among almost all courses concerning Asia, Africa or the Middle East. In fairness, the School of Foreign Service (which does not house Mr. Ziegler's government or philosophy majors) offers several more nuanced courses--to those who seek them.


This is what all Arabs look like, even when showering.

Would the average undergraduate take a course on the great Islamic philosophers, or appreciate the pan-Mediterranean development of what we now consider to be "Western" thought? Where would men like John Ziegler learn that while the post-Roman European continent effectively lost literacy for a full millennium, the Islamic and Jewish scholars of the umma preserved the works of Aristotle and his ancient Greek contemporaries? Where would they learn that until the 18th Century, China far outshone Europe in wealth, power and influence? Where might they connect the half-century of violence in the Middle East with the exploitative and ideologically-blinded 20th Century foreign policies of Great Britain, France, Russia, Israel and the United States?

Where might you take a course that teaches that the world outside the United States and Europe is filled with real-live human beings who work, get married, have children, fear war, pine for peace, eat McDonalds, faithfully tune in to Oprah, and are likely be crying to Atonement ("the most achingly romantic movie since Titanic!") on bootleg DVD as we speak.

For every "Arabist" who steps across the Georgetown stage to inherit the world, there are two security studies graduates who view the "Islamo-Confucian" world (an actual Samuel Huntington neologism from his 1993 article-cum-book The Clash of Civilizations) as a dreamworld of wealth and war. Enticing for her Eastern riches, but alien and somehow unrecognizable. And so these people are more than happy to spread a condescending hand to the "more-rational" few that can be found among the Oriental mass, sending money, advice, and arms to our men in the Jordans, Egypts, Moroccos, Saudis, Bahrains, Pakistans, Japans, South Koreas and Taiwans of the world. Even these--our "friends"--are merely children in our foreign policy family. They are given a yearly allowance of foreign direct aid, and expected to jump when told. As Mr. Ziegler stated (with refreshing candor, at least), "we are better as a people, as a culture, and as a society," and only we can deserve the responsibility of democracy. Thus, it is no coincidence that our primary allies in the Arab world are monarchies and dictatorships, and our nominal enemies are in the more democratic elements in the area (Iran, Yemen, Lebanon and Palestine). In the global Platonic Republic, the United States comprises the philosopher-kings and warriors of the guardian class, along with the elites of our client states acting as middle-management. The oil fields and trinket factories of the East are populated by the inferior producer class who's role it is to create wealth to support the guardian class, but who lack the ability and education to direct their own destiny.

I don't perceive that a standard Georgetown education would do anything to contradict this worldview. If anything, I've believed that Georgetown's self-aware role is to educate the American philosopher-kings, as well as their viceroy elites abroad. My Jordanian friend offered me the (apocryphal) anecdote yesterday that half his country's Parliament was educated at Georgetown. Crown Prince Abdullah II, for one, achieved a School of Foreign Service master's degree in 1987. Our many international students, past and present, comprise a laundry list of elite children from all corners of the globe--they who have the capacity to shell out $45,000 cash per year.

It is not my intent to monger conspiracies, rail against the "Illumniati cabal" directing the world or to indulge in anti-American self-loathing. I will argue fiercely to anyone that among the practical options, the United States is the least-bad guardian of the world. Nor do I blame Georgetown solely for the propagation of unfortunate beliefs among its students. I sought out and found there a wellspring of elucidating knowledge and empathy for the global human condition. But for many, if not most, of my peers, the promise of such enlightenment was lost. For them, the highest opportunity lies in an investment bank.

I don't buy that "we are better as a people." Furthermore, it seems to me that such thought is self-defeating and contrary to the interest of American leadership. I've bemoaned the foolish pride and bravado superiority that has led us into fiascoes like Iraq, that leads us to support Israel in starving the Gazans in the midst of a Middle East peace process. I've lamented how those who would sort the world into a hierarchy of humanity have both undervalued the worth of innocent lives and underestimated the potential of our competitors and enemies. It is not only long-suffering civilians in Baghdad and Gaza whom we hurt, but also our ambitions and our selves.

That great Catholic thinker Thomas Aquinas once said "inordinate self-love is the cause of every sin," and certainly our recent experience would seem to bear that out. Can we learn to practice humility as well as forthrightness? Can we lead by example rather than by force? Or will we become the next Soviet Union, treating the world as a canvas for our ideology rather than a vast land ripe with hope? These values will determine the future of American leadership, and academies like Georgetown determine what values these leaders will embody. Leaders who truly embody the Jesuit promise hold true to both the Ignatian ideals of "men for others" and "men with others." It is the latter that differentiates the loved from the feared.