Conservative provocateur David Horowitz is used to being shouted down when he gives talks on college and university campuses. He's also used to getting a lot of mileage out of the irony therein--usually he's talking about intolerance when the shouting down happens. Now he's got even more to work with. On Wednesday, while delivering a speech at Butler University, Horowitz was hit in the face with a pie. According to InsideHigherEd.com, this was the third time in ten days that a conservative speaker has been pelted with food while delivering a talk on a midwestern campus:

William Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard, was hit in the face with a pie during a speech at Earlham College and Pat Buchanan, the former presidential candidate, had salad dressing thrown on him at Western Michigan University.

Horowitz was at Butler as part of his campaign to encourage state legislatures to adopt the "Academic Bill of Rights," which Horowitz says will encourage a diversity of views in higher education, but that critics say is an attack on academic freedom. In a statement on the incident at Butler, Horowitz said, "It is ironic that these assailants tried to prevent me from delivering a lecture on the need for greater tolerance and respect for dissenting opinions in the academic community."

After the incident, Horowitz finished his speech.

It astonishes me that hitting someone with a pie isn't routinely treated as criminal assault. It isn't amusing theater, it's a physical attack on the victim -- something that I'm sure would occur to people if it were, say, anti-abortion protesters were hitting Planned Parenthood or NOW leaders with pies.

That said, as a Burkean conservative, I find Horowitz' shtick appalling and contrary to the basic nature of conservativism.

There's a difference between offering contrary opinions and offering lies. People who are clearly manufacturing and selling lies, like Horowitz, should not be invited to speak at universities, because it wastes resources, discourages honest critical thinking, and encourages further lying.

Just a few weeks ago, for example, Horowitz claimed that university professors are a privileged elite that work between six to nine hours a week, eight months a year for an annual salary of about $150,000. That is an outright lie.

I'm sure universities could ban some speakers not on the basis of suppressing free speech, but on the basis of quality control. In fact, that would actually encourage conservatives to get speakers who are more thoughtful than Coulter, Malkin, and Horowitz.

"Just a few weeks ago, for example, Horowitz claimed that university professors are a privileged elite that work between six to nine hours a week, eight months a year for an annual salary of about $150,000."

I wonder if Horowitz -- who I agree is a jerk and a demagogue -- ever said that. The sole source (quoted in a hundred blogs) is a Boulder CO newspaper, The Daily Camera, but it doesn't have a direct quote or an attribution. The story just asserts that that's what Horowitz believes. I just have this sneaking suspicion that he said that SOME university professors work just a few hours a week, etc. Which would be true, I suppose.

I read the same quote that Chris did. Horowitz was way off and out of line, obviously. But at the same time, that "swimming in time and money" howler is the same sort of bull hockey I've heard from the same "9-monthers" on now we "soft money" types have all the money and time in the world. What goes around comes around, I guess! I honestly don't know who to at laugh louder when it comes to that one.

But it doesn't make pieing him, acting like a horses' arses in front of students (like at the event Chris mentioned) or selective quality checking of conservative speakers (what no check on Michael Moore? I could say the same thing about Moore as with Horowitz, Coulter and Malkin) OK though.

Then again, only those people with "Do not Excite" MedAlert bracelets are gonna come and listen to sensible, smart, but... temperate... pundits like Will or Raspberry.

Chris...would your proposed speaker ban "on the basis of quality control" also apply to professors at the university?

And who would serve as quality control inspector?

Chris - Would that ban go against Leftist speakers too? There are a plethora of them who are every bit as fact-challenged as you claim Horowitz et al. to be (if not more so).

the basis shouldn't be political, the basis should be relation to truth vs opinion, coulter and horowitz have opinion, but little relation to the truth, similarly several other commentators who spout rhetoric, paralogic, and sophistry.

Now David, there's no shortage of potential quality control inspectors. We can start with the people who steal the newspapers, If they don't want to do it ,maybe we can ask Catharine MacKinnon or Nancy Hopkins.

Anyway, I haven't heard Horowitz speak, and while I disagree with him on the Academic Bill of Rights issue, from what I've read of his writings and excerpts from his speeches, he seems to be reasonably accurate. I have to wonder if the objections to him are based more on his viewpoint than his accuracy

" I have to wonder if the objections to him are based more on his viewpoint than his accuracy"

Horowitz is a shameless self promoter (that's why he's invited to speak, just like every other hot-to-grab speaker). And with Horowitz, he tends to personalize the issues (often making it "about him" and not about the matter at hand - Churchill is turning into that too and Moore has always been there). If he weren't playing a game of chicken with people who don't necessarily respect the laws of physics & inertia, he would be fun to watch.

That's why I loathe the thought of him being behind the A/SBoR -- no matter how close it gets to "bullet listing" or "cliffs-noting" the historical documents on academic freedom. The A/SBoR is turning into a referendum on Horowitz and Pals, and not about whether or not we are turning Academic Freedom into a cafeteria plan that favors the current fashions in academia, picking and chosing what we tolerate as we go.

I'd bet if Stanley Fish (of "The University is NOT a Poltiical Party" - Required Reading) were promoting it in almost its current form (it still needs some massaging for me to harumph it) as agressively, it might have an easier run through our community -- or at least we could be talking about the current state of Academic Freedom and not focusing on the appropriate use of baked goods (pies, cookies, the lot) and not about Dave Horowitz.

But right now, it's all about Horowitz. Cause with Horowitz, it's ALWAYS about Horowitz. Serious talk about Academic Freedom's gonnahaveta wait till he gets off the stage.

"the basis shouldn't be political, the basis should be relation to truth vs opinion, coulter and horowitz have opinion..."

Jeremy, does it not strike you that in the same sentence in which you said the basis shouldn't be political, the two you mentioned are on the same side of the aisle? I don't know if it's possible for the basis not to be political, unless the people making the judgment are carefully chosen from both sides. I have a better idea - let the speakers speak, and ban the pie-throwing.

I remember being in college, and studying and working my butt off. I did occasionally attend concerts and plays. I didn't have time or mental energy left over for this crap.

Reminds me of the attempted "pie-ing" of Ann Coulter in Arizona.

Strange how those that often preach tolerance to the rest of us are often themselves the first to "shout-down" someone with which they disagree.

The hypocrisy is not only obvious, but it is laughable as well...

jeremy wrote: "the basis shouldn't be political, the basis should be relation to truth vs opinion, coulter and horowitz have opinion, but little relation to the truth"

But Jeremy, humanities departments across the nation have put the idea of "truth" in stocks and are pelting it with rotten fruit, all the while exalting their own "subjectivities" as the new basis for thought. Stanley Fish himself noted that postmodernism freed him from the need to be right, requiring him only to be interesting.

I think your call for truth is touching, though, and I wish more academics were interested in that old-fashioned idea. Still, something like the truth is often arrived at through a vigorous battle of theories and, yes, opinions. Pie throwers may be interesting (a la Professor Fish), but they don't contribute anything to the discourse--in fact, their goal seems to be to stop it dead.

I'm with Laura: Student should do their f'ing homework and let the speakers speak.

Also, just because Horowitz is a "shameless self-promoter" it doesn't follow that his ideas are wrong. One of the saddest discoveries of my own long-ago adolescence was finding out that people I despised could still turn out to be right.

"People who are clearly manufacturing and selling lies, like Horowitz, should not be invited to speak at universities, because it wastes resources, discourages honest critical thinking, and encourages further lying. "

But wouldn't that reasoning also cover ex-President . . . . or ex anchorman . . . . or ex- candidate. . . . .or Professor. . . . ? (The reader can insert whatever names appear most appropriate.) Wait a second, maybe there's something to be said for this after all.

Just to add a few random thoughts: Horowitz was allowed to speak on campus, so what happened here is more like a heckler's veto, than an attempt at what Chris described as quality control. Besides someone invited Horowitz to speak and was apparently willing to pay his speaker's fee. You would have to assume that wouldn't have happened unless whoever paid the fee thought it was worth it.

Also you can't really explain the pie throwing incident as an aberration due to Horowitz's personality because it also happened to William Kristol. Other conservative speakers have had their microphones turned off, and there are plenty of other instances of censorship, such as newspaper thefts. So it seems to me at least that the problem that should be focused on isn't one of quality control, even if you could figure out a way to do that. Rather it's how to make sure that voices that dissent from campus orthodoxies can be heard.

Chris Martin said "Just a few weeks ago, for example, Horowitz claimed that university professors are a privileged elite that work between six to nine hours a week, eight months a year for an annual salary of about $150,000. That is an outright lie."

The lie you speak of must be yours since D.H. never said must be yours because he never said what you claim. Change your premise to "6 to 9 hrs a wk in class" and it changes the whole equation.

I don't really think you were lying, just a little emotionally sensitive to the issue.

oops! Got side tracked in the middle and didn't proof read. sorry

Well Rose, I actually sorta like Horowitz the same way I like Hitchens (I tend to like them more when I disagree with them, though I'm irritated as to the way he's doing the S/ABoR - it could be done better).

Say what you will about his fan-base but he's graciously provided a roustrum for apostate liberals and leftists (e.g., radical feminist Phyllis Chesler) without requiring them to compromise or hide their broader stances. He has also said positive things on gays (like he did on Dennis Miller over gay marriage) and such. His hard-core conservative fans tend to stress a bit when he does that. He seems to like "difficult" people being a difficult one, himself. In that respect, he seems to be bigger on diversity than some stereotypical university departments.

My issue, like I said, is that he does tend to martyr-up a bit on his Apostate Leftist status which [the apostate thing] in itself drives the left into a tizzy. It so easily becomes not about the issues but about the man, and when he gets that way, he stops being as interesting.

But diversity doesn't include black people, as he has constantly and consistently lied about us, claimed that we are whiners, that we aren't oppressed(while white university students who do not want to think are the real oppressed ones) I understand that many white people hold hateful and cruel ideas about blacks, however, do we really need to use university time and resources to tell people what they already 'know'?

Here's a hateful column by him if you want to hear some of his spew: http://www.salon.com/news/col/horo/1999/08/16/naacp/

Shannon, university time and resources get spent on a lot of futile things. If Horowitz is coming to your campus, and you don't expect him to have anything helpful or interesting to say, don't go hear him. It's as simple as that.

I did not, but he whined in our school newspaper because he didn't get a handout for repeating his crap a second time. I wrote an editorial pointing out his anti black public statements and our BSA was invovled in protesting him, although some may have been unfairly searched. We have fought too hard for enterance to a university to see ourselves denigrated with university money. It is our money because we pay for these things out of our tuition and fees.

Basically, what a university supports reflects on it. You may say "Don't listen to the KKK(hate is hate, even if hate wears a tie)" but does that create a safe institution for students who actually do want to learn? Let conservatives have their own universities on the free market, and let us who want to work get in. If we were a public university, taxpayers would be paying for his hate speech.(I'm not using this in the conservative way to mean merely speech I dislike, but speech that incites people to move to bar certain students from institutions of education is hate. We have fought hard and long for rights. People have died.)

Shannon,

Hate speech? Because he pointed out crime statistics? Because he said that sociopaths kill people? Because he disagreed with those who attribute all the problems in the Black community to whites? That's what Horowitz complained about.

Then you say ,"Basically, what a university supports reflects on it. You may say "Don't listen to the KKK(hate is hate, even if hate wears a tie)" but does that create a safe institution for students who actually do want to learn? "

What in the world are you talking about? Do you mean no one can speak on campus unless he expresses a view that you find acceptable for the university to endorse? Do you mean the fact that Horowitz speaks somehow means that Blacks are not safe on campus?
If you want to bar people from talking on campus because you find their views on personal accountablity offensive hate speech, then anyone can bar anyone from speaking on campus because they find their views offensive. Is that what you want?

Sure, student groups have the right to invite whomever they please to speak on campus. And students have every right to protest whatever speakers they wish to protest. Pie-throwing, of course, while pretty funny, is not protest; it is civil disobedience (however misguided).

In any case, though, Horowitz is a total fraud. Check out the recent post at www.michaelberube.com for an account of how Horowitz selectively edited an email debate between himself and Prof. Michael Berube.

There is a clear line between making a few errors and being a complete fraud. Everyone makes errors. Not everyone creates an entirely fictional world based on flimsy evidence. My point is that certain arguments are so weak that they don't even acknowledging them is giving them too much respect.

Now Horowitz is a smart man -- I had an argument with him personally. His public persona is a schtick that he uses to be more popular among crowds, which fall for that sort of thing.

And yes, I think all speakers, left, right, center, and non-political, who are complete frauds should not be invited to college campuses.

And Mike Piazza, the article says six to nine hours a week. It doesn't include the words "in class." And even if it did, it would still be deception on Horowitz's part because he would be hinting that professors have only a few hours of work per week. So your comment seems pointless.

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My point is that certain arguments are so weak that they don't even acknowledging them is giving them too much respect.
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Chris, you're free to acknowledge arguments or not. The questions are (originally) whether their proponents should be physically assaulted and (your escalation) whether they should be banned "on the basis of quality control".

Pie-throwing isn't civil disobedience. It's assault.

Shannon, you have a pretty interesting way of using the term "conservative". Being one myself, I could interpret it as hate speech pretty easily

Well, Laura, I won't debate the ins and outs of civil disobedience with you.

Horowitless is lucky he only got a pie, especially with Republican congressmen threatening the lives of judges on the floor of the Senate and at theocratic policy retreats (http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/04/11/judicial_conference/index.html).

Do I approve of the pie? No: letting Horowitz talk is his own (and his audience's) punishment. His intellectual dishonesty is only matched by his scratched-LP mode of repeating the same thing over and again ("the Left liked Communists, now the Left likes Islamofascists"). He and Michael Moore should mate and have a love child. They could name the baby "Christopher Hitchens."

Luther,

Now this is why you really need to hear what the right says rather than what the left says they said. What you call a threat is discussed at length in Beldar's blog. There was no threat.
And the comment that the left likes Communists and Islamofascists, is a lie? They don't? If you're a leftist, what 's not to like?

Allan: I shouldn't even give your bitter comment a reply. But I cannot sleep, so perhaps this blogstrain will put me out.

First off, here are the great senator's exact words: "Finally, I don't know if there is a cause-and-effect connection, but we have seen some recent episodes of courthouse violence in this country -- certainly nothing new; we seem to have run through a spate of courthouse violence recently that has been on the news. I wonder whether there may be some connection between the perception in some quarters on some occasions where judges are making political decisions yet are unaccountable to the public, that it builds up and builds up to the point where some people engage in violence, certainly without any justification, but that is a concern I have that I wanted to share."

Now, when some folks say things like "Islamic terrorists emerge out of a sense of frustration with the lack of accountability of US and Israeli politics," right-wingers go nuts. But Cornyn uses the same logic: violence against judges arises out of a frustration with their lack of accountability. Forget that in the instance Cornyn is discussing, a convicted rapist attacked a judge (I suppose Cornyn thinks that anti-rape legislation is too much feminist PC nonsense?).

On the topic of Communism, I'll only say that as many leftists uncritically supported Red regimes as right-wingnuts supported dictatorships (including Iraq). And while Horowitz's logic might seem compelling to the brain-dead, not every critic of the U.S. is ultimately the same on the basis of something as vague as "being a critic of the US." If you can't see the difference between, say, Tom Frank and a terrorist, then you need some serious emotional help.

Luther, don't worry. I do see a difference between Tom Frank and a terrorist. I'd also never lump people like Joe Lieberman, Ed Koch, etc in with them either. But when we look at those who fire shots into Republican headquarters,,or slash tires on Republican vehicles, or beat up Conservative students,, or go on national tv and call for bodily harm on Republicans, not to mention those who overty aid terrorists, it's a different story.
Besides, the comment I was addressing didn't say "terrorists " It said "Islamofascists. "

Threatening violence, or calling for violence, is illegal, I believe. If Republican senators have done this, I want the book thrown at them. Has anybody pressed charges? And does the fact that people I don't know have possibly done something I deeply disapprove of mean that I have to overlook the wrongness of idiots throwing pies?

Looks like someone just did it to Pat Buchanan, but with salad dressing instead of pie.

Allan, you have been told lies about black people. I will try to straighten them out for you. Yes, there are many blacks who are educated, and know history, and thus somehow think that the ongoing fight to keep blacks out of the biggest institutions in this country, such as the best jobs, the highest government positions, and white colleges, the fight to criminilize blacks(my cousin got arrested for watching TV in a non moving car) and the white flight and hysteria that predominate in this country have to do with whites, not magic fairies that sprinkle racism dust. Maybe you should read some books before talking?

However, there are many self hating black people, because we have also been exposed to the lies that we are inferior, and bad people because we are not white, if it makes you feel better.

The real thing is that Horowitz helps stir up anti black sentiment among whites. It's like a Holocaust denier and neo nazi speaking at your school. He may pull up some statistics, but they are for his greater purpose of stirring up hatred against Jews. Just because anti black racism isn't treated seriously doesn't mean that one needs to fall for transparent lies. There are no barriers to keep you from reading books and learning before you shoot off your mouth.

Many whites wish not to learn about the whys of black problems because that would mean taking responsibilty(personal responsibilty never applies to whites, men or the rich, you ever notice that?) so they go to people like Horowitz to tell them that it's not their fault, that blacks are inferior. Once the poison has set in, people often begin to act on their beliefs. Just imagine a neo nazi with a tie on, and then you'll understand,ok?

Also, Lauren, conservatives back abstinence only education and conscience clauses that may lead to women not being able to get birth control,but they are the first to spew hate against poor, especially black, mothers. My dislike of them is justified on those grounds, not to mention they are constantly saying people of my skin color are not qualified, or are criminal sociopaths. White people believe these things without thinking about them, and they affect me when we get inferior schools, barred from good jobs(if you wanted to learn, you'd read about the white and black name studies), and given worse medical care. If you wanted to learn, you'd know that already, and that is why I am against the anti intellectualism that Horowitz expouses.

Shannon, I suppose you mean me.

I know all about the name studies. I, a white person, have lived in a majority black city for the past 23 years and probably know more about race relations than you think. My point is that if you are going to define "hate speech" in the generous way you do, you need to look in a mirror.

Shannon, you say that I have been told lies about Black people, that I should read books before talking, and that I was shooting my mouth off. Yet all I did was ask you some questions. Sure you have the right person?

Laura, the selective quotation from Senator Cornyn's remarks seems has said more about the people quoting him than it could have about them. You, at least, appear to have actually had the honesty to have left in "certainly without any justification," although you seem to have ignored it nonetheless.

"Threatening violence, or calling for violence, is illegal, I believe."

Based on that and earlier comments, I'd strongly advise you to pick up a casebook on the First Amendment. What Senator Cornyn said cannot remotely be construed as a threat. What words did he use to actually incite violence? Where's the "clear and present danger"?

Moreover, the idea that anyone let onto campus is being endorsed by the university is a recipe for stultifying intellectual conformity. Whatever happened to the marketplace of ideas? But, I get it, like so many on the left, when you talk about free speech, you mean freedom to agree with YOU, i.e., "free speech for me but not for thee." Dress it up in the cloak of hate speech or fraud or whatever else, but it's a thoroughly unconvincing attempt to prevent people from hearing what you dislike.

"If Republican senators have done this, I want the book thrown at them."

Even if this was a threat (which it wasn't), legislators are immune from both criminal prosecution and civil liability for floor statements: separation of powers requires the courts to defer to each chamber's authority to discipline its own members, which would provide the remedies in such a case, i.e., to have your words stricken from the record, to be censured, or to be expelled.

Dave, I think you are morphing me and Luther, which is probably difficult to do since our politics are so different.

My point was that Luther wants me to excuse pie-throwing at David Horowitz because "Republican congressmen threaten the lives of judges". I can't believe that it's legal for anyone publicly to threaten or call for assassinations. If they did, that can't be tolerated. If they didn't, somebody's lying their heads off to score political points (nothing new, unfortunately). (And may I say, I am vastly underwhelmed by any arguments using Salon pieces as support.) Either way, pies shouldn't be thrown at speakers on campuses. I just don't see a connection here.

David Horowitz is unaccountable to the public. And it is this very unaccountability that perhaps is making him a target of pie-tossers, Pastry Terrorists, and Custardofascists. I think it's the public's frustration with Horowitz's activism and lack of accountability that's leading to these attacks. So let's make Horowitz more accountable to the public.

(Sound like a load of crap? Sure it is. Sound like I'm maybe supporting pie-tossing or rationalizing or justifying attacks on public speakers? Sure it does. And if it does, remember that all I'm doing there is paraphrasing Senator Cornyn's words about judges.)

What do Cornyn and other Republicans -- like the Christian retreat leader who quoted Stalin's idea that dead dissenters can't dissent -- have to do with Horowitz? Well, all good Judeo-Christians know all about an eye for an eye, living by the sword and dying by the sword, etc.

But of course, in my original use of the Cornyn example, I was simply making a tasteless joke (i.e., that Horowitz should be happy it was only a pie and not, say, a Senate-rationalized rapist going after him for revenge).

My real point is to point out the silence and rationalizations of conservatives about crap like Cornyn and the Christian Right while pointing the finger at moronic left-wing pie-throwers.

What did that long-haired Jewish hippy say? Something about pointing out the mote in another's eye while a beam is stuck in your own? Too bad there's no infallible authority on earth right now to give me an official interpretation of that statement.

I do not know how to express to you any clearer, Luther, that I am not excusing threats made by Cornyn or anyone else. I'm not there to hear them. I don't trust Salon as a news source, sorry. If Cornyn asked me if he should make threats against judges, I would tell him no. You're talking about "silence" from conservatives about this issue, and I supppose you must have your fingers in your ears.

I don't know what kind of accountability you want Horowitz to have to the public. He speaks, and people can go to hear him or not. I thought that was the American way. Who exactly should he have to account to? You?

Here's a little blast from the past. Alec Baldwin, remember?

"They voted on one article of impeachment already. And I come back from Africa to stained dresses and cigars and this and impeachment. I am thinking to myself, in other countries they are laughing at us 24 hours a day and I’m thinking to myself, if we were in other countries, we would all right now, all of us together, [starts to shout] all of us together would go down to Washington and we would stone Henry Hyde to death! We would stone him to death! [crowd cheers] Wait! Shut up! Shut up! No shut up! I’m not finished. We would stone Henry Hyde to death and we would go to their homes and we’d kill their wives and their children. We would kill their families. [stands up, yelling] What is happening in this country? What is happening? UGHHH!"

Oh, the poor peace-loving Democrats, constantly being threatened by irresponsible Republicans.

You say Horowitz is not accountable to the public? What hogwash. Horowitz lives by self-promotion of his intellectual property. If that is not accountability to the public then there is no such thing.

Horowitz is not an elected official. He is a private person. Private persons in this country still have freedom of speech, regardless of the wishes of the fascists.

1) Laura and Arturo: Read for tone. See that paragraph in parentheses in my last comment? See how it outs the paragraph before it as parody?

2) To repeat my last point: I'm tired of silence on the right about violence and shutting down debate and fascist tactics, as if it's only folks on the left engaged in stupid activities, and, more importantly, as if the entire left is defined by these pie-throwing clowns. (See Scriptural paraphrase in my previous comment.)

3) No political party has a monopoly on good ideas. No political party has a monopoly on bad behavior. There's no room for true centrism (and I blame morons like Michael Moore and David Horowitz and many many blogs and cable news shows).

4) Laura, no one's asking you to do anything. I just find it interesting that people flock to blogs all about the fascism of the academic left, as if it proves their own innocence as victimized conservatives: the passion of the Horowitz does not pay for the sins of all Republicans.