John Hawkins over at Right Wing News picked up on the story of a University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point English professor who wrote an editorial in the student newspaper that displayed some typical liberal charm:

In the November 4th edition, Rothfuss focuses on the outcome of Tuesday’s election. Rothfuss writes of his desire for “Punching smug looking Republicans in the mouth.” He also advises a deluded Democrat, “You might want to go out and key every car you see with a Bush sticker, or set fire to a couple houses.” He goes on to advise, “Why don’t you go on a killing spree? I bet you can take out 15 or 16 Republicans before they gun you down.”

The campus College Republicans responded with some good points (pardun the pun):

Please excuse me for not laughing. Such hate speech would be irresponsible if Rothfuss were a student. But Rothfuss actually teaches at UWSP! Rothfuss is an associate lecturer in the UWSP English department. The content of Rothfuss’s weekly column, as a general rule, is totally inappropriate considering he is a faculty member and this is the most egregious example. Imagine how Republican students feel in Rothfuss’s classes. Diversity and freedom of expression are not promoted in an environment in which a teacher advocates the killing of those who vote differently. (But don’t worry Republican students. It’s all just a harmless joke!) Imagine the reaction if Rothfuss had substituted another campus minority group for “Republicans” – gays, women, Jews, African-Americans, for example.

This is what I don't understand. How can campus liberals be so focused on showing tolerance and promoting diversity and then turn around and be so intolerant of people who add to the diversity of ideas on campus? Are they really so shallow that diversity only means the color of someone's skin? Isn't that just a step away from saying that ideas and beliefs don't matter, and that all that matters is your race? Whatever happened to Martin Luther King's dream of "a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."?

Of course, I'm not surprised by this attitude, but I am a little surprised to hear about it at Stevens Point. I grew up in Point's rival town, Wisconsin Rapids, which is just about 1/2 hour away. Both cities are Central Wisconsin paper mill towns. While Rapids has cranberry production to recommend it, Point distinguishes itself with its University and Point Beer (try the White Biere!). But the two towns aren't that different. This isn't Columbia or Berkeley. It's not even Madison. This is small town Wisconsin, where truck outnumber cars and grunge suddenly made everyone stylish for a few years.

I think this Professor is probably just a wannabee. He wants to be "cool" like the radical professors on the coasts. He wants to be outrageous like Michael Moore. This guy probably thinks he's way too good for a school like Point (which, by the way, like all the UW schools is a great school) and this is his way of signaling to hiring committees all over America that he belongs. In fact, he's probably hoping that this article pops up in every google search of his name. Hopefully one of those committees will soon pluck him from UWSP. Good riddance.