The same MIT professor who called Americans “too stupid” to understand Obamacare has joined fellow professors in signing a letter to protest Stephen K. Bannon and other appointees by President-elect Donald J. Trump.
Bannon, who is the incoming White House Chief Strategist and Senior Counselor, is set to visit Harvard University this week as part of a regular post-election gathering of campaign veterans. In protest, a list of professors at nearby Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have banded together to register their opposition to Bannon and others to whom President-elect Trump has already offered positions.
They have signed a statement, “A message from MIT faculty reaffirming our shared values,” whose “about” page states explicitly that it is motivated by explicit opposition to Bannon because of his position as Executive Chairman of Breitbart News. (Bannon is currently on leave from the company.)
The first principle of the “message” is: “We unconditionally reject every form of bigotry, discrimination, hateful rhetoric, and hateful action, whether directed towards one’s race, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, national origin, disability, citizenship, political views, socioeconomic status, veteran status, or immigration status.”
Some of the professors who have signed onto the protest letter include climate activist Susan Solomon; tech expert Tim Berners-Lee; professor emeritus and long-time far left activist Noam Chomsky; and Jonathan Gruber, architect of Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare.
Gruber has said on at least three separate occasions that the American people are too stupid to understand the complexity and need for Obamacare, and so they must be lied to in order to trick them into accepting the President’s take over of the nation’s health care system.
For example, he said: “Lack of transparency is a huge political advantage. And basically, you know, call it the stupidity of the American voter or whatever.”
In a press release about the MIT statement, Gruber is quoted as saying: “Public policy discussions have moved away from facts to conjecture and opinion. The only way to reverse this dangerous trend is to reaffirm the scientific method and its sound application to the important policy issues of the day.”
In their statement, the professors insist that they object to Trump’s appointments based on allegations that they have “endorsed racism, misogyny and religious bigotry, and denied the widespread scientific consensus on climate change.”
The signatories claim that they value “open, respectful discourse and exchange of ideas from the widest variety of intellectual, religious, class, cultural, and political perspectives.”
Some three hundred other MIT faculty have also signed the statement.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail.com.