Over the past month or so, I've become increasingly frustrated with anti-intellectualism coming not from its usual source of Limbaugh, Hannity, etc, but from fellow liberals. A few weeks ago when talking about the power of the grassroots, a friend of mine said to me, "I think it's terrible how these days a group of so-called experts runs everything."
Now, I completely understand the need to incorporate everyone's views and ideas into our party and our politics, but we should not be railing against "experts." Ever since FDR the left has employed intellectuals to figure out ways of improving our society. It was academics who thought up the New Deal, Social Security, and the economic policies that worked so well during the Clinton years.
Lately I've seen much ranting about economists which I find disturbing. In a discussion over trade on mydd (I can't find the URL now), there were rants about the supposed failure of economics and the lack of diversity of opinion in economics departments. At issue is the entire neoclassical economic theory, which some liberals flatly reject because it does not conform to their preconceived political views.
This is exactly the kind of anti-intellectualism that we despise wingnuts for. When wingnuts decry evolution and the lack of biologists expressing alternative theories, we deride them and call them loony. But when economists form a consensus that international trade benefits society, we reject them and decry all of neoclassical economics. If this is not an example of Lakoff's "the facts don't fit the frames," I don't know what is.
The facts when it comes to economics is that most of the models do work. Thanks to the contributions of economic theory, we know how to use monetary policy to avoid panics and depressions, which used to occur every decade in this country. Thanks to economics, we have a capital asset pricing model that does explain 25% of the variation in stocks and 90% of the variation in portfolios. Thanks to economics, we have reason for why monopolies should be regulated. But no, we should reject all of this work because we don't believe in trade.
In a similar vein, because of our views on equality, we have Armando's rant about Larry Summers. You may or may not think Summers' remark was sexist. But I do think there is something anti-intellectual about shouting down someone for suggesting that genetic differences account for why there aren't as many exceptional women in science. This is a legitimate scientific question to ask, but instead of a discussion, we resort to shouting matches and ad hominem attacks because genetic differences are incompatible with our belief in equality.
As progressives we all share values of opportunity, security, responsibility, etc. But in expressing our views, I hope that we retain respect for intellectual thought.