As people across the world take to their homes in hopes of avoiding the coronavirus, many of them have seemed to remember an axiom of which Democratic political operative Rahm Emanuel is quite fond: never let a crisis go to waste. That is to say, anyone with any ideological persuasion whatsoever (yes, that includes me) is convinced that his ideas are just what this moment requires. The disease of self-assurance is much more contagious than the coronavirus, and the desire to do anything in response to the latter malady may well cause the former to have a greater impact on our world, long our lives regain a sense of normalcy. In times like these, we would do quite well to sit down, take a deep breath, and consider our options in response to this pandemic.
But that is not what the students of Georgetown University did. Not even one week after Provost Robert Groves announced that Georgetown would offer its students the option to take any class pass/fail until the last day of the semester, the incoming GUSA executive demanded that all students be given no less than an A- grade in every class, regardless of previous performance. Many things could be written about this wretched proposal, and my friend Justin Drewer has written some of them.
I think we would do well, however, to consider the unmitigated gall of students who would demand a free grade just for being enrolled in college at an inopportune time. Yes, it is true that some students will more easily transition to online classes than others due to reasons beyond their control. No, that is not fair. But life is not now, nor has it ever been, fair. To reward all students enrolled in college an A- for their troubles is to strike a blow for grade inflation, and to devalue any diploma Georgetown University has granted in the past, or will grant in the future.
Demonstrating that Georgetown campus politics provide excellent training for the big leagues that are the United States federal government, congressional Democrats engaged in the sort of opportunism that has made “bill” a four-letter word to those of us who have had the pleasure of watching our government rack up nearly $24 trillion in debt, most of it in the last 20 years. Under the guidance of Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, Democrats attempted to lard up an ostensibly stopgap measure with unrelated environmental regulations and giveaways to favored interests groups. They only allowed the $2 trillion spending bill pass after a public outcry, but Speaker Pelosi indicated that she would like to see more than $700 billion more in new spending. How new emissions standards for airplanes and increased bargaining power for public sector unions will help America fight the coronavirus, I know not.
One key principle of American conservative thought is that things can always get worse. And if Harvard Law School professor Adrian Vermeule has his way, things will get a whole lot worse. Vermeule has published a screed in The Atlantic that, if nothing else, demonstrates the amazing power of academic tenure. A constitutional law scholar, Vermeule spends over 2000 words explaining that now is the perfect time to throw out over 200 years of constitutional law, because “in this time of global pandemic,” we must understand “that government helps direct persons, associations, and society generally toward the common good, and that strong rule in the interest of attaining the common good is entirely legitimate.”
Since 2016, Vermeule has spent the vast majority of his time giving converts to Catholicism a bad name, and in the midst of the coronavirus, he has given us a manifesto about his desired political programme, one with some nastily fascist overtones. What he has also given us, however, is the opportunity to consider the similarities between his desires, those of the Green New Deal progressives, and the more than 1600 Georgetown students who demand A’s for all.
While integralists like Vermeule share very little with Green New Deal progressives and grade inflators by way of political substance, they overlap almost completely in terms of their attitudes towards governance. I will group the grade inflators in with the Green New Deal progressives completely for the purpose of this argument, because those two groups generally share an affinity for the language and ideology of intersectionality. Both groups hope that their audiences will fall prey to a logical fallacy introduced in the British sitcom Yes, Prime Minister, the politician’s syllogism. The syllogism states, “We must do something. This is something. We must do this.”
In most cases, the “this” is not the right solution to the problem. But in the minds of integralists and progressives, that is not a relevant obstacle. The current crisis is only a means to an end for people proposing free A’s or a Catholic social order aligned towards the “Highest Good.” They know what the people need, and believe that they are the only ones that can give it to them. We must hope that people have the sense to recognize these power grabs for what they are.
Michael Ginsberg (COL ’20) is a Contributor majoring in Medieval Studies and minoring in Government.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official or personal position of the Editorial Board, Contributors, or Business Staff of The Georgetown Review
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