Correspondence

Well, after writing the entry on The Professors last night, I decided to email the two Penn State professors on the list to congratulate them for the honor David Horowitz bestowed on them. Here's what I wrote:

Dear Professors,

Congratulations on becoming two of the 101 Most "Dangerous" AKA Liberal professors in the USA. I feel honored to attend an university with a diverse faculty that holds a wide range of view points. The two of you should be honored to be on the list, even though the author does not feel the way I do. Making the list says that the two of you are leading voices in your respective fields and must be eliminated by the conservatives. That says something about your skills and merit. Congratulations.

Sincerely,
[Aventius]

Today, I was very surprised to see that both of them responded. Here's what the first said:

Dear [Aventius],

Many thanks. Truth be told, I think that in order to make that very exclusive list, one has to have (a) served time in a Maoist sect of the late New Left or (b) crossed David Horowitz personally. I think Sam and I fall under (b), just for the record, as do most of the top 101. But we'll do our best to be (cough) dangerous, now that we have reputations to live up to--

Best wishes,
[Professor #1]

And here's the second professors response:

[Aventius].

Ironically, I probably don't even belong on this list of radical professors. I'm not liberal (as I'm a libertarian and probably more conservative than liberal). I'm not anti-American, and students don't seem to think that I impose my thoughts on them. But I do think Horowitz is a nit-wit and so I'm honored to be the kind of prof that he would never be.

Best,
[Professor #2].