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March 24, 2010
Eisenhower Saw It Coming
"Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.
"The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present
- "and is gravely to be regarded.
"Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientifictechnological elite." -- Military-Industrial Complex Speech, Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1961
Posted by Vanderleun at March 24, 2010 4:56 PM. This is an entry on the sideblog of American Digest: Check it out.
Your Say
The last (only?) populist president. Honest to the bone, he warned of real threats from both factions.
The joke at the time was the 'Eisenhower Doll': you wind it up and it does nothing, for 8 years. (except allow average Americans to grow prosperous as the Greatest Generation.)
I still like Ike.
Posted by: Robert at March 24, 2010 5:29 PM
Sometimes doing nothing is better than doing something. Case in point, America was indeed prosperous during his administration.
Posted by: Cilla Mitchell, Galveston Texas at March 25, 2010 4:41 AM
I learned to like and respect Ike long after he was gone. I grew up in an ultra-liberal household -- hence my revulsion for said "liberalism" as an adult. Familiarity does breed contempt.
Posted by: Don Rodrigo at March 25, 2010 2:36 PM
Except for a certain Southern Senator, Ike would have pushed for strong Civil Rights legislation. The 1964 Voting Rights Act could have been had in 1956. Only one problem, LBJ couldn't figure out a way for the Democrats to profit from it. Then he dreamed up the "Great Society" to buy the votes of the newly enfranchised Southern blacks (and blacks in general in the rest of the country) to make up for the white Southern voters such legislation was going to lose him. It worked. I could say some other unpleasant things about LBJ, but won't run on - just note that he was the first President to dip into Social Security - and now Social Security is broke - technically insolvent.
Posted by: Anonymous at March 26, 2010 4:46 AM
Except for a certain Southern Senator, Ike would have pushed for strong Civil Rights legislation. The 1964 Voting Rights Act could have been had in 1956. Only one problem, LBJ couldn't figure out a way for the Democrats to profit from it. Then he dreamed up the "Great Society" to buy the votes of the newly enfranchised Southern blacks (and blacks in general in the rest of the country) to make up for the white Southern voters such legislation was going to lose him. It worked. I could say some other unpleasant things about LBJ, but won't run on - just note that he was the first President to dip into Social Security - and now Social Security is broke - technically insolvent.
Posted by: RKV at March 26, 2010 4:48 AM