The Institutional Advisory Council at Hillsborough Community College has recommended the school stop saying the Pledge of Allegiance at its meetings. The IAC claims they did it to save time at their meetings, and they were concerned about the Pledge’s

appropriateness in an institution of higher learning which fosters academic freedom and structured dissent against authority.

How dishonest is this? If we stretch the 15, or so, seconds it actually takes to recite the Pledge of Allegiance into a minute to get everyone on their feet and facing the flag (they do have one in their meeting room, do they not?) and then sat back down after the recitation, we’re still not taking any time away from the meeting. Plainly Hillsborough’s IAC doesn’t consider patriotism to our nation—the nation that nurtures its members and provides them the environment within which they can pull…foolishness…like this, the nation whose other citizens have been killed or maimed defending their right to pull…foolishness…like this—worth the time.

The IAC’s claim is disingenuous in another way, too. “Structured dissent?” Why does dissent need to be “structured?” Oh, yeah, that Progressive notion that every human activity has to be regulated by the individual’s Betters.

Beyond that, though, is the outright logical dishonesty in their claim. How is it possible to dissent (structured or not) against the Pledge, for instance, when by not being allowed to recite it, the ability to refuse to do so, to dissent against it, is denied? Of course, those well-educated and highly intelligent members of the IAC know this full well.

Sadly though, Hillsborough ‘s President, Dr Ken Atwater, is another aficionado of leading from behind. He asked the IAC to reconsider their decision. Nonsense. The IAC is an advisory body. He’s the President. He can, and should, overrule the IAC and cancel its decision on his own initiative.