Mike Steger argues that Harvard’s failures did not begin with DEI, critical race theory, or modern campus politics. He traces the institution’s transformation back more than 300 years and examines its conflict with the religious and political movements that helped shape the American Revolution.
Mike explores Harvard’s opposition to revivalist preacher George Whitefield, its connections to Crown loyalists during the Revolution, and the influence of the Boston Brahmins. He argues that Harvard’s elite culture repeatedly aligned itself with British imperial interests instead of the American tradition of national sovereignty and economic development.
The discussion then turns to Harvard economist Frank Taussig and the intellectual campaign against protective tariffs. Mike explains how free-trade economics displaced the American System associated with Alexander Hamilton, Abraham Lincoln, and William McKinley.
Mike also examines economist Jeffrey Sachs and the “shock therapy” policies implemented in Bolivia and post-Soviet Russia. He argues that these policies accelerated unemployment, privatization, economic collapse, and the rise of oligarchical power before similar neoliberal ideas contributed to American deindustrialization through NAFTA, the WTO, and globalization.
The consequences can now be seen in America’s shortage of welders, electricians, mechanics, shipbuilders, semiconductor workers, and other skilled professionals. Mike argues that the deeper crisis is the disappearance of industrial knowledge passed from one generation of American workers to the next.
President Trump’s administration has proposed regulations that could remove federal tax exemptions from private educational institutions using race-based policies. It has also launched the Foundry School, begun planning a U.S. Space Academy, and released the “Science: A New Golden Age” report outlining changes to the American research system.
Mike compares these initiatives with Lincoln’s land-grant colleges and Douglas MacArthur’s rebuilding of West Point. He argues that America must once again educate young people for engineering, manufacturing, scientific discovery, public service, and the physical development of the nation.
This is ultimately a battle between two educational models: an elite system built around credentials, abstraction, and globalization, and an American System centered on competence, industry, national mission, and human creativity.
Mike explores Harvard’s opposition to revivalist preacher George Whitefield, its connections to Crown loyalists during the Revolution, and the influence of the Boston Brahmins. He argues that Harvard’s elite culture repeatedly aligned itself with British imperial interests instead of the American tradition of national sovereignty and economic development.
The discussion then turns to Harvard economist Frank Taussig and the intellectual campaign against protective tariffs. Mike explains how free-trade economics displaced the American System associated with Alexander Hamilton, Abraham Lincoln, and William McKinley.
Mike also examines economist Jeffrey Sachs and the “shock therapy” policies implemented in Bolivia and post-Soviet Russia. He argues that these policies accelerated unemployment, privatization, economic collapse, and the rise of oligarchical power before similar neoliberal ideas contributed to American deindustrialization through NAFTA, the WTO, and globalization.
The consequences can now be seen in America’s shortage of welders, electricians, mechanics, shipbuilders, semiconductor workers, and other skilled professionals. Mike argues that the deeper crisis is the disappearance of industrial knowledge passed from one generation of American workers to the next.
President Trump’s administration has proposed regulations that could remove federal tax exemptions from private educational institutions using race-based policies. It has also launched the Foundry School, begun planning a U.S. Space Academy, and released the “Science: A New Golden Age” report outlining changes to the American research system.
Mike compares these initiatives with Lincoln’s land-grant colleges and Douglas MacArthur’s rebuilding of West Point. He argues that America must once again educate young people for engineering, manufacturing, scientific discovery, public service, and the physical development of the nation.
This is ultimately a battle between two educational models: an elite system built around credentials, abstraction, and globalization, and an American System centered on competence, industry, national mission, and human creativity.