A reader sends the following on my post concerning background checks on academics:

Regarding your blog on criminal behavior within the professorial class: True. The academics don’t want any legal oversight. I think I am less outraged by that impulse than you, but in the end I completely agree with your stance. What I mean is this: the professions (law, medicine, the academy, the military) have always traditionally sought to remain somewhat apart from the central legal authorities and structure, preferring to monitor themselves–with permission from or in agreement with the government. This self-monitoring has seriously eroded in all the professions over the last 50 to 60 years, but the impulse–not wanting legal oversight– still remains. The problem with the impulse in its current form is that the academy wants zero oversight of the profession; they repulse the government’s overtures to do so but refuse to undertake the task themselves. Here you have an old–and good–habit of thought that is now coupled with the most slothful habits of the modern professorial class. Regards, Matthew Mehan U.S. Editor for MercatorNet www.mercatornet.com