When it comes to conservatives on campus, it’s not that they don’t make them like they used to. It just may be that there are more curbs on their activity than in the recent past.

“How many of you are in college?” Alyssa Cordova asked of the Clare Booth Luce Policy Institute (CBLPI) asked about 100 or more idealistic youth at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) last week. Most of their hands went up.

Then she asked, “How many of you have been around this many conservatives before?” Two hands went up.

“See, that’s the problem,” Cordova noted. Yes it is.

Cordova is the lecture director at the CBLPI. She actually manages to get conservative speakers on college campuses, sometimes even Ivy League ones.

“It’s hard to find professors who will debate our speakers,” Cordova avers. “A student at Penn spent months trying to find someone to debate Christina Hoff Sommers.”

One is reminded of William F. Buckley’s answer when asked why then-Senator Robert F. Kennedy, D-NY, would not go on Firing Line. “Why does baloney reject the grinder?” Buckley asked.

Malcolm A. Kline is the Executive Director of Accuracy in Academia.

If you would like to comment on this article, e-mail mal.kline@academia.org