Socialist Republic of California

I remember when I was going to college, I often heard conservatives from the generation before me refer to it as ‘the socialist state university of California’ ..and a typical exchange might go something like this:

“So Bill, what are you doing for your thesis ..?”
“Studying how people can be easily misinformed ..like deceptive advertising, that sort of thing.”
“Oh, so you can devise better methods of propaganda ..”
“No, so we can teach better methods of detecting it ..”

Later, I would discover that they were going around saying: “Hey, did you know Bill is studying to be a propaganda minister.” At first, I took it as a joke ..and laughed it off. Then one day I kind of got the gist of it when someone at work got real pissed and told me how unfair it was: “Even though I didn’t go to college, I have to pay so punks like you can.” And I thought, yeah .. it was part of a land-grant act to set aside state funds for higher education. Later I discovered some people actually believe universities teach communist principles. Why ..? Because, as the name implies, universities teach universal principles, paving the way for a one-world society. And here I thought they were teaching us how to communicate better with other societies. When I look at the wars we’ve been fighting, I realize how easily misinformed I have been.