MSNBC's Morning Joe panel castigated college campuses in the U.S. on Monday for being so dominated by liberals that conservative ideas are rejected out of hand, undermining the concepts of liberal education and freedom of speech.
The panel was discussing a New York Times op-ed by Nicholas Kristof published over the weekend on "college echo chambers." After co-host Mika Brzezinski read a portion of Kristof's piece, fellow co-host Joe Scarborough and panelist Harold Ford Jr. discussed how intolerance of open debate on college campuses is damaging liberal education and the Democratic Party.
"Harold, you talk about illiberal education, that's not liberal education. Illiberal education has seized college campuses across America, as Nick Kristof said," Scarborough said. "You only have one out of ten professors that are Republicans or conservatives. You can't understand the world if you don't let it in behind your gates."
Ford, a former Democratic congressman, agreed.
"The most powerful statement is the final sentence that Mika quoted about diversity is not just about embracing people that don't look like you but people who don't think like you," he said.
After both men remarked on the damage being done to higher education by the lack of diverse opinions, Scarborough continued a step further.
"But, again, if everywhere you go, people say you're right no matter how weak your argument is, it creates an intellectual laziness that allows you to see your party collapse," Scarborough said. "And you wake up one day and you only have 11 or 12 governors nationwide."
Scarborough appeared to be referencing the 2016 elections in which Democrats under-performed compared to expectations. The Democratic Party was unable to gain control of the Senate and lost the presidency as well as several governorships and state legislatures.