The Brown University Spectator:A Journal of Conservative and Libertarian Thought

Author Archive

When Democrats Go Too Far

By Travis Rowley • Sep 15th, 2008 • Category: National

Consequences are the results of choices. So, as Rhode Islanders confront a half-billion dollar budget deficit, they should reflect upon the decisions that caused their State’s economic distress. After all, the State’s current fiscal condition was never a fated scenario. Alternate policies could have been employed.
So what decisions led to Rhode Island’s economic crisis?
The easy [...]



The State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations

By Travis Rowley • May 8th, 2008 • Category: Local

The United States, a nation long thought of as being comprised of a unique citizenry, who dedicated themselves to revolutionary propositions before subscribing to much else, offers much to reflect upon regarding its remarkable national character, and much to ponder in terms of how such a formidable society could founder.
Over the course of more [...]



Be Not Afraid? Skepticism, Politics, and Islamic Jihad

By Travis Rowley • Dec 6th, 2007 • Category: International

Oh, you Muslims everywhere, sever the ties of their nation, tear them apart, ruin their economy, instigate against their corporations, destroy their embassies, attack their interests, sink their ships, and shoot down their airplanes. Kill them in land, at sea, and in the air. Kill them wherever you find them.” —Sheikh Abdel Rahman
While nobody enjoys [...]



Congress shall make no law abridging flip-flops

By Travis Rowley • Oct 26th, 2007 • Category: National

“We have to consider the need for additional troops to be in Iraq, to take out the militias and stabilize Iraq…I would say 20,000 to 30,000—for the specific purpose of making sure those militias are dismantled, working in concert with the Iraqi military.”
— (incoming) House Intelligence Committee Chairman Silvestre Reyes (D), December 2006
“We don’t have [...]



The Case for a Core Curriculum

By Travis Rowley • Oct 20th, 2006 • Category: Brown University

“If a nation expects to be ignorant and free…it expects what never was and never will be.”
—Thomas Jefferson
On September 26th, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI) released the findings of an unprecedented review of higher education’s efficiency in increasing student knowledge of America’s history and crucial institutions. The study, conducted by the University of Connecticut’s Department [...]



Liberals Gone Mad!: The Campus Responds to Out of Ivy

By Travis Rowley • Oct 6th, 2006 • Category: Brown University

Below is a small sample of responses I received from Brown students in response to my book, Out of Ivy. The big point here is not the vulgarity, but the hate. And also the inclination to avoid discourse, and spit vitriolic insults meant to make me feel dumb and bigoted. Ironically, this is the Left [...]



So, You’re a Pimp. Vagina: How Does it Smell?

By Travis Rowley • Mar 1st, 2005 • Category: Essay

One of my early encounters with liberalism at Brown University wasn’t even on campus. I met a girl while I was at a bar called the Yellow Kitten on Block Island, a small old-style colonial island off the coast of Narragansett, Rhode Island, my hometown. The area is a popular tourist spot in the summer, [...]