This is the notorious professionalized liberal making machine
The Secretary of the US Department of Transportation is an airhead lawyer and former reality-TV “star” with no qualifications in transportation, Sean Duffy, but hey, you knew because he has a high appointment in the Trump administration that he was unqualified and incompetent. At least it’s better than his previous sinecure as the acting administrator of NASA! The last I heard about Duffy he was advising us to take advantage of the long delays at airports by doing calisthenics in the terminals. That’s just the kind of guy he is.
What I didn’t know is that he roped in a bunch of corporate sponsors who wanted to curry favor with the Trump administration, like Boeing, Toyota, Shell, United Airlines, Comcast, Royal Caribbean, Enterprise Rent-A-Car and Lyft to fund his summer vacation. He, his wife, and his 9 kids got into a gigantic RV with a following camera crew to drive all around the US for 6 weeks or so. Boeing and Toyota each coughed up a million dollars to pay for the extended joy ride.
I haven’t had a vacation in years. Maybe I’d be able to if just one of those corporations gave me a million dollars. Unfortunately, I’m not a corrupt opportunist like Duffy, and don’t have any influence on our government.
So anyway, one of the purported justifications for this trip was to visit colleges, for his kids who were of age to enter college. They visited Harvard. His daughter Paloma wants to go to school there. Duffy has opinions.
Sean Duffy tells his daughter she cannot go to Harvard because they have "professionalized figuring out how they can take good young girls and corrupt their minds" pic.twitter.com/opCB02jPEv
— FactPost (@factpostnews) August 19, 2026
After declaring that they were a highly conservative family and that they had raised their kids in a strictly Catholic environment, he announces that she cannot go to Harvard because he didn’t believe that Harvard offers a well-rounded education.
His wife, Rachel Campos-Duffy, declares We spent a lot of time nurturing and providing formation for our kids, giving them an environment where they are steeped in faith and values, so the idea of dropping her off at a place where they would undermine that or undo all those things makes me worried.
Because he is a profoundly stupid man, Sean chimes in And again I don’t want them to get one viewpoint, I want them to get a lot of different viewpoints, but I don’t want them fed only one viewpoint that is contrary to the way my kids were raised,
completely oblivious to the fact that he has just contradicted his wife and himself in one sentence. Because he is truly, deeply, stupid and unthinking. He then claims that Harvard has professionalized figuring out how they can take good young girls and corrupt their minds
.
Uh, I’m not the greatest fan of Harvard (I think they are over-rated and too rich for their own good, and that we have numerous great institutions of higher education all over the country), but Harvard is not particularly liberal, and they are not a machine with the goal of churning out liberal students. The liberalism is a side-effect of getting a lot of different viewpoints
. Harvard has a lot of prestige, a lot of money, and has a privileged status in the world; if any of my kids had had the opportunity to go there, I would have encouraged them, although it probably would have bankrupted us. Duffy wouldn’t have that problem. He’s just an ignorant goober attached to an administration that hates education.
I am wondering about poor Paloma. What shithole school would Sean and Rachel like to ship their daughter off to? I hope it’s not Liberty University, but that’s probably not Catholic enough for them. Sean is a graduate of Saint Mary’s University of Minnesota, a private Catholic college which I wouldn’t describe as a shithole, but it probably doesn’t have the status the Duffys would want. Notre Dame? Bad news there, they expose their students to a healthy diverse student body, and she’d probably end up learning about feminism and equality and reason, all those things the Duffy family opposes.
I’d recommend that she attend the University of Minnesota Morris, if Harvard is off the table. We don’t have a professionalized liberalizing process here, we just let students be who they want to be, and help them get the education they need. Paloma might just fit in perfectly here.
This current regime is nothing more than one dumbass after another. It’s an indictment of this country that these people have any power over our lives at all.
I looked at the list of top Catholic Universities. Georgetown is at the top, but honestly the list is pretty impressive group of universities that have real curriculum- so probably will make her a little more liberal.
Coin toss on whether or not it’s Georgetown (near where daddy works) or College of St. Mary’s in Omaha (deep red state in the middle of nowhere- though they would be surprised at how blue Omaha is to the rest of the state).
The first question to ask is “what does she want for a major”? Sure, someone that age probably hasn’t made a final decision on that, but knowing what fields are of interest should guide the choice of school.
Please, give Harvard some cred as the only big U which fought back against the Trumpistas (even if they are the only U which could afford to).
Since they’re worried about Paloma being corrupted at a university, perhaps they should home school her. That might not be great foundation for her as an adult, but she won’t be corrupted by different points of view that are “wrong” according to the Duffy’s.
PZ: “We don’t have a professionalized liberalizing process here, we just let students be who they want to be”
But that is the professionalized liberalizing process. The Duffys are looking for a university which lets students be who their parents want them to be.
I went to De Paul U. way back in the dark ages and got an excellent education without any god bothering. My grandson is starting his 3rd year at U of Dayton and he doing very well for himself. Both schools were founded by Jesuits who seem to be more interested in educating their students to be prepared for life as a well-rounded adults rather than trying to turn them into priests and nuns.
I knew he had Road Rules experience, but Wikipedia says he was also on a season of The Real World. His wife was on a previous season of The Real World and they met on Road Rules. Ain’t that sweet.
The season his wife Rachel Campos starred in featured Pedro Zamora who was dealing with HIV. That may have been one of the more personal real life representations of that at the time. Unfortunately the infamous “Puck” was in that cast too.
I guess Duffy and his wife are trying to relive their Road Rules glory days.
Shorter version of his, and his wife’s objection – “We want education to be like studying the Bible, or its history. Everything should be hand fed and curated, so that only our version of it is represented as truth, and all contradictions are explained away as attempts to undermine that truth.” This, in my experience, seems to be how every single damn evangelical, or “strict, the Bible is true-ists”, always function when dealing with everything.
Simple, have her attend pragerU! That will indoctrinate her with exactly what dumbfuck duffy really wants.
Nothing says you’re confident that your worldview is the right one like admitting that four years of exposure to different perspectives will undo eighteen of indoctrination.
I think they are looking for Liberty
UniversityBible College.You are wondering around rich Paloma? She’s inheriting a fortune from the crooks plundering our nation — she will be fine, unless a disgruntled proletariat chops her head off.
Better a dove than a pigeon.
—
Beholder, I had the same thought.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Girl_(Hall_%26_Oates_song))
Religion in America is a brain disease driving the population insane.
I wonder how long it’s going to be before we find out that one or more members of that family are sexual abusers.
To anyone saying nice things about Catholic Universities. They still send profits to The Vatican. The Vatican is still top 5 most corrupt and evil things ever. Yuk.
The only reason Trump’s appointees are in the positions they are is because he believes they are loyal to him personally, not because they’re any good.
And if the Duffy’s children have been steeped in faith and values – meaning evangelical Christian faith and values – then how could their beliefs be undermined by different viewpoints, the challenge of which the parents say they want their children to face and which Harvard – overblown as its reputation might be – can provide?. Sounds to me like the parents have a good deal less confidence in all their steeping and nurturing and Christian values than they’re letting on.
seversky, “After declaring that they were a highly conservative family and that they had raised their kids in a strictly Catholic environment”.
That is quite distinct from “evangelical Christian faith”. Those are protestant outgrowths.
One should not equate Catholics with Evangelicals.
They used to go to war with each other, you know.
(think Sola Scriptura vs tradition, or Sola Fide vs sacraments)
@ 12
Liberty is a Protestant diplomat mill, so I don’t it will comport with the Duffy’s papist tastes despite their ideological similarities.
Personally, I’m surprised the Opus Dei types haven’t started their own fake university. Maybe they already have and just haven’t heard of it.
Edit: …so i doubt it will comport…
I wonder where Paloma Duffy would choose to go if she really got to have that choice?
No idea what her personality and real intrests & desires are. Up to her – or is it? Seems likely to me that it isn’t.
There is Elmbrook University Center, not a university but a support center for Opus Dei affiliated men. Ironically, located next door to Harvard.
They also have a lot of secondary and primary schools. Get the boy, and you have the man, you know.
St. Mary’s is my abusive ex-spouses Alma mater, though he did not graduate. It’s one of multiple MN high quality (and price) colleges that began as private Catholic institutions. (St. Thomas, St. Katherine, etc) No idea how this doofus managed to attend a Liberal Arts college and emerge as a grifting anti-woke politician.
Paloma barely got to speak during that obviously scripted ‘discussion’, but she did have to quash her eye roll at her father’s performative rhetorical bs. I think she will be just fine.
I’m going to call BS on the entire segment. It’s too contrived, too scripted. Harvard! Bah, why Harvard? Because it’s in the script, a college everybody “knows” is the best. And, note, she didn’t say she had been accepted, no, it was a “what if.” The kids I have known who actually go to Harvard talk about Harvard Law school, or economics, or medical. Kids I know who actually have a clue pick Stanford or MIT for science and engineering, or Smith college for aspiring authors, or KU for its location if nothing else.
Naw, the segment was too pat. It fit the “conservative bias” of an evil “liberal” school that contorts minds. And, hey, contort? Who uses that word in a conversation who’s not in a circus. Also, Duffy never mentions Ivy League schools in general or other so-called contortion factories. Sorry, but Paloma will end up at Liberty University studying for her MRS degree, and, unless she gets a clue, grows a spine and learns by some miracle to think for herself, will end up as vapid and shallow as her parents.
My husband and I met while attending a Jesuit school – St. Louis University.
The Jesuits taught us to always answer every question with a question of our own.
They taught us to think for ourselves and to question everything, especially authority.
That is where we learned to be the liberal free-thinkers that we are today.
We recently visited St. Louis. Most of the city and its suburbs show that the state is being mismanaged by
by the current red-state government. The exception is the vibrant area in and around the SLU campus.
The current state government must really hate our alma mater for showing them how much good a liberal campus can do for a community.
Doc Bill @ 25
Our oldest daughter had her pick of schools, not because of parental wealth, but because of her own record.
She was valedictorian of a class of 650 students in a huge Texas high school, planning on an engineering degree.
She was guaranteed a half scholarship to any state school, and received a nice offer from Rice in Houston.
I encouraged her to apply to her dream schools, just in case. She was accepted at all of them.
Harvard offered her a partial scholarship. MIT offered nothing beyond the prestige of being accepted there.
Stanford offered a half scholarship. CalTech sent her a plane ticket and told her to not worry about costs if she and they decided that she would be a good fit. She call;ed Stanford and asked if they would spring for a plane or bus ticket while she was visiting California, and wrote them off when they refused.
She called me from the CalTech dorm to tell me that she had found her place.
Five years later, she graduated with an Electrical Engineering bachelor’s degree and a Master’s in Computational Neuro Science.
She was highly sought after by graduate schools, and went on to earn a Master’s in Neurobiology and a PHD tying it all together from Duke. After a Post Doc at NYU, she worked for the FDA until very recently, after the current administration ruined that prestigious agency.
@Magi #27
Similar here. My oldest daughter went to college fairs at the mall and at her high school (Clements, Sugar Land) and kept picking KU. She applied to KU as a veterinary medicine major, got accepted and had glorious years as a Jayhawk. She switched majors because she “hated” chemistry (full disclosure, I am an analytical chemist! Wounded!) Switched to Math, then Physics, then Astronomy and finally discovered Aerospace Engineering. All that switching cost her an extra year but she is an aerospace engineer working for Boeing Space for over 20 years. She got an MBA, sponsored by Boeing, at Cal Poly. Middle daughter got a business degree at UT, Austin, then unemployed during the Great Recession, went back to school and earned an MBA in International Finance at Penn State and is now a VP Operations and Planning for a large multinational corporation.
They chose, I paid. I can tell you one thing, “viewpoints” never entered the equation. I feel sorry for Paloma and Cricket.
@15 nomdeplume
FTFY
The son of our good friends recently won an essay contest sponsored by the Freedom From Religion Foundation
https://www.freethoughttoday.com/free/ffrf-legal-essay-contest-2026-first-place-sam-foer/
One of Sam’s key points is that there is, of course, a difference between exposure to ideas and indoctrination. Parents who don’t understand the difference can rob their kids of valuable experience (I’m looking at you, Sean Duffy). But that may be exactly the point.
Interesting that Sean and Rachel at roughly their own kids’ age were “picked [by satanic MTV] to live in a loft and have their lives taped.” Those were some wild times with exposure to various sorts of ungodly stuff. Yet they prefer to keep their daughter in a protective bubble.
Remember when MTV, oh I don’t know, pretty much just played music? Then this when off piste with reality show mission creep and ushered in an era of programming that eventually yielded The Apprentice.
Funny that Sean Duffy was in Road Rules then went on to become transpo secretary as if the reality show qualified him. He knows “roads”. Hired.
Is MTV even a thing anymore? If so they are under the evil Ellison umbrella.
And given the number of podcasters/influencers picked by Trump I can’t help but think there were better choices in that sphere: Mr. Beat, Dr. Heather Cox Richardson, Dr. Dan Wilson (Debunk the Funk), Dr. Vincent Racaniello (TWiV), Dr Gil Carvalho (Karate Kid looking nutritionist), Dr. Levi Cowan (Tropical Tidbits), etc…