One of the sovereign beliefs of the culture warriors of the right is
that the problem with America is that it is in the grip of over-educated
elites who don’t uphold the traditional values of God and country.
Especially God. And one of the sovereign beliefs of the culture warriors
of the left is that the problem with America is that it is in the grip
of under-educated yahoos who, er, cling to their guns and Bibles.
Especially their Bibles.

Well, actually, no. Thanks to my colleague Barry Kosmin’s ongoing analysis
of the 2008 Trinity ARIS data, it turns out that America’s
over-educated elites are just about as likely to believe in God and
cling to their Bibles as the rest of their fellow citizens. Those New
Class types that neocons and their paleocon readers love to excoriate are just
a couple of percentage points more likely to say they have no religion
than the population at large–and a lot more likely to belong to a
religious congregation and to participate in religious life-cycle
events.

Now, the criterion for elite membership is achieving a degree higher
than a B.A. And no doubt, the elite that the right has in mind is the
professoriat–pointy headed atheists who spend all their time teaching
undergraduates advanced thinking that the undergraduates promptly go on
to forget. Be that as it may, it’s time for all of us to stop thinking
about higher education as a barricade in the culture wars.