Socialism is for the little people - 

Leftist professors form elite private university for wealthy folk - 

Dear Professor Grayling, 

I was sorry to hear about your spot of bother at Foyles last night, but can't say I'm surprised. Being shouted down in public by left-wing zealots is the fate of anyone who challenges the educational establishment I'm afraid. Their allegiance to the status quo isn't based on reason, but on tribal loyalty. Public education is the last redoubt of the hard left and their student praetorian guard will stop at nothing to defend their turf. Their aim is not to persuade you of the errors of your ways, but to terrorise you into renouncing your heretical ideas. They are the secular equivalent of the Taliban's goon squads. They see their role as the prevention of vice and the promotion of virtue. 

Your proposal for a new, elite, private university is particularly infuriating for these knee-jerk tribalists because they thought of you as one of them – a "pinko", in your words. You're now an apostate, the lowest of the low. To make matters worse, you've recruited dozens of other lefties to join you in this venture – Richard Dawkins, Steven Pinker, Steve Jones,  Sir Christopher Ricks, Sir David Cannadine … it's a pinkos hall of fame! Then your dazzling coup de grâce: you're going to charge students £18,000 a year, double the maximum allowable at public universities. That's like pulling up in your Bentley in front of a group of anti-cuts protestors, rolling down the window and flipping them the bird.