A common notion on the Left is that higher education is being starved by stingy conservative legislators. (One recent book making that lament is Austerity Blues by Fabricant and Brier, who say that we must, as their subtitle puts it, fight "for the soul of public higher education.")The trouble with that thesis is that public colleges and universities have been spending copious amounts of money on things that don't relate to education. They waste lots on sports and politically correct baubles...