--interesting, I've rarely found myself intimidated by right wing students. I've had much bigger problems with liberal students who fancy themselves to be 'critical' and are dead certain that their idealist politics are right because they have been told by other professors that idealist approaches to thinking are not only valid but the best available. And god forbid you go after one of their icons like say Bell Hooks or Cornel West...
But to be intimidated is to give into the attacks on academic freedom that don't come only from the right on American campuses. Heck, in fact I find Horowitz largely clownish, in his publicity and profit seeking 'attacks' on the left in academia, and most of his acolytes the same. A Todd Gitlin is far far more bitterly intense and serious in his despising of anyone whose politics is left of Barak Obama on American campuses. Then there's the whole identity politics crowd that spans the political spectrum and plays endless games of 'gotcha' that is designed to intimidate and reign in their critics on the left.
Steve
-- Stephen Philion http://stephenphilion.efoliomn2.com/