Bye, Bye Tenure?

I'm really curious as to what Stanley Kurtz could be thinking here about the need for "a serious campaign to eliminate academic tenure" starting with "a fairly conservative-leaning legislature, in a state with its own university system." Suppose we started with Texas, a conservative state with a major public university. And suppose the University of Texas abolished tenure because National Review writers and the Texas state legislature wanted to subject Longhorn professors to more direct political supervision. What would happen?

Texas would just rapidly become a much, much worse university -- one with huge problems recruiting faculty and students. Even your more talented conservative and conservative-sympathetic professors wouldn't want to teach there. The school would rapidly become a backwater, and this would have potentially devastating effects on the local economy.