And the article is even dumber than that. Education isn't about increasing one's intelligence, it's about learning things. Some of us may have more capacity to learn things than others, but all of us can learn. Knowledge (the result of learning things) is the goal of education, and it enables economic and personal success. What's so controversial about that?
Tolstoy is an unreadable Russian tale about the fall of the nobility. Good riddance. History has already written that tale. Instead of immersing myself with an antiquated historical artifact, I'd rather read something that can be useful now.
“ our society’s near-uniform valorization of intellectual achievement as the primary signifier of individual worth.”
Our what now? Has this guy met very many Americans?