IN AUSTRALIA, It’s Rudd over Gillard. Well, that’s some sort of an improvement, I guess.
Archive for 2013
June 26, 2013
LIVE-BLOGGING THE SUPREME COURT, at ScotusBlog.
TAXPROF ROUNDUP: The IRS Scandal, Day 48.
MASSACHUSETTS: Democratic Machine Bashes Supreme Court on Affirmative Action, Crushes Latino For Old White Guy. “Democrats say they love diversity except when it comes to one-party rule. Gomez would have been the first Latino U.S. senator from Massachusetts but liberal media and Democrats ignored that and said Gomez wasn’t ‘one of us’ because he was wealthy. So they backed the old white guy while complaining about the Supreme Court gutting affirmative action.”
UPDATE: More evidence of racism: “As the Chief Justice noted in oral argument in Shelby County, the state with the largest gap between white and black voter turnout is Massachusetts.”
Reader Michael Poulos comments: “When I was in college, the liberal joke was that conservatives thought that all the world’s problems would be solved if we could just reset history to the status quo of 50 years ago. Looks like the nostalgia wheel has turned.”
THE PERSPECTIVE IS KINDA SOCIAL-CONNISH, but Charlotte Allen reviews Men On Strike in the Wall Street Journal.
UPDATE: Helen just heard from the publisher that they’re going into a third printing. Get your copy now! (Bumped).
ANOTHER UPDATE: My mistake. This was just the second-printing notice coming a second time. Sorry for the confusion. It’s still good!
NATIONAL JOURNAL: Snowden Watch: Why Putin Is Loving It.
SO HOW COME NOBODY’S LOSING THEIR JOB FOR THE SNOWDEN AFFAIR? Jack Shafer:
According to Alexander, the Snowden breach ravages a program that has contributed to the “understanding and, in many cases, disruptions” of 50 terrorist plots, obviously implying that the unauthorized disclosures will hinder the future understandings and disruptions. While Snowden is the confessed thief of the data, he’s not the one who made the theft possible. Surely his superior, or his superior’s superior, or his superior’s superior’s superior, or somebody on the NSA organization chart designed a flawed system that was easily defeated by a junior contractor. Surely a large bag filled with heads will roll at the NSA for this grievous lapse, and Alexander will accept responsibility for his own shortcomings and step down from the NSA so the president can assign a more competent director.
Instead of asking Alexander for his resignation, This Week host George Stephanopoulos needled him with penetrating questions about Snowden’s heist, asking “why the alarm bells didn’t go off?” and “what’s to say this couldn’t happen again?”
Alexander had no concrete answer for how the alleged crown jewels of terrorist identification could have been stolen and were now on a world tour bound for South America. He cribbed his answer from every dairy farmer ever to lose a cow.
Accountability is for the little people. If there’s anything that’s been established since January of 2009, it’s that.
ANOTHER IRS SCANDAL: Inspector General: IRS Credit Cards Used For Wine, Pornography. “For example, investigators found that one IRS employee spent $2,655 on diet pills, romance novels, steaks, a smartphone and baby-related items, including bottles, games and clothes. The case was referred to the IG’s office that investigates employee misconduct, the report said.”
MEGAN MCARDLE ON AFFIRMATIVE ACTION:
There’s a certain irony in the fact that white students usually bring these affirmative action lawsuits (and that defenses of affirmative action are often framed in terms of white privilege). The evidence seems to show that if completely race-neutral admissions policies were adopted at colleges and universities, the admissions rates for blacks and hispanic would fall dramatically . . . but the admissions rates for whites wouldn’t change much. The primary beneficiaries would be Asian students, who would fill nearly four out of five of the extra admissions slots.
One of the oddest facts about college admissions is that everyone seems to be aware that colleges have imposed restrictive admissions quotas to keep Asians underrepresented in their student bodies, akin to the “Jewish quotas” which used to exist at Ivy League schools until the 1950s. But no one seems particularly bothered about systemic, institutionalized racial discrimination against a large group of Americans. I’m not even aware of any concerted effort by Asian community groups to shame universities into stopping this.
I saw an Asian woman protesting quotas outside the UT College of Nursing last year. But there was just her; marching with signs seems kinda un-Asian doesn’t it? Is it possible that our culture of campus protest — developed since the 1960s — is itself racially discriminatory against Asians?
THE COUNTRY’S IN THE VERY BEST OF HANDS: 5 Senators Who Support Immigration Bill Don’t Know Answer to Key Question About It.
ILYA SHAPIRO: Jim Crow Is Dead. Long Live the Constitution.
Yeah. Bull Connor was a member of the Democratic National Committee. Now the South is mostly Republican.
ANOTHER ARTICLE ON GETTING MEN TO WANT TO USE CONDOMS. Perhaps things have changed — though I doubt it — but when I was single I noticed that it was often hard to get women to want to use condoms, too. Even at places like Yale Law School, where you’d think self-discipline would run high, there was often resistance. But these stories always make it sound as if women are eager for condoms and men are always reluctant.
Meanwhile, this bit amuses:
In the developing world, condoms raise other issues. In some cultures, men are so resistant that women must engage in delicate “condom negotiation.” And women who carry condoms might be assumed to be prostitutes.
Apparently, Mike Bloomberg’s New York City is “part of the developing world.”
MICKEY KAUS: Fake is Real on Gang of 8 Vote.
One of the oldest senatorial traditions is the Cloture Con: You vote “yes” on the vote to end debate, typically the crucial vote (because it requires a supermajority); then you vote “no” on the final vote to pass the bill, knowing your support’s no longer needed (because if the bill got 60 votes on cloture it will definitely have 51 to pass). The second “no” vote is for show. You can tell your constituents you opposed the bill, hoping they’ll ignore the more important, earlier cloture vote.
Sleazy! But it’s entirely possible some distinguished Senators who support the Gang of 8′s massive ”comprehensive” immigration bill (S.744) will engage in this venerable deception. Support for the legislation may sit well with big money donors but public opinion is split–and opponents have all the intensity. The bill’s already passed the key cloture hurdle with 67 votes (69 if you count two Senators whose planes were delayed). At least some of those senators–especially red state legislators and GOPs with primary worries– may now be tempted to try to con the public by casting a for-show “no” on final passage.
The answer of principled opponents of the bill, faced with these patently deceptive and inauthentic opposition votes, is, of course … we’ll take ‘em! Every “no” vote counts at this point, because Senator Schumer has established a special, extraconstitutional hurdle on immigration: the bill needs 70 votes, he says, to have enough momentum to somehow bowl over House Republicans. If a nervous red state Senator engages in a bit of last-minute theatrics that reduces the final count to 68 or 67, that’s less meaningless than it usually is.
A Kabuki”no” might not even be all that fake. On this issue, fake is real.
Read the whole thing.
June 25, 2013
THE KEY WORD BEING “PROMISED:” “America elected a president who promised unprecedented transparency and protection for patriotic whistleblowers.”
AT A VOICE FOR MEN, Dean Esmay and Erin Pizzey interview the Insta-Wife about her new book, Men On Strike. Did I mention she’s got a book out?
WHO NEEDS A CONGRESS, OR JUDICIARY? Obama Orders EPA to Regulate Power Plants in Wide-Ranging Climate Plan.
FROM FATHER KNOWS BEST TO FATHER DOESN’T MATTER.
AIRBRUSH ALERT: Did New York Times Scrub ‘War On Coal’ Quote By Obama Advisor?
THE RISE OF “DIGITAL DEMENTIA:” “Doctors in South Korea are reporting a surge in ‘digital dementia’ among young people who have become so reliant on electronic devices that they can no longer remember everyday details like their phone numbers.”
SO HOW’S THAT ZIMMERMAN TRIAL GOING? Prosecutors admit Trayvon Martin’s girlfriend lied under oath. “The murder case against half-Latino neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman was dealt a devastating blow Tuesday, when prosecutors acknowledged that their star witness, the 19-year old former girlfriend of the late Florida teenager Trayvon Martin, lied under oath.” He’s also blacker than Homer Plessy was, by the way.
UPDATE: Oops! This is old, but somebody just sent it to me and I didn’t notice. Sorry — perils of multitasking, I guess.
But this is up-to-date: Legal Insurrection: Zimmerman Trial Day 2 – Analysis of State’s Witnesses. “Today can only be characterized as an utter debacle for the prosecution.” But is that how the jury will see it? Because that’s all that matters. There’s lots of video, so you can decide for yourself.
NRA T-SHIRT CASE UPDATE: Prosecution attempts to silence Jared Marcum with gag order; reporter covering story threatened with arrest. “Prosecutors were hoping to bar Jared, his father and his lawyer from sharing their story with the press, under the guise that their request would serve Jared’s better interest, something Jared’s father Allen Lardieri sees as ironic.” Tar. Feathers.