MY HOUSE IS A WRECK: In their justly famous article, “Broken Windows,” George Kelling and James Q. Wilson put forward the theory that disorder invites crime. When people see a disorder around them—broken windows, graffiti, trash, loitering, etc.—they act as if they have been given permission to engage in petty and not-so-petty crime. Communities that fix broken windows, clean up graffiti and trash, and discourage loitering will thus prevent crime.

I have the following corollary: Bathroom remodeling leads to slovenly behavior. My bathroom is currently being made into what I hope will soon be a wonderland of blue and white talavera tile. In the meantime, the area around the bathroom is unavoidably untidy. Alas, I have succumbed to the tendency Kelling & Wilson warned of. So far I haven’t broken any laws that I know of. But the whole house looks like a tornado hit it. My bad ….

A BRAVE DOG ISN’T THE ONLY ANIMAL HERO THIS WEEK:  Meet the goats who helped save the Reagan Library from fire.

TRANSGENDER BATHROOM CASE HEADED UP TO THE FOURTH CIRCUIT COURT OF APPEALS (AGAIN):  Remember the Supreme Court case of Gloucester County School Board v. G.G.?  In 2017, the Supreme Court dodged the issue by remanding the case to the lower courts.  Judge Arenda Wright Allen (an Obama appointee) recently held that schools do indeed have to allow transgender students to use the bathrooms, locker rooms and showers used by the sex they identify with rather than their anatomical sex.  So the appeal process is starting up again.

Here is the amicus brief that Peter Kirsanow and I filed when the case was before the Supreme Court.  All the arguments still apply except the  one about deference to an agency’s interpretation of its own rules.  Because the Trump Administration withdrew the Obama Administration’s interpretation, there is no longer any need to worry about deference.

ELIZABETH WARREN’S LOOMING LEGAL EMBARRASSMENT: There are so many reasons she isn’t quite what her admirers think. (including this one).

HOT OFF THE PRESS: The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights has “updated” its embarrassing 2015 report on immigration detention centers. The result is (in my view at least) another embarrassing report. Here is my (hastily written) response. Also here is my original dissenting statement on the 2015 report.

(This is a re-post from Thursday.  My article was removed from the SSRN web site for a few days, because SSRN didn’t understand that government reports are not copyrighted. My article is now only warm off the press. )

WASHINGTON STATE REFERENDUM:  A Duplicitous Attempt to Revive Racial Preferences.

THERE BUT FOR THE GRACE OF GOD GO I?:  The case of the 7-year-old boy whose mother says he is a transgender girl is really frightening.  If the mother has her way, her son will be given puberty blockers when he turns eight and later estrogen hormones.

Lots of children “identify” as the opposite sex or at least like to imagine what it would be like to be the opposite sex.  Most grow out of it.  When I was this child’s age,  I wanted to be a boy. And not just any boy.  I wanted to be Illya Kuryakin on The Man from U.N.C.L.E.  I carried a cool toy gun and insisted that everyone call me Illya.  Fortunately, it was the 1960s, so nobody tried to give me testosterone (though in fairness to my mother and father, even if it had been today, I am confident that they would not have been susceptible to this particular fashion).

My transgender phase tomboy phase ended when NBC aired The Girl from U.N.C.L.E.  Stefanie Powers had a cool gun too … plus a more extensive wardrobe.

NOT FROM ME:  Where Does the Impulse to Vilify America Come From?

THE NEW CAMPUS DEPLORABLES:  Who?  Me?

PETER WOOD: Vote No on Washington State’s Referendum 88.

NO MORE LAW BY “DEAR COLLEAGUE LETTER”: The National Association commends (and in doing so explains) the Trump Administration’s recent executive orders curbing “rule by bureaucracy.”

WASHINGTON STATE’S REFERENDUM 88:  Peter Kirsanow explains how the Washington State legislature guts Washington State’s 1998 initiative prohibiting preferential treatment based on race or sex.  Very tricky these Washington State legislators. Vote No.

PAUL MIRENGOFF:  Vote “No” on Washington State’s Referendum 88.

JOHN FUND:  Radical Climate-Change Protests Coming Soon to a City Near You?

SCHOOL DISCIPLINE: The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights makes the claim that K-12 students of different races misbehave in school at the same rates. Under this view, there is no good reason for the fact that African American students get suspended at  higher rates (and that Asian American students get suspended at lower rates) than white students.  It has to be that teachers–one of the most liberal professions in the country–are a bunch racist pigs (or so the logic of the Commission’s argument runs).   The Commission is simply wrong about the underlying misbehavior rates … seriously and inexcusably wrong.  The Commission’s majority just isn’t good at understanding statistics.

This past week Stanford University came out with a study finding that the black-white achievement gap on standardized tests predicts the black-white discipline gap. This is not exactly a surprise, and it is not clear what causes what, but it is interesting.

I DON’T KNOW …  I THOUGHT SHE WAS NICE:  On this day in 1960, the fourth of the Kennedy-Nixon debates was televised.  This is the debate at which Nixon kept saying, “America can’t stand pat.”

The statement was met with chuckles throughout the land.  (For those of you who were born too late to get it, Nixon’s wife was named Pat.)

WASHINGTON STATE VOTERS GET TO DECIDE … AGAIN: Twenty-one years ago, voters in Washington State adopted Initiative 200. Modeled after California’s Proposition 209, its operative clause was as follows:

The state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting.

The initiative thus outlawed both “affirmative action style” preferences as well as the more traditional kind of discrimination. The vote wasn’t close: 58.22 % of voters supported it.

Unlike Proposition 209, however, Initiative 200 merely created a statute. It did not amend the Washington State Constitution. Some folks has been trying to get the legislature to repeal it ever since. Recently, they got their way. The new legislation is called Initiative 1000.  Adopted on a party-line vote, it purports merely to amend Initiative 200, but in fact it completely guts it.

Fortunately, through the hard work of Washington Asians for Equality, the issue has been forced into a referendum, now titled Referendum 88.  It’s on the ballot for November.

To Washington State Voters: Please vote to reject Initiative 1000’s effort to gut the original Initiative 200 by voting “NO” on Referendum 88 (There are many reasons to vote no, but here some reasons that are less well known.)

To Everyone: The heroic little organization that forced this to a vote—Washington Asians for Equality—is being vastly outspent by the opposition. If you have some extra money, please consider sending it their way. I have dug pretty deep into my pockets. This is important. If we lose this referendum, the MSM will treat it as gospel that public opinion has shifted on this. It won’t matter how much polling evidence there is to the contrary (and there is plenty).

(BUMPED FROM FRIDAY:  Thanks to everyone who already contributed!)

JOHN ROSENBERG:  Why Harvard’s Affirmative Action Victory Should Be Overturned.

ROGER CLEGG:  Round One:  Harvard Beats Asian Americans.  But there will be a Round Two and maybe more.

UNITED AIRLINES DOESN’T LOVE ITS FREQUENT FLYERS ANYMORE: It loves big spenders instead. Understandably, I guess. But as a longtime 1K/Million Miler who often flies on government fare, I am stricken to my very soul. Or something. It looks like I’ll be flying Jet Blue, Alaska and Southwest a lot more.

ON THE HARVARD CASE: Last week a federal judge decided that it is just fine for Harvard University to demand much higher academic credentials from Asian American students seeking admission than from other students. Not unexpected … but not good.

Interestingly, in the court of public opinion, the race preference question consistently comes out the other way. Even when WGBH tried to load the question in favor of race preferences in admissions, its poll came out against them and in favor of race neutrality.

Should polls have any bearing on the law?  Hmm … maybe.  (For non-lawyers:  Under longstanding legal doctrine, a law or governmental policy that discriminates on the basis on race must be narrowly tailored to accomplish a compelling governmental purpose. In 1978, Title VI was held in the Bakke decision to apply this standard of “strict scrutiny” to private schools, like Harvard, that receive federal funds.)

Of course, if the public is in favor of race discrimination, that should carry no weight in court at all. (Obvious, right?  That’s the whole purpose of the strict scrutiny standard–to make it really difficult to uphold a law or policy that discriminates.  The thumb on the scale against race discrimination is heavy) But if it’s the other way around—the public firmly opposes a policy that discriminates on the basis of race and wants race neutrality instead—that should be a different matter. I don’t see how in the world the Supreme Court can conclude that the policy nevertheless serves a “compelling purpose” that the public doesn’t view it as compelling (or even minimally persuasive).

For this (and many other reasons), I believe there is hope the decision will be overturned on appeal.  We’ll see.

DID NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR JUST ARRIVE A LITTLE LATE?: Kursat Pekgoz and James Moore argue that the Ministry of Love is alive and well.

THE GILDED RAGE:  Why is America so angry?

DEROY MURDOCK: Media Often Ignore Trump’s Outreach to Racial Minorities. (Yes, they do.)

THIS DOESN’T LOOK GOOD FOR ELIZABETH WARREN: And neither does this critique of her bankruptcy study.