From the Washington Post: Walk into The Pug today, and you can order a beer or a shot, but you can no longer order “Marion Berry’s Dirty Asian Summer Punch.” The punch, a fruity vodka concoction, was whipped up by the H Street NE bar’s owner, Tony Tomelden, as an admittedly crude but satirical tribute […]
Archive | September, 2012
Amar on Lochner
By David Bernstein on September 12, 2012 3:04 pm in Constitutional History, Constitutional Law, Rehabilitating Lochner
Let me start by expressing my delight that Professor Amar is guest-blogging here at the VC. Akhil is clearly one of the great constitutional scholars of our time, and I have learned a great deal from his work over the years. It’s therefore with some trepidation that I engage in this blog dialogue with him. […]
Gary Johnson on Ballot in 47 States
Politico reports that Libertarian Party presidential candidate Gary Johnson is on the ballot in 47 states and the District of Columbia. In 2008, former Rep. Bob Barr was on the ballot in 45 states. The Libertarian Party is still seeking to place Johnson on the ballot in the remaining three states.
Ward Churchill Appeal Rejected by Colorado Supreme Court
The Colorado Supreme Court rejected Ward Churchill’s appeal to be reinstated as a professor on an immunity theory. Inside Higher Ed story here. Opinion here. From the opinion: We affirm, albeit on slightly different grounds. First, we hold that the Regents’ decision to terminate Churchill’s employment was a quasi-judicial action functionally comparable to a judicial […]
All of You Who Harshly Condemn Anti-Homosexuality Religious Beliefs, Take Note
And same for all of you who mock young earthers, or devout Scientologists, or believers in miracles — and all who say that, for instance, racist or sexist religious beliefs are contemptible — and maybe even all those who, even politely, contend that rival religions’ views are wrong and will deny salvation to the holders […]
Posner’s Criticism Is Pretty Weak With this Example From the Scalia & Garner Book
I’ve mostly stayed out of the Posner v. Scalia spat involving alleged misrepresentations in the new Scalia/Garner book. The devil is in the details in this sort of disagreement, and I don’t have the book to know what Scalia & Garner say in order to know if Posner’s criticisms are accurate. But over at Walsh’s […]
“De-habilitating” Lochner: A Response to David Bernstein
In my previous two posts as a guest blogger this week, I have served up a few thoughts about Conspirators Randy Barnett and Eugene Volokh, and the ubiquitous Richard Posner. Today, I offer a few words about David Bernstein. In Chapter 6 of my new book — oh, have I mentioned in the last thirty […]
What If the Supreme Court Doesn’t Accept Cert in the Prop 8 Case?
The question whether to accept certiorari in the Prop 8 case will come up at the Justices’ conference on September 24. I think the Court will accept cert, so there won’t be any new same-sex marriages in California in the immediate future. But what if the Court refuses to review the Ninth Circuit’s decision striking […]
Mathematics as Post-Modern (in a Particular and Actually Quite Helpful Way)
A few days ago, over the breakfast table, my 9-year-old tells me: Dad, I told a boy at school that any number to the power zero is one. He said that was idiotic. Indeed, I had told Ben earlier that any (nonzero) number to the power zero is one. I think I had even tried […]
Math Puzzle Solution
Yesterday, I posed this math puzzle: Treating “^” as meaning exponentiation, and treating the exponentiation chain as going on infinitely, solve for x: x^(x^(x^(x^(x^(x^…))))) = 2 Many people in the comments got the right answer — the square root of 2 — some people were unsure, so I thought I’d briefly blog a follow-up. Here’s […]
Upcoming Talk on Democracy and Political Ignorance
This Thursday, I will be giving a talk on my book Democracy and Political Ignorance (under contract with the Stanford University Press), at the George Mason Economics Department Workshop on Philosophy, Politics, and Economics. The talk will run from 2 to 3:30 PM, in Enterprise Hall 318, at George Mason’s campus in Fairfax. I covered […]
Carbon-Free Carbohydrates?
By Jonathan H. Adler on September 11, 2012 9:32 am in Junk Science and Quackspertise, Politicizing Science
What’s wrong with this picture? (Or this site?) I generally have a laissez-faire attitude toward product claims, so long as they are arguably true. If a claim is literally false, however, I think that’s a problem. (Ht: Hanah Volokh)
Could Individuals Have Standing to Challenge IRS Rule Creating Tax Credits in Federal Exchanges?
The PPACA provides for tax credits and subsidies to help eligible taxpayers purchase health insurance in state-run health insurance exchanges. Although the text of the statute only provides for the issuance of credits in exchanges “established by a state,” the IRS has issued a regulation providing for the issuance of tax credits and subsidies in […]
U.S. Complicity in Katyn Cover-Up
Newly declassified documents reveal that the U.S. government concealed evidence that the Soviet Union was responsible for the Katyn forest massacre of several thousand Polish POWs. In all, over 20,000 Poles were killed in mass executions. The USSR had consistently denied responsibility for the killings until 1990. The newly released documents show U.S. officials were […]
Freedom of Speech in America’s Unwritten Constitution (With Some Thoughts on Volokh, Posner, and Scalia)
My new book, America’s Unwritten Constitution: The Precedents and Principles We Live By, is organized around different techniques of constitutional interpretation. Throughout the book, I use the freedom of expression as a testing ground for various interpretive approaches. As I explain in the book’s Introduction: Textually, [the freedom of speech] appears in the First Amendment, […]