Author Archive | David Bernstein

Australian ABC News: Ailing Cuban leader Fidel Castro said the US Government misinformed Americans and the world about September 11, echoing conspiracy theories about the terror attacks against the United States six years ago. In an essay read by a Cuban television presenter on Tuesday night, President Castro said the Pentagon was hit by a […]

When I first came across the term “Islamofascism” years ago, in a column by Christopher Hitchens, I was repulsed. It struck me as the usual knee-jerk leftist (and yes, I think Hitchens remains a leftist, though an unusual one) response to any ideology one doesn’t like–call it “fascist.” Last I heard, college libertarians were still […]

It will probably be some time before I get around to reading the new “Israel Lobby” book, but the book’s web page links to a response to critics by Mearsheimer and Walt written late last year. The defense makes some reasonable points, especially with regard to some of their more emotive critics, but in general […]

OK, so he was caught soliciting sex in a public restroom. Not so good. But compare that with behavior by other Senators that is not leading to any resignations: (1) Violating their oath to uphold the Constitution, by voting for legislation they believe to be unconstitutional, but arguing that they will let the courts sort […]

according to “Clare Short, a member of the British Parliament and Secretary for International Development under Prime Minister Tony Blair until she resigned in 2003 over the Iraq war”? One hint–it’s not the Protestants.

Brian Leiter’s new study is here, with appropriate caveats provided by him. The top four, not surprisingly, are Yale, Chicago, Harvard, and Stanford. I’m pleased to report that George Mason, home of Conspirators Bernstein, Somin, and Zywicki, is ranked number 21 by mean citation count, and 24 by median citation count. Citation counts, as Leiter […]

According to this story in the New York Times, about a government campaign to replace 1950s American refrigerators, it’s because of the “island’s economic isolation, compounded by a United States embargo in place since the early 1960s.” Oh, and “unlike education and health care in Cuba, refrigerators are not free.” And why would people replace […]

I’ve pointed out several times on this blog that contrary to those who argue that Israel somehow pushed the U.S. into war with Iraq, Israeli leaders actually thought Iraq was a distraction from the much greater threat of Iran. Here’s a piece on the same theme: Israeli officials warned the George W. Bush administration that […]

There aren’t any new legal arguments in the Iowa trial court decision of yesterday declaring the state’s exclusion of gay couples from marriage unconstitutional. What’s unusual in the legal analysis (pp. 43-61), at least if you compare it to the various state supreme court decisions so far on the issue, is the conclusions reached. The […]

There’s a long and honored tradition of New York City employees with non-office jobs working only part of the day. My family’s alarm system, for example, was put in during “working hours” over a several day period by a city employee, who always seemed to be able to arrive by 1 pm. A close relative […]

Not my cup of tea, but any Jewish Obama supporters who want to be styling at High Holiday services this year can order “Obama-kahs” (Obama yarmulkes) here. Update: Is it wrong to declare political allegiances on a yarmulke? I’m not sure, but given that it’s easy enough to find, for example, Mets yarmulkes, a Simpsons […]

There is a long list of public figures whose personal motto seems to be: “Hate the sinner, love the sin.” It’s hard to work up much sympathy for Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho). He had a perfect legislative score from traditional-values groups, a zero rating from gay civil-rights groups, supported the Federal Marriage Amendment, and refused […]

Gail Heriot has an excellent op-ed on the subject in the Wall Street Journal. As I’ve emphasized in previous writings and speeches, it’s a real problem when the consistent focus of affirmative action in law schools is on how many black students are admitted, with little if any attention paid to how many of the […]

Duncan Kennedy’s extremely influential manuscript, circulated via photocopies for three decades, is now available as a paperback book, with a preface by the author. It should interest some law professors that Kennedy writes that he researched the manuscript between September 1973 and September 1975, and submitted it as the principal element in his tenure file. […]

In the comments to my post reconstructing a quotation, distorted by an ellipsis, attributed to Ariel Sharon, a reader wrote,”Next up, Prof. Bernstein explains the quote attributed to Moshe Dayan, ‘we have no solution, you shall continue to live like dogs, and whoever wishes may leave.’” Sure, why not. This quote comes up pretty often, […]