In late August, I began writing a post: “An Optimistic Scenario for the Stock Market and the Economy.” Because of the difficulty (bordering on impossibility) of predicting the stock market, I waited until I saw some evidence of a move up to post my predictions, which I did on September 9, 2010: Typically, a Democratic […]
Author Archive | Jim Lindgren
How Separation of Church and State Was Read Into the Constitution (Hint: the KKK got its way)
The flap over Christine O’Donnell’s debate comment suggests that many people still don’t know how Separation of Church and State became part of the law of the First Amendment. On this, I reprint part of an old post from 2005: 6. The phrase “Separation of Church and State,” as Philip Hamburger establishes in his classic […]
The Latest From BarackObama.com: The Alinskyite Attack on Boehner Continues
On Wednesday afternoon, I received the following email missive from BarackObama.com: James — The special interests in Washington are not happy, and it’s because of something you did. Since President Obama moved into the White House, this movement has stripped them of their influence, proving we could take on the lobbyists and corporate cash with […]
An Optimistic Scenario for the Stock Market and the Economy
Predicting the stock market is either impossible or extraordinarily difficult, so I generally refrain from doing so — in print. Even apparently successful investors who trade daily or weekly are wrong nearly as often as they are right. So with the caveat that the chances of my being right are at best not appreciably better […]
Ric Burns’s Goldman Sachs Documentary
A few years ago documentary filmmaker Ric Burns was hired by Goldman Sachs to make a documentary on the firm, with Goldman retaining editorial control. Funny or Die has an excerpt from the upcoming film (after a particularly loud and annoying ad from Minyanville): Ric Burns Presents Goldman Sachs Documentary – watch more funny videos
Orin’s Opinion on Obama Birthday Email is Based on Factual Error
In a post below, Orin Kerr expresses his opinion that he does not find the Obama birthday email even “a bit creepy.” While certainly entitled to his own opinion, he is not entitled to his own facts. Orin writes: As far as I can tell, Jim received this e-mail because he signed up to be […]
Michelle Obama Asks Me to Sign President Obama’s Birthday Card
I received the following email from First Lady Michelle Obama: SUBJECT: Will you sign Barack’s birthday card, James? James — Every year, our family tries to come up with a fun way to wish Barack a happy birthday. And this August 4th, when he turns 49, I have something new in mind. This has been […]
Obama Campaign Adviser Participated on JournoList
Jared Bernstein, chief economist for Vice President Joseph Biden, served in 2008 as an economic adviser to the Obama campaign. At the same time, he was a member of JournoList, the controversial progressive email list. Bernstein’s bio at Politico, which appears not to have been updated since 2008, states: “He is an economic adviser to […]
Latest JournoList Revelations: Attacks on Palin
The latest quotes from the JournoList emails are on the initial response to Sarah Palin. I remember being shocked at the viciousness of the attacks at the time. Defenders of J-List have argued that the Daily Caller (DC) is taking quotations out of context. That is certainly possible. For that reason, it would be better […]
More on JournoList: Election Night 2008 and Nate Silver’s Life on J-List
1. A New JournoList Thread on the 2008 Election. The Daily Caller has yet another JournoList thread up on its website. Members are expressing their strong emotions and expectations for the future on the day Barack Obama was elected president. Though some of the comments on Nov. 3 and 4 look a bit silly in […]
JournoList Members Discussed Whether the Government Should Shut Down Fox News
It appears from the last few days’ stories that JournoList was even worse than I’d always suspected. The Daily Caller reports that UCLA law professor Jonathan Zasloff raised the possibility of a government shutdown of Fox News and defended pulling their White House press pass: The very existence of Fox News, meanwhile, sends Journolisters into […]
Questions About a New Study on Political Diversity in Law Schools
I have been working through a draft SSRN paper on Ideological Diversity and Law School Hiring by Douglas M. Spencer and James C. Phillips of Berkeley (tip to Glenn Reynolds and Paul Caron). The paper concludes: Using regression analysis, we find no statistically significant relationship between political ideology and prestige of hiring, although we identify […]
Chronicle Review Admits Bellesiles’s Story is False — Blames Student, not Bellesiles
The Chronicle of Higher Education confirms my research and Big Journalism’s initial doubts that Michael Bellesiles’s story published in the Chronicle Review is false. There was indeed no soldier injured in Iraq or Afghanistan who fit Bellesiles’s story. As the Chronicle reports the facts (which are a bit sketchy), the student lied to Bellesiles, whom […]
Professor Of Military History Weighs in on the Implausibility of Bellesiles’s Story
The Chronicle of Higher Education has not yet revealed the results of its investigation of the veracity of Michael Bellesiles’s story about a dying soldier and his student brother. One can only speculate why it is taking more than a day or two to verify a story that should have been easy to verify (if […]
The Chronicle Review is Looking Into the June 27th Bellesiles Article
Late Monday afternoon, I received a one-sentence email from Liz McMillen, Editor of the Chronicle Review: I just wanted to let you know that we are looking into the questions you have raised in your blog post Friday about Michael Bellesiles’s article for us. Here is some background on Bellesiles’s June 27th article. Here is […]