On May 4, 1886, a peaceful labor protest turned violent after a bomb exploded and police fired on the protesters. Eight activists were subsequently indicted and, according to the conventional account, railroaded at trial. All were convicted and four were subsequently executed. What if the conventional account of the Haymarket protest and trial are wrong? The February […]
Author Archive | Jonathan H. Adler
When Campaign Contributions Are a Crime
It’s not every day a federal judge cites Jesse Unruh and Herodotus in the same opinion, but that’s what Judge Jeffrey Sutton of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit did in his opinion for the court in United States v. Terry, a Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas judge’s appeal of an honest […]
National Jurist to Correct Rankings, But Keep Ratemyprofessors.com
National Jurist will revise its much-maligned law school rankings, according to an announcement from NJ editor Jack Crittenden on the publication’s website. Although NJ defends its decision to rely upon Rateemyprofessors.com for 20 percent of each school’s rating (for those schools for which sufficient data is available), it has acknowledged some data disparities and is going to revisit the […]
Peretz on the New New Republic
Last year, Martin Peretz sold The New Republic to Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes. The magazine’s new owner installed himself as editor-in-chief, as Peretz had, and proclaimed his commitment to independent thinking that has characterized much of its recent history. Looking at the new magazine, however, Peretz is not convinced Hughes is fulfilling that commitment. In […]
States Pile on Against Dodd-Frank
By Jonathan H. Adler on February 13, 2013 5:31 pm in Administrative Law, Financial Crisis, Separation of Powers
Eight more states have joined a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of various provisions of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law. The states are Alabama, Georgia, Kansas, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Texas and West Virginia. As three states (Oklahoma, Michigan, and South Carolina) had already brought suit, this brings the total number of states involved in the suit […]
Ranking Law Schools with Ratemyprofessors.com
National Jurist decided to toss its hat into the law school rankings ring, and the result is something of a joke. Among other things, NJ decided to base 20 percent of each school’s score on the haphazard evaluation of its professors on Ratemyprofessors.com. (No, really. I couldn’t make this stuff up if I tried.) As […]
Is the Climate Less Sensitive than We Thought?
At DotEarth, Andrew Revkin summarizes recent research that is leading to some to conclude that the climate is less sensitive to greenhouse forcing than previously thought. He writes: on one critically important metric — how hot the planet will get from a doubling of the pre-industrial concentration of greenhouse gases, a k a “climate sensitivity” […]
The Incredible Shrinking PPACA
When Congress passed the PPACA, the Congressional Budget Office projected the law would result in an additional 32 million people getting health coverage within a decade. In 2011, CBO was even more optimistic, predicting the law would lead to coverage for 34 million people. Now, as Bloomberg reports, the CBO has changed its tune. According […]
Reactions to the Drone Strike “White Paper”
The release by NBC News of a confidential “white paper” outlining the basis upon which the Obama Administration justifies the use of drones to conduct targeted killings of suspected terrorists, including American citizens, has prompted a substantial amount of commentary — mostly negative. Among other things, critics note the expansive notion of what constitutes an […]
Professor Hagel
Former Senator (and Secretary of Defense nominee) Chuck Hagel spent three years teaching at Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service. What did he teach? Buzzfeed has an interesting report on “What Professor Hagel Taught.” Among other things, the story suggests that Hagel is skeptical of the need for dramatic greenhouse gas emission reductions.
Killer Cats
The NYT reports on new research finding that domestic cats are far more bloodthirsty than previously assumed. According to the study, cats “kill a median of 2.4 billion birds and 12.3 billion mammals a year, most of them native mammals like shrews, chipmunks and voles rather than introduced pests like the Norway rat.” The estimated […]
Exaggerating Species Extinction – The Sequel
By Jonathan H. Adler on January 26, 2013 8:57 am in Endangered Species, Environment, Politicizing Science
In 2011 I noted a report in Nature suggesting that species extinction rates have been overestimated. A new report in Science has similar implications, suggesting that fears many species will go extinct before they are even discovered are overblown. Specifically, the study suggests many common estimates exaggerate the likely number of species and presume greater […]
The Virginia GOP’s Rotten Electoral Vote Plan
James Taranto is not persuaded by some of the arguments against the GOP plan to change Virginia’s method of awarding electoral votes from winner-take-all to allocating votes based on the winner of each congressional district and awarding the remaining two votes to the candidate who wins the most districts. Nonetheless, he opposes the plan because […]
Are Plastic Grocery Bag Bans Bad for Public Health?
San Francisco banned disposable plastic grocery bags in 2007. It’s not alone. Several dozen communities around the country have adopted similar policies, all in the name of environmental protection. Those thin plastic bags may require far less material than in years past, but some still see them as wasteful. New research, however, shows that banning […]
Chevron Revisited in City of Arlington v. FCC
Tomorrow the Supreme Court will hear oral argument in City of Arlington v. FCC. This dispute between local governments and the Federal Communications Commission over the latter’s authority over the application of local zoning rules to wireless facilities could well produce the most significant administrative law decision in a decade. At issue — and the […]