Another Washington Post story today reports that apparently Arnold Schwarzenegger’s not such a bad governor after all! The story has this great nugget: Last fall, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, California’s Democratic eminence, denounced the recall vote that led to Schwarzenegger’s election as a grave threat to democracy. A few days ago, she stood beside the governor […]
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Higher Education:
A story in today’s Washington Post reports on the final exam given by Jim Harrick, Jr., the former assistant basketball coach at the University of Georgia (and son of Head Coach Jim Harrick, Sr.) in his class on Principles and Strategies of Basketball in 2001. [The print edition of today’s Post also has the actual […]
On Milton Friedman:
Brian Weatherson has a good discussion of Friedman and positivism at Crooked Timber. Also, John Quiggin on why Borda counts are fatally defective.
Shouldn’t public radio stations be a bit less timid?
Cathy Seipp reports: KCRW [a local public radio station] just sent out a weirdly dainty inhouse memo/press release saying that “she uttered a certain banned word that could have cost us our license with the FCC.” Therefore the fateful, f-word Feb. 29 “Loh Life” was the last one for KCRW. . . . I have […]
What law students really like to think about: Apparently it’s The O.C., at least at Boalt. Michele Woodruff points to this story, though there’ve also been others. An excerpt: [John] Kim’s so Seth. Wearing his Members Only black jacket, white shirt and black tie, the University of California, Berkeley, law student rocks with his band […]
Cathy Seipp criticizes Naomi Wolf. I don’t know enough about the controversy to have an informed opinion, but Cathy’s work is always fun to read (and my uninformed guess is that here Cathy is probably quite right).
Oregon gay marriage:
A county attorney in Oregon– a state without a mini-Defense of Marriage Act and with a state-level prohibition against discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation– has expressed his judgement that it is unconstitutional to restrict marriage licenses to opposite-sex couples, and his county has accordingly begun issuing marriage licenses to gay couples. This might […]
Buggery, buggery, buggery:
The classy John Derbyshire strikes again. Eugene has configured the Volokh Conpiracy so that readers can view posts only by selected authors. I’d love to see the Corner do so, so that I could read Ponnuru, Goldberg, Adler, Barnett, etc without getting interrupted with this stuff…
Political Science:
Ronald Bailey provides the evidence in support of David’s claim that government science inevitably becomes political science. In addition to some of the examples Bailey cites, some other examples of Democrats politicizing science include: then-Senator Al Gore threatening a witness at a hearing with the termination of federal support for the research institute at which […]
Common misunderstanding about the Supreme Court:
A reader writes, apropos the equally divided court issue: 1. All laws passed by Congress are presumed to be constitutional. 2. The burden is on the party making the challenge to a law. 3. A tie court vote implies that the challenge has not been met. QED The law is constitutional. Well, it turns out […]
Original jurisdiction and equally divided court:
The answer is posted as an UPDATE several posts below; just scroll down.
Cave Species and Commerce:
On Monday, the Supreme Court denied cert in Rancho Viejo v. Norton, an unsuccessful commerce clause challenge to regulation of activities allegedly harmful to the Arroyo toad under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) brought in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. The next such case to go up for cert will be […]
Clinton as VP?
Readers Barry Jacobs and Charlie Martin point to this op-ed by Prof. Stephens Gillers (NYU) that argues that Bill Clinton can be elected Vice President: The first objection, the constitutional one, can be disposed of easily. The Constitution does not prevent Mr. Clinton from running for vice president. The 22nd Amendment, which became effective in […]
Catholic Charities Required To Provide Employees With Contraceptives Coverage:
On Monday, the California Supreme Court, in a 6-1 ruling, held that Catholic Charities does not have a constitutional right to an exemption from a state law requiring employers to provide health insurance coverage for contraceptives. Use of contraceptives is, of course, against Catholic teachings. Justice Janice Brown, whose nomination to the D.C. Circuit has […]
For law geeks only:
Betsy Newmark asks, on behalf of one of her high school students — what happens when (1) the Supreme Court hears a case within its original, rather than appellate, jurisdiction, (2) one of the Justices is recused (yes, unlikely in an original jurisdiction case, but possible), and (3) the Justices split 4-4? In an appellate […]