We Win, They Lose
The Wit and Wisdom of Three Guys Named Brent, Mark and Mike
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Jason McElwain
Remember this story from last year? The autistic kid who nailed six three-pointers in a row in his only game ever, on Senior night? After serving four years as the manager and water boy for the team, he finally got to suit up, and was put in the game with four minutes to go. He missed two shots badly, then hit six three pointers. Video here and here and here and here and here (this last is a good story).
Friday, April 20, 2007
Crazy Stuff
"We live in a generation now where dudes are chicks and chicks are dudes."
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Philadelphia Mayor Marks New 'Gayborhood'
Are you kidding me?
It is a historic moment for the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) community as the City of Philadelphia and Mayor John F. Street dedicated 36 new street signs that are permanently affixed with the rainbow flag to designate the "Gayborhood" today. The dedication ceremony was held at 13th and Locust Streets, Philadelphia, PA. Locals sang "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and shot rainbow confetti into the air.
The street signs have been installed in the Gayborhood, defined as Chestnut to Pine Streets between 11th and Broad Streets. The rainbow-branded street signs are an internationally-recognized welcome symbol that demonstrates a city's commitment to diversity and inclusiveness. Philadelphia's "Gayborhood" is a place where GLBT visitors and regional residents can patronize a concentration of gay-friendly businesses, bars, nightclubs, coffee shops and restaurants.
Patronize? Did someone say patronize? That's funny...
And how come these guys get all the "historic moments"? I want one...
Also, when are we gonna come up with a heterosexual flag and affix it to all the street signs? What's that? Intolerant, you say? Sorry.
Any thoughts on what the heterosexual flag would look like? Ideas?
Barrel Shrouds??!? We Don't need no stinking Barrel Shrouds!!!
You gotta check out this video of an idiot congresswoman (but I repeat myself). Tucker Carlson scrounged up a copy of Caroly McCarthy's bill and put a simple question to her: since she’s so worried about weapons with barrel shrouds, could she at least explain to the viewers what a “barrel shroud” is?
Nice.
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Yesssss......
Finally, a victory at the Supreme Court. Opinion here. Looks like Alito taking O'Connor's place paid off -- guess Rehnquist forcing Sandy out provided the margin of victory. Politico comments on the five Catholics here. By the way, has anyone seen Ginsburg's dissent charcaterized as "scathing" or "bitter"? That is invariably the case when Scalia dissents.
UPDATE: Check out this post at Confirm Them, wondering what is in Senator Reid's head...
UPDATE II: Here is an article I wrote on partial-birth abortion a few years ago.
UPDATE III: I wasn't going to say it, but I wonder if the Virginia Tech killings, and all the media attention focused thereon influenced - even a little - the timing of today's release of the opinion?
Sunday, April 15, 2007
"Was Dred Scott Rightly Decided?"
Click here for link to a video of the lecture by that name, given recently by one of my favorite law professors, Michael Stokes Paulsen. You'll thank me.
Monday, April 09, 2007
Great Post on Mitt's Mormon Base
The always interesting website Get Religion has this great post from last Thursday, regarding The Washington Post's article about Mormons contributing to Mitt Romney's presidential campaign. A taste:
MacGillis suggests that for Romney, the large sums of money are part blessing, part curse. The problem with the story’s thesis — as outlined in the headline “Mormon Base a Mixed Blessing for Romney” — is that the curse part of it is never really thoroughly explored[.]
*****
We know that many Americans do not want a Mormon president, and by golly if they wouldn’t want a Mormon president, then they certainly don’t want a bunch of them mobilizing like “dry kindling.” But why would his base add to that opposition? Is it because a presidential candidate’s base typically ends up in his administration in one form or another? Are Americans concerned that Washington will become saturated with Mormons?
The article rightly goes through the many signs that Romney has an extensive base of Mormon supporters, but the second half of the article’s premise — that this is something that will hurt Romney — is never fully explored. Perhaps we’re dealing with a false premise, or is it one that’s too touchy to explore?
As National Public Radio’s Brian Unger would say, it is one thing to say that “some people” are concerned about Romney’s Mormon base, but it’s another thing to find people who will say it.
Getting Beyond Race
is the title of this interesting piece at OpinionJournal.com, which mentions a symposium attended by Justice O'Connor at my old stomping grounds. Some quotes:
Justice O'Connor spoke at a Washington and Lee University symposium honoring Powell, a good friend of hers who retired from the court in 1987. She explained how his reasoning in Bakke informed her own opinion in Grutter, but she also expanded on some of the cautionary language she had included in her 2003 opinion: "The court expects that 25 years from now the use of racial preferences will no longer be necessary to further the interest approved today."
In her speech on Friday, she said that preferences should be viewed as "a temporary bandage, rather than a permanent cure."
The article continues, and makes an excellent point:
Moreover, Justice O'Connor's comments about UCLA obscured an important and promising real story. While it's true that black and Hispanic enrollment at UCLA and Berkeley went down after Prop 209, these students simply didn't just vanish. The vast majority were admitted on the basis of their academic record to somewhat less highly ranked campuses of the prestigious 10-campus UC system, which caters only to the top one-eighth of California's high school graduates. In the immediate wake of Proposition 209, the number of minority students at some of the nonflagship campuses went up, not down.
This "cascading" effect has had real benefits in matching students with the campus where they are most likely to do well. Despite what affirmative action supporters often imply, academic ability matters. Although some students will outperform their entering credentials and some students will underperform theirs, most students will succeed in the range that their high school grades and SAT scores predict. Leapfrogging minority candidates into elite colleges where they often become frustrated and fail hurts them even more than the institutions. It creates the illusion that we are closing racial disparities in education when in fact we are not. While blacks and Hispanics now attend college at nearly the same rate as whites, only about 1 in 6 graduates.
Affirmative action often creates the illusion that black or other minority students cannot excel. At the University of California at San Diego, in the year before race-based preferences were abolished in 1997, only one black student had a freshman-year GPA of 3.5 or better. In other words, there was a single black honor student in a freshman class of 3,268. In contrast, 20% of the white students on campus had a 3.5 or better GPA.
There were lots of black students capable of doing honors work at UCSD. But such students were probably admitted to Harvard, Yale or Berkeley, where often they were not receiving an honor GPA. The end to racial preferences changed that. In 1999, 20% of black freshmen at UCSD boasted a GPA of 3.5 or better after their first year, almost equaling the 22% rate for whites after their first year. Similarly, failure rates for black students declined dramatically at UCSD immediately after the implementation of Proposition 209. Isn't that better for everyone in the long run?
Wow - only 1 in 6 graduates? I wonder what the comparison rate is, say for whites and Asians. But again, wow. No matter what the comparison is, that statistic by itself is deplorable.
Planned Parenthood Celebration Jolted by Abortion Survivor
Check out this story, which occurred last year. It is pretty interesting. Here is the majority leader's quote, directly from the Denver Post.
"I think it was amazingly rude to use a human being as an example of his personal politics."
Judge Learned Hand
I have posted this before, but Bill's article brought to mind again this wonderful quote from Judge Learned Hand:
I often wonder whether we do not rest our hopes too much upon constitutions, upon laws and upon courts. These are false hopes; believe me, these are false hopes. Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. And what is this liberty which must lie in the hearts of men and women? It is not the ruthless, the unbridled will; it is not freedom to do as one likes. That is the denial of liberty, and leads straight to its overthrow. A society in which men recognize no check upon their freedom soon becomes a society where freedom is the possession of only a savage few; as we have learned to our sorrow.
Thursday, April 05, 2007
Good Article
My friend Bill Watkins has written what is certainly a great article, soon to be published in the Duke Journal of Constitutional Law and Public Policy. It is titled: "POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY, JUDICIAL SUPREMACY, AND THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION: WHY THE JUDICIARY CANNOT BE THE FINAL ARBITER OF CONSTITUTIONS." Sounds great, right? And my boy is wicked smart, too, a few years ago he wrote an excellent book you should check out.) A taste of the article:
Today, Marbury is cited for the proposition that the Supreme Court is the final arbiter of the Constitution. This interpretation divorces Marbury from its historical roots and grossly overstates the holding of that case. Whereas popular sovereignty provides clear support for the doctrine of judicial review, it provides no support for judicial supremacy. Popular sovereignty explicitly rejected the proposition that a mere branch of government had the final word on fundamental law. Unlike judicial review, judicial supremacy is not an outgrowth of popular sovereignty. Instead, it is a regression to an older theory of sovereignty that existed prior to the American Revolution.
Foolish Democrats
This editorial by the Washington Post regarding Nancy Pelosi's trip to Syria undoubtedly is sent as a message to Democrats to get their act together so that they don't harm their chances to retain control of Congress and to obtain the Whitehouse in 2008. Nevertheless, it is good to see a more liberal paper criticize the foolishness of Democrats. I wish I had more time to comment on some of the ludicrous statements and actions of Democrats in recent weeks.
Sunday, April 01, 2007
How Modern Liberals Think
is the title of this video at YouTube. It was sent to me by a friend, and looks pretty good. You should check it out.
Cheney speech at conservative BYU is drawing hisses
Good grief. A taste:
A growing number of students, faculty and alumni at Brigham Young University are opposing the selection of Vice President Dick Cheney as commencement speaker.
Some students plan to boycott graduation April 26, hold alternative ceremonies off campus or publicly protest the speech, said Warner Woodworth, a professor who is organizing a petition drive.
Woodworth and others are hoping the school, which is owned by the Mormon church, will drop the invitation or at least bring a Democrat to campus to counter the vice president.
“Cheney is of such an unsavory character, that he makes his protege, felon Scooter Libby, who was recently convicted of perjury and obstructing justice, seem as pure as a nun,” Woodworth said.
Egad! The number of students is "growing"? What ever will we do?
This Woodworth guy looks like your typical loon.
