The Corner - National Review Online

The Corner - National Review Online: "The HRC had claimed that a theater manager used a “condescending tone” to tell a sold-out theater audience watching a Tyler Perry movie (Why Did I Get Married?) to please silence their cell phones so everyone could enjoy the movie. One of the audience members was Juana Fuentes-Bowles, director of the state’s Human Relations Division. She stood up and claimed the manager’s announcement was blatantly “racist.” Why? Because he was addressing a largely black crowd and his tone struck her ears as “offensive and condescending.”"

Feeding North Korea - Megan McArdle - Business - The Atlantic

Feeding North Korea - Megan McArdle - Business - The Atlantic: "Policy choices are often framed for us as a choice between compassion and something else--selfishness, moralism, rigid rule-following.  But when you take into account systemic effects, the 'obvious' compassionate choice--the one that our hearts urgently impel us towards--often isn't so obviously the best one.  North Korea had a bad harvest this year, but the problem isn't their bad harvest--it's a political and economic system that leaves the country forever one harvest away from utter disaster.  "

The Volokh Conspiracy » New York Yankees Co-Owner Hank Steinbrenner Denounces “Socialism”

The Volokh Conspiracy » New York Yankees Co-Owner Hank Steinbrenner Denounces “Socialism”: "That said, comparing MLB revenue-sharing to socialism is absurd. Socialism is government control of the economy, not a private arrangement to divide up profits from a joint enterprise. You might as well say that a law firm is “socialistic” if individual partners don’t keep all the profit generated by the clients they bring in, and instead have to transfer some of it to the other partners."

Sarkozy admits French language a hoax after Wikileaks exposé | NewsBiscuit

Sarkozy admits French language a hoax after Wikileaks exposé | NewsBiscuit: "After yesterday’s Wikileaks revelations, Nicolas Sarkozy has today confirmed that the “French language” is indeed a one thousand year old hoax. The president of France revealed that what purported to be his native tongue was in fact complete gibberish, admitting the French really speak English, except in the presence of the British. This comes as Wikileaks published cables sent by French diplomats to countries such as Spain, China and Russia which were all found to be written in English."

Ouch!

Instapundit » Blog Archive » NAH. IF THAT WERE TRUE, HE’D BE COLLABORATING WITH THEM: Soros: Fox News Like Nazis….

NAS - The National Association of Scholars :: Articles and Archives Hypotheticals in the Criminal Law Classroom: An Interview with Lawrence Connell Ashley Thorne

NAS - The National Association of Scholars :: Articles and Archives Hypotheticals in the Criminal Law Classroom: An Interview with Lawrence Connell Ashley Thorne: "Professor Lawrence Connell, who teaches Criminal Law at Widener University, has been placed on administrative leave after students complained about him referring in classroom hypotheticals to killing the university dean, Linda Ammons.  

Some commentators have said that because Dean Ammons is black, his repeated referrals to her death, even for the sake of example, amount to racist and violence-invoking speech."

Free Speech for Them but Not for Us, David Henderson | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty

Free Speech for Them but Not for Us, David Henderson | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty: "On Tuesday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave a speech at George Washington University in which she criticized foreign governments for cracking down on freedom of speech. In her audience was a retired CIA official, Ray McGovern, who quietly turned his back on her in protest of her pro-war actions. He didn't disrupt her speech. Right while Clinton was touting free speech and look at the back of the small room and could, presumably, see McGovern, goons roughed up McGovern and hauled him away. Did Hillary Clinton protest? No. She didn't even miss a beat. Nor, sadly, did anyone in her audience speak out."

Emerging Markets as Partners, not Rivals - Economic View - NYTimes.com

Emerging Markets as Partners, not Rivals - Economic View - NYTimes.com: "Yet this catch phrase is also problematic. For one thing, “Winning the Future” was the title of a 2005 book by Newt Gingrich. It is almost as if Mr. Gingrich were to run for president in 2012 under the banner “Audacious Hope.” And then there is that pesky abbreviated form of the phrase — WTF — that does not exactly inspire confidence."

I Agree--Romney is Toast

Commentary » Blog Archive » Mitt Romney as Presidential Candidate: "I know Romney thinks he can get away with saying there’s a difference between an individual mandate at the state level and one at the federal level, and that might technically be true, but it’s not true when it comes to the conceptual origins of the policy. Plus, it’s sophistry.

To be completely honest, I can’t understand why on earth he is even bothering to run. This isn’t an albatross. It’s a two-ton weight chained to his torso, and he’s not Houdini."

New drilling method opens vast oil fields in US - Yahoo! News

New drilling method opens vast oil fields in US - Yahoo! News: "A new drilling technique is opening up vast fields of previously out-of-reach oil in the western United States, helping reverse a two-decade decline in domestic production of crude.
Companies are investing billions of dollars to get at oil deposits scattered across North Dakota, Colorado, Texas and California. By 2015, oil executives and analysts say, the new fields could yield as much as 2 million barrels of oil a day — more than the entire Gulf of Mexico produces now."

Social Psychologists Detect Liberal Bias Within - NYTimes.com

Social Psychologists Detect Liberal Bias Within - NYTimes.com: "“Anywhere in the world that social psychologists see women or minorities underrepresented by a factor of two or three, our minds jump to discrimination as the explanation,” said Dr. Haidt, who called himself a longtime liberal turned centrist. “But when we find out that conservatives are underrepresented among us by a factor of more than 100, suddenly everyone finds it quite easy to generate alternate explanations.”"

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom: "Elder Maxwell also observed that we increase the power of governments when people do not believe in absolute truths and in a God who will hold them and their government leaders accountable."

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom: "My esteemed fellow Apostle, Elder Neal A. Maxwell, asked:

“[H]ow can a society set priorities if there are no basic standards? Are we to make our calculations using only the arithmetic of appetite?”59

He made this practical observation:

“Decrease the belief in God, and you increase the numbers of those who wish to play at being God by being 'society's supervisors.' Such 'supervisors' deny the existence of divine standards, but are very serious about imposing their own standards on society.”"

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom: " I quote Carlson again:

“The broad trend has been from a view of marriage as a social institution with binding claims of its own and with prescribed rules for men and women into a free association, easily entered and easily broken, with a focus on the needs of individuals. However, the ironical result of so expanding the 'freedom to marry' has been to enhance the authority and sway of government.”50

“As the American founders understood, marriage and the autonomous family were the true bulwarks of liberty, for they were the principal rivals to the state. . . . And surely, as the American judiciary has deconstructed marriage and the family over the last 40 years, the result has been the growth of government.'51"

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom

I guess I should have read further. He's not even hiding the ball:

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom: "It was apparent twenty-five years ago, and it is undeniable today, that the significance of religious freedom is diminishing. Five years after I gave my DePaul lecture, the United States Supreme Court issued its most important free exercise decision in many years In Employment Division v. Smith,21 the Court significantly narrowed the traditional protection of religion by holding that the guarantee of free exercise did not prevent government from interfering with religious activities when it did so by neutral, generally applicable laws. This ruling removed religious activities from their sanctuary—the preferred position the First Amendment had given them."

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom: "Another important current debate over religious freedom concerns whether the guarantee of free exercise of religion gives one who acts on religious grounds greater protection against government prohibitions than are already guaranteed to everyone by other provisions of the constitution, like freedom of speech. I, of course, maintain that unless religious freedom has a unique position we erase the significance of this separate provision in the First Amendment. Treating actions based on religious belief the same as actions based on other systems of belief is not enough to satisfy the special guarantee of religious freedom in the United States Constitution. Religion must preserve its preferred status in our pluralistic society in order to make its unique contribution—its recognition and commitment to values that transcend the secular world."

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom

Elder Oaks doesn't appear to be a fan of Scalia's opinion in Employment Division v. Smith:

Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks' Speech Given at Chapman University School of Law - LDS Newsroom: "Much of the controversy in recent years has focused on the extent to which state laws that are neutral and generally applicable can override the strong protections contained in the free exercise clause of the United States Constitution. As noted hereafter, in the 1990s the Supreme Court ruled that such state laws could prevail. Fortunately, in a stunning demonstration of the resilience of the guarantee of free exercise of religion, over half of the states have passed legislation or interpreted their state constitutions to preserve a higher standard for protecting religious freedom. Only a handful have followed the Supreme Court's approach that the federal free exercise protection must bow to state laws that are neutral as to religion.17"

The Problem of the Friendly Tyrant

Faster, Please! » The Problem of the Friendly Tyrant: "We’ve had many alliances with friendly tyrants, from Stalin to Papa Doc, from Mubarak to Pinochet, from the shah to the Saudi royal family. It’s not an easy embrace. If you’re the American president you know, or should know, that it’s only a matter of time before the American people — or at least a big chunk of “public opinion” — turn against the tyrant and demand that we support his domestic enemies, real and imagined. You don’t want that, since you know that in the ensuing political free-for-all you will be stained with the same spray of slime that besmirches the tyrants."

"On the other hand, if you pull the plug on the tyrant, you send two very dangerous messages. You tell all our allies that we’re weak and unreliable — which discourages them, along with all the would-be friends and allies who are trying to figure out what to do. And you tell all our enemies that we are weak and will run at the first sign of trouble. For extras, if the abandoned tyrant should win, he won’t be a great friend of ours again."

The Problem of the Friendly Tyrant

Faster, Please! » The Problem of the Friendly Tyrant: "We’ve had many alliances with friendly tyrants, from Stalin to Papa Doc, from Mubarak to Pinochet, from the shah to the Saudi royal family. It’s not an easy embrace. If you’re the American president you know, or should know, that it’s only a matter of time before the American people — or at least a big chunk of “public opinion” — turn against the tyrant and demand that we support his domestic enemies, real and imagined. You don’t want that, since you know that in the ensuing political free-for-all you will be stained with the same spray of slime that besmirches the tyrants."

"On the other hand, if you pull the plug on the tyrant, you send two very dangerous messages. You tell all our allies that we’re weak and unreliable — which discourages them, along with all the would-be friends and allies who are trying to figure out what to do. And you tell all our enemies that we are weak and will run at the first sign of trouble. For extras, if the abandoned tyrant should win, he won’t be a great friend of ours again."

Althouse: When did the left turn against free speech?

Althouse: When did the left turn against free speech?: "Remember when lefties were all about free speech? When did that change? Why did that change? Perhaps the answer is: Free speech was only ever a means to an end. When they got their free speech, made their arguments, and failed to win over the American people, and when in fact the speech from their opponents seemed too successful, they switched to the repression of speech, because the end was never freedom."