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April 30, 2007
The Dormant Commerce Clause Dozes On...
The early returns show Roberts and Alito to be more deferential to precedent than I had thought they would be.
Posted by Eric at 3:58 PM
"Man [sic] And His [sic] World"
So do I.
Do you?
Posted by Eric at 9:29 AM | Comments (6)
April 27, 2007
With First Choice in 2007 NFL Draft, the Raiders Select . . .
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
History -- Al Davis's history -- says "NO WAY" to taking a quarterback with the top pick, either LSU's Russell or Notre Dame's Quinn.
The Raiders' greatest run of success started in the mid-60s, after Davis obtained Daryle Lamonica in a trade from Buffalo. Lamonica took the Raiders to SB-II and four straight AFL/AFC title games.
After Lamonica, Ken Stabler took over in '73. Stabler was a 2nd round pick in the '68 draft. He led the Raiders to five straight AFC title games, finally winning it in '76 and leading the Raiders to their first SB win over the Vikings.
After Stabler came Dan Pastorini in 1980, acquired before the season in straight-up trade for Stabler. Pastorini got hurt and . . . .
Jim Plunkett took over. Davis picked up Plunkett off waivers from the 49ers a year earlier Plunkett won SB XV over the Philadelphia Eagles and SB XVIII over the Washington Redskins.
A long dry spell followed.
Plunkett was succeeded by the first QB Al Davis ever took in the first round of the NFL Draft, Mark Wilson from BYU (1980 draft). Wilson struggled.
So Davis replaced Wilson with Jay Schroeder, a former baseball star at UCLA whom Davis acquired early in the '88 season in a trade with the Redskins. Davis gave up offensive left tackle Jim Lachey, who became maybe the best lineman of the early '90s.
Schroeder was replaced briefly by Steve Beurlein, a 4th-round pick in 1987. Eventually, Schroeder gave way to free agent Jeff Hostetler, who gave way to Jeff George, who came from the Falcons.
Rich Gannon took over from George (and Donald Hollas), when he joined Oakland as a free agent. A couple years later, the Raiders again reached the SB in the '02 season.
The only QBs the Raiders have drafted in the 1st round since the AFL/NFL common draft are Mark Wilson in '80 and Todd Marinovich in '91. Marinovich was a terrible reach, not particularly good, and an unfortunate head case thanks to his dad . . . but he's reputed to be a hell of a surfer.
By the way, the first QB the Raiders chose in the first round was Roman Gabriel in 1962, with the first overall choice of the old AFL's draft -- but that was before Davis was running the team. Gabriel joined the Rams instead.
One other note. There have been 14 QBs selected first overall since 1967. Of those, five have started and won a total of 12 SBs. Of those 12 victories, though, 7 belong the Terry Bradshaw (4) and Troy Aikman (3). Jim Plunkett and and John Elway each won a pair, but only after changing teams -- and Elway had to wait 15 years and for the arrival of RB Terrell Davis to win his. Peyton Manning owns the other SB title, winning it this past year.
The point. The Raiders have never had success on the field with a QB they drafted in the 1st round. Really, only two teams have. Al Davis knows that. He knows it takes a few years to develop a QB. And he knows he doesn't have much time left. Davis will turn 78 on July 4th.
Plus, Al Davis likes to go against conventional wisdom. He took punter Ray Guy and kicker Sebby Janikowski with first-round picks.
So, given Davis's against-the-grain reputation, his history of winning with experienced QBs, and the fact of his age, the man Davis takes is . . . Calvin Johnson, the WR from Georgia Tech.
That is, if Davis doesn't trade the pick.
Posted by shertaugh at 11:00 AM | Comments (2)
April 26, 2007
A Boy Named Barbra
This post is about the only major league baseball player named Barbra.
Not his last name. His first name.
The player was Barbra O'Neil Chrisley. He went by Neil.
Hitting a baseball may be the hardest physical act in all of sports.
Trying to hit a baseball while hearing every bench jockey on the other team (and in the stands) must have made it close to impossible for Chrisley -- as measured by his career average. [It also helps further establish the greatness of Jackie Robinson.]
My own thinking is Chrisley had no chance from the start.
And what team would have him? Why, the Washington Senators . . . of course.
Posted by shertaugh at 5:33 PM
"When I step into the classroom this week I reach my limits as a teacher:" A Virginia Tech professor, the Talmud, and Silence
* * * * *
What There Is To Say
Classes at Virginia Tech resume this week, and the cacophonous presence of the media that had settled upon the campus has begun to dissipate. Students clad in orange and maroon mull about the Drillfield; some toss Frisbees, kick soccer balls, fly kites. Others gather by the newly placed memorials, inscribing their thoughts and prayers on huge placards, leaving flowers and candles, VT memorabilia and Bibles, before heading off to class.
But classes this week will not be as they were before, and like many other professors here, I have been thinking about what I should do when I enter the classroom. In the face of such horror, what can we possibly teach our students?
There is a well-known story in the Talmud, that great compendium of Jewish law and lore, which describes an encounter between Moses and God on Mount Sinai. When Moses ascended the mountain to receive the Torah, he found God adorning the letters of the book with crowns. Confused, the prophet asked God why he was adding these seemingly meaningless designs. God answered that many generations later a great Sage named Akiba ben Joseph would expound "heaps and heaps of laws" from these jots and tittles, and allowed Moses to appear in Rabbi Akiba's classroom and experience the genius of his teaching.
But when Moses asked about Akiba's reward, he was shown the brutal aftermath of Akiba's eventual martyrdom, the rabbi's flesh weighed out at the market-stalls. " 'Lord of the Universe,' cried Moses, 'such Torah, and such a reward!' He replied, 'Be silent, for this is the way I have determined it.' "
This is one of many texts that I have my students read and grapple with in my Judaism class. Over the past few days, I've been thinking about this story and my students' encounters with it. Understandably, they are usually disturbed and perplexed by it. Many resist the denial of a rational connection between the great Sage's deeds and his earthly fate. How could such Torah earn such reward? Why does Akiba meet such a terrible end? Why does Moses not receive a vision of the Rabbi teaching in paradise? How can silence be the end of the story?
Moses' curiosity about Rabbi Akiba, and his shock at discovering the great Sage's end, implies that there ought to be a rational connection between one's deeds and one's fate. But the tale challenges that relationship -- and this may be the point. Its refusal of explanation exposes the limits of our knowledge and understanding, providing not easy solace but a profound and troubling awe. Like Moses, the reader is left mute, encountering only the haunting paradox of a divinity at once intimate and utterly inscrutable.
Religious traditions and communities, I suggest to my students, are involved in building -- and maintaining -- a meaningful world. This is an ongoing struggle, in which the beliefs and practices of the past are drawn upon to explain the present. At times, human beings find it difficult to square their inherited conceptions of ultimate reality and their own experiences, and the tradition is challenged, deepened, transformed. Confronted by the ineffable mystery of the cosmos, they hear the complaint of Job, the lament of the Psalmist, the command: "Be silent."
Much has already been said about the tragedy at Virginia Tech. Much more will be said over the coming days, weeks, and years. There are many things we will, and should, speak about. As scholars and teachers, our job is to try to understand and interpret the world, and we encourage our students to do so as well. We will resist glib answers and facile explanations. We will attempt to fathom the psyche of the gunman, to comprehend how he turned into a monster who tried to cloak himself in the language of suffering and martyrdom. We will discuss the violence so prevalent in our society, gun control, the failures of our mental health system. We will reflect upon the fact that so much of the evil we endure, here and elsewhere, is of all-too-human origin.
Perhaps most importantly, we will speak of the victims. We will speak about those we knew and learn about those we did not from the people they have touched. We will recount their hopes and their deeds, and we will try to keep their memory alive in the way we conduct our lives.
But with my students I can go no further. When I step into the classroom this week I reach my limits as a teacher. I know that many students are struggling with how to reconcile the events of April 16th with their own beliefs and commitments. That thirty-two lives have been cut short, that thirty-two worlds have been destroyed by a madman's bullets defies all understanding. I will find no reason for this tragedy, no explanation for why on that blustery spring morning a young man's rage turned on those students and teachers.
Facing my students, my colleagues, the survivors, and the families of the deceased, after I have offered my words of consolation, I will reach the limits of my understanding and will take heed of those austere words uttered to Moses: "Be silent."
Posted by Eric at 3:04 PM
April 25, 2007
You Lovin' It?
This ad, however, is a bit of a whopper.
Posted by Eric at 12:52 PM | Comments (2)
"Thinking Blogger": An Oxymoron? Discuss.
The rules of this little blogospheric meme require me to tag five blogs that make me think -- and I'm forbidden from designating Sally's, whose blog would otherwise have topped my list.
So here are my five. To each I say, "Thanks for the great blogging!" and, consistently with the "tag" metaphor, "You're 'it'!"
Discourse.net. A blog by my law school classmate and University of Miami lawprof Michael Froomkin. He's just always good. Always.
The Legal History Blog. A relative newcomer to the blogosphere, USC lawprof Mary Dudziak's blog is superb. She links to great reading and offers provocative and helpful content of her own about legal history and academia.
Cliopatria. A history group-blog. Each author has a distinctive voice; each writes about the things that interests him; each is a great writer; and together they're all very interesting.
Ed Cone. Ed's been at the game a while, and he's not just interesting but one of the political blogosphere's true class acts. His many links send me to interesting places, and his original content (and the discussions in his comments) always inform me.
David Neiwert's Orcinus. David says a lot of things that need saying, and he always keeps his eye on the ball. I've learned a ton over at Orcinus.
Posted by Eric at 10:37 AM | Comments (1)
"Only Probably"
Posted by Eric at 9:24 AM
April 24, 2007
Posts on Uncle Leopold and the Holocaust
1. Yom Hashoah 2005
2. Was Gone, And Now I'm Back
3. My Great-Uncle Whispers To Us From Beyond The Grave He Never Got
4. An Open Letter to the Members of the Institute for Political and International Studies of the Foreign Ministry of Iran
5. The Sadness of Failed Rescue
6. "And How Was The Weather in Łodź?"
7. A Spring Evening, Bad Kissingen, 1936
8. Uncle Leo's Medals
9. Uncle Leo's Medals: An Astonished Update
10. Uncle Leo's Kennkarte, Sixty-Five Years Later
A number of readers have also suggested to me that I should write a book about Leo and my search for the story of his life and death. This is something I've thought about doing. I've got two university press books under my belt -- but this would be a rather different venture. If any of you knows a literary agent who might find this an interesting project, I'd appreciate the referral.
Posted by Eric at 5:17 PM
Uncle Leo's Kennkarte, Sixty-Five Years Later
Its cover, with the stylized capital "J," shows that he was a Jew.
I discovered the kennkarte in Leopold's Gestapo file at the Staatsarchiv Würzburg a few weeks ago. (To read the posts about my visit to the archive, and all of the other posts about my great-uncle Leopold and the Holocaust, click here.) Like the World War I medals that were also in the file, the kennkarte came as a surprise to me; I had no idea that such a thing still existed.
It was the first thing that tumbled out of the Gestapo file when I opened it. My eyes naturally went first to the photograph of Leo – a photograph that neither I nor anyone else in my family had ever seen.
This was obviously a photo that he had taken specially for this identity card, like we would get a passport photo taken today.
Soon my attention turned to the fingerprints, which I found much sadder than the photograph.
At the time, the prints struck me simply as irrefutable proof that he had in fact once lived – a visible tracing of his human uniqueness, and a hint of the uniqueness of the millions of other vanished fingerprints of that era.
Only later did I come to understand another aspect of the sadness of these prints – an aspect tinged with anger. Fingerprints connote criminality, and these prints on a kennkarte stamped in 1939 with the letter "J" made me viscerally aware that at that time in Germany, to be a Jew was becoming a sort of crime.
Where are the fingerprints of the functionary who issued this racial identity card? Of the policeman who seized Leo's World War I medals and then packed him on the train to Poland? Of the troops who guarded the train, or the engineer who drove it, or of any of the dozens and dozens of others who processed Leopold on his way to oblivion?
Why is it that what remains to be discovered all these years later are the fingerprints of the victims rather than the perpetrators?
In truth, it was something of a miracle that the kennkarte itself remained to be discovered. As of January 1, 1939, German law required all Jews to carry the "J"-stamped identity card with them and present it on demand. When German Jews were deported to the East, their kennkarten went with them. Look at this page from a book about the victims of the Holocaust from my great-uncle's region in Germany:
My great-uncle is the only victim of the Nazis with a photograph because the authors' source was the Gestapo files, and Leopold's Gestapo file was the only one out of this entire group of deported Jews with a kennkarte in it. The other victims' cards vanished in Poland with their owners.
But why did Leo's identity card end up in his Gestapo file rather than on the train with him to Poland? This question puzzled me, but the tragic answer lay right there the file.
Leo and the other Jews of Bad Kissingen were "evacuated" from their hometown on April 24, 1942 -- exactly sixty-five years ago today -- to the nearby city of Würzburg. A Gestapo memo to the city police in Bad Kissingen recites what happened next:
"The Jew Leopold Israel Müller … will be evacuated to the East on April 25, 1942. He alleges that on April 24, 1942, he lost the kennkarte that he formerly had in his possession and that was issued by the mayor of Bad Kissingen. Müller is therefore without identification papers."The Bad Kissingen police went straight to Leo's empty house and searched for the kennkarte:
"The Jew Leopold Israel Müller … was not in possession of his kennkarte on 24.11.42 [sic] when he was transferred to Würzburg. He had allegedly either left it in his house or lost it on the transport from Kissingen to Würzburg. The kennkarte was discovered in a search of his house, and is enclosed herewith."
The kennkarte arrived in Würzburg on April 30, 1942 – three days after Leopold was deported to Poland:
"1. The identity card of the Jew Leopold Israel Müller, belatedly sent by the Criminal Police of Bad Kissingen, arrived too late for intake. The identity card is therefore to be placed in the file."So Uncle Leo was deported to the East without his identity papers.
This could not have made his situation any easier, or less terrifying.
UPDATE: An especially good comment on this post appears over in the comments at the Volokh Conspiracy:
What impresses me is the dogged bureaucratic thoroughness with which these monsters pursued their purpose. When Leo was found without his card, they searched his house, found the card, and sent it forward within days.The sheer number of man-hours devoted to absurdly niggling details relative to the enormity of their project reveals a mentality anesthetized to ends through focus upon legalistic means. This example of each participant's capacity to ignore a pristinely evil and inhuman purpose, or to rationalize it, through his focus on the chaff of quotidian operational detail, should stand as a warning to us all.
We owe thanks to Eric's Uncle Leo for losing his card, whether on purpose or inadvertantly. By doing so, he provided us a revealing glimpse into how pure evil operates, which we can hope better equips us to prevent it.
Posted by Eric at 12:05 AM | Comments (31)
April 23, 2007
"This Better Be Good": The Chords
Intro:
D - A (C#) - D7 (C) - B7 - Em - A(sus) - A
Verse 1:
D – A (C#) – D7 (C) – B7 – Em – B7 – Em – A – D – D (C) – B7 – B7 – Em7 - Em7 – A(sus) – A
D – A (C#) – D7 (C) – B7 – Em – B7 – Em – A – D – D (C) – B7 – B7 – Em7 – Em7 – A(sus) - A
Refrain:
D – D – B7 – B7 – Em7 – Em7 – A(sus) – A – D – D – B7 – B7 – Em7(add 11) – Em7 – A(sus) – A
Verse 2:
D – A (C#) – D7 (C) – B7 – Em – B7 – Em – A – D – D (C) – B7 – B7 – Em7 – Em7 – A(sus) - A
D – A (C#) – D7 (C) – B7 – Em – B7 – Em – A – D – D (C) – B7 – Em7 - Em7 – A(sus) - A
Refrain:
D – D – B7 – B7 – Em7 – Em7 – A(sus) – A – D – D – B7 – B7 – Em7(add 11) – Em7 – A(sus) – A
Bridge:
Bflat – Bflat – Gm – Gm – C – C – F – A7 – Bflat – Bflat – Gm – Gm – F9#5 – F9#5 – Asus – A
Solo:
D – A (C#) – D7(C) – B7 – Em – B7 – Em – A – D – D (C) – B7 – B7 – Em7 - Em7 – A(sus) – A
Refrain:
D – D – B7 – B7 – Em7 – Em7 – Asus – A – D – D – B7 – B7 – Em7 – Em7 – Asus - A
Posted by Eric at 11:15 PM | Comments (1)
Squeeze Reunion: The Band
Glenn Tilbrook -- vocals and lead guitar
Chris Difford -- vocals and rhythm guitar
John Bentley -- bass (Bentley was with Squeeze from 1979 to 1982)
Simon Hanson -- drums (he's the drummer in Tilbrook's current band, the Fluffers)
Steven Large -- keyboards (keyboardist for the Fluffers)
It's not surprising that Jools Holland won't join the band for the tour; his career (especially on British television) has in some ways eclipsed that of his former bandmates, and it would have been an odd step backwards, I think, for him to link back up with Squeeze.
Gilson Lavis's absence is a shame, though. Apparently he's tied up on tour this summer with Jools Holland.
Just the other day, by the way, I learned that opening for Squeeze at their August 7 show at the North Fork Theater at Westbury (NY) is none other than Fountains of Wayne. Still my beating heart!
Posted by Eric at 4:01 PM | Comments (2)
Blurbs
Tell me about blurbs. When you're thinking of buying a book, do blurbs matter at all to you? What matters more -- who the blurber is, or what the blurber says? Are you likelier to open up a book with a great blurb by somebody you've never heard of, or a book with a nondescript blurb by somebody famous?
Posted by Eric at 10:07 AM | Comments (7)
Annoying Movable Type Problems Continue....
Posted by Eric at 8:12 AM | Comments (1)
April 19, 2007
Has Rudy Giuliani Changed His Position On Abortion?
This is right in principle: legislators vote every day against proposed bills that would, if passed and challenged, a court would uphold against constitutional challenge.
But it may be wrong as a matter of fact. Here is what Giuliani said back in 1999, in his Senate race, about New York's state law allowing the now-illegal abortion procedure:
(image from Elisabeth Bumiller, "Abortion Seen As Pivotal Issue in Senate Race," New York Times, 11/26/99, p. B6.)
He said the New York law worked to create the "necessary scope of freedom and prohibition." If Giuliani thought in 1999 that a law permitting this abortion method was "necessary" to freedom, then how can a 2007 Supreme Court decision that upholds a law barring something "necessary" to freedom be a correct interpretation of the Constitution's due process clause?
Posted by Eric at 9:42 AM
April 17, 2007
Gun Control, Campus Shootings, the Wild West, and Kent State
At the University of Utah, students with concealed-weapons permits are allowed to carry their guns around campus.
Though the context is surely different, the renewed debate about whether students should be allowed to arm themselves took me back to the tragic killing of 4 Kent State students in 1971. The students were protesting America's invasion of Cambodia. The shooters were Ohio National Guardsmen. The events at Kent State marked the end of the rebellious '60s and the restoration of law and order.
But imagine a replay of Kent State today at a state university where carrying concealed weapons is legal.
Hundreds of students gathered to protest the president's Iraq policy. Hundreds of National Guardsmen with M-16 pointed at the students.
Because the M-16 can be fired with as little as 2.2 pounds of pressure, a sympathetic response by one guardsman because his left arm tired could trigger his weapon. [By comparison, a Remington .12 gauge pump-action shotgun requires about 3.5 pounds of pressure on the trigger to fire a shell.]
And then all hell would literally break loose. We'd have a wild west shootout.
Maybe Kent State could never happen again. But I'm not so sanguine.
Update: Commenter Jim E. helpfully identified my typo that the Kent State shootings happened in 1971; the shootings occurred in 1970 -- as the link to Wikipedia makes clear.
Posted by shertaugh at 7:26 PM | Comments (11)
Help!
I'd appreciate some help in diagnosing and fixing this problem. Please leave a comment, or email me.
UPDATE: And when I just try to load the main page, www.isthatlegal.org, the page takes forever to load (although I don't get the error message).
Posted by Eric at 9:49 AM | Comments (9)
April 16, 2007
Tommy Thompson's Joe Biden Moment
WASHINGTON - Former Wisconsin governor and Republican presidential hopeful Tommy Thompson told Jewish activists Monday that making money is "part of the Jewish tradition," and something that he applauded.UPDATE: Eugene Volokh defends Thompson's comments at length. I am not at all persuaded. I described Thompson's comments, as "unbelievable," and that's still how I see them. If a politician praised an NAACP audience for being such great dancers, or an Asian-American audience for being so good at math, it would be unbelievably stupid -- just as it was for Thompson to praise Jews for being good at making money.Speaking to an audience at the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism in Washington D.C., Thompson said that, "I'm in the private sector and for the first time in my life I'm earning money. You know that's sort of part of the Jewish tradition and I do not find anything wrong with that."
Thompson later apologized for the comments that had caused a stir in the audience, saying that he had meant it as a compliment, and had only wanted to highlight the "accomplishments" of the Jewish religion.
Even if Eugene is correct that over the span of the last 1000 years, Jewish tradition has not explicitly valued poverty in the way that (some) Christian culture has at least presented itself as valuing poverty (while, it should be noted, accumulating wealth), Eugene misses the fact that the identification of Jews with wealth has been the source of centuries of anti-semitic resentment, hostility, and violence. Sure, it's at least theoretically possible that Tommy Thompson has somehow managed to create his own mental construct, utterly independent of centuries of prejudice and hatred, in which the supposed Jewish acumen in wealth-acquisition has connotations only of virtue and not of avarice. But I really doubt it.
If Tommy Thompson thinks it's OK to praise Jews for being good at making money to their faces, I am certainly left wondering what else Thompson might say or think about Jews when speaking to others, or in other contexts.
Posted by Eric at 4:02 PM | Comments (6)
In Horror ...
UPDATE: What a truly warped way of breaking the news of a tragedy like this:
FURTHER UPDATE: And this, from Americablog, is no better:
Let's wait at least a day before trying to score political points, shall we?
FINAL UPDATE: Eugene Volokh asks an important question.
Posted by Eric at 3:06 PM | Comments (2)
Chapel Hill: The Town That Repeats On You
Sally Greene is now blogging about a new proposed slogan for our town: "The Feeling Never Leaves You."
Sally doesn't like it because it's too intangible.
I don't like it because it sounds too much like indigestion. Or PTSD.
Posted by Eric at 8:00 AM | Comments (4)
April 13, 2007
Uncle Leo's Medals: An Astonished Update
Nearly a month ago, I filed a request with the Staatsarchiv Würzburg for my great-uncle Leopold's World War I service medals that I discovered in his Gestapo file. To be honest, I was expecting the archive to refuse my request, or to reply with burdensome paperwork and lengthy delays.
I was not expecting what I received in the mail today:
[translation: This is in reply to your understandable wish that both the military decorations in the corresponding Gestapo file (Gestapo-Stelle Würzburg 8137) be returned to the family of the victim. Because the approval of the Directorate of the Bavarian State Archives was necessary, there was a slight delay in delivering them. For this we ask for your understanding. The decorations were replaced in the file with a Polaroid photo."]It is a comfort that Uncle Leo's medals are again in the proud and loving hands of his family.
May we always remember the enormous crime that the theft of these medals represents, and the millions and millions of unique human lives that crime extinguished.
Posted by Eric at 3:36 PM | Comments (17)
Joe Kennedy: Nifong May Have Criminal Exposure
Posted by Eric at 3:18 PM
April 12, 2007
Liz Cheney: No Talking to Syria - Except About Torture
In a nutshell, here's her bottom line, in a shot at Nancy Pelosi (among others):
Conducting diplomacy with the regime in Damascus while they kill Lebanese democrats is not only irresponsible, it is shameful.
What I don't get about Cheney's position is how she squares her "no talks with Syria" argument with the fact that the Bush/Cheney administration has a rendition agreement with Syria -- that is, a pact whereby America outsources to Syria the torture of people about whom there is a 1% chance they may be suspected of terrorism.
Liz Cheney said in her Op-Ed that "[t]alking to the Syrians emboldens and rewards them at the expense of America and our allies in the Middle East."
So my question for Liz Cheney is this: who was talking to the Syrians to set up the rendition agreement, and exactly what did the Bush/Cheney administration agree to give up in exchange?
Needless to say, while the print and TV media were breathlessly reporting Bush's and VP Cheney's bashing of Nancy Pelosi for talking to the Syrians last week, they forgot to mention the Bush/Cheney torture agreement we have with the Syrians.
No talking to Syria. Indeed.
Posted by shertaugh at 12:46 PM | Comments (2)
April 7, 2007
Ann Althouse At The LBJ Library (or, Did People Disapprove of LBJ More Intensely Than They Do of GWB?)
One passage did, however, send me googling:
"The piped in music is The Doors, The Jefferson Airplane -- all counterculture, evocative of hating LBJ. 'Did people hate him more than George Bush?' Chris asks. 'Yes,' I say without hesitation."Yet George W. Bush has been a good deal less popular than LBJ at every single parallel moment of his presidency. (See the graph here.) Lyndon Johnson's disapproval rating was 47% in January of 1968 (Source: David Culbert, "Television's Impact on Decision-Making in the USA, 1968," 33 Journal of Contemporary History 419, 433 (1998).) GWB's disapproval rating is now at around 60%.
Ann's point may have been that people then hated Johnson more fervently than people today hate Bush. That is, she may have been telling her son that whereas a larger percentage of Americans disapprove of GWB than did LBJ, the smaller percentage of Americans who disapproved of LBJ really, really disapproved of him, unlike today's larger percentage of Americans who disapprove of GWB more tepidly.
I was in kindergarten in 1968, so I can't report on how intensely those who disapproved of Johnson disapproved of him.
But to the extent that Ann thinks that those who disapprove of GWB today do so tepidly, I believe she's mistaken.
Posted by Eric at 1:30 PM | Comments (14)
"Some Guy Wearing Light Blue Dockers Pants"
I'm a bit more positive about it than they are, I suppose. I agree that the album lacks a true knockout single, and I also agree that you can sometimes hear the craft behind the tunes. But their craft is just so impossibly good that I have a hard time holding it against them.
Favorite tune at the moment: "This Better Be Good:"
I saw you holding hands
With some guy wearing light blue Dockers pants
And I thought that I might just give you a chance to explain
What the hell is in your brain
You know you pretend you're going to Sea Bright
For the long weekend but something don't seem right
And your best friend Renee keeps on saying she saw you at the Gap with somebody in a baseball cap[refrain] And you know
This better be good
This better be good
Yeah, this better be good now baby
Cause you sure don't act like you should
This better be good
GoodI thought you could be trusted
But I guess you can fess up
You're totally busted
Cause I swear you were sharing a hot dog with mustard after work with that same old polyester jerk[refrain]
[bridge] I know you'll deny It
But don't even try It
Your half-baked alibi's so full of holes
I think you might want to stop in at the donut shop
They might buy it
I sure won't[guitar solo]
[refrain]
Posted by Eric at 12:24 PM | Comments (1)
April 6, 2007
"When you're walking home tonight and some great homicidal maniac comes after you with a bunch of loganberries, don't come crying to me!"
Posted by Eric at 10:57 AM
"The Hand of God Blew Him From The Road"
Q. You've kept God out of the public discussion of your situation. Why?It's hard for me to describe how much I admire the candor of these words.A. I had to think about a God who would not save my son. Wade was—and I have lots of evidence; it's not just his mother saying it—a gentle and good boy. He reached out to people who were misfits and outcasts all the time. He could not stand for people to say nasty things about other people; he just didn't want it. For a 16-year-old boy, he was really extraordinary in this regard. I wish I could take credit for it, but I can't. You'd think that if God was going to protect somebody, he'd protect that boy. But not only did he not protect him, the wind blew him from the road. The hand of God blew him from the road. So I had to think, "What kind of God do I have that doesn't intervene—in fact, may even participate—in the death of this good boy?" I talk about it in the book, that I had to accept that my God was a God who promised enlightenment and salvation. And that's all. Didn't promise us protection. I've had to come to grips with a God that fits my own experience, which is, my God could not be offering protection and not have protected my boy.
Posted by Eric at 9:54 AM | Comments (2)
Coincidence? I Think Not.
Here is a map of slave and free territory in 1850:
Is felon disenfranchisement a tool, or at least an instance, of racial oppression? The maps tell a damning story.
Posted by Eric at 9:39 AM | Comments (5)
Dudziak Receives Guggenheim
Posted by Eric at 9:19 AM
April 5, 2007
Apologies And More
Posted by Eric at 2:50 PM
Jack Chin on The Daily Show, from the Horse's Mouth.
Jack has now blogged about it himself. It's interesting.
Posted by Eric at 12:08 PM | Comments (1)
Our Irrational Airlines
Below are the current cheapest prices for air tickets into (roughly) the northwestern quadrant of Wyoming, originating from Raleigh-Durham, NC, for the period from 6/21/07 to 6/24/07.
I defy anyone to explain the pricing into Cody. (Obviously, the explanation does not lie in the proximity to Yellowstone National Park, a popular summer tourist destination. Jackson, WY, is no further, and it also offers access to Grand Teton National Park.)
Posted by Eric at 9:33 AM | Comments (4)
April 3, 2007
Traffic and Weather
Posted by Eric at 3:07 PM | Comments (1)
Today I Am Filing An Amicus Curiae Brief Challenging Post-9/11 Racial Detention
The Turkmen case is a lawsuit for damages brought by Arab and Muslim alien men who allege they were swept up and abusively detained on alleged immigration violations in the wake of the attacks of September 11. Back in June of 2006, a federal district judge in New York dismissed the plaintiffs' allegation that the government had illegally singled out Arab and Muslim aliens for prolonged detention before ultimately deporting them. Accepting the allegation that the government had singled out Arabs and Muslims for detention that was longer than necessary, the district judge held that such prolonged detention does not violate equal protection; "the executive," said the trial court, "is free to single out nationals of a particular country" for prolonged detention.
The amici I represent are children of the three Japanese Americans who unsuccessfully challenged racial curfew and detention before the Supreme Court in World War II. Karen Korematsu-Haigh is the daughter of Fred Korematsu (Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 (1944)). Jay Hirabayashi is the son of Gordon Hirabayashi (Hirabayashi v. United States, 320 U.S. 81 (1943)). Holly Yasui is the daughter of Minoru Yasui (Yasui v. United States, 320 U.S. 115 (1943)).
Their interest in the Turkmen appeal is in avoiding the repetition of a tragic episode in American history that is also, for them, painful family history. That history is not the ordeal suffered by their famous fathers and other American citizens of Japanese ancestry, but rather that suffered by their grandparents Japanese aliens in the United States at the outbreak of war in December 1941.
Their claim is that the district court's broad endorsement of an executive power to single out aliens for prolonged detention on the basis of race, religion, and national origin is a revival of the long-discredited legal theory that supported the mass and prolonged detention of Japanese aliens during World War II.
The brief is available in .pdf format here.
WIth me on the brief were Steve Pesner, Bob Pees, and David Altschuler of the New York office of Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld.
UPDATE: The amicus brief is the subject of an article by Nina Bernstein in today's New York Times.
Posted by Eric at 12:05 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
April 2, 2007
All Errors Are, However, Mine.
Posted by Eric at 2:51 PM
Why Are Summer Airfares So High This Year?
What's going on with summer airfares this year? Am I missing something? Tips from savvy travelers would be much appreciated.
Posted by Eric at 8:57 AM | Comments (3)
April 1, 2007
Census Data Misused in World War II
(I got an email on this from my friend the historian Greg Robinson, who noted that the headline on this USA Today story about Anderson and Seltzer's discovery ("Papers Show Census Role in WWII Camps") is inaccurate: the discovered documents do not show the Census Bureau cooperating in anything that had to do with the internment camps; it reveals the Bureau helping law enforcement track down Japanese Americans in the vicinity of Washington, DC.)
Posted by Eric at 3:04 PM | Comments (2)