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Does US News Degrade Law Schools? By Richard Baehr

Posted By on May 16th, 2016

Engines of Anxiety: Academic Rankings, Reputation and Accountability by Wendy Nelson Espeland and Michael Sauder, Russell Sage Foundation, New York, 2016

The three weekly news magazines, Time, Newsweek and US News and World Report, at one time printed and sold around ten million copies combined each week. All have been greatly reduced in scope and circulation, unable to compete as weekly new journals with rapid-fire instant news feeds available from online sources or 24-hour cable news channels. One of the three, US News, under the direction of its owner Mortimer Zuckerman, chose a different course a quarter century back: becoming the bible of annual higher education rankings. This venture has proven to be a great success, whatever the profitability of the enterprise for the company. Today, US News rankings of undergraduate universities and colleges, top high schools, and graduate and professional programs, have become a primary source of information for applicants, faculty, school staffs, employers, and alumni, and an important measure of status and achievement for the various schools and programs.
The ratings have always been controversial. How do you assess the quality of a program? Are the annual surveys measuring the right things? Are the weightings of various factors which produce a rating score and a ranking reflective of what should matter most in evaluating schools or programs? Do the ratings capture the student experience and the value of a college or graduate program? Are the distinctions among schools real, or just a factor of a need to rank order? Can the ratings be gamed? Do the ratings themselves influence some of the scores that are measured in the next ratings cycle, rather than just neutrally present a status report on a school or program?

Wendy Nelson Espeland and Michael Sauder’s new book, Engines of Anxiety, focuses on the US News rankings for one particular professional program, law schools. The authors argue that whereas there are alternative rankings for other professional schools or graduate programs, such as business schools, which provide alternatives to the US News survey, and there are many books which try to evaluate and score undergraduate programs, there is no real alternative to the US News rankings of law schools. US News divides undergraduate colleges and universities into national universities, and national small colleges, as well as regional universities and colleges. A business school can pick and choose one of the surveys which ranks its program, or components of its program highly, and sell that to prospective students. But US News has no real competition for its law school rankings (latest rankings here), for which one ranking system is applied to all law schools, virtually all of whom comply with the “system” and submit their data to the magazine each year.

The authors argue that the high compliance rate relates to the fact that US News will estimate a law school’s data for each factor measured when it does not submit its own. This would include data on job placement, admissions rates, LSAT scores, and GPAs for entering students, and the US News“estimates” are designed to be conservative — lower rather than higher than what might be the real experience. Why not get ranked 89th with your own data, than 116th when US News fills in the blanks?

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The Greens and Nature Worship By Norman Rogers

Posted By on May 16th, 2016

The Biblical view of the relationship between man and nature is set out clearly in Genesis 1:28:

God blessed them [mankind] and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

The view of the Sierra Club is well described by this:

Humans have evolved as an interdependent part of nature. Humankind has a powerful place in the environment, which may range from steward to destroyer. We must share the Earth’s finite resources with other living things and respect all life-enabling processes. Thus, we must control human population numbers and seek a balance that serves all life forms.

In the Biblical view, mankind rules nature and exploits it. In the Sierra Club view “humankind” must blend in with all the other animals and not burden the natural order. The Sierra Club view represents a step backward from monotheism to nature worship. They cannot admit that they are practicing a religion, because if they did many of the laws passed in response to lobbying by the Sierra Club and similar organizations would be unconstitutional, according to the first amendment, as a “law respecting an establishment of religion…”

John Muir, the founder and first president of the Sierra Club, made clear the religious nature of the club in his protest against the damming of the Hetch Hetchy valley in Yosemite National Park: “Dam Hetch Hetchy! As well dam for water-tanks the people’s cathedrals and churches, for no holier temple has ever been consecrated by the heart of man.”

In the preface to the book Dark Green Religion, the green religion is described as:

Dark green religion — religion that considers nature to be sacred, imbued with intrinsic value, and worthy of reverent care — has been spreading rapidly around the world.

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TEACHING WHILE WHITE: EILEEN TOPLANSKY

Posted By on May 16th, 2016

Teaching While White (TWW) is becoming an occupational hazard these days. So is being a white student, for that matter. At the “Unofficial Scripps College Survival Guide,” students learn that “white peers and faculty — portray Claremont Consortium as a haven for liberal ideology and acceptance. It’s a rhetoric that has led many white students to believe that racism does not exist on campus.” Thus, “as white students, [they] must identify the ways that [they] are engaging in the perpetuation of white supremacy and work to unlearn [their] racism.”

Of course, “reverse racism does not exist because there are no institutions that were founded with the intention of discriminating against white people on the basis of their skin. Many white people claim to be victims of reverse racism when people of color associate negative characteristics with white people or have a general dislike for them as a group. This is not reverse racism because racism is privilege plus power and people of color do not have racial privilege. Moreover, distrust or anger at white people is a legitimate response to a repetitive history and current state of racist violence.”

And so Rachel, Anna, Emi, and Jasmine, authors of the above, state that “[t]he solution to white privilege is to ‘ask people of color to absolve [white people] of [their] guilt.'” But even that is “not an adequate response… [since] whites must be accountable and hold other white students accountable, too.”

I would like to ask the authors if I decide to be black tomorrow a la Rachel Dolezal, would I still be guilty of white supremacy? After all, an Indian-American student got into medical school by pretending to be black.

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Germany: Christian Refugees Persecuted by Muslims “Incidents are deliberately downplayed and even covered up.” by Soeren Kern

Posted By on May 15th, 2016

http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/8043/germany-christians-persecuted Thousands of Christians in German refugee shelters are being persecuted by Muslims, sometimes even by their security guards, according to a new report by the NGO Open Doors. “A major obstacle to the survey was that many victims were afraid to participate. … Their concern was not only on the possible consequences for them […]

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HIS SAY: DAVID GOLDMAN ON TRUMP VS. HILLARY CLINTON

Posted By on May 12th, 2016

A fit of high dudgeon has gripped many of my Republican friends, ex-friends, and soon-to-be-ex-friends now that Donald Trump has all but won the Republican nomination. My advice to them: get over it. This presidential race will look like Alien vs. Predator. I’m for Predator, without a second’s hesitation, because he’s our Predator. For all his faults Donald Trump would be (and I’m confident will be) an incomparably better president.

I’m not pleased about the outcome of the primaries. I supported Ted Cruz and helped out in his campaign with economic research and news analysis. Yes, Trump is a vulgarian with poor impulse control. I don’t like him and find his vulgarity objectionable and his insulting remarks about Mexicans (for example) deplorable. The mother of my children is Mexican, and I take this sort of thing personally. If I ever have the opportunity I will give Trump a black eye.

But there’s a war on–three different wars, in fact. To remain neutral is moral cowardice; to choose the wrong side would be downright wicked.

First, there is a war on between Judeo-Christian principles and the political correctness inspired by the Frankfurt School and the French existentialists. Lunatics have seized control of our universities and have stamped out dissent with the zeal and vigilance of the Spanish Inquisition or the Taliban. The distinguished historian Paul Johnson said it best in a Forbes essay:

America has been a land of unrestricted comment on anything–until recently. Now the U.S. has been inundated with PC inquisitors, and PC poison is spreading worldwide in the Anglo zone. For these reasons it’s good news that Donald Trump is doing so well in the American political primaries. He is vulgar, abusive, nasty, rude, boorish and outrageous. He is also saying what he thinks and, more important, teaching Americans how to think for themselves again.

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DAVID COLLIER: ANTI-SEMITISM AT THE HEART OF THE LABOUR PARTY

Posted By on May 12th, 2016

Last night, I went to an event at the student central in Malet Street organised by supporters of the Labour Party. Part of the Birkbeck campus. The event was titled ‘Antisemitism, Zionism and the left’. The purpose was to address the ‘witch hunt’ taking place against anyone who criticises Israel. Something that is seen by some as part of a co-ordinated attack to unsettle Corbyn and remove him from power.

Given what was said, it is clear that Corbyn’s issue with antisemitism runs far deeper than a few councillors or MP’s. There were about 150 people there. Had there been a vote, every single card carrying Labour member present would probably have agreed, reposted or repeated, every single comment made by those suspended. Antisemitism is not a comment made in careless anger by these people, it is embedded in their world vision.

The panel was made up of 6 speakers.

Tariq Ali, writer, journalist and filmmaker
John Rose, author of the Myths of Zionism
Arthur Goodman:, Jews for Justice for Palestinians
Weyman Bennett, Unite Against Fascism
Lindsey German, Stop the War Coalition
Walter Wolfgang, veteran Labour Party activist
Labour and antisemitism denial

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Our Elites Can Afford to Support Looser Immigration Policies By Victor Davis Hanson

Posted By on May 12th, 2016

Support for, or opposition to, mass immigration is apparently a class issue, not an ethnic or racial issue. Elites more often support lenient immigration policies; the general public typically opposes them.

At the top of the list are Mexico’s elites. Illegal immigration results in an estimated $25 billion sent back in remittances to Mexico each year. The Mexican government worries more about remittances, the country’s No. 1 source of foreign exchange, than it does about its low-paid citizens who are in the U.S., scrimping to send money back home. Remittances also excuse the Mexican government from restructuring the economy or budgeting for anti-poverty programs.

Mexico sees the U.S. the way 19th-century elites in this country saw the American frontier: as a valuable escape hatch for the discontented and unhappy, who could flee rather than stay home and demand long-needed changes.

American employers in a number of industries — construction, manufacturing, hospitality, and others — have long favored illegal immigration. Low-wage labor cuts costs: The larger the pool of undocumented immigrants, the less pressure to raise wages. That was why Cesar Chavez’s United Farm Workers in the 1970s occasionally patrolled the southern border in its vigilante-style “illegals campaign” to keep out undocumented immigrants while opposing guest-worker programs.

Moreover, the additional social expense associated with millions of undocumented workers — in rising health-care, legal, education, and law-enforcement costs — is usually picked up by the public taxpayer, not by employers.

Ethnic elites also favor lax immigration policies. For all the caricatures of the old melting pot, millions of legal immigrants still rapidly assimilate, integrate, and intermarry. Often within two generations of arrival, they blend indistinguishably into the general population and drop their hyphenated and accented nomenclature. But when immigration is mostly illegal, in great numbers, and without ethnic diversity, assimilation stalls. Instead, a near-permanent pool of undocumented migrants offers a political opportunity for activists to provide them with collective representation.

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Obama Inc. Spares Benghazi Ringleader from Death Penalty Daniel Greenfield

Posted By on May 12th, 2016

We’re living in the enlightened future so we know that applying the death penalty to the Muslim murderers of Americans is a form of outmoded barbarism. All right-thinking people know that it should be reserved for…

1. Critics of the administration

2. Women who don’t want men using the ladies room

3. Republicans in general

Not the mastermind of the murder of an American ambassador.

The Justice Department will not seek the death penalty against the Libyan militant charged in the Benghazi attacks that killed four Americans, federal officials have announced.

Ahmed Abu Khattala has been awaiting trial in federal court in Washington in connection with the September 2012 violence at a diplomatic compound in Benghazi that killed a U.S. ambassador and three other Americans.

His attorneys had been imploring the Justice Department to remove the death penalty as a possibility if Khattala is ultimately convicted at trial.

On Tuesday, the department revealed its decision in a court filing that provided no explanation.

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Obama’s Latest Amnesty for Drug Dealers Freeing drug dealers, terrorizing communities. May 12, 2016 Daniel Greenfield

Posted By on May 12th, 2016

Charlie Brown used to run a fortified crack house in South Providence. Surveillance cameras kept an eye out for cops and a steel-reinforced door was built to keep them out. Brown had been dealing drugs for at least nine years. He had two previous drug convictions dating back to his twenties. His drug money was used to buy real estate, renovating and renting out the houses that he wasn’t using to sell drugs.

Despite all that, Brown’s lawyers tried to suggest that he lacked the “mental capacity” to understand his criminal case and suffered from lead poisoning. Mental capacity, often blamed on lead poisoning, is to modern criminal defense attorneys what phony claims of insanity used to be decades earlier.

But it didn’t work. Brown stayed in jail. Until Obama commuted his sentence.

Providence police Lt. Thomas Verdi had said, “These three defendants are notorious in Providence. This sends a message — that these individuals who are dealing drugs and involved in violent crimes will be apprehended and face serious, serious prison sentences — not locally, but in the federal system.”

He would have had better luck locally because Brown will be out next year. And he’ll be far from alone.

Artrez Nyroby Seymour was part of The Organization, a group of crack dealers in Chicago Heights that modeled their operation after the movie New Jack City. The Organization operated outside an elementary school whose children were never allowed out to play out of fear of its drug dealers.

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Kardashians Do Cuba: The World’s Coolest Place Shooting the next show at a Stalinist death-camp. Humberto Fontova

Posted By on May 12th, 2016

Thanks largely to Obama’s recent “engagement,” Stalinist Cuba has quickly become the absolute coolest place on earth.

Close on the heels of Katy Perry, The Rolling Stones and the Obama family itself, this week Karl Lagerfeld showcased his Chanel “cruise line” with a fashion-show extravaganza where Havana’s Prado Street served as the catwalk/runway for the world’s coolest models. Gisele Bundchen, Tilda Swinton and Vin Diesel monkey-shined for the paparazzi on the sidelines.

Not to be outdone, the Kardashians just arrived in Havana to shoot their next show.

Attaining such status for coolness among the world’s coolest people is not easy. Such coolness does not just land haphazardly in the lap of any random society. It must be worked on. So let us briefly peruse the societal and political characteristics that the cool and beautiful people (all liberals, needless to add) make a big media show of denouncing.

With this list in hand, we shall scan the world looking for the places where the political authorities most scrupulously eschew such wickedness and thus escape the vilification from cool people that befell such places as Apartheid South Africa; Pinochet’s Chile; Baltimore, Maryland; Ferguson, Missouri or —please give me a second to reach for the smelling salts here–the state of North Carolina.

Firstly, do not mistreat blacks. For heaven’s sake! Do not even jail blacks if they are convicted (by an independent jury during an internationally monitored trail) of being communist terrorists. South Africa learned this bitter lesson with Nelson Mandela.

In fact, the strictures of cool people stipulate that governmental authorities must not kill blacks even in self defense. Ferguson, Missouri and Baltimore, Maryland recently had this valuable lesson driven home by many cool people.

Given the above guidelines, you would certainly not want the distinction of having jailed and tortured– without even rudimentary due process– the most and longest suffering black political prisoners in the modern history of the Western hemisphere; many more political prisoners than were jailed by Apartheid South Africa, in fact.