College Republicans Do Not Have to Lie

The Student Senate of the University of Rhode Island (URI)did the right thing. They refused to accept a proposal to derecognize the College Republicans. Further, the College Republicans do not have to apologize for their farcical satire that advertised "scholarships" for white, heterosexual, American males.

Hurray for Freedom of Speech. No compelled speech (forced apology) at URI.

Of course, the SOARC, otherwise known as the Student Organizations Advisory and Review Committee were likely upset, as this oversight committee had directed the College Republicans to either publically apologize (to whom? and for what) or face derecognition.

See FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights in Education) for more, including the letters that went back and forth.

Abortion and Potential Regret

I discovered an interesting blog today: Mirror of Justice - A blog dedicated to the development of Catholic legal theory.

The notion that a woman who is pregnant with an unwanted baby might be fully informed about the procedure, the risk to herself and the risk to the baby (sometimes they survive the procedure only to be killed outside the womb), is an idea that is overdue.

According to the blog cited above, the state has a legitimate purpose in reducing the risk that a woman discovers (much too late) that (1) she was woefully uninformed about the above risks, and (2)(my addition) that she has tremendous regret at having chosen an abortion over other legitimate choices.

The blog cites Justice Sandra Day O'Connor in the Casey decision. It is worth a read.

Nothing Much to Report

I honestly do not know what to write about. Strange thing, that. Perhaps it is because I just came back from a week-long vacation in California and Nevada. Or, perhaps it is because I am still in shock over airline delays and generally poor service.

Of course, the airline I was on had pretty good service, on the trip between Chicago and Columbus. The airline steward was funny and seemed personally interested in our well being. Still, no peanuts or pretzels. And, only one small cup of liquid refreshment.

The reason for the delay getting home? The bathroom door would not lock. That took 1.5 hours to get repaired. You see, they cannot fly if the bathroom door cannot lock or unlock from the outside. Safety is important.

So, the lock had to be replaced. Oh, yeah. They could have just shut down the bathroom for the 54 minute flight. However, airline regs require that a "shut down" of a bathroom requires taping closed the door and locking the door from the outside.

And the lock would not lock from the outside. So, the lock was replaced.

And yes, we did arrive home ONLY 1.5 hours after expected.

That is an improvement over the 5 hour delay between Chicago and Los Angeles on the way to vacation!

Truckers Are Set to Voice Their Opinion

In the wake of an interesting "international" - err - should I say "national" decision to allow truckers from a neighboring county (here, Mexico) to travel deeper in to the United States (or perhaps all the way through to Canada), U.S. truckers are going to protest.

Imagine that! They are taking their time and money (and time is money in that industry) and are going to Washington D.C.

But why?

Well, they expect that truckers and trucking firms from Mexico are going to undermine the wages (about $.47 a mile around here) that U.S. truckers earn. Outsourcing within our own boundaries. Oh, yeah, I forgot! President Bush wants this. Oh, well. I suppose that what he wants, he will get, no matter the consequences to US citizens.

The taxpayers will likely be paying for the unemployment benefits of a whole lot of truckers. Who cares about that? After all, we consumers (taxpayers) will also be paying less for all our goods - after all, shipping costs are quite a huge part of the price of each and every item that we buy.

Of course, there is also the issue of the road worthiness and safety of the trucks coming from Mexico. But, perhaps, this issue will be solved by charging all the suppliers less money to ship stuff, and more stuff will be shipped, and costs to maintain trucks will be less, etc, etc, etc.

Anyway, U.S. truckers are planning to drive around state capitols and the US Capitol, slowly.

Just keep on trucking!

HIgh School Student Wants to Exercise Free Speech Between Classes

I have been working on a motion for leave to appeal, and forgot entirely about posting on my blog!

The administration says that the student can hand out information, but the high school is worried about the content of the material as well as the places that the information will be shared.

If the subject of homosexuality is discussed at all at the school, they why not allow opposing viewpoints? Many school districts include homosexual instruction from early in their elementary school curriculum. I do no know if that is the case in the school district in question.

The student in question wants to hold a fairly widespread presentation on the "Day of Truth." The "Day of Truth" is a day where Christians attempt to present their idea that homosexual behavior is immoral. Period.

Unfortunately, it appears that the students who wish to have the "Day of Silence" do not have to jump through all the procedural hoops as those who wish to have a "Day of Truth." This is sometimes the case when one viewpoint is considered "harmful" for people to have to hear or see.

I remember that sort of thing from my own high school days. We could not talk about the Viet Nam War unless it was pro-war at my high school. Also, we could not put information regarding any drug treatment centers in our high school newspaper. So, things have not really changed. Free speech exists only for the "politically correct" viewpoint. In my own high school, I suspect that the reasoning for censorship was that the school should support what the parents wanted their kids to know - and protect the kids from "knowledge beyond their years." Or something like that.

What is the Day of Silence? A day at high schools that is designed by students to inform other students that gay students need support. OK. That is a reasonable exercise of free speech. Note: the students are "speaking" all day long - by their silence. And everyone is supposed to receive that message, no matter whether in class, on the quad, at lunch, between classes, etc.

The Superintendent of the school district indicated that the officials were in no way trying to stop the student and that the event is on the schedule.

There appears to be a disagreement over that fact. The student claims that the school always makes him write a whole lot of letters and asks for meetings with his parents every time he tries to have an event. And, he asserts that has happened this time, too.

Oh, the student in question is the president of the Christian club at his high school.

As an aside, the high school has a really cool logo.

ADF helps communities fight ACLU

As you may know, the ACLU receives taxpayer funds so it can fight government intrusion on personal Constitutional rights. That seems OK on its face. Individuals rarely have enough time or money to fight the government when the government abrogates individual rights. Historically, the ACLU fought the good fight, and it seemed OK that the ACLU could use governmental taxpayer monies to fight the government. The little guy could get his/her day in court. Wonderful.

However, the ACLU has been, for quite some time, dedicated to protecting individuals
from having to tolerate any intrusion of religion (especially Christian religious symbols, prayer, etc.) into their visual or auditory sensory intake systems. It appears that the ACLU believes that the mere existence of a cross, or the recitation of a simple dedicatory prayer, abrogates an individual's right to be free of religious influence.

The argument is, basically, that because the government provides the land, the building, the time, the space for the religious message, that is a de facto violation of the First Amendment. Even if the government sells the property or transfers the property to a private individual or group to avoid "sponsoring, endorsing, promoting, or financing religious symbols." Therefore, if a cross was placed on private property, say, in 1950, and the private property was given to a public park, say, in 1989, then the cross is, according to ACLU, now (2007) being "sponsored" by the government. If the government mows the law, pays for repair of the cross, allows religious groups a permit to gather around the cross for prayer, etc., that is governmental endorsement, promotion, and financing of the religious symbol. Therefore, the government chose which religious symbol it would endorse. Since a cross is Christian, the government impermissibly chooses one religion over another.

The separation of church and state notion, derived from the First Amendment and a phrase in a Thomas Jefferson letter, seems to require (according to the ACLU) total exclusion of religious ideas, symbols, and programs from the public sphere.

Moreover, the ACLU attends government meetings. What does the ACLU do at these meetings? It objects to dedicatory prayers at the start of meetings. The ACLU bullies small governmental entities into forgoing long-standing practices on the notion that the U.S. Constitution requires that governmental actors refrain from mentioning God or any other religious idea.

And the government folds. It gives up. It hands the ACLU exactly what it wants (elimination of God from the public sphere) without a fight. Why?

You see, governmental entities know that a legal defense of their practices will cost, perhaps, more than their annual intake of property and income taxes. The ACLU is paid, partly, by taxpayer funds. The government has to pay for its own defense. Therefore, the government gives up. The ACLU wins without having to actually take every case to court. Bully tactics work.

Thank goodness that the Alliance Defense Fund is stepping it to help government actors understand their Constitutional rights and to help them understand how to protect their own interests.

"Christmas Story" Director and Illegal Alien

It is purported that a young adult Mexican national, caused a traffic accident wherein Bob Clark (director of "A Christmas Story") and his son, Ariel Hanrath-Clark were killed. The Mexican was driving a SUV, without a license and purportedly under the influence of alcohol, and of course, received only minor injuries. I suppose that California actually charged the Mexican with vehicular manslaughter. Perhaps they will prosecute only the DUI.

The good news? Virginia Kice, a spokeswoman for Americans for Legal Immigration Political Action Committee, reports that the Mexican will be turned over to our federal immigration officials after the proceedings in Los Angeles are completed.

The bad news? Probably, INS will not do anything this this guy other than put him back on the street. This is, after all, his first traffic violation, and has no priors other than soliciting a prostitute.

Of course, the only real significance to this story is that it happened on beautiful Pacific Coast Highway and that two innocent lives were lost at the hands of an illegal immigrant driving with no license. No story here, I suppose.

Ethics Breach Means Law Firm Disgorges Fees

You have to love it. An insurance defense law firm has been ordered to give up millions of dollars in fees that were paid to it. The problem? The firm assisted one client to set up a competing business. Of course, that was against the interests of another client.

But to make matters worse, the law firm breached its duty to an exiting client by "participating in a scheme to transfer policyholders to another insurer."

All in all, the law firm had to forfeit all the legal fees that it received from the original client, placed at $3.4 million.

I cannot help but wonder what partner gave his/her OK for the above activities!

Central Michigan University Students May Discriminate on the Basis of Politics

On a few occasions during the past four years, I have noted that a ploy to destroy some college student organizations comes from within. What? You ask? Well, if a person is an "outsider" to any given organization, and really, really dislikes the message/dogma/political message, etc. of that organization, the "outsider" can join the organization and try to change things from the inside.

I first heard of this type of tactic way back in 1974 from a man I was dating at the time. Apparently, it is an effective technique.

Yesterday, Central Michigan University revised its policy that banned ideological and political groups from discriminating (via membership) on the basis of political persuasion." How this works: a libertarian group can now require that its members be libertarians. Or, perhaps more importantly, the board of the campus Republican club can now insist that its members be Republicans, not Democrats, or Green Party, or whatever.

However, I could not find any mention of this decision on the University's website.

Willful Ignorance and Clearing the Underbrush

According to 9th Circuit Judge Alex Kozinski, willful ignorance amounts to knowledge of criminal activity. This was reported earlier today.

Judge Kozinski is a well-regarded jurist. See
here, here, and here..

This jury instruction is known as a "Jewell instruction" in the Ninth Circuit.

One of dissenting judges,
Judge Susan Graber, said that this kind of instruction creates a crime that does not exist in the text of the statute, and that this instruction "transform[s] knowledge into mens rea more closely akin to negligence or recklessness."

So, if this is a serious problem, why has the "Jewell instruction" existed in the Ninth Circuit Model Jury Instructions? Why has it not been changed since 1976?

Milberg Weiss Indictment

As reported in the Federalist Society's recent publication, Class Action Watch, a
major law firm that specializes in class actions is in a heap of trouble. It seems likely that this law firm actually PAID plaintiffs to be plaintiffs. Nope, more than that, only the lead plaintiffs got paid (by the law firm) to be plaintiffs.

One guy, a plaintiff in more than 50 class action suits, Seymour M. Lazar was indicted for receiving more than $2.4 million in payments for more than twenty-five years.

The charges against the law firm partners? racketeering, conspiracy, mail fraud, money laundering, filing false tax returns and obstruction of justice.

The law firm in question responded to the indictment.

Of course, this is a slightly old story, but see the indictment here.

At least the Ohio Attorney General fired this same law firm because he thought the firm's indictment "severely compromised" its representation of clients.