A reader of Schools for Misrule points out that the book’s endnotes (at p. 240) do not include a source for one of its statements (at p. 14 of the text) about law faculty political disparities. (“Democrats at last count outnumbered Republicans 28 to 1 on the Stanford faculty, 23 to 1 at Columbia….”) The omission was inadvertent; the numbers come from a study by David Horowitz and Joseph Light entitled “Representation of Political Perspectives in Law and Journalism Faculties” whose findings are summarized, among other places, in this Oct. 13, 2005 post at Paul Caron’s TaxProf. Sorry!
Archive for 2011
Update: French court tosses “book review defamation” case
According to Prof. Joseph Weiler’s website, a tribunal in France has not only dismissed the criminal libel complaint that Prof. Karin Calvo-Goller filed against him, but has imposed a monetary penalty on the complainant for abuse of process. The dispute arose over a negative book review in an academic journal Weiler edits (earlier here, here, etc.).
“Stalker takes legal action against victim”
U.K.: A man jailed for four months for breaching a restraining order against a woman he had stalked “has taken legal action against her for ‘ruining his reputation’ with comments on her website.” [Telegraph]
Hospital drug shortages, cont’d
I’ve got a new post up at Cato at Liberty on the avoidable medical crisis brought about in part by an FDA crackdown — and how the government might manage to make it still worse. I quote commenter “Greg S.” from our earlier thread (& White Coat).
Schools for Misrule review roundup
Professor Bainbridge has just opened his copy, and in the mean time has assembled some of the favorable reviews and summaries of Schools for Misrule that other leading bloggers have already printed. You can buy your copy of the book there or here (usual Amazon commission applies).
Robert VerBruggen has written a favorable review of the book at National Review, under the title “The Gilded Guild” (paywall). A few highlights:
…An important theme here is that in law, careerism is a powerful force. As a result, the worst left-wing impulses of the legal academy tend to stumble when they come into conflict with lawyers’ self-interest, and to succeed when they advance it.
In particular, as the book relates, law students themselves have served as an effective check on some kinds of ideological adventurism by law faculties when such adventurism threatens to deprive them of a serviceable legal education. On the other hand, there’s often less of a check on bad ideas when they advance the welfare of lawyers present and future:
… And that’s where we see the true genius of legal academia, and the legal profession in general: It manages to argue, on moral grounds, that it deserves more work, more money, and more power.
Yesterday I spoke to an enthusiastic crowd at the Cato Institute auditorium in Washington, D.C. Judge Douglas Ginsburg of the D.C. circuit was generous in his comments, and there was a lively Q-and-A with the audience. Cato will post the event as a podcast at its media site.
The radio campaign for the book also proceeds apace. I was on the Mike Rosen show out of Denver on Tuesday, and in the next few days will appear on Kevin Whalen’s WRKO show in Boston (Sunday), Cam Edwards’ national show, and Steve Malzburg’s show on NYC’s WABC (both Monday).
John Edwards, victim
Even the disgraced White House hopeful deserves better than to be tripped up by slippery and undefined campaign-finance laws, argues Mickey Kaus (at the Daily Caller, new home of Kausfiles).
U.K.: “Roadblocks set up to catch drivers smoking”
Authorities in Essex say they will check ashtrays and impose fines over smoking in company cars and commercial vehicles, which has been banned in England since 2007. [Telegraph via Stuttaford, NRO] We may need to develop a new terminology here: was Nanny herself ever so bossy and intrusive?
If you drink more than 1000 cans of cola a day…
… you may want to know more about the Center for Science in the Public Interest’s “caramel coloring” cancer scare (earlier). Pediatric Insider and Abnormal Use provide some needed perspective.
“Why bad teachers survive”
A chart from the Chicago Tribune editorial opinion section on the stages needed to remove an inadequate Chicago educator.
Meanwhile, some Andrew Sullivan readers point out that contrasts between the public and private sectors can be overdone, since it can be legally troublesome for private managers, too, to fire poorly performing workers. I wrote a whole book tackling related themes some years back.
Office productivity prizes for prosecutors
Like other variations on contingency pay for those charged with enforcing the law, they sound like a really bad idea [Greenfield]