Had it somehow been revealed, a mere decade ago, that scientific journals had kept tabs on the race or sexual orientation of its writers, it would have sent waves of outrage through the scientific community. How dare anyone suggest that a scientist’s race, gender or love life play a role in assessing the quality of her work, her ideas or her discoveries? Scandalous. Outrageous. Offensive. Until it wasn’t.

Studies continue to reaffirm that diversity — on a multitude of axes — boosts performance and the quality of work across disciplines. Science is no exception. Only researchers as diverse as the people and phenomena they study, experts said, can accurately capture the dizzying amount of variation in the natural world and innovate beyond it. Scientists who hail from across spectra of gender, race, ethnicity, disability, sexuality and more are also uniquely equipped to collaborate with communities that have been ignored, silenced or even exploited and abused by the discriminatory practices of Western scientists.

Continue reading →

Dr. SJ made the most delicious lemon cake, and as we sat around the table sipping tea and licking lemon glaze off our fingers, she asked me, “Do you think it’s possible that Trump could actually win?” “Sure,” I replied, in the “anything’s possible” way that I do. Not so much at the hand of people who like Trump, but at the hand of people who reject the possibility that Biden will be the last liberal president, and while Trump has done enormous damage to the institutions of government out of his combination of astounding ignorance and self-aggrandizement, the institutions are still there, badly bruised but standing.

Will Biden pay back the left wing of his party, the Squad, Bernie and Liz, by letting them reinvent a nation in their image? Will they follow Biden into power and do so then? Will Biden last long enough to keep the ambitious Kamala from doing so, not because she has any belief in progressive destruction of the institutions of government but because it will promote her ambition to pretend to be woke rather than a cop? Continue reading →

An action was commenced by the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to enjoin implementation of Trump’s Executive Order prohibiting the federal government, its contractors and grant recipients, from engaging in “diversity training.”

Today, however, many people are pushing a different vision of America that is grounded in hierarchies based on collective social and political identities rather than in the inherent and equal dignity of every person as an individual. This ideology is rooted in the pernicious and false belief that America is an irredeemably racist and sexist country; that some people, simply on account of their race or sex, are oppressors; and that racial and sexual identities are more important than our common status as human beings and Americans.

Continue reading →

The law, in its majestic equality, forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal their bread.

―-Anatole France

It’s no crime to be poor. But then, the connection of poverty to crime gives rise to a great many issues, many of which are being brought to the forefront by reformers of late. Why does a person charged with petty theft sit in jail awaiting trial while presumptively innocent when an accused killer walks free because he has the wherewithal to make bail? Continue reading →

Between the hysteria and obsession with the Supreme Court, in general, and believing that it’s a bunch of hacks doing the Republican’s bidding, people seem oblivious to the fact that elections are run by states. Even federal elections. State legislatures enact the laws under which their state’s elections are run, and challenges to the laws are heard in state courts.

Because of COVID and the huge expansion of mail-in voting, combined with the push to get demographics that did not traditionally vote (the 18 to 29 cohort, for example), and the concurrent expansion of the franchise to people with prior felony convictions, this election is replete with novel issues that were poorly considered and left unaddressed until the last minute. Continue reading →

On the third call to do something about Walter Wallace, two cops killed him as he approached them with the knife he refused to drop. Protests, riots and looting followed, as did attacks on the cops deployed to stop them, including one officer run down by a pickup truck. The usual round of rationalizations followed, from Wolf Blitzer wondering why cops can’t just shoot to wound to contentions that, had Wallace been white, cops wouldn’t have killed him because reasons.

This isn’t a new scenario, and we’ve heard the arguments proffered to justify the protests, riots and looting. Continue reading →

Last night, Amy Coney Barrett was sworn in as the newest associate justice of the United States Supreme Court by Justice Clarence Thomas. This should come as no surprise to anyone, as it was absolutely certain that it would happen, and yet it brought howls of anger, outrage and condemnation. That should probably come as no surprise either, as it’s become America’s favorite pastime.

The dire predictions of disaster have generated a variety of ways to “fix” the Court now that the Republicans have “illegitimately” seized control of it by a 6-3 conservative majority. But this begs the question: Does the Court need fixin’? Liberal Harvard lawprof Noah Feldman was ahead of the curve on this question. Continue reading →

Not too long ago, there was an argument on the twitters between a friend of mine, an old criminal defense lawyer, and a prominent think-tank crim law reformer about jury nullification. The theorist was pandering to unduly passionate reformers about the glories of nullification when the lawyer called him out.

The old lawyer argued that, based upon a career trying cases in front of juries, the belief that they’re the defendant’s friend, hate criminal laws and, given a free hand to ignore the law, would acquit defendants in the name of justice, jury nullification was no silver bullet, but a steaming pile of malarkey. Others with neither the old lawyer’s experience, nor any actual experience in crim law, joined into the fray to parrot the reform belief that Jury nullification will absolutely work to save defendants from bad laws and never be used to convict the innocent. Continue reading →

Five hundred thousand dollars wasn’t enough, so the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors upped the ante to a cool mil. Not for new school books. Not for free lunches for hungry kids. Not to add more teachers. They had a far more important need at stake.

Dauber told the board the audit is “urgent.”

“Students are returning to campus now, and when they do, the epidemic of sexual violence will return with them,” Dauber said.

Continue reading →

It’s happening on the left coast, where weird things happen with sufficient frequency to suggest that it’s not worthy of being taken seriously, but it reflects a shift in perspective that could soon come to a state near you. Proposition 16 will be on the ballot in California.

A “yes” vote supports this constitutional amendment to repeal Proposition 209 (1996), which stated that the government and public institutions cannot discriminate against or grant preferential treatment to persons on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in public employment, public education, and public contracting.

Amending the state Constitution isn’t unusual in California, since legal stability is for squares. The point of Prop 16 is to repeal Prop 209, which prohibits discrimination. Continue reading →