Patrick Reidy did well in school, graduating salutatorian of his class at Notre Dame. Later going to Yale Law School and first interning, later clerking, for Judge Thomas Hardiman at the Third Circuit. After doing a fellowship at at Yale Law School’s Center for Private Law, he got a gig as an associate professor at Notre Dame law school. Not too shabby, right?

So why shouldn’t a Supreme Court justice pick Patrick Reidy as a clerk?

After graduation, he entered formation with the Congregation of Holy Cross — the order that founded and continues to serve at Notre Dame — and earned his Master of Divinity from Notre Dame.
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Pamela Paul writes about why she’s not keen on joining protests. It’s not that she doesn’t like the outdoors, or has bladder issues. It’s that they seem kind of ineffective, on the one hand, and intolerant, on the other.

Intolerant?  Try being the skunk at the garden party.

I’ve never been much of a tribalist or a joiner, and have no use for conformity of thought or dress. Unless it’s Halloween or a costume party, I don’t like playing dress-up. Nor do I want to be part of a group where people might think I accidentally left my pussy hat at home. When I see a bunch of white kids wearing kaffiyehs I can’t help wonder whatever happened to the whole anti-cultural appropriation thing. Continue reading →

Over at VC, Ilya Somin has an excellent post about Biden’s “parole in place” policy. which should be about as uncontroversial from a policy perspective as any presidential act could be.

Today, President Biden  announced a policy granting “parole in place” to undocumented immigrant spouses of US citizens who have been in the US for at least 10 years, and meet some other criteria. Those eligible can apply for parole status. If they get it, they will then have a three-year period during which they will have work permits and can apply for “green card” permanent residency (that status will eventually also enable them to apply for citizenship). Currently spouses of US citizens are already eligible to apply for green cards. But if they entered the US illegally, they are required to meet onerous conditions, such as first leaving the United States, and staying away for up to ten years. About 500,000 people could potentially benefit from the program.

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While many people who find Trump so personally repugnant that they could never vote for him under any circumstances, that doesn’t mean that they’re enthralled with the alternative. There is a debate coming up, during which we may learn that neither candidate is fit for office, even if Joe Biden isn’t as bad as Trump. Then what?

I posed the question on the twitters and the responses were . . . interesting.

What do we do when we have a presidential debate and neither one proves capable of coherent thought?

— Scott Greenfield (@ScottGreenfield) June 16, 2024

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For a while now, Jon Haidt has been arguing that social media plays a significant role in the spike in anxiety and depression in teens. While it hasn’t received universal approval, it also hasn’t received much condemnation. There just aren’t a great many people who want to argue that social media in excess is good for anyone, particularly when it comes to kids using their smartphones to access social media during school.

Surgeon General Vivek Murthy has come up with a solution: Put a surgeon general’s warning on social media. Continue reading →

My father died in 2019. Dr. SJ’s father passed last November. Neither of us has a dad to send a card to, make breakfast for or give a gift to. The days of doing that are behind us now, but we don’t forget.

Mothers were the ones who nurtured us, fed us, wiped our tears and kissed our boo boos. Dads? They were the ones who would be stern when they got home. Things were a bit different back when Dr. SJ and I were young.

Dads were the ones who fixed things that broke and were too busy mowing the lawn to play catch. When we misbehaved, they were the ones mom told us we should wait for when they came home. We didn’t really appreciate dads as children. But we grew up and realized how important they were in our lives. Continue reading →

Not being a gun guy, it’s unclear to me what purpose a bump stock serves other than to allow someone to shoot a lot of bullets very quickly by using the rifle’s recoil to do the trigger pulling work. They are useful to people with disability, or so I’m told, though I’m not sure why and it doesn’t really matter. And after what happened in Vegas, I can well appreciate why bump stocks can present a horrific menace that should no more exist than machine guns in civilian hands.

Your mileage may vary, but I just can’t see any reason to allow the sale of bump stocks, other than to prepare for battle with…someone. Continue reading →

Every once in a while, someone who sees herself as a radical reveals more than they intend. This twit is one such time.

I can't imagine wanting to go to work at @citi this badly. Get a coffee dude. Listen to the scientists. #summerofheat pic.twitter.com/muUNJJYytD

— Valerie Costa (@valeriecosta) June 12, 2024

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Cold cases are cold, and the failure to close old, cold cases is often used to condemn law enforcement with good reason. After all, cops are brilliant on TV shows, capable of using a combination of intuition and magic to figure out whodunnit. But that’s not working in Florida, so the attorney general, Ashley Moody, has come up with an alternative plan when CSI fails her.

Attorney General Ashley Moody, with the Florida Association of Crime Stoppers, Florida Sheriffs Association and Florida Department of Corrections, at the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office today announced the launch of Cold Case Cards. Each playing card features a photograph and information about an unsolved homicide or missing-person case. More than 5,000 decks will be distributed to Florida jails and prisons to generate new leads and insights from inmates to help solve longstanding criminal investigations.

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In contrast to the kerfuffle over Justice Sam Alito’s answers to Lauren Windsor, Chief Justice John Roberts said all the right things.

Ms. Windsor pressed the chief justice about religion, saying, “I believe that the founders were godly, like were Christians, and I think that we live in a Christian nation and that our Supreme Court should be guiding us in that path.”

Chief Justice Roberts quickly answered, “I don’t know if that’s true.”

He added: “I don’t know that we live in a Christian nation. I know a lot of Jewish and Muslim friends who would say maybe not, and it’s not our job to do that.”

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