As many of you know, I love the NASA website and the images produced by the agency. This week however the folks at NASA out did themselves with this ultra cool, ultraviolet image of the sun resembling a giant flaming jack-o’-lantern. The image from its Solar Dynamics Observatory satellite was released for Halloween.
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I have the pleasure this morning of giving the closing keynote at the 37th Annual Eastern District Conference in California. The conference is being held at the Ritz-Carlton Lake Tahoe resort. My keynote will address the erosion of free speech protections in West and will be held in the closing plenary session from 9:15 a.m. – 10:30 a.m.
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Emory University University is now the focus of the national debate over the conflict between academic freedom and university rules against the use of racial slurs, even as part of academic work. Professor Paul Zwier is currently on suspension over he was accused of using the “n-word” in the course of a class and later in a meeting about the controversy. He first used the word to discuss who the word “negro” was likely used in a case as a sanitized version of the slur. Students complained and charges were brought, including an allegation that Zwier used the word again in an office discussion with a student on the incident. This month, a report from the Office of Equity and Inclusion that recommended Zwier be suspended for up to two more years due to his usage of the racial slur.
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Good news for kids around the world! Researchers at Wageningen University and Research in the Netherlands have determined that it is possible to grow food on Mars except for spinach. Of course, Matt Damon was the first to demonstrate this finding. Unfortunately, the selection thus far is not what many of us would prefer: garden cress, rocket, tomato, radish, rye, quinoa, chives, peas and leek. Only spinach failed to grow.
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Rep. Liz Cheney has been much in the news with controversial statements like her suggestion that the Turkish invasion of Syria was due to the impeachment inquiry by the Democrats. Many of us were critical of that comment but one person seems to have taken his anger with Cheney out on . . . the University of Wyoming. That’s right, Connecticut-based author and psychologist Hank Weisinger has threatened to take back his father’s collection of papers related to the Superman comic series because he is upset that the state has Cheney among her elected officials.
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Harvard Professor Alan Dershowitz once dared his accusers to sue him in the ongoing controversy over his role in the alleged abuse of underaged girls in the Jeffrey Epstein scandal. One did just that. Virginia Giuffre has claimed that she was forced to have sex as an underaged girl with friends and acquaintances of Epstein, including Dershowitz. Dershowitz called her a liar on multiple occasions, including statements he never met Giuffre and that she is a “serial perjurer,” a “serial liar,” and a “serial prostitute.” She sued him for defamation and U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska in New York has rejected Dershowitz’s motion to dismiss and held that Dershowitz will have to face a trial on her claims. Former judge Paul Cassell has also leveled charges against Dershowitz as one of the abusers.
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University of Washington Professor Holly M. Barker has published an article “Unsettling SpongeBob and the Legacies of Violence on Bikini Bottom” that seeks to strip away the true meaning of SpongeBob SquarePants as a colonizing, violent cultural appropriator. Moreover, the cartoon is deemed as “whitewashing of violent American military activities” against natives of the Pacific.” What is most remarkable however is that she appears to be serious.
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Academics often struggle with the confining language of grants, particularly federal grants, in purchasing equipment and hiring staff. Former Drexel University professor, Dr. Chikaodinaka D. Nwankpa, has been accused of an alleged departure from any reasonable interpretation. The former head of Drexel’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering allegedly spent nearly $200,000 in federal grant funds on trips to strip clubs and sports bars in Philadelphia. Worse yet for Drexel, the school will now have to pay for the strip club parties. What is fascinating is that Nwankpa has not been criminally charged and he has only been barred from government contracting for six months.
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We have previously discussed the trend of students and faculty preventing speakers from being heard on campus without any disciplinary action taken by universities. The latest example occur at Georgetown University Law School where students and faculty opposed an invitation of Acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan to speak on campus. It was a wonderful opportunity for an exchange of views but both students and faculty wanted opposing views to be silenced. When the school went forward with the event, protesters immediately stopped the event. CREDO Action – the advocacy arm of the progressive nonprofit group CREDO — has admitted that Georgetown students participated in the action and videotapes clearly show those responsible. However, Georgetown would not commit to taking disciplinary action despite repeated inquiries.
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As previously discussed the controversy over the race-based criteria used Harvard University’s undergraduate admissions program and whether it discriminates against Asians. Not only do the criteria limit Asian-American students to 20 percent of the class but the plaintiffs alleged that such students are routinely given low scores on “personal ratings” to further reduce their admission numbers. U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs in Boston has now rejected those claims and upheld the admissions criteria, writing in the 130 page opinion that “The court will not dismantle a very fine admissions program that passes constitutional muster, solely because it could do better.” This case could prove a major new challenge to race-based admissions as it now works up to the court of appeals.
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Professor Kyle Kusz, who teaches a kinesiology professor at the University of Rhode Island, has declared yet another example of the culture of white supremacy in America: Tom Brady. Kusz concludes that it is white supremacy that explains the popularity of Brady in his book “Making American White Men Great Again: Tom Brady, Donald Trump, and the Allure of White Male Omnipotence in Post-Obama America.” It is a bizarre theory since, as I have patiently explained in the past, Brady’s success is only explained by the fact that he sold his soul to the Devil decades ago and he is watched over by a barely disguised Cerberus in the form of Bill Belichick.
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It is my great pleasure to give a keynote speech at the Federal Identity Conference in Tampa, Florida today — an international gathering of government, private, and academic experts in the field of biometric technology. I will be presenting material from two forthcoming law review articles on privacy in the biometric age. I will be speaking at the Tampa Convention Center at 10:15 am.
Continue reading “Turley To Speak At Biometic Conference”I have previously written about the toleration shown by colleges and universities in students and faculty disrupting speakers with whom they disagree. This has included protests where students have been prevented from studying as other students accuse them of privilege or racism. Administrators at schools like Dartmouth have allowed such abusive conduct to occur without disciplinary action, even apologizing to the protesters. Students at Columbia University library prevented College Republicans from speaking at a meeting while students at Northwestern prevented a class from being held. The latest example occurred last week at Georgetown where the Georgetown University College Republicans were prevented from holding an event critical of climate change theories. It is precisely the type of diversity of opinion that should be welcomed on a campus, but student protesters stopped others from hearing these views. As with the prior incidents, there is no indication of any punishment for the students in stopping the exercise of free speech on the Georgetown campus.
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There is an interesting story in the New York Times that the city has decided that any of its 1.1 million public school students will be allowed to skip classes without penalties to join the global youth climate strikes to be held this Friday. As someone who has long advocated for action on climate change and opposes the Trump environmental policies, I am entirely in support of demonstrations. However, the decision raises some concerns over how the New York Public School system chooses which protests to sanction. Would students be permitted next month to attend anti-climate change protests? If not, this authority is being used in a viewpoint discriminatory manner.
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The annual Annenberg Constitution Day Civics Survey is the latest chilling survey revealing the lack of knowledge of most Americans about their own system of government. While this country remains highly patriotic, most Americans are woefully ignorant of the details of their constitutional system. According to the survey by the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania, only 39 percent of Americans can name all three branches of government.
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