I previously wrote a column opposing the claim of Myriad Genetics over patenting human genes in the case of Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, No. 12-398. The Supreme Court appears to have the same concerns. The Court unanimously ruled this afternoon against the Utah company and by extension of the Federal Circuit in claiming such property rights.
Continue reading “Supreme Court Rules Against Patenting Of Human Genes”
Strobridge Elementary Principal Charles Hill has implemented what he considers a key public safety effort: a toy gun buy back program. A child who turns in “their guns” will be given a book and a raffle ticket to win one of four bicycles. I fail to see why such programs are worthy of such effort. Not only will it have no likely impact on the natural tendency of children to play such games, I fail to see the the value of such programs. Continue reading “California School Launches Buy Back Program For Toy Guns”
Johnny Cook is not just a Georgia bus driver but a father. It was perhaps the later status that led Cook to voice a concern on Facebook over children who were going hungry at Haralson County Schools. He posted a comment on Facebook after learning that a sixth-grade student was denied lunch because he was 40 cents short to buy lunch. Cook wrote on Facebook “This child is already on reduced lunch and we can’t let him eat. Are you kidding me? … The next time we can’t feed a kid for forty cent, please call me. We will scrape up the money.” That was posted on May 21. On May 23 he was fired by Superintendent Brett Stanton (left).
Continue reading “Bus Driver Fired For Expressing Concern Over Child Going Without School Lunches”
There was an extraordinary scene in Texas that pitted student rights against school authority at the graduation for Joshua High School. Remington Reimer (great name by the way) has been accepted to the United States Naval Academy and was the speaker at the graduation. When he began his speech he mentioned that the school officials threatened to cut off his mike if he deviated from his speech. The mike then went dead.
We have yet another case of the “zero tolerance” policies being imposed in our school as an excuse of zero judgment or though by school officials.We have been discussing the steady stream of absurd actions taken by school officials under “zero tolerance” policies. For a prior column, click here. In the latest case, an 11-year-old boy was suspended from school for talking about guns on a school bus. That’s right, for saying the word “gun.” The boy reportedly said that he wish he could have defended the school with a gun to stop the massacre.
Continue reading “Eleven Year Old Boy Suspended For Using Word “Gun” On Maryland School Bus”
There have long been complaints about the temperament and civility of Judge Edith Jones of the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Indeed, when I clerked on that court, Jones was rather infamous for her run-ins with colleagues and others. Jones has been criticized for her extremely conservative views and, more importantly, her perceived intolerance (and hostility) for opposing views and colleagues. This includes telling another judge to “shut up” in oral argument. Now, she is facing a formal complaint over a Federalist Society speech given at the University of Pennsylvania where she allegedly said that certain racial groups are predisposed to crime and that defenses like mental competence and actual innocence are “red herrings” among other bizarre claims.
Submitted by: Mike Spindell, Guest Blogger
When I started as a college student about 50 years ago I took the Sociology I course as a required subject. There is little I remember from that course and less I remember about the instructor, except for his introductory words on the first day of class. To paraphrase him he said: “You will be taking a lot of courses in what are called the Social Sciences. Approach them all, including mine, with skepticism because they really aren’t science courses like those you’ve learned as a high school student. They will spend a lot of lecture time though trying to prove they are truly scientific, don’t believe them”. His clear meaning was that although the Social Sciences try to operate as if they are using the scientific method of experiments/research to prove theories, most of the work done is skewed to prove the theory of choice by those doing the research. In the five decades since that lecture my own experience and reading has taught me how true the advice from that long forgotten Sociology instructor is.
The social science that has my attention at the moment is Economics. I’ve read many an economist, from all points on the political spectrum and frankly while I favor those such as Krugman and Baker, I take most of what they say as opinion, rather than scientifically determined truth. Yes I’ve even read “Freakonomics” by Levitt and Dubner and the follow-up “Superfreakonomics” and while they were good reads I see them as not only bad science, but a conflation of economics with other social sciences that is superficial at best. This is really the problem with many economists and their theories. They presume to divine human behavior via the prism of economic theory. In the end their proofs are merely retrofitting their pre-judgments. That brings me to the “Austerity” movement which has hampered the recovery from the economic “depression” brought on by the wars and tax reductions of the Bush years, while it has also caused a crisis worldwide through its imposition upon many nations. The foundation research that has justified this “Austerity” movement came from two Harvard Professors: Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff. A University of Massachusetts student Thomas Herndon found that their work was filled with mathematical errors in their research spreadsheets. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/16/reinhart-rogoff-austerity-research-errors_n_3094015.html Their spreadsheets were their “proofs” that economic austerity promotes economic recovery and this theory, long held by many economists, is the basis for the imposition of austerity onto so many Nation’s economies and is the source of bitter national debate in our own. Though I will present some overview and links amplifying “austerity’s” false assumptions, my interest is in presenting my view on why the powers that be have imposed this doctrine, whose effects fall squarely upon 99% of the people of these nations, leaving the wealthiest unscathed. Continue reading “The Austerity Conspiracy”
Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger
The idea for this guest blog came from Anonymously Yours, who has been around at Jonathan Turley’s Blog, for at least as long as I have. We have had an E Mail relationship, offline for many years. He sent me the link that I’ll be basically using and I think his judgment was on the money. The topic is George Washington’s Farewell Address, how prescient our First President was and how much good advice he gave that we should heed today, after the passage of 218 years.
Like every other American child what I learned about George Washington came from school and little else. When I started learning about him and the revolutionary war, it was common when speaking about him to call him “The Father of Our Country”. As the years passed this description has seemingly fallen out of consciousness and we usually only see him referenced wearing a white wig and a tri-corn hat on President’s Day selling cars. Certainly too, as my education progressed through High School and College, the view of Washington as one of our Founding Father’s was diminished as compared to his more glamorous and brilliant cohort among the Founding Fathers, Jefferson, Franklin and Madison. It is easy to see why this change came about. When you think of Washington, most would see the famous portrait I’ve used as a picture above. The portrait shows a prim-mouthed, rather dour man with a wig. History has given us certain personal details like his famous wooden false teeth. History has also supplied a childish, hagiographic mythology that he never told a lie and threw a coin across the Potomac. There is even some debate about his competence as a General. Indeed, the traitor Benedict Arnold is considered by many to be the best military mind on our side during the Revolution.
So when AY sent me his E Mail, I was at first skeptical about the project until I read the link. While in some sense I knew about his Farewell Address in the back of my mind, rereading it and the commentary on it caused me to rethink George Washington. As I see now he was a great man, in a true sense and he at least gave this country a good start. He also made a contribution regarding how he felt this country should comport itself that is relevant today, although certainly not heeded. Let’s explore Washington’s message and see what wisdom we can draw from it today, or should have drawn in the ensuing 218 years since it was written. Continue reading “The Father of Our Country”
We just discussed a story of a kindergartner who was disciplined for a LEGO gun that he brought to school that was smaller than a quarter. Now we have another kindergartner who was suspended for the rest of the year (10 days) for bringing an orange-tipped toy gun to school. Rather than simply discuss the matter with his parents, school officials proceeded to interrogate him for hours without calling his parents– a growing problem that we discussed in another story today. The toy was in the boy’s backpack and he was pulled into an interrogation with police. I cannot imagine what officers did for two hours in questioning a 5 year old child but it is clear that Calvert County officials have zero crime and even less judgment. During his detention with the officials and police, the boy wet his pants.
John Dryden, is a social studies teacher at Batavia High School in Illinois. It may have been his social science background or his concern for basic rights of students, but Dryden felt that he should mention that students have constitutional rights not to incriminate themselves in a school-mandated survey. The survey, after all, was asking the student if they had used drugs, tobacco, and alcohol. In response, the school disciplined Dryden and docked his pay.
I have previously written about my concern with the criminalization of conduct in America, particularly at our schools. A case in Columbia, Missouri again raises this issue with a 17-year-old Hickman High School junior facing possible felony charges for a prank. The student changed the last name of Raigan Mastain to “Masturbate” and more than 700 yearbooks went to press with the change. Now a prosecutor is considering a charge of first-degree property damage and harassment — a felony prosecution for an immature prank.
Continue reading “High School Student Facing Potential Felony Charge For Yearbook Prank”
We have yet another zero logic case out of our schools enforcing zero tolerance policies on guns. We have yet another case of lunacy in our schools as part of the zero tolerance policy regarding guns. We have previously explored how teachers and school administrators are expelling or suspending students for everything from finger guns to stick figures. (here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here). For a prior column, click here. Even nibbling a danish into a gun shape can get you expelled today. Now a 6-year-old kindergartner attending Old Mill Pond Elementary School in Palmer, Mass faced possible suspension or expulsion because he was spotted with a plastic Lego G.I. Joe gun — the size of a quarter — on to his school bus. After public outcry, the school decided that it would not discipline the boy. However, the boy was given detention after the discovery.
There is an exciting discovery out of Siberia where Russian scientists have discovered a fully-grown female mammoth preserved in the ice. What is different is that not only does this animal have well-preserved muscle tissue but actual liquid blood. Yet, the godless scientists at the Institute of Applied Ecology are likely to be disappointed. Scientists were not only surprised to find running blood after pricking the body but found that the blood continued to run in the 10°C below zero temperature at the site. That leads them to believe that the mammoth’s blood has some type of “cryo-protective properties” previously unknown to scientists.
Continue reading “Russian Scientists Discover Fully-Grown Mammoth With Running Blood”
While Eric Holder refuses to resign and Obama refuses to fire him, another leading citizen appears to be moving toward a resignation after her own controversial leak investigation scandal. Harvard Dean Evelynn Hammands is leaving her post as undergraduate dean in the wake of a controversy over her ordering the searches of the emails of junior faculty to determine who spoke with the media on a recent cheating scandal. In my view, it was an outrageous act that contravened both academic and privacy principles.
Continue reading “Harvard College Dean Resigns In Wake Of Leak Scandal”
Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty (rafflaw)-Guest Blogger
Recently I wrote an article that discussed how the FDIC and the Bank of England had written a joint paper agreeing on how to deal with failing large banks in the post Dodd-Frank world. Banksters In my research for a follow-up to that article, I discovered that Congress was busy at work trying to do everything in its power to water down or eviscerate Dodd-Frank. I guess I should not be surprised that Congress might be trying to defeat a law that was passed in an attempt to make sure that ordinary citizens would not be asked to bail out the large banks once again. While Dodd-Frank is far from perfect, it is a step in the right direction. At least for the taxpayers. Continue reading “Do the Big Banks Control Everything?”