Interviews with Friends: Audrey

I always enjoy in-depth celebrity interviews -- the one's where you just get to dive into their life and thoughts on all sorts of random subjects. But that got me thinking how I'd love to see one of those done with one of my friends. I have interesting friends! And I'd love to get the full backgrounder on their life stories and their opinions on the issues that move them. Thus was born what I hope will be a regular feature: "Interviews with Friends." It's just what it sounds like: I interview a friend of mine, then post the results on the blog.

Audrey and I met at Carleton, where she and I shared a major of Political Science and the status of east coast transplant. Audrey often self-describes herself as a gangly nerd in braces which is bizarre to anyone who knew her at Carleton, where she stood out as exceptionally poised and glamorous. She is also a devout Christian—an identity she grew into while attending Carleton—and a proud Philly native. Audrey returned to the City of Brotherly Love after college, briefly attending law school before switching over into social work, and continues to live and work in the city.

 Me: First, let's get the brief biography. I know you're a Philly girl -- were you born there, or when did you move?

Audrey:  I was born and raised in Philadelphia, PA. Moved to Minnesota for undergrad, and then returned to Philly for the rest of my life (to date, anyway).

Me:  Tell me a bit about your family and your childhood in Philadelphia.

 Audrey:  My dad emigrated from Haiti in his twenties, and my mom emigrated from Peru when she was about 14. They met at work (ooooh, scandalous), got married, and along came a daughter. My dad insisted that I be named after Audrey Hepburn; my mom was a fan as well. I was the only biracial kid in my school. I didn't quite blend in with any particular group, but had a few close friends of the Puerto Rican persuasion. Which is now actually really interesting to me, since Latinos don't have a "race," per se.

Me:  Any siblings?

Audrey:  I have five older siblings on my dad's side. Although I am close with one of my sisters, I think that the age gap prevented me from becoming closer with the others. For all intents and purposes, I was pretty much raised as the baby of the family/only child.

Me:  What did your parents do? You said that they met at work?

Audrey:  My mom was (and still is) a social worker. My dad did something with computers and consulting (which I never quite understood). Something about before C++ and up-and-coming tech in the '80s. He tried to explain it to me, rest his soul. But I am still fairly clueless.

Me:  When did your father pass away?

Audrey: He passed away on 1/27/2010, subsequent to a courageous battle with colon cancer. He actually lived for a few years past his initial 6-month prognosis. No complaints there! He loved music, was a polyglot, and played several instruments. I think that I get my artsy/creative sense from him.

Me:  Well then he's passed on a pretty solid legacy!

Audrey:  Agreed!

Me:  So, you mentioned that you were the only biracial kid at your school. What was the general demographic of your neighborhood? Was it wealthy, or poor, or middle-class, or a mix? Likewise, predominantly white, black, Latino, or diverse?

Audrey:  My neighborhood, at the time, was working class but on the lower side of the income spectrum. My school was pretty diverse racially; a few first-generation-ers, like me. A few Caucasian, Asian, Black, Latino. No biracial kids for some odd reason. I moved to a more suburban neighborhood during my freshman year of high school, which was very White. But my high school, which was a magnet school, was very, very mixed. I made a few biracial friends there!

Me:  Obviously, you're super-smart so it makes sense that you'd go to a magnet school. At the same time, not every smart kid decides they want to go to a school like that. What made you decide that was the right program for you?

Audrey:  Great question, and thanks! I went to Catholic school for 8 years, and knew that I wanted a more, um...open-minded learning setting for high school. Before we moved, I would not have survived at my neighborhood high school. I was a certified nerd, with the glasses AND braces to prove it, and I'm sure that I would have been shoved into a locker at my neighborhood high school. I also had the highest GPA in my class in grade school (can you be valedictorian in 8th grade? Because I was. I wasn't ever again in life...but I digress). So I thought that a magnet school, while public, would help me avoid being marginalized for my nerdiness.

Central High School is one of the best high schools in Philly. I hate to admit it, but Central is #2. Masterman is #1, and I didn't get in, so I chose CHS.

Me:  You can't feed me a line about "open-minded learning" without follow-up. What were your thoughts on Catholic school education, and how did you come to realize you wanted something more "open-minded."?

Audrey:  Um... I think that I just felt, as a 12-year-old, that the belief system was so...rigid. And I was really starting to question the whole praying to statues thing. Seemed like idolatry to me, I don't know. I have Catholic friends (I sound like the racist person at a dinner party now, right?), and I respect their beliefs, but I just couldn't envision myself growing mentally and intellectually at a Catholic high school.

Me:  That's really interesting, and definitely something I want to return to. But when you talk about being "shoved into a locker" -- you mentioned that you had just moved to a predominantly white neighborhood but that the magnet school was more diverse .Was there a racial element to your concern about going to the local public high school, or was that not really on your mind at the time?

Audrey:  Oh wait, backtrack. So before I moved to the predominantly White neighborhood, I was in the more racially diverse but also lower income neighborhood. So I think that the concern was that the kids at my neighborhood high school would have attacked me for being a nerd. I don't think that I had much concern in the way of racial differences. I think that my primary concern was bullying, and "fitting in." Not being popular, but just...not being teased incessantly. I was bullied waaaaayyyy too much (not that any amount is tolerable or reasonable). But it just happened like, every day.

Me:  Oh okay -- I was confused on timeline.

Audrey:  Yeah, I didn't move until 9th grade

Me:  That's terrible. Now you've pretty emphatically put the emphasis here on being bullied because you were a nerd, had glasses, etc., and not a more "racialized" story one sometimes hears on Fox News (though President Obama has sometimes said this too) about "acting White" by being studious. I've generally thought that "acting White" was just a localized version of "nerdy kids get bullied" -- which is still terrible, absolutely, but it isn't a specifically racialized problem. What are your thoughts on that?

Audrey:  These are great points that you raise. I do recall being told that I "talk White" or "sound like a White girl" or "act White." I probably didn't help my case by attempting to debate those fools on how asinine they made themselves seem, by implying that only White folks have proper decorum or command of the English language. So I suppose, in retrospect, part of my underlying concern was in fact racialized.  It was slightly more difficult for me, I think, because I didn't really have a racial niche.

Me:  Obviously your identity as a biracial woman is really important to you. And while we have a very famous biracial American now, in the form of Barack Obama of course, from my outsider’s vantage point it seems his rise to prominence has been a decidedly mixed bag in terms of how people think about bi- and mixed-race persons in America? How have you seen the treatment of that identity shift over your life?

 Audrey:   I don't really think I have experienced a shift in treatment. I find that people still want to categorize me, either as "exotic" or "mixed" or "Black." In the same way that Obama is biracial, yet referred to as the first "Black" president, I think that many followers of the "Coffee Drop" theory wish to label me as Black. Which, to this day, bothers me. Not because I have textbook self-hatred, but because there is an entire White half that, I feel, gets dismissed when I'm not referred to as biracial. I have seen, overall, a shift towards more people of color stating (incorrectly) that they are biracial, when I really think that they mean multiracial. I think that there continues to be a misunderstanding of what a biracial identity is, or isn't.

Me:  That's really interesting. It does seem like it's very either/or -- sometimes you see this sort of faux-play up of Obama's biracial background as a means of showing he's not really Black, which obviously he rejects and seems to me to be a statement made in bad faith. But at the same time, it's also clear that we're oversimplifying his identity in a way that doesn't really do his experience any favors.

Audrey:  Exactly. And I'm not sure what the ideal answer/solution is. But I do think that it's important that we continue to allow individuals to have their own identities, whether they be biracial, or trans*, or Asian, or whatever.

Me:  Agreed. Though I am deeply disappointed that we couldn't come to an ideal solution to the problem of American racial identity in the space of a gChat conversation.

Me:  So how did a Philly girl like yourself end up going to rural Minnesota for college? It seems there must be some sort of story there.

Audrey:  Correct. I was at a magnet, college preparatory high school. I was in class, and Todd Olson (former director of the Carleton Liberal Arts Experience) showed up with my guidance counselor, and asked for five minutes of my time. I was annoyed with missing part of my lesson, but agreed to meet.

Todd: What do you think about Minnesota?

Me: Minnesota? Um...never been there.

Todd: There's a GREAT school there. Carleton. Heard of it?

Me: No...

Todd: Well you SHOULD have. Come visit us. And we'll waive your application fee.

Me: Okay...

So I visited, sat in on a Poli Sci class, attended an Ebony performance, and loved it. I liked the smaller class sizes and reputation among liberal arts institutions.

Me: That's ... unnervingly similar to my experience (right down to the Todd Olson connection).

Me:  Now, I'm going to be straight with you: I think you would have stood out anywhere you went -- you've got this "Josephine Baker goes to Paris" thing going on that's just absolutely killer.

Audrey:  Well, thanks! I still feel like the scrawny, awkward nerd girl in glasses AND braces.

Me:  But I think it's fair to say that in super-Scandinavian rural Minnesota, you really stood out. Did you feel that way?

Audrey: Um...I don't really recall feeling like an "other" at first glance. I came from diversity, and while Carleton wasn't the MOST heterogeneous microcosm, it didn’t alarm me. I didn't start to feel like I stood out until second term, I think, because my White brethren kept commenting that I looked "exotic." I mean, I had gotten similar comments in Philadelphia from my browner-skinned folks as well... But it happened much more often in Minnesota.

Me: In general, did Carleton mostly lived up to your expectations?

Audrey:  Indeed, it did. I think maybe I felt like more of an "other" in terms of class/socioeconomic status. During my first week, I met someone whose family owned a small island. He had three televisions. In his dorm room. People were never rude or snobby, per se, but there were subtle reminders of my working-class, first-generation status.

Me:  Now, the other part of your identity which perhaps isn't stereotypical-Carleton is that you're a very devout Christian. How did that play out in your college experience?

Audrey: You know, it's interesting that you ask this. And I'm finally not so super embarrassed to explain the connection. So yes, I was raised Catholic, and always leaned towards the Jesus camp. But I wasn't formally "saved" (Christian-speak for when you make it a personal decision to acknowledge, believe, and say that Jesus is God, etc.) until about halfway through college. I remember going through a pretty deep depression after my college boyfriend and I parted ways. I was searching for deeper meaning, etc., and whilst on a Habitat for Humanity trip with some Carls, I wandered into a Christian bookstore, picked up a Teen Study Bible (which I had never seen before; I had only read the sleep-inducing King James Version), and was HOOKED! I was actually teased by a few of said Carls for "believing in that nonsense" and not having more "common sense and logic." But a kind, Atheist classmate defended me, and retorted that I wasn't hurting anyone with my beliefs.

So right, read my Bible a lot, and then, during the summer of 2006, I visited a high school friend's church (he had been inviting me since high school, lol), and walked down the aisle and formally accepted Christ. I returned to Carleton that Fall very gung-ho about my faith, and was waaaayyyy too judgmental (but I was a newer Christian, and didn't quite know how to really walk in a non-judgmental, loving fashion as Jesus did yet). Oh yeah, and I fell off the bandwagon, partied too much, got inebriated, and made all-around poor decisions during my senior year at Carleton. But then I came home, got back on track, and certainly haven't been perfect since. The whole grace, mercy, and love aspect of God is still amazing to me. I'm totally imperfect, and there is nothing that I can do to be deserving of God's love, and yet...I accepted Him and He accepted me, and I am still His work in progress.

Sorry for the Jesus-freak moment.

Me:  It's no problem. One thing I liked about Carleton was that it really seemed to welcome all sorts of people. That's a cliché, but I think at a lot of places "welcoming" means a sort of performative leftism that isn't actually all that welcoming to, say, first-gen college students, or people of faith, or racial minorities, or anyone who isn't in on the performance. But Carls are chill -- not necessarily the most socially graceful, but genuinely non-judgmental about these sorts of things (with, of course, exceptions) That was my experience anyway.

Audrey:  Yeah...I think maybe some folks were also "Minnesota nice" about it? As in, there was a generally friendly aura, even if they disagreed with a certain lifestyle choice, or had presuppositions about race, etc.

Me:  I think that's true. I've heard mixed reviews about "Minnesota nice" -- some think it's just a cover for exclusion -- but I've always found it charming myself.

Me:  Anyway. After college you briefly attended law school [at Drexel University], then switched to social work. Why law school, and why the switch?

Audrey: Ah, my law school stint. Yes, I was fortunate enough to have a summer associate gig during 1L summer. I didn't feel that I was making a difference. I went to law school thinking that I would save the world, and somehow ended up in a posh office reviewing a multimillion dollar contract involving corporate buyout and I was like, "Oh no! I sold out!"

My dad became increasingly ill with colon cancer, so I took a leave of absence during 2L Fall. Then dad entered hospice, and passed away. Which caused me to re-think things. So I decided to become a counselor. Or at least, get my Master's in it. Which I did, and I ended up in case management, which is a good fit for me. It allows me to use my administrative and critical thinking skills, as well as my inclination to counsel and nurture people.

Drexel told me that I can return to finish my J.D.. And now that I've been roped into working with the First Judicial District's Mental Health Court, I have considered it

Me:  As a cheerleader for the legal profession, we'd be happy to have you back, but the important thing is to do what makes you happy.

Audrey:  Agreed. And thanks! At this juncture, I want to see how far I can go in my career without additional schooling. I don't want to be a "forever student."

Me:  ... she says, to the man about to return for his doctorate, Last  line of questioning before we wrap up: You've been very involved in the recent protests against police violence that have occurred across the US. How did you get involved in that?

Audrey:  Two words: social media. I would see random event info. on my Facebook Feed, or hear about preparation on the news and then re-post online. Also, working for the courts has its perks, in that we get inside information to ready ourselves for any potential traffic, challenges, etc.

Me:  It seems like this round of protests has finally put the issue of police violence on the public radar in a serious way. Why do you think that is?

Audrey: I think that social media plays a vital role here as well (coming from someone who recently deactivated Facebook). It has become easier to organize, assemble, and protest, and to know details about these events, because of sites like Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. In addition, it's difficult for folks to ignore, as legitimate news articles are posted, shared, and re-posted.

Me:  Are you optimistic or pessimistic about how things will progress on this issue in the near-term?

Audrey:  I would love to end on an optimistic note, so with that intention in mind...I am hopeful that, although in the short-term these challenges will continue to arise within our society, we will collectively develop better means to address issues of police militarization, and problems with institutionalized racism and socioeconomic/educational disparities.

Me:  Last question: What does the future hold for Audrey?

Audrey:  Having faith, helping folks in need, and happiness. And alliteration.

Me:  An excellent life motto if I've ever heard one.

This interview was conducted on gChat over several days. It has been edited for length and clarity.

The FIFA Field

The Palestinian Football Association (PFA) is pushing ahead with an effort to expel Israel from FIFA, citing restrictions on the movement of Palestinian soccer players and the fact that various Israeli settlements field soccer teams. Israel offered a compromise addressing the former complaint (ignoring the latter), but the PFA rejected the overture.

I highly doubt that this gambit will pass, requiring as it does 3/4 of FIFA's membership to vote in its favor. But I suppose one never knows in the context of resolutions on Israel and international bodies. What I am certain of is that if the resolution passes, the reaction from American and Western Europe will be swift and furious, and probably will entail them withdrawing from FIFA altogether. Which, come to think of it, would be one of the best things that could happen for international soccer, as FIFA is an utter disgrace. So, you know, there really is no losing here.

Midweek Roundup: 5/20/15

Blog's been quiet, but a roundup will fix that!

* * *

Even in the South, where entrenched utilities rule, Florida stands out for its anti-competitive electricity policies. But a rare Enviro-Tea alliance may change that to enable California homeowners to access the state's abundent solar resources.

Speaking of conservatives doing unusual things, Nebraska looks set to abolish the death penalty. Says one GOP state senator: "If government can't be trusted to manage our health care ... then why should it be trusted to carry out the irrevocable sentence of death?" Not quite the argument I'd make, but that's what happens when you work bipartisan.

Seeds of Peace is just one of many fantastic groups that approach conflict-resolution by bringing people together, rather than driving them apart. It's a great organization worthy of your support.

Reading about this conference, which focused on remedying growing gulfs in the Jewish community over various Israeli policies, is quite depressing. There's this weird disconnect wherein conference participants take views that really aren't that far from J Street, but are appalled that anybody would listen to a terrible group like J Street. It's a weird sort of denialism and it doesn't exactly inspire confidence at the ability to right ship.

Hey, remember that oft-heard complaint about how Palestinian leaders say one thing to Western audiences and another to the people at home? That's what springs to mind when I hear Bibi insist to an EU envoy that he supports a two-state solution.

Post-Grading Roundup: 5/13/15

Exams are graded and turned in. I've yet to have an angry mob of students assail my office door (or email inbox). And my browser is starting to be overrun. So let's clear some debris, shall we?

* * *

* The always-provocative Northwestern Law Profesor Eugene Kontorovich explores how the international community and international press has reacted to other blockades in situations analogous to the Israel/Gaza conflict (e.g., Georgia/Abkhazia, Sri Lanka/Tamil, and Saudi Arabia/Yemen). In all cases there seem to be few claims that the blockades are illegal (indeed, there seem to be few instances where people pay attention at all).

* Eugene Volokh has the rundown on a really bizarre story out of Canada, where some reports have high government officials threatening prosecution of anti-Israel BDS activists (on "hate crimes" charges), while other officials dismiss those reports as "conspiracy theories." It's unclear what is going on, but if I had to guess the government is not planning to prosecute anyone for mere advocacy of a boycott, but might be indicating its belief that actually carrying out such a boycott would constitute illegal national origin discrimination. But that's really a wild guess on my part.

* Speaking of national origin discrimination and boycotts, a proposed BDS resolution at an Ithaca co-op was rejected after co-op attorney's determined it would put them at risk of liability under New York human rights laws (which prohibit boycotts based on national origin). This interests me, since I've always though the BDS movement was vulnerable to this point of attack, but I hadn't seen it get much traction up until this point. And to be clear: the attorneys are not saying adopting a BDS resolution is illegal, only that it raises a sufficiently colorable risk such that it might (for example) affect their insurance rates. That seems pretty incontestably true.

* A South Africa columnist sharply condemns those rallying around a student leader who expressed admiration for Hitler (the defenders, needless to say, are accusing the student's administrative critics of being "puppets" for the shadowy Jewish conspiracy supposedly funding the university). I'm of two minds on this: On the one hand, the column really is well done and unapologetic in its condemnation of this form of anti-Semitism, even when it (as always) tries to cloak itself as mere "anti-Zionism" (and the author makes abundantly clear that he agrees with the basics of the anti-Zionist position). On the other hand, I feel like if I'm getting excited that a columnist is able to unapologetically condemn praising Hitler, I might be setting the bar too low.

* My latest draft paper is up on SSRN. It's titled The Siren Song of Strict Scrutiny, and explains why the failure of sexual orientation to be elevated to the ranks of a "suspect classification" is actually a very good thing for the gay rights' movement.

Extra-Diverse Democrats, Part III

Last month, I noted how Republicans would inevitably describe Hillary Clinton following Barack Obama as Democrats engaging in "affirmative action." Wayne LaPierre grouping both Obama and Clinton as naught but "Demographically Symbolic" Presidents gave me an n of 1 , but I claimed vindication. And now look: the Weekly Standard has devoted a cover story to the theory authored by Joseph Epstein (via)!

If Hillary Clinton wins the presidency in 2016 she will not only be the nation’s first woman president but our second affirmative-action president. By affirmative-action president I mean that she, like Barack Obama, will have got into office partly for reasons extraneous to her political philosophy or to her merits, which, though fully tested while holding some of the highest offices in the land, have not been notably distinguished.

If by "second", Epstein means "forty-fifth", he might be on to something (though admittedly, it is hard to argue that George W. Bush's rise to the presidency benefitted from any factors "extraneous to [his] political philosophy or to [his] merits"). But of course, any time women or non-White people rise to any level of political or social prominence, their accomplishments are dismissed as simply undeserved gifts bestowed by guilty White men. They never earn it on their own the old fashioned way: say, by being born into a political dynasty or by benefitting from only members of one's social class having the right to vote or by appealing to crude public sentiments of xenophobia and victimhood or by knowing that the only candidates adjudged to be "viable" would be ones who shared their race and sex. That's choosing a president on the merits.

Let's be clear: Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were and are every bit as qualified and meritorious as your typical President before them. That's true regardless of whether or not one subscribes to their policy preferences. The only work "merit" is doing in the above critique is stand as a proxy for their non-White male character. Just like the Sotomayor confirmation, where " Princeton, Yale, and nearly two decades of federal court experience makes one a big ol' dummy [unless your name is Samuel Alito]", the veneer here is so thin it is incredible even the Weekly Standard was able to get it out with a straight face.

Inexplicable Sentiments

The "U visa" program allows undocumented immigrants who are the victims of certain crimes the opportunity to normalize their status in the U.S.. It is designed to encourage the reporting of crimes; obviously, persons fearing deportation are much less likely to call the police if they have to worry that instead of pursuing their attackers, the cops will seek to expel them from the country.

One North Carolina prosecutor, though, is reading in a Latino exception to the law:

[Gaston County District Attorney Locke] Bell said that if a crime victim is Latino and the accused is also Latino, he will not certify visa applications that come through his office. Evelin came to North Carolina from Honduras, and her ex-boyfriend is from Mexico.

Without confirmation from Bell, Evelin and other victims of domestic violence, rape, human trafficking and about two dozen other serious crimes cannot obtain U visas.

This policy came to light in a very explicit manner: after a Honduran immigrant was assaulted by her Mexican ex-boyfriend, she filed a police report and sought a U visa. The request was rejected in quite straight-forward language: "“Assault on a Latino by a Latino is not the rationale for the statute" (needless to say, the statute says absolutely nothing about determining the race of the perpetrator or the victim). Who doesn't care about minority-on-minority crime now?

Now, I know what you're thinking: This sounds a little bit racist! But don't worry! It's not!

Told that some people may view his U visa policy as discriminatory, Bell defended his position. He said he did not understand how anyone could conclude it was racist.

“In my position, I have to make decisions that people don’t like,” Bell said. “This is one of them.”

Well, I'm glad we got that squared away. Honestly, I'm not sure what came over me, thinking that a policy that explicitly discriminates against Latino victims of crimes based on the race of the perpetrator might be racist. It's inexplicable how that thought even entered the mind.

Other people not myself can inquire as to whether Mr. Bell's act constitutes a criminal violation of 18 U.S.C. § 242.

Canelo Alvarez vs. James Kirkland: Preview

Ah, to have a big fight on the horizon where the most serious conviction of one of the participants is "just" armed robbery where we can reasonably expect electrifying action. Tomorrow, junior middleweights Saul "Canelo" Alvarez (44-1, 31 KOs) and James Kirkland (32-1, 28 KOs) square off in a bout that could definitively establish the #1 154 pounder not named Floyd Mayweather.

Alvarez is a fighter I respect in spite of myself. For one, I tend not to like fighters who are declared stars before they earn stardom, and Alvarez -- with his boyish charm, matinee good looks, and distinctive red hair -- got the big star push very early in his career. I also tend not to like fighters who get decisions I disagree with, and while Canelo is 3-1 in his last four fights, on my scorecard he'd be 1-3.

So why do I respect him? Simple: He goes after the big fights. He does not duck challenges. And a corollary to my desire for top fighters to face other top fighters is that I don't discount them even if I think they lose, so long as they're competitive. And Alvarez has been competitive in all of his top challenges (save one). His last four fights -- against Austin Trout, Floyd Mayweather, Alfredo Angulo, and Erislandy Lara -- are illustrative.

The Trout fight came about because Canelo actually had his eye on a lucrative match-up with Miguel Cotto. That was derailed when Cotto was upset by the relatively unknown Trout, and rather than seeking out easier money Canelo insisted on fighting Cotto's vanquisher instead. I had Trout narrowly winning that fight, and didn't recall being super-impressed with Canelo's performance. But I admit it was razor thin, and Alvarez still deserves credit for going tooth-and-nail with with a very slick fighter who was widely considered the #1 (non-Mayweather) man in the division.

Alvarez then scored the twin blessing and curse that is a Floyd Mayweather fight. There's no two ways about it: Alvarez was thoroughly outclassed bell-to-bell. His caused was not aided by the unwise decision to try and box with Mayweather, but it hardly mattered. It also hardly matters to me that a 23-year old fighter was soundly defeated by the best fighter on the planet.

Alvarez returned against straight-ahead brawler Alfredo Angulo, and simply had his way with him. Angulo -- who himself had a brutal war with James Kirkland -- was never in the fight and got busted up en route to a 10th round stoppage. That set up yet another high-risk low-reward fight against Cuban slickster Erislandy Lara. Once again, I had Lara winning the fight; once again, it was generally agreed (by me as well) that the fight was exceptionally close. And so the fact is that Alvarez was close and competitive with top fighters that he insisted on facing. Whatever else you can say about him, he is not coasting on stardom. He genuinely wants to earn his place in boxing's elites.

Respect notwithstanding, I'll be rooting against Alvarez tomorrow night. One reason is pragmatic: If Alvarez wins, one boxing star leaves the ring, but if Kirkland wins, two do. Alvarez doesn't need a win to get (or preserve) mainstream popularity, but this is an opportunity for James Kirkland to really burst onto the scene like he seemed destined to do only a few years ago. The other reason is personal: James Kirkland is one of my favorite fighters. He is, and there is no better way to put it, in the hurt business.

To describe James Kirkland as a brawler isn't to do him justice. When I think of brawlers, I think of a crude hack-and-slash approach typified by wide looping shots. What makes Kirkland special is that he's actually relatively technically sound ... on offense. He puts his punches together nicely, and compactly, and has a devastating and varied attack to the head and body. What he shares in common with brawlers is that he is 100% offense. His defense isn't bad so much as it is irrelevant -- he has no objective in the ring but to deliver as much pain as possible in as short an amount of time. Often, this leads to him being knocked down -- indeed, it's rare to see a James Kirkland bout where he isn't at least rattled early in the fight. But he fights through it and eventually breaks nearly all of his opponents down.

The problem with James Kirkland is that he's inconsistent. His one loss is not to the greatest fighter on the planet, it's to entirely unheralded Nobuhiro Ishida, a light puncher who nonetheless dropped Kirkland three times in the very first round of their 2011 fight. Many blamed the loss on Kirkland lacking the presence of long-time trainer Ann Wolfe. After Ishida, he got back together with Wolfe and rattled off 5 straight victories. Two of those were phenomenal action bouts (against Alfredo Angulo and Glen Tapia). One of them has a serious question mark (Carlos Molina, who was beating Kirkland before getting controversially disqualified in what to my eyes was a clear misapplication of Texas rules). But all of them saw the Kirkland/Wolfe team clicking on all cylinders, which made it all the more eye-brow raising that Kirkland and Wolfe again parted ways. This story on ESPN is the first one I've seen where Kirkland actually gives an explanation for his decision to move on, and it's not superficially ludicrous (Wolfe specializes in a particular skill-set of strength and conditioning, but Kirkland felt like he needed to improve his game in other areas). But it remains to be seen whether Kirkland can win at a high level without Ann Wolfe in his camp.

And that is a large part of the drama of this fight. It is the rare fight where I can see any outcome. Canelo Alvarez is far better than Nobuhiro Ishida, and if Kirkland isn't in the right mindset its easy to imagine an early stoppage. I can also see Alvarez simply being better than Kirkland -- too strong, too tough, too versatile -- and either winning a decision or scoring the late KO. But when James Kirkland is on, he has the ability to tear through anyone. It is not inconceivable that he could lay a beating on Alvarez similar to what he did against Tapia or Angula. It's also perfectly plausible that Alvarez -- who has never been down in his career -- can survive the punishment better but simply be busted up over the course of the fight.

If I was a betting man, I still wouldn't put money on this fight because there is so much in the air. The safer money is with Canelo Alvarez, who is more consistent, has fought higher-quality opposition, and is the a-side fighter here. But when things are clicking for James Kirkland he has a spark inside him that I haven't seen in any fighter since Mike Tyson. It makes for brutal action and high drama. And this Saturday, I expect it to make for a very interesting night.

Things People Blame the Jews For, Volume XVIII: Black Politicians Endorsing White Politicians

There is an open Senate seat in Maryland, precipitated by the retirement of long-time Senator Barbara Mikulski (D). Since Maryland is a safely blue state, this seat has drawn a lot of high profile attention, and right now the main contestants to succeed Mikulski are D.C. area Reps. Chris Van Hollen (D) and Donna Edwards (D). Van Hollen is White, Edwards is Black, but both are staunch progressives. The main difference between the two is that Van Hollen is more of an establishment-type (being former head of the DCCC), while Edwards has more of an insurgent's profile (attaining office by successfully primarying an old-school boss style politician in Albert Wynn). Edwards is also on the J Street side of the pro-Israel spectrum, while Van Hollen straddles the normal Democratic line of being both a staunch defender of the Jewish state while also urging it towards productive steps towards a peaceful two-state solution.

There's no question that Van Hollen has been more attentive to the constituent services element of his job than has Edwards, and has for a long time been very attentive to the needs and desires of local politicians around the state (no doubt in part with an eye on a race like this in the future). Edwards has considered to be somewhat lackluster in this field, and the result is that Van Hollen has been far more successful on the endorsement front than has Edwards. Two of his most important endorsees are Montgomery County Executive Ike Leggett and Prince George's County Executive Rushern Baker. Both men are African-American, and while Montgomery County forms the heart of Van Hollen's base, PG County is Edwards' territory, so Baker's endorsement in particular is a major pickup for Van Hollen. And, well, some folks are less than pleased:

A flier alleging Jewish control of black politicians was distributed at a budget meeting in a Maryland suburb of Washington.

The flier distributed Monday in Prince George’s County uses Photoshop to depict three Maryland Democrats in the U.S. Congress — Sen. Ben Cardin and Reps. Chris Van Hollen and Steny Hoyer — standing over two dogs bearing the faces of County Executive Rushern Baker and Montgomery County Executive Ike Leggett, both African-Americans.
[...]
“Van Hollen will run against Donna Edwards and other African-American candidates chosen and financed by the Israel lobby for the purpose of splitting the African-American vote in the primaries,” the leaflet said. It accused Leggett and Baker of selling out Edwards “for a few doggy treats.”

To be clear, Edwards (and Van Hollen, of course) have condemned the flyer (which is of unknown origin). And the Black community time and again has demonstrated that it does not find this sort of hate-mongering remotely compelling. So I'm not worried. There are valid reasons to pick Edwards over Van Hollen, and vice versa. But the decision by Black politicians to endorse Van Hollen is attributable to nothing more sinister than the fact that Van Hollen is a proven progressive voice and leader who has been a successful advocate for all sectors of the Maryland community. To allege, as the flyer did, that folks like Leggett and Baker are taking their position in order "to ensure Blacks don’t get political power in the Senate" is grotesque. But it demonstrates one of the great truths of contemporary anti-Semitic discourse: that there is something foul about Jews playing the political game and winning. Politicians being responsive to a minority community's preferences in the political arena? Lapdogs!

Sleeping in Fear, Part II

The other day, I noted the abject paranoia of some Texans convinced that a U.S. army exercise in the southwestern United States was a cover for a military takeover leading to the seizure of their guns and their internment in FEMA concentration camps. My snarky comment was that perhaps this fear would give these residents more empathy towards the far more reasonable fears that many people of color have towards the armed governing authorities, which pose a far less speculative threat to their lives and livelihoods.

But I also admit sharing Digby's sentiments, which were to marvel at just how disrespectful this is towards the men and women who serve in our armed forces. This conspiracy-mongering relies, at its root, on the presumption that the young people who volunteer to risk their lives in defense of America will, at the drop of a hat, just elect to destroy their own country as tools of oppression and despotism. That is a statement of contempt, and entirely undeserved contempt, and it really is shocking that prominent politicians from a party that perceives itself as "pro-military" would indulge in such ugly sentiments.

Supreme Court To Review Demand-Response

The Supreme Court has granted cert to review a challenge over FERC's efforts encourage "demand-response" policies. As incredibly dry as that sounds, this is a significant deal in energy/environmental area. The NYT article linked above actually gives a pretty decent summary of the issue, but I'll give my own quick take.

"Demand-response" refers to policies which give consumers price breaks when they consume electricity at off-peak times (as opposed to those times when energy usage is highest, like mid-day). In of itself, this doesn't "save" energy -- it just shifts usage around -- but it matters from an environmental standpoint because of the way power dispatched. Electricity supply and demand must be matched perfectly and instantaneously -- we produce exactly the amount of power that we need to consume. Functionally, that means that certain base generators are (more or less) always on, and then as demand rises additional generators come online to meet peak demand. Typically, these peak generators are older, more expensive, and dirtier than the base load generators -- hence the environmental benefits of demand-response. It also comes with reliability benefits -- reducing the peak electricity spikes means lessening the chance that the system will be overloaded. The losers, of course, are the operators of the expensive and dirtier peak-load plants.

The legal challenge here has to do with how the regulatory authority over electricity is allocated between the federal government (FERC) and the states. The Federal Power Ac, the main federal statute on the matter, grants FERC the authority to regulate wholesale (sale-for-resale) power transactions while preserving retail regulation to the states. Demand-response intuitively is more retail than wholesale -- it relates to when end-use consumers use their power -- but FERC attempted to structure its regulation in such a way that it created a wholesale-based demand-response framework. The D.C. Circuit didn't bite, ruling 2-1 that the program was actually impermissible retail regulation, and that is the decision under review by the Supreme Court.

Hence, as a legal matter this is less an "environmentalism: yay or nay" case than it is a "federalism/administrative law" case. Still, ideologically speaking the Court often has a left-right breakdown regarding the extent of federal power and the degree to which the judiciary ought defer to federal agencies. On that note, one encouraging sign for FERC is that Justice Samuel Alito is recusing himself from the case.

Have Another Thought

Maya Rosen and Joshua Leifer, two Jewish Princeton students who head the campus chapter of the Alliance of Jewish Progressives and supported the failed divestment vote at the University, have penned a column with their thoughts on the matter and their demands of the Jewish community.

There is a lot here that is frustrating -- try to follow their shifting logic on the role "consensus" should play in these sorts of debates -- but what is perhaps most aggravating is their disdain-verging-on-contempt for anyone who disagrees with divestment as a tactic. I've remarked before on the shared incentive the far-left and far-right have to portray Israel debates as being amongst two camps: If you don't support ZOA, you're an anti-Zionist monster. Or, if you don't support BDS, you're in the bag for the most irredentist wing of Likud. This column is a sterling example of the latter -- it goes so far as to say that the failure of Jews to support divestment hinders efforts to "decouple Judaism from right-wing Israeli policies", blaming Jews for ongoing anti-Semitic attitudes on campuses nationwide.

Of course, there are many reasons one could oppose divestment that have nothing to do with favoring right-wing Israeli policies, and are indeed endorsed by sharp critics of those policies. One might be concerned about the association with the global BDS movement, a train which seems to have no brakes. The BDS campaign at its best is cavalier about the validity of Jewish self-determination and liberation, and has often bled into blatant anti-Semitism (in the link above, BDS was the frame for urging the expulsion of all Jewish students from a South African university). Certainly, the tropes put forward in this column -- whereby Jews who oppose BDS are said to be beholden to a "conservative establishment" which insists that "all Jews support [all?] Israeli policies" -- don't exactly inspire confidence that this is a movement that actually respects that polyphonic character of the Jewish community. Or one might recognize that the same capacities which enable Israel to continue its occupation of the West Bank are those which enable it to protect itself from suicide bombers, and that the divestment campaign's studied refusal to recognize the entanglement suggests that they don't think Israel has any valid claim on security at all. Or perhaps they are just sick of the persistent demand to view Israel/Palestine as a quest to find bad guys to scold, and would rather a politics that sought to identify good guys and empower them to do more good.

The divestment advocates say that the debate demonstrated widespread desire amongst Princetonians to take a more proactive stand on this issue; that students hunger to do something to prod the situation in the Middle East closer to justice. And I bet that's true! The 53% which voted no may have various reasons why divestment is off the table, but that doesn't mean there is no proposal that wouldn't garner their support. And of the 47% that voted yes, I'm doubtful that all of them are "BDS or bust." They might have supported that resolution, but it's not the only resolution they'd support.

What we do know is that a majority of Princeton students oppose divestment, and that there is no likely scenario where divestment could be anything but bitterly divisive. So my question them is simple: What's your next thought? Are you seriously trying to say that a divestment resolution is the only arrow in your quiver? Even if you genuinely believe it "is the best way", even if you're absolutely certain that "political and economic pressure are our most effective nonviolent means" for effectuating change (maybe you can take a break and demand reinstatement of our Cuba sanctions), are they really your only thoughts on the matter? Is your only move, when Princetonians reject this particular strategy, to go back to the same well once more?

If divestment is a non-starter, what are some other thoughts we might have? The obvious answer is investment. Instead of cutting ties with the putative bad guys, try to forge new ones with the good guys. Instead of looking for bridges to burn, search for places where bridges are worth building. In Israel and Palestine right now, there are a great many civil society organizations who are committed to creating the conditions for Jewish and Palestinian freedom and self-determination. By far the best of these is OneVoice, a parallel Israeli and Palestinian project "that amplifies the voice of mainstream Israelis and Palestinians, empowering them to propel their elected representatives toward the two-state solution." It's based on the notion that the most important players and most powerful agents of change are the people of Israel and Palestine, the everyday folks who have no interest in dominating or subjugating the other, but just want to live in harmony with their neighbor and work together for a better future. What if Princeton partnered with OneVoice and lent its prestige and brainpower to the cause of democratic empowerment as a means of change (some of us have a sentimental preference for that sort of work over economic coercion).

Or what about TULIP -- Trade Unions Linking Israel and Palestine? TULIP's goal is to forge connections between Israeli and Palestinians unions as a means of building political momentum towards two states. There was a time when building solidarity amongst labor unions and the working class would have been the first thought of a group with a name like the "Alliance of Jewish Progressives". Alas, we live in different times, and so I guess now it takes some prodding. But again, call me sentimental, but I am a fan of the power of workers to unite around a common interest in economic empowerment, and recognizing that spending precious lives and resources on a fruitless conflict is antithetical to that cause.

What if Ms. Rosen and Mr. Leifer proposed a resolution centered on those parameters: identifying groups in Israel and Palestine that are working to change conditions on the ground such that both sides respect the legitimate national aspirations of the other, suggesting that Princeton should take official steps to partner with and otherwise support these groups, and urging that Princeton take greater steps to invite persons affiliated with those groups to the Princeton campus so that Princetonians could gain a first-hand perspective on their struggle and how they could help? How much of the vote do you think that resolution would get? 65%? 75%? It wouldn't be unanimous -- there are people who really do support right-wing Israeli policies, after all. And there are people who genuinely are "BDS or bust", because their end goal isn't a two-state solution or any solution at all that respects Jewish equality -- they're in the field to annihilate Israel outright.

But I don't think those sort of people are the majority of either the 53% or the 47%. A resolution like this could unify the Princeton campus around a strategy that breaks free from the tired "punish the evildoer" mold. It wouldn't be consistent with BDS fundamentalism -- no strategy which acknowledges that both Israelis and Palestinians have an indispensable contribution to a just resolution of the conflict would be -- but Ms. Rosen and Mr. Leifer claim not to be fundamentalists.

Whether they are or aren't is not something I pretend to know. I do know that Naomi Klein once claimed that BDS was "a tactic, not a dogma," and that this has proven to be one of her less-than-stunningly accurate pronouncements of the past decade. Everything we've seen from the BDS movement indicates that it cannot contemplate other strategies other than BDS; even amongst those adherents who don't sign on to the more maximalist parts of the agenda. BDS squeezes out any and all alternative strategies, but it is especially hostile to those which ask how we can help Israelis and Palestinians work together. For some reason, once people board this particular train, it does not even occur to them that there might be other routes to their goal.

I'm not asking Ms. Rosen or Mr. Leifer to denounce BDS (though of course I'd be happy if they did). All I'm asking is that they think one step further -- that they have another thought after divestment. Rather than assuming that Jews and non-Jews who oppose divestment are denouncing any measure that might further a just two-state solution, they should think a little harder about what other steps they might take that would unify their community and the Princeton community around a salutary goal. To that end, a resolution which specifically endorses organizations like OneVoice and urges Princeton to take additional steps to provide them with institutional support would be an easy winner that would build on the dialogue the first resolution sparked and unite proponents and opponents alike under a positive and constructive banner.

Anyway, it's a thought.

Things People Blame the Jews For, Volume XVII: Vaccines!

Though it is by far the most popular feature of this blog on Tumblr, I really prefer not to do back-to-back segments of my things people blame the Jews for series. I even had to resist putting up a striking example blaming Jews for massacres of Muslims in Myanmar. But my resolve cracked when I saw this post detailing anti-Semitism in the anti-vaccine movement.

This is, of course, a match made in heaven. On the one hand, the anti-vaccination craze is probably the most mainstream-yet-still-absolutely-bonkers conspiracy out there that doesn't, on its face, involve the Jews ("did we land on the moon" is equally crazy but far more fringe; global warming denialism, though based off horrendous science, doesn't rely on quite the same level of tinfoil as do the anti-Vaxxers). On the other hand, given those characteristics of course Jews are going to get roped in sooner or later. Much of the anti-vaccination movement is based on hyperventilation about big pharmaceutical companies, so its obvious that somebody is going to do the whole "greedy Jews" thing ("Just calling out this PAID ZIONIST PHARMA TROLL" who is contributing to "the Judaification of America[, you] are evil scumbags.").

What is more creative is the "special Jewish handshake" theory about how we're getting the real, non-poisonous shots.

Go to Wal-Mart and look at the children in the check out line.... They usually all have blank stares now .... Walk the check outs until you see a kid who is totally engaged with people, smiling, bright and acting intelligently. Ask the mom if she vaccinated her baby, and if hse says yes, ask if she is Jewish.... I never figured out the method, but I can definitely state that somehow, "they" do not get the same shots.

He adds later "You know something like this can be going on with so many Jewish doctors out there."

The point is, anti-vaccination and anti-Semitism are two repulsive tastes that unsurprisingly mix perfectly together. I, for one, look forward to finding my Jewish doctor to give my Jewish baby his or her special Jew shots, and raising another generation of smiley and intelligent scumbags.

Things People Blame the Jews For, Volume XVI: Baltimore

Not the Charm City itself, mind you. Jews are, of course, blamed for the police violence which has led to the latest batch of protests. The link is that Baltimore County (not City -- they're separate jurisdictions) police officers are offered training in Krav Maga, an Israeli-developed martial arts form. If you've watched a movie fight seen and wondered why it didn't end in 15 seconds with a joint break, Krav Maga is for you -- it emphasizes ending physical confrontations quickly by immediately incapacitating the opposition. For this reason, it is purely a "functional" fighting style (it isn't designed for aesthetics or competition, for example). Police and military units sometimes train in Krav Maga because it offers effective means of dispatching armed violent attackers (many Krav Maga scenarios involve, for example, an unarmed person being attacked with a knife).

In any event, the Nation of Islam saw the "Jewish martial art --> political jurisdiction bordering Baltimore City" link and immediately decided that the whole thing was a Mossad/Shin Bet plot. Needless to say, Max Blumenthal jumped all over it too.

Somehow, one gets the feeling that if a police department was trained in Tae Kwon Do, folks wouldn't immediately rush to blame acts of violence on the Koreans. But that's all part of what makes being a Jew so special.

Sleeping in Fear

As we reflect on the Baltimore protests and how they have once again focused our minds on how many Americans simply cannot have confidence that the authorities are there to protect them, rather than oppress them, a local Texas official gets at the heart of the problem in poignant fashion:

"It's a sad when people's greatest fear is their own government," [Bastrop County Judge Paul] Pape said. "Think about the ramification of that. If Americans go to sleep at night worrying whether their own government is going to sell them out before morning, it'd be hard to sleep."

A striking sentiment.

Of course, Pape was talking about local Texas residents convinced that America was about to launch a military takeover of Texas, seeking to " "confiscate guns or implement martial law" under guise of a major military exercise. But, you know, I'm sure this experience of rampant paranoia will attune them to the tribulations of their fellow Americans who have far more rational reasons to view their own government with trepidation.

AAUP: Illinois Board's Rejection of Salaita Violates Academic Freedom

Their media release is here, the full report can be read here. The gist of their position is that, once Salaita had been offered and accepted a tenured position at Illinois, he was effectively a tenured member of the faculty and entitled to due process from "summary dismissal." The board approval was widely known to be pro forma, particularly in circumstances where their approval would come after Salaita would have already begun teaching. Chancellor Wise's invocation of "civility" as a reasonable standard for dismissing a tenured faculty member is vague and unworkable; who decides what is and isn't "civil"? Finally, in the press release, the AAUP Committee Chair emphasized something absolutely correct and worth reiterated:

e. "The issue in the case has never been the content of Salaita’s message. One may consider the contents of his tweets to be juvenile, irresponsible, and even repulsive and still defend Salaita’s right to produce them.”

Having read the release and skimmed the report, I have no objections to anything of substance. The AAUP is right on this issue. One can find Salaita's tweets to be hateful, repugnant, and anti-Semitic, and nonetheless think it has no bearing on the academic freedom issue his case presents. Salaita had for all intents and purposes already been hired by the University of Illinois. It made its bed and it should of had to lie in it, even if we think the appointment itself was a mistake or the result of poor judgment. We can criticize his scholarship, and we can even criticize the decision to hire him in the first place, but academic freedom is a constraint on remedies, and here it means that the remedy of dismissing (or "unhiring") Dr. Salaita in such a belated manner should have been off the table.

The Maryland Exception

The other day, I went to a talk by Yale Law Professor Akhil Amar, who was promoting his new book The Law of the Land. The conceit of the book is a telling of the "story" of American law and our constitutional ethos via various state-based vignettes (the first one is about Abraham Lincoln and Illinois, the second about Hugo Black and Alabama, and so on). A major theme of the book and talk is an argument about the endurance of America's geographical divides. The list of states that voted against Lincoln in 1860 bears a striking a resemblance to those which voted against Obama in 2012. Of the four states which were genuinely "purple" in 2012 (decided by less than 5 points), three of them were "north-meets-south" states (Ohio, Virginia, and North Carolina). The fourth, Florida, is functionally "north-meets-south" as well, due to its massive population of New York and New Jersey transplants (I've often joked that South Florida is essentially a suburb of Brooklyn).

After the talk, I was able to ask Professor Amar about a state that did not receive a chapter in his book -- my home state of Maryland. Maryland, it seems, is a very stark exception to this tale. It is a southern state -- below the Mason-DIxon line. It was a slave state. It didn't secede, but mostly because it was under Union military occupation. It has a large Black population, which in Southern states had historically been associated with extraordinary racial polarization in voting (that is, in Southern states the more Blacks they were the more conservative Whites voted).

Today, Maryland is not Virginia, or North Carolina, or Ohio. It is among the most liberal states in the country. It is Massachusetts, or Hawaii. If you lived in the beltway suburbs (Montgomery County or Prince George's County) in 2006, there was not a single Republican representing any level of government -- federal, state, or local -- except for the President. I think that remained true until the recent election of Larry Hogan to the Governor's office -- only the second Republican to hold that office since Spiro Agnew (and even with Hogan's election, Democrats maintain a 91-50 edge in the House of Delegates and 33-14 advantage in the State Senate). It is a left-wing state.

Right now, Baltimore is awash in protest, initially sparking by the police killing of Freddie Gray, who succumbed to spinal injuries inflicted while he was in police custody. In some sense, this is just the latest chapter of the ongoing, national unrest that results from the continued exclusion of Blacks from the full fruits of the American dream.

But perhaps not. For as Adam Serwer notes, "Baltimore is no Ferguson, Missouri." Baltimore is a city with "a black mayor, black police commissioner, and a police force evenly divided between black and white officers." This is an exception too; Baltimore "is one of very few cities that burned despite substantial black representation in the city government and police force." For Serwer, this gives lie to the notion "that harmony can be achieved by elevating a few blacks to positions of power within a system that leaves so many impoverished. American cities cannot avoid unrest by simply placing black people at the helm, as long as progress for so many is ephemeral. An unjust system remains unjust no matter the ethnicity of its caretakers."

This is, indeed, a bitter pill, and a noteworthy one. Process-oriented liberals (and not all liberals, to be sure, are process-oriented) have sought to channel racial justice into a narrative of democratic inclusion -- the harm stems from being excluded from the levers of political power and self-determination, the solution is to create conditions of political equality and representation. Yet even as Maryland and Baltimore are in many ways exceptions to the rule where such equality is nowhere to be found, they are not exceptions to the social malfunctions and disasters which provoke the current unrest.

Of course, the conservative response to all of this is simple: Blacks should stop being Democrats. What have liberal politics done for you? What has a Black President done for you? Jump over to our side of the fence! The easy retort, of course, is that locales where Republicans are dominant political players are hardly paragons of racial virtue either -- if anything, they're worse than Maryland, but the best you can say is that it is a non-factor. The bigger problem, though, is that the small-d democratic solution -- self-determination, pick your own leaders -- doesn't seem to be sufficient either. It is a bedrock principle of respecting a group that you respect their choices on how to self-govern, even when one might disagree, even when they seem to be off the mark. The self-governance is the critical consideration; anything else has to answer the charge that it is domination in disguise. Yet Baltimore isn't a situation where the process failed. It's a situation where the substance failed.

I think it is to our nation's credit that we are starting to look seriously at the substance of things -- that substantively speaking too many people view Black lives as expendable and substantively speaking too many people don't care what happens in their neighborhoods. But it is a challenge because when it comes to racial justice people are very uncomfortable thinking in terms of substance. Procedural, representational justice is (conceptually easy), and one could argue that Maryland and Baltimore already achieved that. But debates over substance can be significantly murkier and far more intractable. I'm hopeful, and I believe, that Baltimore and Maryland have the right foundations to tackle these hard questions in a way that makes us an exception -- an exceptional leader in resolving these problems right.

The Road Not Taken: J Street and the Brandi Maxxxx Strategy

As you may know, my strategic advice for J Street and like orgs over the past couple years has been to seize the center. Stress that the emphatically pro two-state, pro-Israel, pro-peace solution bears far more in common with what the more established center groups like AIPAC and the AJC do than the unrelenting Greater Israelism of their right-wing counterparts at ZOA or the ECI. You might also know that they are not taking my advice, instead "defining itself as an outright opponent of the Jewish establishment rather than as its dissenting adjunct."

This Bloomberg article, detailing efforts by AIPAC to forestall putatively "pro-Israel" amendments to the Iran bill by Seante Republicans, struck me as a perfect opportunity to exploit this strategy -- except, of course, my advice is moot. Even still, I thought I'd at least roll through the path not taken. I call it "The Brandi Maxxxx Strategy."

For those of you who don't know, Brandi Maxxxx is a bit character in the TV show Parks and Recreation where she is Pawnee's local porn star. It is either a great compliment or great insult to Mara Marini, who plays Brandi, that on first view I genuinely was unsure if they got a regular actress to play the role or if they brought in a real porn star to do some cameos (as best I can tell, Marini has done no porn). In any event, one of the running jokes of the series is that Brandi not only looks a lot like Leslie Knope (even portraying her in a video), but is always declaring just how similar they are. "And just like Leslie, I know what it’s like to be the only woman in a room full of men." "What Leslie and I do is obviously art."

This, of course, drives Leslie bonkers. But the reason it does so is simple -- she's not wrong. Leslie really does believe that we shouldn't censor expression simply because some deem it obscene. Leslie really does value strong women in workplaces dominated by men. Leslie's feminist credentials are such that she'd never slut-shame Brandi for her choice of profession. Basically, while she doesn't like the tone or the emphasis, Leslie can't actually disagree with the content of what Brandi's saying. And so it is that the understanding of Brandi as being "just like Leslie" is cemented in the public mind.

J Street could do the same thing. "Like AIPAC, we are appalled that extreme conservatives would try to sink the Iran bill in defiance of Israel's best interest." "J Street and the AJC are in agreement that groups which promote a one-state solution can in no way shape or form declare themselves to be pro-Israel." These statements are entirely accurate, which would make it quite difficult for the mainline groups to disavow them (if they did, it would give J Street a far cleaner shot at claiming the mantle of the only pro-two states group on the political map). And suddenly, our understanding of the "pro-Israel" community isn't "AIPAC", it's "AIPAC + J Street."

Why should we care about perceptions? Well, perception has a funny way of calcifying into reality. Imagine a straight-down the center Jewish Israel supporter -- the most mainstream of mainstream. He's probably an AIPAC guy, but he's willing to work with other groups. If the media drum is that AIPAC is always fighting with J Street but is basically aligned with ZOA, he'll be inclined to feel friendly towards them and their positions. But if the media narrative is reversed, his perspective will reverse as well. Everything we know about group identification suggests that who we perceive as ideological compatriots does far more to channel our ultimate policy positions than the reverse. Someone who perceives J Street as basically aligned with the pro-Israel movement will also look more favorably on J Street's policy objectives.

Indeed, talking in this way is probably the best thing J Street could do to break the media narrative of the group as functionally an opponent of Israel in the United States. If there is one thing I've learned from observing politics and political coverage, it's that the media can only for so long resist a narrative presented as fait accompli before reporting it straight. This is true for claims far more outlandish than "J Street holds mainstream pro-Israel positions." If Paul Ryan keeps on saying -- as if it was the most natural thing in the world -- that he's devoted to the needs of the poor, the media will start reporting that as at least a rebuttable presumption that others must argue against. The trick is that the presentation can't take the form of an argument or apology -- it has to be cast as the obvious way things are. It's not "actually, J Street and AIPAC are aligned on this issue." It's "as usual, J Street and AIPAC are aligned on this issue."

Of course, it is fair to argue that at some point a group is so obviously distant from one's own priors that it does no good to try and "seize" it. If AIPAC genuinely wasn't interesting in peace in the middle east or the perpetuation of Israel as a Jewish democratic state, then tying J Street to them would do more to cripple the latter than to enhance its credibility. But I don't think that objection holds here. It strikes me as wrong to say that AIPAC is in fact so distant -- as evidenced by the fact that they keep on saying and doing things that J Street could quite honestly note makes them "just like J Street." One can doubt their sincerity, but I've found that the best response to that possibility isn't to call them liars but to simply treat them as if they were sincere. A debate on honesty nearly always dissolves into an irresolvable mush. But if AIPAC is forced to disavow, over and over, statements that simply assert that "it favors a two-state solution", that would be better proof of their insincerity than any raw allegation could be.

I worry that J Street is being infected by the lone wolf fetish one sees so often on the left, wherein one is so committed to viewing oneself as a solo Jeremiah standing up to the powers that be that one affirmatively resists taking steps to actually win the political game. Trying to win risks losing, whereas if one never makes the effort there's no real loss, only the comforting warmth of "I told you so." I have long worried that J Street is more committed to its self-image as the bold truthsayers in an otherwise blind pro-Israel community than it is to actually getting effective policy work done. It's a weakness activists can't afford to have.

And that brings me back to the Bloomberg article, and the missed opportunity it evinces. If you're worried about Jewish pro-Israel support bleeding from the Democratic Party, you couldn't ask for a better frame than "J Street and AIPAC versus the Senate GOP." That's like an early Chanukkah present. But seizing that opportunity to isolate the putatively pro-Israel far-right requires presenting the center and left as a united front. By instead separating itself out from the middle of the community, it is losing a valuable opportunity to reclaim the norm of what it means to be pro-Israel.

Are My Opinions Best?

I imagine most of us have at some point in our lives been told "you just think your opinions are best!" It's meant to imply that we're close-minded or arrogant. But on face, it's a very weird objection, isn't it? Of course I think my opinions are best! If I thought someone else's opinions were best, I'd adopt those opinions. Consider the following statement: "I believe X, but Jan believes Y. I think Jan has the better opinion on the matter, actually, but I still believe X." That seems awfully strange.

Thinking that, though, made me wonder if there are scenarios where that isn't true. The example I came up with was my versus Stephen Hawking's opinions on physics. I have certain beliefs about how the physical world works, as does Dr. Hawking, and I'm pretty confident his are better than mine. Does that mean I've just tacitly adopted his opinions on the matter? I don't think so, for a few reasons: First, I can't even coherently explain what his opinions are -- they're way beyond my understanding of physics. I don't think I can claim to hold an opinion that I don't actually know or understand the substance of. Second, related to the first, I still basically act in accordance to my own primitive understanding of how the physical world will behave. So in that sense, I'm still adhering more to my opinions than anyone else's. And finally, I'm using Dr. Hawking as a prominent stand in for "really smart physicist", but presumably many smart physicists disagree with one another, and I don't necessarily share Dr. Hawking's view when it is in disagreement with other prominent physicists. Even where two well-credentialed physicists take mutually contradictory positions, I still think that both of them have "better" opinions on physics than mine -- but it wouldn't make sense to say I'm adopting mutually-contradictory positions.

I don't know if this goes anywhere interesting (it feels like the sort of question epistemologists have resolved six ways to Sunday), but it was on the brain for the past few days so I thought I'd share. I would note that it seems to have greater relevance to the salience of "moral facts" (if such things exist) than it does physical facts. We're okay with people accepting that the best physical explanations may simply be beyond the reasoning capacities of the average person because we don't expect everyday people to do complex physics. But we do expect people to do moral reasoning accurately. So if we're in a world where there are moral facts, but average people are incapable of understanding what those facts are (knowing only that their primitive efforts at moral reasoning are obviously nothing close to reliable, and that while there exists a small class of persons who can do this sort of reasoning more effectively, they aren't in so much agreement so as to allow for us to simply substitute their views for our own), that seems to leave us in a dangerous place.

It All Hangs Together

I'm not going to say you shouldn't read Liel Leibovitz's latest Tablet Mag column "We Are All Racists Now." But maybe you don't have time. You're a busy guy. So I'll do you a favor and summarize the argument. Ready?

The White House just opened a gender-neutral bathroom, probably because it thinks trans-bias is more dangerous than Iran because presidential administrations should only do one thing at a time. And that one thing obviously shouldn't be transgender rights, because gay marriage is becoming more popular. The administration claims it has something to do with "safety", which shares a root with the word "safe", as in "safe spaces", man aren't those ridiculous? Kids these days. Anyway, by announcing support for transgender rights, he's just taking the easy way out by riding the wave of popular support for gay marriage, rather than doing something hard like taking on banks. Or doing a different foreign policy. You see, transgender rights are part of the culture war, and Obama wants to call anyone who disagrees with him a gay basher or a racist. Oppose his Iran plan, and he'll point to his unisex bathroom and say you hate ... gays? What would have happened if congressional Democrats systematically tried to undermine Reagan's foreign policy? We don't know because they didn't try! I guess that settles that.

Yet despite this cunning and perfectly comprehensible retort, some people still think some attacks on Obama are racist. Once upon a time liberals favored open discourse, but now they use that discourse to call things racist that I don't think are racist, and that's offensive triggering silencing censorship for some reason, rather than just counterspeech that makes me sad. All of this will be bad for the Jews, because if there's one group that would benefit from "-ism" claims being preemptively dismissed as a form of censorship, it's the Jews. In conclusion, "we're all racists now." The end.

Seriously, it's like if someone promised Liel that they'd take a shot for every inane trope he was able to string together without a segue. Please, go ahead and read the column and tell me where I'm being remotely unfair.

Amnesty Rejects Resolution To Combat Anti-Semitism

A proposed resolution asking Amnesty International UK to confront rising anti-Semitism Failed on a 461-468 vote. It was the only proposed resolution at the Amnesty conference that was not passed. You can read the text of the proposed resolution here, suffice to say it does not appear remotely controversial. Well, except for the part where opposing anti-Semitism is inherently controversial. Even in the private sphere, Jews still lose.

Still, I have to say that a part of me is shocked by this outcome. A resolution demanding action on anti-Semitism before a human rights group in the UK ... and it only failed by seven votes? Frankly, that's far better than I had any right to expect.

My friend Yair Rosenberg suggests that "It's going to be hard for Amnesty International to claim to stand for universal human rights after this." Oh, I'm sure they'll manage somehow.

Academic Freedom versus Academic Legitimacy: The UNC Case

At the tail end of 2013, I published a very short essay in the Florida International University Law Review entitled Academic Freedom versus Academic Legitimacy. The goal of the essay was to disentangle two oft-conflated concepts, both of which are intuitively important and both of which express exceptionally important academic values.

The first of these is "academic freedom": the right of persons within the academic community to forward any idea -- no matter how outlandish, offensive, or controversial -- without facing formal sanction or punishment. The second is "academic legitimacy": the belief that ideas presented in academic concepts should generally be good, interesting, well-reasoned, or thought-provoking, and that correspondingly where the academic community forwards poorly-reasoned or outlandish ideas, something has malfunctioned. "Academic legitimacy" does not entail agreement; there are many ideas which are perfectly "legitimate" -- in the sense of being thoughts that usefully forward an intellectual discussion -- that many people disagree with.

If, for example, a geology professor brought in a flat-earther to speak, we would presumably think that they had failed in an important scholarly aspect by acting as if flat-earthism was even "in-bounds" as something worth presenting in an academic context. This isn't (just) because we think flat-earthism is "wrong", it's because it is not a useful contributor to a reasonable conversation about geology. And this belief would hold even as academic freedom constrained the remedy -- we could not fire or otherwise discipline the professor. Holding this distinction is critical on both sides of the equation: Saying something is academically illegitimate (even if correct) does not justify abridging their academic freedom, but alleging that something is academically illegitimate does not constitute a violation of academic freedom (even if incorrect).

In my article, I note that what is and isn't "academically legitimate" will be contested, and offer several examples of potential speakers whom we might debate over. These ranged from BDS activists and the Black Panthers to David Horowitz and Gilad Atzmon. On this blog, I've applied this idea to two recent controversies: the hiring and unhiring of Steven Salaita by the University of Illinois, and the hosting of a talk at NYU law school by anti-vaccination activist Robert Kennedy Jr..

In Professor Salaita's case, I argued that while academic freedom principles may demand that we object to his "unhiring", this in no way should entail sanctioning some of the horrific anti-Semitic comments he made on Twitter. Too many people were combining these cases, saying that he should be reinstated and that his comments were perfectly innocuous, and grouping both under the mantle of "academic freedom". But only the former part is -- the question about whether his comments were benign "criticism of Israel" or repulsive anti-Semitism is an academic legitimacy question -- it has no bearing on the academic freedom issue. Likewise, with NYU "academic freedom" means that whichever member(s) of the NYU community invited Kennedy ought not be punished or disciplined, and should not have been prospectively barred from issuing the invitation. Nonetheless, I think most of us feel that something went wrong when the invitation was extended. A member of a university the caliber of NYU should not think that anti-vaccination conspiracies are a legitimate topic of debate. Put simply, NYU community members should do better than that in picking their speakers.

All of this leads up to a recent editorial in the Daily Tarheel, the University of North Carolina's student newspaper, which has been getting far more negative attention than I think it deserves, primarily based on the same conflation I observed in my article. The editorial takes note of two recent speeches given at UNC and Duke by David Horowitz and Mitt Romney, respectively, who were invited by the local College Republican chapters. The editorial makes it absolutely clear that it does not support a ban on their speeches. Rather, it suggests that both speakers had "little intellectual heft to back up their cultural prominence," and did little "to promote serious discussions about controversial issues." In Horowitz's case, this was due to their appraisal of Horowitz as basically a racist hatemonger. In Romney's case, the criticism was more specific -- he was speaking on foreign policy, an arena in which he has no special background or expertise, and his talk was allegedly just a litany of partisan talking points rather than anything of significant substance. The editors suggested that the host of the event, Duke Professor and former Bush administration national security official Peter Feaver, would have actually provided an interesting and intellectually sophisticated (and, I'd add given his background, conservative) foreign policy address.

Since the editorial explicitly did not call for any ban, oversight, disciplinary action, or any other restriction on the groups which invited Horowitz and Romney (and in fact affirmed their right to speak on campus), theirs was an academic legitimacy critique, not an academic freedom one. Like the criticisms of NYU following the anti-vaccination presentation, the editorial urges that College Republicans do a better job picking speakers that will significantly advance scholarly debate. I'll tip my hand here and say that I agree with them in the case of Horowitz and disagree with respect to Romney, and I'll go into more detail on that in a moment (specifically, on why the case of a prominent politician's political speeches is in fact a debatable case).

But there were many, many people -- my friend Yair Rosenberg, Popehat, a Texas Supreme Court Justice, among others -- who contended that the editorial pressed for a "ban" on conservative speakers, or "pre-approval", or was an "Orwellian" attack on free speech. And they're wrong. And they're badly misreading the argument. The column does not endorse, and in fact specifically rejects, any abridgment of anybody's free speech rights in the course of its critique of the speaker-selection.

One response I got from some quarters upon making this observation was quite straightforward: the UNC editors are lying. They say they respect the free speech rights of the speakers, but they don't mean it -- if given the chance, they'd support prohibiting them outright. For starters, this is no way to have a discussion -- assuming that one's interlocutor is lying so as to avoid the awful possibility that they actually don't disagree with you. There's also nothing in their argument that suggests an internal inconsistency -- the position they're forwarding, that groups are free to select whatever speakers they want at their discretion but they should in the exercise of that discretion select intellectually serious people, is theoretically perfectly intelligible (even if we disagree over who is or isn't intellectually serious). Finally, the fact that they specifically recommend a different Republican (Feaver) as an example of someone who would be intellectually serious is evidence that their position is not simply a fig-leaf for banning speech they disagree with.

A few people tried to buttress this inference of insincerity by referencing other malign movements on college campuses that do explicitly call for censorship of "hate speech" or "triggering" ideas. But the presence of such forces makes it more imperative that we disaggregate those students who respond to disagreeable speech in the right way -- by arguing that it is bad speech and urging that it be replaced with better speech, while forswearing illegitimate instruments like formal speech restrictions.

Another argument I heard a lot was that even urging a group like the College Republicans to "voluntarily" recalibrate their assessment of what sorts of speakers are worthwhile is a form of censorship. Some people tied this argument to the aforementioned presumption that the "voluntary" part was a fiction, but many seemed to honestly believe that arguing in opposition to the College Republicans appraisals, and asking them appraise differently (better), was in of itself a form of censorship. This argument is nothing short of bizarre. Unless one offers an open-mic night or selects speakers by lot, the decision to invite a particular speaker obviously entails an appraisal of their quality. That's presumably why Mitt Romney the politician was invited instead of Mitt the audiovisual specialist -- the former is the sort of person who would give an interesting, informative, and intellectually stimulating talk. The latter would be unlikely to. The editorial is a claim that the group's appraisal was flawed, and they should try to improve it. Now, maybe that's wrong -- in fact I think it is, at least with respect to Romney -- but it's not a form of censorship.

Indeed, this position might the most dangerous from the standpoint of encouraging people to dissent by disagreeing, rather than by resort to actual censorship. When some folks try to promote censorship and say we should ban the speech we don't like, the common (and correct) response is to tell them that's the wrong remedy. The right remedy is to argue that the speech is wrong and try and persuade their fellows to adopt a different, better position. We might, of course, disagree on which positions are right, but that's the terrain in which the debate should be hashed out. But if people do exactly that and are told it is in fact tantamount to censorship, that's suggestive that the objection actually isn't to formal efforts to "ban" disagreeable speech, but to the speech being challenged at all.

Finally, some folks argued that the real problem was that the editorial was one-sided -- that it viewed only conservative speakers, and even a very mainstream conservative like Mitt Romney, as academically illegitimate. The allegation is that the student editors, in appraising what sorts of speakers say intellectually serious things, are biased. They mistake "conservative" for "unserious". Under this view, we might say that it's not the College Republicans who need to reassess what they consider to be academically legitimate, but the editors of the Daily Tarheel.

Importantly, while this argument may have force, it's not a censorship argument. It is a line-drawing argument. If the invited speaker had been, say, a Klan Wizard, nobody would be saying "they're biased -- they only criticized inviting Klansmen!" That we all agree that it would be perfectly proper to criticize a group that invited a Klansman, and to suggest that (notwithstanding their right to extend such invitations) they should exercise their discretion in a more thoughtful fashion the next time around, is evidence that we don't actually believe in the second objection ("persuasion efforts = censorship") and our problem here is a substantive one -- we think that (at least) Mitt Romney is not the sort of speaker who should be objected to as academically illegitimate, and we think the best explanation for why someone would think he is so objectionable is a mind clouded by political bias.

Now, even though this is not a "censorship" problem, this sort of behavior would still be worrisome. We should worry about ideological self-segregation and biased appraisals of discomforting evidence. Everything we know about motivated cognition suggests this is a real phenomenon. It is a different sort of problem than one centered on "free speech" or "censorship", and so framing the debate in those terms is misleading at best. But that does not mean this hypothesis isn't worth considering, just that even if proven it would not demonstrate any free speech failing on the part of the students (which, of course, is the core of the critique -- political bias is a much more mundane sort of failure than brute censorship justified by an Orwellian invocation of free speech).

Before we go running off with this sweeping conclusion of unchecked political bias, though, it's worth taking stock of the evidence. The opinion piece cites a grand total of three cases. One of them (Horowitz) I think some of the column's critics (e.g., Yair) agree could be validly indicted as academically illegitimate. Moreover, we know that the newspaper does not actually object to having any conservative speak -- it specifically said it believed that Professor Feaver would have been excellent. Basically, what we know is that the editors found two conservative speakers unserious, one (potential) conservative speaker serious, and zero liberal speakers either serious or unserious. I'm not exactly a crack social scientist, but even I know better than to draw a robust conclusion from an n of 3. Given such a small sample size, breaking down what it would mean to demonstrate a lack of bias only illuminates the absurdity. Instead of a 1-0 scoreboard, would writing a single column critiquing two liberal speakers (thus tying the game at 1-1) count? One tweeter claimed that the alleged failure of the paper to condemn Bill Bradley's 2000 commencement address was evidence of the double-standard. A compelling argument ... except that the current editors of the Tarheel were all of 5 years old when that happened.

By far the most compelling argument supporting the "political bias" position is that their critique incorporated Mitt Romney -- not a David Duke, not even a David Horowitz, not an extremist or fringe figure of any sort, but a perfectly mainstream member of the Republican Party. As I mentioned, this is the point where I get off the Tarheel's train, but even here I don't think their position is transparently ludicrous nor solely attributable to ideological blinders. To explain why, indulge me in one more story.

When I was an undergraduate, I almost never attended talks delivered by politicians. This was not because I was politically incurious (I started this blog even before I entered Carleton). And it wasn't because I was averse to hearing competing viewpoints -- the first publication I wrote for was Carleton's conservative outlet (the Carleton Observer), and for quite some time I was a co-panelist on KRLX's political debate talkshow (a 2v2 conservative versus liberal format). Rather, I didn't attend because I found such talks to be breathtakingly boring. The claims and arguments presented were not intellectually rigorous, they were sophists, purveyors of partisan drivel designed to rev up a crowd or score cheap points. I never felt like I was learning anything useful from them about the best policies on the topic d'jour. They were, in short, intellectually unserious. And so I thought it was a waste of time to listen to them. I'd have rather we brought in real thinkers -- conservative or liberal. And whether they showed up or not, I certainly read them on my own time (my senior thesis was predominantly inspired by a major conservative legal theorist, Michael McConnell).

Now some of this is tempermental to me -- there is a reason why, despite my keen interest in political issues, I chose an academic route while elected office has never held the slightest appeal. I never joined and had no affiliation with the Carleton Democrats for precisely this reason -- party speech, organization, and activism was to me a paradigmatic example of doing political debate poorly, and I wanted no part of it. I know I'm not the only person who thinks like this -- whose first instinct upon seeing that a politician (of whichever party) is speaking is to roll their eyes. This is often true for people I nominally agree with as well as those I don't.

The Daily Tarheel did not argue that Mitt Romney was inherently incredible or that someone with his politics is obviously unserious. Its argument was twofold: first, that Romney has no particular foreign policy expertise, and two, that the speech he actually gave was pure political pageantry that contributed nothing to any serious foreign policy understanding. The latter part, no doubt, is not unique to Mr. Romney or persons of his party -- most politicians speak like that most of the time. It's their job. But in academic environments maybe we should expect more of ourselves, and look to people who can provide more than a grandstand.

The counterargument to this -- and what I ultimately find persuasive -- is that someone with Mr. Romney's background is "interesting" no matter what substantive views he presents, simply because it is useful to know what major politicians or world leaders think (even if, depressingly, the answer is "they think in terms of cute soundbites and platitudes"). Mitt Romney is meaningfully distinct from other persons who talk in terms of cute soundbites and platitudes, because he's Mitt Romney -- former presidential candidate and influential Republican. That, for me, is sufficient to render his talk academically legitimate -- it is a useful part of an interesting intellectual discussion simply because there are important intellectual discussions to be had about what major world leaders and politicians are saying about important issues. But the opposing position outlined above is one that I would have had a lot of sympathy for as an undergraduate, and not for any partisan reason. I don't think we do ourselves a favor when we pretend that political talking points packaged for a 30 second TV clip represent the best we can do in terms of policy reasoning.

I phrased this last issue as a motivated cognition story, and I should add that I think that's still very likely to be in play here. For example, motivated cognition may make liberals more likely to think that a Romney speech is pure useless talking point, while a Obama speech is perhaps a mix of interesting information and partisan drivel. That's obviously worth watching out for, and it's important. It reflects a serious problem across all of public deliberation that extends way beyond the editorial staff of one college newspaper.

But this debate has been framed in terms of censorship, in terms of free speech, in terms of banning thoughts that we don't like. And that is a misreading of the editorial and grossly unfair to its authors. These persons were quite clear that they had no quarrel with the academic freedom rights of the College Republicans or the persons they chose to invite. They criticized their intellectual contributions and suggested that other speakers would be more beneficial participants in the debate. They may be wrong on the merits. But they framed the debate along the right dimensions, and conflating a substantive line-drawing disagreement with the fight against censorship is a dangerous mistake to make.