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Back in the day, the president of Harvard stood up to an unaccountable, unAmerican, evil conspiracy. I also count Joseph Welch, a Harvard Law alum, (and coincidentally, another Iowa boy) as one of my heroes in the same national battle. Of course, the stakes then were limited: only the survival of American liberty and the [...]
Archive for the ‘Politics and Leadership’ Category
January 28th, 2012
January 25th, 2012
I missed this while it was happening, but it got some attention in the NYT today. New Hampshire has enacted a law that seems to give parents unilateral power to line-item veto their kids’ curriculum in public schools. The law looks like a can of worms, because the parents’ substitute material has to be “sufficient [...]
January 19th, 2012
Anthropologist Kate Fox gives a master class on British behaviour in her funny and smart book “Watching the English“. Among her many astute observations is that most Britons are sceptical of radicalism, preferring instead incrementalist politics. She parodies the prototypical English protest rally call-and-response as follows: Q: What do we want?!! A: MODEST CHANGE!!! Q: [...]
December 22nd, 2011
Category: Democratic Party, Elections 2010 and 2012, History, Political Science, Politics and Leadership, Republican Party
That’s what pundits would have you believe, that we’re a “center-right” nation, that Reaganism is deep in the electorate’s bones, yadda yadda yadda. But does the data bear it out? Well, no. James A. Stimson is a political scientist at the UNC-Chapel Hill, and one of the most well-respected public opinion researchers in the [...]
December 1st, 2011
The current ambassador to China, Gary Locke, is teaching the Chinese some useful stuff without a word of preaching or assertion, mainly by carrying his own bags and flying economy, and being seen to do so. The German for ambassador is botschafter, which means message carrier, and Locke’s story nicely enlarges our idea of how [...]
November 26th, 2011
Category: Education policy, Income distribution, Leadership, Management, Occupy Wall Street, Politics and Leadership, University of California
On Monday, the Berkeley faculty will have a special meeting to consider several resolutions condemning the police behavior at the Nov. 9 Occupy Cal demonstration, and another resolution that says in part: Therefore be it Resolved that the Berkeley Division of the Academic Senate has lost confidence in the ability of Chancellor Birgeneau, EVC Breslauer [...]
November 17th, 2011
I just love this woman: House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) mocked Rick Perry’s suggestion that she debate him about his idea for a part-time Congress. “He did ask if I could debate here in Washington on Monday — it is my understanding that such a letter has come in. Monday, I’m going to be [...]
November 16th, 2011
OWS is losing public support, [correction: polling numbers ungarbled 16/XI] to 33 for-45 opposed from 35F-36O a month ago. The project is suffering from a variety of problems mostly related to the lack of focus and leadership that appeared to its adherents as a virtue when it began. This doesn’t mean it shouldn’t have happened, [...]
