Tag: state legislators
The Worst DEI Policy in Higher Education
Attacks on faculty rights are frequent in academia, where professors’ words are now policed by illiberal administrators, state legislators, and students. I’ve reported on related controversies in American higher education for more than 20 years. But I’ve never seen a policy that threatens academic freedom or First Amendment rights on a greater scale than what is now unfolding in this country’s largest system of higher education: California’s community colleges.
Roughly 1.9 million students are enrolled in that system. Its
The Court Is Likely to Reject the Independent State Legislature Theory
It is often difficult, if not impossible, to tell what the Supreme Court is thinking about a case from the questions the justices ask counsel. But the argument in Moore v. Harper, heard by the Court in early December, was different. By the end, it was clear the Supreme Court has no appetite for the independent state legislature theory—and that offers hope for the future of America’s democracy.
The theory—that state legislatures have the unreviewable power to set
There May Be a Blunt-Force Fix for Inflation
This is an edition of Up for Debate, a newsletter by Conor Friedersdorf. On Wednesdays, he rounds up timely conversations and solicits reader responses to one thought-provoking question. Later, he publishes some thoughtful replies. Sign up for the newsletter here.
Question of the Week
Pick your poison: high inflation or a recession. Which would you prefer and why?
Send responses to [email protected] or reply to this email.
Conversations of Note
What if the Fed raised interest rates by 2 percentage
What College Students Really Think About Cancel Culture
Every couple of months it seems the news features another college-campus free-speech incident. In 2021, for instance, a University of Rochester professor was suspended after quoting texts that contained a racial slur; MIT canceled a lecture by a speaker who’d criticized diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives; and a handful of students across the country felt they were kept out of campus leadership positions due to their conservative beliefs.
Because of events like these, many political commentators write about the threat
The Simplest Way to Sell More Electric Cars in America
Updated at 5:20 p.m. ET on January 21, 2022
The Rivian R1T, the $75,000 debut pickup from America’s new electric-truck maker, is unlike any vehicle I have ever driven.
It is, first, really big: 18 feet long and six feet tall, it weighs three and a half tons, heavier than a white rhinoceros or a tricked-out Ford F-150. But this girth is belied by everything else about it. The R1T has an aesthetic unity missing from every mass-market automobile on