Bonjour! Here’s your PolicySphere morning briefing! If you were forwarded this, here’s more about who we are and what we’re doing and, of course, don’t forget to sign up.
UP TODAY: Our interview with Jeremy Carl, author of The Unprotected Class: How Anti-White Racism Is Tearing America Apart. We recommend the interview, which was thought-provoking, and the book. Regardless of what you think of Carl’s argument, we believe it to be important and worth engaging with.
On to your selection of policy news links:
#StudentProtests #HigherEd – In what may be the most stunning news of the latest round of “pro-Palestine” (and, seemingly, too often, pro-Hamas and anti-Semitic) student protests, Northwestern University folded like a cheap suit and granted protesters a list of eye-watering concessions. “Most notable among those concessions is a promise to offer full-ride scholarships to Palestinian students and guaranteed faculty jobs for Palestinian academics,” writes National Review‘s Zach Kessel. Does this matter? We think so, because it shows that American elite students are marinading in an ideological stew more radical than anything since the 1960s, radical even for what we’re used to from American academia. American higher education is either explicitly or implicitly government-funded. Policymakers have a right and arguably even a duty to make sure that the future leaders of the nation aren’t indoctrinated in ideologies that are radically at odds with the beliefs the nation was founded upon.
#HigherEd – This is a bit older but still relevant, a report from Claremont’s Center for the American Way of Life on the decline of Protestant universities. One reason why this the issue of student radicalism is important is because there are so few alternatives in the current higher ed landscape.
#HigherEd – Other worrying higher ed news: the LSAT has dropped the “logic games” section of its test. We understand it was the most challenging part of the test–therefore the most useful for predicting future performance, but also the one that generated the most “inequity.” We can’t put it better than Tim Rosenberger, legal fellow at the Manhattan Institute: “This weak sauce LSAT poses a disservice to the academy, to the profession, and to our very nation. Great legal education requires students to learn not only from their professors, but from their peers. The old LSAT correctly predicted which students had the aptitude to contribute meaningfully to classroom discussions, but also revealed which students would commit the time and effort to be successful in a program that requires countless hours of independent study. A logic games-free LSAT seems poised to create the illusion of false parity between less talented, and less hardworking, applicants and their peers.”
#Chyna – Important report from the Peterson Institute for International Economics: “Within hours of each other, the European Union and the Biden administration acted in April to take dramatic and unprecedented actions against Chinese economic interests. [T]heir actions are potentially reshaping their long-accepted norms in dealing with international trade and investment.” Read the rest.
#AdministrativeState – This Summer, the Supreme Court will be reviewing its (in)famous Chevron doctrine. This has potentially Earth-shattering consequences. “How might the judicial, executive, and legislative landscape change in a potential post-Chevron world?,” asks AEI’s Adam White in an important new report.
#Immigration – From John Fabbricatore, a former ICE field office director who serves on the National Immigration Center for Enforcement: “Biden is gutting ICE detention amid illegal immigrant crime wave” Is there any potential evidence that this isn’t a deliberate policy? We sincerely ask.
#BigTech #FreeSpeech – Via Jim Jordan: “On July 16, 2021, Mark Zuckerberg texted Sheryl Sandberg, Nick Clegg, and Joel Kaplan. Three of the highest ranking executives at Facebook. Could Facebook tell the world that ‘the [Biden] WH put pressure on us to censor the lab leak theory?'” This was subpoena’d by the House Judiciary Committee. Damning.
#MentalHeath – May is “Mental Health Awareness Month”! The mental health epidemic, particularly among young people, is real. The Bipartisan Policy Center has a good website with resources on this issue.
#Culture – Interesting from Manhattan Institute fellow Allison Schrager: “The Winner-Take-All Economy Is Ruining Art, Too“
Chart of the Day
Via demographer Lyman Stone, a reminder that in Portugal, often held up as a model of drug decriminalization, drug deaths went significantly up after decriminalization.
Meme of the Day
