Tag: justice

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Accountability education and schooling folly general freedom ideological culture local leaders media and media people moral hazard nannyism national politics & policies responsibility too much government

Demeritocracy

affirmative action, quota, college admissions, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, racism, discrimination, reverse, justice, fairness

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has a beef with Stuyvesant High School.

It’s about race, of course.

Stuy (as it is affectionately known) is a tuition-​free accelerated academic/​college prep program open to all city residents based on how well they perform on a specific test.

Unsurprisingly, Asians make up the bulk of the student body.

And de Blasio finds this horrific, a “monumental injustice” — there should be more Hispanic and black students, he says.

In front of black parishioners. 

Demagoguery aside, the New York Mayor’s attack is really against the very idea of a meritocracy. The old Progressive vision was to pull from every ethnic group, economic strata, and community the best and brightest, allowing people to advance by study and hard work. Progressives called this “equality of opportunity”; most everybody else, “the American Dream.”

It was the Progressives’ pride and joy.

And today’s progressives are hell bent on destroying it.

They demand “diversity” instead — by which folks like de Blasio mean participation based not on talent and studiousness and sheer academic drive (which some cultures push more than others), but, instead, on today’s primary progressive obsession: skin color.

“My limited tolerance for affirmative action,” writes Richard Cohen in the Washington Post, addressing de Blasio’s excess, “possibly permissible when the poor are advantaged at the expense of the rich — hits a wall in this case.”

My tolerance for “affirmative action” hits the wall earlier: Help the poor afford to go where they can academically earn a spot. (Helping privately would be best.) But do not let race or any other demographic factor put a finger on the merit scale.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

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Accountability crime and punishment folly moral hazard nannyism national politics & policies Popular responsibility too much government U.S. Constitution

Where the Beef Is

cheese, law suit, justice, McDonald's, hamburger, Florida, class action

In South Florida, two McDonald’s customers are suing the fast food behemoth for charging them for cheese they say they do not want.

“According to a class-​action lawsuit filed in Fort Lauderdale federal court on May 8,” informs the Miami Herald, “Cynthia Kissner, of Broward County, and Leonard Werner, of Miami-​Dade, say they have had to pay for cheese they don’t want on their Quarter Pounder sandwiches.”

Before you upchuck every last greasy, chemical-infused/​extra-​beef morsel of this story, let’s look at the facts:

The Quarter Pounder went national in 1973.

The fast-​food franchise used to charge extra for the cheese.

But “at some point” the junk food purveyor stopped “separately displaying these products for purchase on menus.” These days, only the Quarter Pounder with Cheese and the Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese are listed.

McDonald’s joints in Florida, at least, provide no discount for removing the cheese.

Rip-​off, say these two customers. How big? A $5 million injury! 

That’s what they are suing for.

It’s mad. The lawsuit, that is. You are not entitled to set the pricing and menu policies of stores you do not own. 

In a celebrated analysis of loyalty in markets, an economist revealed that consumers have a continuum of options, including “voice” and “exit.”

“Voice” is what you express when you argue your case in a family or a democracy — and fast food provisioners. Decent people will, if disgruntled, choose “exit,” driving down the street to a Wendy’s.

McDonald’s could rightly charge extra for withholding the cheese. 

That it doesn’t do so? Chalk it up to savvy. 

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

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Accountability crime and punishment folly ideological culture moral hazard national politics & policies responsibility

Excepting Responsibility

Google, memo, sexism, discrimination, responsibility, guilt, justice, crime

Responsibility: demand it of others, expect it demanded of you.

So you might think that those who try to redress old grievances with compensatory (“reverse”) discrimination would be a bit more careful. 

Yesterday I wrote about the bizarre Google Memo case, wherein an employee was fired for (basically) warning of a groupthink ideological monoculture at Google … thus proving him right.*

Last weekend I wrote about racial quotas in college entrance. 

In both cases, there’s this idea that moderns in general and white males in particular must “accept responsibility” for the past.

And the evidence is undeniable: Our pale-​faced ancestors — or more likely a very small percentage of other white people’s ancestors — held human beings in bondage. So, too, did almost all peoples around the world; slavery’s old. Here in these United States, after our bloodiest war, our forebears ended that ancient crime. Then there was another century of Jim Crow discrimination, with systemic violence committed against blacks in many areas of the country, often with government acquiescence or involvement.

Harvard and other educational institutions are trying to right those wrongs. 

But there’s a problem: the principle behind their affirmative action schemes is lunatic: Each person of one race bears responsibility for the crimes committed by any person of that same race.

Far better is individual responsibility. Individuals have every right to compensation for any harm another has caused them, certainly. But folks have no right to create new harms against innocent people who happen merely to be of the same race or gender as those who have caused them past harm.

Justice is supposed to be blind, not crazy.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* The author, it is worth noting, addressed this monoculture in his title, “Google’s Ideological Echo Chamber.” I wonder if being proven right by one’s enemies compensates for job loss.

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Accountability crime and punishment ideological culture media and media people national politics & policies

Savagely Killing Conversation

Michael Savage, police, murder, killing,, justice, Bernie Sanders

“You think the police deserve to be killed?” That’s what talk show host Michael Savage asked his caller yesterday.

What brought that on?

A self-​described liberal woman named Teri had called The Savage Nation. Though not a Trump supporter, she “did not have the antipathy for him that most liberals did.”

“[U]nderneath his brashness and braggadocio,” Teri had thought, “there actually beat a heart for America.” But after his numerous initial appointments, she is now “terrified.”

On air, Teri admitted that her preferred candidate for president had been independent (not turned Democrat) Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont. Savage called Sanders a “con man” — a “race-​baiter” who “attacked the police regularly.”

That’s when he inquired if it was her desire to see police officers murdered. To which, she replied, “No, my husband was a police captain.”

Savage: “That’s amazing. How could you vote for a man like Bernie Sanders, who hated the police and used the police as a weapon to stir up minorities?”

Teri: “Believe it or not, my husband actually supported him, too.”

Savage: “Why would a police captain support Bernie Sanders?”

Teri: “Well, my husband was a very honored and honorable policeman.”

Savage: “You mean, all the police who were killed deserved to be killed?”

Savage, indeed. Does he really believe that a person criticizing certain police behavior or seeking reform necessarily thirsts for the blood of innocent police? Really?

Or does he simply hope to shut down any thoughtful conversation about the injustice in our criminal justice system?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Michael Savage, police, murder, killing,, justice, Bernie Sanders

 

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Common Sense crime and punishment general freedom jury rights and duties U.S. Constitution

Guess Who Else Nullifies?

Jury Duty

Citizens have more power than they exercise. But folks in government aren’t exactly falling all over each other in the rush to help citizens participate and realize their potential.

Take juries. There are few more awesome responsibilities than sitting on a jury. And one of the things you can do, as a juror, is to refuse to follow the law or the judge, instead making your decision contrary to the immediate, official directive. Disapprove of a bureaucracy’s “legal” prosecution of an individual or group? Judge the law as well as the facts. Acquit.

Glenn Reynolds, writing in USA Today, shows that this practice has a long, honorable history in our country — he not unreasonably mentions how northern abolitionists fought the Fugitive Slave Act — and, if you, the juror, push it, “there’s nothing anyone can do about it…

Of course, prosecutors have essentially the same power, since they’re under no obligation to bring charges against even an obviously guilty defendant. But while the power of juries to let guilty people go free in the name of justice is treated as suspect and called “jury nullification,” the power of prosecutors to do the exact same thing is called “prosecutorial discretion,” and is treated not as a bug, but as a feature in our justice system.

Reynolds concisely makes the case that jury nullification is, itself, a designed feature of our American constitutional tradition, and not nearly so buggy as “prosecutorial discretion.”

Why? Its tendency is to liberate us from usurping government action.

Prosecutors’ “discretion” (on the other hand) gives folks in government more power over our lives. And ruins many.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Jury Duty

 

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crime and punishment general freedom ideological culture national politics & policies

Robert Reich Makes Common Cause With Police State

Police State Apologist, Facebook, Robert Reich, collage, photomontage, Paul Jacob, http://cognitivebiasparade.prosite.com/, political, politics

Common Cause says its job is “Holding Power Accountable.” Robert Reich is the pre-​eminent “people’s progressive” propagandist of our time, promoting himself as on the side of underdogs and against corporate power structures.

After the Wisconsin John Doe probe was judicially squelched, last week, Reich promoted Common Causes’s official reaction, insisting that “Corruption — even the appearance of corruption — erodes our democracy. Corruption of our system of justice undermines strikes at the heart of our government.”

This is the Common Cause take:

The Wisconsin Supreme Court recently ended the investigation of possible illegal activity between Scott Walker’s 2011 – 2012 recall campaign and outside special interest groups.

Four of the justices of the court were the beneficiaries of dark money spent in their behalf and which was the heart of this case. They should have recused themselves and did not.

Robert Reich enthusiastically reiterated Common Cause’s demand for adoption and practice of strict judicial “recusal rules.”

Hmmm. No mention that a federal judge had also ordered the investigation shut down, but that ruling was stayed awaiting state court resolution.

No mention, by either Reich or Common Cause, of the methods the prosecutors used in this case, the gag rules and secrecy, the official attempt to squelch public discussion.

Also no mention of the pre-​dawn raids, complete with SWAT teams, barking dogs, and pointed guns, as if the political activists (targeted for unsubstantiated campaign finance rule breaches) were violent drug dealers or terrorists.

The lack of mention of those tactics suggests not merely a lack of interest in the real rule-​of-​law questions, but also an acceptance of those tactics … when applied to political enemies.

That is worse than mere corruption.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Police State Apologist