Californians are not real people.
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All Is Not Quiet In the Library Catalogs
Navigating the changing landscape of library cataloging
This article was written by an author who wishes to remain anonymous.
Imagine you are searching for a book in your local library’s online catalog. What do you expect to see in the record for the book? Factual information, I presume: the author’s name, the title of the work, the publisher, some information about the book’s topic, and where you could find it on the library’s shelves. Would you appreciate knowing what the cataloger who created the record thought of the book? Would you be surprised to read a content warning, something like “This book may contain material that is harmful, offensive, or insensitive to [X] community?” What about seeing the value judgment “transphobic works” listed as the genre of the book? Next time you search your library’s catalog, pay attention, you might see some disturbing changes taking place.
Most people don’t think too much about cataloging. Catalogers are generally quiet and unassuming people, working back-stage, away from the controversial lives of librarians. I am a cataloger in a large library in a North American city, and I was happy with my quiet and stress-free job. I don’t have to choose the books the library purchases, I don’t deal with irate patrons, I work at my own pace and I get first dibs on the books that come across my desk—what’s not to love? Except that, recently, the controversies of the rest of the library world have finally reached the cataloging corner. In the last several months there have been multiple heated discussions on the cataloging forum that I subscribe to, and I was dismayed to read what my colleagues thought was to be promoted and encouraged.
Traditional cataloging practice requires the cataloger to describe the book as objectively as possible; there are even specific guidelines reminding catalogers not to select subject headings (those hyperlinked topic descriptors in the record) based on their own values and beliefs. One of the first questions I was asked in my hiring interview was to confirm that I would agree to catalog materials that I, personally, found offensive. After all, libraries—and, by extension, catalogers—are supposed to be guardians of free speech and intellectual freedom. We do not know who will be looking for the materials and for what purpose, and so we have to be fair, accurate, and objective in order to make it easier for the material to be found. But it seems that now the overriding duty of the cataloger is to protect the patrons from the harm that the records (not even the materials!) may cause them.
In the discussions I mentioned above, fellow catalogers were unabashedly stating that certain marginalized groups should get to decide how a book should be labeled. If a cataloger who is a member of a marginalized social group believes the book in question is harmful or offensive, he is fully in the right to add a note in the catalog stating his beliefs. Thus we now have four books in the international catalog (used by libraries worldwide) with the label “Transphobic works”. Several books that are critical of the current gender affirmation care model now have the subject heading “Transphobia”. These books are not about transphobia, so the subject heading is likely being used as a way to warn the reader of the record (and potentially the librarian choosing which books to order for the library) that these are “bad books” and should not be read or purchased.
Others in the forum did not seem to convince this group of catalogers when they pointed out that not all members of a marginalized group think the same way, that there are some marginalized groups that have conflicting goals and vocabularies (“gender-critical feminist” versus “trans-exclusionary radical feminist”, for example), or that if this sort of value judgment is permitted then catalogs will become embroiled in editing wars. To them, the unspecified harm that would result from a catalog record that does not warn the reader that the book described is “bad” or “unsafe” is worse than all that, worse even than the loss of trust that will inevitably occur when patrons realize their books are being labeled with prejudice.
There are still some of us who push back, that cling to the belief—not at all controversial only a short while ago—that readers can be trusted to make up their own minds about the books they choose to read, that library workers should care for all the members of their community, including the ones they may disagree with, that the best way to affect positive change in the world is to promote intellectual freedom and the vigorous exchange of ideas.
We’re still here, but I don’t know how much longer we will last.
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The Falsehoods Biden Keeps Telling
Is the president dishonest or just confused?
By James Freeman
Give President Joe Biden credit for consistency. For the entirety of his term he has relentlessly and falsely claimed that the economy was a shambles when he took office. His latest deceptions portray the raging inflation he did so much to inflict on Americans as a pre-existing condition. “For the second time in less than a week, President Joe Biden falsely claimed Tuesday that the inflation rate was 9% when he began his presidency,” writes CNN’s Daniel Dale. He adds:
Biden’s claim that the inflation rate was 9% when he became president is not close to true. The year-over-year inflation rate in January 2021,
the month of his inauguration, was about 1.4%.The Biden-era inflation rate did peak at about 9.1% – but that peak occurred in June 2022, after Biden had been president for more than 16 months.
Not close to true is an apt description of the Biden economic message. Over the years some media folk have tried to portray Mr. Biden’s tall tales as evidence of grandfatherly charm. Folksy or not, he has been remarkably consistent in making false claims about the state of the economy when he took office.
His inauguration occurred during a stretch of fast growth and low inflation. Real GDP was growing at an annual rate of better than 5% during the quarter he took office. It has grown more slowly in the years since and of course with the additional plague of rising prices.
This is not just an issue of deceptive rhetoric. The deceptions of 2021 actually helped cause the resulting inflation. That’s because Mr. Biden’s false portrayal of an economy in distress was the justification for the spending spree he initiated despite warnings from prominent Democratic economists. The bogus claims have had highly destructive consequences.
The volume of falsehoods on this particular subject certainly suggests a pattern of dishonesty. But to be fair, the Biden Justice Department’s special counsel Robert Hur has reported his conclusion that Mr. Biden suffers from a memory problem so severe that the president could not be successfully prosecuted despite evidence of willful violations of law.
The latest Biden falsehoods on a subject of great importance to the people of this country raise again the question of why Justice decided to let him walk. Mr. Biden holds a rather important job for someone with cognitive challenges.
No one is expecting Justice to reconsider. But given the obvious attention the inflation issue receives and the centrality of the value of our currency to everyone’s lives, could a healthy adult who is reasonably well-informed about the issues of the day honestly think the inflation rate was 9% when Joe Biden took office?
Whether one ascribes the Biden inability to reckon with the facts of the economy to declining faculties or dishonesty, the message to voters is clear. Don’t expect better policies from a man who cannot grasp the reality of his failures or simply chooses to lie about them.
James Freeman is the co-author of “The Cost: Trump, China and American Revival” and also the co-author of “Borrowed Time: Two Centuries of Booms, Busts and Bailouts at Citi.”
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More Biden efforts to prevent the public from knowing what it has a right to know.
The Biden Justice Department is manipulated by Biden and is anything but independent.
The occupier is totally beholden to the whip Biden cracks.
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The Epoch Times
EXECUTIVE BRANCH
Biden Blocks Release of Special Counsel Interview Tapes
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While the middle class bleeds from inflationary costs of basics the oligarchs are making fortunes.
If you don't believe me read: "Controligarch's," By Seamus Bruner.
Every time Sullivan speaks, it's as if a 15-year old teenager is explaining why they took the car without permission.
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Caroline Glick
Jake Sullivan is not being wise here. He is willfully, and immorally blind. The Gazans are not interested in a political horizon. They want all the Jews dead. So long as they retain any capacity to kill us, they will use it to kill us.
This is why discussion of a diplomatic solution or horizon or whatever is crazy. This is a military problem. The only solution is military. This includes the eradication of the Gazans' capacity to kill Jews and long term Israeli military control over all of Gaza to prevent them from rebuilding their capacity to kill Jews.
I write "the Gazans," rather than Hamas because all sectors of society - young, old, women, men, Fatah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad -- all participated in the massacres of October 7. There were thousands more "civilians" burning Jews alive, raping and torturing them, and kidnapping them than uniformed Hamas terrorists. This is a war of annihilation being waged against Israel by Gazan -- or more broadly -- Palestinian society. It is not the campaign of one terror group operating contrary to the wishes of its wider society.
Sullivan has all the information he needs to understand this reality. He chooses - every day -- to ignore it.
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Al Arabiya English
@AlArabiya_Eng
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May 14
#US national security adviser Jake Sullivan says that the White House has urged Israel to outline a “clear strategic endgame” in #Gaza.
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For my golfing friends.
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The Genocide Libel Is the Blood Libel of Our Time
Posted By Dennis Prager
In medieval Europe, Christians who hated Jews spread the lie that Jews kidnap Christian children, slaughter them, and use their blood to bake matzos for Passover. This lie became known as “the Blood Libel,” probably the greatest libel in history. Over the course of many centuries, Jews were tortured and murdered, often by being burned alive, because of the Blood Libel.
The Blood Libel was particularly odious in light of two facts: It was the Jews who, through their Bible, first outlawed human sacrifice; and one of the first laws in the Hebrew Bible is a ban on consuming blood.
For centuries, Jews had to confront the fact that all around them, throughout Europe, a vast number of people believed an enormous lie about them. Jews have to confront the same thing today. We are now living through the Second Blood Libel: the claim that the Jewish state is committing genocide. But, unlike the Blood Libel, this libel is not the product of Christians; it is the product of Muslims and the Left. The very people against whom the greatest genocide in recorded history — the Holocaust — was directed are now accused of that crime.
According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, in 1948, there were 1,380,000 Palestinians in Israel and the greater Palestine area, and as of 2022, there were 7 million. In other words, there are now five times as many Palestinians in the Palestinian territories and in Israel as there were in 1948.
Now, as I have said all my life, truth is a liberal value and it is a conservative value, but it has never been a left-wing value. Yet, given these figures, even leftists would be forced to acknowledge that Israel has never had the slightest inclination to perpetrate genocide against the Palestinians. People targeted for genocide do not increase their numbers — let alone by a factor of five.
What the Left and their Muslim allies claim is that since Oct. 7, Israel has presumably changed its mind and decided to commit genocide against Palestinians (though, apparently, only in Gaza, not in the West Bank).
Here are some facts that explain why the charge of “Israeli genocide” is as much a lie as was the Blood Libel:
First, as Israeli officials have repeatedly stated, if Hamas released the hostages and surrendered, Israel would cease its bombing of Gaza. That was precisely the condition that the United States and its allies offered Japan and Germany: Unconditionally surrender, and the bombing of Japanese and German cities will immediately cease.
Second, World War II brings us to more proof that the charge of Israeli genocide is a lie. No one ever accused America or Britain of committing genocide against Nazi Germany or Imperial Japan. Even those who now maintain that the Allied bombing of Dresden and other German cities was morally wrong do not accuse the United States or Britain of having committed genocide. So why is Israel so charged?
Third, during World War II, it was almost universally understood that every German death by the Allies was caused by the Nazi regime, and every Japanese death was caused by the Japanese fascist regime. Had there been no Nazi invasions of European countries and no Japanese bombing of the United States and invasions of myriad Asian countries, there would have been no World War II and therefore no bombing of German and Japanese cities. Likewise, if there were no Hamas and no Oct. 7, there would be no Israeli bombing of Gaza. Every dead Palestinian in Gaza is the result of Hamas’ actions.
Fourth, Hamas is responsible for every dead Gazan for another reason: Hamas uses Gazan civilians as human shields.
Fifth, despite far larger mass killings around the world, only Israel is widely charged with genocide.
Since the beginning of this century, the Islamic terror group Boko Haram has murdered more than 60,000 Christians in Nigeria. Not only have there been no left-wing protests, few people even know, let alone care, about it. The Left doesn’t care because the perpetrators have been Islamists — their allies in the fight against the West — and blacks. The Left cares about dead black people, whether in America or in Africa, only when they are killed by whites.
From 2003-2008, in Darfur, Sudan, the Arab regime and Arab paramilitary groups killed more than 300,000 civilians and created about 2.7 million refugees. Again, because blacks are being killed by Muslims, the Left has no interest in their deaths.
One more example: In just the last few years, according to the BBC, between 700,000 and 800,000 civilians have been killed in the war between the Ethiopian government and the breakaway province of Tigray. Virtually no one knows or cares: It’s blacks killing blacks, after all.
Sixth, the United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has just revised its child fatality figure in the Gaza war sharply downward. On May 6, it reported more than 14,500 deaths; two days later, it reported 7,797. OCHA also revised downward its figure for women fatalities from more than 9,500 to 4,959. In other words, all the mainstream Western media have reported as truth the lies Hamas announced about the numbers of Gazan women and children killed by Israeli bombs. (However, even the original false figures don’t come close to substantiating the genocide charge.)
Even if the media give these new numbers the attention it has given the alleged “genocide,” it will not end a single anti-Israel demonstration or cause one Israel-hater to cease accusing Israel of genocide. Since the accusation was never based on truth, truth will not end it.
The only genocide in the Israel-Palestinian war is the one Hamas and Iran seek to perpetrate against the Jews of Israel.
This column was originally posted on Townhall.com.
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Israel releases new Gaza death toll, claims historically low civilian deaths
From Tal Brody
The ratio of terrorists to Palestinian noncombatants killed during Israel’s ongoing war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip is approximately one to one, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu revealed this week.
“What Israel has done is take the effort to minimize civilian casualties as no other army has done,” the Israeli leader said in an interview with U.S. author and political adviser Dan Senor on Monday.
“We use leaflets, we use millions of text messages, phone calls. We actually call the people, give up the benefit of surprise, tell them: ‘Get out of the way. Get out of the war zone so that we can accomplish our military objectives while you’re in a safe place,’” said Netanyahu.
“We’re facing 35,000 Hamas terrorists. We’ve killed already about 14,000, wounded many others, and we’re progressing towards that goal” of destroying the terror group, he added.
Israeli government spokesman Avi Hyman on Monday reinforced Netanyahu’s message, saying that the Israel Defense Forces had killed more than 14,000 terrorists and approximately 16,000 civilians since the outbreak of the war on Oct. 7.
“Israel is setting the new gold standard for urban warfare with what appears to be the lowest civilian-to-combatant casualty ratio in history,” stated Hyman.
Last week, the United Nations admitted it overcounted the number of Gazan children who have been confirmed killed in the war by a staggering 42%.
In March, the U.N. Children’s Fund stated that 13,450 children had been killed, citing figures from the Hamas-run Gazan Health Ministry. Last Wednesday, the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) released updated casualty figures according to which 7,797 Gazan children have died in the war as of April 30.
“The revisions are taken…you know, of course, in the fog of war, it’s difficult to come up with numbers,” Farhan Haq, deputy spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, told JNS on Friday.
The 13,450 statistic was cited frequently in the international press, leading to accusations that the Jewish state had committed war crimes, including intentionally targeting children.
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Biden turns on Israel
He doesn’t understand that Hamas loves dead Gazans
By Clifford D. May
Kerem Shalom is one of the main crossings through which humanitarian assistance moves from Israel into Gaza. It lies just a few miles southeast of Rafah, where four Hamas battalions are believed to be preparing for battle with the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
On May 5, rockets launched from Gaza at this border crossing killed four Israeli soldiers. Why would Hamas leaders attack a conduit for aid needed by Gazan civilians, the people they have ruled since 2007 and want to continue to rule the “day after” the current war ends?
Because they understand that the more Gazans suffer, the more Israelis will be blamed, punished, and demonized by the “international community.”
Because they know that using civilians as human shields – illegal under both international and American law – will not diminish their popularity among the “social justice warriors” on American campuses.
Because they are confident that their barbarism will be not just condoned but handsomely rewarded.
And, sure enough, the attack on Kerem Shalom was soon followed by complaints that the Israelis were not moving fast enough to reopen the crossing (how long does it take to clean up a few corpses!) and get those humanitarian supplies flowing into Gaza again.
Two days later, Hamas fired more missiles at Kerem Shalom – from a civilian shelter in Gaza. Hamas missiles were fired at the crossing again on May 8, 10, 11, and 12. Israeli military officials assured impatient reporters that the crossing would be reopened as quickly as possible.
If this does not strike you as grotesque, there’s no point in you reading the rest of this column.
Last Tuesday, President Biden gave a moving speech at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, recalling the Nazi genocide of the Jewish communities of Europe and vowing “Never again.”
The next day, in an interview with CNN’s Erin Burnett, Mr. Biden lent encouragement to Hamas’ leaders whose goal is to follow the Nazi example by exterminating the only surviving and thriving Jewish community remaining in the Middle East. The atrocities of Oct. 7, they’ve vowed, were merely a foretaste.
For months, Mr. Biden and other Democrats had slammed Republicans – quite rightly – for not passing a bill providing arms to Ukraine and Israel, democratic nations and friends of America under attack by enemies of America. Thanks to House Speaker Mike Johnson, the bill finally passed – with overwhelming bipartisan support.
But Mr. Biden told Ms. Burnett that he was holding up the delivery of munitions to Israel and would block additional security assistance if Israel launches a major assault on Hamas in Rafah.
“We’re not walking away from Israel’s security,” Biden equivocated. “We’re walking away from Israel’s ability to wage war in those areas.”
Wars cannot be won on defense alone. Boxers don’t win fights just by blocking punches. “Deterrence by denial” not coupled with “deterrence by punishment” invites enemies to try, try again.
If Israelis must fight terrorists without American support, they will do so. They’ve done it before. Israel exists so that never again will Jews lack the means to stand up to those determined to slaughter their children.
But Israeli leaders can’t focus all their attention – or all their remaining ammunition – on Gaza. Hezbollah, a proxy of Tehran like Hamas, continues to fire missiles from Lebanon. Some 80,000 Israelis have been forced from their homes in the north for more than seven months.
And last month, for the first time, Iran’s rulers launched hundreds of drones and missiles at Israel from Iranian soil. This time, those rockets were prevented from reaching their intended victims. But there will be a next time. And the regime’s nuclear weapons program has progressed significantly since Mr. Biden moved into the White House and eased economic sanctions on Tehran.
Israeli leaders must prioritize and sequence as best they can. They appear to agree that neutralizing Hamas’ military capabilities is imperative – and that sooner is better than later.
I can’t imagine them allowing Hamas’ leader in Gaza, Yahyah Sinwar, to emerge from the tunnels and declare himself the victor – the jihadi who beat the accursed Jews; the mujahid who humiliated the cowardly Palestinian Authority and the Arab Zionists who joined the hated Abraham Accords.
What I can imagine: The IDF bringing an end to this conflict without a “full-scale offensive” or “major military operation” – terms Biden administration officials have used to describe the military actions they adamantly oppose.
For example, over recent days, with precision and minimal combat, the IDF has taken control of the Gazan side of the Philadelphia Corridor, the border with Egypt, adjacent to Rafah.
Stopping resupplies of ammunition to Hamas coming over that border should not be difficult. Stopping resupplies of ammunition to Hamas coming under that border through tunnels will be more complicated.
But an effort has begun. On Saturday, the IDF announced that “a significant underground route” near the border containing “many weapons” had been “eliminated” along with “dozens of terrorists.”
Beforehand, civilians had been moved out of harm’s way – despite Hamas’ efforts to facilitate their martyrdom.
If that’s Israel’s continuing approach, will Mr. Biden be satisfied? Bernie Sanders and Rashida Tlaib will instruct him not to be.
Late last week, White House spokesman John Kirby told reporters that there is still hope for a hostage-for-ceasefire deal but that to achieve it is “going to require leadership, some moral courage and it’s going to require continued ability to compromise and negotiate in good faith. We’re not giving up on that.”
Mr. Kirby is doing his job like the good sailor he is. But I doubt he’s proud of himself for ascribing to Hamas terrorists a capacity for “moral courage.”
More than that: He’s too smart not to understand that Hamas loves dead Gazans.
Clifford D. May is founder and president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) and a columnist for the Washington Times.
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Subject: This Election
From Tim Allen...
Here are some interesting points to consider prior to the November election, especially for my friends on the fence, like moderate Democrats, Libertarians, and Independents, the never-Trump Republicans, and those thinking of "walking away" from the Democratic party.
Women are upset at Trump's naughty words, but they also bought 80 million copies of 50 Shades of Gray.
Not one feminist has defended Sarah Sanders. It seems women's rights only matter if those women are liberal.
Chelsea Clinton got out of college and got a job at NBC that paid $900,000 per year. Her mom flies around the country, speaking out about white privilege.
And just like that, they went from being against foreign interference in our elections to allowing non-citizens to vote in our elections.
President Trump's wall costs less than the Obamacare website. Let that sink in, America.
We are one election away from open borders, socialism, gun confiscation, and full-term abortion nationally. We are fighting evil.
They sent more troops and armament to arrest Roger Stone than they sent to defend Benghazi.
60 years ago, Venezuela was 4th on the world economic freedom index. Today, they are 179th and their citizens are dying of starvation. In only 10 years, Venezuela was destroyed by democratic socialism.
Russia donated $0.00 to the Trump campaign. Russia donated $145,600,000 to the Clinton Foundation. But Trump was the one investigated!
Nancy Pelosi invited illegal aliens to the State of the Union. President Trump Invited victims of illegal aliens to the State of the Union. Let that sink in.
A socialist is basically a communist who doesn't have the power to take everything from their citizens at gunpoint ... Yet!
How do you walk 3000 miles across Mexico without food or support and show up at our border 100 pounds overweight and with a cellphone?
Alexandria Ocasio Cortez wants to ban cars, ban planes, give out universal income, and thinks socialism works. She calls Donald Trump crazy.
Bill Clinton paid $850,000 to Paula Jones to get her to go away. I don't remember the FBI raiding his lawyer's office.
I wake up every day and I am grateful that Hillary Clinton is not the president of the United States of America.
The same media that told me Hillary Clinton had a 95% chance of winning now tells me Trump's approval ratings are low.
The problem with socialism is that sooner or later, you run out of other people's money.... Margaret Thatcher...
Maxine Waters opposes voter ID laws; She thinks that they are racist. You need to have a photo ID to attend her town hall meetings.
President Trump said, "They're not after me. They're after you. I'm just in their way."
Now, go back & Read this Again as your Future Depends upon it Because it Does...
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DAILY FOLIOS AND CONSECUTIVE SENTENCES
To Stop the Campus Riots,
Abolish Faculty Tenure
Full-time professors will have no choice but to teach wisdom, not Hate America poison.
By DOV FISCHER
How many fields of pursuit in America come with a guarantee that the employee can never be fired?
Owners typically cannot be fired, but corporate boards of directors often fire CEOs who come in with poor results. Sports managers and coaches get fired all the time. School teachers can be fired. First responders can be fired. In law firms, when an associate “makes partner,” he theoretically cannot be fired, but that is because a law firm partner actually becomes a part owner of the firm. So he does not get a set hourly wage anymore but a share of the firm’s annual profits. In many firms, the new term for a “law partner” is a “shareholder.” And even then, if the partner fails to continue bringing in new business or billing a reasonable number of hours, he will get pressured intensely to leave. I worked for ten years at three of America’s most prestigious firms — Jones Day, Akin Gump, and Baker and Hostetler — and I saw this first hand.
So the campuses are full of tenured professors — approximately half their faculties — many of whom are legit and many others of whom barely work at all.
People get fired. Deans get fired. The president of the University of Pennsylvania got fired recently, and that snake was followed out the door by the plagiarizing former president of Harvard. In time, the president at Columbia rightly will get the boot. Presidents and other elected government officials get fired by the voters, or they simply get termed-out. Almost everyone, other than owners of private businesses, can be fired. (READ MORE from Dov Fischer: Sue the Members of the College Boards)
Except for tenured university professors.
And that is just wrong. And outrageous. It is corrupt. There is nothing like it.
I was a non-tenured adjunct professor of law for sixteen years at a once-fine Southern California law school, and also for six years at an outstanding University of California law school. An “adjunct” is a part-timer. We are hired to teach, but are not expected to be on campus 9-5, holding office hours, attending committee meetings, sponsoring or guiding or mentoring individual students for graduate papers or law review submissions, and publishing scholarly articles in respectable law reviews. Rather, we are hired only to teach. Some of us adjuncts are not such good teachers and do not last very long. Many others of us are far better at teaching than are the tenured professors whose roles are described above. We love teaching, and we are fabulous at it. We love our students and give them far more personal time than the tenured professors do because teaching and students are our passion, not publishing weighty law review articles that no one ever reads.
There are downsides as well as upsides to being an adjunct. We do not get the employee benefits that tenured professors do. No health coverage. No life insurance. Virtually no pension. We have to pay for parking every time we show up. We get no office to meet students, so we have to meet with them at coffee shops or outdoors on campus. And our contracts are for six months only, only one semester at a time. One wrong step, and sayonara.
I taught for 16 years, so was hired and rehired 32 consecutive times. They could have dropped me any term they wanted, but the students loved me to pieces, and I was one of the most effective professors at the law school. How do I know? Because I received hundreds upon hundreds of emails from my students over those sixteen years saying so, even emails two and three years after they graduated saying that, looking back, the only class and professor they took in all their law school education that proved valuable in actual practice was mine. One wrote me that she was working for a partner who did not know a certain rule of civil procedure, so she quickly chimed in, without researching, and told him the law. He responded: “Pretty sharp! Where did you go to law school?” She told him. He replied: “Oh, that one. I’ll bet you had Fischer!” Her retort: “Who else?”
I have hundreds of these, close to a thousand such affectionate letters. I kept them in case I ever got fired over political correctness and cancel culture. When my beloved wife and best friend of twenty years, dear Ellen of blessed memory, passed away in July 2020, I knew it was time for me to “call it a day” with law teaching. I already had achieved far more than I ever hoped to attain as an adjunct. I no longer needed the money. No longer wanted to grade final exams. But I had continued doing it because I absolutely loved my students of all ethnic, racial, and religious backgrounds and teaching them, and it was a 90-minute car drive each way — three hours total every Wednesday — during which Ellen of blessed memory always accompanied me. Those three hours with Ellen were worth everything in the world to me, especially as she became ill. As an added bonus, her presence allowed me to use the carpool lane, saving an hour on the drive. Once she passed and went to Paradise to be with the souls of the Righteous, and with COVID rampant on earth, and me diagnosed with terminal interstitial lung disease (saved later only by an emergency lung transplant), I realized I had to give up law school teaching, like Joe DiMaggio did with the Yankees, at the top of my game.
And then I got a push. The great Rush Limbaugh, G-d rest his soul, for the third time in three years, read an entire article of mine on his radio show. Whenever he would do that, it would guarantee an extra 100,000 or more readers of that column. Once, he even got me one million readers. So Rush read it, and it made waves, and two wacko leftist professors at the law school demanded that I be “investigated.” I was not sure what would be investigated. I am an American citizen and have papers to prove it. I had a circumcision on my eighth day. I have copies of my college degree from Columbia, my graduate degree and rabbinical ordination (s’mikha) from Yeshiva University, and my law degree from UCLA. I even have a certificate that I was a good boy and drank my milk in first grade. But the wacko leftists demanded an “investigation.” The Dean of Adjuncts — yes, there is such a thing — phoned me apologetically to tell me he would have to “investigate” me. I used a procedural loophole to delay any “investigation” for two days. I called Jim, a dear friend, the best plaintiffs’ employment law attorney in California, thereafter two former federal chief circuit court judges, and finally an old buddy of decades, and they all unanimously counseled me to walk away. (READ MORE: The Blessing of the College Riots)
I no longer needed it. I no longer needed the money. I had experienced the prestige of being called “Professor Fischer” for 16 years, along with “Rabbi Fischer” for forty. Ellen of blessed memory no longer would be spending three hours in the car with me every Wednesday. I no longer would have access to the carpool lane. I no longer would have to grade another final exam. And, with my corroding lungs, I dared not stand in an over-filled classroom (as my classes always were) amid the height of COVID. So I hung up my syllabus and just walked away.
Let them investigate that.
They once were the 37th best law school in the country. Now they are #61, tied with Seton Hall and the University of Kentucky. But they do have an impressive “Black Lives Matter” web page.
Within 48 hours, I picked up a new income opportunity that paid more than they ever paid, at half the hours, and twice the fun. G-d is so good. I love G-d, my life, and my new wife. But I miss Ellen z”l of blessed memory terribly.
So that is the life of an adjunct. A touch of job insecurity like everyone else. By contrast, a tenured professor cannot ever be fired except for “moral turpitude.” So the campuses are full of tenured professors — approximately half their faculties — many of whom are legit and many others of whom barely work at all or fail to keep up with their assigned subjects. They re-use the same reading lists and syllabi for so many years that students would think the sociology or political science class for which they signed up actually is one in history. They do not prepare. They assign less challenging term papers and administer easier final exams that can be graded by a Scantron machine, rather than by a human being. They are not available for their students because they are busy at committees or researching and writing scholarly papers about deconstructing constructions. They cannot be fired. They are useless, often narcissistic, haters because they are safe to spout any garbage that comes to their minds that day, and their decaying presence blocks opportunities for enterprising newcomers to advance.
A beautiful example can be found in the great Russel Crowe film, “A Beautiful Mind.” The guy is a genius, a brilliant, remarkable mathematician. But he does not care a rat’s petootie about his students. He hates even going through the motions of teaching. He just wants to think and publish. (The story is far more gripping than that, but this pertains here.) That is what too many tenured professors are. How do I know? I studied under them. I worked alongside them. I know them. To be fair, no blanket description can fairly describe an entire class of people. But the shoe fits.
Tenure goes back to the American Association of University Professors 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure and even earlier. The idea was to protect free expression and intellectual freedom to think, to explore, to take daring risks in pursuit of knowledge. But in today’s world, the impact is the opposite: it imposes ideological strictures of severe conformity. Professors seeking tenure in a liberal arts field where the faculty department is predominantly or even uniformly liberal and progressive/woke are forced to conceal and even to transform their views to accord with the department’s left orthodoxy, or they will be denied tenure or even initial employment. Therefore, anticipating their future careers, they must publish politically correct views in journals and be wary of what they post on social media. From the day they enter grad school, in fact, they must be careful to select a topic for their dissertation that will not get them “dinged” when they seek academic employment.
Tenure is a century old, out of date, and must be stopped. Laws must be enacted, both by the federal and any state government that allocates money to colleges and universities, that any institution receiving such public funds — toward scholarships, fellowships, student loans, research, or even by means of tax exemptions — must document to the government that the school no longer maintains a policy of academic faculty tenure. (READ MORE: Colleges Must Stop Admitting Foreign Students for Two Years)
That does not mean that professors should be fired every term. On the contrary, any experienced excellent professor always will be rehired over an inexperienced newcomer. However, the dross will be discarded and the chaff sifted out. Those who use their classrooms as platforms to indoctrinate and brainwash will be held to greater scrutiny. If they are teaching lies, their lectures and classrooms will be exposed by students with video clips on social media, and public outrage will place their employment in jeopardy. College and university directors and trustees, fearing — correctly — they themselves will be sued by the federal government and in parents’ class actions, will act to remove the garbage. Tenured professors will have no choice left but to teach and publish wisdom and useful knowledge, not Hate America poison or conspiracy theories that George W. Bush worked with Bin Laden to take down the World Trade Center’s twin towers.
As part of a comprehensive program to fix the rot in our colleges and universities, the practice of academic faculty tenure must be abolished.
To receive Rav Fischer’s Weekly Extensive Torah Commentaries or to attend any or all of Rav Fischer’s weekly 60-minute live Zoom classes on the Weekly Torah Portion, the Biblical Prophets, the Mishnah, Rambam Mishneh Torah, or Advanced Judaic Texts, send an email to: shulstuff@yioc.org
His 10-part exciting and fact-based series of one-hour classes on the Jewish Underground liberation movement (Irgun, Lechi, and Haganah) and the Rise of Modern Israel can be found here. In it, he uses historic video clips of Irgun, Lechi, and Haganah actions, decades of past Arab terrorist atrocities, as well as stirring musical selections from the Underground and video’d interviews of participants, to augment data, statistics, maps, and additional historical records to create a fascinating, often gripping, and scholarly enriching educational experience about issues that remain deeply relevant today as Israel engages in an existential war in Gaza against Hamas terrorism.
His latest deeply moving weekly series of informational and inspirational programs on the Hamas Gaza war may be found here.
His 40-part Bible Study series covering all of I Samuel (First Samuel) intensively with Talmudic and Midrashic commentaries, and now into II Samuel is now up here.
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Tom Fitton: ‘Caution’ Letter Proves Judge Merchan’s Ethics Violation
By CATHERINE SALGADO |
The judge now infamous for his role in the politically charged New York case against Donald Trump reportedly received an official “caution” for his ethics violation.
Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton cited the as-yet-unreleased caution letter to Judge Juan Merchan as proof of the latter’s ethical failure. While a sitting judge, Merchan reportedly donated to Democrats, including Donald Trump’s current Democrat presidential opponent Joe Biden. The latest news is that Merchan was officially cautioned over this ethics failure.
Fitton had originally posted back on May 6, 2023, “Judges are prohibited under ethics rules from donating to political campaigns and organizations. Accordingly, there are legitimate concerns about Judge Merchan's reported political contributions while a sitting judge to Biden and Democratic causes.” Merchan is a dedicated Democrat, it would seem, indicating political bias in the trial of GOP frontrunner Trump.
On May 18, citing Reuters, Fitton further posted on Twitter/X, “UPDATE Judicial Conduct Commission Vindicates Trump: The New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct dismissed an ethics complaint with a ‘caution’ to Judge Merchan over his donations to the Biden campaign and other Democratic causes.”
Unsurprisingly, Fitton noted that “Reports are Judge Merchan has not released the ‘caution’ letter, which he evidently received last summer. This official ethics finding, which can be used against Merchan in any future ethics proceedings, serves to confirm Trump's concerns about Judge Merchan's bias and ethics.” The Judicial Watch president concluded, “This black mark against Judge Merchan for his improper political donations again demonstrates how the abusive trial of Trump is corrupted by politics.”
Related: Just When You Think the Trump Trial Couldn't Get More Corrupt, This Guy Shows Up
Merchan appears to have multiple connections putting his objectivity into question, however. PJ Media’s Victoria Taft reported on how Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY), the same who formerly helped Democrats prosecute the first impeachment of then-President Trump, paid the firm of Judge Merchan’s daughter to help him get elected to Congress. And there’s an even more direct connection to the current Trump trial:
This week, we found out that Goldman has been bragging about "prepping" former Trump attorney Michael Cohen "a number of times to prepare him" for his various legal proceedings before the House Intelligence Committee. That was Schiff's committee to Get Trump and frame the president as a Russian secret agent. For years, they kept up this sham to undermine support for the president even when they knew it was a lie… Goldman knows both Michael Cohen and Judge Merchan's kid, the grown adult who must not be named by Donald Trump due to Merchan's unconstitutional gag order on the former leader of the free world.
Ah, nothing like Democrats for incestuous corruption. It’s a small anti-Trumper world after all, and it would seem Judge Merchan should indeed be taken off the Trump case because of his compromised ethics.
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Supreme Court Puts Final Nail in Coffin of Effort to Block Trump From Ballot in Arizona
By Tom Ozimek
The U.S. Supreme Court dealt a final blow to an effort to block former President Donald Trump from the presidential ballot in Arizona by refusing to hear an appeal from a man who’s waged a legal battle in dozens of states to get the former president disqualified over the Jan. 6 incident.
The high court has denied a petition for a writ of certiorari from John Castro, a registered Republican candidate for U.S. president in 2024, who fought in court to block President Trump from the ballot in Arizona, and elsewhere, according to an April 22 order list.
The Supreme Court’s denial of Mr. Castro’s request for review effectively upholds a lower court ruling from December 2023 that rejected Mr. Castro’s claim that President Trump should be barred from the ballot because he “gave aid and comfort to insurrectionists on January 6, 2021.”
In his lawsuit, Mr. Castro filed a motion in September 2023 seeking a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction that would have forced Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes to block President Trump from appearing on the state’s presidential ballot, based on Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.
Mr. Castro’s failed Arizona lawsuit was one of 27 cases that he brought against the former president on the same grounds.
In his 12-page opinion and order, U.S. District Judge Douglas Rayes ruled that Mr. Castro’s lawsuit “must be dismissed for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction because Castro lacks standing to bring his claim.”
Supreme Court Denies Bid to Expand No-Excuse Mail-In Ballots in Texas
Mr. Castro appealed the decision to the Supreme Court, which on April 22 put the final nail in the coffin of his lawsuit by denying review.
While the high court did not provide a reason for rejecting Mr. Castro’s appeal, but it’s likely related to a March 4 decision by the Supreme Court that said President Trump can’t be removed from the ballot by individual states—only by Congress—while overturning a Colorado Supreme Court ruling that disqualified him under the 14th Amendment.
The Epoch Times has reached out to Mr. Castro, Mr. Fontes, and the Trump campaign for comment on the decision.
Mr. Fontes’ office declined comment.
When the Supreme Court ruled in March to disallow individual states from blocking him from the ballot, President Trump reacted by saying it was a “big win for America.”
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