People in the News--Eric Holder

Holder-- Embarrassing and Offensive

People in the News-- Jenny Sanford

From Shadow to Limelight

People in the News--Rachel Uchitelle

Her Affair with Tiger Woods

This Week's Assignment

This week's assignment is to prepare an outline of your paper, including title, thesis statement and path of argument.

US Homes Prices, City by City

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/04/29/business/2009-wide-housing-graphic.html

Richard Lindzen, MIT climate specialist, on Global Warming Hysteria

Environmentalism is the New Religion

This Week's Assignment

Two issues this week:

1. Is the US budget deficit something to worry about? Here are two pieces that appeared in the November 23 edition of the New York Times. This article says we should worry. Paul Krugman says we need to borrow and spend more.

2. The man-made global warming movement suffered a major setback this week when it was exposed that global warming scientists have been doctoring and hiding evidence that does not support the man-made global warming case. Read this, this and this.

Roberts and Sotomayor on Lawyers Fees

Read this interesting piece on Justice Roberts and Sotomayor's views on super-contingent compensation for lawyers who obtain especially good results for their clients. Are good results in court the result of good lawyering?

More Soul Train-- This is Great Stuff

Soul Train 1971

Dwayne Wade Dunks

Posner: Is the US Going the Way of Japan?

Posner: Is the US Going the Way of Japan?

States Supporting Gay Marriage

This Week's Assignment (11/19)

1. In re Bilski. The Supreme Court last week heard oral argument in a patent case involving so-called "business process" patents. The case involves a patent application for a commodities hedging technique. The issue is whether patents should be issued only for inventions that are scientific and technical in the conventional sense (machines, chemicals, etc.) or should extend to "softer" processes such as speed dating. Look at the following:

--WSJ article

--SCOTUS blog article

--California Federal Appeals Court case

--SCt oral argument

2. Is being rich the result of brains and hard effort, or just dumb luck? Read this.

This Week's Assignment

For this week, read the first of Michael Sandel's Reith Lectures given earlier this year on the BBC. Sandel is a professor in the philosophy department at Harvard (read pp 3 - 10; you don't need to read the Q&A). He argues that there are some things-- health care included-- that are too important to be allocated purely by the market. In the lecture he cites Gary Becker's proposal that the right to immigrate to the US be allocated to the highest bidders as an example of a good that should not be allocated by the market.

Read this brief description of Becker's immigration proposal.

Take a look at Professor Sandel's class blog.