Here’s something we should all envy…. the noble endeavor of NYPD to vanquish crime and sustain a safe city. That’s better than a chocolate city or a vanilla city. It’s the sort of community I want to live in.

New York Cops: Still the Finest….a great article by Heather MacDonald at City Journal. It’s a long substantive piece but, in part, she says this about New York City’s falling crime rate….

New York City has shattered criminology’s central myth, but criminologists remain in denial. Policing, they still insist, can do little to lower crime. Economic inequality, demographic trends, changing drug-use patterns—these determine crime levels, they say, not police tactics….

….The conclusion is unavoidable: policing is the most powerful tool that society possesses against crime. Since the 1960s, New York has spent billions on redistributionist social programs designed to eradicate both poverty and the dysfunctional behavior of the underclass. Yet by the 1990s, packs of feral youths roamed subways and parks, maiming and murdering. Thugs armed with military weaponry ruled whole neighborhoods. Today, thanks to the NYPD, those neighborhoods thrive with commerce and family life. Urban government does not possess the power to transform character or to uplift residents beyond what they’re willing to do for themselves, but it can provide the most important basis of civil society: security. And in so doing, New York policing has helped the poor more than decades of welfare programs ever did.

Here is a link to the recent Washington Post op-ed from SA’s favorite senator and drunk driver.  Here is a taste of his indictment:

Now that the votes are in from their first term, we can see plainly the agenda that Roberts and Alito sought to conceal from the committee. Our new justices consistently voted to erode civil liberties, decrease the rights of minorities and limit environmental protections. At the same time, they voted to expand the power of the president, reduce restrictions on abusive police tactics and approve federal intrusion into issues traditionally governed by state law.

Teddy, you still don’t get it.  The party in the White House gets to choose judges and justices (subject to advice and consent).  You will likely disagree with the judicial philosphy of the administration’s picks–just like SA readers will disagree with the judicial philosophy of the picks of the next Democractic president.  But so long as the nominee is qualified–like Roberts and Alito obviously were–you can’t cry foul. 

If the Dems want to appoint judges, perhaps they should adopt positions more in line with middle America and win the next presidential election. 

From the AJC:

A federal judge granted a temporary restraining order Friday preventing authorities in Columbia County from enforcing a provision in the state’s new sex offender law that bans sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of a school bus stop. He denied requests for restraining orders in Richmond and Burke counties, saying those requests were premature. The three counties are located along Georgia’s border with South Carolina.

The Act is being challenged on a number of grounds, including the ExPost Facto Clause and the Due Process Clause.  The Brief in Support of the Motion for a Temporary Injunction can be found here. 

The recent shootings are not helping the image of New Orleans as it tries to recover.  However, blaming poverty and public schools is not the answer.

“The spotlight Katrina put on the city showed the real reason for these murders abject poverty and a poor education system,” Councilman James Carter said. “We have to go from looking at this as a strict law enforcement situation and take a more holistic approach.”

Councilman Carter:  How about holding individuals accountable for bad acts?  One does not need a fist-full of dollars or a diploma to understand that commandment that thou shalt not kill.

Talk about an understatement.

Yesterday  President Bush signed legislation extending for 25 years the Voting Rights Act.  Under Section 5, jurisdictions covered by the Act cannot implement any change affecting voting until the Attorney General or the United States District Court for the District of Columbia determined that the change did not have a discriminatory purpose and would not have a discriminatory effect. In addition, the Attorney General could designate a county covered by these special provisions for the appointment of a federal examiner to review the qualifications of persons who wanted to register to vote. Further, in those counties where a federal examiner was serving, the Attorney General could request that federal observers monitor activities within the county’s polling place.  Section 5 only applies to 16 states–states back in the 60s deemed likely to discriminate. 

This is really a switch for Dubya.  According to this from the Washington Times:

Less than a decade ago, Mr. Bush fought that exact part of the Voting Rights Act, with his appointed secretary of state, Antonio O. Garza Jr., calling the provisions a burdensome and unnecessary federal intrusion into Texas’ affairs.
“The Bush administration has really done a flip-flop on this,” said Edward Blum, a senior fellow at the Center for Equal Opportunity who has studied Texas voting and the Voting Rights Act. “This is not where he was, and this is not the kind of philosophy that then-Governor Bush had when it comes to getting Texas out from under the thumb of the federal government.”
 He said Mr. Bush has abandoned “the great color-blind ideals that conservatives believe in.”

 In signing the legislation, Bush really sticks his finger in the eye of his home state of Texas.

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said the law has “been an effective and important tool in assuring all Americans the right to vote,” and she said it doesn’t target Texas.
 ”Texas long ago came into compliance with the Voting Rights Act, and the newly reauthorized bill doesn’t change that,” she said.
 Mr. Blum, though, said Section 5 clearly singles Texas out among its neighbors such as Oklahoma, Arkansas and New Mexico, which aren’t covered.
“Are Texans so different in their racial attitudes and their behavior toward minorities that Texans require supervision, but not the legislatures of those surrounding states?” he asked.

That’s a good question.  If Texas has come into compliance long ago, why target Texas for renewed federal intrusion into its affairs? 

Is America perfect?  No.  But can anyone really make the argument that the Voting Rights Act, which only targets a handful of states, should be extended until 2032.  As a South Carolinian whose state is covered by the Act, I take this as an insult.  Sure, there are many things in our history of race relations that are dissapointing and down right embarassing.  But this is not 1965.  Things have fortunately changed for the better in many ways and we need to move forward.

By signing the legislation renewing Section 5, Dubya sends a message that 16 states of the Union–including his own–still cannot be trusted to respect and protect the right to vote. That’s just not true.

Hoping to win some additional minority votes this November, the president and the Republican Congress have sold us out again–branding our states as racist until 2032.   My thanks for reminding me why I often vote foe third parties. 

No, not for abortions. For tans…

In the Sunday Edition of the Washington Post:

Do “American Idols” grow on trees?

In Birmingham, apparently so. Over the past four years, three of the city’s talents have barreled to the finals of Fox’s hit reality show. The streak started with Ruben Studdard in 2003, followed by 2005 runner-up Bo Bice and this year’s crowned crooner, AARP-haired Taylor Hicks. So, America wants to know: How did Birmingham get its groove?

Alabama’s largest city cannot be pigeonholed — musically or culturally. The three Idols are a good example: Hicks sings pop-wrapped soul, Studdard belts out gospel, and Brice channels Southern rockers. Indeed, there’s no pure Birmingham sound; it’s more like a compilation disc.

“We have gospel, punk rock, Dixie, jazz musicians who claim to be gospel and Christian instrumental,” says Hunter Bell, 34, who produces and hosts a weekly public radio show featuring local bands. “I think there’s a ton of talent. . . . A lot of people think the Birmingham music scene is going to explode like Athens [Ga.] or Austin. It hasn’t happened yet, but it’s on the brink.”

A big push has, of course, come from “American Idol,” which just announced that it will hold auditions in Birmingham for the first time. But the city is also working hard to improve its image, breathe life into deserted buildings and create a environment that sparks innovation and makes its own stars.

Me: I know most of you couldn’t care less, but I keep telling people that the world is beginning to notice our little slice of heaven down here in Dixie – it seems that I just might be right on the money…

Kinda makes you lose faith in the system, though, doesn’t it?

There’s a reason I won’t give up posting privileges at SA until Steve Dillard pries them from my cold, dead hands. 

Where else could I ask the readers for a recommendation on where I can find a really good barbecue cook-off or a barbecue festival?  Now, listen, I’m not talking about any of that Texas brisket stuff.  I’m talking about barbecue pork and chicken. 

Since Southern Appeal is one of those blogs that is linked into the mutual-referentialism of the whole blog world, I thought it was appropriate to link to this. 

S.T. Karnick is one of the journeyman writers of the conservative-libertarian (or as he would say, classical liberal) movement.  His work has appeared just about everywhere.  Some of you may remember him from his editorship and co-creation of American Outlook, which was a very good policy and culture magazine put out by the Hudson Institute for several years.  He and Wlady gave me my first opportunities in freelance writing a few years ago.  (Thanks to both for helping through a couple of lean years in Waco.)

Although Karnick has written about just about everything between his freelance work and his regular editorial pieces for the Hudson magazine, he really shines when opining about popular culture.  After years of encouraging him to focus on that area, I am happy to report that Karnick on Culture is now in business.  After only a few short days, Karnick has written posts covering Mickey Spillane, Monk, Psych, the Beach Boys, Touching Evil, Nero Wolfe, The Closer, and Superman Returns.  Spend a little time with S.T. Karnick before you make another CD, DVD, or fiction purchase.  You’ll be glad you did. 

Yes, I am, and always have been, a huge fan of the Newt. See, e.g., here (imagining a Gingrich presidency would be a good thing). So it was with glee I read Rich Lowry’s latest, which I now pass along to all.

I figure Larry Arnhart had to sit on the pot for a long time to come up with this thesis. His book…. Darwinian Conservatism.

No doubt you’ve already heard about Kevin Barrett, the adjunct instructor at the University of Wisconsin who is also a 9/11 conspiracy guy – that is, he thinks the attacks were part of an “inside job” meant to provoke a war in the Middle East.  In the NYT Stanley Fish argues that much of the debate surrounding whether Barrett should be allowed to teach or not – he seems to have made it clear that he will teach his conspiracy theories – is misguided in that it’s framed as a question of “academic freedom.”  But as Fish rightly points out, academic freedom is primarily about research activities, not teaching. He suggests that the Provost should have asked whether Barrett could separate himself from his beliefs when teaching because if he couldn’t, then he’s in the business of “indoctrination,” not teaching.

The advantage of this way of thinking about the issue is that it outflanks the sloganeering and posturing both sides indulge in: on the one hand, faculty members who shout “academic freedom” and mean by it an instructor’s right to say or advocate anything at all with impunity; on the other hand, state legislators who shout “not on our dime” and mean by it that they can tell academics what ideas they can and cannot bring into the classroom.

All you have to do is remember that academic freedom is just that: the freedom to do an academic job without external interference. It is not the freedom to do other jobs, jobs you are neither trained for nor paid to perform. While there should be no restrictions on what can be taught — no list of interdicted ideas or topics — there should be an absolute restriction on appropriating the scene of teaching for partisan political ideals. Teachers who use the classroom to indoctrinate make the enterprise of higher education vulnerable to its critics and shortchange students in the guise of showing them the true way.

The first thing to note is that this is a bit of a strange argument for Fish, who has made his name (outside literature circles) by pressing the view that we can’t separate ourselves from our basic beliefs and that there is no neutral ground.

The second thing to note is that Fish’s description of academic freedom even in research isn’t quite right.  No university allows professors to conduct research that will harm human subjects; professors have to work through institutional review boards even when doing something as innocuous as interviewing people on their political affiliations.  Psychology professors can’t see if electric shock therapy could change people’s views.

The third thing is that teachers just don’t have the freedom to teach whatever they want – and they shouldn’t.  Universities – and any other kind of school – exist (among other things) as institutions dedicated to the moral and intellectual formation of their students.  The professor is a *part* of that institution and as such has to fit within the parameters set by the institution.  No one assigned to teach a class on Shakespeare should be allowed to have his students read comic books for the semester, neither should should someone teach “flat-earth” geography.  We rightly give professors a wide latitude in designing their courses but only because we think that, in the end, the students benefit. There are limits to that autonomy.

Finally, though, there’s something to Fish’s distinction between “teaching” and “indoctrination” and in the idea that the classroom isn’t supposed to be a recruiting session for one’s pet projects, however noble they might be.  But that doesn’t mean, I think, that teachers need to separate themselves from their views.  I used to think that teachers needed to remove themselves from their own views on controversial matters when teaching them, trying as they can to provide all sides of the controversies as fairly as they can – what we might call the detachment model of teaching.
I still think teachers should show all sides of controversies as fairly as they can, but I think there is actually great value in teachers doing so from their point of view, explaining to students why they think that one side is superior to the other (or others).  It’s a tricky way to teach, mostly because students will have to learn to trust the professor to be fair in their grading of papers and exams and because the professor has to be good at criticizing other points of view fairly.  But if it’s done well, it does something that the detachment model doesn’t – it actually models how it’s possible to have civil, serious arguments over important and very deeply disputed issues.  The primary reason that I think the detachment model is deficient is that it subtly teaches students that what smart people do when faced with controversial subjects is to take an air of detached neutrality, cooly surveying the various options, and declining to embrace any of them.  My experience as a teacher has been that students don’t really like to get engaged in arguments over controversial subjects – the detachment model merely reinforces that tendency.

So, should Barrett be allowed to teach?  Probably not, since it seems pretty clear to me that he’s unwilling to treat views different from his own fairly and is probably more interested in indoctrination than teaching.

Always a fine topic to ponder when the people of earth are very busy blowing each other to pieces. I’d like to recommend a couple of DVD’s that should stir the Christian imagination a bit. Recently released, End of the Spear and (a few years older) To End All Wars. Both exceeded my expectations. If you’ve seen either or both, I’d like to hear your thoughts.

Proportionality is a legitimate concern in a just war, but not as redefined by those criticizing Israel.  Proportionality, properly understood, means first and primarily that the damage inflicted must be proportionate to the good expected by engaging in war.  Proportionality is also significant when considering how the war is carried out and specifically in applying the double-effect principle.  Most claiming that Israel is not acting proportionately, however, are merely totally up the number of deaths on both sides or comparing the number of troops capture–three–to the number of deaths caused by Israel.  Since Israel is causing more death, many critics reason that Israel is acting disproportionately.  But Hezbollah engaged in an act of war against Israel and when someone engages in war, the innocent party is morally justified in defending itself and winning the war.  And to win a war, you must kill more people and take more ground.  If proportionality meant the number of deaths are proportionate on both sides, no one would ever win a war.  But then again, maybe that’s the problem.  Today’s society doesn’t like winners and losers, so society tries to turn war into a scoreless pee-wee baseball game.

That’s according to Michelle Colon, the president of the Jackson, MS, chapter of NOW.  In an interview with “The World Can’t Wait”, a pretty far-left group, Ms. Colon equated Christian fundamentalists with Islamic terrorists:

[TWCW]:  So what needs to happen to dramatically change this direction society is going in? Do you indeed think we need to drive out the Bush Regime?

[Colon]: Oh yeah. I think this bus tour you guys are doing is great. You all have been going to communities that have been left off that map, left for “red states.” We need to get back to stuff like you all are doing, get back to the grassroots. When I found out some of the places you were going [Louisiana, Mississippi, Indiana] People in those places need to see this kind of hope. In these red states, most progressive people feel, they really feel like they are the “only ones” [opposed to the way society is being reformed]. And they’re not. And yes, we need to get them out, and this is the first step for us. The pro-choice movement in Jackson really came out of the closet on this one.

[TWCW]: What kind of role do you think the Christian Fundamentalists are playing in creating this new direction for society?

[Colon]: Oh, they’re totally tied up in the attack. And the attack on all of us, the ones they call the unholy alliance, the deviants. The want us rounded up, by the government, all the ones they consider the most vulgar parts of society. These fundamentalist Christians are to Christianity what the Muslim terrorists are to Islam.

I must have missed the meeting where “rounding up the deviants” was decided to be an official goal of the Vast Christian Fundamentalist Conspiracy (a wholly owned subsidary of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy).

(link via Magnolia Report)

The opinion is available here. 

I, for one, would definitely pull for him to be the VP on Allen’s ticket:

For now, Christian conservative leaders are still looking around. “The current front-runners are on values issues hard to distinguish in many respects from a lot of folks in the other party,” Bauer says. “People keep saying, ‘Who’s the conservative going to be?’ ”

Brownback hopes to become that candidate.

“There are two windows you’ve got to get through” to win the Republican presidential nomination, he says the next morning over pancakes and coffee at Des Moines’ Drake Diner. “One is: Are you ideologically acceptable? Secondly: Are you electable?”

He says he’s answered the first question. He leaves to greet delegates at the state GOP convention, trying to answer the second. One voter at a time.

They told me that they were gonna beat Ralph big time and they did it.  Pretty impressive stuff against a very talented fellow.  This just goes to show you how ugly the Abramoff thing has been.  The Reed career appears to have been short-circuited, possibly permanently.

A couple of things come to mind.  First off, the guys running the Cagle campaign were old Ralph operatives.  Ralph’s old guys apparently didn’t like Ralph very much.  I know some were disillusioned by his willingness to work for most favored nation trade status for China, but I think it probably goes deeper than that.  I think there was some serious personal stuff going on, too.

Second, I have to wonder where Reed goes from here.  He was going to walk into the Lt. Gov’s office and then just move down the street to Sonny’s house when he finished his second term.  And from there — who knows — maybe a shot at the presidency.  That’s all in a pile of ashes now.  I don’t suppose the future looks too bright for Reed’s consulting business, either.  Why not hire the guys who beat him instead?

I’m not happy at all to see Reed go down like this.  I preferred Cagle because people I trusted preferred him, but he had a golden age when he topped all the Christian politicos in modern American history because he was super-bright and super-articulate.  I hope there’s a second act of some kind for him, both personally and politically.  If he were a lefty, a place at Harvard would be waiting for him!

Here’s a great piece on George Allen, via RCP today:

ASK GEORGE ALLEN IF HE’S RUNNING for president, and Virginia’s junior senator demurs like any politician facing re-election this year.

“When we get to the future, I’ll determine the future,” he told reporters recently.

But make no mistake — George F. Allen is running for president. Or he just happens especially to enjoy primary states. In March and April, he visited Iowa, New Hampshire, Texas, South Carolina, and North Carolina. He’s courting bigwigs at state party conventions, and throwing his name in the hat for presidential straw polls.

Me: This is a very small taste of a detailed article that’s, IMO, somewhat generous of the good Senator. He’s not perfect, but I believe he is steadfast on most of the issues that conservatives care about and if nothing else, he’s extremely electable – which is going to matter greatly in the upcomng presidential election.

I highly encourage those unfamiliar with Allen to read this as a primer…after all, he most likely will be your next president.

awaiting evacuation, as I’m seeing on various news broadcasts, seem to me like a huge target for Hezbollah.

Salvo Magazine is the latest effort by the publishers of Touchstone.  Salvo has an intellectual edge, like Touchstone, but is not devotional or necessarily religious at all.  It is, however, a wickedly funny indictment of culture with some insightful articles along the way. 

I’m telling everyone I can about the magazine because it has exceeded all my expectations.  I wrote an article for it and promptly forgot about the project thinking it would be just another throwaway magazine, but Salvo is gorgeously rendered and makes the articles pop right out of the page. 

You have to buy the mag or subscribe for four quarterly issues to see it, but I can assure you that the fake ads are worth the price of admission alone.  Bobby Maddex has really accomplished something as editor of this magazine and I encourage everyone who wants to see more of these efforts to support it by subscribing for the first year.

I listened to Newt Gingrich on a radio news program (not a conservative talk show, but plain news) discussing the current situation involving Israel and Syria last night.  What struck me about him was that he speaks from a clear conservative viewpoint without sounding apologetic at all and comes off smart as a whip.  This is a guy who is comfortable speaking without notes because he absolutely knows his stuff.  He is a scholar and a hard-nosed politico, which is a combination one does not easily find, particularly in the GOP ranks.  Perhaps most importantly, he has and has always had vision.

Conclusion:  I think we have to seriously consider supporting this guy for the White House in 2008.  He is probably the best of the best.  Of course, supporting Newt would be uncomfortable for conservatives because he has clearly had sexual indiscretions and we don’t like those.  I think if he can successfully deal with that issue via candor and repentance, then we may have something with Mr. Gingrich.

First, they blow secret intelligence programs.  Now they tell our wives how to train us.  May they all end up working for US Weekly….

You can find it here. To be released at the end of August, Modern Times is Dylan’s first album of original material since the release of the highly-acclaimed Love & Theft on September 11, 2001.

in several ways, as this article on the take-down of the Canadian terror plot illustrates.  While the article focuses the most direct way–a devout Muslim acted as a mole and infilitrated the Canadian cell–I found another point as significant.  Specifically, the article notes how the mole originally wanted to jihad, but he then notes that:  “I was lucky that I was exposed to people who I could talk to, who could correct my understanding.” 

I was in a hospital waiting room yesterday listening (unavoidably so because of volume) to a few women discussing the difficulty of having borne children prior to marriage to men who promised they’d marry them and then disappeared. All in all, highly confirmatory of my own views on the subject, particularly since these ladies talked about how they wished they could take it all back and do it differently, withholding sex until a family had been legally formed.

Despite my ideological agreement with what they were saying, I was a little disturbed by the exceedingly frank tone of their conversation. The talk got fairly graphic at a few points, which doesn’t bother me too much, but I kept wondering how some of the older folks felt about it. There was a time when you simply wouldn’t have talked that way around strangers and I think it might be better to regress to that point.

I once heard Jackie Mason, Borscht Belt comic extraordinaire, tell a joke which went something like this:

“You ever notice something about Jews and Italians? You see an Italian guy walking down the street in New York and you say, “Ooooo, there goes a tough Italian guy. Don’t wanna mess with him!” But you put him in the Italian Army, and he can’t beat nobody. But you see a Jewish guy walking down the street, and you say, pfft, look at the wimpy Jewish guy. But put him in the Israeli Army, and he can beat anybody in the world.”

[You can find a variant of this story in the fourth paragraph at this web page.]

This story from Ynet reminded of that joke, and of why I support Israel so strongly in its war against the nations and terrorist organizations which are seeking to destroy it. Here are some of the money quotes:

[Israel's] Interior Minister Ronnie Bar-On toured northern Israel on Friday and met with heads of the regional councils in the area. “[Sheik Hassan] Nasrallah [leader of the terrorist organization Hezbollah] has sentenced himself by his own acts. I doubt that he would be able to find a life insurance agent these days,” he told Ynet.

and

Bar-On stressed that Israel would see to it that the rocket attacks on Israel are stopped. “If the Lebanese government fails to take control over the border and put a stop to Hizbullah’s shooting, we will do it. If it fails in restoring calm in Southern Lebanon, we’ll bring the Wild West to the area,” he warned.

Lest you think Bar-On’s reservation was “off the reservation”, as they used to say in our own Wild West, here is Amir Peretz, Israel’s Defense Minister, quoted in the same article:

“We expected Hizbullah to break the rules, and we plan to break it in return,” Peretz said.

Men like this deserve the unconditional support of the United States.