I can’t recall if I’ve mentioned it before on this blog, but I was on the debate team in high school and college, and I coach a high school debate team now. I’ve coached several students who went on to debate for Harvard, two of whom won collegiate national championships and one of whom won a world championship, a rare feat for an American debater. So I was pretty surprised to read this article from The Guardian, which reports that a team of New York prison inmates defeated a team of Harvard debaters a couple of weeks back. Kudos to the inmates. I know from experience that those Harvard kids are sharp. In other news: Justices drift left as they age. FiveThirtyEight.com recently posted this article, which uses statistical analysis to suggest that Justices, especially those appointed by Republicans, tend to become more liberal as they age. As the article puts it, “[a] typical justice nominated by a Republican president starts out at age 50 as an Antonin Scalia and retires at age 80 as an Anthony Kennedy. A justice nominated by a Democrat, however, is a lifelong Stephen Breyer.” New death penalty poll in North Carolina. A new poll by High Point University found that 72% of North Carolina residents believe that the death penalty is warranted in at least some cases. The poll is attracting some national attention. For example, Crime and Consequences argues here that the poll asks a better question than Gallup’s death penalty poll. The High [...]
Faculty Coordinators
