Mindless Philosopher

It boggles my mind that the Supreme Court might strike down local school boards’ efforts to increase diversity. I understand that using race as factors in decisions is often wrong-headed (certainly when racism is involved), but when the compelling state interest is racial diversity, it makes sense that you’d have to take race into account.
I don’t know much about the two desegregation systems in question (Seattle’s and a county in Kentucky’s), but after listening to the oral arguments in the Seattle case, their system is certainly “narrowly tailored.” Racial considerations only come into play in school choice after the family’s preferences, the family’s school connections (e.g., where siblings attend), and proximity to the school are all examined. Race is only used as a “tie-breaker” and there are not hard-and-fast limits on the racial make-up of the schools (unlike in the KY situation). Both programs have the support of the community (though obviously not unanimous support).
It will truly be a sad day if the Court strikes down Seattle’s de-segregation policy. How some justices believe that diversity in public education is not a compelling state interest, yet keeping two adults who love each other from marrying is within the purview of the state’s goals is simply beyond me.
Speaking of loving adults getting married, if you live in New Jersey, the Assembly may act on the Court’s mandate to give equal marriage rights to gay couples in the next couple of weeks. (The goal being to get the controversial decision out of the way before we even begin to approach the 2007 NJ election season.) I hear that only about a sixth of the 120-member state assembly members support gay marriage, but that fraction climbs every day. So, if you live in NJ, express your support for full rights by calling:

• Governor Corzine, (609) 292-6000
• Senate Pres. Codey (973) 731-6770
• Assembly Speaker Roberts: (856) 742-7600

Let’s show these elected officials that compelling state interests start with the people’s interests!

High marks for Spamalot. The musical followed the script from the movie somewhat closely, with the main exceptions being: lack of witch scene, no bridgekeeper, and completely different ending. The funniest bit was a hidden Star Wars joke — if I hadn’t been surrounded by people who didn’t get the joke, I would have been laughing aloud for 3 minutes. Thanks to Chicklet for the tix and company.
Thanksgiving was fun: went back to NoVA — the fam is doing well. Saw Janeite, Rain, and other various TJ people. At Rain’s game night we played Uno, Burn in Hell (terrible game), Apples to Apples, and Balderdash. I didn’t win a single one :(.
Back in Princeton now; played a great game of ultimate frisbee this afternoon. Post-thanksgiving, 60-degree weather: ridiculous. Maybe ignoring Kyoto is a good thing….
QOTW: “You know, [James Bond] isn’t Sean Connery anymore.”
Update: For you bakers out there, my pumpkin cheesecake with praline topping was a hit. I highly recommend.

My 2nd-least favorite WaPo reporter, Jim VandeHei, has left the Washington Post for a new startup. Sokolove expresses a good chunk of my views here:

Memo to Jim VandeHei: In a mere 48 hours you’ve gone from a guy doing an interesting thing to a guy I can’t wait to see fail.

PS. As far as I can tell, the infamous Hanna Rosin — who is “suprised” that young evangelicals are real people too — is still on book leave.

Week in Review:
Last Friday, I went with Kate to Triangle Club’s presentation of Heist Almighty, a musical comedy. The jokes were quite funny, it actually had a plot (spoof of Ocean’s 11/The Italian Job flicks), and the all-male, trans kick-line was a sight to behold. I guess some undergrad Princeton traditions work out pretty well.
Saturday the CJL grad student group went to see Borat. I have to say that, while the movie was quite funny, I was a bit disappointed that their weren’t more public scenes (i.e., too many scripted back-and-forths between Borat and his “producer”). I was impressed by the guts it took to do the naked wrestling bit, but nothing stacked up to the Arizona bar scene from his TV show.
During the week, I worked — a lot. Pretty boring. Anyone know someone who has $8,000 to fund research on text messaging?
On Friday, Princeton celebrated their football wins over Harvard and Yale, by lighting stuff on fire. But, it wasn’t much of a riot or anything — the bonfire was simply stacked in a pyramid fashion. I commented to my fellow politics grads that it appeared that the undergrads outsourced the work to some migrant workers — “I’ll be in my eating club; let me know when it’s done.”
Friday night, I attended by first reform Jewish services at the CJL, in honor of their producing their very own Siddur (prayer book). The project was five years in the making and turned out beautifully. There were great commentaries on the margins by (among others) Princeton students, Maimonides, Tolkien, Einstein, and the New York Times. Quite an achievement.
And last night, I schooled some undergrads in soccer and touch football. Well, I held my own in soccer, but I was the first- or second-best touch football player out there, which was a nice confidence boost. I have a nice battle wound above my lip to show for it too.
And today it’s off to the city for ice skating in Bryant Park and SPAMALOT!

Ever since I watched “The American President” for the first time, I’ve wanted to make one of those big boards where you can slide people’s names across from “against us” to “undecided” to “with us.” As Kodak says:

You. New guy. “Jarrett, Democrat,
Minnesota.” Slide his name on over
to “for.”
(to Lewis) We just had his name laminated under
“Undecided.” How’d you get the fence
pole out of his butt?

Since I don’t run a policy shop, I had to tweak the board for election purposes: “Waiting”, “Winning” , “Tied”, “Losing”. After printing a 2′ x 3′ poster at Kinko’s I taped it onto my magnetic white board and bought some small magnets off of E-Bay. Here’s the board on Tuesday afternoon, with all the races on “waiting”:

I took the board over to the pro-choice party at 7:30pm and starting shifting the early races. After we were certain we had won the race (or after CNN had called it), we would take off the magnet and color in the appropriate box either Blue or Red. I don’t think I took out the Red marker until after 10:30pm. Here’s the board at 10pm: check out the 2nd column (Dem winning) — we’ve won the House!!

But the Senate wasn’t looking too hot at that point. Webb was behind Allen in VA, and McCaskill’s St. Louis vote hadn’t come in yet. We kept waiting for the St. Louis vote….and waiting….and waiting…and, back in VA, Webb was still trailing. The crowd began to thin at midnight, and then more so at 1am. Anne (Missouri native) and I were sticking around to cheer on our home states though. And then….
Between 1am and 2am, the St. Louis vote comes in and McCaskill takes the lead! CNN calls the race shortly after 2am, and back in VA Webb catches up….and five minutes later, the Fairfax absentees come in and Webb takes a 16,000 vote lead!!! WE WIN THE SENATE! As Anne and I are the only two people in the entire building, I feel no compunction for jumping up and down and yelling like a maniac.
A few minutes later, I calm down and realize that Montana is actually getting a little close….we wrap it up at 2:34am, with one last picture of the Big Board. (I didn’t actually go to sleep until 4am.)

You can see the lone Senate magnet left there for Tester’s not-quite-finished victory. But, of course, that would eventually come and Bush’s “thumping” would be complete. What a night!

Go Tester, Go! (Looks like they’ve stopped counting at 75% in…)
I’m fairly confident about VA (the only senate race I got wrong — but wow, am I glad that I missed that one!)
Update, 8:42AM: Everyone agrees that there are 5 precincts left to be counted in Montana, but which 5? The AP reports that Meagher county is only one precinct and that four precincts remain to be counted in Yellowstone county. But, the Yellowstone page says that everything is done, and the SoS has reported five Meagher county precincts in the past. If you’re a Democrat, you want the latter scenario, but hopefully Tester will hold on to his 1500-vote margin in any case.

My soccer predictions weren’t very good, as I had a small bet with ADale that DC United would prevail, but hopefully my Dem picks will be better. Back in August, at APSA, Prof Medvic asked all of us in the campaign working group for our predictions. I went with 5 in the Senate and 21 in the House. I think those look a bit conservative now, but I’ll stick with them.
Senate: Dems pick up Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Missouri, and Montana.
House: Dems pick up AZ-08, CO-07, CT-05, FL-13, IA-01, IL-06, IN-02, IN-08, IN-09, KY-03, NC-11, NM-01, NY-24, NY-25, NY-29, OH-15, OH-18, PA-06, PA-10, TX-22, and WI-08. Hello, Speaker Pelosi!
Also, I think Lieberman will win CT, unfortunately, and I have grave doubts about whether he will caucus with the Dems or become Secretary of Defense (thus giving his CT seat to the GOP).
Gay marriage amendments pass in Arizona, Idaho, South Carolina, South Dakota, and Tennessee. Fails in: Colorado, Virginia, and Wisconsin.
South Dakota strikes down their abortion ban.
And Dems take a majority of the governorships, with pickups in AR, CO, MA, MD, MN, NY, and OH.
Not a single congressional or gubernatorial Dem incumbent loses.

I just finished watching Borat’s appearance on tonight’s Daily Show. I’ve never laughed so hard at a Jon Stewart interview (and Jon certainly didn’t do any of the work) — I practically hyperventilated. Head over to YouTube (which again hosts Comedy Central content) and check it out.

Even though I attend Princeton now, I’m certainly not ready to turn in my nerd card. This year, for my friends’ Halloween Party in New York, I dressed as The Facebook Newsfeed. Hey, it’s what scares the undergrads the most this holiday season :) . (And, as a Princeton grad student, they certainly emphasize that scaring undergrads is part of our job description.)
I think the idea was decent, though the execution left some to be desired. Basically, my costume was missing some sort of clothing element. My friend Sarah’s Fruedian Slip ‘tume (which unfortunately I didn’t get to see in person) is a great example of balancing clothing and text. Keya’s “Terror Alert” costume, which won “best in show” on Friday night, also combined placards and color-coded fabrics. But, alas, all I could come up with was poster board:

If you can’t read what it says, here’s a sampling. (There were 10 entries total, front and back).

More artistically, I stopped by Boston last weekend, and Dawn’s McCormick young women were carving pumpkins. The clear “scariest pumpkin” winner:

Death Eaters in the Great Dome! Actually, the Dark Mark would be an incredible hack if Tetazoo could pull it off.

my new state of residence…until today! The NJ Supreme Court just ruled that the state leg has 180 days to give gays and lesbians the same marriage rights as us breeders!
And! And! It was a 4-3 decision, but the dissenters were to the left of the opinion, mandating that the leg give same-sex couple marriage, not just the same rights. So, the court was unanimous in granting same-sex couples civil unions :)