AFTER FIDEL CASTRO conquered Cuba in 1959, the United States opened its doors to Cuban refugees fleeing the homicidal communist takeover of their homeland. Following the fall of Saigon in 1975, the United States admitted hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese boat people fleeing the homicidal communist takeover of their homeland. When Hungary's communist government crushed a pro-democracy uprising in 1956, President Dwight Eisenhower made it possible for tens of thousands of Hungarian refugees to escape to a better life in America. Pressure from Congress in the 1970s and '80s enabled half a million persecuted Soviet Jews and Pentecostal Christians to emigrate to the United States.

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"THERE ARE two races of men in this world," wrote the psychoanalyst Viktor Frankl in Man's Search for Meaning , the profoundly influential book he published about his experiences in the Nazi concentration camps. "Only these two — the 'race' of the decent man and the 'race' of the indecent man. Both are found everywhere; they penetrate into all groups of society. No group consists entirely of decent or indecent people."

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LORI LOUGHLIN and Mossimo Giannulli threw in the towel last week. The married couple, a Hollywood actress and a fashion designer, pleaded guilty in federal court to conspiracy to commit fraud in connection with the "Varsity Blues" college admissions scandal. Abandoning their year-long attempt to get the charges dismissed, they accepted a plea deal under which Loughlin would serve two months in prison and pay a fine of $150,000. For Giannulli, prosecutors recommend five months behind bars and a $250,000 fine.

I won't be shedding any tears for Loughlin and Giannulli. Their behavior, it is clear, was dishonest and disgraceful. What isn't clear is why this had to be turned into a federal matter.

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SOMETIME THIS SUMMER, Israel's new government — a broad left-right unity coalition — may move ahead with plans to formally annex about 30 percent of the West Bank, applying Israeli civilian law to the Jordan Valley and to Jewish settlements established after 1967, when Israel seized the territory in the Six-Day War. It has formally been under military occupation ever since, while its permanent status has been up for negotiation.

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IN 1996, Californians approved Proposition 209, the accurately named California Civil Rights Initiative. By a 55 percent majority, voters amended California's constitution to put an end to state-sponsored discrimination on the basis of race or sex. Proposition 209 required state government to get out of the business of quotas and preferences — to stop judging citizens by the color of their skin, and focus instead on the content of their character and the level of their ability.

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