Copyright 2010 Jeff Jacoby Thu, 02 Sep 2010 22:40:01 -0400 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Jeff Jacoby :: Writings http://www.jeffjacoby.com jacoby@globe.com (Jeff Jacoby) webmaster@pundicity.com en-us http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7913/clunkers-was-a-classic-government-folly Wed, 1 Sep 2010 09:00:00 EST IN THE MARKET for a used car? Good luck finding a bargain: The price of "pre-owned" vehicles has climbed considerably over the past year. According to Edmunds.com, a website for car-buyers, a 3-year-old automobile today will set you back, on average,... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7903/let-the-private-sector-fund-stem-cell-research Sun, 29 Aug 2010 09:00:00 EST JAMES THOMSON, an embryologist at the University of Wisconsin, cultivated the first embryonic stem cell lines in 1998. By then the prohibition on using federal funds for scientific research in which human embryos are destroyed was already on the books:... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7888/lifting-the-embargo-would-entrench-cubas-rulers Wed, 25 Aug 2010 09:00:00 EST IS IT TIME to unplug the restrictions on trade and travel between the United States and Cuba? The prospect seems to tempt more people than ever, but it's a temptation to be resisted. The New York Times reported last week that the Obama administration... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7866/lighten-up-mr-president Sun, 22 Aug 2010 09:00:00 EST DEAR PRESIDENT OBAMA, Welcome back to Massachusetts. Your press secretary said last week that that you were returning to Martha's Vineyard, where you vacationed last year, for "some hiking, some time at the beach, some time at the ice cream store -- all... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7849/the-disengagement-disaster-five-years-on Wed, 18 Aug 2010 09:00:00 EST FIVE YEARS AGO THIS WEEK, the Gaza Strip was forcibly purged of its Jews. In the largest non-combat operation in the history of the Israeli Defense Forces, 50,000 troops were deployed to expel some 9,000 residents and destroy the 21 pioneering... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7835/born-in-the-usa Sun, 15 Aug 2010 09:00:00 EST LAST WEEK, House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio joined the chorus of Republicans amenable to rewriting the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment, which guarantees American citizenship to "all persons born or naturalized in the United States and... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7781/anti-semites-and-double-standards Wed, 4 Aug 2010 09:00:00 EST LATE IN JULY, a Hollywood honcho uncorks a blast of anti-Semitic bile, the sort of malignant stereotype about Jews one might expect from David Duke or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Is that newsworthy? It certainly was in 2006, when Mel Gibson, arrested in Malibu... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7775/electoral-college-bypassers-should-be-careful Sun, 1 Aug 2010 09:00:00 EST IT IS ELECTION NIGHT, 2012. The polls have closed. State by state, the votes are being counted, and gradually it becomes clear, to the bottomless horror of some voters and the unbridled delight of others, that former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, the... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7761/keelhauling-kerry Wed, 28 Jul 2010 09:00:00 EST NO ONE is ever likely to mistake me for the president of the John F. Kerry Fan Club. I worked hard to prevent Kerry's election to the Senate in 1984, I have voted faithfully for his opponents ever since, and when he ran for president in 2004 I was... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7748/a-free-press-takes-no-subsidies Sun, 25 Jul 2010 09:00:00 EST Second of two columns (Read Part 1) "THE 10 most dangerous words in the English language," said Ronald Reagan in 1988, are 'Hi, I'm from the government, and I'm here to help.'" But how dangerous could it be for the news industry to accept government... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7734/does-the-press-deserve-a-bailout Tue, 20 Jul 2010 09:00:00 EST First of two columns ARE GOVERNMENT SUBSIDIES the cure for what ails the news business? Add Lee Bollinger, the president of Columbia University, to the roster of eminentoes who think the answer is yes. In a new book, Uninhibited, Robust, and Wide-Open: A... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7724/look-whos-defending-states-rights Sun, 18 Jul 2010 09:00:00 EST ONE OF THE BIGGER TENTS in the history of American political thought, the one flying the "States' Rights" banner, has proved capacious enough over the centuries to accommodate everyone from Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and John C. Calhoun to Strom... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7714/fouled-by-the-taxman Wed, 14 Jul 2010 09:00:00 EST A WEEK before LeBron James's announcement on ESPN that he was leaving the Cleveland Cavaliers to join the Miami Heat, the New York Post and Rush Limbaugh saw it coming -- and for reasons having nothing to do with sports. "If LeBron James goes to the... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7677/were-the-founders-hypocrites Sun, 4 Jul 2010 09:00:00 EST "HOW IS IT," the great English man of letters Samuel Johnson taunted Americans 235 years ago, "that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of Negroes?" His fellow Englishman Thomas Day remarked in 1776 with equal scorn: "If there be an... http://www.jeffjacoby.com/7660/declining-on-the-bench Tue, 29 Jun 2010 09:00:00 EST IN THE SUMMER OF 1990, Supreme Court Justice William Brennan retired and President George H.W. Bush named US Court of Appeals Judge David Souter to succeed him. A few days later, Justice Thurgood Marshall fumed about the Souter nomination in an interview...