Weekend Roundup

I've been doing a cite check this week, which has been a huge time suck. Fortunately, I was assisted by the fact that I am a known expert on regulatory affairs, with a particular emphasis on the economic impacts of arcane environmental regulations. So that helped.

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Jews continue to have disproportionately high approval ratings for President Obama. They're only equaled by non-religious Americans, and dwarf Catholics, Protestants, and Mormons (Muslims were too small of a sample to be measured). Fun fact: Jews are the only religious groups to register higher approvals for Obama from non-Hispanic Whites versus people of color (though -- with apologies to Aliza Hausman -- I can't imagine the sample size for the latter was that big).

Yale Law Professor William Eskridge, one of the leading scholars in the field of sexual orientation and the law, claimed in Congressional testimony that he was denied tenure at UVA due to anti-gay prejudice. Via.

Are women better judges? Eric Posner and friends run the data and make the case. Their findings are that female judges tend to have worse formal credentials (elite law schools, judicial clerkships) upon appointment, but are as productive, influential, and independent as men once on the bench. Indeed, on the independence side, women actually outstrip men.

The Second Circuit may have just raised and then killed the prospect of corporate liability under the Alien Tort Statute.

Sudan continues to blame the Jews for Darfur. It's a refrain we've heard before.

American mayors are sick of illegal guns plaguing their streets.

Sarah Palin's book was ghost-written by a White supremacist affiliated author?

I never understood these things when I was in middle school. And I was a good student, too.

I think the right-wing hit job on Ken Kevin Jennings is absolutely despicable, but what can you do? They have no shame. The CNN piece is a good start, essentially noting that all their claims are lies. But it would be nice for them to say it directly: instead of writing "Conservative groups charge that Jennings, who is openly gay, condoned statutory rape and child molestation," try "Conservative groups falsely charge that Jennings, who is openly gay, condoned statutory rape and child molestation." Why is that so hard?