RUTHFULLY YOURS

The promotion of diversity has been a well-known feature of the legal profession for many years. Surprisingly less well-known is the imposition of racial quotas on law firms by the actual courts themselves.

So-called “diversity orders” have been issued for years by federal judges in class-action proceedings to mandate that plaintiffs’ counsel be diverse enough to “effectively represent’” their class member-clients. The underlying assumption apparently being that proper representation can only be provided when counsel and class racially concord. Recently, the constitutionality of diversity orders was made the subject of a Supreme Court petition.

The case, Martin v Blessing [1], was an important one to watch. If review had not been denied, the more ideological judges within the federal judiciary might have seen the decision as a green light to impose more of these types of orders, not only in class-action proceedings, but perhaps elsewhere as well.

The Martin case derives from a 2010 antitrust lawsuit against Sirius-XM Radio, which raised fees on subscribers following the takeover of its only industry rival. Unhappy with the negotiated settlement (plaintiffs got a guarantee that subscriptions wouldn’t rise for 5 months, attorneys got $13 million in fees), class members filed another challenge which also included an objection to a “diversity order” made during class-certification proceedings. Before he agreed to certify class counsel, Manhattan District Court Judge Harold Baer Jr. ordered [2] that they “ensure that the lawyers staffed on the case fairly reflect the class composition in terms of relevant race and gender metrics.” Aware of the huge fees lead counsel roles can bring, the candidate firm apparently failed to mount any protest and dutifully complied with the order.

http://frontpagemag.com/2013/frontpagemag-com/when-obama-said-hes-sorry/print/

This week’s Glazov Gang was joined by an All-Star Cast: Ann-Marie Murrell, National Director of PolitiChicks.tv, Basil Hoffman, a Hollywood Actor (“The Artist”) and Monty Morton, a Conservative Entrepreneur.

The Gang gathered to discuss The Haunting Design of ObamaCare. The dialogue focused on the president’s true morbid objectives in implementing his health care plan, his peculiar “apology,’ the myriad ingredients and consequences of the ObamaCare nightmare, and much, much more:

Part I:

The easiest way to tell that Obama has run out of things to do in the Middle East is his desperate pivot to the peace process. The never-ending peace process, which is now on its fourth administration and its sixth prime minister, is the gift shop in the museum of the Middle East. It’s the place you stop by on the way to the exit because it’s convenient and everyone back home expects some souvenir peace t-shirts.

In 2013, the West Bank and Gaza are more irrelevant to events in the Middle East than ever before. Like toddlers left alone in their high chairs, the Palestinian Authority and Hamas have spent the last year whining that no one is paying attention to them. And no one in the Arab world is paying attention to them because suddenly killing Shiites has become more of a priority than killing Jews.

If in the past Western diplomats could claim with a straight face that peace would stabilize the region, after the diplomats tore it apart with the Arab Spring that line ought to come with its own laugh track.

If Arafat’s corpse rose from the grave to dance the Hora and Netanyahu learned to shout, “Allahu Akbar,” no one in the region would even notice. The Syrians, Turks, Qataris, Saudis, Lebanese and Iraqis are too busy fighting in the misnamed Syrian Civil War to even pretend to care about a peace process that they never really cared about even back when they were pretending to care about it.

Now they aren’t even pretending.

Obama’s trip to Israel to jumpstart another miserable round of non-negotiations between an Israeli side that wants a deal and a Palestinian Authority side that wants an excuse not to make a deal because it wouldn’t survive a day after signing an agreement was another international demonstration of his cluelessness.

Obama, the prevaricator and ideologue clearly has no shame when it comes to lying. But the ObamaCare “Got Insurance: Let’s Get Physical” ads that are now being targeted to the millennial generation hit a new record for sordidness.

I have heard that it takes a village to raise a generation. If society is supposed to protect its young, we are failing big time.

When Sarah Palin spoke about being a grizzly mama bear, many Americans responded positively because the first instinct when a child is being attacked is to fiercely defend the young no matter what cost, no matter what the struggle.

Wake up mama and papa bears.

Families across the nation are being targeted by the Obama administration. The marriage penalty in ObamaCare makes no sense except to destroy the sanctity of marriage. How does taxing married people help health care?

Now the young are being kidnapped by Mr. Cool Prez as he mesmerizes them with hip and cool slogans. In reality, the ObamaCare advertisements reflect yet another invasion into their private lives — which is, of course, the embodiment of tyrannical rule.

But with young people innocently permitting violation of their own privacy via the various social media sites, it is no wonder that Obama and his minions think that ads that pander to easy sex, thug culture, and the idea that “girl power means they never play it safe” will attract the attention of these rather naive young folk.

Letting it all hang out defines far too many of our societal expectations. It is time to sit down and start a conversation.

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303680404579141781929962584?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTTopOpinion The Constitution’s power-constraining pieces had to be interpreted out of existence to allow judges to blindly defer to legislators. In the constitutional challenge to the Affordable Care Act, Chief Justice John Roberts held that requiring citizens to buy health insurance was beyond the power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce. Yet he provided the […]

http://us1.campaign-archive1.com/?u=87b74a936c723115dfa298cf3&id=5c7f0d38d8&e=552053f981

Australians keep taking the lead.

Minutes after being elected Prime Minister, Tony Abbot began keeping his campaign pledge to repeal Australia’s wasteful and destructive carbon tax.

In preparing for the UN climate summit in Warsaw, the Australian cabinet instructed its delegation to cut off support for “socialism masquerading as environmentalism.”

Take a look at the address former Australian PM John Howard made to the Global Warming Policy Foundation.

Howard’s call for the world to abandon the “religious” nature surrounding the global warming issue and return to rational decision making should be heeded in every world capital.

We certainly can use some global warming realism in Washington.

It became clear to me on a recent trip that I was declining many offers to participate in various activities because of the inordinate demands of my hair. I either had to wash it, set it, fix it, or re-do it – so much so, that a friend suggested it was like travelling with an extra person. That revelation struck home: my hair was behaving like a moody adolescent and I not only had to tolerate it but accommodate it and give in to its bi-polar attitudes. On warm, sunny days, it simply sat down and refused to cooperate. On humid, windy days, it chose to give me that petulant frizz – the kind of spiteful behavior that mocks you with its arbitrariness. It said: I know there’s no reason for me to do this except to show that I can and you can’t do anything to stop me. And then sometimes, especially indoors in the evening, it was totally compliant and as easy to be with as an affectionate puppy who wants desperately to please. Of course I could choose to ignore it and often I did, only to come back to my hotel later to see it sitting on top of my head like a smashed slice of hair pie – with lumps and bumps where none had been noticed earlier. “Ignore me at your peril,” it said and laughed out loud.

It was on a day that I was determined to be the adult in this relationship that I arrived in Malta and chose to spend an hour sitting in the center of Valetta watching the local Malteds go about their quotidian tasks. It was some sort of school holiday and a constant stream of young mothers pushing strollers ambled by, sometimes accompanied by an older replica of the young woman – her mother. It soon became apparent that there was a prevailing body type on this island and that was a short legged, wide-midriffed endomorph with enormous pendulous breasts. They all seemed confident and comfortable in their skin. But wait a minute, I thought – What about the Mediterranean diet ?

Israel’s Economy Minister Bennett Schools CNN’s Amanpour Over Use of Term ‘Occupied Territories’ (VIDEO) Israel’s Economy Minister Naftali Bennett took CNN’s Christiane Amanpour to task in a tense television interview on Monday, objecting to the anchor’s insistence on referring to “occupied territories,” to which the leader of Israel’s Jewish Home party responded flatly, “One cannot occupy […]

CFACT unleashed its secret weapon today at the UN global warming conference in Warsaw, as Apollo Astronaut Walt Cunningham went toe-toe with global warming alarmists.

Walt was lunar module pilot on Apollo VII, the first manned Apollo mission. Along with Wally Schirra and Donn Eisele, he orbited the Earth 163 times. Interestingly, Walt won an Emmy award for making the first human television broadcast from space.

The professional warming crowd pitches a false consensus. They want the public to believe that the scientific debate is over and that all great minds think alike. CFACT readers know exactly the opposite to be true. The Astronauts who brought America to the moon took part in one of the pinnacles of human achievement. The selection process which vetted them, their courage, experience, training and precision are legendary. When they speak, attention must be paid.

CFACT held an official UN press briefing today at COP 19 featuring a powerful one-two punch. After Executive Director Craig Rucker made introductions, Marc Morano, who publishes CFACT’s Climate Depot news and information service, led off with Walt Cunningham batting cleanup.

Marc took dead aim at all the idle talk going about the COP raising the Philippines typhoon as a rationale to support the climate treaty. “Typhoon Haiyan/Yolanda was not the most powerful typhoon to hit the Philippines in recent history,” Marc said, “it was the seventh worst.” 1970’s Typhoon Sening averaged 24 mph more powerful. The typhoon which hit the Philippines was not caused by the lavish lifestyle of ordinary Americans. As CFACT has asked before, “how high would the carbon tax have to have been to have prevented the typhoon?” That’s nonsense. Marc Morano released a Climate Depot special report which thoroughly debunks the typhoon-warming link.

The World Bank has a reputation for integrity and objective professional analysis which it’s new report calls into question.

When Israel vacated Gaza American Jewish donors had bought more than 3,000 greenhouses from Israeli settlers in Gaza for $14 million dollars and transferred them to the Palestinian Authority. Former World Bank President James Wolfensohn, who brokered the deal, put up $500,000 of his own cash. To show their gratitude and their commitment to peace, the Arabs looted, ransacked and destroyed evey single farm including seeds, tents, state of the art agricultural equipment and dwellings….rsk

A newly-released report issued by the World Bank’s office for the “occupied Palestinian territories” charges that “Israel’s occupation costs the Palestinian economy $3.4 billion each year.” That claim has certain logic. The more the PA gets, the greater their wealth; one side’s gain is the other’s loss. Tel Aviv would be better, but that also doesn’t belong to them.

The purpose of this report seems to be to raise economic and financial claims against Israel which imply deceit and theft, thereby shifting blame for the PA ’s problems to Israel.

To understand why the new report was issued, one must compare it with a more comprehensive World Bank report issued in 2012 which described the PA ’s economy as a failure, “unsustainable” – not so much because of Israeli security restrictions, but due to inherent flaws and rampant corruption within the PA itself.

The 2012 report, Towards Economic Sustainability of a Future Palestinian State: Promoting Private Sector-Led Growth, analyzed the PA economy critically, upsetting Palestinians and their supporters, and challenging their portrayal as victims of Israeli policies.