Another Positive Review and a Jumping-Off Point

Warm reviews for economist Bryan Caplan's The Myth of the Rational Voter continue to pile up (indeed, I thought I'd made mention of the book here before, but can't find any such post). The latest is that of John Stossel - though warm may be a trite too optimistic; reviewers recognize the value of the book and its contribution to the discussion of voting behavior, turnout, etc., but no one is exactly cheered by its message.

NRO's Jonah Goldberg (writing on Townhall), however, goes one step further. He points out that if Caplan's arguments are correct then we shouldn't be trying to increase turnout (the ones who stay home in the first place are stupid) or make voting mandatory. Instead, in what is truly (a welcome) anti-democratic effort, he suggests that if immigrants must take a test to become citizens (and thus vote) why shouldn't we subject native-born citizens to such a test? Obviously it wouldn't go over too well in much of the US - Democrats and Republicans alike would scream bloody murder. Such distinctions within the electorate were quickly destroyed in the earliest days of the US; I doubt they'll make a return in the "enlightened" modern era. But he does breach a subject that has been wholly untouched by the recent immigration debate; namely changing the qualifications of citizenship so that one does not become a citizen automatically by being born here. In that the US is relatively alone in the West, and while it might give us warm fuzzy feelings inside, it also creates plenty of ingrates - both of native and immigrant stock. Maybe it's time to start talking about this?

Koran In Toilet = Hate Crime

Last year, a senior at Pace University allegedly tossed a Koran in a campus toilet on two separate occasions (so two Korans, two toilets); he's now charged with a pair of felonies for those actions (I believe on the grounds that what he did was "hate speech"). I saw the story the other day, didn't have time to blog about it. Thankfully Rick Moran over at Right Wing Nut House has more time than I do. Read it and be shocked, and then spread the word. And to think Congress just expanded the definition of hate crimes...

This Really and Truly Galls Me

Michelle Malkin caught a story that truly sticks in my craw: in Britain, education bureaucrats have proposed striking from the curriculum the requirement that students be taught about Sir Winston Churchill; they also proposed that more "relevant" topics such as global-warming be taught. Needless to say, Churchill's grandson, Tory MP Nicholas Soames, was furious; he said that “It’s total madness. The teaching of history is incredibly important. If people do not seem to care about the country in which they live, the reason is that they don’t know much about it.” I entirely agree with you, sir.

According to the Sun, though, Winny isn't the only figure of historical import facing the axe: off the mandatory list are Stalin, Hitler, Gandhi, MLK, the War of the Roses (probably an unheard-of event to my American readers), Elizabeth I, and Henry VIII. So perhaps facing the axe was a bad pun.

This simply forces the question of what will students be taught in their history classes? All of these figures (save perhaps MLK) are crucial in the development of modern Britain, and one would think indispensable components of a true education. The Sun doesn't highlight exactly why WSC should be cut, I'd be interested to know. Perhaps because tenacious fighters who doggedly insisted that Britain never never never give up, or noted that "an appeaser is one that feeds the crocodile, hoping it will eat him last," or who rightly said that a fanatic is one who "won't stop talking and won't change the subject" might complicate the process of British submission to Islam. You know, restore their stiff upper lip and all. I'm truly aghast.

Strange Bedfellows

Alaska's "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" case from 2002 will be heard by the Supreme Court tomorrow. Best of all, some Christian groups are supporting the sign-bearing student fearing a curtailment of religious speech on campus. Politics does indeed make strange bedfellows.