Author: Andrew Sullivan

Chris Beam makes the case for nixing tenure:

The most common pro-tenure argument is that it protects academic freedom. Once a professor gains tenure, the thinking goes, he or she can say anything without fear of being fired. Academia thrives on the circulation of dangerous ideas.

The problem is, for every tenured professor who's liberated at age 40 to speak his mind, there are dozens of junior professors terrified to say anything the least bit controversial, lest they lose their one shot at job security for life. Academia relies on young scholars to shake things up. Yet tenure incentivizes them not to. Instead, it rewards students who follow in the footsteps of the elders whose favor they will require when the day of judgment arrives.

McArdle and Poulos debated this topic a few weeks ago.

A seasoned writer ditches the publishing industry:

Anyone who is computer savvy can become a publisher these days. I know, because I've just become one. I'm now Ray Connolly, writer, editor-in-chief and head of marketing of Plumray Books, and any one of the 2 billion computer-owning people in the world who wants to read my new novel, The Sandman, can do so at the click of a mouse. It's being serialised chapter by chapter on my website where, over the next 10 weeks, it will build like a part-work. In the words of a friend, I'm "doing a Dickens".

An excellent rebuttal on Frum's site of the hyperventilation of NRO's Ed Whelan.

A music critic explains why he doesn't care about the private lives of songwriters:

To trace anybody's work, what they produce, what they put into the world, what you or I respond to, to somebody's life, their biography, is utterly reductionist. It's simply a way of protecting ourselves from the imagination, from the threat of the imagination. Some people are very uncomfortable with the idea they can be moved, they can be threatened, they can be thrilled by something that is just made up.

John Irving, the novelist, once said to me, "You know why that is? It's because people who don't have an imagination are terrified of people who do." I don't know if that's true, but we live in culture of the memoir, where we're not supposed to believe anything unless it's documented that it actually happened. Never mind that most memoirs are more fictional than novels. We want that imprimatur: "This really happened. This is really true." You can respond to it. You can feel "okay" about being moved by it.

Whereas with art, whether music, movies, novels, painting, ultimately, to be moved by art, by something somebody has made up, is, from a certain perspective, to be tricked. To be fooled. You made me cry, and you just did it like you hypnotized me. I love that. Not everybody does.

By Carli Davidson (who also appears to have shot Stains).

Most encouraging:

"During the interview she also asked me about the plan to build a mosque in New York, very close to Ground Zero. I told her it is a sign of the value we have for freedom in this country, and for religious freedom in particular. We certainly do not want to support groups that promote terrorism, but there are many American citizens who are Muslim, and they have a right to practice their faith. Having a mosque near the site of the attack can be a very important symbol of how much we value religious freedom in this country.

I compared the situation to a historical situation in Ireland: During the Easter Revolution the Irish were very careful to protect the rights of the Protestants in the Free State. They did not take back their cathedral or close their churches. Instead, they wanted people to see they believed in freedom of religion."

The person I'm most interested in on this question is Mitt Romney.

Even NRO dissents. A reader writes:

I don't think you really appreciate the magnitude of the insanity of that list of the 25 worst Americans.  Just think, FDR, the man who led us through the Great Depression and to victory over Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan is apparently "worse" than a terrorist who murdered 168 people in cold blood, including children (not to mention FDR apparently is worse than spies who handed nuclear secrets to the Soviet Union and Lincoln's assassin).

I'm beginning to wonder is the right in the country has less of a grasp of reality than your average North Korean party member.

Prop 8 supporters seem to be having a bit of a meltdown:

In its 73-page appeal, which was filed Thursday, ProtectMarriage repeatedly accused Walker of distorting the evidence from a trial he presided over in January. "The district court simply ignored virtually everything — judicial authority, the works of eminent scholars past and present in all relevant academic fields, extensive documentary and historical evidence, and even common sense — opposed to its conclusions," the group said. Challengers of Proposition 8 presented 17 witnesses at the trial. ProtectMarriage called only two, and those witnesses made several damaging concessions during cross-examination. In his ruling overturning Proposition 8, Walker complained about the dearth of evidence from ProtectMarriage.