Cartoon Controversy Hits New Mexico

The Associated Press reported last week that some students at the University of New Mexico are irate at the student newspaper there over the appearance of a cartoon ridiculing affirmative action. According to the report, the cartoon depicts "a space alien crediting affirmative action for his admission to the law school." Accusations of racism followed on the heels of the cartoon's publication and some students have since distributed letters to local businesses demanding that they cease advertising in the paper of else face a boycott.

No word yet on whether the offended students are earthlings or space aliens, or on whether the cartoon depicted the space aliens in a stereotypical fashion.

William Bennett for UT President?

The finalists in the competition to become the next president of UT have been chosen. It should truly sadden conservatives that William Bennett is not among them. Bennett, the former Reagan Education Secretary and best-selling author of The Book of Virtues, earned a Ph.D. from UT and has to his credit a distinguished record of public service. Though he's never been a faculty member before, lack of teaching need not be an impediment to success at the job. When Oklahoma politico David Boren retired from the Senate a few years back, he immediately took the helm of OU. So why not Bennett at UT?

Well, according to our sources, he simply didn't pass the physical exam. Unlike the other candidates who made the final cut, medical X-rays of Dr. Bennett revealed he is physically unfit for the job. His spine is still intact.

What Will Those Graglias Come Up With Up Next?

Conservative bogeyman Lino Graglia is not the only scholar in his family. His lovely wife Carolyn, also trained as a lawyer, has just published a new book, Domestic Tranquility: A Brief Against Feminism. Her work is every bit as politically incorrect as the comments her husband made earlier this semester, and it will probably not result in many speaking invitations to law schools. Mrs. Graglia maintains that women have gotten a raw deal from the feminist movement, which among other things, urged women to liberate themselves from old-fashioned sexual ethics.

She argues that an unintended consequence of this mistaken path was to deprive women of the cultural traditions, expectations and behaviors they formerly used to fend off unwanted suitors. She refers to the concept of "date rape" as an invention and claims that the expansive law on sexual harassment is actually a consequence of contemporary women's lowered skills at handling male libido. "Today, well educated professional women, who are embarrassed to defend the unsophisticated concepts of virginity and chastity, are less competent to control men's sexual advances than high school girls in the 1940s," writes Mrs. Graglia.

Uhh, don't expect to see Mrs. Graglia's book on any required reading lists for women's studies courses next semester.