Here are some excerpts from The Onion's take on the "war for Christmas":

WASHINGTON, DC—In a sudden and unexpected blow to the Americans working to protect the holiday, liberal U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Stephen Reinhardt ruled the private celebration of Christmas unconstitutional Monday.

"In accordance with my activist agenda to secularize the nation, this court finds Christmas to be unlawful," Judge Reinhardt said. "The celebration of the birth of the philosopher Jesus—be it in the form of gift-giving, the singing of carols, fanciful decorations, or general good cheer and warm feelings amongst families—is in violation of the First Amendment principles upon which this great nation was founded." ...

America's children are bearing the brunt of Reinhardt's marginal, activist rulings.

"Why did the bad man take away Christmas?" 5-year-old Danny Dover said. "I made a card for my mommy out of paper and glue, and now I can't give it to her."

Shortly after Dover issued his statement, police kicked down his door, removed his holiday tree, confiscated his presents, and crushed his homemade card underfoot...

"Our hearts go out to the Americans this ruling affects," Sen. Chip Pickering (R-MS) said. "If it's any condolence, I wish you all a Happy Holidays, which, I'm afraid, is all I'm legally allowed to say at this time."

The Solomon Amendment, which denies federal funding to universities that bar military recruiters, has been the subject of much controversy in recent years as an increasing number of universities wish to ban career recruiters from organizations that discriminate against homosexuals. The amendment is the subject of a case awaiting decision from the Supreme Court.

Typically, liberals are portrayed as opposing the Solomon Amendment (on gay rights grounds), but the issue is certainly one which transcends party lines to a certain extent.

Thus, this column from The New Republic which makes a case for liberals to support the Solomon Amendment, is quite interesting. The column basically argues that the Solomon Amendment promotes class diversity in the nation's military. I'm not convinced, but read it for yourself.

From Saturday's Fort Wayne Journal Gazette: Indiana State to Study Possibility of Opening Law School:

Indiana State University officials are considering whether to start the state's third public law school, saying many interested students are not being admitted elsewhere because of a lack of space. A feasibility study to be done by the school and the Indianapolis law firm Barnes and Thornburg is to be finished in June.

...

But the announcement took school faculty and state higher education officials by surprise.

"We know very little about it," said Stan Jones, the state's higher education commissioner. "I think we need to be certain we really have a need in the state for another law school before we would walk down that path."

...Indiana became the 19th U.S. state.

Prof. William F. Harvey, who in many ways is a father figure to the law school, will be roasted at a dinner hosted by the Indianapolis Legal Aid Society. In other faculty news, rising star Professor Gerard Magliocca recently gave a presentation at New York University Law School as part of their Legal History Colloquium. His presentation was taken from his upcoming book, One Turn of the Wheel: Andrew Jackson and the Modern Constitution. The school website quotes him as saying:

"This book takes a new look at how constitutional law is created and destroyed. In it, I argue that the primary force shaping our legal institutions and practices is a competition between different generations that collide according to a regular and predictable pattern. To see this constitutional cycle in motion, the text focuses on the rise and fall of one of these creative generations -- Jacksonian Democracy. In the process, the study dramatically reinterprets the landmarks of the ante-bellum era, including Marshall's opinion in M'Culloch v. Maryland, the removal of the Cherokee Tribe along ‘The Trail of Tears,’ the infamous Dred Scott opinion, and the origins of the Fourteenth Amendment."

I've read the first chapter of the book and I can honestly say I expect it to be one of the best books on legal history I've read.

Inside Higher Ed carries an article on the Bradford affair titled, "Web of Lies," which seems very well written. Prof. Eugene Volokh of The Volokh Conspiracy, one of the most widely read legal weblogs in the country, also offers this post on the subject. Much of it is a summary of the events that have transpired, but Prof. Volokh also includes an email that Bradford recently sent to him.

One of the greatest internet experiments of all time is in the midst of tweaking its policy.

Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia that allows anyone to contribute articles, is tightening its rules for submitting entries following the disclosure that it ran a piece falsely implicating a man in the Kennedy assassinations. Wikipedia will now require users to register before they can create articles, Jimmy Wales, founder of the St. Petersburg, Fla.-based Web site, said Monday.

Considering that you don't need an email address or any other bona fide identifying fact to register, I'm not sure how much this will truly change things. As an interesting aside, there are several Wikipedia articles related to the school. Here's the link to the school's main article.

Click here. (Warning: When I say "graphic," I mean graphic.)

Infamous Indianapolis Star columnist Ruth Holladay, who in many ways helped catapult the Bradford/Roisman discussion to the national stage, offers what appears to be a mea culpa in today's paper. Holladay offers an abbreviated account of Bradford's now-debunked claims, her initial column, and the subsequent fallout on this blog and elsewhere. She concludes with a quote from Prof. Karlson that sums it all up quite nicely: "I don't think that anyone comes off looking very good in this."

According to more than one source, Professor Bradford has submitted a letter of resignation to the university.

I am awaiting confirmation from the Dean and from Bradford himself, and I will post the letter of resignation if possible.

Update: Dean Mead has confirmed his receipt of his resignation and will be sending a statement to the student body.