Title: “Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life”

Author: William Deresiewicz

Rank: 38

Blurb: “Excellent Sheep takes a sharp look at the high-pressure conveyor belt that begins with parents and counselors who demand perfect grades and culminates in the skewed applications Deresiewicz saw firsthand as a member of Yale’s admissions committee. As schools shift focus from the humanities to ‘practical’ subjects like economics and computer science, students are losing the ability to think in innovative ways. Deresiewicz explains how college should be a time for self-discovery, when students can establish their own values and measures of success, so they can forge their own path.”

Review: “Although a liberal arts education, as he advocates, may provide tools for developing a ‘meaningful life’ so will reading, work experience, marriage, parenting, travel, volunteering in one’s community, and other significant life experiences. Personal traits such as curiosity, confidence, honesty, determination, and open-mindedness — if nurtured in childhood and maintained through life — are at least as important as knowledge and skills.”

Customers Also Bought: “SpongeBath Food Safe Biodegradable Antimicrobial Sponge Cleaner”

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No, not him, although that was the last movie he was in where he was cute.

The clips of the oral arguments before the Seventh Circuit when Reagan-appointee Judge Richard Posner ripped new assholes (so to speak) into the AGs from Wisconsin and Indiana regarding their marriage equality bans were a thing of beauty.

A day late, but not a dollar short, I give you a linque to his incredibly readable and awesome opinion. There have been other opinions snarkily quoting Scalia’s dissent in the DOMA case, but Posner lays it out in language that you can share with your Aunt Marge in Minnetonka or Tio Manuel in Midland.

And as a side note — my favorite thing about Posner is that he uses contractions, which rumor has it is because he dictates his opinions and can’t (cannot, if you want to be an annoying attorney) type. Read his opinion out loud – it really is like he’s the awesome dinner guest you bring with you to Thanksgiving in Hot Springs to explain to grandma why you’re (not you are) getting married to your friend/roommate of 20 years.

My favorite passage:

Indiana has thus invented an insidious form of discrimination: favoring first cousins, provided they are not of the same sex, over homosexuals. Elderly first cousins are permitted to marry because they can’t produce children; homosexuals are forbidden to marry because they can’t produce children. The state’s argument that a marriage of first cousins who are past child-bearing age provides a “model [of] family life for younger, potentially procreative men and women” is impossible to take seriously.
At oral argument the state‘s lawyer was asked whether “Indiana’s law is about successfully raising children,” and since “you agree same-sex couples can successfully raise children, why shouldn’t the ban be lifted as to them?” The lawyer answered that “the assumption is that with opposite-sex couples there is very little thought given during the sexual act, sometimes, to whether babies may be a consequence.” In other words, Indiana’s government thinks that straight couples tend to be sexually irresponsible, producing unwanted children by the carload, and so must be pressured (in the form of governmental encouragement of marriage through a combination of sticks and carrots) to marry, but that gay couples, unable as they are to produce children wanted or unwanted, are model parents—model citizens really—so have no need for marriage. Heterosexuals get drunk and pregnant, producing unwanted children; their reward is to be allowed to marry. Homosexual couples do not produce unwanted children; their reward is to be denied the right to marry. Go figure.

BAM!

Title: “Mindset: The New Psychology of Success”

Author: Carol Dweck

Rank: 80

Blurb: “Dweck explains why it’s not just our abilities and talent that bring us success — but whether we approach them with a fixed or growth mindset.”

Review: “The irony of Dweck’s book is that if the reader understands and believes what she’s saying, then after the first chapter that reader has no reason to keep reading.”

Customers Also Bought: Inevitably, something by Malcolm Gladwell.

Footnote: Our mindset prevents us from accepting poorly expressed ideas like “fixed” and “growth”, as well as notions of “success” that require measurement.

Mindset [Amazon]

Buy or Die [Stinque@Amazon Kickback Link]

Title: “The Art of Public Speaking”

Author: Stephen Lucas

Rank: 60

Price: $128.86

No, that’s not a typo: $128.86. For a paperback.

Blurb: “Utilizing the full suite of resources, students learn to internalize the principles of public speaking, build confidence through speech practice, and prepare for success in the classroom and beyond.”

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Don Pardo, Longtime Saturday Night Live Announcer, Dead at 96 [TVLine]