A new issue of African American Review is out. From Slate, Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson and Dahlia Lithwick discuss the Sotomayor hearings. In defense of confirmation hearings: Sonia Sotomayor spends the week in the spotlight of Senate confirmation hearings — attempting to "depoliticize" the process would not merely be impossible but undesirable. Conservatives love activist judges — they just prefer when they advance the interests of white people. Mark Tushnet on how the Supreme Court's ruling on Ricci v. DeStefano hints at trouble ahead. From TNR, what do you get when a literary theorist reads the constitution as art? Gordon Wood reviews The State as a Work of Art: The Cultural Origins of the Constitution by Eric Slauter. Jay-Z vs the Game: Marc Lynch on lessons for the American primacy debate. From LRB, Berlusconi in Tehran: Slavoj Zizek on the Rome-Tehran Axis; Mary Beard reviews Marcus Aurelius: Warrior, Philosopher, Emperor by Frank McLynn; and Peter Campbell on the Codex Sinaiticus. From Cato Unbound, Clay Shirky on the future of journalism: not an upgrade, an upheaval. Peace out: Helena Cobban on the decline of Israel's progressive movement. Not a "Dawkins flea": A review of The Selfish Genius: How Richard Dawkins Rewrote Darwin's Legacy by Fern Elsdon-Baker.
