Monday Morning Links

* Bérubé: Why I Resigned the Paterno Chair. I saw some snark about this on Twitter, but I found it an interesting take on the current situation at Penn State, and was personally scandalized to learn that the NCAA punted on the UNC scandal. If they have jurisdiction over wide-ranging criminal conspiracies, actual academic malfeasance seems like a no-brainer…

* EU flexes that Nobel Peace Prize muscle.

* Memory is not such a cure-all. On the contrary, many of the great political crimes of recent history were committed in large part in the name of memory. The difference between memory and grudge is not always clean. Memories can hold you back, they can be a terrible burden, even an illness. Yes, memory—hallowed memory—can be a kind of disease. Via MeFi.

* In interviews, however, consultants to both campaigns said they had bought demographic data from companies that study details like voters’ shopping histories, gambling tendencies, interest in get-rich-quick schemes, dating preferences and financial problems. The campaigns themselves, according to campaign employees, have examined voters’ online exchanges and social networks to see what they care about and whom they know. They have also authorized tests to see if, say, a phone call from a distant cousin or a new friend would be more likely to prompt the urge to cast a ballot. Maybe you guys could just try being good at governing for a while and see if that gets you any votes.

* G.O.P. Fighting Libertarian’s Spot on the Ballot. Or you could just try being good at governing for a while…

* Obama winning the all-important babysitter index.

* How to debate a liar. My expectation is that Obama will take up something very much like this strategy in tomorrow’s debate, perhaps beginning with an opening statement that recalls the lies advanced in the last one.

* And it looks to me like David Cameron is flirting with breaking up the UK for short-term partisan advantage. Really makes the American right look like a bunch of amateurs…

Links for Tuesday

* Obligatory: So you want to get a Ph.D. in the humanities.

* Donald Brown at Penn State’s Climate Ethics blog is the latest person to suggest that corporate behavior in the face of climate change could constitute a new class of crime against humanity.

* Good Jersey, Bad Jersey: You can have new anti-bullying legislation, but Christie’s still not sure about the Hudson River Tunnel.

* As the candidates arrived, a group of Paul supporters pulled a female MoveOn member to the ground and held her there as another Paul supporter stomped on the back of her head and neck.

* Outraging conservatives everywhere, the Texas Supreme Court has cited international interplanetary law.

* Durham: Proud to be one-half of America’s 4th smartest city. Duke doesn’t even make the list of most dangerous colleges, though nearby NCCU clocks in at #7.

* Confirmed: the Moon has water. Let’s go back and get it.

* Crooked Timber coins the term: zero-dimensional chess.

After two years of operating at loggerheads with Republicans, Mr. Obama and his aides are planning a post-election agenda for a very different political climate. They see potential for bipartisan cooperation on reducing the deficit, passing stalled free-trade pacts and revamping the education bill known as No Child Left Behind — work that Arne Duncan, Mr. Obama’s education secretary, says could go a long way toward repairing “the current state of anger and animosity.”

Translation: Mr Obama and his aides plan a series of pre-emptive capitulations, after which the Republicans will demand the repeal of the healthcare act (or maybe abolition of Social Security). When/if that is refused, the Repugs will shut down the government, and this time they will hold their nerve until Obama folds.

* And Paul the Psychic Octopus has died. Good night, sweet prince. May flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.

Oil Spills Grow Up So Fast

The oil spill is one month old today. Heavy oil hits Louisiana shore, enters sea current. Scientists scramble to help Cuba. Coast Guard blocks journalists from filming oil on the shoreline, citing “BP’s rules.” Oceanographers attack Obama administration response. BP admits they underestimated the amount of oil leaking as more washes on shore. How big? An Exxon Valdez every three days. BP withholding information. BP skipped critical testing hours before explosion. BP told to stop using toxic dispersant. Fmr. EPA Investigator Scott West: US Has Told BP “It Can Do Whatever It Wants and Won’t Be Held Accountable.” No one could have predicted. The Gulf of Mexico is a crime scene. And then Kevin Costner fixed everything.

How the Rich Starved the World

What biofuels do is undeniable: they take food out of the mouths of starving people and divert them to be burned as fuel in the car engines of the world’s rich consumers. This is, in the words of the United Nations special rapporteur on the right to food, Jean Ziegler, nothing less than a “crime against humanity”.

The New Statesman explains how the rich starved the world. Via Cynical-C.