3 Whisky Happy Hour

With all three bartenders back together and John Yoo in the host chair, the gang wonders why it is that Robert F. Kennedy Jr is so far making the most sense in the 2024 presidential race, how it is that Kevin McCarthy has (stop the presses!) actually impressed Lucretia, and why the obviously political attacks on Justice Clarence Thomas expose the left at their power-grasping worst.

But then we get back to school, with John expressing his usual faux-puzzlement about the New York Times's genuine puzzlement of why conservatives "still" like Aristotle. Too bad there isn't an Aristotle for Dummies title we can send the Times, but we do manage to sort out John.

Finally, we round out this episode with some mockery of the high octane decadence of the ruling class as seen by the scheduing of the Met Gala and the White House Correspondents Dinner within 48 hours of each other last week. It must be exhausting for our rulers to keep up this kind of social schedule, not to mention the expense of the wardrobe. Tune in for Piers Morgan's fantastic headline about the scene, and grab a can of Raid.

Heather Mac Donald may be the most fearless journalist in America. She is relentless in her reporting, bracing in her truth-telling, and ferocious in arguing her case. Her new book, When Race Trumps Merit: How the Pursuit of Equity Sacrifices Excellence, Destroys Beauty, and Threatens Lives, explores how the current attack on meritocracy in the name of "equity" is rampaging through almost all American institutions, in particular arts and culture, but also higher education and corporate America.

Her bleak inventory includes the degredation of the sciences as well, which will if continued will exact a high cost. But our conversation also takes some unusual twists and turns, delving into some of the deeper aspects of the issues of race and merit that are typically neglected. We conclude our conversation with a discussion of Heather's recommendations for remedies, which will require some serious backbone on the part of the nation's political leadership that appears to be in short supply just now.

Who is the only federal judge to have played basketball in the Olympics for Cuba? Who is the only federal judge known for driving around town in a 1960s-era convertable Rolls Royce? Who is the only federal judge who was nearly deported?

The answer is an n of 1, as statisticians would say: Judge Carlos T. Bea of Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, who the Los Angeles Daily Journal was correct to call "the most interesting judge on the 9th Circuit." Born in San Sebastian, Spain in 1934, his family left Spain for North America after the Spanish Civil War and on the eve of World War II. And the story only gets more interesting from there.

Judge Bea recently took senior status on the 9th Circuit, and the San Francisco chapter of the Federalist Society decided to throw a reception and celebration of his long and distinguished career in the law, inviting me to serve as an interlocutor with Judge Bea for a conversation that covers the highlights of his colorful life story along with his views on jurisprudence. He also supplies lessons on how to survive and prosper as a Republican in San Francisco.

This week we took the 3WHH on the road for a special ad-free episode, as Lucretia and Steve recorded before a live audience at Commenter-Con II in Phoenix. Commenter-Con II is the inspiration of 'Ammo Grrrll" (known in real life as Susan Vass), with Power Line readers from 27 states turning up. It also coincides roughly with the 40th anniversary of Lucretia and Steve's very first argument, which, Steve now admits, Lucretia was right about after all.

After we kick around the stunning news about Tucker Carlson's startling exit from Fox News, and a few other background questions about favorite books, reasons for the never-ending whisky divide, and related, we turn to audience questions, in particular our nominees for who we'd like to lock up if we had genuine prosecutorial powers.

(John Yoo wasn't able to join us as he had to be in the classroom for the last week of his classes at Berkeley Law, but sent along a note: "I wish I were there, but on the advice of counsel, I've been warned against showing up anywhere where people calling themselves 'Ammo Grrrll' and 'Lucretia' are in attendance. Steve Hayward, not so much."

In what may be the most wide-ranging episode of the 3WHH yet, the troika ranges from the implications of the Fox News settlement with Dominion for the defective NY Times v. Sullivan doctrine, to an extended discussion of the natural law arguments on abortion—the topic aborted last week for lack of time—and lastly to a look at notable political movies with the unlikely offering from Lucretia that an underrated moral-political movie worthy of note is . . . The Devil in Miss Jones??!!

Needless to say John and Steve didn't see that coming, and didn't know quite what to say. And this doesn't include our new segment, "Lucretia's Featured Rant of the Week," which debuted with a much deserved blast at the Department of Justice.

Steve gets his revenge at the very end, with exit music drawn from his favorite recent political movie that John and Lucretia have embargoed from further mention on the 3WHH.

This week the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case of Groff vs. Dejoy, involving a Post Office mail carrier named Gerald Groff, who, for religious reasons, wished not to work on Sundays. Previously the postal service had granted this accommodation, which was easy back when the Post Office didn’t do mail delivery on Sundays. But a few years ago the Post Office started contracting with Amazon and other package delvery services to do Sunday deliveries, though they still granted Groff his religious accommodation. But then the Post Office changed its mind and compelled Groff to work Sundays. Hence this case, raising again an aspect of the First Amendment’s free exercise clause.

You would think after all these decades of both religious liberty cases and employment law cases that such a situation would be well-settled, but you would be wrong. In fact the First Amendment’s clauses related to the establishment and free exercise of religious remain highly contested and unsettled.

One person who has a deep grasp of the broader issue is Vincent Phillip Munoz, who is the Tocqueville Associate Professor of political science and law at the University of Notre Dame. His most recent book is “Religious Liberty and the American Founding: Natural Rights and the Original Meanings of the First Amendment’s Religion Clauses.” Phil’s work has been cited in several Supreme Court opinions on the issue.

Phil sat down recently with John Yoo and me to discuss the issue, and the wider issue of how constitutional originalism should be understood today. You could think of this episode as a “two-whisky happy hour,” as we wanted to have Lucretia Zoom in, but she wasn’t able to, so Phil got off the hook. But in any case, let’s turn to Phil now.

Note: Apologies for the background static and other sound issues. We had our communal microphone on the wrong settings, and it was not amenable to a post-production fix.

Lucretia hosts the bar this week, as Steve and John extol the virtues of Japanese whisky while trolling the left for its latest futile attempt to take down Justice Clarence Thomas. Lucretia celebrates a brew pub in Arizona that stood up to the braying mob that resents real beer drinkers who like the Federalist Society, which deserves to go with a lighter highland malt. And in our "This Week in Democrats" segment, which pairs well with a dusty, peaty whisky, we wonder why the left is suddenly trying to push out Dianne Feinstein, and the problem this creates for Gov. Winsome Newsom, among other amusements and free entertainment Democrats provided this week.

John then walks us through the puzzles of the fast-moving case involving the revocation (stayed for the moment) of the aboritificent drug mifepristone, which turns quickly to a too-brief discussion of natural law and abortion, and why, to borrow once again Stan Evans's great line now more applicable than ever, it is a good thing Republicans are pro-life, since they spend so much time in the fetal position, unable to offer even the simplest public argument for their stance on the issue. (To be continued. . .)

Finally, Steve and Lucretia wonder why the leak of classified documents showing that the situation in Ukraine is very different from what we've been told (some people might call the party line a "lie," but that's just some people) isn't seen as the equivalent of the Pentagon Papers and Vietnam. Instead, we're being treated to a spectacle of government secrets unveiled by the cast of High School Musical: Gamer Sequel.

You know how people who think they can top something crazy like to say, "Hold my beer"? Well, this week Budweiser decided to try to top Alvin Bragg's bogus indictment of Donald Trump by rebranding their "light" beer such that no one want to hold it even for Alvin Bragg. What explains this dumbest marketing move since the New Coke? And does the Biden Administration have a political death wish by deciding to use Title IX as a trans-cudgel? ("Trans-cudgel" is one of the 159 genders isn't it?) Yes, this week was that crazy, and we haven't even got to the elections in Chicago and Wisconsin yet.

John Yoo hosts this week's episode, which is good since Steve is under the weather with yet another bug of some kind, necessitating at least three whiskies, while Lucretia adds to her "Moron of the Week" designation with yet another new feature (which will rotate amongst the three of us every week) on . . . political philosophy! Don't groan—it's going to be fun. Especially since Steve demonstrates in this episode how it is possible to sneak up on John unawares with a reference to . . . the verboten Clean Air Act!

Lot going on this week, including Steve successfully completing his mandatory online "Abusive Conduct Training," otherwise known as Lucretia's How-To Guide to Blunt Speaking. Did you know abusive conduct ias bad? How would we have known without an online training module?

The good news for Lucretia is that "making unpopular statements about controversial issues" is not considered abusive. The bad news is that "making egregious statements about a person's lifestyle" is considered abusive, so we have to stop ragging on John for his McRibb fixation.

The main subject this week is the turmoil in Israel about proposed reforms to its judiciary. Somehow this is an international story, as it involves possible interference from the United States, and with might be called the Internationale of the Administrative State. Did you know Israel doesn't have a written constitution? This is a large part of the problem. While the judicial reform package Netanyahu's government put forward may have some defects, its defeat—and defeat is what has occurred, make no mistake—is a loss for the cause of constitutional government everywhere.

We also get in some observations about the Nashville shooting, the proposed Census question about whether someone is a descendant of slaves, and a new feature: Lucretia's Stupid Person of the Week.

We’re a day late getting to the whisky bar this week on account of complicated travel schedules. Lucretia sits in the host chair as Steve was still feeling light-headed from too much high-altitude skiing while John is his usual jaunty self, baiting Lucretia with his thoughts in the Boston Globe about how Alvin Bragg and the other chipmunks of the left are blowing it with their attempt to bring... Source