Today's uses of the Second Amendment may invoke James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, but they have a lot more to do with interest-group politics.
No one should take away people's rights. But with respect to 'the right to arm ourselves,' we have lost sight of our own history.
There's every reason to think that whatever their political leanings, Americans will be highly receptive to numerous reforms designed to improve health, safety, economic security, environmental quality and democratic self-government - at least if those reforms do not eliminate their freedom of choice.
I would think that to say 'regulations cost jobs' or 'regulations create jobs' is too simple, and we need to look at the regulation.
Usually, to promote a new work, I'll aspire to be published in the 'Columbia Law Review' or the 'Stanford Law Review' and to have at least five really enticing footnotes.
In the end, 'Star Wars' insists that you can't be redeemed without attachment. That's the strongest message of the saga, and that's what makes it speak to people's deepest selves.
One of the things 'Star Wars' is most deeply about is fathers, sons, and redemption. In its own way, it points to the indispensability of paternal love, and it has a lot to say about the lengths to which people - boys or girls - will go to get it.
They call soccer the beautiful game, but if I had to identify just one sport to show members of some alien species what the human race is all about, I'd nominate squash.
Humility is of central importance; I think it's an underappreciated virtue in the contemporary discussion of law and politics.
I am a professional squash player, and I recently played badly - but as well as I could - in a professional squash tournament. A professional squash player might sound like someone who is in a food-tasting group, but it is a racquet sport.
Having a constant productive anxiety doesn't mean that people are miserable and wailing but that people know they will be held accountable if things do not go right.
I think President Obama has been an extraordinarily successful president, and that this period will record that with a bunch of exclamation points. But obviously, not everybody thinks that.
In 'The Force Awakens,' women as well as men are in positions of authority. And you don't have to work hard to do that - it's not a statement, it's the world.
In government, you're not a writer, you're an administrator.
Whatever your gender, you can be a 'Star Wars' fan.
As an academic, a great deal of my time is spent writing, with very little in meetings. In government, the premium is placed on figuring things out through discussing them with other people.
I love Richard Thaler's 'Quasi Rational Economics.' A collection of some of his most interesting and inventive essays, the real foundation of behavioral economics.
The habit I've developed is to write in any free half hour I might find.
The process of getting regulations right is described publicly as far more political than in fact it is. It's essentially a legal and technical enterprise.
For any child, boy or girl, a father is both Jedi and Sith: Obi-Wan Kenobi - gentle and calming and good - and Vader, fierce and terrifying.
