#1 is correct.

also, SKADDEN CUTTING SALARIES: CHECK NALP

remember, Latham is the only top firm that's done mass layoffs. they laid off 45% of the associates in their ny office this year, including more than half the first years after only several months of work. this occurred after Latham's "no layoffs" promise, and after Bob Dell reassured everyone at First Year academy that "there was a place" for them at Latham. After this and what happened in the 90s, it's become obvious to everyone that this is latham's model: hire like crazy during the boom times, make tons of money, then fire everyone in sight once economy turns. only a fool or a masochist would go to Latham NY now.

Did PE become a goat herder after his dog died?

my god Elie, there are slow days on ATL and then there's today.

friends don't let friends go to latham

Rommel -- you magnificient bastard -- I read your book!

elie are you saying that white people can't be interesting without black people around

because that's what it sounds like you're saying

Elie,

First, let's accept as true your premise that universities admit black applicants because, without affirmative action, blacks would not be able to get in on the merits, and then we wouldn't be able to learn from each other and be tremendously enriched.

Even if this is true, why have affirmative action in the workplace? Why does the U.S. government set aside contracts for minority-owned businesses? Certainly not so we can enrich each other as we're pouring concrete on I-95.

Even if you accept the rationale that universities use affirmative action to diversity their student body for the good of everyone, that doesn't explain why we have set-asides and soft quotas in the workplace. The only explanation for this type of AA is that blacks just can't compete on the merits and need a boost.

9 = David Duke

http://puertorico.en.craigslist.org/lgl/1225243264.html

I agree with Elie.

Who has suffered more than the Jews, I ask you? NONE.

Affirmative action for Jews!

So ATL is now a forum for links to Elie's blog?

Sigh.

Elie -- why do you do your best work on True/Slant?

"Affirmative action isn’t about grand intellectual ideals. It’s about a quiet conversation shared between two people who wouldn’t otherwise have any reason to talk together, to learn together, or to work together. It’s about people with all different kinds of test scores and qualifications and experiences coming together in a place of business and producing something much more interesting than any of them would have come up with on their own."

No, Elie. All of that comes from a personal statement-type essay. Affirmative Action is all about grouping people together according to the color of their skin and then using unsupported generalizations about these groups to produce an "optimal" student body. That is why many people have a huge problem with AA - because it is a form of racism.

What about the Irish?

"Twenty years after an Irishman couldn't get a fucking job, we had the presidency. May he rest in peace...If I got one thing against the black chappies, it's this - no one gives it to you. You have to take it."

Who knew Elie had a separate blog dedicated to his ultra black nationalist writings?

http://trueslant.com/eliemystal/

BLACK POWER!

15 = Abigail Thernstrom

15 = Abigail Thernstrom

We're quite talented at bringing you last week's news.

Popped collar = TOOL

If there is a limited number of spots in college/jobs in a workplace, and two identical candidates apply, and X gets in bc he is black while white does not because he did not the the same (+1), then please oh please tell me how you think you did not take someone's spot?

Moreover, the PROPONENTS of affirmative action, in appeals argument after appeals argument, state that absent affirmative action black attendance in elite schools would be reduced to virtually ZERO. So how is race then "just one of many factors?"
If you want a diverse school, then don't place so much emphasis on these "ineffective" test scores. Problem solved.
Finally, Elie, wasn't your dad some kind of politician on Long Island? Or is Google wrong. I would love you to tell me how you've been more disadvantaged than I was and slept on a used mattress for 5 years after coming to this country, and watched broadcast TV on a black and white I found in someone else's trash.

Mystal, do you ever find the need for a support garment for your moobs?

From Elie's blog:
"Affirmative action isn’t about grand intellectual ideals. It’s about a quiet conversation shared between two people who wouldn’t otherwise have any reason to talk together, to learn together, or to work together. It’s about people with all different kinds of test scores and qualifications and experiences coming together in a place of business and producing something much more interesting than any of them would have come up with on their own."

This is why blacks are pushing for more diversity for Jews and other whites in the NBA (80% black), right? Sure, Jewish athletes may have more "diverse" and "different" qualifications, but think of their contributions to the locker room dialogue.

Elie - Busta Rhymes was never a member of De La Soul. He was a member of Leaders of the New School.

Elie,

The statement the bakesale is making is that it's not right to treat people differently on account of race.

How is that pathetic and evidence of brain damage?

Elie,

The statement the bakesale is making is that it's not right to treat people differently on account of race.

How is that pathetic and evidence of brain damage?

Re: ending one's SC political career. Sanford was an enormous pussy who could never get down hard enough to prowl with the big cats.

-Thomas "The White Tiger" Ravenel

I don't understand, Elie. AA afforded you "token and piddling" opportunities? Then why the vigourous defense, big guy?

23 = Lester Maddox

22 = Jeff Sessions

"token and piddling" opportunities = Harvard.

25 = Strom Thurmond

27, 28 = George Wallace

gee i wish mr. mystal would explain his apparent contradictions to us so that we can see how a harvard grad contributes to a conversation

Elie, if you think today's affirmative action policies actually work how you describe it (i.e., geared toward achieving diversity of interests and backgrounds), then I have some magic beans to sell you. And if you try to tell me that race can be used as a proxy for that diversity, you're an idiot.

Elie, if you think today's affirmative action policies actually work how you describe it (i.e., geared toward achieving diversity of interests and backgrounds), then I have some magic beans to sell you. And if you try to tell me that race can be used as a proxy for that diversity, you're an idiot.

37, 38 = George Lincoln Rockwell

31-35: Exactly. Saying people should be treated equally by the state or institution regardless of race is exactly the same as segregation on the basis of race. You won me over.

Elie, at my law school most minorities had more in common with my race (socioeconomically speaking) than I did. I was even scoffed at by one for dressing poorly. Enriching.

guys in my high school used to make secret trips to argentina all the time. it was no big deal.

Not to mention that a significant number of blacks in higher education are actually recent immigrants. A recent black immigrant from Jamaica or South Africa gets extra points for his race in addition to his immigrant story, while a recent immigrant from Ukraine or Vietnam does not get as much in preferences? Makes sense, since only black (and Hispanic) immigrants contribute to diversity.

Ellie's blog is a vast repository of strikingly uniformed and poorly thought out opinions. I'm a dumber man for having been exposed to it today.

Take this little nugget of absurdity from Ellie's blog:

"[Ellie talks about getting accepted to Harvard] Did being black help my application?

I don’t know and I don’t particularly care. Because what I do know is that I didn’t “take” a spot that should have gone to a “more deserving white man.” Harvard, like most institutions, starts with a list of what it deems to be “qualified” candidates and then has to pare that list down. Anybody who has ever hired somebody for a job knows that you generally deal with a number of people that could complete the assigned task, from there you have to make a decision based on arbitrary factors and nonobjective criteria like “fit” or “feel.” Dessert — whatever that means — doesn’t even come into play."

Firstly, Ellie, stop pretending you don't know whether you got into Harvard because you're black. Of course you know, and of course you did. This much is not debatable. Just stop it.

Secondly, Ellie, your point about arbitrary factors and nonobjective criteria is one of the dumbest things that has ever left your brain and (unfortunately) made its way to mine. And that's in light of a veritable library of dumb things you've said, that I've (again, unfortunately) read.

Affirmative action is NOT arbitrary and the criteria that is used to admit URMs through affirmative action schemes are NOT nonobjective. The very opposite is true. The race of the candidate is sought out, consciously considered, and is part of an ongoing collective effort to place tags on all candidates with similar racial backgrounds, and determine their qualifications separately and distinctly from those who were not fortunate enough to bear those tags. There is nothing arbitrary about it. It's planned. Nor is there anything nonobjective about it: You're either a URM, or you ain't.

It's a qualification contemplated ahead of time, before an application is even filled out, and what's more, it's solicited by the school. They're LOOKING for it. It is, for all intents and purposes, part of the applicant's "qualifications". An aspect the school is going out of their way to obtain. An aspect of being qualified for Harvard that no white person will ever be able to achieve, not because they won't work at it, but because they genetically cannot achieve URM status. Therefore, these schools are most definitely, and without the possibility of logical refutation, displacing otherwise qualified white applicants with URMs who have a single qualification more than their white competitors: Being born into a favored race.

You see, Ellie, the problem with affirmative action isn't that URMs are displacing equally or more qualified white applicants, but that the "qualification" of racial background that these schools fabricated, is a senseless one.

Fun, slightly unknown fact about African immigrants? They tend to score about as highly as Asians, Indians and higher than white men and women on standardized tests. There was a big study in England on this point a year or two ago and I believe something out of Boston College, too.

45,

Does that prove that the tests are not racist? If so, please forward this information to the Mass. Fire Department.

You're in a heated intellectual discussion about affirmative action. You need to explain why interracial interaction at the collegiate level is important enough that schools should continue to maintain their affirmative action admission standards. Here is your reasoning:

"The policy reminds us that a diversity of experiences and backgrounds makes for a stronger institution, company, and nation. We learn from each other. I met a lot of white people at Harvard who had never met or even conceived of a black man who preferred Pearl Jam to De La Soul (no disrespect to Busta Rhymes). Conversely, I had classes with poor white people from Texas who couldn’t rope a steer to save their life and loved bagels. Don’t even get me started on what an African-American learns about Africans (white or black) when you meet a couple and excitedly ask them if they have a lions in their “village.” I can show you the scars later."

If it wasn't for affirmative action at Harvard, you would never have met that bagel loving Texan or that hilarious African. That is, unless you applied to schools in Texas that you could have qualified for on your merits, or just decided to go to any school in a high African immigrant populated region. But why quibble with details. You win!

45, so are our standardized tests "culturally biased"?

"Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal informed me of something called an 'Affirmative Action bake sale.'"

How sad is it that Elie only just learned about AA bakesales today.

I'd pay $1 for Kash's muffin.

The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.

Because I refuse to click on the comment link attached to the atrocity that is Hope Winters's latest post, I am noting here that it is, by far, the worst feature on this site.

That is all.

44 = Bull Connor

47 = James Earl Ray

Elie may have gotten into Harvard based on merit, but I'd be really surprised if he did.

If I thought that I might have gotten into school based on anything less than merit, I would tell myself that I didn't care. But I would care.

And if I did get in based on merit, I would be mad that everybody thinks otherwise. But that's what affirmative action does, it reinforces the idea that black people are dumb.

So why does Elie write so passionately in support of affirmative action? He must be trying to lose some weight.

white pple so smart...no odder race smart...white pple alone make america what it be today.

Elie- your performance on this blog says volumes more about aa and your own merits than your illogical arguments in favor of aa ever could. You can't get around the fact that it is a race based preference. White people can join clubs in high school, but they can't get into harvard with inferior stats because of soft factors. The bottom line is 3/4 of minority students (who get the benefit of aa) at elite schools would not have been admitted without a preference. You can't explain that away. It's all about skin color. Period.

New Haven is in CONNECTICUT, 46, not Massachusetts.

AA didn't take your spot, genius.

I can count on one hand the number of interesting comments to this post, and none of them concerns Elie or affirmative action.

This is 45. I recall (and had read this tangentially for a different issue for my own research) that it had to do with the manner in which a person learned English, whether they lived in communities where a large number of African Americans (native born) lived and whether the parents were educated and a few other factors. But I did recall being surprised when I saw those findings. It makes sense why my class at a T-3 was full of black immigrants in hindsight.

Nice Patton reference, 7.

This individuality stuff is a bunch of crap.

Nice comment 59. P.s.- nobody cares about what you find interesting.

I always wonder, how will AA work when whites are no longer the majority? Will they qualify for diversity scholarships, etc.?

Mystal, your other blog sucks. You just look like an angry middle aged black man from East St. Louis.

63 - no, white people will just be the overrepresented minority (READ: qualified).

congratulations on being a writer for a law blog, linking to an article that contains a discussion of a legal issue, and then only harp on the part that offends you bc it points out the hypocrisy that you benefited from.

congratulations again on being amongst the bigger douche bags i have had the displeasure of reading.

Mystal, fat and angry =/= educated and erudite

62, stop playing with yourself and get back to work. You know who you are.

Of course one must always pop his or her own collar. How is that even a question?

The moron conservative commenters on this site are ruining it. Practically every thread contains their ridiculous assertions on affirmative action, the economy, gays, etc. It's like it's still the 1980s for them, as if the last 30 years never happened. WAKE UP FOOLS! THE FUTURE IS NOW! YOU LOST!

-- Lawyer Gay

70, Was affirmative action not around in the 1980s? Did things get worse for minorities since then?

BTW, when does Justice O'Connor's affirmative action expiration date run out?

When did this become the editor's forum to promote his own political agenda? So ridiculous.

I love how fatso pretends AA just helps as a finger on the scale between two equal candidates. It isn't. It's a hammer.

The median LSAT of an HLS white is 171-173 depending on the drift that year. The median LSAT of an HLS black is 162.

Only 1-3 blacks per year score over 169 nationwide. Read the LSAC report from around 6 years ago. They even changed the test for them. That's why the logic games section went from 24-25 hard questions to 21-22 easier questions; AAs did poorly on the games.

~a dude in admissions

22

The problem with your hypo is its contradictory nature. If one student is black and the other white, they cannot be identical.

Another point that hasn't been mentioned as much -- There's affirmative action at EVERY LEVEL.
- Private schools (if applicable)
- Colleges
- Law Schools
- Law Firms

How many boosts do URMs need? In theory, wouldn't one boost provide all the opportunity needed? I.e. URM gets to go to a top private school where s/he has access to top-notch teaching, facilities, etc. Why is there a further need for affirmative action? I'm somewhat sympathetic for URMs coming from really bad public schools, but why should a URM coming from a top private school get ANY sort of AA boost in college admissions compared to a poor white student coming from a crappy school?

If we're talking about lack of opportunity, a one-time AA boost is somewhat defensible, but why should a URM get a private school boost (maybe), a college boost, a law school boost, a law review boost (at some schools), a law firm boost, and maybe even a partnership boost (if firm has been under heat for lack of URMs)?

AA got me into the most prestigious nursery school in the state of MA.

I don't regret a thing.

Exeter2y

75, when the minorities that steal their way into top tier schools through affirmative action end up in the job market, they realize they're not equipped (yet again) to compete straight up. Their grades aren't up to standards because someone who should be at University of Connecticut isn't going to compete that well with a hundred people who rightfully belong in Yale.So, now they need the law review handout. When they graduate, lo and behold: they only achieved half as much as everyone else. So, the job handout is needed to supplement the education handout. But, once on the job, they realize they're still not on the same intellectual level as their peers. Sure, the Yale diploma is just like everyone else's, but, not REALLY. And so, eventually they need the promotion handout to supplement the education handout and the job handout.

Collard greens, kid! They killin it. Gots to get them collard greeeeens!

Um, simple way to solve that problem when they do the bake sale again. Roll up with your native american friend and a truck, take all their food. Screw them over bigtime with AA and give them something to cry to their pie-baking mommies about...

all i can say in response to ellie's garbage is ... MysTTTal (as in the TTT he would have gone to if he were white)

I want to know what Elie scored on the LSAT. If he was admitted on his merits, then he should at least disclose that.

Elie, you're an idiot.

Elie, you're an idiot.

Elie's True/Slant blog is filled with more trash than the alley behind my mamacita's apartment building

-- Gov. Sanford

Elie:

you one jive ass mofo!

You know what I just realized? black militants like Elie just want black people to get ahead, that's all. The whole logical basis for AA that Elie handles so very poorly is just one of many weapons designed to further that goal. Elie doesn't give a damn if it's right in some astract truthiness way, it it helps black people get ahead, he'll back it using "logic" or whatever other concept a bunch of dead white males thought up in the old days.

What I thought was funny was how Elie condescendingly "explained" affirmative action to the anti-AA crowd and then completely misconstrues Justice Thomas's opinion on the matter in the comments. Thomas's dissent in Grutter v. Bollinger is revolutionary. Large portions could have been written by Malcom X himself.

To 70 (lawyer gay):

1, Lat is a member of the Federalist Society. 2, You are ruining the country, you degenerate evolutionary dud, so shut your face.

Elie, posting such a link to your blog indicates you want to have somewhat of a conversation on the AA issue. Amidst the rants and insults, a lot of really good points have been made in these comments. If you don't respond, I think its fair to assume you can't and have conceded such points.

1) Hey 88, tough guy, way to stoop to Nazi-like levels with the biological claim.

I'm pretty sure that you're not the type who has ever said "shut your face" to anyone live and in-person, save perhaps for your kid brother or sister.

2) I'm a straight, white male (with blue eyes no less, just the sort that 88 no doubt wants populating the world). You other straight, white guys who get off by posting your frustrated little anti-AA and homophobic rants are the most pathetic types in all of the legal world. The world has been ours for the taking since, well, since the beginning, yet some of you chumps still complain about the fact that minorities receive any sort of special assistance in obtaining an education or professional job. Pathetic.

I cruised through high school, doing the bare minimum. After a few years off to do this-and-that, I returned to college and, again, while still having a fine time, graduated and went to law school. I (i) graduated from a pretty good school (T30) and now (ii) practice at a pretty good firm (V20). I was a middle class kid, with only slightly above average brains, and was able, without much difficulty, to enter a prestigious dimension of the legal profession and live in an affluent section of my expensive city. That a handful of minorities received a little AA help in getting in to my same school, and fewer still into my same firm, does not bother me in the least. What bothers me are (i) the mouth-breathing losers on this site who feel that the reason they're not clerking on the US Supreme Court or practicing at a top firm is because of AA and (ii) the equally offensive d-bags who did in fact land prestigious jobs, but feel that the very presence of AA-assisted individuals at their schools and firms somehow lessens their own accomplishments or "spoils the club."

Elie -- the only critique I have of your AA post is that affirmative action bake sales have been going on, and been extensively covered by the press, for at least five years. The conservative kids at the University of Michigan were getting national coverage for this stuff for years in the run-up to the Gratz and Grutter decisions.

hey 90, I don't care if we have black firm partners or black doctors or a black president. my two best friends are black. i just don't want stupid people doing the same jobs as regular people, or regular people doing the same jobs as spectacular people. who the hell cares about skin color?

if i'm paying for wachtell, i want someone who scored 175+ on their LSAT to be figuring out whether the yellow coal plant can be next to the green rabbit zoo. not some chump with status inflated from their freakin' pigmentation.

73 = Daniel Bell

spear chuckers, the lot of them

I pop the collar on the shirt and the blazer, because I'm ____________

You picked: "prestigious"
You should have picked: "too fat to button the top button."

I pop the collar on the shirt and the blazer, because I'm ____________

You picked: "prestigious"
You should have picked: "too fat to button the top button."

Elie- I support affirmative action but can no longer support you. Busta Rymes in de la soul??? Was 50 Cent in A Tribe Called Quest? Come on man. Please tell me that you are not from LI. He was in Leaders of the New School.

I pop the collar on the shirt and the blazer, because I'm ____________

You picked: "prestigious"
You should have picked: "too fat to button the top button."

MOAR MOOBS

Once again Elie trots out anecdotal evidence in a debate that revolves around statistics. I think that even after dozens of posters have tried to explain the distinction to him, he still doesn't get it.

Elie - just because you are black, scored well on the LSAT (which I guess I have to take your word for), and earned your spot at Harvard does not mean that every black person at HLS did so. Check the statistics, Elie - #73 is pretty close to on the money. The very best law schools obviously snap up the very best black students, but there aren't enough high-scoring black students to go around, so HYS also take many who score well below their medians. At the next tier down, the issue is even more pronounced since HYS already snapped up the better URM students, and by the time you reach fourth tier, schools are admitting, in the name of "diversity," people who shouldn't have gone to law school at all

But that's all statistical, and Elie has no interest in discussing any of this anyway, as evidenced by his complete failure to respond to any of the comments.

100 = Richard J. Herrnstein

90 - you don't seem to understand that people can be both i) philosophically opposed to racist programs and ii) be completely unaffected by them. So instead you call me a frustrated white man who thinks minorities are ruining the spoils of my prestige. Which is fine, since you can't be expected to understand otherwise.

Why is Mystal complaining about this bake sale? Because of his race, he gets to have more baked goods to stuff his face with.

Maybe Mystal doesn't understand the analogy made in this bake sale.

The baked goods represents a college degree. The initial price tag is different for black and white people based solely on skin color. This is akin to scholarships offered only to minority students based again on skin color. I guess the bake sale should allow for customers to submit personal statements and resumes to obtain a discount, but I'm sure they could only afford one price break that is available to "everyone."

I'd love to see how many of the anti-AA folks here direct the same amount of vitriol towards legacy admits and other forms of white AA (crickets). Oh, and let's here the excuses you have for whites admitted to elite schools with less than "ideal" paper credentials (they do exist you know).

What's probably closer to reality is that with or without AA, not a single one of the anti-AA folks posting here believe blacks/hispanics are qualified to attend prestigious universities. That's anecdotally borne out by the ridiculous notion being kicked around by some conservatives (Karl Rove) that somehow Sonia Sotomayor's academic credentials can't be trusted. Mkay...Phi Beta Kappa from Princeton, Yale Law Journal, etc. All the objective measures of achievement anti-AA folks value, yet when it comes to Judge Sotomayor there are "questions." Right.

Like Elie, most minorities I know don't give a fuck what anti-AA folks think about them or their achievements and make no apologies whatsoever. You'd think less of minorities with or without AA, so why should they care? The only way you'd ever be satisfied (if ever) is if all minority candidates had test scores and GPAs higher than the highest test score or GPA for a white candidate. You can always rationalize why it's OK for whites to meet a lesser standard.

Bravo Elie.

104 - You are confusing vitriol toward a racist entitlement program with vitriol toward the beneficiaries of such a program. I understand why blacks defend AA - nobody wants to give up an advantage.
The admittance of legacies is proper quid pro quo: you give my underqualified child admission, I give you money to keep your doors open. There is no contrived "diversity" benefit; but assuming diversity is such a great benefit, grouping people according to race is NOT the proper way to achieve it. Face it, middle/upper middle class Af Ams who "like Pearl Jam" are the primary beneficiaries of this disgraceful program. Poor white kids (incl. Euro immigrants) with much more diversity of perspective don't get any corresponding benefit. Get it?

76 - Exeter is in NEW HAMPSHIRE, not Massachusetts (and is only 9-12). Andover is in Massachusetts. And neither of them will accept your kids.

105 - 104 here. Thanks for proving my point. If the issue is truly about unfair advantage, then you should be as equally outraged about legacy admits as you are about AA. I fail to see how you could view the admission of legacies as any less heinous -- regardless of the so-called quid pro quo between university and alum -- particularly if you believed such an admission negatively affected your child's chances of admission.

And please spare me this nonsense about vitriol not being directed towards the beneficiaries of AA but, instead, towards the program. One need only read the comments in this thread about Elie to see that the distinction you're trying to draw is one without substance.

One of the things you overlooked in Elie's piece is his spot on assessment of how admissions officers make judgments on who is admitted i.e. that admittees are selected from a pool of qualified applicants. Part of what AA helps to do is counteract the tendency of universities to select the "norm" from this qualified pool of applicants, something which, unfortunately, admissions officers at predominantly white institutions failed to do for the majority of the history of this country (hence part of the reason for the creation of the HBCU system and the reason why objectively briliant lawyers like Oliver Hill and Thurgood Marshall had only Howard University School of Law as an option). The tired counterpoint from AA opponents is that selected minority candidates are unqualified to be at these universities because their test scores don't measure up. The problem is that AA opponents never specify where the scores need to be for a person to be considered qualified for admission The only fact that matters in their analysis is whether a white candidate has better test scores than those of a minority admittee (nevermind that there are white admittees that likely have scores at or below those of a minority admittee)

Since test scores are the be all, end all in determining whether a person is qualified to attend a particular college or law school, why don't we just do away with extensive applications altogether? Let an application consist solely of a person's name, contact information, and SAT/LSAT/MCAT/GRE/GMAT score. Dispense with GPAs and other achievements, experiences, hardships, etc. because, in the final analysis, none of that really matters, right?
Surely AA opponents can get onboard with this proposal, no?

107, I hope you can see the difference between discrimination on the basis of race and discrimination on the basis of wealth or schooling. You can't possibly be this stupid at making analogies. Imagine a social club/restaurant that discriminated based on one of these factors -- which one would be illegal?

If the test scores are not perfect, use another better race-neutral factor, like family upbringing or writing ability. As Martin Luther King once said, don't judge people by the color of their skin.

107, nobody has any problems with using soft factors in admissions. The problem is when one of these soft factors is how many skin pigments you were born with.

Let's say a college gives a boost to only members of the white race. You would have a problem with it, no? Discrimination on the basis of race is racial discrimination regardless of the race being benefited.

Again, 73 posted the median LSAT of HLS whites as being ~171-173 (~98-99 percentile) and the median LSAT of HLS blacks being ~162 (~80-82 percentile -- varies by year). A non-URM applicant with a 162 LSAT would be looking at schools like UConn, Arizona State, Case Western, Pepperdine, and Kentucky -- schools ranked in the 50s instead of #2.

In contrast to Elie's "qualified pool" assertion, it's simply unrealistic to expect the overwhelming majority of people with the stats of someone from a school ranked in the 50s to be able to compete at / be qualified to go to Harvard. In fact, studies have shown that a highly disproportionate number of URMs at top law schools finish in the lower half, third, and quarter of their classes -- a clear sign that they simply weren't at the same level as their classmates. If they were indeed qualified, that shouldn't be happening at the rates it is. Hence, the endless need for further waves of affirmative action boosts (law review and law firms recruiting).

And, that's not even starting to go into AA's "targeting" problems. Funny how diversity is only measured by race, and not by political beliefs (how many conservative go to top law schools?), religious beliefs, or much by socioeconomic status (law schools don't meaningfully distinguish between affluent URMs and poor URMs -- they're just happy to bolster their demographic numbers).

110 again proves the point that the only thing that matters to AA opponents are standardized test scores. I'd love to see those studies on how URMs perform, particularly since many top law schools do not rank students. I'd also love to see the credentials of non-URMs who do not rank at the top of their classes. Regardless, if a person graduates from law school, it means they were qualified to be there.

108 - The argument I made is not a legal one, but a question of fairness i.e. if the issue is fairness in the admissions process, then there simply is no difference between a legacy admission and what you perceive as the admission of an unqualified URM under an AA program. Check your reading comprehension skills.

Again, let's do away with the consideration of anything in the admissions process other than standardized test scores since that's clearly all that matters.

111, it's well known that top law schools (and really most law schools sans Cooley-type places) simply DO NOT fail students out, short of leaving the exam blank, overt academic violations (plagiarism, etc.), or assaulting their classmates. Therefore, you're basically saying that just about everyone admitted to any top law school is "qualified," even the students who receive grade well below the forced mean or almost fail out, but don't by a hair? You can't even admit that the student who goes to a top-ranked school and ends up doing horribly (ex, a GPA in the 2s) perhaps wasn't qualified to go there?

And, for some statistics / analysis on problematic URM performance due to being "mismatched" into law schools, read Richard Sander's work:
http://www.law.ucla.edu/sander/Systemic/SA.htm

111 - AA opponents are not monolithic in their beliefs- you would have us believe all of them = Karl Rove.

Look, I would not begrudge a program that gave disadvantaged applicants a preference (even if they are underqualified). AA does NOT accomplish this because the beneficiaries of affirmative action need only fit into race-based categories to qualify for such a preference. Who do you think is more deserving of admissions help - an upper middle-class, suburban AfAm kid (child of a politician, perhaps), or a white person from a dirt poor family in a dirt poor community? Which does the current AA institution prefer in the first instance? Obama is on record saying the same EXACT same thing, using his daughters as an example.

Finally, the vitriol against Elie on this issue is well-deserved. This is a man who calls AA piddling, but yet, at certain times of the year, he "exposes" the "least diverse" firms. He can't validly claim AA hardly helped him in one post, and then parade around with watchdog data in another, castigating firms for not filling racial quotas he thinks should exist.

90,

88 here.

1, You obviously didn't learn about Darwinism and evolution in school (re: gay nd "world from the beginning" comments)
2, no cares about your stupid life.

90,

88 here.

1, You obviously didn't learn about Darwinism and evolution in school (re: gay nd "world from the beginning" comments)
2, no one cares about your stupid life.

88,

90 here.

1. Now you're an expert on Darwin's work? That's rich.

2. Notice how this comment appears only once? It's quite easy to accomplish, if one is not stupid.

112 - It's also a well known fact that student rankings invariably stratified students from top to bottom, regardless of their incoming credentials. Consequently, students who score high on the LSAT can and do end up in the middle or bottom of the class. I can attest to that phenomenon in my own law school class (and can also attest that most of the students at the top of my class had lower LSAT scores than folks who came in as beneficiaries of the school's academic scholarship program, all of whom had the top LSAT scores in our class).

Regarding Sanders, I suggest you read some of the rebuttals, particularly this one: http://www.law.ucla.edu/sander/Systemic/critics/Wilkins.pdf

I will say that AA based on race is probably over and done, despite O'Connor's assertion in Grutter that we need another 25 years. I'm not opposed to an AA system that gives preferences to economically-disadvantaged candidates. What bothers me is the assertion that minorities should feel some sort of shame a la Clarence Thomas that AA may have played a role in their admission to an institution of higher learning. What matters is what you do with the opportunity. CT got into Yale through AA and performed better than half the white students in his class who got in based on "merit." Did he not deserve to be there?

112 - It's also a well known fact that student rankings invariably stratified students from top to bottom, regardless of their incoming credentials. Consequently, students who score high on the LSAT can and do end up in the middle or bottom of the class. I can attest to that phenomenon in my own law school class (and can also attest that most of the students at the top of my class had lower LSAT scores than folks who came in as beneficiaries of the school's academic scholarship program, all of whom had the top LSAT scores in our class).

Regarding Sanders, I suggest you read some of the rebuttals, particularly this one: http://www.law.ucla.edu/sander/Systemic/critics/Wilkins.pdf

I will say that AA based on race is probably over and done, despite O'Connor's assertion in Grutter that we need another 25 years. I'm not opposed to an AA system that gives preferences to economically-disadvantaged candidates. What bothers me is the assertion that minorities should feel some sort of shame a la Clarence Thomas that AA may have played a role in their admission to an institution of higher learning. What matters is what you do with the opportunity. CT got into Yale through AA and performed better than half the white students in his class who got in based on "merit." Did he not deserve to be there?

All I got from your article was:

a) you got into Harvard because you are black, not because you are smart (like the rest of us who attended)
b) your actually can do a worse job writing than what you post on ATL
c) you hate white people and feel entitled

Some of you need to make friends with an admissions officer and see what actually happens. My understanding is three stacks

1) Legacy (race-blind)
2) Minority
3) Everyone else

Allocate % and admit judge each separately. And that is the real world.