Richard J Peltz, a law professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, is suing two students in the school's Black Law Student Association, the association itself and one other person affiliated with the group. Peltz is alleging defamation after several of his pupils took to the law school's dean and demanded Peltz face punishment for his so-called "hateful and inciting speech" regarding affirmative action.

According to a memo sent to the dean, Peltz is accused of "ranting" about affirmative action; saying affirmative action helps "unqualified black people"; passing out a form on which he asked students to specify their race, claiming their answers would affect their grades; and "denigrating" black students in a debate about affirmative action. The memo then asked that the dean publicly reprimand Peltz, bar him from teaching any course black students would be required to take and to mark on Peltz's personnel file that he is "unable to deal fairly with black students."

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With colleges around the country being sued for exercising affirmative action and right-leaning activists attempting to demolish the practice completely, what's a college admissions board to do in order to maintain diversity while not facing lawsuits? Why, leave it all up to computers, of course!

Juan E Gilbert, an associate professor of computer science at Auburn, has created a software that he says satisfies the demands of both pro and anti-affirmative action parties.

The software works this way: A college decides how many applicants it will admit from that middle group. Then the college picks the criteria it will use to evaluate the applicants. These would generally include a range for acceptable SAT scores or high school grades, planned major in college, status such as first generation to go to college, intended major, race, gender and so forth. Then the software clusters all of these applicants into groups equal in total number to the number of projected admits. In doing so, the software groups applicants who share the same qualities together. Then the software selects one person from each group to be admitted, but this person is the applicant who is the least like others in his or her cluster. (Details are available on the company’s Web site.)

Gilbert said in an interview that this system offers key advantages. First, it removes bias from the equation, as an admissions officer can’t be accused of providing more or less emphasis to any criterion based on personal interests. Second, it assures that race and ethnicity are taken into account, but not given more weight than the Supreme Court would permit. “It does what we as human beings can’t do on a large scale,” he said.

Auburn will begin using the software for its admissions beginning next year. After that, the revolution of the machines. Bow to your MacBook!

Opponents of affirmative action are on the verge of almost fully defeating Leftist politicos in four states over ballot initiatives that, if passed, will outlaw preferential treatment based on race, sex and nationality in public university admissions and government hiring. Missouri, Arizona, Colorado and Nebraska are all in danger of losing their affirmative action programs come November 4, a day being called "Super Tuesday for Equal Rights" by some anti-affirmative action circles.

Liberal groups have been fighting tooth and nail through litigation to keep the issue away from voters, but so far the court battles have been all for naught in Arizona, Colorado and Nebraska. Missouri, say enemies of preference programs, is proving to be a more difficult battleground, with the opposition there behaving "more aggressively."

Affirmative action supporters in the four states have a lot to worry about, as ballot initiatives intended to strike down preferential policy have proven in the past to be agreeable to voters from both the left and right.

In liberal Washington state, for example, the antipreference initiative was backed not only by 80% of Republicans and 62% of independents, but by 41% of Democrats; this in the face of liberal opposition that — abetted by such local corporate behemoths as Eddie Bauer, Microsoft and Starbucks — massively outspent supporters of the measure. The Michigan Civil Rights Initiative similarly passed despite the fierce opposition of a liberal-left coalition of 180 groups, ranging from the League of Women Voters and the United Auto Workers to the Arab-American Institute.

Money can buy anything, nowadays, even highly sought-after opportunities to not spend it. Millionaire rapper Master P recently saw his son, Beverly Hills High student Romeo Miller aka Lil' Romeo, honored with a full-ride to the University of Southern California on a basketball scholarship. Basketball insiders were "shocked," however, because Romeo is neither remarkably tall nor good at basketball – USC coach Tim Floyd willingly admits the 5'10" point guard "must improve" – and his family is certainly able to afford the $44,000 per year cost of the school. The impetus for the scholarship? First, to put young asses in stadium seats: "We may have more 11- to 17-year-old girls in the stands than we've had in the past," says Floyd.

And then there's Romeo's relationship with Demar DeRozan. Some believe Romeo's acquisition by USC was a package deal, a way to lure his close (and much more talented) friend, DeRozan, to the basketball program. People believe this because Coach Floyd is telling everyone that that's exactly what happened:

Mr. Floyd says, Percy Miller [Master P] called while driving both players from a tournament in Fayetteville, Ark. Percy Miller said "Demar and Romeo are ready to make their decision, and would you like to have them both on scholarship?" remembers Mr. Floyd. "I said absolutely."

DeRozen, who will graduate this year from LA's Compton High, announced his decision to attend USC jointly with Romeo last November at a press conference at the Four Seasons hotel. Master P's PR firm scheduled the event and Romeo Miller was given top billing. DeRozen did not later receive a conference of his own in South Central.

Get ready to be depressed: more than three times as many black people live in jail than in college dorms!

Get ready to roll your eyes: this doesn't include students who live off campus. Or commuter students. Not to mention the different lengths of time a person would be living in jail vs. living in a dorm.

Still, the fact that a black person is more likely to live in a jail cell than in a college dorm is an upsetting, if misleading, stat. Just ask Marc Morial.

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