March 19, 2025

Now, on to the news…

For years, the federal government has directed grant money to university programs that recruit faculty on the basis of race. But as states and the federal government now turn against DEI, these programs’ administrators increasingly face a legal challenge: How can they continue their race-conscious missions in the wake of state and federal bans on race-conscious policies?

In a new reported feature, Manhattan Institute Senior Fellow John Sailer reveals the results of his investigation into one of these programs, “RISE UPP,” founded in 2022 to increase the number of “minoritized postdoctoral scholars” on various college campuses. Sailer reports that, rather than comply with state and federal law, “program administrators brainstormed ‘workarounds’ to state policy, disguised the project’s true intentions, and used proxies to achieve their demographic goals.” Such evasive tactics, he argues, are just as bad as the explicitly race-based frameworks that these programs adopted at their inception.

Read the rest of his piece here.

In baseball, a hitter’s OPS—or “on-base percentage (OBP) plus slugging percentage (SLG)”—is meant to provide a more comprehensive understanding of his contributions. But it makes no statistical sense, argues City Journal Economics Editor Jordan McGillis. He has created a new metric for better synthesizing the skills of getting on base and hitting for power: BABE (batter’s average bases earned). Read about his pioneering idea here.

With Donald Trump back in the White House, the crypto industry’s future looks brighter. Even so, it will take time for the administration to iron out rules and for Congress to create a lasting regulatory structure, writes Jennifer J. Schulp, director of financial regulation studies at the Cato Institute’s Center for Monetary and Financial Alternatives. Read her take on what Trump’s presidency will mean for digital currencies.

Earlier this year, the U.K. demanded that Apple provide, on request, backdoor access to any iCloud account. Apple filed an appeal, and a hearing reportedly took place last week.

If the company were indeed to enable this type of access, data would no longer be encrypted, and the move could affect users in the U.S. as well. “Once created, it is only a matter of time before a backdoor gets exploited—whether by hackers, foreign adversaries, or rogue insiders,” writes Corbin K. Barthold, Internet policy counsel at TechFreedom. Read his view on how the U.S. should respond.

“The apocalyptic reaction is tantamount to the over-indulged child being told NO after years of getting his way.”

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Deb, commenting on the National Institutes of Health’s decision to limit the amount that it would pay universities for indirect research costs

Photo credits: Allen J. Schaben / Contributor / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images