links for 2009-06-12

You might think that the American Medical Association, which today came out in opposition to a "public option" on comprehensive health care reform, is just a bunch of doctors trying to do what's best for their patients, and that their opposition to the public option is a mere disagreement over details. And you'd be wrong.

[E]ven assuming there's anything illegal about online poker, the law is simply stupid. Indeed, the Reasonarticles illustrate that the most recent legislative crackdown was a classic example of interest group legislation -- namely, an unholy alliance between social conservatives and entrenched gambling interests who don't want competition. And just so we're clear -- I'm allowed to play government-administered lotteries, to bet on horse races, to go to casinos, and to purchase things from AIG. But the federal government is apparently drawing the line at... online poker. We delicate snowflakes simply cannot endure its horrors.

At today's memorial for John Hope Franklin at Duke University, playwright Emily Mann -- daughter of historian Arthur Mann, a close friend of Franklin's -- related one of many illuminating personal stories about the pioneering historian and scholar. In a conversation about the North Carolina political landscape, someone asked Franklin "Where did Jesse Helms come from?" Franklin quickly replied, "From hell" -- "not missing a beat," Mann said. It was a sentiment shared by many African-Americans, civil rights allies and others in North Carolina. ... The resolution to honor Helms passed 41-1 in the Senate and 98-0 in the House. Seventeen lawmakers abstained, including a half-dozen members of the House black caucus who waited outside the chambers rather than participate in the vote. Only one North Carolina legislator -- Sen. Julie Boseman, a white Democrat from Wilmington -- voted against the Helms resolution.