Everything's Coming Up

(or "J.J.")

I have an announcement to make: I have a job this summer!

I'll be working in the compliance office of the University of Iowa Athletics Department. It's going to be awesome. I think it's going to be really cool, and different from a typical legal job. I like that I'll be working with college sports again, and kind of returning to my Daily Universe sportswriting days a little bit. Of course I won't be writing articles, but I'll be working more behind-the-scenes of running a college athletics program under the NCAA.

Erin is of course especially excited, because I'll be staying here in Iowa City this summer. Part of me (maybe most of me) really wanted to do a big adventure and spend the summer in D.C. or New York or something. I think having an internship in New York City a couple of summers ago really spoiled me - it kinda set the standard, and now almost everything else pales in comparison, haha. There wasn't really a whole lot in Iowa City that sounded interesting to me. But then I thought of working at the compliance office, and it was my favorite out of all the people who responded to my job applications. And Erin is happy that she'll have her husband around this summer to help her with our three kiddos.

One thing that will be great about this job is what it might set me up for. After working with NCAA compliance, I'll be on a track for lots of different jobs with the NCAA or any college or university. I think it would be awesome to stay connected with college sports and make a living out of it. I'm still interested in other areas of the law, but we'll see where this takes me.

The way I found the job is kind of interesting too. For my Summer 2013 Job Hunt, I basically applied for any job that came up in Symplicity (the online service that Iowa uses for posting jobs for law students) that looked interesting, including pretty much any judicial externship that came up. But I did think of some places to apply to on my own, including a Utah Supreme Court justice I met last year and a federal district judge in Houston who Erin's family knows. I asked my friends with connections in the baseball world, Dylan Higgins and Lakia Holmes, for any resources or ideas they had for finding a baseball legal job. I also applied for a couple of internships I discovered through the J. Reuben Clark Law Society.

But this one was totally my own initiative. There was a panel at the law school last semester with Dan Matheson and Monica Mims about the NCAA, college sports, and law. It was really interesting and got me more excited about working in sports law. (Of course, every time I come into contact with one of the areas of law I'm interested in, I think, "Yeah, that's what I want to do!" and that option rises above the others. So I change my mind a lot.) Dan Matheson used to work in NCAA enforcement, and used to work for the New York Yankees. Now he teaches sports business for undergraduates at Iowa. Monica Mims ran track for Iowa, then she got her juris doctorate here, worked in the USC compliance office, and now works at the compliance office here.

I emailed Monica, telling her I really enjoyed that NCAA panel and that I was interested in any internship opportunities at the compliance office this summer. I didn't even know if they regularly had interns or if that was even a thing. But she told me to come in for an interview, and at the interview she sounded like she was really interested in having me work there. Then a couple of weeks later I got an email from her, basically asking, "When can you start?"

I'll start at the end of May. Go Hawkeyes!

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Oh, and I should mention something else in the world of employment.

A lot of law students here start during their second year working as research assistants, or R.A.s. There are a lot of perks to being an R.A.: since you have a job in Iowa, you qualify for in-state tuition, and since you work for the university, you qualify for their health insurance. More importantly, you get to work one-on-one with a professor and help him or her with whatever research projects they are working on, or scholarly articles they are writing, or that sort of thing.

My professor for Foundations of International Law, Professor Burns Weston, invited me to apply for an R.A. position with him this coming school year. And then he offered me the job! So I'll be making some money during the rest of law school. It's only 10 hours a week, but it will be a great experience to be on the more academic side of law. And working with Professor Weston will be amazing. I really enjoy his class, and he is a leading expert in the field of international law, especially environmental law.

I'm lucky and very grateful to have these opportunities, and I'm looking forward to what I'll learn and do the rest of the year and beyond.

Grade Point Average = Gun Permit Application

Published in today's Daily Iowan.

This cartoon is based on this story:

UI suspends sharing student information for gun permits following investigation

I'm not a big gun guy. But this just seemed sort of bizarre to me, that the University of Iowa was sharing FERPA-protected information with the sheriff. I'm all for open information, as a proud member of the journalism profession. But looking at a person's grades to determine whether someone qualifies for a gun is probably unnecessary.

Transparency

University of Iowa's president, Sally Mason, has been going through a lot from the Iowa Board of Regents. Some of it has to do with Peter Gray, the Iowa associate director of athletics student services, who resigned last November amid allegations of sexual harassment.

There have been other similar incidents over the past few months. So the Board of Regents would like some more transparency for the university. Specifically, there's an idea to have an "transparency officer."

UI officials back Regent Lang's transparency proposals

Hence, this cartoon:

In today's The Daily Iowan.

Keep Out

My prediction from yesterday was correct. Today The Daily Iowan published one of my cartoons about the Wagner v. Jones case in the U.S. Court of Appeals.

Just to recap from my post yesterday:

The federal case is between Teresa Wagner, a part-time employee at the University of Iowa law school, and Carolyn Jones, the former dean. Wagner claims she was denied a full-time job because of her conservative ideology.

The case has attracted a lot of media attention.

Verdict could alter hiring in higher education

This week, the jury reached a ... non-verdict. Hung jury, mistrial.

Judge calls mistrial in conservative's lawsuit claiming liberal bias in hiring at U. Iowa law

I had drawn two cartoons in anticipation of the verdict: one if Wagner won, another if she lost. Even though it was a mistrial, the cartoon of Wagner losing still can apply, I think.

To see the other possible cartoon, click here.

Performance Review

Today's cartoon is another cartoon about the judicial retention election.

Here's an update on that story, by the way: New poll shows more Iowans plan to vote against Wiggins' retention

Now, there's another big news story going on in right here at the law school. There's a federal case between Teresa Wagner, a part-time writing adviser at the law school, and the old dean of the law school, Carolyn Jones. Wagner applied for a full-time instructor position, but was denied the job. She claims it's because of the law school's anti-conservative bias.

Verdict could alter hiring in higher education

It's a really interesting story.

Anyway, the verdict was expected to come this week. So, being the cartoonist who goes above and beyond, I provided The Daily Iowan two cartoons: one if Wagner wins, and another if Wagner loses.

But I didn't draw one specifically for a mistrial!

Judge calls mistrial in conservative's lawsuit claiming liberal bias in hiring at U. Iowa law

I found out about the mistrial at about 6 p.m. yesterday, which was too late to draw a new cartoon. But I did email the opinion editor to suggest that my "If Wagner loses" cartoon could still work. I never heard back from him, and this morning I found the judicial retention cartoon instead.

But, lucky for you blog followers, you can see both of my Wagner v. Jones cartoons right here!

If Wagner wins

If Wagner loses

The paper could maybe still use the "If Wagner loses" cartoon tomorrow. In that case, you just got an exclusive sneak preview of tomorrow's edition.

Almost Harmony

I love when I can combine more than one news story into one cartoon.

I actually drew this cartoon last week, as a possible alternative to this one. But it also worked for this week since Iowa beat Minnesota, 31-13. (See, I don't always need Iowa to lose to advance my cartooning career.)

Dr. Freeze

Another cartoon in The Daily Iowan!

The opinions editor Benjamin Evans especially liked this one, because it was super local. Super local cartoons are a challenge, since I'm new to the campus and being a law student makes me less connected to the campus as a whole anyway. But that's more of what they're looking for at The Daily Iowan, so I'll keep trying to come up with more.

Evolution?

Well, the question of who to vote for in 2012 just got more complicated for me.

If the election were before yesterday, I probably would have voted for Barack Obama. Not especially avidly or ardently or with any fire in my belly, but simply because life for me and my family during the past four years hasn't been that bad. In fact, it's probably been better than it would if John McCain were president. Erin's and my being able to stay on our parents' health insurance until age 26, a tangible result from Obamacare, has actually directly affected and helped me, a head of household who made fewer than five figures last year (and not for lack of work ethic).

I like President Obama's plan for supporting education and making student loans less burdensome. Although we only know through retrospect, the auto bailout worked. The economy isn't great, but it's better than it used to be. In the realm of foreign policy, under President Obama's watch the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are tapering off, and both Osama bin Laden and Muammar Gaddafi were toppled. And in the case of Gaddafi and Libya, not a single American soldier was lost and the operation was only a matter of months.

Maybe Romney would be a better president, especially in relation to the economy. And he also supports lower interest rates for student loans. But in almost everything else (taxes, immigration, foreign policy), he's either the typical rich snob, the typical Republican, or both. It's hard for me to be a big fan of someone who has an elevator for his cars, says "corporations are people too" and calls himself a fan of "sport." Maybe I'm just skeptical and hesitant when it comes to people whose wealth is in another stratosphere, and who don't know how to relate to people whose wealth is closer to earth.

I disagree with some of his political beliefs, but I wouldn't bemoan Romney becoming president, and I don't think he'd be a disaster or anything. He could even be great. Who knows?

And, since yesterday, I might be more willing to give him a chance.

Barack Obama came out in personal support of same-sex marriage yesterday, in an ABC News interview. He said that his views on the subject have "evolved," and after talking with his family and pondering about it, he has decided that same-sex marriage should be legal.

That in and of itself doesn't bother me. Of course he's entitled to his opinion.

And, a vote for President Obama doesn't necessarily mean a vote for same-sex marriage (yet). He said that politically, legalizing same-sex marriage should be left up to the states. And I can live with that. I wouldn't flee the country even if a majority of states legalized it. Heck, I'm about to willingly move to a state where same-sex marriage is legal. Iowa can legalize it if it wants to, and North Carolina and California can make it illegal if they want to. And I'm fine with that.

But here's what does bother me:

1) There was some discussion, definitely warranted, on how when Romney changes his mind on something, it's "flip-flopping," but when President Obama does it, it's "evolution." I usually think Romney does flip or flop according to what is most politically opportunistic. He's a capitalist, in the sense that he likes to capitalize on any situation and make any statement that will get him votes. But, on some of his positions, I think Romney probably did genuinely change his mind. So does President Obama, and so does any human being. The media should remember that in their portrayals of both Romney and President Obama, and should be fair to both sides. And by portraying Romney and President Obama in this way, it's a dead giveaway of media's liberal bias.

2) What bothers me more than that, however, is this will add momentum to the sense that universal support for same-sex marriage is inevitable, and that it's only a matter of time before everyone else will "come around."

In many ways, I think the change in opinions and understanding about homosexuality is progress and evolution. And I've progressed and evolved too.

But no matter how much knowledge I gain about the issue, I don't see myself ever voting for same-sex marriage.

Just in my own short lifetime, I have seen a shift in public opinion on this issue. Support for gay rights and same-sex marriage rights have moved from being represented by folks on the extreme fringe to being shared by people in the mainstream. I remember when someone who wanted marriage for same-sex couples was radical. Now, someone who doesn't want same-sex marriage is widely considered a backward-minded bigot.

Some gay rights activists see themselves in the midst of a revolution, and compare themselves to Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. In reality, the Mormons and others who supported Prop 8 in California are more like the civil rights crusaders than the gay rights activists are.

"After a significant majority of California voters (seven million - over 52 percent) approved Proposition 8's limiting marriage to a man and a woman, some opponents characterized the vote as denying people their civil rights. In fact, the Proposition 8 battle was not about civil rights, but about what equal rights demand and what religious rights protect. ...

"The marriage union of a man and a woman has been ... the core legal definition and practice of marriage in Western culture of thousands of years. Those who seek to change the foundation of marriage should not be allowed to pretend that those who defend the ancient order are trampling on civil rights." - Elder Dallin H. Oaks

No matter what side of the debate we are on, we have to realize that fighting for same-sex marriage is not the same as fighting for human rights. The freedom to marry is not the same as freedom from oppression or tyranny. Sexual orientation is not the same as race or ethnicity, and being gay is not the same as being black or white.

Being in a homosexual relationship or marriage has always been a choice. Even if someone is born with a susceptibility to the temptation, acting on that temptation is still a choice. Being tempted by homosexuality does not define us any more than any other temptation or sin defines us.

“You serve yourself poorly when you identify yourself primarily by your sexual feelings. That isn’t your only characteristic, so don’t give it disproportionate attention. You are first and foremost a son [or daughter] of God ...” - Elder Jeffrey R. Holland

I can't help but see this issue through the lens of the understanding and knowledge I have, whether that be secular or spiritual knowledge. I don't want to force or impose that knowledge on others, but at the same time I don't have to embrace something that is contrary to and conflicting with my knowledge.

On a lot of political issues, there isn't any cut-and-dry knowledge, secular or spiritual, to make an obvious choice. But you won't be seeing me voting to legalize same-sex marriage, marijuana, taking the Lord's name in vain, coveting or anything else I know is wrong.

At the same time, if other voters choose differently and put me in the minority, I won't hate them. I'll just have to work harder to follow what's right and teach what's right to my family.

3) President Obama said that he talked about this topic with his daughters at the dinner table. And what they said surprised me. The president's daughters had friends who had same-sex couples as parents, and to them it was completely normal.

"It wouldn't dawn on them that somehow their friends' parents would be treated differently. It doesn't make sense to them," the president said in the interview.


Before that, when I imagined Allisyn and my future children growing up and learning about the world around them, I was expecting that I would need to teach them to be tolerant and respectful of people who choose to live a homosexual lifestyle.

But now, I wonder if maybe Malia's and Sasha's and my children's generation lives in a different world than I do. I might have to teach my children from the other direction, guiding and reminding them that although we should be tolerant and respectful of others' beliefs, God intended for marriage to be between a man and a woman, and there are reasons for that. I agree that "their friends' parents" shouldn't "be treated differently" by my children. But those parents and their lifestyle shouldn't be treated as just another viable option, because according to what I know and what I want my children to know, it isn't.

It's not necessarily a problem that I would have to teach that way. Just an interesting factor to add to my future parenting methods.

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I don't know yet whether all of these thoughts and feelings will make me vote any differently this November. But, I'll put it this way: spending the summer in a house with a Mitt Romney sign on the front lawn might not be as bad as I thought it would have been a couple of days ago.

BYU Level: Completed!

I'm a college grad!

On Friday at 1:22 p.m. MST, I emailed a newspaper article I wrote about our COMMS 406 class project, which meant I had completed all my work for my last semester before earning my bachelor's degree.

By the way, here's the BYU ElevenNEWS article and video about the project:



So now, I just wait for final grades to be calculated and for my diploma to come in the mail. And then in April I'll walk in the commencement ceremony.

It's hard to believe I'm done! Except for my two years in Argentina, since kindergarten I've never had a break from school longer than summer vacation.

This break won't last forever, since I'm planning on law school in a few months. But for now, I'm done with essays, reading assignments, quizzes, exams, textbooks, Blackboard, group projects, PowerPoint presentations and 8 a.m. classes. I like school in general, but there are parts of it I won't miss.

 What I will miss is working at The Daily Universe. My time has sadly come to an end. The newsroom was a home away for home, as much for Erin and Allisyn as it was for me, and I loved being a part of the Universe.

What's really more impressive is that Erin graduated. It's something we usually took for granted, we always expected that each of us would graduate from college. Even before I met Erin, I always knew I would be married to a college graduate. And it was always important to Erin and her family too, enough that one of the conditions for Erin's dad to give her hand in marriage was that I had to support her and allow her to graduate from college.

But from the outside looking in, Erin's accomplishment is really remarkable. She became a wife and a mother and still earned a bachelor's degree. It seems like most people I know either put off motherhood until after college or put off college until after motherhood (or, more often than not, never get back to school). I'm not saying those women are taking an easy way out or are falling short in any way. It's certainly not a requirement to be a mother or to be a college graduate in order to be a successful human being. But I know it was important to Erin to do both, and for us it worked out that she did both at the same time. It wasn't always easy, which makes me all the more impressed with her.

In our little family, right now we plan to be more traditional, with me bringing home the bacon and with Erin as a full-time mother. So some of you might wonder why Erin worked so hard for a degree. The way we see it, a college degree is far more valuable than a gateway to a career. Even if Erin is never employed again, we know being a college graduate will make her a better wife and mother. I have no doubt that she will use her college education every day (and not just so she can help our children with their homework). Education is for more than just getting a job, it should make a person who he or she is. (And, besides, circumstances could change and make it necessary for Erin to get a job someday.)

(Click here and read the comments.)

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So, now what?

I have a four-month internship at The (Provo) Daily Herald starting in January! I'm pretty excited. I'll be writing for The Ticket, the weekly arts & entertainment section. I've been a reporter or an editor for two years, but I haven't done much writing about movies and music. So this internship will be a good mixture of familiarity and new challenges.

The internship is only minimum wage and part-time, so I'm still looking for another job. I filled out an application for J Dawgs, everybody's favorite hot dog stand in Provo. They're opening a new location in Orem which means they're hiring. It seems like a fun place to work, and there's someone in my ward who works there and likes it a lot. We'll see if I hear back from them.

In the near future, I plan on finishing the rest of my law school applications. I've finished three (Texas, North Carolina, Notre Dame) out of 14 on my list. So I have a lot of work to do. I also am waiting for my second LSAT score to come in. If it takes the same amount of time as it did in October, then it should come on Dec. 26.

Other than law school applications, I'm looking forward to a couple of weeks of reading Moneyball (I got it as a birthday gift, and only now have time to read it), watching How I Met Your Mother, meeting up with childhood friends and celebrating Christmas during a relaxing vacation at home in Oregon.

Engaging Shakespeare

The Shakespeare class that I've been thoroughly enjoying has been building up to our big event this Friday night.

It's going to be pretty awesome. Basically, it's each group showing off their final project. But eventually, through our website, it will take on a life of its own and share our projects digitally and globally.

Photo by Luke Hansen

This Friday we'll present art, an audio book, a mini-play, a documentary about the mini-play and a music video, all made by our class.

You should come!

Friday, December 9
7 p.m.
JFSB B192
RSVP here.

My connections with The Daily Universe helped our class get a story. Although it wasn't me who decided to actually assign the story or put it on the front page. So, don't worry, I'm not abusing my power! :)

Shakespeare: Not just for the 17th century

And check out the website!

Engaging Shakespeare

Glory road

The opinion editor for The Daily Universe asked me to write a viewpoint about Jake Heaps' transfer:

Detour in Heaps' glory road

I held back some of my harshness when I was writing this. I do see Heaps as being kind of selfish here. It looked to him like BYU wasn't going to give him a green light to the NFL like he thought, so he took his talents to South Beach, so to speak.

Some people think it's the coaches' fault for not giving that green light. But I don't think any coach should be expected to cater to one athlete and center their game plans around him. As a former athlete of team sports and a team member in every class or job I've ever been in, I know that you fulfill your role and don't try to take matters into your own hands. You can still have a voice and be involved, but an attitude of "I know best" is usually not the best, and even if it is it just annoys people.

That said, at this stage in our lives we all are supposed to be a little selfish. We're here to plan our success for ourselves and our family, and get all the education we can so we will have more advantages compared with our competition. That's what I'm doing by going to law school. So maybe Heaps transferring and me going on to law school are similar.

And even though I wish Heaps would stick it out, I certainly don't wish for him to fail. Like I said in my viewpoint, it would be great if he transferred to a Pac-12 school and beat the Utes a couple of times for us, haha.

Unrelated point: If Heaps wasn't able to handle two years of BYU football, I wonder how he would handle two years on a mission. Am I being too harsh? What do you think? Talk amongst yourselves.

Insert Text Here

Hey there, J Squared fans.

Today's column is about the Texas Board of Education's recent overhaul of their history and social sciences curricula. The majority of the board has felt the need to have more conservative textbooks in the classroom, and last week the board voted and passed some of the proposed changes.

Insert text here

(If you go to the website you won't see my brilliant headline, just the subheadline. But if you see today's paper or look up the PDF file on the Daily Universe website, you'll see it there.)

I cycled through a few non-argumentative columns the past couple weeks. Time to bring on the controversy again, haha. Actually, the way I wrote the article you can tell I'm definitely on a certain side but I'm not passionately adamant, and I acknowledge the parts of resisting "progression" that I agree with.

In my "sign-off" line at the end of the article, I give a shout out to my father-in-law Carl. I hope he likes that.

When I came into work today, my boss Rich brought to my attention that I didn't mention anything about textbooks and textbook writers who do stick to the middle of the road. Of course, many textbooks, historians and professors do keep it moderate and show both sides of history. I didn't include that in my article. Rich said it wasn't necessary to address that in the paper, but I figured I might as well do that here. For the record, I don't think all historians or textbooks are extreme, in either direction. I'm glad to have multiple points of view on historical events, and to then be able to draw my own conclusions. Isn't that what real education should be?

Childish Behavior? (September 10, 2009)

By this time, Senator Barack Obama is now President Barack Obama. Around the beginning of the school year, President Obama took the time to try and inspire American schoolchildren, the next generation of workers, innovators and leaders. Whatever your opinion of President Obama, I was impressed with his desire to be personable and direct with middle schoolers. Not that a speech from the President of the U.S. will definitely motivate the unmotivated, but to me it was nice to know he cares.

But, of course, the knee-jerk reaction of the paranoid Fox News crowd is to cry out "Indoctrination!" "Socialist brain-washing!" Hey now. It's not every day that your son or daughter gets to sit down and have a chat with the most powerful man in the world. (And, at least recently, it's not every day that the most powerful man in the world has conversational skills* more advanced than that of your son or daughter.) This is a man elected by more than half of the population, so it's safe to assume that he's not an extremist on the fringe. That's more Hollywood stuff. In reality, we have an articulate and intelligent president who endured more trials than most to get to where he is today. He probably has some wisdom to share, and we probably shouldn't deny him the privilege to share it. (If he does say something just a little too far to the left, then discuss it with your children at home. That's your job.)

Some parents I know weren't freaking out over some conspiracy theory, but were still concerned. They argued that they should be allowed to see a speech transcript prior to the speech. I think it's a valid argument, but if it doesn't happen (and it didn't), it's not the end of the world.

*(Number 3 is especially applicable.)