FIRE President Greg Lukianoff's book, Unlearning Liberty: Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate, is now available for pre-order on Amazon.com. The book will be formally released on October 23, but from now until then, we are spreading the word about the book and the important stories it tells regarding censorship on campus. Getting the message out about how bad things have become on college campuses for once-cherished principles like free speech and due process helps FIRE fight back against campus abuses, and all proceeds from the book go to FIRE to help support our work. Unlearning Liberty is the first book since The Shadow University, written by Alan Kors and me, Harvey Silverglate, to attempt a far-reaching and large-scale exposition of the insane cases of censorship and abuse of basic rights that occur at our nation's colleges and universities. 

Being Fourth of July week, it seems a particularly apt time to consider the various forms of tyranny with which we have been inundated of late. The treatment of federal prisoner (and putative “corrupt pol” – a subject on which I expect to have more to say at some future date) Salvatore DiMasi is of the stomach-churning variety. Or at least the treatment of DiMasi by federal prosecutors and “corrections” officials should churn the stomach of all decent citizens devoted to the essential respect for human dignity demanded of our government by the Bill of Rights. Please read my views on the subject in the current issue of The Boston Phoenix; the column after the jump.

Today U.S. District Judge Douglas Woodlock sentenced Catherine Greig to 8 years in prison for harboring longtime fugitive James “Whitey” Bulger. On Friday, prosecutors requested a 10-year sentence, while Greig’s defense, as well as the probation department, recommended 27-33 months. David Boeri interviewed me for WBUR about this emotionally charged case.

The day that I read the judge’s instructions to the jury in the John Edwards campaign financing criminal trial, I predicted a deadlocked jury on all counts. I was close. Why was I so certain of this outcome despite Edwards’ exceptionally unsavory character? Because the jury instructions were so obtuse that not even the judge herself (were she honest about it) could understand them. The Edwards trial provides yet another example of overzealous federal prosecutors using dangerously unclear statutes to go after whomever they choose, regardless of whether the person in question has actually committed a crime.

The column after the jump...