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Author: Laurel Conrad

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Laurel Conrad

Laurel Conrad is the president of the Cornell Review, Cornell's conservative news publication, and president of Network of Enlightened Women, a campus conservative women's networking organization. She is the daughter of a retired Marine Corps officer and the oldest of four children.

Laurel has previously contributed to the Daily Caller and Cornell Insider. She will graduate with a degree in Government and minor in Asian Studies in 2014. You can follow her on twitter at @LaurelRConrad

Posted by Laurel Conrad on April 27, 2015 33 Comments
When I wrote my previous LI piece about Christina Hoff Sommers lecture at Georgetown, I hoped that the “trigger warnings” and “safe spaces” were the end to the attempted censorship of Dr. Sommers’ speech. The Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute, for which I am the lecture director, sponsored the speech, and recorded it so that others could both hear Dr. Sommers and the people who questioned her. Unfortunately, I was wrong about the controversy being over. [caption id="attachment_125067" align="alignnone" width="556"][Photo Credit: Georgetown U. Republicans] [Image Credit: Georgetown U. Republicans][/caption]Now, Georgetown University itself is putting pressure on the Georgetown College Republicans to make CBLPI edit its video of the lecture. In an email, the assistant director for Georgetown’s Center for Student Engagement told the lecture student organizers that if CBLPI is “unwilling or unresponsive to the request, Georgetown will need to step in.”

Posted by Laurel Conrad on April 21, 2015 39 Comments
College campuses are meant to be a place where students engage in new perspectives and critical reasoning. Or so they say. But by labeling conservative points of view as “extremist,” “anti-feminist,” and “racist,” feminists are shutting down the dialogue on their college campuses before it even begins. To the leftist student activists, it seemingly doesn't matter whether or not these labels are deserved. They've realized that all they need to do is to stigmatize a talk by a conservative speaker is to condemn the speaker as an oppressing force. For instance, last Thursday, I facilitated a lecture at the Georgetown University on behalf of the conservative organization I work for, the Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute, and the Georgetown CRs. As soon as the campus feminists caught wind of the event, they immediately began protesting and demanding trigger warnings in order to silence the talk.

Posted by Laurel Conrad on April 27, 2014 17 Comments
Welcome to the age of Hashtag Diplomacy. For those unfamiliar with the concept, this is what it looks like: Jen Psaki The above tweet is U.S. State Department Spokeswoman Jen Psaki giving a thumbs-up to Ukraine. It illustrates the State Department's latest foreign policy strategy, a twitter campaign for #UnitedForUkraine. However, this Twitter campaign must not be a very formidable or convincing strategy, because it did not take long before the hashtag was "hijacked" by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation. Below is just one example of the various MFA Russia taunts at the Obama Administration:

MFA tweet

On Thursday,  Jen Psaki responded to the MFA by tweeting:

Posted by Laurel Conrad on April 09, 2014 1 Comment
Venezuela Update: Is the end of violence finally in sight after two months of deadly anti-government  protests? In February, I highlighted the Venezuela protests with depiction of protesters taking to the streets to fight against corruption in the government, high inflation, and a high murder rate. At least three people were confirmed to have been killed during anti-government protests by “armed vigilantes on motorcycles.” After nearly two months of protests, 39 deaths, and and hundreds of people detained after confrontations with Venezuela security forces, talks between the government and opposition are in the works. BBC News reports that an umbrella opposition group says it is willing to enter into talks with the government as long as certain conditions are met. According to BBC News:
In a letter addressed to the Unasur delegation, the umbrella opposition group Table for Democratic Unity (MUD) said it was "willing to hold a true dialogue, with a clear agenda, equal conditions [for both sides] and the first meeting of which will be transmitted live on national radio and television channels".
Additionally, the opposition wishes to have a third, independent involved in the talks in order to facilitate the process. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro earlier agreed to meet with members of the opposition, reports the Latin Times. Unasur and the Vatican have made offers to act as observers, and President Maduro said he "accepted" the Unasur proposal, according to BBC News. On Sunday, a graphic video depicting the Venezuelan people confronting the government for control of the streets was posted to Youtube. Watch it below:

Posted by Laurel Conrad on March 08, 2014 8 Comments
I'd like to re-pose the age-old question: "If Israeli Apartheid Week happens on campus and no one notices, does it make a sound?" Israel Apartheid Week (IAW) officially took place on campuses across the U.S. over the course of February 24-March 2, although the exact boundaries of the "week" varied somewhat. When we set out to monitor events at Legal Insurrection, we expected an avalanche.  But it never showed up.  There were events, but none seemed to have much energy or attendance. We're just starting the "Israeli Apartheid week" in Europe too, but even in Sussex, England, only 8 people showed up to the BDS march.  That may reflect that even in Britain, a hotbed of anti-Israel activities on campus, IAW is losing steam, UK Students Say 'Israel Apartheid Week' Losing Steam. Has Israeli Apartheid Week peaked already in the U.S.? The Jewish Press reported that pro-Israel counter-events outnumbered IAW events. We had trouble finding reports of any large-scale IAW activities, and those that did occur failed to draw coverage or attendance on numerous campuses. For example, at the University of Maryland, only 12 of 426 invited guests rsvp'ed as attending the IAW event, "The Wall Must Fall." Neither did the event receive any coverage from their student newspaper.

University Maryland IAW

Posted by Laurel Conrad on February 16, 2014 15 Comments
On Sunday, Florida Senator Marco Rubio took to Twitter to draw attention to the deadly street protests in Venezuela. Marcho Rubio Twitter Venezuela What's Happening The tweet links to a powerful youtube video titled "What's going on in Venezuela in a nutshell (English version)," where a Venezuelan woman living in America explains the current anti-government protests and government backlash. The video depicts photos and footage of the violent scene in Venezuela.  At the end of the video, the woman narrator concludes, "If you are human, and want to share the truth, please, share this video." Over the past week, Venezuelan protesters have been fighting against corruption in the government, high inflation, and a high murder rate.

Posted by Laurel Conrad on February 09, 2014 23 Comments

When journalists descended on Sochi last week, many took to Twitter to express their dismay at the state of their hotel rooms. While their conditions are hardly ideal- yellow water, bees in the honey, and more- they are certainly providing entertainment for audiences back home.

One Twitter account, @SochiProblems, has become particularly viral- even outnumbering the official Sochi Twitter account by more than 100,000 followers. Here are six of the most horrifying #SochiProblems that make me feel especially thankful that I am in the US, where there is clear water, working doors, and toilets that flush the paper. Side note: while many Sochi fakes have come out, we believe these (unfortunately) to be real.

1. Managing editor - sports for Yahoo! Canada, Steve McAllister, was locked inside his room:

2. Olympic bobsledder Johnny Quinn seems to know exactly how to handle that sort of situation:

Posted by Laurel Conrad on December 25, 2013 7 Comments

This Christmas, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell offers his own spin on the "Night Before Christmas" classic. Set to Nutcracker music, McConnell makes jabs in the reinvented tale at both President Obama and democrat opponent Alison Lundergan Grimes. Check it out for yourself: “Twas the night before Christmas, four years...

Posted by Laurel Conrad on November 28, 2013 10 Comments
After a long bus ride from Cornell back to Virginia yesterday, I get the rare chance today to escape the campus lefties and spend some quality time with my family. And while it's easy to fixate on scary things like the job market I'm about to enter after graduation, today in particular, I reflect on what a conservative college student has to be grateful for.

1) The Republicans control the house

Which is at least something. US_House_of_Representatives_Logo

2) Obamacare is self-imploding

Want to hear a funny joke? Healthcare.gov.

Posted by Laurel Conrad on November 28, 2013 14 Comments
Democrats have prepared a guide to confronting Republican relatives at Thanksgiving: https://twitter.com/TheDemocrats/status/405706375096827904 For those Democrats who are too dumb to remember the talking points, they even have a cheat sheet (h/t Noah Rothman): https://twitter.com/dccc/statuses/405770354314190848 And what a fantastic idea; nothing says, "this would make for interesting dinner conversation" quite like debating Obamacare.  After all, over the past month, signing up for Obamacare has really put people in the holiday spirit. Democrats are just doing what the leader of the Party wants: https://twitter.com/BarackObama/status/405765118492811264 To get the warm-fuzzies going, a month ago BarackObama.com introduced the idea of "it's time to have the talk" in a video on its website.

Posted by Laurel Conrad on November 17, 2013 14 Comments
In an ironic twist, Bill Clinton is now distancing himself from Obamacare. In an interview earlier this month, Bill Clinton told online magazine Ozy:
I personally believe, even if it takes a change to the law, the president should honor the commitment the federal government made to those people and let them keep what they got.
However, this is a far cry from Hillary Clinton's previous support of Obamacare.  As Professor Jacobson pointed out on Wednesday, Hillary was more pro-mandate than Obama. Now, likely in looking forward to the 2016 election, the Clintons have suddenly changed their tune. But with an established track record of supporting Obamacare, will Hillary be able to successfully distance herself from the policy's unpopularity? Here are just five examples of Hillary's support for the Obamacare:

1.  Hillary was "very pleased" by Supreme Court decision

Hillary Clinton's initially reacted to the Supreme Court's ruling on Obamacare by saying:
I am very pleased- that's how I hoped it would turn out. I think it's a great moment just to think about what this will mean for the millions and millions of Americans who have already benefitted from the Affordable Care Act, and so many more will continue to do so. There will be a lot of work to do to get it implemented and understand what the opinion says, but obviously I was quite pleased to hear the results.

Posted by Laurel Conrad on November 10, 2013 9 Comments
In October, Brown University protesters prevented New York City Police Chief Ray Kelly from speaking. During Kelly's talk, titled “Proactive Policing in America’s Biggest City,” protesters loudly chanted slogans and read prepared text, drowning out Kelly. A university administrator tried to reason with the protesters, but to no avail. As a result, after a failed half-hour attempt at regaining control of the room, the lecture was cancelled. As covered extensively at Legal Insurrection, the protesters have received support from several professors, two of whom also are active in the anti-Israel movement. Leftist and anti-Israel shout downs are just about the only shout downs on campus these days. But don't think it's just Brown. There is a long history of liberals and anti-Israeli groups shouting down speakers with whom they disagree. Here are five examples other than Brown:

1. Congressman Tancredo at UNC

In 2009, students at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, brought Republican Congressman Tom Tancredo's talk about illegal immigration to a halt by shouting him down. When Tancredo asked ironically, "This is the free speech crowd, right?" a student responded, "not for hate speech!" The students continued to chant, "No dialogue with hate!" as Tancredo struggled to get across a single word.

Posted by Laurel Conrad on November 05, 2013 27 Comments
Last week, White House press secretary Jay Carney admitted that Obamacare would force around 15 million people -  5% of the US population - to drop their current insurance. This number doesn't seem like a big deal to him, however:
“That’s the universe we’re talking about, 5 percent of the population,” Carney described. “In some of the coverage of this issue in the last several days, you would think that you were talking about 75 percent or 80 percent or 60 percent of the American population.”
That number is close to some other estimates for the individual market, but does not include people whose employers drop coverage, multiplying that number several fold. But how many people is 15 million? Is it really such a small number, something we shouldn't care about? Let's put it in perspective, and visualize 15 million people:

1. The combined population of 13 states

Yes, you read that correctly. 15 million is approximately the number of total people living in Wyoming, Vermont,  North Dakota, Alaska, South Dakota, Delaware, Montana, Rhode Island, New Hampshire,  Maine, Hawaii, Idaho, and West Virginia combined.  And more than all of the New England states!

Posted by Laurel Conrad on October 30, 2013 12 Comments
Stephen Jimenez is the author of "The Book of Matt," a book that calls into question the deeply ingrained narrative that the murder of Matthew Shepard was an anti-gay hate crime. The extensively researched book reveals that the Shepard anti-gay hate crime narrative may be all wrong. Jimenez, who is gay himself, has been praised by prominent gay rights activists, including Andrew Sullivan.  In response to the new information, Sullivan has even called the narrative "a politically convenient myth" deployed to "raise gobs of money and pass unnecessary laws." Stephen Jimenez: Meth And The Murder Of Matthew Shepard from The Dish on Vimeo. On Monday, The New York Post's Andrea Peyser lauded Jimenez for shedding light on "an uncomfortable truth":
 Jimenez unearthed a story that few people wanted to hear. And it calls into question everything you think you know about the life and death of one of the leading icons of our age.

Posted by Laurel Conrad on October 28, 2013 8 Comments
The launch of healthcare.gov, the Obamacare website, continues to be extremely unpopular due to glitches and long wait times. According to Pew Research, only three-in-ten Americans responded favorably to its launch. The glitches are even turning-off many liberals. Some top Democrats insist on making excuses and down-playing the failures of the website as just "glitches."  Here are 5 of the website glitchers:

1. Pres. Obama

During the week following the failed launch of the Obamacare website, Obama defended the policy and went after Republican critics in his weekly address. But even liberals are not buying the president's hyper-positive rhetoric. On Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show," Stewart compares clips of Obama speaking at a press conference to the character of Gill, a desperate and unsuccessful salesman from "The Simpsons". The clips, which are from 5:02- 5:25, reveal Obama enthusiastically proclaiming things like, "the health insurance that is available to people is working just fine," "The product is good," and "I want people to be able to get this great product; and that product is working, it's really good!" (language warning)
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