How'd You Like Your History Thesis to Undergo a Supreme Court Grilling?

As discussions keep going strong about last week's Elena Kagan '81 nomination, the White House has announced that it will publish Kagan's undergraduate thesis from Princeton's Department of History.  This announcement was made after the right-wing site RedState had illegally posted her "socialist thesis" last week; apparently, Kagan (and not 'ole Nassau) holds the copyright for her undergraduate work.  Her graduate thesis from Oxford will also be released.  A White House official explained:

In addition to requesting an expedited release of the documents from the Clinton White House detailed in [White House counsel Bob] Bauer’s letter, the White House will make available copies of Kagan’s theses from Princeton and Oxford. These documents were not specifically requested by the Judiciary Committee in the questionnaire, but demonstrating our commitment to transparency, they will be made available to the committee and the public regardless.

The thesis can now be accessed online: read away, if you have a few days to spare (as we all clearly do during exam week. Duh.). Or check out the Prince's Cliff Notes version from earlier in the month if you're a tad short on time. Read Politico's full story on the theses releases here. For a more sympathetic take on how college kids are supposed to write theses that are naive and inflammatory (and not meant to be read out of context), head over to Slate, where Christopher Beam wrote a great piece yesterday about how "college is all about screwing up." Sweet music to our ears, Chris...