Obama’s Misguided War Against School Choice

One of President Barack Obama’s conceits is that he is a pragmatist who seeks policies that work rather than pursuing a partisan agenda. On school choice, he doesn’t live up to the advertisement. His administration has been relentless in its ideological hostility to the idea, and seized on every possible pretext to express that hostility.

The White House considers any government funding for private or parochial education, even indirect funding, to be a betrayal of the public schools. The D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program -- which provides federally funded vouchers for poor kids in Washington to attend private schools -- seems to have had some positive results, including higher high-school graduation rates for participants. Yet the Obama administration, not generally known for its tightfistedness, has repeatedly tried to end funding for it.

This position was terribly misguided, but it was at least open and transparent. Twice this year, the White House has gone after local school-choice programs -- which involve no federal funding -- in a more underhanded way.

In April, the Justice Department announced that private schools that participate in a choice program in Milwaukee will be subject to new regulations under the Americans with Disabilities Act. They will be treated as though they were government contractors. Never mind that the schools have contracts with parents, not with the government that aids the parents. Never mind, either, that in the program’s 22 years of operation no complaint about the treatment of a disabled student has ever been filed. A five-year study of the program found that being disabled had no bearing on a student’s likelihood of getting into a participating school.

The decision will nonetheless raise costs for the private schools. It will also make them think twice about participating, both because they want to avoid those costs and because they don’t want to compromise their independence.

Via: Bloomberg

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A Dakota Boom Town, but Not the Kind You'd Expect

Everyone has heard stories about the shale-oil boom towns that are transforming North Dakota, for better and worse. "Man camps" for oil-field workers, jobs for anyone who can work a rig or drive a truck, social distortionslike those of the Klondike. You know the stories, and the town of Williston ND (where we've not yet visited, but plan to), with the orange dot in the upper left-hand corner of the map above, is a frequent dateline for them.

Have you ever stopped to wonder why you don't hear these stories about South Dakota? The map at the top offers a clue. It shows "shale plays," or active and prospective shale-gas mining areas, as defined by the U.S. Department of Energy. A little tongue of the Gammon Play laps into South Dakota, versus the huge Bakken Play that is spread over North Dakota. 

The map  shows a larger view of shale basins, with potentially exploitable reserves, in the plains states. South Dakota includes almost none of the Williston Basin (pink) to the north, the Powder River Basin (tan) to the west, or the Denver Basin (a poppyish color) to the south.

So how, then, can South Dakota be any kind of boom state on a par with North Dakota? Especially the state's most populous city, Sioux Falls, which is in the far southeastern corner of the state (green pin) and much closer to Iowa and Minnesota than to any point in North Dakota?

What my wife and I have seen in Sioux Falls this summer, and will try to itemize, is a combination of ingredients that have together produced a genuine economic strength quite different from a shale-oil boom and potentially more instructive for the country as a whole. The unemployment rate in greater Sioux Falls now is around 3.5% -- about the average for the state as a whole. (That give South Dakota overall the second-lowest unemployment rate in the country. For number one, you could go to the BLS site -- or just take a wild guess, based on the maps above.) Our Marketplace partners kicked off a series of coverage of the Sioux Falls economy last week. 

Via: The Atlantic

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DCCC Chief: Syria Not Big Issue in 2014 Elections

The House Democratic campaign chief told reporters Tuesday that while Capitol Hill is consumed with debate on Syria, the issue will not affect the 2014 midterms.

“2014 is not going to be a referendum on Syria,” said Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Steve Israel at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast. Instead, he added, the 2014 midterms will be about “solutions,” helping the middle class, extremism and partisanship.

Israel declined to detail the Syria issue in his role as DCCC chairman, reiterating the committee does not endorse policy positions. Instead, he argued that many House Republicans who oppose authorization for intervention in Syria would support the same policy if Mitt Romney were president and proposed it instead of President Barack Obama.

“The level of hypocrisy is what amazes me,” he said.

Israel stated that his personal position — not that of the DCCC — is generally supportive of military intervention, but he is hopeful about reports that the Russian government proposed taking control of Syria’s chemical weapons.

“Now we have to see if that path is credible,” he said.

As for his own incumbents, he stressed that his vulnerable House Democrats must be “communicating” with their constituents on Syria. Israel added that Democrats should not be taking into consideration whether their vote “helps or hurts the president.”

Via: Roll Call

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Day Two Highlights from the World Summit on Counter Terrorism

Some interesting and provocative discussions during Day 2 of the World Summit on Counter Terrorism in Herzliya, Israel (my Day 1 overview is here). Some of the highlights from the second day of proceedings:

A report released at the conference announced an estimate that the Assad regime in Syria has 1,000 tons of chemical weapons.

Syracuse professor William Banks offered his assessment, in line with one offered the previous day, that while the Syrian regime may have violated international law with the use of chemical weapons (even though they are not a signatory to the chemical weapons convention), the remedies do not include the use of force, much as President Obama is proposing.

Qanta Ahmed warned against the virulence of Islamist ideology, claiming it was more dangerous than nuclear weapons, and stressed the importance of moderate Muslims unmasking the “wolves in sheeps’ clothing,” i.e., so-called “moderate” Islamists.

Undoubtedly the most lively discussion of the day involved Canadian columnist and author Tarek Fatah. During his speech, which you can see in the clip below, he notes that missing from much of the debate over the use of chemical weapons by Syria, and even Iran’s budding nuclear program, is that Pakistan already possesses 100+ nuclear weapons.

Via: PJ Media

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Dem Senator to MSNBC: ‘We Aren’t Trusting Assad, We’re Trusting the Russians’

Appearing on MSNBC with Andrea Mitchell, Sens. Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND) and Joe Manchin(D-WV) explained their opposition to PresidentBarack Obama’s push for intervention in the Syrian civil war. They expressed their hope that the so-called Russian solution may avert a crisis. When pressed about the lack of enforceability or accountability of the Russian plan, Heitkamp said that the U.S. was not trusting Syrian PresidentBashar al-Assad to make good on his word. “We’re trusting the Russians,” she explained. 

“Why would you trust Assad,” Mitchell asked Heitkamp. “Assad has, until this initiative, denied there was an attack, denied he was part of it, denied he has chemical weapons. Why on earth would we trust this man to tell us he’s turned them all over to international monitoring and that he is signing a treaty that he’s never redesigned?”

“We’re not trusting Assad,” Heitkamp explained. “We’re trusting the Russians to come to the table…”

“Whoa,” Mitchell interjected. “You’re trusting the Russians?”

RELATED: CNN’s Arwa Damon: Russian Solution to Syria Crisis ‘Not Realistic’ or ‘Executable’

“We’re trusting Russia’s intent at this point to actually deliver the right set of circumstances,” Heitkamp clarified.

Manchin stepped in and clarified that the U.S. does not have a trusting relationship with Moscow, but the international community should back up the Russian proposal.

Heitkamp further explained that she does not believe “we should trust what anyone says,” but that “we should trust what they do.”

Watch the clip below via MSNBC:

Via: Mediaite.Com

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Rousing workers to seek higher wages

The union organizer found Naquasia LeGrand on her lunch break, sipping coffee and wearing a hat emblazoned with the logo of her employer, KFC.

She was about to return to boxing coleslaw and chicken tenders when he introduced himself and asked how she was doing, how she was surviving on $7.25 an hour, the minimum wage. The organizer, Ben Zucker, wanted to know whether she might want to join a group of workers trying to get higher pay.

It wasn't something she'd thought much about. The job was a detour between high school and that computer degree she was hoping to get someday. A way to help support her aunt, grandmother and cousin, who lived with her in a cramped apartment in one of the most expensive cities in the country.

She didn't think of herself as someone who needed to join a union or someone who would be a fast-food worker for long.

Still, the two exchanged numbers in front of the restaurant, across the street from tire shops, a bodega and a Latino church. Without knowing it, LeGrand had begun a process that would change her from an apolitical fast-food worker to one of the most vocal members of a growing labor movement.

LeGrand, 22, is the kind of convert unions desperately need as they try to reverse a decades-long decline in membership. The new front in that effort is fast-food restaurants, and union leaders, although they are optimistic, know that unionizing these workers won't happen overnight.

Via: LA Times

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Making Sense of Syria

This is what I think we’re seeing:

The president has backed away from a military strike in Syria. But he can’t acknowledge this or act as if it is true. He is acting and talking as if he’s coolly, analytically, even warily contemplating the Russian proposal and the Syrian response. The proposal, he must know, is absurd. Bashar Assad isn’t going to give up all his hidden weapons in wartime, in the middle of a conflict so bitter and severe that his forces this morning reportedly bombed parts of Damascus, the city in which he lives. In such conditions his weapons could not be fully accounted for, packed up, transported or relinquished, even if he wanted to. But it will take time—weeks, months—for the absurdity to become obvious. And it is time the president wants. Because with time, with a series of statements, negotiations, ultimatums, promises and proposals, the Syria crisis can pass. It can dissipate into the air, like gas.

The president will keep the possibility of force on the table, but really he’s lunging for a lifeline he was lucky to be thrown.

Why is he backing off? Because he knows he doesn’t have the American people and isn’t going to get them. The polls, embarrassingly, show the more people hear the less they support it. The president’s problem with his own base was probably startling to him, and sobering. He knows he was going to lose Congress, not only the House but very possibly—likely, I’d say—the Senate. The momentum was all against him. And he never solved—it was not solvable—his own Goldilocks problem: A strike too small is an embarrassment, a strike too big could topple the Assad regime and leave Obama responsible for a complete and cutthroat civil war involving terrorists, foreign operatives, nihilists, jihadists, underemployed young men, and some really nice, smart people. Obama didn’t want to own that, or the fires that could engulf the region once Syria went up.

His plan was never good. The choices were never good. In any case he was going to lose either in terms of domestic prestige, the foreign result or both. Likely both.

Via: NYT

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Tea partiers rally against GOP’s ‘phony votes’ to defund Obamacare

WASHINGTON — Hundreds of sign-waving tea partiers rallied on the lawn of the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday to demand that Republicans in Congress take authentic steps to defund President Obama’s health-care law and not just keep going through the motions to appease the conservative base.

“Over the next few days, we’re going to see all sorts of games, showmanship, shenanigans and other things that other people in the ruling elite will try to do to pull the wool over our eyes,” said Jenny Beth Martin, the national coordinator of Tea Party Patriots.

Via: Daily Caller

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Ted Cruz Opposes Eric Cantor and Pete Sessions’ “Hug It Out” Plan to Fund Obamacare

Multiple people confirm to me that just a few hours ago Pete Sessions blew up about Ted Cruz and made sure everyone in the room knew he held Cruz in absolute contempt.

It might be because Ted Cruz just called BS on Eric Cantor and Pete Sessions trying to screw conservatives.

Cantor and Sessions are pursuing a plan to make it very easy for the House to vote for defunding Obamacare while ensuring Obamacare is still able to get funded. Cruz, in a press release earlier today, called on the House of Representatives to not get cute and actually defund Obamacare.

“Last night, news reports surfaced that the House of Representatives might vote to ‘defund Obamacare’ in a way that easily allows Senate Democrats to keep funding Obamacare. If House Republicans go along with this strategy, they will be complicit in the disaster that is Obamacare.

“The American people are not surprised that politicians in Washington–of both parties–are afraid to take a stand. But another symbolic vote against Obamacare is meaningless. Obamacare is the biggest job killer in America, and people are hurting.

“House Republicans should pass a continuing resolution that funds government in its entirely–except Obamacare–and that explicitly prohibits spending any federal money, mandatory or discretionary, on Obamacare. They should not use any procedural chicanery to enable Harry Reid to circumvent that vote.

“If you oppose Obamacare, don’t fund Obamacare. Our elected leaders should listen to the American people.”

You too should tell Pete Sessions and Eric Cantor to stop playing games with the lives of Americans. They need to defund Obamacare, not just pretend to.

Via: Red State

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[CARTOON] Obama’s Immigration Plan

Via: California Political Review

The Latest on the Dog and Pony CR Plan (Continuing Resolution)

Today, Majority Leader Eric Cantor announced his new dog and pony CR plan to the House Republican Conference.  They will ensure that the Senate sends a clean CR without defunding Obamacare to the president’s desk.  The catch is that the House will vote to defund Obamacare in the CR, thereby saving members from an embarrassing vote, while splitting off the defund rider when the bill heads to the Senate.  The Senate will be able to vote down the defund bill separately and then send a clean CR straight to the President.

So when will they fight Obamacare?

The next time!

Yes, they will fight on the next debt ceiling battle later this year, according to NRO’s Jonathan Strong:

“Towards the end, however, he dropped a big piece of news about the House Republican strategy heading into the next fiscal fight — over raising the debt ceiling. To increase the debt ceiling, Cantor said, Republicans will demand a one-year delay to Obamacare.”

As we’ve noted a number of times, this plan is beyond comical:

• Why in the world would anyone believe you are willing to fight on a harder battle, one which raises the false specter of a default, when you are not willing to fight over a plain government funding bill?
• The CR coincides with the implementation date of Obamacare; the debt ceiling fight will be at least a few weeks after implementation begins.
• If Democrats know that you will always blink out of fear of brinkmanship, why would they listen to you and delay Obamacare?  There is no difference between defund or delay if you lack the courage to follow through with the threat.
• Republicans already delayed the debt ceiling fight in January for the explicit purpose of dealing with the CR first.  Now they are reversing the order again.  Who is dumb enough to fall for this chicanery?

Another issue here is that leadership is trying to use the sequester cuts as the shiny object for the CR.  They are saying that the CR will reflect the $967 billion annualized discretionary spending levels set forth in the Budget Control Act along with the sequester.  There are two problems with this shiny object, aside for the fact that some random discretionary cuts are inconsequential when compared to the fight over Obamacare.

Via: Red State

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Obama Judge: Hijab Ban Violates Muslim Civil Rights

An Obama-appointed federal judge has handed the administration a major victory, ruling that a Muslim woman’s civil rights were violated by an American clothing retailer that didn’t allow her to wear a head scarf as required by her religion.

The lawsuit was filed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the federal agency that enforces the nation’s workplace discrimination laws. In 2011 the agency sued the retail giant, Abercrombie & Fitch, accusing it of religious discrimination for firing 19-year-old Umme-Hani Khan for wearing a hijab at a northern California store. The company, which focuses on hip casual wear for consumers aged 18 to 22, has a policy against head covers of any kind for its employees.

In the case of this Muslim woman it amounts to discrimination based on religion, according to the EEOC, and that violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Employers are required to accommodate the sincere religious beliefs or practices of employees, the agency says, unless doing so would impose an undue hardship on business.

This month Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers of the U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, agreed, ruling that Abercrombie & Fitch is liable for failing to accommodate the Muslim woman’s religious beliefs and may owe punitive damages. “Reasonable jurors could determine that by offering Khan one option—to remove her hijab despite her religious beliefs—Abercrombie acted with malice, reckless indifference or in the face of a perceived risk that its actions violated federal law,” the judge writes in her 27-page opinion.

Gonzalez Rogers was appointed to the federal bench by President Obama in mid-2011. Her husband, Matthew Rogers, has served in various positions in the Obama administration, including the president’s transition team and as a top advisor in the Department of Energy (DOE). In fact, Rogers served as the DOE official overseeing Obama’s scandal-plagued green loan program that’s fleeced American taxpayers out of hundreds of millions of dollars. Remember Solyndra?

Via: Judicial Watch

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