Month: December 2023
Chris Christie Is Right, Trump’s Trade War Accomplished Nothing
“Trump’s presidency overturned decades of a generally pro-trade Republican consensus and ushered in an era of assuming that trade is bad for American workers and consumers. He hiked tariffs on steel, aluminum, solar panels, washing machines, and a wide range of Chinese goods. For Trump and his allies, those higher tariffs—which were directly paid by American importers and consumers—were meant to reconfigure the trading relationship between America and China.
But Christie is exactly right. It failed.
The one material thing Trump’s trade war accomplished was a so-called “phase one” trade deal with China, which he signed with Chinese President Xi Jinping to much fanfare in December 2019. That deal included a promise that China would buy $200 million more American exports annually. Those increased purchases were supposed to be spread across multiple sectors of the American export economy, something Trump promised would provide much-needed relief to farmers, manufacturers, and other businesses harmed by the tariffs he’d imposed since taking office.
China didn’t do that. According to an analysis by the Peterson Institute for International Economics, American exports to China didn’t even reach pre-trade-war levels in the first year that “deal” was in place. Both countries seem to have quietly dropped any pretense of following through on the agreement.”
https://reason.com/2023/12/07/chris-christie-is-right-trumps-trade-war-accomplished-nothing/
Congress Spent $7.5 Billion on E.V. Chargers. After 2 Years, None Are Built.
“”The slow rollout…primarily boils down to the difficulties state agencies and charging companies face in meeting a complex set of contracting requirements and minimum operating standards for the federally-funded chargers, according to interviews with state and EV industry officials,” the article notes.
Even with federal funds, part of the problem may also be cost, because the chargers are quite expensive to build and maintain. The types of chargers mentioned in the law are either Level 2 or Level 3, also known as Direct Current Fast Charging (DCFC). Level 2 chargers use alternating current electricity and take between four and 10 hours to charge an E.V., while DCFCs use direct current and can charge an E.V. in less than an hour.
Any long-term solution would prioritize DCFCs—no road-tripper will want to wait all day for their car to charge when fueling up a gas burner takes minutes. But DCFCs are considerably more expensive to install: A 2019 study by the Department of Energy found that while Level 2 chargers can cost up to $6,500 to install, DCFCs can cost as much as $40,000. Depending on factors like hardware costs, other estimates have put the price between $50,000 and $100,000.”
…
” Ultimately, consumer choices will dictate the future of electric vehicles; if people don’t buy them at their current price and with the current technology, then companies will either innovate or come up with something better. By merely subsidizing the current thing, the Biden administration is upholding the status quo and disincentivizing other innovations that could revolutionize the industry and make environmentally-friendly vehicles truly competitive with their gas-burning counterparts.”
https://reason.com/2023/12/08/congress-spent-7-5-billion-on-e-v-chargers-after-2-years-none-are-built/
How Some of California’s Worst Schools Got Better at Teaching Reading
“Back in 2017, the families of children in some of California’s worst-performing public schools sued the state for failing to teach low-income black and Hispanic children how to read. This led to a legal settlement in which the state’s 75 worst-performing elementary schools agreed to invest in evidence-based reading instruction—that is, in training teachers to use techniques, such as phonics, for which there is strong evidence that they work.
According to a new working paper from two Stanford researchers, the extra training helped. Students’ reading scores improved when compared to students from other poorly performing schools. The score increases were roughly as valuable as an additional 25 percent of a school year.”
https://reason.com/2023/12/11/how-some-of-californias-worst-schools-got-better-at-teaching-reading/
70% of Palestinians Support The Hamas Attack on Israel (This is a video about YOU, not Hamas)
The Entire History of Hamas
Hunter Biden’s Multiplying Charges Exemplify a Profound Threat to Trial by Jury
“contrary to the impression left by movies and TV shows, criminal cases almost never go to trial. In the United States, nearly 98 percent of criminal convictions result from guilty pleas”
https://reason.com/2023/12/13/the-multiplying-charges-against-hunter-biden-exemplify-a-profound-threat-to-trial-by-jury/
Infographic: Florida’s Public School Book Bans
“No state banned more books than Florida in the most recent school year, according to free expression nonprofit PEN America. Over 40 percent of school book bans in the U.S. happened in Florida, though a slight majority of Florida school districts had no bans at all. Justifications for the challenges vary, but scenes depicting nonconsensual sex are a common motivator.
PEN America’s definition of a “book ban” is admittedly broad, and all these books remain available for purchase from private sellers, but most challenges against books still end up hindering free speech and open debate. Combined, 1,098 different books were banned in Florida in the 2021–2022 and 2022–2023 school years.”
https://reason.com/2023/12/14/infographic-floridas-public-school-book-bans/
Anti-Woke Classroom Rules Threaten Florida’s School Choice Achievements
“DeSantis and state Republicans’ overall support for school choice makes for a sharp contrast with their one-size-fits-all approach to teaching race, gender, and sexuality.
“Parents….should be protected from schools using classroom instruction to sexualize their kids as young as 5 years old,” DeSantis said in March 2022, when he signed H.B. 1557, the Parental Rights in Education bill, into law. Colloquially known as the “Don’t Say Gay” law, it forbids any classroom instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity for students from kindergarten through third grade. That part of the law is what DeSantis and H.B. 1557 defenders want to draw the most attention to, and it probably seems eminently reasonable to many people. But another part of the law forbids any classroom instruction “in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards” in all grades—giving the state’s Board of Education wide latitude to decide what can and cannot be discussed in every classroom.
In April 2023, the board did exactly what the law’s critics feared: It banned all classroom instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity across all grades unless it was required as part of state education standards or as part of a health instruction class that parents could opt their students out of. A follow-up bill, H.B. 1069, passed in May, expanded the reach of H.B. 1557 to charter schools—schools that were explicitly created as alternatives to traditional public schools. Parents who want their children taught about these topics would need to turn either to private schools or to homeschooling.
Florida’s education standards did call for classroom instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in high school psychology classes, where they’re clearly relevant topics. But in July, the state’s Department of Education removed those standards, seemingly forbidding high school psychology teachers from teaching the subjects. In August, the College Board, the nonprofit that helps coordinate programs and test students for Advanced Placement (A.P.) classes, warned that Florida students might not get college credit for A.P. psychology classes if these subjects were removed from the state’s curriculum, noting that these topics had been part of the class for 30 years.
Immediately after that warning was issued, Florida Education Commissioner Manny Díaz Jr. sent a letter to the College Board assuring that the class “can be taught in its entirety in a manner that is age and developmentally appropriate and the course remains listed in our course catalog.” This seems to have satisfied the College Board. “We hope that Florida teachers are able to teach the full course, including content on gender and sexual orientation, without fear of punishment in the upcoming school year,” a spokesperson says.
The state’s Department of Education has put out guidance to school districts that the law doesn’t require schools to remove library books. But H.B. 1069 creates a legal framework for parents to demand books be removed from schools that mandates schools comply first and then investigate the objection. In October, the Florida Freedom to Read Project calculated there had been at least 4,000 unique attempts in the state to remove books from state schools since October 2021.
These dynamics, while being presented by politicians and conservative proponents as supporting “parents’ rights” to decide how their children are educated, in reality give a small group of people wide authority to attempt to censor educational materials regardless of the desires of local parents and students.
“School choice is a way to sidestep the politics of the classroom altogether,” Reason Foundation’s Christian Barnard notes. But Florida reminds us that even in a strong school choice system, there’s still a risk of politicians pushing their ideas into the classroom.”
https://reason.com/2023/12/14/the-challenges-of-choice-in-florida-classrooms/
A $2M missile vs. a $2,000 drone: Pentagon worried over cost of Houthi attacks
“As American warships rack up kills against Houthi drones and missiles in the Red Sea, Pentagon officials are increasingly alarmed not just at the threat to U.S. naval forces and international shipping — but at the growing cost of keeping them safe.
U.S. Navy destroyers have shot down 38 drones and multiple missiles in the Red Sea over the past two months, according to a Defense Department official, as the Iran-backed militants have stepped up attacks on commercial vessels moving energy and oil through the world’s most vital shipping lanes. On Saturday alone, the destroyer USS Carney intercepted 14 one-way attack drones.
Houthi leaders have said the attacks are a show of support for the Palestinians, and that they won’t stop until Israel halts its operations in Gaza. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Monday announced a new international maritime coalition to safeguard shipping and counter the attacks.
The cost of using expensive naval missiles — which can run up to $2.1 million a shot — to destroy unsophisticated Houthi drones — estimated at a few thousand dollars each — is a growing concern”
https://www.yahoo.com/news/2m-missile-vs-2-000-190000271.html