1) North Carolina Governor Declares State of Emergency to Stop School Choice
Democratic Governor Roy Cooper came unhinged yesterday declaring that “public education in North Carolina is facing a state of emergency” and he called the education choice initiative that has passed the legislature “an atomic bomb on public education.”
The Governor warned that wider access to school choice “spells disaster for the schools.” Never mind that many of the kids can’t spell "disaster".
The lead sponsor of the school choice bill, Democrat-turned-Republican Tricia Cotham, has a great response:
The Committee to Unleash Prosperity is currently running radio ads supporting the expansion of school choice in North Carolina – but it looks very likely it will have to be done by overriding the governor's veto.
The housing market has been sizzling hot for the past five years and is a major factor propping up the economy. Is that wild rise screeching to a halt? A new Gallup poll finds Americans have turned more bearish on the housing market than ever in 40 years.
“Opinions of the housing market are bleak and generally similar among all major subgroups, including by region, urbanicity, homeownership status, income, education and party identification,” says Jeff Jones, an editor at Gallup.
Meanwhile, higher mortgage interest rates and falling real incomes are creating a housing affordability squeeze:
The index attempts to quantify the ratio between the median monthly income and the median monthly mortgage payment. When the index is at 100, affordability is at an equilibrium level. When it falls below 100, affordability declines...well below a level deemed healthy.
Massachusetts has long been held up by liberals as a blue state that works. It’s a liberal state for sure - nicknamed “Taxachusetts” – but for a long time, it operated with a fairly modest flat rate income tax.
But now the Boston Globe is asking “Is Massachusetts losing its economic mojo?” after decades of being a leader in medicine, biotech, and university research.
Globe columnist Larry Edelman notes that last year’s passage of a “millionaires tax” – a 4 percentage point surcharge on incomes over $1 million – may be chasing wealthy residents out. (We warned of this, of course.) Adding to the exodus is the most punitive estate tax in the country, kicking in at a threshold of $1 million, compared to the federal government’s $13 million.
A new study by the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation shows the state’s labor force has declined by 100,000 workers since 2019. Massachusetts was one of the birthplaces of the tech movement with MIT located in Boston, but even tech jobs are leaving for low-tax states like Texas and Florida. Massachusetts lost 2,200 jobs in computer systems design in the last three years, while Texas added 77,000 jobs and Florida gained 31,000.
4) Hooray: Brittney Griner Stands Respectfully for America's National Anthem
Women’s basketball star Brittney Griner made headlines in the summer of 2020 by asking the WNBA to stop playing the national anthem before games. She said it didn’t represent black Americans.
Now, after spending time in a Russian prison, she says she realizes her mistaken ways and is honoring the anthem and our flag.
We salute Ms. Griner’s refound patriotism. These days it takes a lot of courage and humility to admit the errors of your ways and to eschew woke anti-Americanism. Let’s hope this is the start of a trend.
This chart from the WSJ shows customers shifted sharply from Bud Light to its competitors following the issuance of an infamous celebratory "day 365 of girlhood" can to Dylan Mulvaney. Even worse was Anheuser-Busch’s marketing director characterizing its own customers as immature “frat boys.”
Since the woke ad campaign began the company has lost roughly $100 million in sales.
