As you well know Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris has selected Tim Walz to be her nominee for Vice President.
Hi there,
As you well know Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris has selected Tim Walz, the progressive governor of Minnesota, to be her nominee for Vice President.
Tim Walz is the same governor who presided over the Minneapolis riots following the death of George Floyd. His lethargic response led to millions of dollars in property damage as looters tore through Minneapolis neighborhoods.
After the death of George Floyd, law enforcement officers became pariahs by many progressives like Walz. As a result, many police officers left the profession, and fewer young people applied to become cops.
Police departments, understaffed and underfunded, pulled back from proactively policing at-risk communities.
And in the wake of the nationwide Defund the Police movement, crime increased across the country.
Unfortunately, the outrage machine moved apace, forgetting that public safety is a core responsibility of the government.
Fortunately, there are solutions to improve public safety; we can get back on track.
Intensive community policing would make North Carolina safer.
What is intensive community policing?
Community policing is a common sense approach to keeping our neighborhoods safe
It means “the strategic deployment of well-trained police officers to high-crime neighborhoods”
The point of this increased presence would be to deter crimes from even happening in the first place
Research has shown it is a proven method for reducing crime and maintaining public order
How do we implement community policing?
Step 1: We hire more police officers
Step 2: (really more 1A) we increase the pay of police officers
Higher salaries will attract, and keep, the best and most qualified officers
Step 3: Make sure NC police officers possess state-of-the-art training, direction, and support, to prevent police abuse
Finally, we deploy officers as “peacekeepers” to the communities that suffer the most from crime and disorder
How will we pay for it?
Intensive community policing requires increased investment from the government…
But if more cops equals less crime, the added cost will be offset in other areas
Reduced costs of arrests, prosecutions and incarcerations
More economic investments and opportunities
One prominent study calculated that $5 billion investment in more police officers would generate about $25 billion in benefits!
I don’t know about you, but a 500% return on investment (and a safer North Carolina) sounds like a big win for you and me
If you’d like, you can learn more about community policing and making North Carolina safer here, here and here as well.
Agriculture is North Carolina’s top industry, and serves as a critical component of our state’s economy and identity. Farmers, distributors, and thousands of other hardworking North Carolinians play a critical role in our state’s food supply.
Yet 1.6 million state residents live in “food deserts”, a geographic area where residents have limited access to affordable, nutritious, and plentiful food.
Why is this happening?
The COVID-19 pandemic was devastating in its own right.
But it also resulted in the passing of broad, and often arbitrary, executive orders and laws at all levels of the government that created a great deal of regulatory uncertainty.
The results highlighted vulnerabilities in our nation’s food supply chain, leading to disruption of delivery and skyrocketing prices.
Local farms struggled to reach markets, resulting in the euthanasia of millions of animals and unharvested crops.
What is being done about it?
The John Locke Foundation has launched a new initiative: the Sowing Resilience project.
We’re aiming to promote policy solutions to protect and enhance North Carolina’s vital agriculture industry and increase food security, protecting the seeds of freedom, in all its forms, for future generations.
You can watch the first episode of our new docuseries and learn more about the Sowing Resilience Project right here!
This year public school enrollment declined by nearly 3,600 students, falling from 1,397,273 in 2022–23 to 1,393,679 in 2023–24. Enrollment in traditional public schools has declined every year since 2016.
Where are the students going?
According to data from the Office of Non-Public Education, enrollment in home schools increased 3.2 percent in the last year, growing from 152,717 to 157,642.
The report also shows enrollment in North Carolina private schools totaled 131,230 in 2023–24, an increase of 3.5 percent over the previous year.
Since 2019, private school enrollment is up 28 percent, and there are 112 new schools.
North Carolina’s charter schools are also experiencing significant growth.
This year, charter schools had a growth rate of 4.9 percent. North Carolina now has 210 charter schools with an enrollment of more than 147,000 students.
Why does this matter?
In 2014, traditional public schools comprised about 85 percent of all K–12 enrollment.
Home schools, private schools, and charter schools accounted for only 15 percent of total K–12 enrollment.
However, in 2024, enrollment in traditional public schools comprises about 75 percent of all K–12 students, while enrollment in home schools, private schools, and charter schools totals almost 25 percent of all students.
This is a significant swing and it shows how when parents are free to choose where they send their children to school, they pick different options!
The blade at the center of this brouhaha is longer than a football field.
What happened?
On July 13, a single blade broke on a wind turbine in the Vineyard Wind offshore wind energy facility.
We have no idea why it broke.
What is the impact??
Since it broke, it’s been spreading fiberglass waste across the ocean.
This dangerous debris isn’t only affecting sea creatures but also beach life
Debris and sharp fiberglass shards mean beachgoers should not go barefoot.
The Nantucket Harbor Master had to close all southern-facing Nantucket beaches.
In just one week, they removed more than six truckloads’ worth of debris, but fiberglass waste continues to turn up even now.
Worse, it’s spreading farther. It’s now washing up in Rhode Island.
What’s the takeaway?
This should be a huge wakeup call for North Carolina policymakers. Unlike wind turbines placed off the coasts of Europe or even New England, turbines placed off the coast of North Carolina are in highly hurricane-prone waters.
There are currently two enormous offshore wind projects planned off North Carolina beaches, and Gov. Roy Cooper and the Biden/Harris administration want more.
That would mean over 870 blades, the failure of any one of which — as we’ve seen from Nantucket through Rhode Island (so far) — is capable of producing an ecological disaster.
