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Passage of Behemoth ‘Infrastructure' Bill Paves the Way for Left’s Radical Reconciliation Plan – Make no mistake, final passage of this proposal is a necessary first step for approval of Democrats’ radical $3.5 trillion-behemoth budget reconciliation package waiting on deck. Republican support for the ‘infrastructure’ deal will enable the biggest tax-and-spend legislation in history. The ‘infrastructure’ plan barely spends any funds on actual infrastructure. It embeds left-wing ideology in the Department of Transportation. It breaks from the bipartisan understanding that infrastructure costs should be covered by the people who use it. Worse, this deal will add hundreds of billions of dollars to the national debt, which is already $220,000 per household. The $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation monstrosity that will follow infrastructure will likely include amnesty for illegal immigrants, a massive expansion of the welfare state, job-killing tax hikes, and a Green New Deal 2.0. It will bring the 2021 spending spree to a whopping $6.5 trillion. That amounts to over $50,000 for every household in the country and is more than the cost of World War II and Obamacare combined after adjusting for inflation. These radical spending plans will only push inflation higher and mock the concerns Americans have about out-of-control spending. Heritage expert: David Ditch

Consequential Decisions on Reconciliation – The budget reconciliation process is meant to provide a fast-track process to amend spending and revenues to align with Congress’s budget plans. Because reconciliation is so powerful, Congress has curbed the use of reconciliation for policies that do not make direct changes to spending or revenue. If a “reconciliation bill” includes significant extraneous provisions, the Senate should not treat it as a reconciliation bill. By potentially including non-budgetary policies (such as increasing the minimum wage, etc.) in a reconciliation bill, Congress could overrule decades of precedent and undermine the rule of law. Heritage expert: David Ditch

American Medical Association, Descending Into Wokeness, Calls for Eliminating Sex on Birth Certificates – Science, medicine, business, good governance, and everything else must be put on the sidelines for the cause, the radical activists say. Those who disagree will be treated with suspicion and contempt, or simply will be canceled. These trends have been well covered in media and academia, particularly the social sciences. But now we are seeing more and more corporate wokeness, and even the hard sciences are falling under the sway of left-wing ideology. The managerial class in government agencies, corporate boardrooms, and professional organizations have flipped on a switch, transforming themselves into social justice warriors. The cause and the revolution always will come first, no matter the science, no matter the truth. Heritage expert: Jarrett Stepman

Rashida Tlaib seen dancing at wedding without mask after slamming Rand Paul – This tool is not about playing a political game of “Gotcha!” It is about protecting and restoring confidence in our governing institutions — a confidence that has been especially shredded by many leaders’ response to the coronavirus pandemic. It’s not too much ask that these officials display the most basic sense of integrity. And it is only appropriate that we call them out when they stubbornly refuse to do so. Millions of Americans have heard the phrase “we’re all in this together” for months from corporate advertisers, friends on social media and, of course, government officials. If the behavior of our elected leaders is any indication, however, it would seem that many of them have chosen to live by another phrase: “YOU’RE all in this together.” Heritage expert: Joel Griffith

Will the Supreme Court overturn Roe v. Wade? – The United States is out of step with 75 percent of other nations prohibiting most abortions after 12 weeks. While some polls show that many Americans oppose abandoning Roe v. Wade, others show that more Americans believe that abortion should be significantly restricted after the first trimester, suggesting that Americans misunderstand the breadth of the Supreme Court’s decision in that case. Additionally, most Americans say that abortion should not be permitted in certain circumstances, such as sex selection or a Down syndrome diagnosis. In other words, most Americans don’t support the radically permissive abortion scheme that Roe and its progeny permit. The Supreme Court’s abortion jurisprudence has distorted our Constitution, done nothing to settle the abortion debate in our country, and poisoned our laws, courts, and culture. The courts have articulated vague and unworkable standards that do not account for advances in science, public sentiment, and the status and independence of women. Mississippi’s arguments are compelling. The Supreme Court should avail itself of this opportunity to make a long-overdue course correction on abortion. Heritage experts: Sarah Perry and Melanie Israel

Judge Defends Equal Justice Against Tide of Critical Race Theory, Disparate Impact – The problem for the plaintiff was that there was no evidence that Port Freeport had any intent to discriminate. East End is next to the port and has to be acquired if the port is to expand. It’s simple geography. To get around that problem, the plaintiff employed a legal theory called “disparate impact.” Under that theory, a plaintiff can try to prove that a decision is racially motivated if it has a bigger effect on one race than another and can’t be explained on nonracial grounds. If that sounds familiar, it’s because you’ve probably seen a similar claim made by race essentialists, like Ibram X. Kendi, who has written that “[a] racist policy is any measure that produces or sustains racial inequity between racial groups.” Disparate impact theory, Ho noted, “forces [judges] to look at race—to check for racial imbalance and then decide what steps must be taken to advance some people at the expense of others based on their race.” The Constitution and Title VI require judges to be race-neutral. Ho explained that only Congress has the power to change the civil rights laws to embrace disparate impact theory. But if judges embrace disparate impact claims, he said, they not only ignore the law, but they cease to be race-neutral. Heritage expert: GianCarlo Canaparo

The Good, the Questionable, and the (Potentially) Ugly Health Care Policies in the Biden Competition Executive Order – President Biden’s executive order promoting competition is counterproductive. It relies too heavily on excessive regulation while limiting freedom. The order does contain some positive health care provisions: hospital price transparency, hearing aids without prescription, and better access to generic drugs. Just like Obamacare, however, the Biden order gives HHS too much power through regulation of health care and Americans’ health-related decision-making. Heritage expert: Doug Badger

UM's administrative bloat is fueled by diversity, inclusion Jay P. Greene and James D. Paul – The surplus of DEI staff for Michigan relative to Mississippi State did not translate into more positive climate responses, which should be alarming for boards of higher education and university trustees across the country. Where is the evidence that DEI resources are being deployed effectively? Are large DEI staff expenditures worthy of taxpayer subsidies? And do DEI programs offer a true diversity of viewpoints? Universities — especially those that are publicly funded — should be welcoming to all students. But we suspect that reducing administrative bloat and reducing costs would do more to promote college access than the best efforts of any well-meaning diversity administrator. Heritage expert: Jay Greene

By Relocating ‘Racist’ Rock, University Fancies Itself a Social Justice Warrior – It’s not about truth, it’s about narratives. That’s what matters most. For now, the Lincoln statue remains at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. But how long will that last when activists make relentless demands to remove “racist” rocks and the school buckles to those demands? In our current debates about statues and history, it’s important to note that the ruling elites of Western societies largely conform to the whims of those who get upset about a newspaper clipping from 1925 and think that rolling a boulder from one end of a college campus to another is fighting oppression. But Lincoln—who literally died setting millions free—is questionable, and maybe shouldn’t be honored because he didn’t do enough for black lives. This whole incident at the University of Wisconsin-Madison is a distillation of the diversity, equity, and inclusion ethos in its terminal stage. It’s sending us into a dark age of un-thought, shallow zealotry, and intellectual bankruptcy. Heritage expert: Jarrett Stepman

Why isn't the government telling us about Chinese nuclear weapons? – Reducing the role of nuclear weapons and avoiding arms races might be a viable strategy if your potential adversaries share those goals. But the facts suggest otherwise. Vladimir Putin recently boasted his nuclear modernization initiative was approximately 86% complete. Moreover, Moscow has started six new, destabilizing strategic weapons programs. As for China, the Trump administration’s 2020 China Military Power report predicted Beijing intended to double its nuclear arsenal within the decade. Last month’s discovery of the new missile fields now leads some analysts to postulate China may in fact quadruple its nuclear holdings. It looks like Putin and Xi didn’t get the memo about reducing the role of nuclear weapons. Heritage expert: Tom Spoehr