Virginia lights a path for Republican success in the midterms – MarketWatch

Youngkin focused on public safety and schoolsin particular1619 Projectandcritical race theorynarratives that the Republic was founded to perpetuate slavery andparents right to define what their children learn.

School officials sayCRT is not formally part of the curriculumbut itstenets have become deeply embedded in teacher training. In Fairfax County, just outside Washington, social studies teachers are told that it is a frame for their work.

Parents are complaining nationwideandrunning opposition slates in school board elections, and attacking CRT could prove a winning issue for Republicans in the midterms.

We should offer childrena reasonable account of the nations founding, theshortcomings of our past and progress toward greater equality, but Youngkin and others will find thecultural movement in the education establishment difficult to root out.

Still, Republicans should not genuflect to the racism and sexism peddled by radicals among progressives, feminists and Black activists. Aspects ofculture in some minority communitiesand thecancel culture impulsesof thewoke executive classneed as much fixing as white middle-class structural racism.

Youngkin promised toban critical race theory from schoolsbut also talked aboutgenerally failing schools, rising crime, the high cost of living and inflation and faltering economic growthand tax relief.

Defunding the police is morally bankruptrising murder ratesinAmerican citiesare terrorizing minority communities.

TheGeorge Floyd tragedycompels focus on better trained police officers, not handcuffing or taking them off the streets. Racial disparities in enforcement are not addressed byrefusing to enforce shoplifting lawsand other misdemeanors. Those policies just provide street academies for young criminals anddeny the elderly reasonable access to groceries, drugstores and prescription services.

College admissions without objectively applied academic standards do a disservice to childrenbright or ordinary, black or white. Requiring that college admissions and credentialing return to sound evaluations of aptitude and achievement and abandoning gender, transgender and racial quotasand whatever else progressive intellectuals can dream up to fuel the injustice industrywould force elementary and high schools to better prepare students or be deemed failures themselves.

Republicans need to address that colleges are producingtoo many ill-prepared graduatesand get behind alternatives likeapprenticeshipsthat provide shorter and less costly paths to rewarding careers.

Reckless spending in Washingtonin particular, thecorrupting$1.9 trillionAmerican Rescue Planrequires the Federal Reserve to print too much money to enable too much borrowing.

Printing-press monetary policy, as practiced by a politically compromised Federal Reserve chairman, Jerome Powell, does nothing to create new chipmaking capacity, unlock overcrowded ports, or otherwise unclog supply chains.

The stimulus package has left ahuge overhang of unearned purchasing powerthat drives up the prices foreveryday essentialslike gasoline, groceries and restaurant meals, as doBiden administration policies that curb oil and gas productionand drive upagricultural fertilizer and transportation costs.

No-work-requiredchild tax creditchecks,bigger food stampsandhealth insurance subsidiesmake America the first civilization with a leisure class at the bottom and chronically short of workers.

Republicans should affirm thatthe transition to a carbon-free economy at midcentury requires adequate sources of fossil fuels todayand for all Americans to pitch in and work.

The progressive wing of the Democratic Party is defining the agenda in Washington and casts a negative narrative about America. Whites are endemic racists, markets and society are rigged, and American power in the world is a negative force.

Thehorrific conditions that will beset Afghanistan this winteris a stain on the souls ofPresident Joe Bidenand theprogressive foreign policy establishmenttheyknew what would happenandwithdrew American forces anyway.

The world is a nasty place. Open borders will only overwhelm and impoverish Americans who must compete for jobs and educational resources with a mass migration of unskilled workers that flood labor markets.

At every opportunity Republicans should pound Democrats for theirirresponsibledefenseandopen-borderpolicies. Those self-serving progressive peddlers of national doubt, guilt, weakness and appeasement deprive the world of some shield against evil and Americans of the security and opportunities for the decent lives they deserve.

Peter Morici is an economist and emeritus business professor at the University of Maryland, and a national columnist.

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Virginia lights a path for Republican success in the midterms - MarketWatch