Historian: The New Deal, Upside-Down
“For half a century,” Democrats’ “advantage as the party that ‘cares about people like me’” has been a mainstay of “political polling,” observes the Washington Examiner’s Michael Barone. But now Dems beat Republicans on the question “by a statistically insignificant 41% to 39%.” Why? “Affluent college graduates” have “become the visible driving force in the Democratic Party, as witnessed by its emphasis on college loan debt forgiveness and net-zero green policies raising the prices of gasoline and appliances.” So “modest-income voters” expect Dems “to push policies that, while providing psychic income for affluent college graduates, will cost them more money for gas and food or force them to buy electric cars that conk out, washers that don’t wash, dryers that don’t dry, and heat pumps that don’t heat. New Deal politics has been turned upside down.”
COVID journal: School Closures’ Irreversible Damage
“Missing a year of school leads to losing over two years of wages. That is one startling conclusion from my new research looking at the long-term impact of school closures,” reports Paul Winfree at RealClearPolitics. COVID closures not only “hurt many students’ academic performance” but will “cause long-lasting economic damage.” And there’s been a “rise in chronic absenteeism since the pandemic,” with “schools that closed for longer during the pandemic” seeing higher rates: “In other words, closing schools due to the virus leads to kids continuing to miss school. And the damage from missing school is potentially irreversible.” This all shows “the importance of keeping schools open this fall, even as COVID cases rise.”
Neocon: End Hamas’ Control of Gaza
Hamas’ horrific attack “is clearly calculated to provoke a devastating Israeli response,” so that “large numbers of Palestinian casualties” will “derail a peace deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia,” notes The New York Times’ Bret Stephens. Yet just as the 1973 Yom Kippur War “led to the 1978 Camp David accords between Israel and Egypt,” so can this war “lead to a similar outcome among Jerusalem, Riyadh and Washington, provided all sides adopt the same watchword: Liberate Gaza.” That means ousting Hamas and turning “Gaza into a zone of shared interests,” having “the Palestinian Authority resume civil control over the strip, with security furnished by Arab states and economic aid from the gulf states, Washington and” the European Union, to “strengthen secular forces in Palestinian politics and free Gazans from extremist tyranny” and economic isolation.
Russia watch: Putin Looking Worried
“Evidence that Russian President Vladimir Putin is in trouble grows,” cheers Diane Francis at The Hill. “It’s hard to believe” the dictator “is interested in probing public opinion,” but a state-run polling firm “is doing just that in an unusually candid way,” asking Russians if “a Putin resignation would ‘improve, worsen or not change’” things, whether someone should replace him “and if so, who exactly?” Ex-Putin-speechwriter Abbas Gallyamov thinks it’s a “gambit” with one of three aims: create a “fake and early groundswell” for him to stay, find a successor or chop “the head of someone who is close to him in popularity.” Francis says, “Whatever the motivation, the survey indicates an insecure Putin who knows that his future is dependent upon the outcome of a war that’s going badly.”
Education beat: Baltimore Truancy Makes Sense
“For generations, American politicians and experts have lamented the dropout crisis,” but for many Baltimore schoolchildren, quips Sean Kennedy at City Journal, “leaving school might be their best option — or at least, it wouldn’t hurt.” The city’s schools are ranked some “of the worst” for academic achievement. Last year’s test results showed “only 10 percent of fourth-graders and 15 percent of eight-graders” proficient in reading. State tests show that “as students advance through Baltimore schools, they appear to do progressively worse in math,” with only 3% deemed proficient by eighth grade. The ugly bottom line: “Things have gotten so bad that Baltimore kids might be better off watching Sesame Street reruns than venturing into Charm City’s failing schools.”
— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board
