Category: Uncategorized
-
Now It’s a Party: Local Elections May Be Decided in June for a While
by Joe Fitzgerald It looks like 12 percent of people voting in Harrisonburg’s Nov. 8 City Council election cast a vote for only one of the four candidates instead of the two they could have voted for. But that number needs more asterisks on it than a home run record. Single-shot votes are difficult to…
-
Alumni Free Speech Alliance to Safeguard VMI Campus Free Speech
The Cadet newspaper and The Cadet Foundation were honored, by unanimous acclimation, to become full members of the Alumni Free Speech Alliance (AFSA). By this honor, Virginia Military Institute (VMI) cadets, alumni, faculty. and staff at VMI now join a prestigious collection of alumni groups representing Ivy League and other major institutions of higher education…
-
A Christmas Guide to De-Bugging Virginia
by Kerry Dougherty This is not a sponsored post. I wish it were; I could use the loot. This is just my gift to you, a last-minute Christmas shopping tip. You’re welcome. I don’t know why more people don’t do their Christmas shopping at truck stops. These friendly joints stock loads of items you can’t…
-
Indictments For Loudoun County School Officials
by Kerry Dougherty Looks like Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares just turned up the heat on Loudoun County. When he was elected, Gov. Glenn Youngkin signed an executive order calling for an investigation into what happened in Loudoun County Public Schools, where an alleged predator in a skirt reportedly got a pass for raping one…
-
Helping Minorities Thrive in STEM
by James A. Bacon There is a shortage of doctors, scientists, engineers and other employees with STEM (science, technology, engineering, and medicine) backgrounds in the U.S. economy. One reason is that American institutions of higher education aren’t turning out enough graduates with STEM degrees. And a big reason for that is that roughly half the…
-
About that Bestiality Post…
I have received several responses from readers who were shocked by a recent post. Was I serious about contextualizing the behavior of a Hampton Roads man for videotaping an act of bestiality with his dog? The answer is NO, I was not serious! I was being totally tongue in cheek when I asked if the…
-
RVA 5X5: A Five-Part Series of Stories
by Jon Baliles STORY #1 — The Pot Overfloweth There have been a lot of stories this week about the $21 million surplus announced by Mayor Levar Stoney and what he is asking City Council to endorse and how to disburse it in a budget amendment vote scheduled for a Monday evening vote. “The growth…
-
Anti-Semitism in Virginia
by James A. Bacon Antisemitism in Virginia isn’t as severe as in some other states, but the number of incidents of harassment and vandalism has increased in recent years, according to a report by the Commission to Combat Antisemitism, “Combating Antisemitism in Virginia.” In 2021, 411 reported antisemitic incidents impacted residents of the Commonwealth, reports…
-
Back To the Patrick Henry Building
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Governor Glenn Youngkin spent late summer and the fall campaigning around the country for Republican candidates for governor. He was passing out his signature red fleece vests all over the country. His main goal was to help Republican candidates knock off Democratic incumbents, but he did appear with three incumbent Republican governors.…
-
Is there a Better Way to Manage Virginia’s State Colleges and Universities?
by James C. Sherlock My wife and I had the pleasure of dining recently with a woman pursuing a career in the financial services industry. I asked her about the leadership of her company. What was the climate in her workplace? She answered that the first thing she learned was to “color inside the lines.”…
-
SCHEV’s Study on College Completion Rates Is… Incomplete
by James A. Bacon The dirty secret of the higher-ed industry is the high rate at which students drop out of college. The six-year graduation rate for full-time, in-state students entering Virginia’s public four-year institutions in 1995 was 60%, implying a drop-out rate of 40%, according to State Council of Higher Education for Virginia (SCHEV)…
-
New VPAP Modelling Shows Why Virginia Republicans Are Losing Elections
by Shaun Kenney There’s a common theme among Virginia Republican number crunchers that Fairfax County is the snake that swallowed the bowling ball. More accurately, that no matter how well Republicans might seem to do across the Commonwealth, when 1.3 million Fairfax County residents make their voices heard, that’s a massive fraction of the nearly…