Tag: Guest contributors
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Charlottesville a Pioneer of Woke Architecture
A dustup over classical architecture at the University of Virginia prefigured the controversy over Donald Trump’s architecture executive order. by Catesby Leigh When Donald Trump ordered a traditionally oriented reform of federal architectural patronage in his final days as president, its life expectancy was exceedingly short. Sure enough, his successor soon revoked the order and…
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Virginia Job Growth Trails U.S. Averages
by A. Fletcher Mangum Virginia’s employment growth has been underperforming the national economy for quite some time. As shown in Figure 1, soon after the recovery from the Great Recession began in earnest in 2011 Virginia’s year-over-year growth in total employment uncharacteristically fell behind the national economy and even briefly went negative in 2014. Then…
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Hudson, Hold My Beer
by Deborah Hommer In Hudson, Ohio, several days ago, Mayor Craig Shubert addressed the School Board. “It has come to my attention that your educators are distributing essentially what is child pornography in the classroom,” he said. “I’ve spoken to a judge this evening, she’s already confirmed that, so I’m going to give you a…
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What I Saw at My Son’s Middle-School Orientation
by Nathan Brinkman By now, most of us have probably lost count of stories about the culture wars being waged in our nation’s public schools. Whether it’s footage of school boards mired in debates over the use of “critical theory” (as seen here, here, and here)… or battles over “gender ideology” (here, here, and here)……
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Virginians Seek Help for Problem Gambling as Industry Expands
by Carolyn Hawley In the first six months of 2021, individuals requesting help for gambling-related problems made 394 phone calls to the Virginia Problem Gambling Helpline. That compares to 335 intakes in all of 2020, and 311 intakes in 2019 — meaning the Commonwealth is seeing a significant increase in call volume made by individuals…
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Virginia Has a Rising Sea Problem, Relatively
by Steve Haner and Kip Hansen When discussing sea level rise, on Virginia’s coast or anywhere else, watch the terms being used very carefully. Absolute sea level is the height of the ocean compared to the center of the Earth. Relative sea level is the height of the ocean compared to a specific point on…
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The Other Side of the “Intensifying Rain” Claim
by Steve Haner and Kip Hansen With the rainy remnants of another hurricane heading for Virginia from battered Louisiana, the stories of a coming Climate Armageddon will again ramp up. A couple of good examples of what to expect recently appeared in Virginia Mercury, the main one quoting numerous sources claiming Virginia is seeing more…
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Let Me Get This Straight…
by Paula Harkins Let me get this straight. I’ve got to show a valid ID to dine out or take a spin class… but not to vote? A growing number of Virginia businesses, restaurants, and venues are requiring proof of COVID-19 vaccination and a photo ID to enter. Richmond was the first Virginia locality to…
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VMI, Media Bias, and Lies by Omission
by Larry Houseworth Charlie Beckett of the London School of Economics addressed journalism’s turn to emotionalism in a talk given at the 2015 Science Festival in Bradford, West Yorkshire, England (“How journalism is turning emotional and what that might mean for news.”) He stated, “the value of objective journalism is the idea that journalism can…
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Complexity and Single-Party Rule in the Modern University
Bacon’s Rebellion publishes here a thought piece by University Professor Allan C. Stam, a professor of politics and public policy at the University of Virginia. Although the column describes research universities generally, Stam says that his critique applies to Virginia research universities and the University of Virginia. JAB by Allan C. Stam Large research universities…
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There’s Gold in Them Thar… Press Releases?
by Jock Yellott It seems there is a vein of quartz underground in Buckingham County sparkling with gold. The General Assembly almost prohibited mining it, but then backed off. This time. A string of historic gold mines going back to the 19th Century appear as red dots on the county geological survey map like chigger…
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Seizing and Freezing with COVID
by Paula Harkins A couple of weeks ago, I received an email from my employer requiring me to report my vaccine status. Ummmm… what?!? Let’s back up a moment. Since March 2019, I have been working from my home in Northern Virginia for a D.C. government contractor. I have limited my visits with friends, family,…
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Women, Stop Blaming Men If You Can’t Have It All
By Paula Harkins Yesterday I was invited to join an advisory panel for a Women in Leadership course hosted by a university in Washington, D.C. Excited to learn about the possibilities, I read up on the course only to find the words, “From the ongoing battle for equal rights to the breaking of barriers on…
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The Left Is Lying: CRT Is Peddling Hate in Our Schools
by Elizabeth Schultz After claiming endlessly that Critical Race Theory (CRT) does not exist, or that it is not being ‘taught’ in schools, the two largest teachers’ unions – the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers, funded with teachers’ dues, – finally admitted they support it. In fact, AFT is so committed to CRT that…
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Local Unions Are Recognized Before Workers Vote?
by F. Vincent Vernuccio Local government leaders are negotiating with union executives who have not been officially recognized by public employees they claim to represent. Counties in northern Virginia are taking steps to allow public sector collective bargaining. But they are doing it with the support of union executives – not a groundswell of voter…