Category: Uncategorized
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The Year: 33 A.D….
In Judea, the land of the Jews, the Passover festival is over, and pilgrims to the great temple in Jerusalem are returning to their homes. For Nicolaus, advisor to the Roman governor Pontius Pilate, it has been a tumultuous week. A charismatic miracle worker from Galilee — Jesus of Nazareth — had stirred up the…
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DEI Hocus Pocus
Now you see it, now you don’t. by James A. Bacon The push is on around Virginia and the U.S. as a whole to eliminate Diversity, Equity & Inclusion in higher education. The first line of defense among DEI preservationists is to give new titles to employees, rename departments, and shuffle around boxes on the…
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The Opportunity-for-All Candidate
by James A. Bacon Pundits and politicians are enamored with the idea that Virginia will “make history” in its gubernatorial elections this fall. No matter who wins the election — Republican Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears or Democrat Abigail Spanberger — she will be the first woman to serve as Governor. The making-history observation applies to…
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Some Small Victories for Good Government
by James A. Bacon Virginians can argue all day long about the proper size and scope of state and local government. But we should be able to agree upon one thing: that whatever it does, government needs to do its job as efficiently and cost-effectively as possible. So, it’s good news to hear that the…
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Solving the Greatest Mystery in History
by James A. Bacon Easter, the holiest day of the Christian calendar, marks the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The historic underpinnings of Christian doctrine have long fascinated me, and I have spent many years of amateur study of Jesus’ life and times in an effort to achieve a greater understanding of this seminal moment in…
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Making America Great Again
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Is this what makes America great again? Before you answer, consider: Finally, can anyone identify a period in this country’s history (“again”) when such actions were considered to have made America great?
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DEI: a 30-Day Update
by James A. Bacon by James A. Bacon Monday marked the 30-day deadline for University of Virginia President Jim Ryan to report back to the Board of Visitors about what he had done to execute on the board’s directive to dismantle the university’s DEI bureaucracy and end racial preferences. Ryan did, in fact, submit a…
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The DEI Debate, So Far, Is Stupefyingly Superficial
by James A. Bacon Virginia Tech President Timothy Sands held a special meeting Friday to discuss the impact of the Trump administration’s order to shut down higher-ed Diversity, Equity & Inclusion programs across the country. Tech’s Board of Visitors voted recently to comply with the directive, and Sands said that the university would no longer…
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Fewer Students, Lower Scores, More Taxpayer Dollars
by James A. Bacon You’d think that with K-12 enrollment declining, the overall cost of educating Virginia’s children might start declining as well. The number of school-age children is sliding down a long slope (see graph above), and there is no indication that the exodus of 44,000 or so pupils during the COVID pandemic to…