Tag: Carol J. Bova
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A New Outbreak of Covid-19 Hysteria
by Carol J. Bova The Covid-19 pandemic may have faded from public consciousness, but controversy over how best to fight the virus rages unabated. For the week ending, June 7, 2025, The Virginia Department of Health (VDH) reported Covid-19 was responsible for 0.3 percent of emergency room visits — compared to 0.2 percent for influenza…
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Dominion Energy Scholarships Define “Communities” by Race
By Carol J. Bova Dominion Energy is offering 60 undergraduate Equitable Education Scholarships totaling $500,000 for “students from historically underrepresented communities.” The rules exclude White students (unless they identify as Hispanic), no matter what “community” they’re from, because to be eligible, applicants must: — Self-identify as Black or African American; Hispanic or Latino; American Indian…
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Dealing with Trolls
by Carol J. Bova In March 2022, The Atlantic published an article, “Trolls Aren’t Like the Rest of Us,” by Arthur Brooks, a contributing writer at The Atlantic and the host of The Atlantic podcast “How to Build a Happy Life.” Brooks wrote: If you use the internet, the odds are about even that you’ll be mistreated there. A…
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Don’t Forget the Dismal History SOL Pass Rates
by Carol J. Bova As the battle rages over the History and Social Science (HSS) Standards of Learning criteria — the State Board of Education decided earlier this month to delay its review of Youngkin administration revisions — it is worth noting how poorly Virginia students mastered the old standards. More than one-third of Virginia…
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It’s a Memorial, Not a Racist Ideology
by Carol J. Bova Accounts from lawyers, reporters, pundits and other outsiders have severely distorted the debate over the Confederate memorial in Mathews County. To The Washington Post, the controversy is about the ”enduring power of the Civil War’s legacy.” To the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights & Urban Affairs and Wilkie, Farr &…
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SOLs: Disentangling Race, Socioeconomic Status, and English Learning
by Carol J. Bova Many politicians, activists and media commentators persist in the conviction that Virginia’s schools are systemically racist. The main evidence to support such a proposition is the reality of disparities of educational outcomes between racial/ethnic groups, like those summarized in the chart at right. If Blacks and Hispanics pass their Standard of…
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A Mature Dialogue: Mathews Board Discusses War Memorial
by Carol J. Bova In Mathews County’s November 2021 referendum, 3,782 (80.06%) voted against relocating the Confederate Memorial that has stood next to the Historic Courthouse since 1912. At the April 26, 2022 Board of Supervisors meeting, there was a motion to authorize a survey to delineate the land under the Memorial to be transferred…
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Too Bad RTD Didn’t Read “Lies, Damn Lies and Race-Obsessed Statistics”
by Carol J. Bova Almost a year ago, I wrote about a March 3, 2021 Virginia Department of Health blog post, in which VDH claimed in an article about COVID-19: In Virginia, Hispanic and Black age-specific death rates are much higher than White age-specific death rates. The age group with the largest disparity was 35-44…
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Don’t Know, or Won’t Say, How Many Omicron Hospitalizations?
by Carol J. Bova The most recent Virginia Department of Health (VDH) information on the number of COVID-19 infections in vaccinated people dates from December 25, 2021. Statewide weekly total case numbers go through January 1, 2022. The Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association (VHHA) gives total hospitalizations and ICU numbers for confirmed and pending tests…
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Dodging a Bullet
Virginia voters have swept Terry McAuliffe into the dustbin of political history, so one might reasonably ask if there is any point in re-hashing more of the GreenTech Automotive story than Bacon’s Rebellion has already detailed in a recent five-part series. The answer is yes. One part of the tale is still worth retelling —…
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Masters of Hype and Puffery
This is the fifth in a series of articles about Terry McAuliffe and GreenTech. by James A. Bacon and Carol J. Bova On July 6, 2012, GreenTech Automotive launched the rollout of the “all-American” MyCar electric vehicle at a ceremony attended by former President Bill Clinton, the governor of Mississippi, the assistant secretary of Homeland…
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Shearing the Sheep
This is the fourth in a series of posts about Terry McAuliffe and GreenTech Automotive. by James A. Bacon and Carol J. Bova The Chinese citizens who lost $500,000 each from investing in GreenTech Automotive were not happy with their setback. While they had ponied up their money as part of a scheme to get…
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Dreams from the Opium Den
This is the third article in a series about Terry McAuliffe and GreenTech. by James A. Bacon and Carol J. Bova When partners Xiaolin “Charlie” Wang, Anthony Rodham, and Terry McAuliffe banded together in 2009 to finance and build an electric vehicle enterprise known as GreenTech Automotive, they thought big. Very big. In a 2009…
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A Handshake Deal Gone Bad
This is the second in a series of articles about Terry McAuliffe and Greentech. by James A. Bacon and Carol J. Bova Fourteen years ago, Benjamin Yeung was a Chinese entrepreneur whose companies manufactured and sold minibuses, passenger cars and business vehicles in China. In 2007 he launched a venture with the idea of building…
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Where Did $140 Million in GreenTech Money Go?
This is the first in a series of articles about Terry McAuliffe and GreenTech Automotive. by James A. Bacon and Carol J. Bova In September 2016, the Office of the State Auditor (OSA) of the state of Mississippi began undertaking a review of the contracts signed by the state’s economic development authority. The goal was…