The coronavirus pandemic has been hard on the U.S. health care system. But our government’s response to it—including heavy-handed demands that all but “essential” care cease—has been harder still. Recently, the Texas Public Policy Foundation held a webinar with U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Deputy Secretary Eric Hargan. He discussed the COVID-19...
With hurricane season looming, it’s time to be prepared both for the possibility of severe weather and for the inevitable media circus touting falsehoods about climate change. NOAA is predicting hurricane activity will be above normal in 2020. Climate alarmists will make every effort to convince you this increase is being caused by man. Supposedly, droughts and...
This has been a wild year. For me, my family moved last year from our beloved Texas to Virginia for my job with the extraordinary folks at the White House. While there, I helped write the president’s budget that found taxpayer savings of a record $4.6 trillion over a decade, made permanent the Trump tax cuts, noted...
As America begins to reopen, many states and counties have face mask requirements in addition to social distancing and hand washing. Some even include an enforcement mechanism. But should not wearing a face mask in public make you a criminal? Some places say yes. In late April, Harris County, Texas became one of those localities...
Years ago the commencement speaker at my graduation from Wiley College in Marshall was James Farmer, founder of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and organizer of the very first Freedom Ride in 1961. Following the ceremony, he shook my hand and said, “It’s your turn now to go out and change the world.” Like...
Could you have imagined, just a few short months ago when we had one of the best U.S. economies on record, that we would be facing one of the worst today? It’s difficult to do. But the disruptions caused by fear of COVID-19 and the shutdowns ordered by state and local governments have dramatically changed...
As of late, the prospects of keeping a job have shrunk. Texas’ unemployment rate jumped to almost 13 percent in April with over a million jobs being lost and several industries shrinking 10 percent or more year-over-year. However, local governments in Texas have not experienced the same troubles that are affecting everyone else. The public...
George Floyd’s death is properly the responsibility of the senior arresting officer on the scene. Had that officer’s training been better, Floyd might be alive today. Had the officer been disciplined or fired for prior improper behavior, Floyd might be alive today. Had the Minneapolis City Council, mayor, and local district attorney done a better...
Since the launch of the federal and state responses to the COVID-19 pandemic, the focus, predictably, has been on how governments at all levels have fared in delivering necessary tests, personal protective equipment (PPE) and other medical equipment to ameliorate the spread of the disease. But government hasn’t acted alone. Far from it. Behind every...
There has been a lot of controversy over a change in the rules that govern the operation of the House of Representatives. The majority party has opted to allow proxy voting, placing the votes of most of the members of what is euphemistically referred to as “the people’s house” in the hands of a select...
Back the Blue — Sign the Pledge, Click Here. More than three centuries ago, British writer Jonathan Swift observed, “Falsehood flies, and the Truth comes limping after it; so that when Men come to be undeceiv’d, it is too late.” Well, a new movement to defund the police is well on its way. And in...
Though illegal immigration has come to a virtual standstill in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, decades of dysfunction in America’s immigration system continue to have deleterious effects in communities throughout the nation. As is often the case, developments in Texas, which shares almost two-thirds of the U.S. border with Mexico, provide some of the...