This commentary originally appeared in the El Paso Times on September 22, 2014. The battle to give our children a good education is very one-sided. We all agree: every child deserves an excellent education. But who gets to decide whether an education is good for a specific child? We can talk all day about what an ideal...
This commentary originally appeared in The Quroum Report on September 10, 2014. Supremes overturned him on two of three major conclusions in 2006 and are likely to do so again Having sat through the both of the recent school finance trials I gained great respect for the intellect of Judge Dietz. However, he gravely missed the mark in...
This commentary originally appeared in Forbes on September 17, 2014. Glance at recent Obamacare headlines and you might think the healthcare law has turned out to be a smashing success, its initial glitches and legal foibles forgotten in the face of incontrovertible achievements. The proof is supposedly in the data, and we’re told the latest data is...
This commentary originally appeared in the Austin American-Statesman on September 16, 2014. In baseball, the tie goes to the runner, but what happens in the law? While scholars have said the indictment against Gov. Rick Perry does not even make it to first base, the most charitable way to view these charges is that there are multiple...
This commentary originally appeared in Real Clear Policy on September 17, 2014. As online education grows, so do the ranks of its critics. One of the charges leveled by online learning's doubters is that it is easier for students to cheat on exams given over the Internet. One report quotes a college senior who has taken three online courses...
This commentary originally appeared in The Texas Tribune on September 15, 2014. More than 80 percent of global energy consumption derives from fossil fuels: coal, oil and natural gas. Official forecasters, such as the International Energy Agency, predict that fossil fuels will continue to dominate consumption for decades to come. Yet current climate policies endorsed in Western...
Teachers love to give their students all the help they can, but it is astonishing the many areas in which they are not given the support which they should receive. One case of this is when teachers have to pay for classroom supplies for their kids out of their own pocket. In many cases, teachers dig deep into their own pockets to enhance the learning experience of their students. In the 2006-07 school year—the most recent for which data is available—Texas public school teachers spent over $400 on classroom supplies. Table 1 provides some information on how much public school and private school teachers are spending:
Last week, the Texas Public Policy Action (TPPA) launched its Texas Government Waste Contest, a public competition aimed at identifying the most egregious examples of state and local government waste in the Lone Star State. Here’s more: "Even in Texas there is an incredible amount of wasteful spending, political favoritism, and crony capitalism. This contest will...
This commentary originally appeared in Breitbart.com on September 4, 2014. Few episodes in our history have tried Americans' souls as much as the current crises of trust. When serial abuses of power become routine and fidelity to legislative duties and campaign promises is the rare excetion, it is natural for citizens to disrepect the entire law-making process...
Speaking about the strength of a wavering national economy is difficult for any Federal Reserve president. Fortunately, Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher has an easier job touting the success of his region because of the robust, quality job growth in Texas. In fact, he spoke about this at the Texas Public Policy Foundation’s “Texas at...
This commentary originally appeared in Breitbart Texas on September 10, 2014. Are radical social engineering policies entering our schools? If Dripping Springs ISD’s latest ploy to save the planet is any indication, the answer is yes. Recently, Dripping Springs ISD joined other school districts in observing “Meatless Mondays,” which, as they sound, are Mondays on which no...
Last night, city councilmembers in the small Texas town of Marlin, a suburb of Waco, unanimously passed an ordinance creating the Marlin Community Initiative (MCI), an innovative community service program crafted with the help of the Texas Public Policy Foundation’s Center for Local Governance and Center for Effective Justice. The MCI is an effort to...