The news keeps breaking, which is what makes it news. Who says the week before Christmas is slow in this business? We’re as busy as elves:
• Several charter schools around Arkansas went before the state last week to ask that their charters be extended. The idea of public charter schools is the most promising educational reform to come along in years. Just getting teachers out from underneath all that red tape would be reform enough. But there are so many good things that come from injecting competition into the education system.
This part of the story stood out: The Exalt Academy of Southwest Little Rock (K-8) asked for a 10-year renewal of its charter. There was some discussion because the last grades the school got were Ds. Explaining the school and its charges, the superintendent of Exalt, Tina Long, told the state charter board that 96% of the pupils in her school qualify for subsidized school meals — a reflection of the income level of the students’ families — and 66% are not fluent in English. She said the school tries to emphasize individual student improvement over other considerations.
But 96% free- or reduced-lunch, and 66% aren’t fluent in English. Let’s all remember those numbers the next time the anti-charter crowd complains that charter schools “cherry-pick” the best students.
• The U.S. military has begun discharging troops who have refused the covid-19 vaccine. Getting that shot — and not only that shot — is critical to maintaining a healthy, ready force. So says the Pentagon. The papers are full of stories about vaccine mandates, and whether health-care workers or federal contractors can be forced to take them. The courts will doubtless make more rulings, and there will be more stories. But this particular story ought not be that eye-opening.
Military personnel are required to take all kinds of vaccines. Upon walking into Basic Training, one of the lines in which to hurry-up-and-wait is the shot line. Nobody asks the recruits if they’re comfortable with getting those shots. And before a deployment to an overseas assignment, there’ll be another whole round of shots to go through.
When you sign up to defend this country, you give up all kinds of rights. Speech. Privacy. A lot of due process. (But I didn’t leave the barracks messy. Why do I have to do pushups?) This is less about the rights of those in the service, and more about following orders.
• The number of illegal immigrants captured at the southern border of the United States increased by 5% in November. And according to those in the know, November is usually a very slow month for such apprehensions. The Washington Post reports that there was an across-the-board rise in the number of migrant families, single adults and, of course, minor children traveling without their parents.
None of this comes as a surprise. The messaging from this administration has all but encouraged it. Would you move to another country for $450,000?
• In San Francisco, car owners have started leaving car windows down, car doors unlocked, and their trunks wide open (or raised in SUVs) to keep the mobs from smashing windows or ruining trunk locks with crowbars. SFPD has reported a 32% increase in car break-ins this year. TV stations show lines of cars in parking lots with everything open, as if all those cars and SUVs needed a good airing out.
One cop told the press this is unbelievable. We disagree. It’s completely believable.
• NASA sent a probe to the sun, and last week NASA confirmed that the Parker Solar Probe became the first man-made object to “touch” the sun. The space gadget flew through the sun’s corona and checked out particles and magnetic fields.
How, some of us wondered, could such a device get so close without burning up? It’s 9,900 degrees up there.
Some science was involved, we’re told. Including a carbon composite shield that is supposed to block much of the sun’s energy.
This was mankind’s first visit to a star. NASA does this sort of thing so often that the news barely made a blurb in the press. That’s a wonder in itself.