Virginia Governor’s Race Is the Establishment’s Revenge

November’s off–year Virginia governor’s race is what conservatives would have faced in 2016 if Trump had done a Hillary as he descended the escalator for his announcement and wound up in A Place for Mom instead of the Oval Office.

Our nominee would have been a bland, white, country club Republican who talked lukewarm TEA Party. A nominee that would have looked just like “Establishment Ed” Gillespie the caretaker conservative running as the Republican in Virginia.

These off–year elections are supposed to send a message to Washington and specifically the White House. If a Democrat wins nationally and Virginia elects a Republican the following year, the result is supposed to mean voters are angry because Democrats went too far.

Conservative voters dissatisfied with the nominee are given a binary choice by party leadership: Hold your nose and support some housebroken Republican or be personally responsible for electing the Democrat.

This hobbling choice is not limited to Virginia. Conservatives nationwide regularly confront this dilemma as yet another cocktail conservative holds their vote hostage to the Democrat alternative.

After years of just following orders my nose is as pinched as Ichabod Crane’s and I’m tired of it. This year instead of sending a message to the White House, where one of the Javanka twins would no doubt intercept it, I want to move the targeting solution about 3 miles from Pennsylvania Ave. to the Republican National Committee.

Instead of an interparty message, I want conservatives to deliver an intraparty message.

Ed Gillespie is a perfect example of a candidate that feels genuine conservatives are good enough to help him win, but not good enough to influence policy once he’s in office. It would have been difficult to find a candidate more out–of–step with the conservatives than Establishment Ed.

The National Review recently endorsed Gillespie and they unintentionally damned him with faint praise. According to those Never Trumpers, Ed deserves our vote because:

• He joined the Bush White House when George W was low on friends
• A Gillespie win will send a message
• Ed wants to cut taxes
• Gillespie wants someone to open more charter schools

Big deal. For conservatives, the most important issue in Virginia is transportation: Base voters want new roads for a speedy trip in to work and new enforcement for a speedy trip back to Central America for illegals.

Naturally, Enervating Ed is on the wrong side of both parts. He doesn’t mention roads and Giveaway Gillespie supported the failed Gang of Eight bill. He’s part of the Delusion Caucus that’s convinced surrendering to Democrat demands to import more voters will someone result in GOP victories.

As befits a former lobbyist who made a living torturing innocent words, Gillespie assures conservatives he didn’t support “amnesty” for illegals, he only supports “legalization.” So, let me explain to Gillespie — who only speaks conservative–as–a–second–language —any result allowing illegal aliens to remain in the US is AMNESTY, regardless of how you try to focus group your way out of it.

Ed’s idea of tough–minded leadership on illegals is keeping a lid on how many other benefits the piñata holds.

The Washington Post reports that Gillespie is so concerned about conservatism potentially rubbing off on him that he promised business donors that he won’t champion any cultural issues from the governor’s office. This failure to grasp that politics is downstream of culture is why Ed and his cronies are long run losers.

It also appears that groveling doesn’t sell particularly well. The candidate of the rich is trailing the Democrat in fund raising by a two–to–one margin.

Conservatives next year are faced with a president who is ready to betray his promises on ending DACA for younger invaders and Virginia voters this year have a gubernatorial candidate who is just as soft on the rule of law.

My advice is don’t allow your vote to be held hostage by placeholder Republicans. When my family goes to vote in November we will be sending a message to the RNC in the only manner they can understand. We will be voting for write–in candidates for every spot on the ballot. And it’s going to be the same write–in each time.

For the first name, we will write DACA and for the last name Betrayal. We will no longer go–along–to–get–ignored. The only way Republican leadership will pay attention to the base it relies on for victory is when the victories stop.

My advice for Virginia voters is write in “Senor DACA Betrayal: and take a photo of your ballot. Send the picture to your state Republican Party and another copy to the RNC. Let’s show them voters are angry because the GOP hasn’t gone far enough.

Ever Wondered Why Hospitals Don’t Give Estimates?

If your goal was to design a system that guaranteed high prices, encouraged waste and discouraged price shopping there is no need to start from scratch. Just adopt the US health insurance market and you’re good to go.

Rick McKee, The Augusta Chronicle, GA

If we bought cars the way we buy healthcare it would work something like this. First you decide which car purchase policy to buy. Do you want a “bronze policy” that has a lower monthly premium, but a much higher deductible due when you pick up your new car? Which, by the way, is likely to be one of those suppository–sized Fiats, since that’s the tier of car covered under bronze.

Or do you want to go for the “gold” policy that has much higher premiums, but also grants you the red–carpet treatment when you waltz into the Tesla dealership?

What’s certain is, regardless of whether you opt for the suppository or the showboat, the final cost is immaterial. There’s no window sticker glued to your new ride. No sitting on a metal folding chair in the salesman’s cubicle while he “goes to check with his manager.” There’s not even any need to go to different dealers. Simply pick the one closest to home or the dealer with the best uppity coffee maker in the waiting room.

The dealer sends the invoice to the car purchase insurance company and you drive home. Price is no object when the company picks up the tab. Under that system we’d soon have two giant federal takeovers of the economy: ObamaCare followed by ObamaCar.

Health care pricing is totally opaque to the consumer and hospitals do their best to keep it that way. Constitutionally the federal government can’t order hospitals to disclose prices. (I know this is no impediment to leftists, but conservatives must try to be consistent.) But it can require hospitals that take federal dollars to meet certain standards.

If the goal is to encourage competition while lowering prices, the standards would include posting turnkey prices on the web for the 25 most common surgical procedures; the 25 most common out–patient procedures and the 25 most common tests. The listed charges must also match the best price offered insurance companies.

That would be the beginning of real healthcare reform. Strangely enough the People’s Republic of Maryland has taken a tentative step. The Washington Post reports the Maryland Health Care Commission has a website with the inane name of “Wear the Cost,” which sounds like the surgery bill will be tattooed on your backside. Instead it compares turnkey prices for common procedures affecting patients who are either women, old or both.

Consumers can finally see what a hip replacement, knee replacement, hysterectomy and vaginal delivery prices are at 21 different hospitals. Niall Brennan, of the Health Care Cost Institute (HCCI), agreed with me when he told the Post,  “[Medical] providers pretty quickly figured out that consumers were immune to the price of health care because it was all being picked up by insurance companies, which led to rapidly increasing prices.”

Like whiskey drinkers, hospital patients associate high cost with high quality, which leads to hangovers in both instances. Take knee replacements. At the brand name Sinai Hospital a shiny new knee will set Blue Cross back $32,493.00. For that princely sum the patient risks an almost a 15 percent chance of going back into the shop due to complications.

Meanwhile the University of Maryland Shore Medical Center at Easton — which for all I know is located in a Walmart parking lot — only charges $22,687 with a complication rate that’s a fraction of Sinai’s.

Healthcare “expert” Kevin Volpp doesn’t believe information will make a difference. By his way of thinking, even if the knee was replaced in an abortion mill the cost would still consume the patient’s entire deductible so the total won’t matter. That overlooks co–pays. Twenty percent of Sinai’s $32,493.00 is $6,498.00, while the co–pay on $22,687.00 is almost $2,000.00 less.

Smart insurance companies, probably an oxymoron, could seize the moment and offer reduced deductibles to patients who agreed to surgery in lower–cost hospitals, saving money for everyone involved and encouraging competition.

Naturally I had questions regarding this breakthrough. Namely are there plans to get pricing data for more procedures? Does the Commission intend to add out–patient surgery? How about prices for medical tests? And will males under age 65 ever find useful information?

Unfortunately, chairman Robert Moffit — evidently a Republican, since he formerly worked for the dreaded Heritage Foundation — and his staff were “too busy” to respond, so the answers to those and other questions remain unknown.

What we do know is this initiative is an excellent start. Let’s hope the hope the hospital–industrial complex doesn’t manage to kill it.

Afghanistan Strategy Is the Only Hope for Education Reform

The federal government is currently enmeshed in two gigantic, expensive reform projects, one domestic and one foreign. Both are failures even though the tactics couldn’t be more different. In one — at a cost of $2.5 trillion — Uncle Sam is trying manfully to completely change a political culture.

In the other — at just under $1 trillion — Uncle Sugar won’t touch the culture. What is the same, and the ultimate source of failure, is the obstinate refusal of project architects to recognize their strategy isn’t working now and won’t be working in the future.

We’ll begin with the relatively cheap failure. Since 1980 the Dept. of Education has spent $872,519,440,000 on just primary and secondary education. The scores from the latest nationwide ACT college admission test are so bad that to forestall criticism of the entire effort, the focus has been shifted to the old perennial: The Achievement Gap.

The Washington Post reports, “Scores…show that just 9 percent of students in the class of 2017 who came from low–income families, whose parents did not go to college, and who identify as [minority] are strongly ready for college. But the readiness rate for students with none of those demographic characteristics was six times as high [at] 54 percent.”

Students with one of the three “handicaps” scored 26 percent college ready, while those with two of three came in at 15 percent.

It would be easy to look at the “six times” more successful and assume all was well in education, but don’t. These numbers indicate a failure so large Mitch McConnell could have been supervising the project.

There were 3.3 million high school graduates in the spring of 2017. Two million took the ACT test and of those 1,080,000 achieved scores indicating they are ready for college. The other 920,000 didn’t make the cut. When you add that number to the 1,333,000 graduates that already knew taking the test was a waste of time, the total of unprepared graduates was 2,253,000. So the feds spent $535 billion on these kids (not counting additional billions spent by state and local governments) during the 12 years they were in school and after that stupendous expenditure ($161,000.00 PER STUDENT!) only 32 percent were ready for college.

With those results its only natural the focus would be on the “achievement gap” between minorities and the other categories. In the understatement of the year ACT chief executive Marten Roorda said, “You could argue that those investments should have made a clearer difference and that’s not what we’re seeing.”

There is nothing intrinsically limiting about being a member of a minority. Genetics aren’t holding them back. Culture is holding them back.

This is where the really expensive culture–changing project becomes relevant. In Afghanistan the US is trying to install a modern democratic state in a land with a primitive, medieval, tribal culture whose only bow to modernity is a thin veneer of alternating current.

Yet there are similarities. US minority culture and Afghan culture feature strong tribal or gang–based loyalties. Both have impulsive honor/vengeance pathologies. And both feature poor education and a high illiteracy rate. Islamic fundamentalism is unique to Afghanistan as out–of–wedlock births are limited to the US example.

In Afghanistan experts ignore history and insist the country is just the breeding ground for the next showplace of democracy after the political culture is changed. In the US education experts ignore history and a culture change that’s responsible for education failure in the hope a few more Baby Einstein videos will do the trick.

Afghanistan has been corrupt for centuries and has absolutely no history of impartial representative government. Yet within living memory in the US the family culture, which is the root of education problems, was an asset to learning.

In 1950 the rate of out–of–wedlock births for black women was approximately 18 percent. Today the percentage is 72 percent. Ignoring this has real costs for the children. Spending billions at one end of the education cycle while ignoring the origin of the problem does nothing more than provide permanent, well–paid jobs for bureaucrats.

The feds should have no role in education in the first place. That’s a state and local responsibility. But if the money is going to be spent, spend it wisely. Try to change the dysfunctional culture of out–of–wedlock births and resulting poverty. Political culture change is destined for failure in Afghanistan, but there is a chance to revive the marriage culture here and in turn close the “achievement gap.”

Let’s try the Afghanistan strategy. Attack a dysfunctional culture directly. Emphasize marriage and finishing school before becoming a mother. After 17 years in Afghanistan we’ve made no difference. Here 17 years of culture emphasis could make a big difference.

Millionaires & Billionaires Fighting “Oppression”

Oppression certainly isn’t what it used to be. Instead of vicious police dogs, water cannon, billy clubs and Bull Connor, America is greeted with the sight of millionaires and billionaires kneeling in football stadiums trying to make white America feel guilty without so much as a Chihuahua yapping in the background.

And they aren’t alone. The Opposition Media, celebrity culture, leftist pastors, educators, politicians, various groin activists and Hollywood were all united in condemning the USA for the alleged subjugation of blacks. The protesters had no compunction about attacking the president and insulting the flag.

If this is “oppression” it’s news to Stalin, Hitler, Saddam and Kim Jong–Un. If I were a white supremacist, I think I’d demand my money back. From all appearances it’s whites, conservatives of all colors and taxpayers who are being told to sit down and shut up.

Instead of being a lonely and dangerous stand against institutionalized brutality and “oppression” the “take a knee movement” has rapidly become this fall’s Ice Bucket Challenge. The difference being the Challenge was a showy, self–involved effort on behalf of a real disease, while take a knee is a showy, self–involved effort on behalf of a grievance fantasy.

The left claims to own science, so lets look at the data. First of all the Us is one of the least racist nations on the planet. An investing and investment newsletter, with the credibility–dissolving name of Insider Monkey, performed an analysis of racism polls that included “responses of over 85,000 people from 61 countries” and found the USA didn’t even make the top 25 of the most racist countries.

The number one for racism was India with South Korea at number 25. What researchers did find was the US ranked #12 on a list of the Least Racist Countries in the World. The report concluded, “We believe America, on average, is one of the most racially tolerant countries on Earth.”

So much for “oppression.” But no protest implying malevolence on the part of whites would be complete without including “police brutality.” Data here proves there may be individually brutal cops of all colors, but there is no institutionally brutal police regime threatening blacks or anyone else.

Philippe Lemoine did an analysis of the Police ­Public Contact Survey (PPCS). It’s a 70,000 sample of US residents 16 or older that’s representative of the whole population. Participants are asked if they had an encounter with the police during the past year. If so they are asked for details, including any use of force.

This means data from the survey is based on personal encounters with law enforcement and not speculation on encounters other people have had with cops based on OpMedia reports or “community rumors.”

Lemoine found “just 16 unarmed black men, out of a population of more than 20 million, were killed by the police…These figures are likely close to the number of black men struck by lightning in a given year. The comparison illustrates that these killings are incredibly rare, and that it’s completely misleading to talk about an ‘epidemic.’ You don’t hear people talk about an epidemic of lightning strikes and claim they are afraid to go outside because of it.”

The case for routine police harassment is just as fraudulent. Black men have less yearly contact with police than whites: 17.5 to 20.7 percent. And as for injury, protesters in the stadium have a greater chance of getting a rug burn at the hands of Monsanto than they do a bruise at the hands of the cops.

“Actual injuries by the police are so rare that one cannot estimate them very precisely even in a survey as big as the PPCS, but the available data suggest that only 0.08 percent of black men are injured by the police each year, approximately the same rate as for white men.” Lemoine reports.

It would make more sense to accuse the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration of brutality since black men are 44 times more likely to be injured in a car crash.

Lemoine’s conclusion: “The media’s acceptance of the false narrative poisons the relations between law enforcement and black communities throughout the country and results in violent protests that destroy property and sometimes even claim lives.”

So why are the knee people blaming ticket holders and the audience? There aren’t any billionaires, mayors or Members of Congress in the stands. All the people with real power are on the field insulting the blameless over a grievance that doesn’t exist.

During the Civil War black soldiers in the 54^th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry — immortalized in the movie “Glory” — could distinguish between individual bigots and the flag of the nation that was fighting to free the slaves.

I wonder why privileged football players, and their enablers in politics and the media, can’t do the same.

Kaepernick: When Taking a Knee Is All About Me

Just think — if Tim Tebow had taken a knee for Antifa instead of God he might still be in the NFL. Or at least he could be a topic of conversation for people wondering why Tebow wasn’t playing. I find it ironic a league that is now encouraging “celebrations” after a touchdown, frowned on Tebow offering a quick word of thanks after a score.

Offering a word of thanks certainly isn’t a problem with Colin Kaepernick.

Kaepernick loses his starting QB job and decides to make himself a spectacle by kneeling during the National Anthem to protest racism in a league that’s 70 percent black.

Tebow loses his starting QB job and quietly accepts an insulting assignment as a blocker on the punting unit, where he suffers broken ribs as a reward for being a team player.

Kaepernick says he can’t “stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color” and “there are bodies in the street and [cops] getting away with murder.” How this squares with the fact he was adopted by white parents and felt comfortable wearing socks that depicted police as pigs while cops were standing only a few feet away went unexplained.

Both players aren’t particularly good pocket passers and both frequently resort to running with the ball when pressured.

Tebow isn’t offered another chance in the NFL even after spending an entire off–season working with a QB–whisperer to improve his throwing mechanics. Kaepernick evidently spent his off–season growing an Afro that rivals that of Angela Davis in her heyday. Tebow’s football career is over and no reporters are asking if he was blackballed because of his Pro–life Super Bowl ad.

Kaepernick appears to be done, too and the Opposition Media, which invaded the sports page, is convinced he’s being blackballed.

Sally Jenkins in the Washington Post condemns NFL owners, “They care that he is a disrupter–dissenter who refuses to play the stock character role assigned to him and might threaten a bottom line. As a result, they have blacklisted him — there is no other term for it — and in doing so have unintentionally underscored his message about pervasive injustice for blacks.”

Then she can’t tell the difference between being fired for an internal memo meant to stay inside the company and a public workplace insult that offends a majority of the customer base. Jenkins sees equivalence between James Damore, Google engineer who authored the memo, and Kaepernick, “You don’t have to agree with Kaepernick taking a knee during the anthem last season — or Damore’s reasoning and language — to be offended by the fact that they are out of jobs for speaking their well–intentioned minds.”

Her colleague, Jerry Brewer, appears to think Kaepernick is a modern Paul Revere warning America of a resurgence of the Klan as “racists feel empowered again.”

Neither of these hyperventilators gives any credence to what Hall of Fame running back Jim Brown said of Kaepernick. Brown knows something about racism. He played in the Jim Crow NFL before the passage of the Voting Rights Act. Brown knows about personally suffering systemic, government–imposed racism and he thinks Kaepernick is a poseur.

Brown told The Post Game, “I’m going to give you the real deal: I’m an American. I don’t desecrate my flag and my national anthem. I’m not gonna do anything against the flag and national anthem… this is my country, and I’ll work out the problems, but I’ll do it in an intelligent manner.”

That’s not a observation that’s going to generate coverage for Brown in the OpMedia, just as Green Bay Packers Safety Ha Ha Clinton–Dix wearing socks with the names of four Dallas police officers murdered by a Black Lives Matter assassin fell into the media’s memory hole.

I’ve never heard a reporter ask Kaepernick what country he prefers to the US? I doubt it’s China, even though white people have no privilege there. The People’s Republic just passed a law making it illegal to mock the Chinese national anthem and the offense is punishable by up to 15 days in jail.

Reporters also never ask Kaepernick how he will know he’s achieved success. Will it be when blacks are allowed the vote? When a black woman has a top–rated national talk show? When the US elects a black president?

The fact is Kaepernick is a marginal QB with a bad attitude who missed the limelight. He’s also a guy whose commitment to “racial justice” was so immutable he backed off the protests when he was trying to land another team.

It’s time for Kaepernick to find another line of work where insulting Americans is part of the company culture. I hear ESPN is hiring.

DACA: Check Expiration Date Before Relying on Trump Promises

In May of 2016 Donald Trump casually discarded one of his central campaign promises. I thought it was remarkable. While it was traditional for Republican candidates in former campaigns to wait until after their inauguration to break campaign promises, Trump didn’t even wait until he was the nominee.

Trump had repeatedly declared, “By self-funding my campaign, I am not controlled by my donors, special interests or lobbyists. I am only working for the people of the U.S.!” It was a central element in his early appeal.

Jeb Bush may have been making money calls between naps, but Donald Trump couldn’t be bought or rented.

Then poof, it was gone! Trump began soliciting donations from the same contributors he’d been disparaging only a few rallies before. It was so surprising I found myself agreeing with MSNBC which said,” Trump is taking one of the best arguments in support of his candidacy and throwing it out the window.”

Trump didn’t appear to suffer any damage from going back on his word and he saved money to boot, so for him it was win–win. For conservatives this casual discarding of a foundational promise should’ve been an ominous development.

The campaign finance issue was a crowd–pleaser but it didn’t have a direct impact on voters. Most of the people at his rallies weren’t contributors before or after the expiration of his promise, so the brief controversy was tangential.

Trump’s chief attraction to disenchanted voters was built around attitude: Trump wasn’t politically correct and he didn’t give a damn about what elite cultural arbiters thought.

As far as voters were concerned specific issues and their relevance were judged on whether or not the topic fit into the general aura of Trumpismo! For many Deplorables it was personality first — policy second.

But what if it was all attitude and arrogance and the issues that were central to our decision to vote for Trump were just so many applause lines at rallies he’s long forgotten?

Trump has been waffling on “Day One” issues since the end of the campaign. He said he’d move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Then he changed his mind. Trump said he would withdraw from the Paris agreement and then went back and forth for weeks on what should have been an easy decision. Trump said it was time to get out of Afghanistan and then decided to buy into the failed nation–building policies of the Bush that got elected.

Those are bad enough, but his seeming decision to go back on one of his bedrock issues and betray his base could make Democrat dreams come true and render Trump a one–term aberration.

During rally after rally Trump promised to “end DACA.” Trump is notoriously sloppy and inexact with language, but I guarantee that not one person in his base interpreted “end DACA” to mean granting illegal aliens the largest amnesty in history.

That appears to be the plan now. Trump tweeted, “Does anybody really want to throw out good, educated and accomplished young people who have jobs, some serving in the military? Really!…..” As someone pointed out, more DACA beneficiaries have enlisted in MS–13 than have joined the military. Trump has owned casinos so he should know when one’s luck runs out, it’s time to go home.

That applies to DACA, too.

Trump has surrounded himself with functionaries whose political advice would have prevented him from winning the nomination, to say nothing of the presidency. Trump appears to have convinced himself that allowing DACA participants to stay in the US without citizenship isn’t amnesty, but for Trumpistas that’s a distinction without a difference.

Before he cratered on DACA Trump made a number of appearances with Angel Moms, mothers who had suffered the death of a child at the hands of an illegal alien. Angel Moms were great props and gave Trump cover when the OpMedia criticized him for his promises to crack down on illegals.

Now the relationship isn’t so heavenly. Angel Mom Sabine Durden told Breitbart, “…the news about DACA receiving amnesty feels like a horrible nightmare and if true, betrayal of the worst kind.”

Mary Ann Mendoza explained, “President Trump needs to stand firm and keep his promises not only to us Angel Moms and Dads but to All Americans.”

Mareen Maloney agreed, “It is reprehensible that President Trump would go back on his campaign promises to the American’s who elected him, especially the Angel parents and families, to make a DACA deal with Democrats.”

Trump once boasted during the campaign, “I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters.” Maybe so, but I wonder how many campaign promises he can trash on Pennsylvania Avenue before voters decide they’ve been had?